After experimenting with the production of ‘skate video’ within Snapchat (videos coming soon) and presenting our ideas to the class during today’s studio, we noticed that the majority of techniques used for the capture of skate video in a linear fashion, were transferable over to skate video within Snapchat.

Which raises question about what it might be that is interesting about Snapchat? Being such a popular application, why are users attracted to it?

Upon brainstorming these questions, we realised the importance of Snapchat videos being distributed only among a private network and only viewable either once, or for a maximum of 24 hours. Due to the fact that you are often only sharing content with close friends through the use of Snapchat, this encourages the user to capture more personal content, or at least material that is relevant to their life. In addition, the fact that the material is only available for a maximum of 24 hours removes a level of expectation regarding quality. Instead, users are encouraged to produce more disposable content. This, in combination with the material being shared among a private network encourages the user to capture momentary material; aspects of each users 24 hour day that is interesting and not necessarily worthy of saving.

In regards to ‘skate video’, the use of Snapchat redefines the video practice as material is more likely to be comprised of more casual and disposable instances of skateboarding, such as easier tricks. As well as capture of spontaneous instances, such as travel between skate locations and ‘mucking around’. Otherwise, if the content in the Snapchat video is similar to high production, serious, linear skate video production, then the action is likely to be recorded separately on a DSLR (or similar) camera as well, so that it can be saved for later admiration. This the  entails the likelihood for cameras and/or a production crew to be visible within the Snapchat video. This is another important factor to consider when creating the guidelines for the content curation.

To visualise what the project looks like, it now stands as a video similar to:

A collection of sketches (or rather rapid prototypes) that explore how to make effective ‘skate video’ within Snapchat in a variety of different ways. This will be used to explore what stylistic aspects of skate video can be implemented within Snapchat in order to create an effective hybrid of narrative/non-narrative form. Furthering the project in relation to our probe, these discoveries will be used to define the guidelines for curation and organisation of user submitted material. This will help relate the prototype itself, being a concept for an online tool that doesn’t exist, to the aims of this studio. The prototype itself will be almost an advertisement for the online tool, something that could be used to pitch the idea to a client, such as Snapchat. This would be made up of multiple shots of users video capturing skateboarding; screenshots of the users sharing the footage with a ‘mother’ Snapchat user/database (similar to Snapchat’s ‘Our Story’; shots of an office-like setup, where curation would take place; screenshots of certain content getting curated in regards to the decided guidelines; a first-person perspective of the tool as the user accepts/views the collection of videos, structured by different days.

The final part of the prototype video would present all of the highlights from the project process in order to appear to advertise the tool for the interest of a potential client such as Snapchat, as well as to a network of potential customers/users.

We spent today’s studio clarifying the requirements for both the portfolio essay and the prototype report.

In regards to the prototype report, it is to be a formal document with references and clear evidence to explain an idea that comes from the probe. I will need to reference the given readings for the studio and refer to theory to explain my understanding of key concepts in relation to the studio. However since it is also practice-based experiment, emphasis needs to be placed upon how the theory relates to what I have made. It also seems important to be transparent, meaning there is no need to hide anything in an effort to claim the prototype is more effective or more developed than it really is. Instead, being still an experimental prototype, it will be useful to be honest about potential problems or room for improvement that was encountered. Most importantly, the report needs to continuously reiterate the probe in relation to the discoveries that were made.

The portfolio on the other hand can be a less formally written document, most suitably presented via a blog post so that reference to other blog posts can be made as much as possible. Also, the use of imagery will be useful to help communicate our group’s progress. This is a reflective process to communicate how my practice has changed or how I have improved during this studio. Again, transparency is an important factor.

Also, during this studio we prepared for the exhibition in week 14. This will entail our studio as a class presenting what we have been working on this semester and explaining our discoveries. As a group, we came up with the idea that to make our presentation more engaging, we would encourage the audience to interact withe the content of our presentation using online tools and services such as a Twitter feed to generate questions about the presentation, a Snapchat story to capture the highlights of the presentation, possibly a live stream to give alternate perspectives of the presentation, maybe someone generating vines throughout the presentation, etc. I think this is a great idea because it not only draws from the tools and services used throughout the studio itself and therefore closely addresses the studio, but also helps contextualise the work that was completed in an creative and engaging manner.

We distributed tasks among the class in preparation for the exhibition, in which Errol and I volunteered to create a highlight reel, visual aid that would loop in the background of the presentation. This would be made up of a selected 2 minutes of each group’s prototype placed in a sequence. This demonstrates the importance of being organised in communication with the other groups in order to collect and compile all of the content before the exhibition.

During today’s studio we were encouraged to begin to think about how we could start making stuff as soon as possible in the hope that visual, rather than conceptual reflection would move the project along, whilst clarifying how the prototype might take shape. Areas/ideas to explore what aspects of ‘skate video’ can be altered and in what ways, within Snapchat in order to produce effective ‘skate video’:

1. Is a shorter or longer duration more effective? What is the minimum and maximum most effective duration within the limitations of Snapchat?

2. Is filming from a low angle or high angle more effective?

3. What effect does music have and is it important?

4. How might transitions be constructed within Snapchat ‘story’ and how effective are they?

5. Is a static or tracking shot more effective?

6. Is a first person or third person perspective more effective?

7. What juxtapositions are effective?

8. Is a long shot or close up more effective?

9. How important is a narrative relationship between images?

10. Is a double angle effective?

These are just some of the ideas that will be used to infer our exploration toward a prototype. These and more discoveries can be used to develop a criteria for the curation of collaborative skate video within Snapchat. Furthermore, as well in reference to notions of quality and effectiveness, we developed ideas for how content may be organised through the curation process into groups. Group/category ideas include:

1. Type of trick

2. Location

3. Stacks

4. People form particular sponsors/company (e.g. Nike, Vans, Thrasher, etc)?

In addition to these ideas, Errol and I considered the possibility for each category to be distributed on one particular day of the week. This would create an expectation for the viewer in reference to the available content that day.

Interestingly, I couldn’t help but consider whether organisation by groups is particularly important for the exploration of our probe/project. Is it possibly more about seeing what hybrid form is produced naturally through the process of producing skate video within Snapchat and the organisational structure that is formed in the absence of curation. Moreover, is it what the natural structuring within Snapchat does to the narrative/non-narrative form that creates effective ‘skate video’ in Snapchat, or at least an effective hybrid form?

Unfortunately today’s studio was cancelled and so in preparation of the next studio, Errol and I continued to clarify and define our intentions for Project 4. As mentioned in previous blog posts, we are interested in creating almost a tool for Snapchat that allows an array of users to contribute content a host user (representing a community of people) in order to create a collaborative collection of skate content within Snapchat and thus, a hybrid from of skate video as an example of online video practice.

After further considering the logistics of this idea, we are reminded of Snapchat’s ‘Our Story’ function in which for the coverage of an event, Snapchat users within a particular vicinity can transfer content to a database-like user allowing many individual users to contribute to the same sequence of imagery (curated for appropriateness). This feature functions very similarly to our intention for the Prototype in the way that it allows multiple users to contribute content to the one piece of work. However, our Prototype would involve more aspects of curation and organising of content in order to produce what we would define as ‘effective skate video’ within Snapchat. Along with taking our discoveries from the previous Projects (as mentioned in the previous blog post), it seems important to create as much ‘skate video’ as possible using Snapchat in order to experiment with what techniques produce effective skate video, whilst exploring what happens to the narrative/non-narrative form. Being both involved in our own practice of skate video (and BMX video alike), Errol and I are familiar with traditional techniques of skate video capture. However, these techniques are relevant for the practice of skate video within a standard linear form. Meaning it will be interesting to discover how this might vary due to the affordances and constraints of Snapchat. I expect the 10 second clip limitation of Snapchat in particular, to pose the ability for new creative practices to be used within skate video, redefining the practice as a new hybrid form.

Today Errol and I spent a good part of the day hacking out the brainstorming phase of project 4. We tried to break the process down as suggested by the class during feedback, rather than jump too quickly toward notions of technology and online tools specifically. As indicated in previous blog posts, we saw the importance of focussing on firstly theorising: what makes effective skate video in general?

This reminded me of our previous explorations, particularly during project 2. Where we analysed a variety of elements that contribute toward the form of skate video. Reflecting on previous discoveries, I was reminded that:

-A third person perspective is more effective for skate video

-Not acknowledging the camera is more effective for skate video

-Jump cuts create an appealing aesthetic

-Juxtaposition is important

-Music contributes toward the non-narrative aesthetic

-Linearity can be manipulated depending on the desired effect

To take these discoveries toward the development of the intended prototype, it is also important to consider the constraints of Snapchat.

Constraints:

-10 second duration limit

-Disjointed relationship between content

-Viewable for 24 hours only

-Mobile only

-Raw (no post production editing)

During this brainstorming process, Errol and I considered forgetting about notions of user collaboration in the interest of keeping it simple. Instead we could potentially focus on purely exploring how to make effective skate video using Snapchat. This would most likely appear in the form of an attempted recreation of linear skate video within Snapchat. That would result in a disjointed, deconstructed skate video which might technically work, however I don’t think this embraces Snapchat as an online service to closely address the aims of the studio. Therefore, considering the constraints of Snapchat, primarily the application’s 24 hour display slot, I was returned to notions of collaboration in the interest of embracing Snapchats constraints in order to present skate video most effectively in direct relation to the online service. By users having the ability to upload all of their content to a particular Snapchat user/database, which could then be curated and organised into categories. This way, a new category could be made available to users within each group, each and every day via the Snapchat story. This would excite viewers to keep regular involvement with the prototype, as well as create a new realm for skate video to function within, as an example of online video practice. In reference to exploring an alteration of narrative/non-narrative form, the narrative linearity is completely removed from skate video during this process, as the material is not ordered by correlations with time or any chronology.

I am looking forward to the Friday studio so we can clarify whether we are on the right track with project 4. We filmed a draft version of this concept so that we can present the idea during the Friday studio.

Questions for Friday:

1. Is skate video within Snapchat – the hybrid form?
2. Do we address the case study specifically in this prototype or just mention how our ideas developed from the case study to the project?

Before today’s studio Errol and I had done some brainstorming to try and develop more concrete ideas for project 4. We had decided that Snapchat was definitely going to be used as the central online service for the exploration. Also, we thought about potentially designing a tool that allowed collaboration to occur between users, generating almost a database of skate video. The way content would be organised would follow a grouping of certain aspects, whether that be location, a type of skate stunt or some sort of aesthetic value.

Today’s studio was a self-directed feedback session in which each group got to brainstorm with the class, their ideas for the final project and help clarify their intentions in line with the aims of the studio. Upon presenting our progress, Seth assisted us to clarify and explain how the idea had been generated and what it meant for the development of a prototype. It seems the idea received positive feedback in terms of its quality in general, however it may be a bit too extensive for the allotted time frame and scope of the project. Really, all that is expected for this project would be to address a probe along the lines of:

How do we make skate video effective in Snapchat?

Rather than:

How do we make a collaborative skate video tool using Snapchat?

Errol and I are still keen to produce a collaborative tool but considering the prototype has to be designed to a point that it could be gven to a programmer, we just have to clarify how we are going to do that exactly and whether it can be done within the next few weeks. Most importantly, it seems we have to start from the raw online service and firstly determine how to capture skate video well in Snapchat, to provide the foundation before we progress toward any notions of collaboration and tool invention.

The feedback received both after our presentation of project 3 to the class, as well as to the RMIT panel consistently referred to a critique of the intended future directions surrounding notions of live broadcasting as a key focus. This was useful feedback because it made Errol and I reflect on how strongly we felt about pursuing live broadcasting. After more discussions we realised that we were primarily interested in live broadcasting for reasons too closely aligned with admiration of the technology, which takes the path of exploration away from the intentions of the studio regarding narrative/non-narrative form in reference to the case study specifically. For this reason, we looked back through all of our other sketches and tried to decide upon a new focus for the project. After brainstorming many of the sketches possibility to be selected (in order to increase the potential for creativity and not pick the first option – speculative sketching), we decided upon the use of Snapchat as a medium for our exploration. This reserved features of live broadcasting that we were interested in, such as the inability to re-watch content, but at the same time didn’t restrict us to live streaming of material. The many affordances and constraints of Snapchat would provide a perfect foundation for our exploration and so from here, we need to go back to the case study and brainstorm what we want to explore in project 4, go crazy making stuff with Snapchat and see what discovery we can make to produce a prototype.

Reporting

Today’s studio was very valuable because Seth spent a good portion of the session clarifying important terms to help us specify the focus of our explorations more succinctly and accurately. We were made aware of the distinction between narrative and non-narrative structure, which furthered my understanding of these concepts. In addition, we explored multiple types of form that belong to both narrative and non-narrative structure, being sure to clarify their differences. A few examples of the types of form we discussed are: linear narrative, linear non-narrative, multi-linear narrative, categorical form, experimental form and associational form. One of the notions raised that I found particularly interesting was the fact that a text can be non-narrative, whilst being structured. I had originally thought that anything that followed an identifiable story line or chain of events would be considered narrative as opposed to non-narrative. However today’s studio indicated that doesn’t have a chain of cause-effect relationships but is still structured around the presence of a recurring element, is considered a non-narrative. For example, the categorical non-narrative organises content into a taxonomy (group of like content). This distinction is relevant because it underpins the language used in this studio, as well as provides vital context for the intention of the project explorations.

Relating

I have previously found the specifics of terminology regarding narrative to be slightly confusing and I have encountered a similar discoveries/clarifications during cinema studies last year, in which we also looked at the work of Bordwell and Thompson. The conditions were very similar in the sense that it took for me to read their description of film form and their notions surrounding narrative structures to highlight my confusion and clarify my understanding. So similar to the last time this confusion occurred, it is important for me to look again closely at the work of Bordwell and Thompson to understand specific terminology, which can be related to our own practice in project 4, as well as this studio in general.

Reasoning

I would connect the potential misconception of narrative terminology, to the flexible use of the term narrative. Naturally, in discussion about narrative during this studio and media practices through university, I have noticed the term narrative be used to describe an array of concepts surrounding story, character intention, action motivation, sequence of images/elements, etc. Meaning without specifying the requirement for narrative to refer purely to structure, ambiguity arises.

Reconstructing

In the interest of minimsing ambiguity in our exploration of skate video, it is crucial to understand exactly what type of form we are analysing and how the form is positioned in relation to other areas of structure, etc. As much as I tried to incorporate as much practical elements as possible into the exploration of project 3, it appears important in future to balance a practice-led enquiry with a theory-led inquiry. Meaning theoretical research regarding the terminology and framework surrounding skate video or narrative/non-narrative linear structures will be useful for the development of project 4 to address the aims of the studio with more clarity.

Frontline’s ‘Generation Like’ is a social media documentary that discusses user expression through social media and how this functions as a marketing tool. Facebook’s ‘like’ function, Youtube’s ‘views’ and ‘subscribers’, Twitter’s ‘followers’ and ‘re-tweets’, all contribute toward a database that creates intelligence for marketing strategies. Generally the openness of the internet and the ability young people have to express themselves is referred to as empowering and although that might be true, it also creates masses of corporate wealth. Social media users’ innocence to the significance of user expression tools in terms of corporate wealth, highlights a weakness in the receptivity of brand domination, as well as hides the fact that it is the users that are actually marketing the products. This reminds me of Axel Bruns’ produser theory, in which he explains how developments in the online network position the consumer with the ability to produce content. One particular part I found interesting in ‘Generation Like’ was the suggestion that the term ‘sell out’ doesn’t exist in the same capacity that it used to. A ‘sell out’ used to refer to someone that took on brand sponsorship and promoted it in their content for advertisement purposes, receiving an income in return. This used to be viewed as betraying who you are and the reasons you became famous. This documentary indicates that having the ability to promote brand sponsorship, is now typically viewed as an achievement. This demonstrates how changes in the network effect online media practices.

To form connections between ‘Generation Like’ and this studio, I can see that the network can be used through the functionality of social media to redefine online video practice. For example, the immense sense of achievement and also career opportunity instigated through a high number of ‘likes’ or ‘follows’, influences media producers to create content that is more likely to be seen and appreciated, which is often, controversial material or silly behavior. In addition, the documentary indicated that to be successful online is to use social media to promote one’s career, in order to develop enough of a following (social media network) that can be sold/used to sell. This correlates with online video practice in the sense that it is becoming more about promotion rather than distribution. This lays importance on utilising the user expressive tools of social media in online video practices in order to not get left behind. The documentary describes the way kids consume media through ‘likes’ and ‘follows’ (and the advertising pathways that result from this process) as “the biggest transformation in the way companies communicate with consumers, in history. Finally, after watching this documentary I am reassured about my decision to study at university (as discussed in another blog post) as being designed to encourage innovative changes or development to media practices, rather than create standard linear content that is distributed via media platforms. Innovative ideas such as the invention of user expression online, clearly have a massive influence on the world of media.

Reporting

Today was the presentation of project 3 to a panel of four RMIT staff in the interest of generating useful feedback for the development of project 4. The panel said that they enjoyed the presentation and thought that it was clearly explained, mainly in reference to the journey from case study to the exploration of project 3. However, feedback became quickly centred around determining whether pursuing a live broadcasting service was the best option. The panel were unable to see any of the other sketches, so it was hard to demonstrate comparisons, however it was clear that a focus on a live service may focus future directions too specifically around the technology rather than the form, as well as potentially remove the possibility for a large amount of skate video’s aesthetic appeal to function (such as music and digital video manipulation). This is relevant because these factors could stray our future direction away from the aims of the studio. I think the panel raised an interesting argument to consider more closely, whether live broadcasting is the most suitable direction for future explorations, or whether returning to study of other sketches may be useful in discovering a better alternative.

Relating

I have noticed similar notions to this during the transition from project 1 to project 2 of this studio. That transition featured Errol and I having a strong, misunderstood focus on the technical qualities and stylistic elements of skate video as an example of online video practice. When it was actually far more important to focus on the narrative/non-narrative structure of the practice, in reference to the particular form (or potentially hybrid form) of the case study. Gearing our experimentation towards notions of form aligned the project much more closely with the aims of the studio. I have learnt from this past experience the importance of not getting caught up on the technical elements of a work, but for the purpose of this studio focusing on form from a simplified standpoint. Do not over complicate the experiment because that leads to confusion from the central focus of the experiment.

Reasoning

The factors underlying this issue I believe are premised on my prior education module being engulfed by notions of satisficing and technical recreation. Satsificing refers to accepting the first solution to a problem, without encouraging further investigation and generation of new ideas. This, in combination with my previous media education being focused around displaying an ability to recreate media by imitating the stylistic features, is what immediately draws me to technical elements when analysing a case study for example. These are important factors to consider because they indicate that it is vital to really prompt continuous brainstorming and idea development in order to do well in this studio, as well as adapt our professional practice to the changing world of online media.

Reconstructing

In future I will encourage myself to explore further solutions to potential issues or areas of development, attempting to transfer my focus away from notions regarding media technologies and more towards a representation of form. The main way I can think of achieving this in regards to the development of project 4 in this studio, is to experiment with effect of live broadcasting on skate video more so, to explore the array of possibilities and questions that are raised. This would hopefully provide the foundations to identify and direct the exploration down the path of an exploration of form. However, furthering notions of speculative sketching (as an alternative to satisficing), I will take a step back from live broadcasting all together in order to explore and brainstorm other potential possibilities for project 4, before selecting live broadcasting so quickly. This could potentially provide the change we need in order to address the feedback given during today’s studio.