No witty introductions from this time, let’s get straight to the point.

Media one students recently had to create a self portrait of someone else. If you haven’t seen my one yet, click here! Below, you will find my reflection on the project itself, so… enjoy?

First of all, I really want to express my happiness in the way the interview turned out. This isn’t the first time I’ve done an interview video before, but it’s the first time I’ve created one to this standard. I really liked the power of my interview. Fighting itself, is quite a empowering thing to talk about. So when compiled with motivational music, it can have quite a strong impact on its audience. One thing I think I did really well is the timing of cuts to the rhythm of the music. I timed punches and kicks to the peaks of the music, which gave it a lot more power than it originally had. I also timed the credits to the rhythm of the music, which also assisted in giving the words on the screen a bit of power.

Another thing I think I did well was building up the momentum at the beginning. It started off fading from black to my interviewee speaking. He started off with introducing himself, and also talking about his beginnings as an amateur fighter. The b-roll used within the beginning was also quite slow, and only featured fighters trading blows between one another while my interviewee spoke about them in small detail. While all of this is happening, the music is slowly building up. When it eventually hits its peak, I made a quick cut from my interviewee to black, then quickly to a shot of my interviewee landing a strong right hook on one of his opponents and knocking him down to the ground. I think this sequence of shots sets the pacing of the rest of the interview to come, and I’m really happy with the way it turned out.

Now on to the negatives – audio. During the interview, I found it hard to position the zoom microphone close enough to my interviewee without getting it in the shot. So I thought it’d be a great idea if he just held it in his hands, outside of the framing of the shot. However, one thing I didn’t take into consideration is his nervousness. He tended to move his hands a lot and also shake his legs during the interview, which got picked up during the recording. It’s very brief, but there are times where you can hear the fumbling of the microphone in his hands.

His monologue also quietened down in the middle of the interview. At the start, his voice was clear and loud. However, as the interview went on, he lost some of this power. This is mostly evident when he says and I quote, ‘and it’s because of them that I am where I am right now’. I did make attempts of raising the volume of his voice recording, but with that also came the introduction of unwanted noise.

In terms of b-roll, I wish I got more shots varying in his training methods. I got shots of him doing pad work and bag work, but it would of been nice to have shots of push ups, or other things along those lines.

Maybe shots of the interview in different locations would have spiced things up a bit as well, instead of having him sit in the one location in front of the mirror.

Overall, I’m happy with the way the interview turned out. And with the minor things that I stuffed up, I’ll definitely keep them in mind as I continue to produce media in the years to come.