Month: June 2016

Media 1 – Final Reflection

Posted on by ryanrosenberg

Well, all good things must come to an end. If only I was a contestant on The Voice, I could have had some kind of sentimental video detailing my journey of hardship and defiance. But to be honest, Media 1 wasn’t like that at all. It was pretty much everything I expected. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Week 1 – Reading: Cal Newport’s Advice That I Will Inevitably Forget
This was pretty much my first blog post. And I’ve decided to write about because I think it’s a good example of my naivety. I’m a cynical person; a pessimist, a nihilist, I can’t help but question absolutely everything I see. It’s my way of understanding how things are. Coming into this course, I brought this attitude with me. While I agree with what I wrote in this post, I think I missed the point of why we were shown this video. It wasn’t about motivation; it was about changing preconceptions. Sometimes my suspicious approach to learning helps me discover things I wouldn’t ordinarily see. Other times it completely blinds me, just like it did here.

Week 5 – Workshop: The Aspirational Figure
One thing I loved about the workshops was our class discussions. We truly had a diverse set of opinions, and as a result, conversation would flourish. In Week 5, Louise introduced to the idea of ‘The Aspirational Figure’. We used faux hotshot Gina Liano as a case study, someone that is seen as an aspiration. This provided myself with a realisation. Nearly all mainstream content (and yes, a reality television star is now a piece of content) is a constructed image disguised as identity. This ‘light-bulb moment’ allowed me to gain a deeper understanding of textual analysis; looking below the surface level.

Week 6 – Readings/Lecture: The Empathetic Character
Robert McKhee’s ‘Substance Of Story’ was probably my favourite piece of reading this semester. Whenever the course work was more focused on film, my enjoyment rapidly increased. The idea of “the protagonist must be empathetic; he may or may not be sympathetic” is something in the past I’ve noticed but never really considered. Applying this theory to film, and also my group’s Project Brief 4 provided a basis for a deeper understanding in narrative.

Week 9 – Readings: The Consequences Of ‘The People Formerly Known As The Audience’
Jay Rosen’s ‘The People Formerly Known As The Audience’ was something I read whilst doing a Journalism course two years ago. There was a lot to like about it, and a lot consider. Reading it two years later, in a media context, rather than a journalistic one, allowed me to look at it from a different perspective. Thanks to social media, the media landscape has drastically changed in the last two years. What this article really made me consider was how important audience is when creating content.

Week 12 – Workshop: Victim Culture
Another blog about a class discussion. There’s a theme here! The workshop discussions were my favourite moments of the semester. This discussion didn’t change my opinion about victim culture; however, it did provide me with a sense of relief. Our class discussion was very open and honest, and the majority of my class believed that victim culture was primarily about narcissism. This was very refreshing to hear. I feel this blog post is quite an honest representation of my crippling cynicism.

The most valuable learning experience has definitely been developing my editing skills on Premiere. As someone who edits a lot of audio, I naively thought editing a video would be quite similar. I was wrong.

One thing I found challenging in this course was my laptop’s inability to function. As a result, I had to find other ways to edit videos and audio. Also, I struggled badly with motivation when it came to blogging. I get the whole blogging thing. It’s a smart way of retaining information and keeping a body of work. But it’s also a hassle. Every time I wrote a blog I felt dread, and after re-reading my blog posts, I think it’s quite evident in my choice of language.

What I discovered about my own creative practice was how much I like working by myself. And this is something that I’m going to have to change, quickly. I struggled to adapt during group exercises, mainly because I hate when things are out of my control. But the film industry is all about collaboration, and I’ll need to get used to the idea of working within a team if I want to get there.

Overall, I’m happy with my contribution to this semester. I could have done better, but then again, we all could have. I’m proud of the content I created, and I’m really looking forward to Media 2.

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Project Brief 4 – Individual Reflection

Posted on by ryanrosenberg

I’m quite satisfied with the result of both my group’s audio and video essay. I thought my group had a reasonably clear understanding of our topics, and the way in which we presented each topic was compelling enough for us all to be proud of our efforts.

The most successful aspect of the essay was how committed we all were to the ‘angle’. For the audio essay, we all shared the same opinion that trigger warnings are ridiculous. This allowed our meetings to be used as a forum for free and open discussion, as we are all naturally anti-censorship. For the video essay, after agreeing on our subject, we found The Interview to be a unique case study (cyber-terrorism, diplomatic relationships, culture and consumption) and since it was a relatively new film, there was plenty of content to research. As a result, we became more devoted to both of our topics, and the research process felt more interesting rather than a chore.

The main issue was the outcome of the edited video essay. We agreed that I would edit the audio essay, and that Lydia would edit the video essay. I’m very pleased with how I edited the audio essay, but I’m not sure the video essay came out how we wanted. It’s understandable; creating a video essay is much more difficult than an audio essay as there are more things to consider. While I found the information we presented to support our angle in the video essay to be compelling, the way in which it was presented could have been cleaner.

After delving into textual analysis through lectures, workshops and further research, I particularly was very interested in idea of “the sense-making processes that take place in the relationship between producers and audiences as mediated through media texts”. I saw trigger warnings as a good example for this due to the fact it is a recent phenomena, it involves education, and that it was primarily about a disconnect between media producers and audiences. For the video essay, Robert McKhee’s ‘Substance Of Story’ introduced the idea of how “the protagonist must be empathetic; he may or may not be sympathetic”. I saw The Interview as a case study of how culture can determine if a character is seen as “empathetic” and/or “sympathetic” in the context of a film. I feel we explored this idea quite thoroughly in our finished product.

Creating both an audio and video essay made me consider the ways in which you can present information through two different mediums. Audio essays are more about telling; sound is the only thing that can be used. When editing, I had to come up with a structure that wouldn’t bore the listener in that particular format. This is why I used different types of sound (music, sound effects and clips that were relevant to our topic) to make the essay a bit more dynamic. The video essay, however, was more about showing. While we used narration to focus on key points, we relied on found footage to provide the basis for our discussion.

During the making process, the main lesson I learned about collaboration was how essential it is to be organised. Despite assigning roles and creating deadlines for certain tasks, I think our group could have been even more organised. There were plenty of occasions where work was completed, but we were still unsure if it was the actual information we were trying to communicate. I think we probably could have had another session per week to discuss the actual idea behind each essay in greater depth, because a clear understanding results in a more developed product. As an aspiring media practitioner, you have to know what you are truly trying to convey. When you are in a group, it’s about having the team share that principle.

Overall, Project Brief 4 was quite fun. I gained a clear understanding of two topics, I thought hard about how to communicate these ideas through two different mediums, and I experienced what it is like to work within a team.