My self-portrait video is underpinned by a pretty simple concept, being to create a “day in the life” representation of self. Given the strict time constraints and the (relatively) heavy volume of content (and various techniques) required to be included, I felt as though it was best to simplify what I was trying to convey and take a soft, minimalist approach to my presentation. I also wanted to fixate my attention on imbedding various techniques and approaches in with one another so that the final product was well textured, however not convoluted or unclear.
The primary reason for focussing on “a day in the life” as an artefact in expressing sense of self was because I am the sort of person who is constantly on the go and fitting as much into her day as possible. It does really seem simple and perhaps not as personal of an approach as what I could have taken. In having said that, however, by focussing on the various and different things that I do in a day, I was enabled to engage with slightly more complicated techniques and editing processes with which I was not previously familiar.
Again, stylistically speaking, I kept the tone quite mellow to strike accord with the overall sense of minimalism that I was striving towards. I felt as though this was an appropriate juxtaposition with the shots that were otherwise very busy and fast-paced and that, from an aesthetic standpoint, it looked more appealing anyway. Because the music running over almost the entire track was also quite busy, I kept the other audio components to a minimal level and only really added them in to compliment the shot that was taking place at that given time. In keeping wth the requirement that the representation be textured, I intentionally played around with the pace of the various shots, leaving some at a slower rate (usually mirroring the rate of the corresponding audio) and quickening others up. This is in addition to switching between colour and greyscale, as well as interrogating various angles and points of focus (as well as subjects) within a shot.
Given that I have never used Premier Pro until a few weeks ago, I feel pretty confident in how I have progressed so far. Yet, in having said this, I’m very aware of the large portion of the software with which I am still not yet familiar so this really is what I want to make a key focus as I continue into this course.
