To demonstrate how we got from the case study to our probe:

We brainstormed 3 main areas of interest that arose from our project 2 exploration and we narrowed this down to one idea which was: playing with the structure of skate video.

From there, attempting to develop sketch ideas, we noticed a recurring theme of media platform based explorations, along with notions of interactivity.

This directed us to think about what would happen to skate video if it were produced across a range of online platforms but we also wanted to include elements of interactivity.

As mentioned in another post, our first probe draft was too focused around interactivity which expanded the required exploration beyond the scope of this project.

So in order to include interactivity but focus more heavily on the actual specifics of the media platforms themselves (the affordances and constraints), a final probe was developed, allowing both to be explored in closer reference to the aims of the studio.

Reflecting upon our chosen question and formation of sketches from the previous post, my group has taken a particular interest in incorporating elements of interactivity within skate video, whilst also continuing to explore what effect different online tools and services might provide skate video. For this reason our probe was reconstructed and now stands as:

What happens to skate video when it is interacted with via different online tools and services?

This new probe prompted the formation of new sketches and alteration of previous sketches, that now perhaps more closely address the studio prompt in regards to experimenting with a narrative / non-narrative form.

The sketches now stand as being:

1. YouTube – what happens to skate video when YouTube annotation links are present?

2. Timeline commenting – what happens to skate video when timeline commenting is enabled?

3. Reply Videos – what happens to skate video when YouTube’s ‘reply video’ function is optimised?

4. User Selected Songs – what happens to skate video when the user can select the song?

5. #Tags – what happens to skate video when tags are optimised?

6. Voting System – what happens to skate video when users can vote on quality of tricks/video?

7. Twitter – what happens to skate video when it is distributed in script form via Twitter?

8. Snapchat – what happens to skate video when it is distributed through Snapchat?

9. Vine – what happens to skate video when it is distributed through Vine?

10. GIF – what happens to skate video when it is distributed via GIF?

11. Photos – what happens to skate video when it is created solely from photos?

12. Sound – what happens to skate video when it is created solely from sounds?

13. Hybrid Context – what happens to skate video when it mixed with video review?

14. Cowbird – what happens to skate video when it is distributed through Cowbird?

To continue the speculative sketching process, Errol and I have chosen to go with the idea:

3. Skate Video on Different Platforms

The case study and skate video in general are suitable for distribution among unrestricted, linear online services. However, what would happen to skate video when it is distributed across a variety of different platforms? Also, what happens to skate video when it’s structure is reorganised or it becomes interactive?

To test the relevance of this idea and also potentially seek further development of the idea, we tried to come up with 14 sketch to address this notion:

1. Vine – what happens to skate video when it is distributed through Vine?

2. Snapchat- what happens to skate video when it is distributed through Snapchat?

3. GIF- what happens to skate video when it is distributed via GIF?

4. Silence – what happens to skate video when it is created without music?

5. No SFX – what happens to skate video when it is created without sound effects (without the syncronised audio)?

6. Special Effects – what happens to skate video, when is created with special effects?

7. Transitions – what happens to skate video when it is created purely from transitions?

8. Context Mix – what happens to skate video when it is mixed with other sports, music, news, etc?

9. Blog Posts – what happens to skate video when it is distributed through blog posts and what might this look like?

10. Photos – what happens to skate video when it is created solely from photos?

11. Sound – what happens to skate video when it is created solely from sounds?

12. Resolution – what happens to skate video when the pixel resolution is altered?

13. Interactivity – what happens to skate video when it includes user submitted content?

14. Documentary – what happens to skate video when it is presented like a documentary and what might that look like?

(This question and sketches were further developed – see later blog posts – final probe here)

Three Things of Interest

1. Visual Relationships

Prominent throughout the case study; skate video in general as a practice of online video; and as well as recurring consistently across my group’s sketches for project 2 is an emphasis on visual relationships and transition between images. What purpose do visual relationships serve in terms of a narrative / non-narrative?

2. Hybrid Contexts

Grounded in the case study is the juxtaposition, whilst simultaneous blending of skate video with street art documentary. What would happen to skate video if it were placed within a completely separate context? How could they not only be distinguishable from each other, but more importantly compliment each other? Could a dialogue be formed throughout a balance of the two context?

3. Skate Video on Different Platforms

The case study and skate video in general are suitable for distribution among unrestricted, linear online services. However, what would happen to skate video when it is distributed across a variety of different platforms? Also, what happens to skate video when it becomes interactive?

Reiterating Eric Booth’s innovative sketching, Monday’s studio provided the context for how the development of project 3 is designed to function. The point of the project is to create a stream of idea development. Firstly the project entails writing down 3 things that interest me about the case study or my previous work in project 2, creating each one of the new ideas to be separate from the others. Then by taking one of these ideas (the one that stands out the most), and trying to list as many possible sketch that result from the original idea, one particular sketch or potentially an area of interest may arise which can then be further explored. The idea is that this process of constant improvement and reflection will produce an innovative idea, something much stronger and more advanced than the first, original notion. i.e. take something from online video and push it sideways and play with it.

This encourages my group to be more experimental in our approach. By understanding that our original ideas may be completely reshaped and transformed by the end of the project, a relief is granted upon the production of original ideas and the brainstorming process gets underway much more quickly than previously. See the next blog post regarding speculative sketching to recognise these statements. Most importantly, today’s studio encouraged me to go outside of my comfort zone and embrace notions of continuous improvement in order to maximise the effectiveness of the brainstorming process and potentially produce more advanced results.

Reporting

Reflecting upon project 2, I felt rushed toward the end of it and I have noticed that Errol and I spent too much time caught up in the brainstorming and planning process, worrying about the quality of our ideas. This over complicated the project resulting in it taking up more time and being less experimental. This is strongly relevant because the basis of this studio is exploration and experimentation. Therefore in my opinion we should have been less concerned by quality and more eager to experiment as much as possible which can be reflected on later in relation to the concept statement and studio prompt.

Relating

I have noticed issues similar to this in the way that I approach a lot of assessment tasks. In an effort to achieve good results, I find myself slowly working through the planning process to an extent of detail which is unnecessary, or at least too time consuming and unfocused. The conditions among university assessment is often the same, however I have developed knowledge throughout my studies which improve my ability to handle this issue. Naturally I still find myself stuck in the planning process to a certain extent, although it’s consistency and impact is reducing.

Reasoning

Factors underlying this issues mainly point towards my hesitation to spontaneously create and experiment. Using Eric Booth’s innovative sketching as a point for reflection, it is now clear that relieving pressure from the planning process and instead encouraging experimentation and constant redevelopment of ideas is what produces the best results.

Reconstructing

This demonstrates that in future, when in the brainstorming phase of any particular issues, it is important to identify a simple starting point and explore the many possibilities that arise from the process of experimentation. Evidence of this issue recurring again is visible in our planning for project 3 but I am now more equip to deal with the issue. To indicate my improvement, many of our sketches for project 3 are simple ideas that do not strongly relate to the concept statement as it stands and instead are used as an exploration to see where it takes us. In regards to project 3, it would be useful to create a large variety of sketches / notions and then rework particular ideas in order to develop a potentially stronger idea at the end of the innovative sketching exercise.

Unfortunately due to family commitments back in Canberra I was absent from Friday’s studio. I was disappointed to miss out on the remaining presentations as I was interested to see how certain groups had progressed and upon catching up with Errol, it sounds like it was an interesting studio. However thankfully, aside from the presentations, little work was conducted in the way of preparing for project 3 meaning it was easy for me to catch back up.

Replacing the blog post discussing Friday’s studio, I decided to address the innovative sketching theories discussed by Eric Booth. The video posted displaying Eric Booth and his notions of innovative sketching identifies the rushed nature of problem solving in education and society in general. Refereed to as satisfying, often students are encouraged to accept the first solution to a problem, rather than to nurture brainstorming. This attitude restricts creative practice as a student is limited to the success of one idea. Instead, innovative sketching entails the student build upon each idea, brainstorming and creating excitement towards experimentation to generate multiple possible solutions to the problem. This has been proven to result in higher quality final work, let alone more enjoyment. Relating this to project 3, I am now more encouraged to have fun making sketches. Given the fact that only a small amount of the sketches will actually be presented, along with our topic’s their tight correlation with a hobby of mine (bmx riding) and the process suggested by Eric Booth, I am excited to go crazy making as many sketches as possible and just see what happens. This realisation really helped me to contextualise this studio in regards to reflectivity and see clearly, the focus of the projects as truely grounded by exploration and experimentation.

“Everyone loves to know the history behind a brand and how it got to where it is today. Using live-stream video, fans will really get an authentic feel of a brand and understand the context behind situations which can be more tricky with photos.”

^ from the article: ‘Eight ways brands can add Meerkat into their marketing mix’, march 24, 2015

This quote, along with the explosive popularity of a new live streaming social video app called Meerkat, demonstrates contemporary society’s obsession with narrative and story telling. The idea that the ‘story’ about the success of a global brand label or a video that provides insight into the ins and outs of a brand label, would spark so much interest is intriguing. Furthermore, this quote also identifies a key affordance of online video in contrast to photography, as it’s ability to create a more “authentic feel of a brand”. Clearly anchored to the addition of motion and sound, it is none the less interesting to consider online video practice in reference to authenticity. Does a quest for authenticity, disregard a sense of creative force? Moreover, as online video practices grow and develop throughout the coming years, will authenticity and realism become a focal point, demolarising artistic elements of online video practice?

Today’s studio entailed the presentation of project 2. Although not everyone was able to present during the time slot, I was pleased that we were able to do our presentation today as I had been nervous about the presentation and eager to get it out of the way. Upon presenting our work, any nerves were very quickly cleared as I realised that I had in fact prepared a large amount of information and as a result our presentation ran over time and felt rushed. This highlighted the importance of condensing the presentation and communicating our ideas more simpler for project 3. Overall I was satisfied with the presentation and I think it helped me contextualise the case study and the project a lot more specifically toward the studio prompt which will assist in the development of project 3.

For project 3 it seems, quite differently to the transition between project 1 and project 2, we should take one particular element that has emerged in project 2 and conduct an intense exploration surrounding that. This prompts Errol and I to discuss whether we would like to take one of the elements we have discovered thus far and move away from skate video, or continue down the same trajectory. I think although moving away from skate videos could be interesting to see what we find, however it is important to take advantage of your strengths. Therefore, given Errol and my own experience in skate and bmx video, we chose to continue with this example of online video practice. Furthermore, given the exploration of hybrid form between skate video and the informative documentary within the case study has prompted so much discussion and interrogation thus far, it seemed a waste to disregard this progress for a fresh concept. Quickly hypothesising what we might take from project 2 into project 3, I am flooded with ideas surrounding the transition between images as a point of exploration.

During the progression toward finalising project 2, a variety of hurdles were encountered in regards to the sketches. Firstly, one of the sketches called ‘Camera Acknowledgement‘ was designed to demonstrate a clear contrast between the camera being acknowledged and therefore having a presence in the real world situation, as opposed to being completely observational similar to the idea of a ‘fly on the wall’. For this to be an effective exploration in relation to our concept statement, the presence of camera would have to contribute to the narrative / non-narrative. When filming, out of poor preparation I captured Errol performing the same skateboarding trick twice over, being sure to look at the camera and gather attention, however not communicating a clear exploration of narrative. In hindsight, the subject in the sketch should converse with the camera man and say things which clearly indicate the camera’s involvement in the situation. For example, I think the subject should yell out “are you recording, are you read?” [perform the trick] “did you get it?” in order to highlight an exploration of staged events and what effect that might have on the narrative / non-narrative form. Immediately I begin to think about notions of realism and how elements of documentary style might be explored (which correlates with the case study as it functions as a hybrid of skate video and informative documentary). Noticing this hurdle, I decided to re-film the sketch with myself as the subject in order to increase the amount of presence the camera had on the captured event and therefore more closely address the concept statement and studio prompt.

Also, without delving into it too much, another problem arose in relation to the ‘Perspective of Narration’ sketch which was designed to contrast first person narration with third person narration. I originally filmed the two contrasting perspectives from two separate camera angles but didn’t change the content. Moreover, the subject completed the same actions identically in both perspectives. However I became more interested in highlighting the affordances of each perspective by showing how bias and exaggeration can become involved. This was only demonstrate-able through contrasting different content that resembled these notions. For this reason, I also re-shot this sketch in order to create a clear contrast between the two perspectives and how that completely redefines the narrative / non-narrative. See ‘Sketch 4‘ for more information.