The feedback after my presentation was very helpful and in some ways unexpected. After I had finished speaking there was a moment of silence and I did hold my breath a little as I waited to see what they thought. To my pleasant surprise the class and the teachers seemed to like it. Robin in particular was interested in my perception of surfing. He was interested in my fear of the water and other personal struggles I’d had with the whole experience. He suggested that I make my exercises more about the foreign nature and fear of surfing I had experienced. As he pointed out, anyone can make a film about surfing but its your personal perspective that will set it apart from the rest. However, he did suggest that I shoot my footage whilst I was still unfamiliar and unsure. In recent yeas when I have had to learn something new that I was not completely confident with, I have had to let go of my fear. This is incredibly helpful when it comes to being able to carry out the task competently. However, now my fear would become a source of inspiration.

One point Paul raised was that it was three semesters worth of work. I agreed and knew it was very ambitious, especially since location was two and a half hours away. This has led me to the decision to down size my project to six short exercises. This will allow me to have more focus on these exercises and take slightly more care with editing as this is not a strong point of mine.

Finally it was interesting that I was encouraged to explore similar sports such as skating and snow boarding for research purposes. It was explained to me that the “shucka” is also common in snow boarding.

I was very pleased with the feedback from my presentation as it has given me some new ideas that I hadn’t considered in the slightest before. It has also helped me to narrow my focus which will keep me passionate about this project.