Post Nine: Creating a script

 SCRIPTS:

Our second workshop with Becky Knapp involved the process of assessing each other scripts; we all had to reach all of the scripts written and say how the could be improved, what we liked and what didn't work so well. Becky herself had also read all of our scripts and gave us the appropriate feedback.The assessments of our first drafts enabled the creation of the second draft to be produced to a better quality and a lot easier.





The first version of my script:

The feedback I received about my script was constructive as a whole with an appropriate amount of positives and negatives; as I received the feedback I made notes on what I needed to improve and how to get it done. The opinions were generally positive as Becky and the rest of the class agreed that my script was 'visually strong', which meant I had a strong basis to create a short film with. They also highlighted the two key problems with my script, the first was the format and structure; the amendments involved a simple case of changing the alignments on word and changing the font and font size. The second problem that there was nowhere near enough detail in my script, the character actions were far too vague and there was a lack of dialogue too which in turn meant that the relationship between 'the girl' and 'her father' was not fully established.

During Becky's feedback she advised that I watch Lynne Ramsay's 'Gasman' as like my script it was based on 'showing rather than telling' and was visually strong. Gasman is based in the Christmas season spirirt, 'Lynne' a young girl dresses up with the aid of her mother. 'Lynne' and her brother then leave to the pub with their father, along the way they meet with a woman who was has two children with her, of a similar age. 'Lynne notices that the girl acts all too familiar with her dad'.

                                             

After going into alot more depth in the detailing of my script and adding more dialogue where I found appropriate and where generally needed I created a second draft of my script.

***IMAGE OF HOW I THEN DEVELOPED MY SCRIPT***



Mrs Shipp said... Did your audience (class) understand your message was it clear? can you relate this back to the exam topic of audience reception theory and preferred readings, negotiated readings etc.

When showed the first draft of my script for my short film 'Bruises' the class understood the message I was trying to convey - According to the audience reception theory my class would have understood the meaning due to the fact that we all have a relatively similar cultural background, therefore we all interpret texts in similar ways. Within the terms preferred and negotiated readings media studies implies that no text is simply 'neutral' - therefore each media text contains a range of meanings/messages that have been encoded into the text either deliberately or unconsciously. This leads to the fact that the interpretation my audience had on my media product was intended by the maker (myself) therefore it is a preferred reading.

Post eight: Decisions & Revisions

Although at first  the creation and development of our scripts seemed like a relatively simple task, it was infact a lot harder than i first though despite all of the class notes and the workshop with Becky Knapp that we recieved. Initially I began the process by finding ways to develop my idea, the first step was to create a time line panning out the events that would occur in my short film, this including the two key turning points. This timeline enabled me to firstly, have a clearer idea of the best order in which to have events occur in my short and secondly, helped me have a much clearer view on the timings of my six minute short film.

After the creation of the time-line we discussed the layout, timings and plot of all of our scripts and gave feedback on what we thought would/wouldn't work and what could be improved. The next task I completed in order the get the the stage at which I could begin my script writing was to create my character profiling. Although we had characters in our coursework task last year, due to the fact that it was only the opening of a film, not a film in it's entirity the characters were not developed at all. Developing the characters for this coursework task required a signifcant amount more detail, instead of just focusing on the physical appearance of the characters I also had to focus of the emotional state of the characters at different points during the plot. In doing this I helped myself get a clearer visual image of my characters and a clearer insight into their lives.

The penultimate task I engaged for research was in was the study of texts that relate to the desired message, theme and plot of the short film I plan on creating. I decided to watch was a string of NSPCC adverts. The NSPCC is a world-wide organisation focused around preventing the abuse of children, Child abuse is classified as an adult harming a young person under the age of 18 and last year alone the NSPCC worked with approximately 250,000 children or adults concerned about children.


The first advert I watched was Cruelty to children must stop - full stop. This TV advert beings by establishing the vulnerability of the children, the victims of the abuse in the advert; this is done through the use of the camera work, e.g. high angle shots such as the following in which the vulnerable is placed low down, on the floor and the camera is in a position of power over the victim. The advert then plays of the emotions of the viewer with the use of audio, match-on-action is used as the advert contains sad music to match the tragic events we assume are happening. The third thing that the advert uses is the actors, the actors show their fear, grief and gloom clearly and successfully.

The next advert I watched was the most recent NSPCC advert, NSPCC - Open your eyes. This advert is based upon the lives of three children, ranging in age from a 1/2 year old boy left crying in his cot, a young girl who is beaten and a boy who is being abused outside of his own home, showing that there is no age limit on abuse. The main tool used to establish the abuse of the children and to create the sympathy and correct emotion desired from the audience in the advert is the use of emotive imagery e.g. close ups on childrens face's to show the unhappiness. Emotive music similarly to the first advert I watched is also used, different music but it creates the same desired negative and hyper-emotional tone to the advert. 

The third and final advert I wached was NSPCC - Talking helps, this advert unlike the previous two is not based on the abuse of younger children, the victim in this advert is a teenage girl which relates more to the short film that I am creating. This advert also differs from the previous two in terms of the focus of the footage, the focus of the other adverts was visual where as the focus of 'Talking helps' is based upon the affect of audio. There is no music in the advert, just a teenage girl sat on a bus replaying the abusive words and violent noises of an older male who the viewer will most likely assume to be her father. At one point the girl begins to speak, she stutters and does not regain her motivation to finish her sentence, this links to the title due to the fact that the girl cannot speak out but 'Talking helps'.

The final task I engaged in was to research real-life stories of abuse and the advice/help provided. I found a website for the organisation 'Tronie Foundation' who's focus is to prevent child abuse, much like the NSPCC. The websites includes information on types of child abuse other than domestic and sexual abuse e.g. human trafficing. The next website I studied was Child Abuse Effects, the website is full of useful information on how to cope with child abuse and also contains a section of tragic child abuse stories.

Post three (A): Target Progress

1) The first and possibly the most prominent target for me this year will be to improve the quality of my camera work and continuity, last year both I and the group in which I worked struggled to effectively recognise when we had broken the 180 º rule, otherwise known as ‘crossing the line’ in our filming. This affected the continuity of our production and therefore obviously had a knock on effect on the grade in which we received for our final product last year. This year I will spend a great deal more time making certain there are no faults in our filming and do further research into vital rules such as the 180º rule to ensure we do not have the same problem this year.

The camera work in my year 13 coursework task has moved up notches in terms of it's quality, continuity and general quality; we were given a higher quality camera with which to film this year, PD150 SONY. Due to the faults that were present and pointed out to me in my project last year I became more aware of several points whilst filming. The first being the 180º rule, whilst filming I became very aware of it, therefore taking more time and effort to make sure the rule wasn't broke. This also led to me taking several different versions of shots, to ensure no rules were broken and that the continuity was the best it could be.

2) The second target I have set for myself will be based around the area of editing, next year I wish to not only improve on the areas I can already do on adobe premier plus but to try and successfully carry out new and original editing styles. As we now know the basics due to the editing of our products last year, this year I plan on spending a significant amount more time extending my skills on the editing suites as to boost the grades I could possibly achieve in our final product.

The editing in my year 13 coursework; initially to help with this task as independent study I spent some time in the editing suites getting a better understanding of the programmes I was using and learning about what would and wouldn't look successful for what we wanted to achieve in our short film. This year compared to last we had a significant amount more knowledge about what we were trying to create and achieve within our projects as well as more knowledge of examples, codes and conventions of what we were attempting to create.

In order to get a grasp on what kind of editing we wanted to carry out on our film we watched other shorts with similar representations and messages to ours in order to help us get an idea of editing aspects such as what kind of lighting we wanted to involve in both our editing and filming.



3) Due to the fact that in the approaching academic year our task is to create a short film in its entirety the process of creating a treatment becomes more relevant and there is now a need for character synopsises. Another one of my targets is to improve the detail in which our narrative and characters are developed. I will achieve this by holding more group discussions therefore deciding as a group a lot more detail about both the narrative and the characters.
Due to the fact that this year we are creating a short film in it's entirety the role of the central protagonist was much higher than any projects i'd previously created. In order to ensure that our character 'Grace' was as realistic as possible I participated in a large amount of independent research into abused children. I achieved this by firstly, spending a lot more time speaking with the other person I was working with, together we decided the correct way to approach 'Grace's' character. Once basic decisions were made together about our central protagonist e.g. sex and age we moved onto more complex details such as Grace's physical build and what we could represent through this.

The next thing we did was to research characteristics or 'give aways' of abused children - a lot of this research included reading 'real life stories' that people had posted online and browsing websites such as the NSPCC, watching their advertisements and reading what they do to achieve the help for children.






4) In this years main task we will be not only creating the film product we will also be creating a ‘postcard’ for our film in terms of marketing. To create the previously mentioned ‘postcard’ we will need to use Photo shop or a programme similar in function to edit the image. In the editing we will need to interpret the conventions so that it is possible to create a unique style for our marketing ‘postcard’ to match our film.

This years project was not only based around the film product but our also around our marketing skills, the way in which we approach the task of marketing our short film was as key as the quality of the film itself. In order to make our postcard as good as it could potentially be both me and the other group member spent a lot of time together brainstorming and coming up with multiple ideas for both the design and desired message of our postcard.

We also spent a significant amount of time researching what editing programme would be best suited to our needs during the process of creating the postcard itself, we used several on the school system and several on our own computer systems out of school.

 5) My final ‘SMART’ target for next year is to work on the improvement of my interpersonal skills, group dynamics are very important when working in close proximity with other people although never having had any real issues when previously working in these groups I believe that if the group dynamics had been better then as a group we generally would have worked momentously more successfully and the work would have been more equally split. So therefore in improving my interpersonal skills the group meetings that are held will be more productive and the group dynamics will be pleasant and easy to work with.

From the beginning of this year I believe that my interpersonal skills have improved significantly from the previous years. A necessary precursor of the positive effects on the improvement of interpersonal skills is that for the practical aspect of the course this year the class was split into smaller groups, of two sets of three's. Due to this fact, the communication within the group was key in enabling the work to be spread evenly and to allow the group to successfully complete the work task with a good atmosphere within the group and for the group to be essentially happy with the finished product. Our group acted well as a group with no tension or negative confrontation when anything went wrong, instead there was no singular blame and any opinions were taken as constructive criticism. We were willing to share our ideas and re-work our ideas until we were in a situation in which we were all happy with what we would be creating.

I believe that I achieved this target through establishing better and more positive relationships between myself and the other people within the group in which I am working within. The relevance of these relationships was that there was no tension which made group discussions pleasent, there were no arguments and generally I enjoyed working within the group and did not dread having to do either the practical work or the written work because I felt we were all cotributing evenly and all wanted to achieve smiliar standards in our work.

Post six: What makes a good short film?

   Short Films

During the process of learning how to create and produce a short film it became apparent in both our normal classes and the workshop with Becky Knapp that idea development and the documentation e.g. script writing, are essential to success of our short films.

Becky Knapp

On the 17/09/10, we had a visitor, Becky Knapp, a film and television producer for several years, well-known for her production 'Popcorn'. we engaged in a 'short film workshop' with her. In the workshop we mainly focused on script writing, she told us the basics of how to create a short film successfully:

- Taking character development into consideration.
- Thinking clearly about the time span - real time being easy and more effective.
- Budgeting - to plan realistically in terms of what you can/can't do on a budget.

To begin with Becky began to explain what a short film is, she explained that there are different lengths of short films and the aim of these films also differ.
- UNDER 5 minutes:
• Stereotypical characters as there is not time to develop characters.• No twists in the plots
• 'Joke' plots are usually the basis.

- 5 -12 minutes:
• Some time to develop characters; not completely stereotypical - still simple.
• Plots can essentially be slightly more complex involving twists.•

- 12 - 30 minutes:
• More developed characters - multiple character traits - characters avoid stereotypes.
• Two stories can run parallel through the film.

The next task Becky set us was to read through scripts of short films that she had been part of, we then watched the films. The two films that were of particular interest to me were “Does God play football?”, a film based upon the life of a little boy interested in football and the lack of a father figure to guide him when a ' miracle' takes place.

 The second was "That old one", a film based upon the central protagonist 'Tom' waking up after a night out in a woman's bed, he realises he had a one night stand and his mind creates a series of memories as he tries to remember the events of the night.

The process of studying scripts and then watching the short films was particularly helpful as it showed us the layout but also showed us the depth to which you have to go into in a script. It also showed us that the ideas for short films do not have to be complex to be successful also helping in the development of our short film script ideas. 

01/04/11
In reference to the target audiences for short films they are relatively small when compared to 'Hollywood blockbusters' - this is due to the fact that the majority of the time short films are created for a niche and not for the general public or to appeal to as many people as possible like blockbusters are. Secondly, the distribution of short films differs from bigger films due to the fact that it is limited to either the Internet e.g. YouTube and film festivals e.g. schweppes short film festival - However short films a lot of the time are not created with just the soul intent of creating a well received film but also as a way of breaking into the industry, many short film makers get the opportunity to create feature films off of the back of their short films due to meeting, impressing and initiating a professional relationship people within the industry and essentially receiving funding for their features.

In terms of the style and genre of short films, many British shorts fit within the 'social realist' range, they centre around social issues within Britain. Therefore the majority of shorts we have watched are of this genre e.g. 'about a girl' (mentioned in post 5) however not all short films are of a social realist, gritty nature we later studied 'on a life's edge and 'signs' (mentioned in post 9), these films although still trying to portray a message do it in a lighter nature and attract different kinds of audiences.

The final thing Becky spoke to us about was pre-production documentation, she explained how important it is for the whole of it to be 'spot on'. She informed us of a major problem that needs to be avoided when producing a short film that many critics, including herself have identified; 'script writers often want to include too much information in their short films'.

Post five: Audience Theory & My Short Film.

EFFECTS MODEL:

Hypodermic Needle Theory - 1920's

• The message the producers wish to present you in their text is directly 'injected' into the audience.
• This would make the audience a passive recipient of the message.
• During the 1920's the mass media e.g. newspapers were known as a type of 'authority'.

2 - step flow - 1940's

• The 'message' of a film goes from producer via a third party to the audience - the 'third party' doesn't have to be a person e.g. word of mouth, the film itself, a film critic.
• 
  
  According to this theory the audience is yet again a passive recipient.

Uses and gratifications - 1960's

• During this period of time the producer is trying to reflect what the audience wants/needs.
• What we actually get from the text.
• In this theory the audience is active.

Reception theory - 1980's

• Stuart Hall - Encoding: Producers make decisions that essentially create the 'meaning' Decoding: Audience breaking down the codes to find the 'message'.
• E.g. IF the audience reveal the intended 'message' it is preferred reading.
• Negotiated reading - This is where the audience adapt the preferred meaning to fit what they desire the 'meaning' to be.

Analysis of 4 short films:

Wasp (2003) - Directed and written by Andrea Arnold

Andrea Arnold's 'Wasp', 2003 was the first of the five short films that I watched during the process of independent study:

- The plot: Zoë, the central protagonist is a single mother who lives in a grotty, run-down house with her four children ranging in age. The family's financial circumstance is dire, they cannot afford to put food on the table, after a raged argument with another mother from the area in which they are situated Zoë's ex-boyfriend, or so we assume from the interaction they have drives past and eventually asks her out on a date. She proceeds to tell him that the four children she has with her are in fact not hers and that she is only baby-sitting. It soon becomes clear that this will be her first date in a long time. Zoë meets her ex-boyfriend up a local pub, leaving the children outside of the pub. After several events occurring in both the mother's situation and in the children's a wasp flies into the youngest child mouth, at this point the ex-boyfriend finds out that the kids are hers due to her reaction.

 

- I believe that 'Wasp' is a representation of 'broken Britain', it is meant to create a sense of moral panic through it's presentations of the diabolical state of the lives which the children in the short film are forced to live, through the sense of the numbers of single mothers rising and the concept of children mothering other children. Due to it's subject matter, 'wasp' is a highly unpleasant and to an extent uncomfortable film to watch, to say that 'Zoë' (Natalie Press) doesn't love her children would be untrue but due to her childish irresponsibility and her selfishness her loneliness is presented to the audience. As a viewer it is hard to feel any form of empathy or sympathy towards 'Zoë' as you watch her hungry children eat sugar when there is not food in the house, scrounge a portion of chips off of the floor when someone has dropped them and amuse themselves by playing on the streets.

The Most Beautiful Man In The World (2002) - Directed and written by Alicia Duffy

'The Most Beautiful Man In The World' 2002 written and directed by Alicia Duffy is the second short film I watched.

- The plot: The central protagonist is a young girl of the age of probably around ten years old, her name is 'Lacey'. She is seen on a on a 'normal' day, she watches television, plays with her dog, rides a bike and then leaves her house to explore surrounding fields. Whilst exploring the fields, a man finds her dog, the man then removes a lady-bird off of her shoulder once she has approached him. This is the first dialogue we see 'Lacey' engage in, her mother is then seen to appear at the door, 'Lacey' goes back towards her house with her dog.

- 'In this an innocent or dangerous world? Is Lacey in trouble?' I believe that many people whilst watching this short film would assume that 'Lacey' is in some sort of danger when she meets the man, due to the society of the 21st century people would assume that the man is out to harm the little girl. I personally think that the message of this short film is not revolving around the man atall, infact I would go as far as to say that he is merely a 'catalyst' for the movement of the film. The film could arguably be a representation of the isolation of children; the girl has no interaction with her mother whom we see in several shots and this 'stranger' whom we see is part of the only interaction 'lacey' has throughout the entirity of the film is merely giving the little girl the attention she seeks and craves.

Spider (2008) - Directed by Nash Edgerton

- The plot: 'It's all fun and games until someone loses an eye.'

About A Girl (2001) - Written by Julie Rutterford and directed by Brian Percival

'About A Girl' 2001 written by Julie Rutterford is the third short film I watched.

- The plot: The central protagonist is a young girl who's the product of a broken home; living with her mother and younger sibling the nameless 'girl' possesses hopeless dreams of becoming a 'pop star'. In her dysfunctional home life her father plays a very small role in seeing her one day a week and taking her to the football and to the pub. The 'girl' never tells the audience her secret directly but at the end of the film as the audience we realise she has had a baby as she disposes of the child's body in the local canal.  

- 'About a girl' winner of a 'best short film' bafta I believe similarly to 'Wasp' revolves around the pivital and controversial issue of the effect of 'Broken Britain' on children. The characterisation of 'the girl' sets her up to be both a lonely and towards the end of the film vulnerable despite her confidence speech and mannerisms. I think that generally the message of the film is about child neglect and this leading to the protagonist having to grow up too quickly this leading her into the teenage mother stereotype.

Post four: Genre as a media concept

Understanding the Term Genre

All of the information and quoting in the following slides are refrenced from 'McDougall, J.2006. The Media Teacher's Book. London: Hodder arnoldrevolved'.

Slide 1:

This slide revolves around Robert Altman (an American film director and critic) and his theories.

Theories:

1) 'That genres are defined by producers and easily recognised by audiences'.

2) 'That texts 'belong' clearly to a particular genre in each case'.

Generally due to the codes and conventions used in films it is relatively easy to distinguish what genre or sub genre the film is.

Sub genres - the mutation of genres to incorporate other genres.

3) 'That genres develop in predictable ways'.

Some  genres develop in predictable ways such as 'Sci-fi' films, due to technological development e.g. speical effects the genre will develop as technology does.

4) 'That texts in a genre share key characteristics'.
All texts in a specific genre will share certain characteristics, otherwise known as conventions. If the text did not share any of these characteristics it would not be classed as the genre, conventions must be met to follow a genre. However, the market are always wanting something new and exciting and in order to do this some conventions have to be broken but in order for the next new film to be new and exciting they must then take the convention breaking further.
- Creating something new - next films has to go further than the last.

5) 'That genres are ideological'.
Definition of Ideology

The technical formular for ideology is 'idea + group + power = ideology'; in the case of a genres is could be argued according to this formula that they are ideological the Idea (genre) + the group (audience) + the power (producer) = ideological. However it could be argued that producers have to and do both listen to and meet audience demands.

6) 'That they  are not specifically located in history'.

7) 'That genre critics are distanced from the practice of genre, or it's working'.
- Do not work with genre closely so who are they to say what genre is or isn't.

Slide 2:
Slide two is based around 'thoughts on genre'
'Might ways in which we label and divide objects, texts and people be constructed in ways that serve particular interests, rather than in logical, natural patterns?' - McDougall, J.
- This quote is revolved around the division of films into genres and sub-genres, logically and automatically people possess a habit of organising films into ‘logical natural patterns’. A example of a sub genre created using ‘logical natural patterns’ would be a romantic comedy – something like a ‘romantic horror’ does not work therefore it is not ‘logical natural patterns’.                                                          

'Should we read genre as a noun or adjective?' - Altman, R.
- Read as a noun because it is there and we are all aware of it
This question raised by Altman goes back to the original question and main questioning of the word genre itself. Genre could be considered a noun due to the fact that is it present and we are all consciously aware of it, it is also relatively like an object to an extent, like a label but a mental one, it posesses object like qualities. On the other hand genre could be instantly as an adjective as it could be viewed as a 'descriptive word'; the word 'genre' describes something about a film. Genre could be logically argued to be either/both a noun or an adjective.


Slide 3:
'Tomatoe puree' - where would you find it in a supermarket?'
'What would happen to this item if it were shelved in another part of the shop?'
'Would the thing itself be any different?'

The questions involving tomatoe puree although seeming both strange and irrelevant to the studying of genre theorty raised a lot of logical questions that at first appear to be simple but made us as a group think very differently about the genre theory as a whole.

- When asked where we thought we would find tomoatoe puree in a super market there were several very different yet valid and reasonable answers; some people said in the chillers, as to keep it cool. Some people said down a condoments isle, pairing the puree with food it would logically be placed with such as pasta. Similarly to the tomatoe puree this happens in the process of catagorising films, certain people will focus on specific aspects of the film and catagorise it according to those aspects or codes and conventions where as others will focus on other aspects this resulting in people placing the same film into different genres. This question and the following two prodcued a debate about genre, the use of it and whether it is needed.
Slide 4:
For you take as students when considering genre is NOT 'how does genre work? BUT why does genre work?

After studying and fully understanding all of the critical opinions and points raised in the previous slides I would personally state that the term 'genre' works due to the interests served through the process of labelling a film. When giving a film a label, a genre, it is not only benefitting the audience as they can get a grasp of the kind of films they enjoy but helps the film industry due to the fact that this labelling makes the process of identifying a gap in the market a much more simple process and shows what films are popular and where. So the use of genre raises and lowers the popularity of films along side the success of the film industry generally.


Slide 5:
'According to Neale (1980), gene treory is to do with circulation of expectation in circulation between industries, media texts and audiences. This leads to 'regulated variety'. Hartley (1999) describes a contract between producer and audience which 'disciplines' choices and reduces desires.


Slide 6:
So a grasp on genre theory actually leads you away from the notion that genre is an easy, blunt tool with which to produce texts along conventional lines.

For Neale, genre is a state of combinations more or less randomly distributed, and genre texts are those which form particular patterns of combinations, or atleast are seen that way by audiences or critics.

Post three: Skills

Skills Table:

In this part of the task we worked as a small group of four or so people we created a table that identifies skills that we posess in terms of exam topics;  and different types of skills; Cognitive skills, Technical skills, Interpersonal skills. After discussing what needed to be put into the table and sucessfully entering all of the needed information as a group we proceeded to explain in further detail and expanded on the points written on the table in a video that we created using a flip video.







Add any further comments you think necessary that explains your current skills level to the examiner.

5 'SMART' Targets

Within the next academic year there are several processes in all areas involved in the course that I need to improve on;



1) The first and possibly the most prominent target for me this year will be to improve the quality of my camera work and continuity, last year both I and the group in which I worked struggled to effectively recognise when we had broken the 180 º rule, otherwise known as ‘crossing the line’ in our filming. This affected the continuity of our production and therefore obviously had a knock on effect on the grade in which we received for our final product last year. This year I will spend a great deal more time making certain there are no faults in our filming and do further research into vital rules such as the 180 º rule to ensure we do not have the same problem this year.


2) The second target I have set for myself will be based around the area of editing, next year I wish to not only improve on the areas I can already do on adobe premier plus but to try and successfully carry out new and original editing styles. As we now know the basics due to the editing of our products last year, this year I plan on spending a significant amount more time extending my skills on the editing suites as to boost the grades I could possibly achieve in our final product.

3) Due to the fact that in the approaching academic year our task is to create a short film in its entirety the process of creating a treatment becomes more relevant and there is now a need for character synopsises. Another one of my targets is to improve the detail in which our narrative and characters are developed. I will achieve this by holding more group discussions therefore deciding as a group a lot more detail about both the narrative and the characters.
 4) In this years main task we will be not only creating the film product we will also be creating a ‘postcard’ for our film in terms of marketing. To create the previously mentioned ‘postcard’ we will need to use Photoshop or a programme similar in function to edit the image. In the editing we will need to interpret the conventions so that it is possible to create a unique style for our marketing ‘postcard’ to match our film.

5) My final ‘SMART’ target for next year is to work on the improvement of my interpersonal skills, group dynamics are very important when working in close proximity with other people although never having had any real issues when previously working in these groups I believe that if the group dynamics had been better then as a group we generally would have worked momentously more successfully and the work would have been more equally split. So therefore in improving my interpersonal skills the group meetings that are held will be more productive and the group dynamics will be pleasant and easy to work with.

Post two: Creativity

Creativity:

'Creative thought is a mental process involving creative problem solving and the discovery of new ideas or concepts, or new associations of the existing ideas or concepts, fueled by the process of either conscious or unconscious insight.' - Wikipedia definition of 'creativity'

'I define creativity as the act of turning new and imaginative ideas into reality. Creativity involves two processes: thinking, then producing. Innovation is the production or implementation of an idea. If you have ideas, but don't act on them, you are imaginative but not creative.' - 'What is creativity?' By Linda Naiman


'Creativity is defined as the tendency to generate or recognize ideas, alternatives, or possibilities that may be useful in solving problems, communicating with others, and entertaining ourselves and others.' - 'What is creativity?' By Northridge University

         TASK ONE: A Game Of 'Consequence'

We were split into groups of either 3 or 4, each group was given a piece of paper and a pen. Then the first person wrote down an adjective, fold the paper over so that what we had written couldn't be seen, and pass the paper on to the next person. The next person carried on the process and wrote down a noun, the next a verb, another adjective and then finally the first person wrote down a noun.

The sentence we ended up with:
'The lovely door jumped the rusty cat'

Would you consider the task 'creative'?
We then created an image representative of the above sentence, I personally think that both the sentence and image are creative in the sense that they are 'out of the ordinary' the selected words above would not usually be put into a sentence together. But on the contrary I do not think that the sentence and image are creative as the fact that they would not usually be put together makes them lack in sense, therefore the lack of sense makes them uncreative.

TASK TWO: 'The Pen'

Our next task in creativity was to create a minute long video, we were given a camera and the only stimulus we were given was a pen, we were told that we could film whatever we wanted but it had to involve the pen in some way or another. Although at first I personally found this task as a concept very confusing as the task carried on and we got into 'the swing of things' and begun to forget the very broad outline we were given and just film whatever first came to mind. The part that made this task so difficult was the fact that the clip had to be filmed in its entirety which meant that if a shot went drastically wrong we were forced to begin the filming from scratch, also without the use of 'run-camera-action' simple things such as knowing when to 'cut' became difficult.

Would you consider the task 'creative'?

This task was creative in the general sense that the stimulus allowed us all in our set groups to be relatively original in what ideas we chose to put into action and what kind of direction we chose to go down in terms of our filming. Not having a lot of direction to follow also allowed us all the independence to improve our creative skills. I'd say the concept of the task was creative and parts of the shots we used such as the ending shot were creative but I would not say that overall the video we created was especially creative.

TASK THREE: Independent Study

For this aspect of the work I chose to create a collage presenting what I consider the most important aspects of my life; the activities I enjoy participating in, the places in which I spend the most time, the people with whom I spend the most time with or key/favourable events in my life such as music festivals or holiday destinations. Once i had selected the photographs  In order to create the collage i used my favourite photogrpahs that either I personally had taken or that had been taken of me, the photogrpahs that mean that most to me.

I would label the collage I have created as 'creative' due to the fact that it is original - if other people were to carry out the same task none of the collages would be identical to mine because we are all individuals. Personality factors - differences in likes/dislikes and differences in interests and hobbies would all contribute to the differences in the creation of the collages. 

30/6/10 - I really like your thoughts on the game of consequences and if you were creative. Are you therefore saying that to you can only be creative if it makes sense? If so, not all art work makes sense to me but surely it is creative??? I'd like to see you respond to this comment in your blog. SHIPP

In terms of 'art work' it can be creative without making sense - Not all art work has to make sense to other people but i'd personally say that all art work has to make sense to at least one person, the artist. Although i'm aware of what the message within the image I created is and the message makes sense to me due to the fact that it is based on the sentence I created, I personally do not enjoy looking at the image or find it particularly mentally stimulating or relevant so I would not consider it creative.