eXplore A/V Semester Reflection

Description

My work ethic, video quality, teamwork skills, and time management skills have improved tremendously throughout this semester. I can especially see how much I've grown by looking through projects from the beginning of the year to my recent projects. The projects assigned this year consisted of:

•  Basic Procedures Video: This was an interesting project for me, particularly because I was not the person filming B-roll. However, I sketched out the shots myself and had a good idea of how I wanted it to look. We had a few problems with filming in the library, including some of the students inside, but we worked through it. I would have likes some of the shots to be framed differently, but I worked well with what I had and it turned out to be a decent looking video.
•  Interview w/ Dema Matthews: This was a great project, particularly because I had some really descriptive content to work with as well as well written voice-overs. Writing about the interview came easily to me because I really enjoy writing anyway. 
• Hobby Video w/ Rylee Kramer: I liked this project, I don't feel like it reflects the best of what I can do but I liked my voice-overs and my use of B-Roll. I think the most memorable part of this project for me would be that my interview was extremely overexposed. My partner and I were having so many technical issues while filming the interview that I probably didn't notice.
• Blood Drive: This was the project in which I realized that the quality of your interviews can really make or break how nicely "put together" your video sounds. My interviews were difficult because I had to really coax people to talk more, but luckily I found a debate/theatre student who was willing to really elaborate over every question. Asking questions to interviewees came very natural to me, because I am typically a very social person in real life and don't feel stressed about talking to people I don't know. I was gone on a few days of editing for the show I was in so I revised the project later to make sure it was at the standard I wanted it to be.
• ONW NOW: This project was very satisfying to me on my (and my partner's) part. Dema and I got great footage of a live event and I edited the video/did the voice-overs well. Even though I was an anchor, I believe that I contributed very well to the project and took a leadership role when I could see that some things needed to get done/needed help. 

Reaction

Even though this semester went very well, I did notice a few issues. My work ethic at the beginning of the year was good, but not at the level that it is now. I could have payed more attention to deadlines and planned accordingly. I always ended up getting everything turned in on time, but I could have saved myself the stress and confusion that would sometimes occur a few days before a due date. While collaborating, it was easy to get caught up in my own ideas for how a project should be carried out, so sometimes I caught myself being a little too overpowering. When I could feel myself doing this, I held back and and really focused on what everyone had to say. I don't think this was too much of an issue, but it was definitely an internal struggle I faced a few times. A key event that really changed my performance was learning about J and L edits in class.  I had noticed them before and I immediately understood how they worked. I believe my work looked 10X better once I started using this technique. 

Evaluating and Analysis

I believe that taking on the role of Anchor in the ONW NOW project was important to the quality of our video because I have exceptional speaking skills due to my background in theatre. However, I believe I also could have been a director or producer. I helped take charge of the group and contributed in many different ways to the overall project. A common conflict among my group was about who was doing what, and about who was allowed to do it. I remember being told a few times that I needed to tell the directors/producers "what was going on" even though it was not my job to inform the leaders of the group about what was happening (the role of the director/producer was to be on top of things and have a clear idea of how everything was being carried out). I think this would have bothered me less if everyone was fulfilling the purpose of their roles that they had chose, but sometimes this was not the case. However, everything turned out well in the end, even though we were rushed to film our ONW NOW segment and scripts were altered/text was hard to read as an anchor. 

Learning and Action Plan

Similar to my description, I learned about time management, teamwork skills,  technical skills, and soft skills. J and L edits, framing, white-balance, the blade tool, back space and front space-keys, favoriting clips, and naming clips were the technical features I used most and also improved in greatly. I covered lots of information over soft skills in my previous topics, but I believe I've grown in every one. 

Action Plan

In order to improve next semester, I will work on time management, collaboration, and technical skills. I will make sure to always be on task and always be on the look out to see how my projects could be better. Finding ways to improve is very important to me because I would like to grow not only as a film maker but also as a creative thinker. I hope to learn elements on cinematography, professionalism, script writing, and framing techniques. I can't wait for entertainment video but I have also enjoyed journalism a lot. Being a journalist is a potential career path for me, especially when it comes to writing. This semester has been great and I can't wait to see more improvements in my work over the next semester.