Reflection on Week Eleven
I enjoyed this week particularly as I spent it tweaking and adjusting my project so that it was the best it could be. I have been rehearsing my cooking, making sure that I know what to do at what point so the timings are correct, and rehearsing my script to talk through. It will be a fast turnaround as I will be growing my cress for the time-lapse video up until Friday 10th December so that it will reach maximum length. This means that I will need to record Part 1 and 2 of my cooking videos on Friday, and edit them to be sent by Monday. This should not be too difficult – the only problem I can foresee is making them into a split screen.
I have also been finding an area in my kitchen where I can position my camera to have the best angle, and a way in which to position the other camera which will show an alternate angle. I have bought a ring light for filming, which includes a tripod. By this point, I also know my recipe for cooking very well, having practiced it multiple times.
The time lapse of the cress has been going well; each one has been growing and it has been great to track their process of growth. At first there were issues with some not getting as much water as others and subsequently not growing as well, but I solved this problem by using a syringe to water the mask pots. Looking at the mask pots full of cress on the plinth is quite amusing; they look like a growing jungle of cress, with small pathways going through them.
I have also been writing my script which I will be reading live over the cooking videos. I was advised in my feedback of my proposal to talk only about the cress, and my project, but I still wanted to intertwine this with narration of the cooking process. I found writing the script rather difficult as I did not want to bombard the audience with talk, and I wanted to have pauses for thought in between to give them time to think about what I have said. I personally find this rather difficult, particularly with my project as I find I have so much to say regarding it.
I was able to rehearse a part of my script over a Teams meeting with my group; this was incredibly useful as it allowed me to go through each line and tweak it and gain feedback on what reads well and what doesn’t. It also gave me ideas on other things to include in the script, such as mentions of sustainable farming. I decided that with my narration, I would make it quite emotive. This was because I wanted to make the audience really understand the impact of using disposable masks – how, if one is going to wear them, they should not just discard it outdoors, they should do so responsibly. The best outcome would be to make the audience want to find a creative cycle for the item, to repurpose it so that it can have more than one use.