During this last week, I’ve only had to focus on presenting my notebook to the group as my project was already compleated last week. Presenting the entire process felt really nice as I was able to, firstly, acknowledge myself for all the work that I’ve done, which sometimes I forget to do because of always aim for a bigger and better project. Secondly, I thought that it was very nice to share with all my colleagues my whole process and work because sometimes carrying these self-directed projects can be a bit lonely as its a journey you take on by yourself, but being able to share and show was a nice way of making the whole experience of creating a shared one.
The feedback that I received from my classmates after the presentation was also very positive and enriching and I will make sure to keep it in mind in my upcoming project.
During the weekend I also continued and finalized the extra recording I wanted to make before leaving for Christmas, in order to be able to enlarge the film “In a Nutshell” during the holidays. This is solely for my enjoyment and feeling like I have completed this project to the best of my abilities. Even though after having finished the semester it was hard to wake up early on the weekend to continue working I’m glad I pushed myself these last two days to finish the semester well.
CONCLUSION
This semester I have been more ambitious than ever and I have managed to finish the film “In a nutshell”, combining over 9 minutes of footage: visuals, audio and text. I’m glad that I finally managed to stop thinking and start creating the project right from the beginning of the semester. This was what I used to struggle the most with in the past but, thanks to developing my ideas over the summer, attending the Eye Festival and venturing to research more prolific artists (performance, installation,…) than I would normally do, I was able to break out of those ingrained habits and throw myself into the process.
During the creation of the film, I realized the number of roles involved in the making of it. Building on my last semesters’ experience of recording a documentary, I wanted to be more careful this time with the little details involved in the process, like for example the scenography, color palette, or sound. Last semester Miranda encouraged me to continue to develop my filmmaking skills in order to achieve a higher quality in my projects, so during this project I have tried to do just that. Going forward, I would like to work on my editing and delegating skills in order to collaborate with more people creatively.
Having to do so many different roles has helped me to start to understand what parts of the creative process I like best and in which direction I want to focus professionally. The parts I enjoyed the most were the creation of the storyboard, the creation of the idea and the visualization of the shots, as well as all those moments during filming and editing, where I could experiment and improvise.
The structure of the module has been a great help to me this semester both in my personal and project development. The tutorials every two weeks have been very important to me as they have kept me on schedule and given me a clear sense of progression, which was especially important in this case, due to it being a self-directed project. This semester I’ve been especially careful with bringing visual material to the tutorials in order to get founded feedback on my project. It has been key to create a successful solo project, as it has made sure that I didn’t lose touch with the rest of the world and that the project didn’t get lost in the concept.
Finally, the group workshops this semester have also been of great value to me. Since the beginning, the group clicked really well and I was able to give in to the experience of creating whilst having an artistic support group. All the stress and overload of my project were much easier to deal with knowing that at least once a week I would have three hours of shared connection and presence, the worry dolls being the icing on the cake.
All in all, I’m very happy about my development this semester and I’m looking forward to maintaining the same growth in the next.