CHRISTOPHER VICKERS #0702394 INDEPENDENT PRACTICE 3B: SUMMATION & PRODUCTION EGRD3015
USING THIS DOCUMENT HYPERLINKS Throughout this document I will be linking you to external video links and websites on the Internet. Images used as links will be described so in text. In all other cases links will appear as they do HERE This will allow me to make comments about moving image or live websites and will allow me to link you to the actual thing.
LOOKING BACK: PREVIOUS UNIT:
Work featured on this spread is from a previous unit that led to the creation of How We Work.
PREVIOUS UNIT: RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT
subject in question was far too much for myself alone, I needed some help.
VISIT SUBMISSION SITE HERE
EXAMPLES
Please visit this link above to see examples of research and development that led to the creation of How We Work as both a brand and a project. I will not spend too much time discussing this work as it is from a previous unit, and was analysed and evaluated at that time, but I feel that it has had a heavy influence on all I have done on this unit.
Please click on any surrounding images on this spread to view my early experimentations. Films include The Milkmen, Do you have any?, Links, Freeze Festival and Demolition.
DEVELOPMENT Unit EGRD3014 allowed me to experiment with film, which until then, was something I was quite unfamiliar with. The sometimes unnerving experience was ultimately a rewarding one as it allowed me to develop skills in film making and start to enjoy the process. At this stage, I was influenced mainly by documentaires I found on VimeoT. A small selection can also be viewed on my submission site, found HERE. PROBLEMS I soon discovered that there was an important reason why there are usually a large number of credits at the end of films whether long or short.. I found that controlling what I wanted to shoot, getting the right shots of it, capturing audio and communicating with the
LOOKING BACK: THE FIRST INSTALMENT - HOW WE WORK
This video was the first step in my investigations into young creatives. In this instance we were focusing mainly on where they work.
THE FIRST INSTALMENT THE BIRTH: This video was made as a final outcome of the last unit. It became the starting point of this one. THE IDEA: Drawing upon my numerous attempts of video, and realising that I needed assistance in getting better results, I decided to pair up with FPI student Sophie Bannister to investigate the personal workspaces of young creatives. We decided to interview a dozen creatives, all of whom were still studying or recently graduated. We asked them to describe their likes and dislikes of where they work. We soon found out that most of these people had numerous frustrations with their spaces, yet they refused to let it restrict their creativity and what they do. THE PROBLEMS One of the biggest problems I had was negotiating all the camera equipment around the small student rooms we were filming in. I also feel that at times due to the size and presence of the 2 HD broadcast cameras we were using our subjects were not as comfortable in answering questions as they could be. Lighting levels were constantly changing as we
moved around rooms. I feel at the time of filming I wasn’t paying as much attention as I could to this and as a result this fluctuates quite a lot throughout the film. THE BRAND We decided that the film we created could also be a launching pad for a new project all together, which after careful consideration we called How We Work. The 12 minute video, which can be viewed HERE has been viewed in excess of 450 times now through the site, Vimeo and embeds.
LOOKING BACK: FMP PROPOSAL:
Written at the beginning of March 2011 as an outline to what I wanted to achieve. As seen on my submission site HERE
FMP PROPOSAL Written 3rd March 2011 HOW WE WORK How We Work is a new blog that will be exploring young creative’s work spaces. We aim to inspire you, not through showing you a lifestyle that is out of reach, but by showcasing you, me, and how we work. PROPOSED MEDIA/ OUTCOME: My final outcome for the independent practice, ‘How We Work’ was an outcome that was both enjoyable and interesting to work on. I have now seen the potential in this, as a brand; blog, and identity. It is something that I would really like to build upon this unit. I want to continue to explore young creative’s work spaces as a theme and find more examples of ‘how we work’. This could come in the form of photography, film, interview but ultimately will become content for an online blog. I will be constantly producing work for the project and as this body of work builds up it could give me the opportunity to create an editorial or create a show or exhibition of the works in addition to the blog.
project has already started. I would plan to continuously add varying content to the project until roughly 3-4 weeks prior to hand-in, in which I will then switch to look for a way of positioning my project externally, be it an exhibition, editorial, or a combination of both. PRACTICAL EXPERIENCE I know that I would enjoy doing this for my FMP as I’ve enjoyed it as my final outcome for this unit. I don’t have a lot of prior knowledge about this kind of project as a whole but do have experience now in film and photography, which would become an important part of the project. I am currently exercising skills in web design, and propose to build upon these as the project builds. INTENDED AUDIENCE The audience of this project would be similar to the kind of people that would feature in it. Young creatives, or recent graduates that would be interested and/ or inspired by the ways in which others work. INFLUENCES Some projects I have seen which I have drawn inspiration from can be found below:
KEY DATES:
BLOOD SWEAT & FEARS
As I have already launched the brand and released a first video the time frame to which I will work on the
THIS YEAR I WILL TRY NOT TO THE SELBY
BRANDING:
The logo and application of the logo has been designed so that it is simple enough so not to clash with any media it is applied to but striking enough to strengthen the brand.
HOW WE WORK BRANDING www.howwework.co.uk THE IDEA The idea was to design a simple typographic logo that could be applied to anything related to the brand of How We Work. It needed to be instantly recognisable and easy to read. It also needs to be integrated within film, or have a version of the logo that will do so. AESTHETIC I decided to keep the logo very simple so that it wouldn’t detract from the features it was applied to. I figured that as I would be filming a range of different people, in different locations that keeping the logo black and white would ensure that it wouldn’t clash with anything it was put next to of over the top of. ‘How We Work’, in white, centre aligned and set in Futura would then be used continuously to strengthen it as a recognisable brand. CONTINUITY The logo appears on the How We Work website, at the beginning and end of each film, all stationary and across all related media for the project to keep it consistant throughout. USING THE LOGO As the logo is typographic
I have tested it and set a minimum size that it can be reduced to, any smaller than this size and it either becomes illegible. The minimum size reduction, 15mmx15mm (shown below)
When used with film the logo should be used without the black square and instead just show the white type which sits static over the moving image.
INSPIRATION:
Todd Selby is in your place is a collection of predominately photographic shoots in creative peoples spaces. The occasional film directed by Todd are also very beautifully crafted.
INSPIRATION: TODD SELBY IS IN YOUR PLACE BACKGROUND Todd Selby is a portrait, interiors, and fashion photographer and illustrator. His project The Selby offers an insider’s view of creative individuals in their personal spaces with an artist’s eye for detail. INSPIRATION I was introduced to Todd Selby’s website, found HERE, by Sophie Bannister, who helps me with this project. She suggested that it would be a good place to look for inspiration, as Todd Selby does a similar thing to what we wanted to achieve. He visits people in their own spaces and documents what he finds. REFLECTION I see our project How We Work in a similar light to The Selby but I feel that our audience and subjects are at opposite sides of the spectrum. I purchased Todd’s book (right) and found page after page of successful people with bespoke spaces, grand designs full of life’s luxuries. I realised that seeing endless amounts of people who have ‘made it’ could become tiring, whereas, showcasing the new, the upcoming and the future is more interesting. Credit where credit is due,
The Selby is a project is beautiful, the photography, the direction of films and the diverse nature of the people he features was very inspiring. Something for me to aspire to, in stylistic terms if nothing else.
VIDEO STATISTICS:
Upload date: 20th January 2011 Views: 295 Likes: 3
DISSERTATION OVER GO CELEBRATE THE IDEA I was keen to continue producing video responses to young creative activities but was finding it hard to find time. I was going through the hell of writing my dissertation and was spending most of my time in the library. I then realised I wasn’t alone and that there were plenty of people going through the same torture, hence How We Work’s second video called Dissertation over - Go celebrate which can be viewed HERE. PROBLEMS So I didn’t disturb anyone from their own work I chose not to include any dialogue in this video. This restricted me for what I could shoot. REFLECTION I enjoyed the quick turnaround for this video and the restrictions of only allowing myself one afternoon to shoot footage and the evening to edit was surprisingly rewarding. I feel that the video was well received amongst people who had also just handed in their dissertations. It made me start to think about the timings of my videos and how I could start linking my project in with social and cultural occurrences.
VIDEO STATISTICS:
Upload date: 9th February 2011 Views: 408 Likes: 5
TATTOO ARTIST - WILL THOMSON Will Thomson made an interesting subject as he dropped out of University to follow his passion of tattoos. Link to the video HERE. THE IDEA The idea behind this video was to take How We Work in a new direction and to start focusing on individuals. PROBLEMS Although bringing a tripod to the shooting venue I barely used it as I was busy trying to captures the shots I wanted before they vanished. As a result the video shakes in parts. The lighting between the three rooms I captured footage in varied greatly. I didn’t realise until the editing process. I struggled to correct it so it all appears very yellow in the video. REFLECTION This video was different from others before it, as it documents a creative event rather than just a creative space. I feel that this gave me far more freedom to capture shots, allowing me to try a range of different viewpoints on the same event. This gave me far more footage to edit with, which ultimately created a more exciting and engaging film.
VIDEO STATISTICS:
Upload date: 28th February 2011 Views: 197 Likes: 38
SUBJECTS FOR CHANGE EXHIBITION - MICHAEL HENLEY Video can be seen HERE. THE IDEA Through a connection of friends I heard that Michael Henley was curating a show at the Red Gate Gallery in London. He was looking for someone to create a video of the event and I was looking to produce another video that may appeal to my target audience. PROBLEMS The Red Gate Gallery is a very nice location, and is situated under a railway arch near Brixton. Due to its location there is no natural light and any sound inside echoes. At regular intervals the entire place trembles as a train speeds overhead. Not the ideal filming location I can assure you. I struggled with lighting for this shoot but made the aesthetic decision to allow the video to keep it’s yellow colouring, after all it really does look like that in there! As I was shooting under pressure before the opening of the show I didn’t spend enough time managing the sound and would have really benefitted from a clip on mic, which was purchased after this event. I feel as though this pressure also got to me when I was
setting up the camera for the interview. The framing of Michael isn’t ideal as it shows very little of the exhibition behind. It is also terribly out of focus, which was disappointing. Keeping true to my subject matter, I had to produce the video regardless of this poor quality and chose to learn from it instead of dwell on it. REFLECTION I feel that I learnt more during this feature than any other, solely for the amount of problems encountered.
VIDEO STATISTICS:
Upload date: 5th March 2011 Views: 268 Likes: 36
BOTSCENE CLOTHING MYLES HUNT Video can be seen HERE. How We Work took a day trip to Norwich in order to feature Myles. THE IDEA Myles runs clothing company from a shed at the bottom of his parents garden. The idea behind this video was to capture the essence of a young creative doing something for himself and having the confidence to build something of his own from scratch. PROBLEMS Myles was rather camera shy so we conducted the interview twice in order to have more footage and more answers to work with, it’s lucky we did really as the mic we were using was somehow picking up some interference from one of our mobile phones. I only realised this when I started editing the footage. REFLECTION I really enjoyed this feature. I felt as though I had learnt from previous mistakes, and made a conscious effort to still get the shots I wanted but with the aid of a tripod. I felt as though I was beginning to get some consistency now and my videos were taking on a style that would relate back to the How We Work brand.
VIDEO STATISTICS:
Upload date: 17th March 2011 Views: 185 Likes: 20
WOODCUT PRINTING AARON KITNEY Video can be seen HERE. THE IDEA At times we found it hard to find people that would make interesting subject matter. Thankfully, my class and house mate Aaron Kitney was starting an exciting project where he was producing large woodcut illustrations and printing them using a press at University. I wanted to document the entire process so started filming him as he worked over a few days in a week. I planned to integrate timelapse footage as well as the standard interview and footage of the process. PROBLEMS Throughout this project camera availability has been an issue. Thankfully I was able to borrow one from a friend. I had to negotiate noisy and crowded working areas in order to get Aaron in a fitting location for the interview. I managed to overcome this by setting up some printing equipment in a room to mock up a print room environment.
VIDEO STATISTICS:
Upload date: 5th April 2011 Views: 140 Likes: 13
STYLIST- SARAH BELL Video can be seen HERE. Sarah was featured in our first ever How We Work video where we interviewed her at her desk in her bedroom. We decided to revisit her while she was styling and photographing a fashion shoot in the studio. THE IDEA As we had already spoke to Sarah before and she had expressed how she used her desk space and room to prepare for shoots I wanted to make sure it showcased the work she does outside of that environment. THE DAY I spent most of the day with Sarah and filmed her building her set, styling her model, then photographing and filming her. I had learnt by this stage that the more footage you get, editing becomes far easier. I brought my laptop so that I could fill a card, upload the data and then continue filming the day as it unfolded. PROBLEMS I managed to overcome the only problem I had on this shoot by using it as a positive. As Sarah shot her model the lighting rigs would dip to black before recharging for the next release. This caused my footage to have flashes of bright light and spells of darkness. I decided to use
this as a method of cutting between shots to imitate the flash of the camera but through the lens of the video camera. I feel it worked successfully and added drama to the film. REFLECTION Due to the nature of the photography studios, I had very dramatic lighting to work with. I felt that this would add to the aesthetic of the video so I decided to use it to the best of my ability. I often set up my camera so that both Sarah and the model were lit beautifully by the lights.
JOTTA: A PARTNERSHIP
In a new partnership with Jotta, they will find content for How We Work to feature and then share the video on their site.
JOTTA - A PARTNERSHIP Jotta’s website can be found HERE for reference. CREATIVE OPPORTUNITIES I got to a stage half way through this project where I wanted to inject more diversity into my features and not just focus upon friends and people at Uni. I decided that by trying to get my project featured on websites that were popular with young creatives that I would not only find new people to feature but spread the awareness of How We Work. After an exchange of emails with Camilla Sundwall at YCN, she recommended that I contacted Jotta as they might be interested in listing the project under their creative opportunities section of their site, found HERE. To my delight, Millie Ross at Jotta said she’d list it for me, but she was also interested in ‘content sharing’ as my project fit in well with Jotta’s ethos of promoting young creatives. MEETING I was invited into Jotta’s offices in Newburgh Street, London to talk with Millie Ross, their content director about how a possible partnership could be developed between us. It was decided that Jotta would use their contacts and portfolios held within
their site to find potential people, places and projects for us to feature for our How We Work project. The resulting videos, which would also credit Jotta, would then be used for both our site and theirs. REFLECTION I was delighted that Jotta could see the potential in my project and saw it at a high enough quality to be used for their site, which boasts an audience of up to 10,000 people weekly. As I’ve highlighted earlier in this document, I was keen to venture out beyond friends and people at University, so knowing that content finding was being managed for me has allowed me to focus more on the aesthetic and message of my videos. TIMINGS Upon writing this analysis of this new found partnership I am unaware of how successful it may be. I have shot, edited and exported our first video under this partnership but am yet to see how it will be integrated into Jotta’s website as they are waiting for their web content designers. I will hopefully know more before my viva voce.
VIDEO STATISTICS:
Upload date: 4th May 2011 Views: 59 Likes: 8
T.H.I.S.- STEVE ALLBUTT & LUKE DROZD Video can be seen HERE. THE IDEA As our first video in partnership with JOTTA we wanted to ensure that we produced this film taking into account all of the things I had learnt from those before it. T.H.I.S, also known as Tottenham Hale International Studios was our first video of this kind. The plan was to conduct a studio visit and capture the ethos, ideologies and setup of this studio. THE DAY After a series of email correspondence we arrived in Tottenham Hale, slightly nervous as we knew nothing about the people we were meeting other than what their website said about them. Instantly put at ease by a friendly welcome into the studio we were taken on a tour of the building and had the history of the collective and the space explained to us. The converted church building was interesting so I made sure I captured plenty of footage of the open spaced area, but also obtained some close ups to give me some editing options for later. After settling into the environment and breaking
the tension with a cup of tea and some biscuits we decided to interview both Luke Drozd and Steve Allbutt. PROBLEMS As there wasn’t too much activity happening in the studio on the day of our visit there were few things to film. Instead I decided to focus on the beauty of the interior of the place. IMPROVEMENTS MADE Even when I had used a clip on mic to increase sound quality I was finding that I still got a lot of static noise. For this video though, I followed some tutorials of how to minimise the noise levels in Final Cut Pro. As it stands I am waiting on JOTTA to add the video to their site, which was part of the agreement to our partnership. When this happens I am hoping that it will build awareness to this video and earlier features while also building traffic to our site and knowledge of the project. You can visit the site for T.H.I.S. HERE.
RESEARCH: MANIFESTO
From my research into manifestos I decided that I would be best suited in trying to write a vox populi, or ‘voice of the people’ instead.
MANIFESTO/ VOX POPULI THE IDEA As this project started to build some momentum it dawned on me that I was dealing with a lot of different people with varying opinions on being a young and being creative. I thought that it would make be interesting if I pulled some of my findings together and construct a How We Work manifesto. After further research into and deliberation about what it was I was trying to say with a manifesto I decided that it wasn’t a manifesto that I wanted to create but a vox populi, which translates as ‘voice of the people’. VOX POPULI I didn’t actually want to make too much of a serious statement, but just build a single ‘voice’ through collating a number of different peoples ideas. INSPIRATION I read some (not all) of the manifestos held within the book ‘100 Artists’ Manifestos - From the Futurists to the Stuckists (right). I found that a lot of the long-winded ones often became too intense and I either lost interest, gave up, or found that they took themselves too seriously.
The most successful manifestos, in my opinion were the ones that either listed points or were short enough to read quickly so that time was better spent thinking about what you had read rather than a struggle to finish the thing. I engaged most with ones that used lists or short points to express opinion rather than over thought rambles. With this in mind I set about thinking what questions I could ask young creatives that would allow me to build my vox populi, after all I wanted to build it using the ‘voice’ of the people - not my own!
INSPIRATION: STUDS TERKEL
WORKING - ‘People talk about what they do all day and how they feel about what they do’ has been a very inspiring book for this project, just a shame I didn’t find it sooner.
STUDS TERKEL People talk about what they do all day and how they feel about what they do. THE BOOK Introduced to Studs Terkel by Luke quite late into my project I began to skim over his book entitled ‘working’. Although not specific to creatives, the book features write ups from interviews with people talking about their jobs. From a policeman to a piano tuner, to a film critic this book goes into incredible detail about the lives of ‘everyday people’. INSPIRATIONS This book made me think about what kind of questions I could ask people that would allow them to open up to me, or Sophie, depending on which of us was conducting the interview. This thought wasn’t solely for the purpose of creating a vox populi but also in terms of interview for our films. Reading just one interview with a barber from this book gave me a great sense of personality of the person. I feel that if I connected with someone in this way for any part of the How We Work project then it would definitely be beneficial.
VOX POPULI: QUESTIONING
Four simple questions asked to a random sample of approximately fifty young creatives to build the How We Work vox populi.
VOX POPULI QUESTIONING THE IDEA I decided to ask a sample of young creatives a range of questions specifically to gain material for my vox populi. I had found that when I spoke to people in person, like when I interview them for a film, that their answers seemed more genuine and sincere. I thought that this would be better than emailing out a set of questions and giving someone too long to consider their answers. We borrowed dictaphones from the media store and set ourselves the target of asking fifty young creatives around the University campus the same four questions. We also sent emails to people we had already featured in films and asked them the same. QUESTIONS The four questions that were asked were; -What is the beauty in being a young creative? -Why do you bother to do what you do? -What keeps you going? -How will you know when you have ‘made it’? ANSWERS The answers were then transcribed and examined for points of interest, reoccurring trends or originality in responses.
From the answers, eight vox populis were made. These were then shared amongst my peers and altered until one worked it’s way out as one that expressed the majority of views.
WHY DO I BOTHER? WHY DOES ANYBODY BOTHER? I LITERALLY DON’T THINK I COULD DO ANYTHING ELSE. I LOVE DOING IT, PURE AND SIMPLE PASSION. I LIVE, BREATH, SLEEP WHAT I DO. CIGARETTES, ALCOHOL, COFFEE, WHAT EVER KEEPS ME SANE. IT’S ABOUT THE POSSIBILITIES. THE IDEA THAT I MIGHT SUCCEED. THROUGH THICK AND THIN I’LL GET THERE.
RESEARCH/ INSPIRATION
The book ‘Format’ helped me to decide how I wanted to design my vox pop and what form it would take.
DESIGN / FORM THE IDEA After creating a ‘voice’ for my project through the vox populi I had a perfect opportunity to design and distribute some printed matter to help promote the How We Work project. INSPIRATIONS I borrowed ‘Format’ (right) from the library and started to look for ideas for the size and format. While looking through, I came across Ravensbourne College’s prospectus for 2002/2003. Awarded a professional award for brochures and catalogues it was the folded wrap-around cover that gave me an idea. THE FORM Shown below, you can hopefully see that the folded wrap around leaves a narrow window that reveals some of the cover beneath. Knowing that I didn’t have enough content to create a catalogue or brochure I decided to use the folded idea for a A2 sized poster. I decided to have the vox populi on one side of the poster and have information about the project and the people featured in it on the other side.
DESIGN / FORM THE FINISHED POSTER: SIDE 1
WHY DO I BOTHER, WHY DOES ANYBODY BOTHER . I LITERALLY DON’T THINK I COULD DO ANYTHING ELSE. I LOVE DOING IT, PURE AND SIMPLE. PASSION. I LIVE, BREATH, SLEEP WHAT I DO. CIGARETTES, ALCOHOL, COFFEE, WHAT EVER KEEPS ME SANE. IT’S ABOUT THE POSSIBILITIES. THE IDEA THAT I MIGHT SUCCEED.
How We Work, exploring the world of young creatives who break the boundaries and push work in exciting new directions, regardless.
A reply to those who question our drive, our creativity, our passion. We are the next generation of creatives and we are more determined than any before us.
THROUGH THICK AND THIN I’LL GET THERE.
The How We Work vox populi: An infusion of quotes from interviews with young creatives. WWW.HOWWEWORK.CO.UK
DESIGN / FORM THE FINISHED POSTER: SIDE 2 BEN EWING. .
GRAPHIC DESIGNER
Q: What’s the best thing about being a young creative? A: I don’t have any boundaries. I do what I want, when I want. I set my own rules!
JAMES MCKENZIE-BLYTH GRAPHIC DESIGNER
www.benewing.co.uk
www.flyotw.co.uk
JENNI SNOWDON
FASHION IMAGING
Q: If you could pass on one piece of advice to other young creatives, what would it be? A: Don’t worry about what you are going to do with your creativeness, just try everything. www.jenniferlouise.co.uk
WWW.HOWWEWORK.CO.UK
SARAH BELL
STYLIST
Q: What is the best thing about being a young creative?
LAURA PARSONS
A: The idea of being able to be free and having a fresh outlook.
FASHION PROMOTION
www.sarahbell.net
Q: What is the best thing about being a young creative? A: The best thing about being a young creative is undoubtedly the freedom and passion.
AARON KITNEY
GRAPHIC DESIGNER/ WOODCUT PRINTER Q: What was it that made you want to be a graphic designer? A: There were only a few subjects in school I fully engaged with, those being music and art. I studied Fine Art at college, which I loved. However I didn’t want a career as a fine artist so I choose graphic design. Within Graphic Design I can still embrace my earlier fine art influences, but with more context within my designs. www.aaronkitney.com
MICHAEL SPEED
ILLUSTRATOR
MICHAEL HENLEY...
EXHIBITION CURATOR Q: If you could pass on one bit of advice to other young creatives, what would it be? A: Keep going! Just keep creating, and above all learn to love coffee and very, very late nights! www.michaelhenleyillustration. blogspot.com
WILLIAM MCGREGOR
DIRECTOR
www.williammcgregor.co.uk
ALHADY ALI
GRAPHIC DESIGNER Q: How will you know when you’ve ‘made it’? A: At this moment in time I could say that I’ve already ‘made it’, as Graphic Design is something I love doing. What does ‘made it’ really mean? As long as you’re doing something you enjoy, you won’t need to ‘work a day in life’.
EMILY SNELL
FASHION JOURNALIST Q: Where do you get your inspiration from?
www.alhadyali.co.uk
A: Life experience. There is nothing like going out there into the unknown and experiencing everything first hand. My writing is much stronger when I have a personal connection to the subject. www.the-jaunt.co.uk
TOMASZ STASZAK
MUSIC PRODUCER
MYLES HUNT
BOTSCENE CLOTHING Q: How will you know when you have ‘made it’?
BEN GARDINER
GRAPHIC ARTIST / ILLUSTRATOR
A: Being able to afford to wear a brand new pair of socks for each day of the year.
Q: How will you know when you’ve ‘made it’?
www.botsceneclothing.com
A: The idea of ‘making it’ I’m not hugely fussed by, as long as I’m happy in what I’m doing, that’s all that I care about. www.benjamingardiner.co.uk
WILL THOMSON
TATTOO ARTIST
Q: What is your biggest inspiration? A: My biggest inspiration in a funny kind of way, are shit tattoos. I tattoo people who, in my opinion have the most awful tattoos you could imagine done by so called “pros”. It spurs me on to learn more and more about techniques so that I never produce anything as shocking as what I see! www.thomsontattoos.blogspot.com
SKYE PENNANT
KNITWEAR DESIGNER Q: If you could pass on one piece of advice to other young creatives, what would it be? A: Always, always, stick to what you believe in. It sounds corny, but creativity is a totally individual thing and you have to go with what you want to do, because that’s what makes you creative. Don’t ever let anyone squash your ideas!
DESIGN AND FORM
Overall I am very pleased with the design, feel and message of the printed vox populi. As a first experience of commercial printing, I found it very interesting and learnt a lot.
PRINTED VOX POPULI THE IDEA The idea behind the printed vox pop is to send/hand it out so it’s used as an advert and to drive traffic to the project and it’s website. In order to achieve this, the double sided folded poster contains a positioning statement, link to the website and is heavily branded with the projects logo and style. THE AESTHETIC I wanted the poster to be eye-catching and felt that although the main colours for the brand were black and white, that there should be an injection of colour. I wanted to batch print these at a professional printers and made the decision to use cyan as a spot colour. The reason for this being that throughout our website, links appeared in this colour so it was in-keeping with the rest of the brand identity. Unfortunately the printers I used (Adams Printers in Dover) couldn’t produce the bespoke folding I had designed as the first fold was along the long edge of the A2 paper and their machine wasn’t big enough. Due to this I am having to fold them by hand which is very time consuming. DISTRIBUTION I am now looking in how the poster can be packaged
in order to easily send it through the post. I need to work this out so that they can be sent out to people we have featured, want to feature or that may be interested in the project. A hit-list, which includes various design blogs is being devised so that hopefully the project may be picked up and featured on another popular site. REFLECTION There was a lot of development and thought that went into the production of this document. I feel looking back that I am very happy with the design, feel and message of the piece. My only slight disappointment has got to be that I didn’t consider checking whether the printer could do the fold I needed before committing to the print. I could have maybe designed the fold so that it was folded from the short edge first and it could have then fit into the machine.
SOCIAL SCENE
After writing my dissertation about the power of social media to advertise, I set How We Work up on both Twitter and Facebook, allowing us as a brand to communicate on a personal level with people.
SOCIAL MEDIAS FACEBOOK How We Works Facebook, linked HERE now boasts 78 members. The idea to move onto Facebook as another platform was to increase the opportunity for the project to be shared and discussed. After writing my dissertation on advertising and social media I understand the power and strength that this tool can bring. TWITTER @ HOWWEWORK Our Twitter page now has 69 members following us. This number is steadily increasing as we tend to pick up a handful of new followers each week. Twitter as a platform allows us to advertise new features, blogposts and also keep people updated on the progress of our project. It also gives us a great opportunity to communicate to people about our project on a more person level. REFLECTION By tapping into social medias the aim is to gain a bigger audience and spread awareness for the project. Twitter in particular has allowed me to effectively hold conversations with people that mat be interested in what we do.
AWARENESS:
With over 2,000 views collectively on my projects videos I can confidently say that people are beginning to engage with How We Work.
PRESS/ MENTIONS WHERE Thanks to Vimeo statistics I have been able to keep track on where videos have been embedded. I found that most videos usually appeared on the blogs/ websites of the people featured but also appear in other places. Jotta, as mentioned previously in this document has got to be the most ‘high profile’ place my project has featured, but there are also a few examples of how people have started to engage with it. Josh Turnip, a young creative from Croydon found my project somehow and included it on his blog, seen HERE. It was interesting to see that he enjoyed the film and went a step further to explain how he works. I am hoping that as the partnership with Jotta progresses that this will drive more people to the project. VIEWS Collectively my videos have had over 2,000 views and this number is growing by the day. I believe that this figure suggests that people are engaging with my project and that it is seen to be at a high enough standard to be taken as a genuine brand.
EVALUATING:
15 weeks for one project summarised by one evaluation.
EVALUATION INTENSIONS I feel that I haven’t deviated too much from my original intensions for this unit, as outlined in my FMP PROPOSAL which can be found earlier in this document. I feel that the reason for this is because right from the outset I knew what I wanted to do.
produce them to a high enough standard. Looking back I feel that this insight was probably based more upon nerves rather than fact as I feel my videos are of a good standard. This can be supported by the fact that Jotta have seen the potential in the project and films and were interested in building a partnership. ITERATION
I gained a lot of confidence from my previous unit (EGRD3014) where ‘How We Work’ was born out of my ‘final outcome’. I learned a lot through the films I was watching and making for myself. I gained the skills needed that helped me decide what shots I wanted to get and how I wanted to string them together through the editing process. I feel as though with each film I produce they get better, yet I am not too short-sighted and can see vast room for improvement, which I still want to strive to achieve.
As stated throughout this unit, with each film I shot and edited I encountered some kind of problem. I found that as I worked on one issue to improve for the next film that new problems materialised. Now, with eight films made under the brand of How We Work, I can see an overall improvement.
This earlier experimentation put me in a great position to continue my last unit’s work and make ‘How We Work’ go live and produce more insightful documentaries on my chosen subject matter of young creatives.
SKILLS
RESERVATIONS I made comments in my evaluation for the previous unit that I didn’t want my FMP to be based solely around film as I was nervous about not being able to
I feel that the only way to really improve on something is to keep doing it. Producing these films has just spurred me on to want to know more, learn more and do more.
My ability to work with film is something I definitely feel far more confident with now. From framing a shot, to editing them together I feel my work has improved. I understand that capturing more footage than you think you’ll need is best and that filming the same act from different angles opens up a wide range of editing possibilities when putting the final cut together.
I also have learned various methods to put people at ease so that their actions and answers form interviews seem as natural as possible. INSPIRATIONS Getting familiar with the work of Studs Terkel has been really interesting. It has also installed a lot of belief for my project within me and made me realise that it’s something that people would find interesting. Todd Selby’s work too has been good to look at, even if it only seems to focus on what most of us will never have, successful people showcased in their beautifully original abodes. I feel like I have been influenced by both Terkel and Selby and positioned my project somewhere in between the two. Showcasing everyday people, like Terkel, but documenting it in a way similar to Selby. STRUGGLES At times I have had difficulties, especially trying to juggle the balance of filming people when it’s convenient for them and being able to book out the required equipment from the media store. I have been rescued on a few occasions by a friend letting me borrow their camera and to them I am very grateful. Sound has been a reoccurring issue throughout this project and I am under
no illusion why it usually takes a small army of many people to create a short film or documentary. To combat this problem, I followed various tutorials to learn how to work with sound and minimise noise and other interference, as well as spending time to get to know the mic I was using. I also managed to get FPI student Sophie Bannister to join me with How We Work and her help in marketing, content direction and interviewing has been of major significance. I am not totally happy with any one film from this project, quite often I will wish I had shot a certain action from another angle, worked to get better focus or caught something else on film. Instead of dwelling on these shortcoming I made a choice to work with these restrictions and edit the best film I could with what I could get in one filming session. With more time, a budget, and a small team of people for help, I’d love to direct a more substantial film under the brand of How We Work. FUTURE I am keen to continue work on this project and try to build upon what I have already achieved during this project. We live in a time where there is a growing blog culture, and I honestly feel that there is space for a site that does what we do.
BIBLIOGRAPHY WEBSITES BOTSCENE CLOTHING www.botsceneclothing.com HOW WE WORK www.howwework.co.uk JOTTA www.jotta.com PREVIOUS SUBMISSION SITE www.christophervickers.co.uk/submission THE SELBY www.theselby.com T.H.I.S. www.thistudios.com VIMEO www.vimeo.com/howwework THE WHITE PENCIL www.thewhitepencil.tumblr.com
BOOKS Ambrose, Gavin. Harris, Paul. DESIGN BASICS: FORMAT. (2005) AVA Publishing. Danchev, Alex. 100 ARTISTS’ MANIFESTOS. From the Futurists to the Stuckists. (2011) Penguin Modern Classics. Selby, Todd. THE SELBY IS IN YOUR PLACE. (2010) Abrams. Terkel, Studs. WORKING. People Talk about What They Do All Day and How They Feel about What They Do. (1972). The New Press. Vaynerchuk, Gary. WHY NOW IS THE TIME TO CRUSH IT! (2009). Harper Studio.
FINAL OUTCOME(S) For final outcome for this unit visit: (if you haven’t already)
www.howwework.co.uk
W W W.HOW WE WORK.CO.UK