Evaulation

With the project now done and dusted, this is my evaluation of how everything went.

I think the overwhelming theme of this post can be summarised as learning to understand the compromises between reality and expectation. What I expected to create was very distant from what I actually created. This is a good thing however. As a creator, I had an idea of what I wanted to make that I did not enclose within any framework of reality. This project gave me the first sense of what this framework of reality looks like. Now I know, to a very small extent, how to mould reality to get what I want. What I want from now will also be much more realistic. I don't like disappointment, and I don't want to be disappointed. That doesn't mean I won't continue to push the boundaries of what can be made though. I'll continue to do it... just much... slower.

Anyway, with that conclusion masquerading as introduction done, this is the nitty gritty. I'm going to start with the magazine cover.

This is probably the best bit of the coursework for me. But I'm still not happy with the final product. The objective was to create a realistic magazine cover, inspired by covers from the Marie-Claire magazine. I'll start from the beginning.

 This was the first draft of the cover. There's a lot wrong with it. The fonts for example. It doesn't hit the conventions particularly well either. The picture doesn't grab a readers attention. However, I quite like the essence of this cover. It was quite simple.

This cover is from mid-way along the project. Something still didn't feel quite right. It felt quite boring and simple. Unexciting.

While this looks a lot like the final, it was far from it. Something still felt quite off. Somethings still needed to move around.

 This is the final version of the magazine. On the surface it looks pretty much the same as before, but there are a lots of changes in the fonts and positioning, and even the copy.

However, even with this being the final version, I don't feel like I achieved what the real covers look like. While I got rid of that feeling that something just feels off, the cover itself doesn't make me happy. This time I can't quite capture what is causing this however.

That aside, I think I learnt a lot about cover design making this. Everything about alignment, correct font usage and text scaling were relatively new to me. I definitely did not understand font uniformity when I started, but now I do, I can see it everywhere on every magazine cover. It makes a lot of sense.

My double-page spread is something I'm overall very happy with, however.  I went from this

to this:

I had to learn InDesign from scratch, and it was a challenge I embraced. Overall, the software was not hard to understand, and to go from nothing to creating a spread that could be in a magazine was a very rewarding payoff. The only gripes I have are the pictures, as if I had more than a double-page spread to work with, I'd have made the document much more picture focused and minimal, like the original inspirational Jodie Whittaker spread. I also would have had a larger variety of pictures, as the same studio pictures are a tad boring. I learnt a lot working in a studio for the first time to take these pictures though, so I appreciate the opportunity. In retrospect, I could have added a on-set picture instead of the Photoshoot one on the top right corner.

Working on the double-page spread taught me further about fonts- it was crazy to see the difference a good font can make to your initial impression of a text. I also really enjoyed writing the actual article; I really enjoy this style of writing so it was fun to come up with something I'd like to read myself. 

What I would fix about this article is adding a clearer link to the show that I could expand upon conceptually. In the extract I used, it's very surface level discussion, and in looking back at the actual articles in the inspiration magazine, they usually explore a thematic idea through out the interview, which I did not think about. I also wish I did something to make the format of the double page spread more lively. It's the same with the cover. I wish they had more energy. They're lacking some elegance I really wanted them to have, which I seemed to have forgotten to think about in the process of making them. As a final statement to this, I'll end with this cover here I really love. I can't figure out if it's just the simple minimalism that makes it, but this has some beauty that I aspire to capture one day.

Video

Overall, in regards to the video, I am ambivalent. I wanted to go beyond the "student film" look but I think I've found out it's very hard to do without a lot of practice and precision. I didn't capture the sense of mystery and desolation I had in mind.

From a writing perspective, I don't think I successfully transferred that idea I had as elegantly as I would have liked to. I don't regret this however, I think what I've learnt from this experience is much more valuable than feeling like I could have done things differently. I'll go more into this further down.

To me, the biggest flaws in the video that are glaringly obvious are the shots I forgot to film in the first place. Admittedly, they may not be that glaring to anyone else but given that the initial narrative was written dependant on it, I think it's clear on repeat viewings. The reverse shots for Drew's side of the conversation are missing, and some camera angles are awkward; for example, the shot leading upto the graphic match feels badly done, because it is. I only filmed that on a whim (hence the terrible exposure balancing), but compared to all the other shots I had, it felt the most interesting to do the graphic match on. Looking back, an alternate shot I think I could have done is one from Drew's side but following Eve's gaze downwards instead of Drew's hand. This would have been a lot less drastic and out of place.

The colour-grading is another aspect I'm not completely happy with. I would have liked to do more complex things than add a simple desaturation filter with increased contrast, as it looks lacking in the final. The other biggest quality related flaw is of course, the zoomed in scenes. While not intended to come out blurry, I can notice the lack of sharpness in many places due to the image being heavily zoomed in. Most TV shows have very sharp image quality, as they have higher production values and better equipment.

Watching the video back, I feel that the concept I'm trying to express is clear. There are attempts to try to achieve shots from real Dramas; the object match sequence is the most obvious one or me. Since then I've seen similar sequences in BBC's latest "Little Drummer Girl". These attempts are just attempts however, and I don't think I figured out how to properly and convincingly execute them in filming. I've certainly gotten better at understanding how to do them though! The narrative itself, has a lot of potential. I think if ITV were to do this, it would be lot more original and high concept though. Maybe this is even more befitting a BBC3 show than ITV one? 

The pace also, feels too fast. The section I filmed would probably be done more dramatically, and stretched out over a longer period if actually produced. A lot of the camerawork would also be better thought out. Other than a shot list, I made up a lot of the framing and camerawork on the go, and a lot of it is not optimum, especially in that last scene where I make Eve symbolically hold the knife over Drew. It was the only take I had of that so it was the one I had to use. I didn't think, when filming, how useful and meaningful it would turn out to be later.

As a project that is supposed to be a learning experience, I can honestly say I've left it much more aware then when I entered. The drama genre was not a genre I'd ever worked with in film before, and through the research and experience of the project I have a much better and deeper understanding of the conventions. Given that a large amount of my TV consumption is in this genre, it's exciting to be able to watch them and understand their decision making processes in a technical way... it's quite wonderful. I know the amount of effort that goes into all of them (and sometimes how little...), as I myself tried out similar camerawork and techniques in the making of this project.

Likewise, for my magazine. There's much more of an art in putting these productions together than I thought, and I have a deep appreciation for the designers who employ their understanding of fonts, alignments and colours to put together the beautiful and appealing covers I see all the time. It takes a lot of time to get to the level they are on. I was personally surprised by how much I enjoyed working on the project. I was willing to push myself further with the skills I learnt on this project, so much so that I had the confidence to take on the task of almost completely designing our school newspaper by myself! It was great to expend skills I learnt in this process so immediately.

In conclusion, while I don't feel that I was able to achieve what I ideally wanted to, I found this coursework has provided me with a wealth of knowledge and provided me with skills and confidence to go further as a creative.