Reflection: Putting Together “Views”

When developing my ideas for Views, there were many concepts that I was considering, to answer my major question “how do individuals change their views depending on the media they are given and what do they notice in the media – ie: the focal point”. There were many ways that I could approach this, but after hearing some simplified methods discussed in class, I settled upon using powerpoint (weird, I know!) and then going through each individual frame; lightening and darkening the photo by each frame. I then put the focal point screenshots onto the original photo – thus, as the photos get darker, the focal point is revealed to the viewer. I then exported these photos into JPEG files and then edited the piece together on premiere pro! This was the least fuss-free and easy method to make my piece, however, I thought it was effective.

The way that I prepared my piece was extremely important because I needed to get my intention across, without exerting my own bias to the piece. I also not only wanted it to show that everyone has different thoughts and views towards pieces of media, as shown through the varied focal points, but also the viewers watching the piece would be thinking to themselves “why did they notice that part of the photograph when I noticed this?” – almost bringing out my original question to the viewer through viewing the piece in itself. Thus, this is why my development and execution of Views was so critical and allowed me to understand my original intention deeper than I had naturally anticipated.

Throughout this process, I was inspired by contemporary works, many of the showcase videos from the Korksaw website, most speficially, Matt Soar’s work – most commonly: Fibbonaci 2 , Almost Architecture  and Ceci n’est pas embres . I would say I gathered my most inspiration from Soar’s work because he allowed the viewer to interpret and focus on his work from an outside perspective and allowing them to develop their own ‘story’ through the Karkasow software – allowing them to click on the preview item that they wanted to watch, thus, allowing them to choose which media interests them most – similar to what I was aiming to do with the focal point of my photograph, they dictate my design of my media, if you will.

I found this process (developing my media from other people’s viewpoints about the original media presented) quite challenging at times, just because it was out of my comfort zone, however, looking back – it has been extremely rewarding and has allowed me to think about the influence of both the creator and the audience on media making, thus, influencing me in my future thinking as a media producer.

Looking back upon the semester and my noticing process developed from Seeing the Unseen, I have developed an awareness of noticing and other individuals take of the media that is presented to them, thus, revealing the true nature of media and potential biases that can be presented. Thus, the questions presented in Week 12 are something that allowed me to reflect on not only Task Four but the semester in its entirety.

• How well have I grasped noticing as an experimental approach to making nonfiction?

Through these tasks, I have grasped noticing fully as an experimental approach – the ideas that I have developed are not developed initially, but are drawn from each individual task. This experimental approach is something that I was aware of when making my media, specifically on task four with the ideas of focal points and how individuals notice different things and how people become selective.

• How well have I explored the creative possibilities of making media outside of traditional linear production methods?

Although I would say I am most comfortable with photography + videography work, I allowed myself to combine these two together for the majority of my projects. Being a perfectionist, I often aim to have ‘control’ of my media creation and the content that I create – however – by giving my thoughts and ideas to others to analyze and to “create” the content that I turn into my final work, also allowing different people to notice different perspectives.

• How do the media artifacts I have made (particularly task four) come close to performing the complexity of the changing world around me?

The media that I have created allows me to ‘take away’ the effects of different camera angles (eg: wide angle shots) and how this changed the viewer and their perception of the media – in terms of giving people media to think about and not just absorbing the content half-heartedly.