In the design and production of my second project brief I worked around a single concept of “place”, in particular my connection to the land. Using this as a base I was able to discuss aspects of my age, family, history and perception of life. The style of a linear documentary was one I found most efficient in communicating what was so important to me and why. The produced footage, photos and audio were chosen because they clearly depicted an image of myself that was conflicted, using my relationship with nature as a focus.
This essence of ‘duality’ was emphasised by the use of contrast and juxtaposition in the structure of my piece. The slow moving frames and cross-dissolves of the first half were used to create a sense of understanding and peace. Conversely, the frenetic pace of the video footage was sped post-production to enhance the juxtaposition of this foreign environment and its effect on me. As this documentary style was such a straightforward presentation I relied on the effects of emotive music and sound scaping to not only enhance imagery of place but also create tension and manipulate mood of the audience. The contrast of the opening and closing guitar tracks draws focus to the journey of the film – where it finds the audience and where it leaves them.
The section where the image of my youth at the train station cuts (the only clean cut in the film) to the next image is the most effective part of the film as it encapsulates the conflict of self, the edit here is an example of Scott McCloud’s “blood in the gutter” (1993) as the images clearly indicate a passing of time, while what happened in that time is left to the viewers interpretation. This I see as the major turning part as the narration changes tone and subject. Doubts I had regarded the effectiveness of the narration in co-operation with the visual stimulus. While my aim here was to join the scenes in doing so it created monotony something avoided in the opening sound/photo sequence. I feel that the text at the ending drew a resolution to the piece but I was lacking in creative ways in which to express it, perhaps if I was able to collage several photographs of letter shapes to design it better.