More Than Fabric – Project Brief #4

This is my final product for the More Than Fabric: Fashion films in the digital age media studio. I am incredibly happy with how it turned out, considering the tumultuous twists and turns that came with getting this project into fruition.

My project is an observational documentary focusing on my friend, Emily Nolan’s fashion label, Unemployed. The documentary focuses on the designs that make up the Unemployed collection so far, the designs which are modeled by the incredible Corey Worthington. Apart from the designs, I really wanted to capture Emily’s hilarious personality, whilst also conveying to the audience how truly brilliant and intellectual she is. More than anything, I wanted the video to be fun to watch. I wanted the audience to laugh but to also indulge in her designs and feel immersed in her creative process.

I met Emily earlier this year at a house party and thought she was absolutely hilarious, with the right amount of wild to her whilst still being a 100% angel. I knew that I wanted to make a little film about her when I saw her accidentally fall down a full flight of stairs, holding a beer, only for her to get straight back up to laugh her head off. I approached Emily maybe a month or two ago and gauged her interest in allowing me to follow her around for a day to document her life. I was thrilled when she said yes, but what truly elated me was at how excited she was at the prospect, and I think this truly comes across in the final product.

In true Justin Palmieri style, I didn’t really give the project a huge amount of thought until the due date was approaching, which actually works to my advantage. The stress really kicks me into overdrive and motivates me to CREATE, which is essentially what happened here. I appreciate Emily’s patience so much as I gave her about a weeks notice to get all of her things together for us to collaborate and create this piece. In this regard, I believe that it actually worked to our advantage! The lack of planning (which makes it sound like I did no work or preparation – I assure you I did!) translated into a video that was spontaneous, fun, and didn’t come across as too contrived. I believe that true art or creativity can’t be forced, and in this instance it definitely wasn’t and hopefully that is conveyed in our film project!

In terms of this studio as a whole, I have nothing but endless praise for it! As it was the last traditional studio that i’ll be partaking of its kind at RMIT, I must say that although it didn’t benefit me in terms of technical knowledge (I learnt a lot of what I know now, in terms of editing and filming, from past studios), it definitely helped me refine my study methods and the way that I look at fashion from certain perspectives. I can honestly say that its one of the first studios that i’ve completed where i’ve felt totally confident and comfortable to go into the “real world” and start creating content. I don’t know whether thats because i’m nearing the end of my final year or whether its because I enjoyed the studio heaps, but thats the reality. I loved learning about the practical aspect of the fashion industry whilst also studying different forms of multimedia that were not only fun and culturally relevant, but were employed during this studio to further our own understanding of the way that fashion films were made and marketed to create some sort of hype. Before I started this studio, I never really paid much attention to how fashion documentaries were made, or rather, never really appreciated the hard work that went behind the scenes.. but after making my own, it became so easy to understand how complex this form of media is. You’re never guaranteed to get that winning shot and even then if you do get a great shot, you still need to put it through post production and editing, which is a whole other ball game. This studio definitely gave me the skills and frame of mind to understand what was needed to make a great fashion film.

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