Category: OLD’S COOL

Project Brief 4: WIP Post #1

Looking upon project brief 3, I felt like there were so many different ideas I could build upon and execute. However, for my final project brief I am interested in extending upon my previous project of exploring another person’s craft. As I touched upon in my presentation for the last project, I was particularly interested in the notion of processes. With every project, everyone had a process – both my classmates themselves and the craftspeople they interviewed. Ideally for my project I’d like to explore the process of both myself, and the person I’d like to interview. I think this will be possible by showing my process in the documentation and the artist’s process in the video.. I think this will be dictated by the questions I ask. However, I am also interested in the stories behind people’s work.. So .. this could mean that the video I make is purely for aesthetic and my documentation focuses on the process.

I want to create a video for my final project, with the hopes of my exploration taking the form of New media PROJECT with old media PRINCIPLES. For this project, I am hoping to interview an artist about their craft but using an interesting format doing so… Still haven’t figured that process out yet… One of the hardest parts about the last project with regards to time was finding a time that suited both myself and the craftsperson so trying to figure out a way that will help minimise this would be great. Perhaps interviewing them over the phone.. I wonder how this would translate into a video. If I was to do this, I also would have to have a trial & error process of what worked best for recording the interview. I think i’ll have a look into different phone recording apps on iTunes, however I feel like recording it with a Zoom Recorder could give it better quality.

I know I want my final video to have a sharp, clean aesthetic. That’s important to me. I feel as though this entire semester I have felt super rushed with my projects. I know I can edit and produce really good quality stuff, so want to try my best at creating that. In order to achieve this I will need to allow myself enough time to edit the project. In order to adhere to this, I have drawn up a schedule for me to follow and adhere to in order for a smooth process.

Another element I found that restricted my timings for the last project was that we weren’t allowed to know the person we were interviewing. Even though I don’t know the artists (personally) I am hoping to interview, I have spoken to them previously for a work project and had a good rep-our and felt comfortable contacting them again.

Moving forward for this project I will need to have a good brainstorm about the exact layout I want my video to take, and create a clear process for me to finish this process and make it the best possible video I can.

“New media has revolutionised communication”

“New media has revolutionised communication”

The introduction of new media in the 21st century has revolutionised the way people communicate. It is undeniable that the introduction of new media, such Email, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram have opened an array of new ways people around the world can communicate with each other. Platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter allow users to reach out instantly, to their friends, family or even people they don’t know. Although this new media has unquestionably revolutionised communication, questions arise about the limitations that accompany this revolution. For example, how have the new communication medium affected the way we communicate? Are there limitations to using new media?

For my third element, I have done a tongue-in-cheek PDF which aims to show how new media has revolutionised communication by answering short questions through a new media format. I have chosen to ask a series of questions to new media databases and take photos of the answers. With that, I will document how long it takes for me to upload the answer from my phone onto my computer. I’m using this to make a statement about the responsiveness of having questions answered instantly, the abundance of information given to us and to show the many different way’s we have learnt to communicate through new media. Social media users benefit from the connections they make and maintain, the entertainment they access to amuse themselves and the information they are exposed to (which increases their knowledge base (Dollinger 2014). There are new ways of communicating now, which didn’t exist years ago.

An example of the major advancement in new media communication is the way people increasingly apply for jobs. Free or low cost internet access at most libraries around the world, combined with free social media sites is a major advantage provided by these mediums which enables opportunities for professional online networking (Askoul 2014). A tool such as LinkedIn allows users to upload their resumes and update their CVs digitally, connect with businesses and receive job offers through others looking at their profile. This transition from old media is astounding. Furthermore, instead of people searching for a lost business card, resume or forgetting their qualifications, employers and co-workers can easily look up their profile.

John Harwood, the Senior Director of Teaching and Learning with Technology at Penn State’s Information Technology Services says that we are creating huge amounts of wonderfully expressive human communication through email, blogs, and instant messaging but a lot of this is not going to survive for very long—or no one will be able to access it (2007) Harwood goes on to explain that our immense volume of electronic communication only exists as long as its medium exists. For example, MySpace was a new media socialising platform, which enabled conversations and documentation in a period in time. Those conversations and documentation are however no longer traceable. On a personal level, I have files stored at my family home, stored on floppy discs, which I cannot retrieve as eight track tapes are useless to computers readily available today.

Social Media as new media has changed the way we share information, teaching us new ways to communicate and collaborate through features such as news feeds, groups and digital events, with social technology helping to shape the world’s events and culture (Benioff 2012). Connected individuals have, and will continue to rally crowds, topple political establishments and firmly challenge issues of social interest.

LINK TO PDF

REFERENCES

Askoul, A, 2014, Editing for Mass Media, blog, viewed 20 March 2017 < http://ayaskoul.weebly.com/>.

Benioff, M 2012, ‘Welcome to the social media revolution’, BBC News, 1 May, viewed 24 March 2017, < http://www.bbc.com/news/business-18013662>.

Dollinger, M, 2014, ‘Social Media: Cui bono? Who benefits from all this socialness?’, Journal of Business Horizons, vol. 58, no. 3, pp. 235-236, viewed 24 March 2017, <http://www.sciencedirect.com.ezproxy.lib.rmit.edu.au/science/article/pii/S0007681314001621>.

Duchene, D & Harwood, J 2007, ‘How has technology affected written communication’, Penn State News, 10 September, viewed 26 March 2017, <http://news.psu.edu/story/141346/2007/09/10/research/probing-question-how-has-technology-affected-written-communication>.

“Almost any collection of documents is an Archive”

“Almost any collection of documents is an Archive”

Almost any collection of documents can be considered an archive. For my element, I have made a collage on Adobe Photoshop. This includes various collections of media, which I consider to be collections of archive. These collections include screen shots of my personal Spotify playlists, written documents in folders saved on my desktop, stock photos of CDs, cabinets and various other mediums.

According to French philosopher, Michel Foucault, the archive has previously been thought to be made up of written documents (Robertson 2011). Because of the ever-changing media landscape, this definition of tangible, written documents has limitations and therefore must be re-assessed. To do so, one must let go of preconceived ideas of what an archive and document is. John Durham Peters from the Department of Communication Studies at the University of Iowa states that we are living in the most “archive friendly moment in history” (2011). Documents have transformed from a white A4 piece of paper, to an MP3 file in iTunes, a PDF in a folder on ‘Finder’ and a CD-ROM.

Although almost any collection of documents can be considered an archive, it is important to acknowledge limitations of the Archive as well as limitations through the mediums in which they exist. To do this, and for this exploration, we will examine both psychical and digital archives as well as limitations of the overall concept of the Archive. All archives are incomplete (Douglas 2010) as they have their own biases based on inclusion, omissions and point of view.

Powerful online search tools or digital Archives such as Google Scholar, YouTube, and Spotify have revolutionised the way in which we engage with the published literature and are “invaluable tools for anyone engaging in research” (Nature Reviews Microbiology, 2010, page). However, these tools are only as useful as the contents of the databases around which they are built, and unfortunately much of the older literature is absent. Although these digital Archives are continuously adding to their collection, there is much missing. For example, even though there is a comprehensive amount of pre-digitally produced music available on Spotify to explore, there are so many other recordings that haven’t been transferred and could readily be available at a record shop.

Digitisation of existing physical Archives is a major priority around the world. The British Library has partnered with online publisher Brightsolid to digitise up to 40 million pages of newspapers, and in the USA, The Smithsonian Institute has digitising its entire collection. This includes137 million objects, 100,000 cubic feet of archival material and 1.8 million library volumes (Hughes 2012). The sense of limitability is almost absent online with an abundance of Archival material readily available. However, new media also teaches us to cherish what we didn’t know we had with old media (Durham 2011). For example, consider a video from the 1950s that has been digitised onto an online Archive. When watching this video online, compared to going to perhaps a Library with an old reel-to-reel projector, everything from the aesthetic to the experience of watching the film is drastically different.

REFERENCES

Arbitarily, O 2013, ‘File: CD rack.JPG’, digital photograph, Wikimedia Commons, accessed 25 March 2017, < https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:CD_rack.JPG>.

Douglas, S 2010, ‘Writing From the Archive: Creating Your Own’, The Communication Review vol. 13, no. 1, pp. 5-14.

Evanson, T 2012, ‘Daniel Ellsberg psychiatrist filing cabinet’, digital photograph, Flickr, accessed 25 March 2017, <https://www.flickr.com/photos/timevanson/7237653296>.

Gorzen, A 2007, ‘Shelves-of-file-folders.jpg’, digital photograph, Wikimedia Commons, accessed 26 March 2017, <https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Shelves-of-file-folders.jpg>.

Hodan, G 2017, ‘Shining Blue Water Background’, digital photograph, Public Domain Pictures, accessed 26 March 2017, <http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/view-image.php?image=42852&picture=shining-blue-water-background>.

Hughes, L 2012. Evaluating and Measuring the Value, Use and Impact of Digital Collections, London: Facet Publishing.

Nature Reviews Micobiology 2010, Raiders of the lost articles: Limitations in online journal archives and citation search tools, coupled with inaccessibility of older journals in libraries, threaten to disconnect us from our microbiological history, Nature Reviews Microbiology, viewed 25 March 2017, <http://www.nature.com.ezproxy.lib.rmit.edu.au/nrmicro/journal/v8/n9/full/nrmicro2435.html >.

Peters, J 2011, ‘Why we use pencils and other thoughts on the Archive’, Media History and the Archive, Robertson, Craig, Taylor & Francis, Abingdon, pp. 108-120.

Rajesh, M 2017, ‘Glitter Pattern 1’, digital photograph, Public Domain Pictures, accessed 26 March 2017, < http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/view-image.php?image=170375&picture=glitter-pattern-1>.

Robertson, C 2011, Media History and the Archive, Taylor and Francis.

‘Stock photo of blur, bookcase’ 2017, digital photograph, Pexels, accessed 25 March 2017, <https://www.pexels.com/photo/blur-bookcase-business-cds-264544/>.

Yang, M 2017, ‘False Green Grass Wallpaper’, digital photograph, Public Domain Pictures, accessed 26 March 2017, < http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/view-image.php?image=49762&picture=false-green-grass-wallpaper>.