have a list of skills you already have and specific skills you would like to develop, approach employers with concrete plan
make a list of 6-12 work attachments: what is your ideal attachment? who will best suit the developmental needs you’ve listed?
must figure out ABC/SBS work attachments (2 year turnover so get on it THIS YEAR)
reply to emails!! And have compose an awesome, kickass email that you can just edit/personalise
letter of introduction, expression of interest (should be in body of email already, only resume as attachment) – put in what you need to say in 100 words or less
look at Career section in RMIT site
I am so excited for these! Now I just need to start writing some kickass expressions of interests, spiffy up my resume, and then find some actual places to send them to.
My ideal attachments would be in the theatre, fashion, opera, dance, live performance, or literature industries assisting their marketing or PR departments in creating material to promote shows and other events.
“The people formerly known as the audience are simply the public made realer, less fictional, more able, less predictable. You should welcome that, media people. But whether you do or not we want you to know we’re here.” – Jay Rosen
For much of my internet life, I’ve been an active member of various fandoms – most recently, a little corner of the Marvel fandom for Agent Carter. I’ve made many posts, gifsets, graphics, and fanvids for the show and engage with a lot of other even more dedicated fans through Twitter.
“If you want to attract a community around you, you must offer them something original and of a quality that they can react to and incorporate in their creative work.” – Tom Glocer
There’s a reason why the most successful and longer lasting of fandoms are those whose original sources lean towards the more fantastical: Star Trek, Harry Potter, Doctor Who, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Marvel, Game of Thrones etc. They all involve the act of very specific world-building in which fans are given much scope to imagine a themselves or imagine a version of themselves that lives in that world as a Hogwarts student, time-traveller, or Sunnydale student. These shows really encourage active audience participation that ensures the shows live on in a much more personal way.
[Agent Carter actor retweeting a fan video I made.]
I love actively engaging with a show I am so emotionally and creatively invested in. When the show airs in the US (West Coast time), I live tweet and watch it along with them (having downloaded it after airing in the East Coast three hours prior). We’re able to engage with the actors, writers, producers, and designers of the show through Twitter and it’s always cool when they reply or share your reactions for everyone to see.
“A central theme…is the importance of moving beyond active production as a criteria for understanding audience participation and the need to pay much more attention to more causal forms of grassroots circulation.” – Henry Jenkins in ‘Rethinking Convergence Culture’
Twitter and Facebook are especially easy for keeping track of “grassroots circulation” because of hashtag and key word searches. They allow raw opinion to be heard equally whether fan or “civilian”. The “live tweet” phenomenon is a great way to engage with watchers from all over as you all experience things in real time. The creators and producers are keeping track of live reactions which give the audience an immediate influence, silent or otherwise, on how a show can proceed. However, Jenkins examines these elements with caution as the “collective agency and participatory politics”. Whether interactivity is a positive or negative thing is still much debated – how much should creators engage in the “fannish space” and do audiences have a right to voice their opinions every time?
[A socially aware fan voices their disapproval at the screen trope of dispelling characters of colour.]
In a time of trending “chill culture”, fandom is a place where there is no chill. It’s okay to be extremely moved and excited by things to tears. There’s a rawness in fandom, an unchecked passion which is just thrilling to witness and be a part of.
A petition for the recently cancelled Agent Carter calling for a move to Netflix. This will not be the first time a cancelled TV show has found new life online because of fan rally and support. Let’s hope we succeed.
Often begins by identifying its subject. These might develop in simple ways which could bore the viewer because of the risk to seem like a list predictably building from one example to another.
Les Blanc’s Gap Toothed Women, however, are a complex and fascinating take on the categorical form. His film makes this form feel like a kitschy scrapbook of images and vignette monologues. A “talking heads” style situation as the book refers to.
I loved the balance between the interview subjects, found images, and especially the slyly suggestive, gap-evocative imagery like the harp.
Experimental:
A “wilfully nonconformist” approach to filmmaking also known as avant-garde. These can be made for a variety of reasons: desire to express a personal experience, convey mood or physical quality, explore possibilities of medium itself…There may not be a story but more poetic language or “pulsating visual collages” like Ballet mechanique. They can also have a story but it will usually be a challenging one.
Abstract Form:
Can be a film organised around colours, shapes, sizes, and movements in the images. Can be organised according to theme and variations – terms taken from the musical world playing on motifs, keys, and rhythms. Similarly, abstract films can also be arranged as such – introducing viewer to initial ideas and materials that could be expected. An establishment of tone, if you will. Then other segments will begin, typically going on from previously established tones and materials. Perhaps augmented in energy or colour but still a similar idea.
Often filmmakers will juxtapose photographs of real, recognisable objects alongside creations of shape/colour etc.
Ballet mecanique uses film techniques to stress the geometric qualities of ordinary things. Close framing, masks, unusual camera angles, and neutral background isolate objects and emphasize their shapes and structures.
The film has been divided in 9 parts:
Credit sequence, intro of rhythmic elements, objects through prisms, rhythmic movements, people and machines, intertitles and photographs, more rhythmic movements mostly of circular objects, objects dancing, return to opening elements.
Associational Form:
Drawing on a poetic series of transitions. They suggest ideas and expressive qualities by grouping images that may not have logical connections but the viewer will look for and probably find a pattern or way of association.
Godfrey Reggio’s Koyaanisqatsi is a full length associational form film in which the associations are not purely image-based but also suggest a whole range of context, meaning, and emotion.
The power of an associational formal system: its ability to guide our emotions and to arouse our thinking by juxtaposing different images and sounds.
All the tips received from this lecture was so helpful and I’m really taking them to heart. I think I know who I’ll be picking as my subject now. It was good to be reminded of the “talent” and whether we thought our person would come across well. I feel like I suddenly got a clearer picture of the sensibility I required from the interviewee I will be choosing.
Learning about biased questions was also another helpful thing that I will definitely be wary of.
Learning how to brief the talent was also helpful – letting them know just enough without making them worry or think too much about the upcoming questions. The note about the clothing was also great to be reminded of.
The interview manner itself was also very important – nodding in response instead of mms and ahhs is a weirdly very simple but important thing to remember.
I keep thinking about the fact that we do not have “ear lids”! Sound really is just a constant thing that happens and all we can do is to physically or psychologically allow or hinder what we would like. I really also loved the imagery of eyes pointing outwards and the ears drawing inwards. There is something visceral about human reaction to sound, it’s so based on sensation, and I dare say I truly believe sound can portray a truer human experience than sight. Sound can reveal a person’s character through voice or a place’s character through the soundscape that permeates it. You can hear distance, energy, mood…no wonder sound media is such an art so creative and extremely technical.
I also loved the whole thing on
“Experiencing sound: psychoacoustics, complex interactions of physics, physiology, sensation, perception and cognition”
Our reaction to sound is so complex and deeply rooted in every sound we have ever heard in our lives up until that moment. It’s so rich and I loved learning about the “layers” of a sound frame. To create worlds like that – life like and consequently invisible – is actually incredible.
Lastly, I keep thinking about this saying we have in theatre “The sound guys. You don’t notice them until something goes wrong.”
If we didn’t already know it before, this exercise cements into your brain that media is everywhere, used by everyone for everything: personal, corporate, marketing, art etc. It’s impossible to be immune to it if you lived in any kind of city. There are so many forms of media and the ways we use it are constantly expanding.
However, compared to many other shopping locations in the area (especially Melbourne Central), the Emporium has considerably less media exposure. It’s quite subdued in there in terms of screen bombardment and is by no means any kind of Time Square. It could be because of the Emporium’s reputation as a more upscale destination and they want to preserve that luxurious atmosphere.
~
UP HIGH:
Animated restaurant menus on screens
Soundtracks to accompany your shopping, has the vibe of the store
ON THE GROUND:
Projections of logos/advertising images
MID-GROUND:
People on their phones
People taking photos
People on their laptops using the free wifi in the food court
BACKGROUND:
People on their phones
Screens projecting advertisements
iPads in many stores to enhance a more personalised, “cooler” approach to shopping in their stores
FOREGROUND:
People on their phones
interactive shopping centre maps/information/game screens
Things I hope my future self can be able to do when I finish this degree…or ASAP, really.
I want to know how to respond to briefs and make awesome things from other people’s suggestions/expectations. I want versatility of style because versatility = more jobs! $$$
I want to make media that I would be proud to show off and make people watch.
Have the technical skill and knowledge to bring my visions into reality.
Develop the creative ideas I have so my visualisations can grow to be even more crazy and innovative.
Be a master at editing photos, videos, media creations – AALLL the Adobe Creative suite tutorials!!
Have a kickass showreel.
Freedom and ability to make what I need as well as what I want
Know how to use and manipulate mixed medias and put them together
To be able to work in the fields I want and manipulate my media knowledge to anything: theatre, arts, culture, fashion, film, TV.
Make distinctive, unique work – develop a creative voice.
