A-level CCR plan

Hello blog! This is the last post of this week! I can't believe this time next week; my portfolio project will already be submitted! In this post, I will continue to research and plan out my critical reflection for my production. I also what I want to improve between my two CCR's 

 The AS level creative critical reflection and A level critical reflection are contrasting in many ways. Such as the AS-level CCR you had to create a creative way of answering all the questions that have been applied to your production. For this, I did 2 videos explaining the four questions. We also had to create a designated script and response per blog postings to prepare ourselves for this. Here's a screenshot of what I did:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1mZqBkzKkt_nwEyO4PmCFJctInvWBn7HY/view

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1TwLUPZLt0UWBMzy0Lc7j7GXfITdiVELy/view

For my A- level critical reflection I really wanted to do things a little differently.  I want to fully analyze and assess each question properly.  I feel like due to time constraints within my media production last year I couldn’t fully address the questions as they should be so for this year's production, I hope to fully analyze all four questions that are being asked in a timely and professional manner.  My goal for this reflection is to not only earn points towards my Cambridge exam but really reflect and see how well of a job I did with building my documentary production.

 The four questions that we are being asked this year are a little different and I will share them below:

1. How did your research inform your products in the way you use or challenge conventions?

2. How do your products engage within the audience? 

3. How did elements of production work together to create a sense of branding?

4. How do your products represent social groups or issues?

Here are some tips that we were given to be successful in our production:

-       Evaluate your own work in a professional manner

-       Support your argument through specifics

-       Offer criticism

 Each question focuses on different aspects of your production. For example, Question 1 mainly focuses stylistic choices as a director while question 2 focuses on addressing your target audience and engagement. As question 3 heavily focuses on branding development throughout production and how you chose production choices to strengthen your brand. Lastly, Question 4 specifically focuses on representation within your production by giving examples of how it is done.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A-level group meeting #2 (post production)

 Hello blog! Welcome to the 2nd to last week of filming for my documentary project. Today, we shared amongst each other what we have accomplished and what still needs to be improved or still done. We had a total of 6 groups members. In this post, I'll be describing my group members progression within their projects. 

But first, here's a quick selfie of today group meeting: 

First was Aneesa Bajaj.  She's the producer and art director for her film which is called” Witch!”.  Her group is wanting to do more planning and pre-production on the second day of filming. They're set consists of a black background. They have filmed their headshots for social media already and they're doing an introduction on social media through tarot cards which I thought was creative.  They plan on filming more montage scenes and staying consistent with the dark color scheme.

 

Emi Valdivia was next.  She is the art director and producer for her film.  They only need to shoot three more scenes out of seven.  They started filming last week Tuesday and they focused on Andrew scenes on Saturday.  She is also the social media manager. The film is called “The Scourge”. They are in the process of making their post cards.  One is inspired by the tarot card that is given to a character in the film which i thought was a cool aspect of their film.

 

Adriana Vega and her partner are finishing filming today.   They are relatively behind on social media and their posts.  They decided to film in the everglades, and they took photos for their Instagram page but haven't posted it. Their film is called “One Flip Away”.  The postcard is in progress, which their planning to finish today as well editing as soon as possible. They plan to film interviews with cast/crew for Instagram reels.

 

Victoria Duque and her group Finalized filming yesterday the short film is mostly shot in the main character's room, and it shows the difference between daytime and nighttime she expressed was how she did it and I thought it was very creative.  They have not stood it on the postcard, yet which will be done soon, but they did film 3 reels for social media as well as a photo shoot for the post cards, film is called “Sprouting”.

 

Audrey and her group have been working on social media. They recently had to adjust the cast/crew because of certain difficulties. For their social media, they wanted to do different personalities for meet cast & crew on social media. They are taking character photos very soon. Their film is called “Session One” and majority of the filming is happening at her house. They start filming this Wednesday!

 

Lastly, I expressed my progression within my documentary.  I filmed before spring break and during spring break I initially had four interviews but ended up doing 3 due to conflicts and i have 5 posts up so far on social media bright color scheme to represent the different Latin American flags.

 

 

A-level Post production

 

    Hi blog! Welcome to the second to last week of blog posting for my A-level production.  I feel like this school year and my portfolio project went extremely fast and I can't believe it's going to be over next week!  Without further ado, let  jump into today's blog post which I’ll be talking about some roadblocks and changes that I had to make within my production.

     When I initially had my meeting about my documentary, I wanted to include the interviews of my studio director and my Choreographer. I thought this would be a good idea to get their insight within the dance community and considering that they come from Latin culture and base their studio off appreciating culture. Another reason that I thought they would be perfect to interview is that they're great in front of the camera and they have a way of words that make sense and is inspiring.

    So, we planned the specific date that I was going to shoot both interviews. The interviews would only consist of one to two questions and I would be asking their input within the dance community and how it relates to Latin American culture. Ultimately, I was not able to film the day that we had planned because of upcoming dance events and projects that my studio had been planning for a while. I was conflicted when this happened because I really wanted their response. 

So, I came up with a solution.  I had them type up their response over messages and I’m going to use that as a voice over for some of the B roll footage.  I thought this was a creative approach to include their responses as well as create narration to make my documentary more interested and engaging for my audience.

 

Here a screenshot of the response:

You might be wondering, what are you going to do with the additional subjects that you have to film?  Great question, here's my solution!  I decided to film one of my close friends, a dancer at my dance studio. I thought tackling this response would give the audience a varied perspective and add some diversity in age and the type of people I was interviewing.

 

 

 

  

A-level let's begin this CCR planning!

 Hello blog! Welcome back to my final post of the week, which is beginning the critical reflection process for my portfolio project. This week has been busy. With my dance studio preparing to compete, getting back into my last quarter of junior year, the year does not get any easier.  Especially since testing season is coming around the corner. 

If I'm being completely honest, I haven’t really planned out what I wanted to do for my critical for reflection. The reason why I have not dedicated time for my critical reflection earlier is for one main reason. I’ve been really been focusing on nailing the actual production process of the documentary and social media, that I haven't gotten the opportunity to really take a look at that portion of my exam. Which is why this post is dedicated to doing so. 

First, I’m going to lay out the questions that we were given in the CCR lesson. Then, I'll discuss how I'm going to approach it. 

Before I get into the questions, here are some standardized things to know about the critical reflection for media studies A-level: 

• - It’s worth 20 points out of the 60 points 

• - We're creating an essay about 1000 words 

• - We're focusing on all elements of our project and we're citing details precisely

Questions/ Format 

Intro/ thesis

Focusing on major themes or ideas conveyed throughout my project which is Latin American culture and symbolism. Keep this short and concise. 

1. How did your research inform your products in the way you use or challenge conventions?

This mainly focuses on your choices as a director. This includes the development of research and genres. Which specifically focuses on the bad bunny super bowl halftime performance. This includes observation within my dance studio and overall society. This section of the essay needs to fill out research and evidence to back up your documentary. 

2. How do your products engage within the audience? 

This question focuses on addressing your target audience and engagement. I consider this a very important question to address because it really creates the format for the overall branding of your production. Which will be discussed more in the next question. My overall target audience is about ages 18-27 But all ages are welcome to watch. 

3. How did elements of production work together to create a sense of branding?

In this question, it heavily focuses on your branding development throughout your production and how I choose niche production choices to strengthen the brand. My brand for my documentary is very distinct and very clear. My overall brand is very bright and very colorful, and it really targets unity and togetherness. 

4. How do your products represent social groups or issues?

For this last question, it homes in on representation within your production by giving examples, and you can decide as a director if it was successful and accomplished through documentary and if it was not, explain why. 

A-level production

    Hi guys welcome back to another productive week of making progress for my documentary portfolio project. In this post specifically, I will continue to be reflecting the production process as well as showing you some raw materials that will be placed within my documentary. 

    I started off this week with continuing to film my  interviews with the subjects. I started off filming the dancer. Her name is Gabriella Daise and I asked her one simple question. I asked her something along the lines of “ How do you feel learning different types of Latin style dances within your studio?”. She replied adequately and stuck to the to question. I then asked her to perform 2- 8 counts of a Latin fusion. 

    I really enjoyed filming this interview. This is because I got the opportunity to get her opinion on what she thinks about Latin American culture within society. I also completed the other interview, which was my dad. I asked him the same questions as I did for the first interview and things ran fairly smoothly. Which were: 

• Can you elaborate on how Latin American music has changed over the decades?
• Do you feel as if Latin American culture has an influence on creating unity within society?

    However, when it came to interviewing the other dancer, something came up and I was not able to interview them. Due to this, I extended my Dad’s interview. 

A-level production

 Hello!! Welcome to the second blog post of the week and this week blog post I will be  discussing the production process for my portfolio project. Last week we met with our teacher to do a little check in on how we’re doing on our portfolio projects. I expressed to her that I haven’t interviewed the remainder of the subjects and I also shot some b-roll footage. In this post, I’ll be discussing my stylistic choices for my b-roll. 

I decided shoot my b-roll for my Documentary project for several reasons and I also gained immense inspiration. Also, I wanted to collect as much footage as I could just in case if I needed it for editing purposes . 

The first reason I came across this choice was I was walking to my class the previous week, and I noticed the AICE Spanish hallway. The hallway is decorated with Latin American artist along with informational facts about their life and their flag that they represent. I thought this was very symbolic and match the overall theme of my documentary well. Because of this, the following week, I shot this b-roll.

As a result of filming the production process this week,  I feel like I have shown immense improvement throughout my last media studies project, which was the AS level short film. I really struggled with time management and finding the time to film.  I felt as if like this production was a perfect opportunity for me to improve my skills and I’m already seeing that along the journey.  

A-level production!

 Hello blog! Welcome to the third and final post of the week which is going to be reflecting the production process for my portfolio project which is a documentary about Latin American culture and how it influences society and creates unity within society. In this post, I’m going to be reflecting upon the first interview I conducted.

 

 I decided to ask my grandmother 2 questions based on the ones that I pondered about in previous blog posts.

 The questions are as follows: 

• Can you elaborate on how Latin American music has changed over the decades?
• Do you feel as if Latin American culture has an influence on creating unity within society?
• 
  

 I thought these questions were appropriate to ask because she grew up listening to Latin music throughout the decades and she is well versed on Latin American culture and the topics that are being presented within my documentary. First, I started by giving her the interview questions a couple days prior because she asked to have time so she would be able to formulate the proper responses and topics that she wanted to talk about within each question response. 

 

For each question response, she went over topics that she wanted to talk about and presented them to me before filming. Then, she came to me and decided to receive feedback on how we can direct the conversation to strictly answer the question.  My response was to give a lot of examples and really show the evolution of how Latin American music has changed over the decades and how the culture has influenced on creating a community and unity within society, she did just that. The interview went very smoothly, and I began by asking her to state her name and spell it out for editing purposes, I then asked her the first question off the screen and recorded her response. The same thing follows for question 2.

 

This wraps up the production process for this week. Next week I will be getting in more interviews for my documentary and recording more B roll footage. See you next week!