Evaluation Q2: What have you learnt from participating in each of the prelim tasks 1, 2, 3 and 5?

Task 1: Complete an audition video:

This being the first audition video I have ever done made it a very good learning experience. It taught me the importance of learning the lyrics beforehand as otherwise it is really obvious by your lip syncing and where you look that you have not done so.

I feel that doing it with someone was very helpful as it allowed me to feel confident and really go for it, not to mention I did not have to waste time pressing record and framing all of my shots and vice versa for my partner. Additionally, having a partner also sped up the editing process.

From an editing standpoint, the audition video prepared me for the main video in the sense that for such a short media product it was very time consuming as you have to match the lip sync and there are also frequent cuts. However, it provided an opportunity to determine the best ways in which to match the lip sync, for example comparing the sound waves in Adobe Premiere.

Task 2: Learn and practice your performance:

Our performance director was hugely helpful in teaching me how to effectively show emotion and also in feeling comfortable around everyone so as to just go for it and not worry what others think. In order to get myself and everyone else comfortable enough for this we all met frequently in the lead up to the main shoot for practice sessions.

Task 3: Help to plan and organise your costume:

In terms of my own costume I brought in my own shoes and jeans which were then signed off by our teacher and costume designer. My white polo shirt was kindly lent to me from our technician.



Me in costume

I also brought in some other pieces of costume for other actors to wear, for example Laith who acted as Jamie wore my jacket, and Tom who acted as cool kid 3 wore my plain black hoodie.

This costume task taught me the importance of analysing the model character for their identity and how the costume connotes that identity. For example, my character of cool kid 1 was portrayed in the music video as a cool, popular character with a good sense of style and so it was important to make sure my costume had the same connotations, so as to improve the quality of our remake.

Task 5: Complete the remake edit:

Editing the Cool Kids remake introduced me to a different style of editing than what I am used to as music videos do not follow the rules of continuity. However, by the end of the edit I felt a lot more confident in this style of editing and also my editing skills in general. I completed the edit with Laith and we both contributed equally to this edit, sharing many roles in the process.

Me editing

In the edit I:
-Named shots, making it easier to find in the editing itself
-Cut the shots and put them in the right place in the timeline
-Edited some shots to play in reverse
-Edited some shots to play in slow-motion
-Graded shots
-Matched the lip-sync to the music

In conclusion, I have learnt lots of new skills from these prelim tasks, particularly music video exclusive skills and I have also consolidated other skills such as grading which I had picked up from previous media edits.