In this video, I hoped to convey an idealised version of myself, with just enough of my own flaws showing to preserve authenticity. Presenting someone looking to make a change in the world, but contrasting it with a self-deprecating image of what people around me tend to see. This is specifically related to my intention to use my eventual Bachelor of Communications to work towards public relations for a non-profit, or a political organisation that aligns with my views. While the audience of this video is obviously actually limited to the person marking it, the intended audience is more my peer group. University students sharing their education and career aspirations, as part of a greater discussion. The one thing we all have in common is plans for the future, no matter how much these vary. This, combined with some facts about my hobbies and interests for a ‘humanising’ element, hopefully reflecting some close parallels with my peers, but nonetheless granting some kind of a look into who I am as a person, or at least a version thereof that I feel comfortable sharing.
My initial intention, and the one I ultimately decided on, was to frame the shot with me off center, on the vertical third, with my eyeline somewhere around the top horizontal third line. This firstly gives me some head room and lead room, but also doesn’t frame me at the center of the shot, which would give more of a “person giving a lecture to a captive audience” vibe than my intended, more standard, “person talking to camera” vibe. I played around with a few different versions of this framing, and tried out a few others briefly: the aforementioned centered shot, a much closer shot and so on, but settled on more or less my original idea. The background borrowed from a lot of current vloggers, including a number of videos from our own Unit Chair Adam Brown, by vlogging in front of a bookshelf. In this case it’s my comics providing an interesting backdrop that give insight to my personality and interests. It also helps to present something of a view into my home, and a feeling of welcome to the viewers, which would not be conveyed by a plain white wall or grey curtain. Unfortunately there wasn’t much to do with my audio, but after a few less successful attempts, I figured out to turn off all the heating and get everyone in the house to be quiet for a few minutes. Hopefully I’ll have an external mic next time.
I encountered a few problems in the recording of this video. Firstly, I sound wooden if I am more or less reciting lines I’ve written previously, and work much better if given a set of topics to riff on. So my script writing quickly turned to dot points. Again, the audio wasn’t ideal, but with the heating turned off, and everyone in the house being quiet, I was able to record useable audio. I would have liked to have more options as to the lighting, but everything I tried either cast weird shadows, or blinded me. I will take the time to acquire softer lights, or record during different times of the day to allow the option of natural lighting.
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