Final Project

Final Project: Personal Narrative

Before:

I thought it would be fun to summarize my day in little video clips. I was hoping there would be funny conversations with my friends, because we think we are very funny people and always joke about having a reality show. I knew that I would be going to a fundraiser at Donatos that night and thought showing that experience on camera would be interesting.

During:

I was surprised at how uncomfortable it was at times to film myself. There were times where I was walking with the camera, trying to get good video but also trying to hide the camera. In class there was the pleasant surprise that my camera made a beep every time it records or stops recording. As you can imagine teachers do not like when you randomly beep in class, so filming during class was a little challenging. At work, I also felt uncomfortable filming. I didn’t ask my boss for permission, I was only filming my face, but we work with very confidential information so I felt a little uneasy having a camera in the office. That night I went to dinner with my mom, having a camera while I was trying to talk to her, eat, and drink was another problem. I ended up using my phone a lot since it had a kickstand to help hold it up.

During filming I didn’t really have any thoughts about the project, I guess because I hadn’t seen it yet. I was also busy that day and didn’t really focus on how I was going to prepare the video or what the focus would be.

After:

            After watching the footage, I think the biggest surprise to me was how much time I spend alone during the day. On an average day (this Thursday being average) I have 2 classes and work and sometime of meeting or dinner plans after, with very little time in between each event. Of course I am with people in class or walking to class, but I actually only talked to another person once in each class and once on the way to one class. It is almost sad how I can be at a place with so many people and just put in my headphones and ignore everyone. At work, I talk to my coworker a little, but we cant even see each other because of the wall separating us. My only real conversations during the day are conducted over the internet through e-mail or from cell phone to cell phone. This is interesting because as soon as I was done with class and work, I went to dinner with my mom and wasn’t alone the rest of the night. I got ready with my roommate, went out with my friends, and went home with my roommate. At this point in the night, I only used my phone to find people, not to hold conversations.

            I decided that every time I was alone, not speaking to anyone I would make the scene black and white, and speed it up. This represented the fact that when I was by myself I was less happy and that this part of my day wasn’t as important. Every time I am with someone I changed the video to color and slowed it down so you could actually see the interaction and hear the conversation. In some cases the camera didn’t pick up the conversations well, unfortunately, and it was almost distracting from the video trying to figure out what was being said. In these cases I took out the sound and added music. This helped to keep the focus on my facial expressions, which were usually happy during these situations. The music I added were all songs I think describe me, or my friends have said describe me/my life. I think the music helps to explain the video, since there is no blatant message in the title or the end of the video. The last part of the video is all screenshots of my friends from the footage. As I was editing the video there were so many times that I wanted to take a screenshot because I thought that moment was a perfect representation of that person. That sounds really corny, but I don’t know how well staged pictures do of representing someone, and I think these pictures actually did a good job.

            Overall, I think the meaning of my video is that the best parts of life are not the things you do but the people you do them with. That may be cliché, but if you watch my personal narrative you will definitely agree.