For this project, I was encouraged to step out of my comfort zone by completing creative projects I had never worked with before. The Conceptual Project represents the knowledge I have acquired from just a few short months as a Junior here at Freestyle. Projects I have completed include poetry, music, web production, and a short experimental film completed as my pioneer project in my Film Elective. The software I have learned to use include Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Animate, Adobe Premiere Pro, Adobe After Effects, Adobe audition, Avid Pro Tools, WordPress, and Google Apps. I have also learned to use modern professional equipment such as DSLR Cameras and Tascam Audio Recorders.

The thing I value most about my English and Digital Media classes at Freestyle is that they allow me to connect the traditional, pen and paper knowledge I learn in school, like poetry techniques and analyzation, and relate it to technological skills that are becoming increasingly valuable to have as I think about my future and my career paths. Both these skills not only provide me with an immense advantage as I venture out into the world, but also make me excited about what I create, making school a place where I am encouraged to display my potential and hard work.

Photo Haiku

In our english class, we were given the opportunity to create a haiku that we paired with a photo we had taken while adhering to a concept statement assigned to us. My concept statement was “I am exploring the feeling of eagerness through the experience of meditation”. In Digital Media, we created a visual representation of our haikus through Premiere Pro, and had to choose music that was appropriate for it.

Staying true to a statement that was undefined and contradictory unto itself was a difficult task, but a valuable and rewarding one nonetheless. The topic I chose to support this statement was the experience of riding in the car as a child, captivated by the mysteries of life and the earth. Feeling eagerness for the destination ahead, constantly asking if you are there yet, pushing at the back of the seat in front of you with your heels, but having to sit still under your seatbelt and wait patiently until you arrived.

Poetry

For the poetry assignment, we created our own poem out of something that we had experienced using the poetry tactics we had practiced in class, like enjambment, line length, alliteration, musicality, and metaphorical language. We read multiple poems and spent multiple weeks dissecting the meaning and the methods the author used to convey that message. In digital media, we created a visual rendition of the poem over a photo of our choice on Adobe Photoshop, as well as recording our poem with our Tascam Recorder and editing it in Pro Tools.

“Saudade” is a free verse poem that documents the struggles of accepting vulnerability and mortality that someone growing up in a time of rapid climate change experiences. The title is a Portuguese word that means a sadness or nostalgia for someone or something that is gone or never existed. I carry this message throughout my explanation of the characters experiences.The speaker in this poem is encapsulated or characterized as a young adult who is in the transition period between childhood and adulthood and feels both attached to a point in time where simplicity was accessible and fearful of their future and what it holds in a rapidly declining world. The speaker is speaking to an unnamed individual, that is up to the audience to define. In the first stanza, I use the poetic technique of enjambment which functions as a means of portraying the bitterness and the complex relationship that the speaker has with the human race, which includes themselves. When the similes shift into hyperboles, the speaker’s attitude de-centers itself from the earth and instead refocuses on the populace of the earth. They begin to talk about the source of the problem rather than the effects of it, and the speaker’s attitude towards climate change and their future changes from confusion to condemnation. When the character begins to simplify their language, representing the speakers want to re escape into their childhood, it shifts back away from condemnation and into desperation. Ultimately, the pattern of tone and metaphor shifts in this poem shows how the reality shifts from how one thing is like another, to one thing being the other. For example, the second stanza says my heart is “cradled in my palm like glass” and in the final stanza I say my heart is “still glass in your hands”. Shifting from being like glass to being the glass. I was particularly inspired by the free verse poem “I met Loss the other day” by Cara Blue Adams. Her poem encompasses the rejection of grief until it’s impossible to ignore. I tried to emulate the personification she includes of loss, who is a man getting a tailored suit, by creating a complex character out of something intangible. I did this because I felt that it allowed me to concisely explain the feeling without watering it down. In order to improve this poem, I adjusted the length of my lines and the placement of my enjambments, to spotlight the feeling of hesitancy or fear that the speaker feels as they admit these things. I want the reader to consider the perspective of the character in the state they are in, which is right in the vacuum between childhood and adulthood, and consider that inconsistency in thought or perspective is symbolic of the turbulence that comes with growing up. I want to make the reader know more than the character does and be able to see past their naivety, especially when the speaker asks someone for something that they cannot do.

Something I valued from this project was analyzing different types of poems. I enjoyed looking for spoken word poems and finding many poems I loved along the way. This project opened me up to many new authors and allowed me to strengthen my abilities.

Photoshop Blend Mode Editing

For this assignment, we were required to create a series of photo combinations illustrating the use of various blend modes on photoshop, effectively combining multiple photos into one.

I value the ability to do many things with photoshop using blend modes

i see myself altering backgrounds to make photos more interesting 

Film Elective

For the Conceptual Unit, we had the opportunity to create an Experimental film that introduced us to some of the the various things we would need to know as novice filmmakers. This connected back to our haiku poem, as we built our film through the same concept statement; “Feeling eagerness through the experience of meditation.” We were encouraged to fully delve into experimentalism and challenge our prefabricated standards for cinema.

My film surrounded a subject in a white room, [ played by CJ Hoo ]. It cuts back and forth between a dark room, where the actions the subject makes are successful, and one with light, where they are unsuccessful. Another shot includes the shadow of a figure moving, as the figure remains stagnant. Both of these things represent the lack of excitement immediately surrounding the subject, and how the eagerness slowly becomes easier to grasp as the subject remains still and patient.

My experience with making this film was that it was exciting to fully integrate myself into an independent project, but similarly, it was also jarring to have so much creative control without the actions of my classmates to guide me. Overall, it was an extremely valuable experience that allowed me to learn the ups and downs of production in a supportive and special environment.

Synopsis:

A character walks into an empty room, the soft sound of a lighter clicking in the background. The subject sets a timer to 40 minutes. In the center of the room there is a chair facing the wall. The subject puts candles of varying sizes on the table, and they snap into place. The lighter is shown to be a significant distance away from the candles. The subject struggles to light the lighter, only succeeding in the dark scenario that they imagine.  The timer is at 20 minutes. The subject attempts to move a wooden figure, moving its limbs in a way that they cannot. A shadow of the figure reflects a large shadow upon the wall, the single source of light being a lighter. The timer rings.

I created the film using the corner of an office that belongs to my Dad. A challenge for me was getting to know my camera, and using it in an active situation. I created the film with the help of my friend, and, although it was a lot of work, it was a very memorable, fun, and valuable experience that I am very grateful to have.