CONTEXT

This project portfolio is a report of my extended project for my second-year UAL Extended Diploma in Creative Media Film and TV pathway. My project is a short film focused on how depression feels, all the emotions that come with it, and also how it effects the person themselves and the people around them, I will be visualising depression to the best I can. The context page of the project portfolio presents the background of my project starting with project proposal writing about myself, what I learned on my course and who or what inspired me for my project. This is followed by explaining what my project is about and why it is important. The context page concludes with my project presentation pitch.

PROJECT PROPOSAL

BACKGROUND OF MY PROJECT

What is it that makes me do my project?

The reason why I chose this topic of depression for my final major project, is because of how much it affects people's lives daily, including mine, and people really struggle to explain how it feels, so I want to create something that people can relate to, and feel comfortable about reaching out for help from watching my short film.

My personal experiences that influence my choices (ideas for the project, my role in the project, how it relates to my future career?

The idea for my topic came around when I was brainstorming ideas, when creating my mind map I thought of an idea that would have a real impact on people which is to visually represent depression. This is a difficult thing to do as everyone sufferers differently, but because of my relation to the topic, I'm going to try and represent depression visually as much as I can.

What do I seek to achieve?

I want to be able to achieve my research question properly, which is what is depression. Achieving this means that I will have visually shown depression the best I can, and also people's views. I want the viewers to be able to feel comfortable with sharing their stories about depression, and how they've suffered to get the help they need.

How does it relate to my target audience?

My short film relates to my target audience as from doing my research, I have based my information on a certain age group, I'm not saying different age groups don't suffer from depression, it's that from my own personal ideas and the people around me. Furthermore the fact because teenagers are hugely misunderstood, I wanted to focus my short film on teenagers.

WHO AM I?

For this task, we had to film ourselves answering questions about our chosen topic for our FMP. The aim of this is to go more in-depth about our topic and ourselves to further help us when we are creating our project. For my topic, I will be talking about depression, which is personal for me.

Before researching my topics for my FMP, I asked myself some questions about myself and how it relates to this topic and also explained why I chose this topic and my thought process behind it. Creating this video is useful for my primary research on my chosen topic, and will contribute to my research overall. This is also a good way to understand more about myself and have self-reflection at the beginning of my research to help me develop more ideas.

This video is an insight into me as a person and my chosen topic for my FMP, which I will be able to reflect on in the future to help me with other ideas. As I am talking about my chosen topic which is depression, I wanted to explain it further as someone who has suffered from it to possibly someone who hasn't, it's a lot different from the stereotypical 'being sad' like everyone thinks, which I state. I really want to be able to visualize how I feel about depression and how it affects me along with other people, as mental illness as a whole is really difficult to describe. Portraying my emotions visually will help more people understand what depression is like.

As I mentioned in my video, I have a huge interest in the film industry and photography, specifically cinematography. I love being able to be so creative and have complete freedom when creating things visually, and all the flexibility that's included when filming. My passion for film didn't really come about until I started this course, I went into this course knowing barely anything about the film industry and having no interests, now I have gained more creativity and another interest, while also learning about something I enjoy doing. I also enjoy watching not just mainstream big-budget films, but rather the smaller budget indie films, some of my favorites are Thirteen (2003), which uses the blue/ green tin to perfectly describe the emotions which I want to do, and Speak (2004) which the way it's edited together and the storyline really captures the emotions discussed. These two films were quite popular at the time in America, the target audience is directed towards young people/ teenagers and the struggles they have to deal with and portray it really well.

Speaking about the target audience, mine will be directed towards young people/ teenagers from my generation, as the topic discussed is something they struggle with, so do adults, but I want to focus on young people as 1) I struggled a lot when I was younger, and 2) It often gets dismissed most of the time as it just being hormones when in reality its trauma and real mental health issues. My short film won't have much or any dialogue, as I want to capture the silence we feel when suffering from these issues, there will be some noises and possibly music but I am still undecided.

WHAT DID I LEARN ON MY COURSE?

From starting this Film & TV course, I have learned so many things, for example how to use a camera properly, which is a huge deal to me as I always wanted to get into photography and film my own things, but just didn't know where to start. Another example is that I never knew how to edit, but from all the lessons in class I can now use Avid and from using this knowledge I can also use Premier Pro too. I've always found it difficult editing but I now feel more confident to be able to create my own small projects and use all the skills I have gained from composition to the camera settings such as ISO and aperture.

WHAT IS MY PROJECT ABOUT?

My final major project is about visualising depression. It interests me the most as I have my personal struggles with it, which will further emphasize the knowledge and feelings I will portray in the short film. I want people to become more comfortable talking about this topic, and how it affects nearly everyone in different ways, no matter the age. This is also my strongest idea as I can picture what I want it to look like, whereas the other ones I can’t as much. Including colour will furthermore highlight the feelings shown in my short film, I want to experiment with colour as I think it has huge significance when creating a film. Throughout my short film I will be going through a sort of daily life for me, and many other people, from the start of the day till the end, and how depression effects peoples everyday lives, from feeling numb to having no motivation.

For my final major project in my last year at college, I have decided to research mental health affecting young people, specifically depression, and how it is so diverse in different people. I wanted to focus on this topic due to me suffering from it personally which has a huge impact on my life and the way I live and also to see how other people suffer from this to be able to help close friends or family if they're struggling, and lastly to gain my viewer's attention, make them check up on their friends or family, try to gain the confidence to speak out as I know its one of the hardest things to do.

Next, I went on to look at the strengths, weaknesses, and also opportunities for each of my major ideas, which helped me with the initial start of my project:

MENTAL HEALTH (SHORT FILM)

Strengths:

I have a lot of knowledge on this subject due to my personal experiences
There won’t be much dialogue as I want to show my video more visually
It's easy to film on my own, I won’t need much help from other people
I won’t need much equipment to film it with, I have my own camera and microphone

Weaknesses:

I will have to film in quite a few locations as I would want to show what a daily life with struggles like these really looks like
Coming up with ideas and locations to shoot might be an issue
As this is a short film, the quality will need to be the best it can be, better than I’ve done before. I will have to experiment with my camera more and watch more videos/ tutorials to get a better understanding of what I want to achieve throughout this project

Opportunities:

I will be able to make an impact on the viewers, especially people who don’t have a lot of knowledge on mental health issues or don’t struggle themselves, I want people to be able to realize the daily battles people with these problems have to go through
I have the opportunity to experiment with colour in editing. I want to use a blueish tint to further emphasise the feelings portrayed in this short film, and give the viewer a further understanding of this topic

SKATEBOARDING (FILM/DOCUMENTARY)

Strengths:

I’ve already done a part 1 of this from doing my last documentary project, therefore I have more knowledge than I did before, and can learn from my mistakes and what I could’ve done better, to therefore create a better outcome for this project
I know a lot about the history, culture, and community, which will help me further understand what I can do to make my project the best it can be
I have a lot of friends in the skateboarding community to help me with this project, this includes being interviewed if I made it a documentary, and overall helping me film and produce clips

Weaknesses:

I will have to film in lots of locations which won’t be planned as I will be following the skaters, they could be street skating or in a skate park
It would take longer to film because of the point stated above and to gather clips and interview people to fit into their schedules as well as mine
I’m still stuck between whether to make this a documentary or a short film, it would be better to make it more of a documentary, so it adds to my previous one, and its more informational rather than storyline based

Opportunities:

This project will introduce various opportunities, one of them being able to show the public more of an insight into the skateboarding community, and they aren’t all bad like most people say, which adds to my previous documentary about skateboarding

MUSIC (DOCUMENTARY)

Strengths:

Like all the other ideas, I have loads of knowledge of the alternative music genre, as I listen to it all the time and have grown up around it
I would have plenty of people to interview as I know lots of people who enjoy this genre of music too
I find creating documentaries is easier than making films, and I also feel more confident when creating a documentary in which I have a lot of understanding of the topic

Weaknesses:

As I will need multiple people to film interviews of, like the skateboarding idea, I will have to fit in with the people’s schedules as well as my own, which could delay the time I have filming
It might be difficult to find the right archival footage I want; I will need the footage to be the same as what I’m talking about

Opportunities:

I want to be able to give people more of an insight into how much music impacts our lives, no matter what genre really. I’m focusing the genre on alternative music as it's frowned upon by a lot of people, most of them hate it because it's‘ different’, but it's no different than listening to any other genre that has meaning to people too.

Justify the strongest idea. What interests you the most about chosen subject/topic? What is it that you want to find out?

My strongest idea is mainly the one about mental health. It interests me the most as I have my personal struggles with it, which will further emphasise the knowledge and feelings I will portray in the short film. I want people to become more comfortable talking about this topic, and how it affects nearly everyone in different ways, no matter the age. This is also my strongest idea as I can picture what I want it to look like, whereas the other ones I can’t as much. Including colour will furthermore highlight the feelings shown in my short film, I want to experiment with colour as I think it has huge significance when creating a film.

PROJECT PRESENTATION PITCH

You will add your presentation pitch and the evaluation here.