REFLECTIVE EVALUATION
There is a lot of things that I have improved upon and learned this year that will help me in my progression towards my chosen opportunities. I have faced many challenges in both professional practice and the practical media tasks but despite how challenging I found them, I enjoyed overcoming them and doing so increased my general ability.
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During my time on this course so far, I have found that my biggest strengths are Graphic Design, Photography and Video Editing. I have discovered this through tasks such as the Our Day Out poster task, the Rude Health design task and the music video editing project from the first year as well as some of the work I have done with a job I have acquired through the course. Since my earlier work, I have improved by focusing on things such as typography, colour theory and connotations, video editing conventions such as time line organisation and effects that improve the overall final result. These were all things I didn't consider as much before but as I focused more on them, I improved them and continue to as I become more confident with the principles and conventions of each practice.
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However, there are still things that I am weaker in. When it comes to aspects such as illustration, audio recording, planning and colour theory, there are things I could improve on. I have found through planning for projects that I struggle with even basic forms of illustration through sketches. Of course sketches don't necessarily need to be perfect, but the fact that I struggle so much with basic illustration is a show of how much I have to work on. I have learned that focusing on how shapes make up individual sections of what I am trying to draw makes it easier and so that is something I will keep in mind as I attempt to improve. Planning for projects in general in something I find difficult. I consider myself quite a creative person (you would hope so considering I'm on a creative media course), but generating ideas for a professional project is something I can sometimes struggle with. It takes a long time for me to come up with ideas, but recently I have learned how to make the most out of common idea generation methods such as diagrams and mood boards, for example, having someone or something to bounce ideas off of is an extremely effective idea generation method for me. Although audio recording is something I do very often, I still find it very difficult, there is a lot more thought that goes into than people seem to think. With more experience I think I'll get better at noticing certain background noises and eliminating them before recording, but currently I struggle with background noise and end up having to heavily edit the audio to remove it. Something as intricate as microphone positioning can effect a recording's quality and I still have a lot to learn about how different microphones should be positioned in different set ups. Having said that, I think the fact that I recognise these issues is a good sign that I will be able to improve this considerably in the future.
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Originally, I intended to get an apprenticeship or try go into employment after this course, however that has since changed. I am currently hoping to move to Leeds and begin a Broadcast Media course at Leeds Beckett University. I believe the reason for my original intentions was because I was afraid of the costs and responsibility. After talking to tutors and doing research, I found it was better to consider the costs as less of a "soul crushing", daunting loan and more of an investment into the career I would like to pursue. If I were to go straight from college into employment, I know it would be much more difficult to obtain a position than if I went to university and got more qualifications. Not to mention the fact that I definitely would like to have more experience before being employed again. I never thought I would be excited by the idea of going to university, but a huge part of me actually is.