Capitalist scheme or empowerment genius?

I wasn’t in the right mindset to edit today, so instead I decided to start working on my film’s website. I chose wix as my website-building platform because, out of my past experience, it has the simplest/most effective interface and the most potential to create an immersive site that best enraptures visitors into the world of my story.

While perusing the default options for wix, its suggestions struck me with a brilliant idea: clothing merchandise! We see this marketing scheme extremely often with bands and musical artists; when you're at a concert or on a band's/artist's website, there is always advertising for the musicians' clothing items that syncs up to the brand they're presenting. So, if my brand for my film is all about clothing, and introducing/wearing clothing that's nonconforming and unconventional: why not offer that for people myself?

Unfortunately, I know absolutely nothing about clothing design, so I have two options: 1) wing it, probably not the best option; 2) briefly research it myself; or 3) talk to someone that has background knowledge in fashion/clothing design to help me out, but I probably don't have enough time to do this. For now, I'm going to finish constructing the basic outline of my website, and use the blanks that present themselves to me to devise the route I'm going to take when designing the clothing.

Composing a plan for tunes

While going through my stock footage, I found some really good stuff in the ones that were "ruined" by the music playing in the background (mentioned in my filming post). However, there was something about one of the songs - titled "tbh ily' by Chet Porter - that seemed to fit so perfectly with the unfolding scene, that I made a split second decision in that moment to contact the managers of Porter to ask for permission to use the song in the excerpt. To my surprise - they got back to me very quickly, granting me permission! (Click on screenshot to enlarge).

















I don't know what I'll be doing for music throughout the entire excerpt for now as far as music goes, but it does set me at ease to know I have a fantastic instrumental to use - and knowing I don't necessarily have to mute the portions that contain the song.

Editing: pending

(I will be continuously updating this blog posting as I continue to edit my footage).

3/22/17

Today I began the editing process of my documentary. The first thing I did was import the files I knew I wanted to edit from my phone to my laptop. Luckily, I already knew that email highly decreases the quality of video immensely. To get around this, I Airdropped all of the videos to my laptop, and was happy to see that the quality stayed intact.

The sequence I decided to edit the footage in has a very defined lineage. Firstly, I edited the intro of myself speaking to the camera, in which I explain the photoshoot and reveal myself as the documentarian to the viewers. I then decided to film all of the stock footage I got of everyone setting up, messing around, getting dressed and getting their makeup done. From here (where I left off), I’ll edit the footage of my interviewees getting their pictures taken, followed by the interviews themselves.

There are two reasons for me editing in this order. Firstly, it’s much more organized. If I upload my introduction separately; follow by stock footage; followed by pictures; followed by interviews, there is no danger of my footage getting all mixed up, out of order and confusing. This tends to happen to me particularly, and it’s exacerbated by iMovie’s limiting timeline options and oversimplified interface functions. Secondly, it allows me to create some sense of structure that I want to concoct. I’m not quite sure of the order I want to place all of the footage I attained, so getting a sense of everything that I have to work with in their correct categories will be helpful in putting together an outline of the narrative I was to build.

Filming!

On Saturday over the weekend, I got together with my club (Gender-Sexuality Alliance) and filmed the photoshoot that went on! A brief summary of what went on/the executive decisions I made while filming:

• When I arrived and myself/the other officers were setting up, I immediately took out my phone and started recording. I got a lot of good stock footage of the set up/the hard work that everyone put into it and the very blatant passion/happiness that they exuberated while putting it together.
• While filming footage of everyone changing/getting their makeup done/hanging around, I realized that because there was music playing, it was going to ruin the footage’s sense of continuity within editing. I immediately had to be the cranky grandfather that turned the music off whenever I was filming - luckily, no one seemed to mind too much.
• I got (what looked to be) great footage of the individuals getting their makeup done. I also held impromptu interviews with the makeup artists/subjects while it was being done that I think will make a great addition to put into it.
• I went for a very casual, handheld look with lots of movement in order to create intimacy between the trifecta of myself, the subjects and the situation itself.
• I periodically pulled aside the subjects that I wanted to interview aside to ask them questions; I slightly regret not using a tripod to film the interviews, mainly because my arms got very tired and I feel as though I could have been a better interviewer if I wasn’t so focused on holding steady and channeling mental effort into keeping my arms up. The footage itself didn’t come out too poor or shaky, so I’m not too worried about that.
• I made an executive decision in the moment to film myself talking to the camera in order to place a face to the name, set context, and establish myself as the figure and documentarian physically stepping into the world that I’m shedding light upon. I had my friend Chris, who is also in AICE Media Studies A level, film it because I know that he has some sense of how to film professionally/properly.
• Finally, I of course got footage of the photographer taking pictures of all of the subjects – particularly (or maybe even limited to) the interviewees I questioned.

I’m excited and fond of the footage I got and excited to edit it and put it all together!

Ideology

Since the photoshoot that I’ll be filming isn’t until this Saturday, I have planned to start working on the website for my documentary until then. The marketing for this project is going to be so exciting for me to plan and execute, because the pitch is one that would appeal directly to myself. This is because I fall directly into the target audience of my piece - something that I forgot to consider while originally putting together my ideas for the project. That was until I sat down with a group of my peers also putting together their own projects, and realized that a lot of their decisions were influenced by who their target audience is. That’s not to say this hasn’t applied to me as well; in my head, I’ve had a certain grouping of people with a particular mentality in mind when structuring the idea for the documentary. However, it wasn’t until my reintroduction to the idea of a target audience that I was reminded that I should probably concisely define who exactly I’m attempting to appeal to - particularly to help me with the marketing process.

The primary grouping of people that this film will appeal to, without second thought or an attempt to cater to them, is younger (Gen Z - Millenials) individuals who are more liberal/left leaning in their mentality and ideology. This is because liberal/leftist ideas are the antithesis of conservatism; based on traditionalism, the concept of trashing gender roles/conventions and breaking/changing “the norm” goes against what they believe in. It goes without saying that the liberal side of the conversations - the ones interested in breaking roles/norms and changing conventions - are the individuals who will seek out this piece and adhere to it and enjoy it. This is likely due to our innate addiction to confirmation bias; the idea that we seek out and consume/validate information based off of what we already believe. Humans are prideful beings, and we don’t like to be told that we’re incorrect; we don’t like challenging our ingrained belief systems (which is kind of paradoxical and contradictory that this applies to liberals as well, considering their entire belief system is based on change and adaptation of ideas).

Now, don’t get me wrong: my criticism of (part of) my target audience is entirely hypocritical. As I said, I fall directly into the target audience of the piece - I, too, fall into the confines of confirmation bias more often than I’d be happy to admit. However, there’s a point to my criticism: if you’re making a piece that’s constructed through education and a call to arms, what’s the point of making it if the people you’re attempting to appeal to already know the information you’re telling them and are already a part of the community/movement you’re insinuating they join? The answer: there is none - at least not from an activist standpoint. And, if we’re being completely frank here, the documentary I’m creating is almost solely a product of activism. So, for this reason, the real target audience of the piece isn’t so specific - I’m not primarily selling to liberals. I’m selling to all people, although mainly Gen Z and Millennials (the groups of people that tend to be either more liberal or moderate, that will be more open to viewing a documentary such as mine).

Succeeding in this endeavor is tricky. It would be much simpler to just appeal to the people that already agree with me, but trying to include everyone in the voice and in the movement can be tricky. On one hand, I can’t be too radical about it: if I am, I’ll alienate the moderates/conservatives that are much more skeptical of viewing the piece. However, if I’m too middle-ground, I can also risk alienating the liberals that want a strong conviction of ideas. Essentially, to sell this piece I need to sell an idea: the idea of individual expression. To express yourself not inside of the roles given to you; or even against the roles given to you; but in the way that makes you. The way that makes you the most comfortable and you the most empowered and you the most happy. To do this, I’ll need to walk a thin line between challenging norms, and doing it in a "normal" way; feeding people “radical” ideas in a socially acceptable, snackable way.

I may or may not be putting too much thought into this, but either way: wish me luck.

A sea of questions

One of the most important aspects of a documentary is, of course, the documentarian's ability to come up with and conduct thoughtful and engaging interview questions: How do you get someone to say what you want them to? How do you guarantee that the way in which they express their ideas will be interesting and enrapturing for audiences? There's no conclusive, sure way to guarantee that your interviewee will say exactly what you want them to in the most enthralling of ways; however, coming up with quality, probing interview questions is the best way to get the odds in your favor. I started jotting and playing around with some ideas:

• Whats your gender identity?
• Whats your age?
• What are your favorite clothing stores?
• Do you consider yourself feminine, masculine, or androgynous?
• Why do you dress the way that you do?
• Why do you express yourself the way that you do?
• What inspires your taste in clothing?
• What inspires your sense os expression?
• What does your clothing say about you?
• What does your sense of expression say about you?
• Other than clothing, what else encompasses your sense of expression?
• Would you say youre nonconforming in the way you dress?
• Are you ever hesitant or scared to dress the way that you do?
• Do you ever feel pressured to dress a certain way because of the way you identify?
• Are you comfortable with the way you dress?
• The way you express yourself?
• Ideally, how would you describe your sense of style?
• Sense of expression?
• Do you find that your friends dress similarly to you, or do you stand out among your friends?
• Do you feel that you dress differently than the majority, or similar to it?

(I took these questions from a Google Doc that I compiled, and will continue to update it as I formulate more questions: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1cwsEwJknZbwsJEBEgLdVa-R154pqxyc8g6sSCrLizK0/edit?usp=sharing)