Planning: Further Information on Working in a Group

Issues During the Creation of Final Production

Production: 

During the whole process of the creation of the music video, the digital package and the advert for the album, my partner and I struggled greatly to get along. From the beginning of the project right to the end, we found it hard to agree on big decisions, we found it hard to communicate and most importantly we found it challenging working together. Because of this, we became hinderances o each other and started holding each other back. We found ourselves resenting working together and even working on projects separately. Our situation got so bad that our course director considered allowing us to submit two different final pieces, but of course, that would not be a possibility because we were entered as a group and we had to submit our final piece as a group. Because of this simple fact, we tried our best to get along in order to get ourselves the grades we both wanted and deserved, we managed to pull through and help each other out in finishing the blog and the final production posts together. We dealt with these personal issues by only communicating when it was necessary and only when we needed information from each other. Overall, through this experience, we learnt that getting along with someone through friendship will not always translate in work and through work ethic. We also learnt to be very patient with each other and most of all resilience and endurance.

Filming: 

The process of filming was quite good. The first time we went filming together was very good, very successful, we managed to get what we wanted, and we had a good time. As is shown on my blog, there were two filming occasions: one in the daytime and one in the late afternoon to night time. I was the hands behind the first film day of filming, at night. The second day my partner chose to film, I was not present, but we had already discussed what we wanted to film in the second recording and where we wanted to film. I was very glad she took the initiative to film as I found myself quite busy during that time and we desperately needed more footage. When I received the footage, I realised there was not much that I could do with it. I figured that the fact that half of our footage was in the daytime and half was in the night time we could confuse our audience too much, also taking into account that our music video is concept based making it confusing enough. I suggested we not use it, however, my partner found a way to use it that fit the video. She took the footage and finished editing the video alone. I was not part of the creation of the music video, but I can say that I was happy with the outcome, regardless of my involvement. I did, however, give a lot of advice and feed my partner, who edited the video solely, many ideas and suggestions of what we could include in our music video. Overall, filming and the using of footage was quite a success within my group regardless of the ups and downs.

Time Management:

In terms of time management, my partner and I found it to be quite a challenge. We found it hard many times to make time to edit together, brainstorm together or even plot tasks together. This resulted in us doing many post and pieces of work separately and constantly not being on the same page. This gravely affected our group as we got to the point where we were both creating two separate different final productions and we had to make drastic changes to accommodate the regulations of the exam board. With this came great sacrifice, patience and understanding of each other. At the end of it, we both got to further understand what we each needed and what we had been trying to say over text and call that was not coming across clearly before. We learnt a lot about each other and about our work ethics and how they differ. Personally, my work ethic is quite difficult to follow, from an outside perspective. I tend to work quite quickly and spontaneously, in terms of subjects, in the night time and my partner, on the other hand, works mostly in the daytime, using schedules to plan her work. Because of these differences in work ethic, we clashed massively. Time management played a massive part in the progression of our final productions. Time management got in the way because we both had clashing schedules and we both never had free time together unless it was unplanned. If we had made more of an effort to see each other and have a verbal face to face conversations I believe our music video could have been a lot more successful.

Editing: During the editing process, my partner was editing the final music video as I was in the process of editing my own version of the video, using my own ideas and my own concept. I talked with some of my teachers and asked if my partner and I could submit two different end projects due to the fact that our project had progressed to such a point where I didn’t even understand what was happening anymore or where we were at as a group, so we came to the conclusion that it would be best for us both to part ways. I spoke to my course director and asked if this was a possibility and that’s when I began creating my individual pieces. During this time, I sent my partner many videos showing her what I was doing but it was all too late to go back and edit the video, and hopefully add what I thought would help. With this, I continued to edit my video and create both my digipack and my advert all in relation to my individual idea. Because of this, my partner and I became even more separated as we found ourselves concentrating more on our individual projects than the group work. After this, I got the discouraging news that we had to submit the same final production. At this point, I had completed my entire production and was basically ready to submit everything. 

However, working together was a massive benefactor. I don’t believe I would have been able to achieve what I have, separately and together, without my partner. She greatly helped me cultivate my ideas and focus on what was important, she also helped me narrow down what I wanted to do and why and reminded me to always add the technical side. I believe I would have managed to complete this task on my own but if I had the option to work in a group again, I would. As hard as it was at times, working with someone I believe we made the most of it and took advantage of each other’s knowledge as much as we could. Working together has taught me never to underestimate anyone’s ideas and their outcomes and I learnt to compromise and learn to allow other peoples ideas to shine before my own sometimes. In terms of filming, many shots where both mine and my partners' ideas merged, the dancing was my partners' idea and the unconventionality of it all was my idea. Together we created a brilliant music video that conveyed both unconventionality and humour, fun and freedom. Regardless of the difficulties, the fact that I was not physically present for much of the production and most of the crucial decisions, we managed to create something amazing due to the fact that we manage to keep some sort of communication going. Communication lead us to share ideas, expressing what we liked and disliked and sharing ideas and aspirations for the music video. With this, we learnt a lot and gained a lot of knowledge and perspective on what it’s like to create a production with another person successfully.