Unit 31: Social Action and Community Media - Evaluation of "Smoking Kills" Video

The Smoking Kills video recorded for the Social Action assignment was uploaded to Vimeo and used to enter into a competition as a method of showcasing it to others. The feedback from this would suggest that it was a very well made/produced video as we came either first or second in their online voting system and were invited to a showcasing of it in London to potentially receive an award. This seems to heavily suggest that there is a high probability that it was fit for purpose and had enough of an impact to be deserving of these potential awards, showing the video was effective at what it was trying to do and met it's original intentions to a high standard. While there was no official written feedback, many different people online had to vote for this video to be placed so highly in the rankings of this competition, suggesting that it had a widespread clarity and high technical and aesthetic standards to effectively be able to get such a wide viewing audience amongst peers and teachers, as well as family, friends and extended groups of people via social media.


My own evaluation, based on comments from others, would be that it is heavily suggested to be a high quality of work with appropriateness to the audience, clarity of audience and was internally viewed as a high production quality piece of work, as suggested by the voting and the production logs provided on the blogs of all those involved that heavily suggest at how the filming went and what it was like on set and in editing that it was all completed to a high quality standard, effectively delivering its message and being of an overall excellent standard.

Unit 4: Creative Media Production Management Project - Proposal and Pitch

The proposal was finished on Google Docs.


https://docs.google.com/document/d/1CT2RtJEQI9aQx2iTDBuZXR_2R58PCiiKjjcCiRqC1J4/edit?usp=sharing


_______________________________________________________________________


The pitch was finished on Google Slides, although I read a script alongside it that was created on Google Docs. The number on my script correlates to the page number of the slideshow.


https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1NGVSxWib7qtChUAZZeJjPoe6MV96QrulWi1oJYR8GPg/edit


https://docs.google.com/document/d/1RQ5barK26S2rsnENPfe1ndlo-If8aB5uBUZ7iDgJwLI/edit

Unit 15: Developing a Small Business in the Creative Media Industries - Business Proposal

 

 

 

University Freelancing Business

Proposal by Rhys Collins

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Formal Proposal for Business

Working Title - Rhys Collins Editing and Writing

Summary of Business - A Freelance Editing and Writing business run by myself that will work in close contact with previous members of Ufilms to support their future involvements and movements in the industry, without overtaking their projects, as well as expanding my name as a competent filmmaker in regards to writing and editing in the local York area and amongst Ufilms clients. Part of this business will involve expanding into the local area and gaining a clientbase within York as well, and potentially recruiting other editors or writers in York to assist.

Aims -

• Help by working on one third of Ufilms projects within the first year of University, as well as work on as many projects as possible within the following years.
• Expand my name by working with local people within the course and the general York area during my time at University.
• Provide an assistance to university work while still trying to promote people into a positive working attitude in regards to their own work.

Business Plan -

• A business plan has been written that covers all the info in regards to the business and plans as necessary.

 

A business plan is helpful as it outlines everything your business stands for, what you intend to do with it, and plans for wages, expansion and publicity to help keep you on a dedicated track without any distractions in growing your business as large as you can with the most potential.

Staff -

• Run and managed by me working freelance with Ufilms.
• Back-and-forth, open communication with clients so that they feel like a part of a team when working with me.
• Potential for expansion with acquired help.

Likely Clients -

• Ufilms
• Local people (Other York St John students, Film students, local business owners)

Unique Selling Point -

• Edited/Written by a student.
• Helpful for people lacking these skills.
• A creative mind behind your writing/editing.

Resources -

• My own skills (as well as the skills of anybody brought on as assistance for projects)
• Time
• PC with Adobe Premiere Pro CS6 or above

Growth - The growth of the business should hopefully be organic, expanding out in the local area once people have seen what I have created and shared that was edited/written by me, making it more desirable and having more people want my assistance in their own projects, making me more recognised due to my credentials. It may, however, be somewhat linear at first depending on how exclusive I work with Ufilms, but the overall goal is to grow organically out into the York area.

 

Strengths -

• Editing/Writing Skills
• Prior Credentials (Wally’s Peaks, Pinkerton, Smoking Kills etc.)
• Closeness to Ufilms

 

Weaknesses -

• University Student - May not have a lot of free time sometimes.
• Dependent on hardware/software that may fail.

 

Obstacles -

• Growth beyond Ufilms, may be others with similar ideas.
• Other Ufilms members may want to edit often.
• Distance from Ufilms.

Targets -

• Expand freelance operation into York.
• Work closely with Ufilms.

 

Contingency - While at University, I will also try and meet with any professionals brought in, give them my credentials and what I have worked on to try and get my name out in to the world and try to generate interest in my work so that I can, hopefully, move up in the industry beyond Ufilms and/or York.

Unit 15: Developing a Small Business in the Creative Media Industries - Business Plan

Definition of Business

My business is here as a providence of editing and writing techniques for aspiring filmmakers to use for a small fee to help push their film along and help finish their product to a standard they can be proud of. I provide personal editing to your finished film, cutting it to any guidelines you provide and finishing it to a standard we can all proud of, as well as offering my own personal writing if you are stuck for an idea. I will be found online, mainly offering my services via Facebook to connect with students s a primary audience, and will offer open communication with myself to the client via the use of their messaging services, as well as through email if desired. I will provide this at a reasonable rate of £4 for every hour of editing work (at below minimum wage) to make it affordable for short products, and to not encourage people to have me edit the entirety of an important, long project for them; Writing would be at a similarly appropriate fee of £30 in total for me to finish it alone, or £15 if the client wishes to write with me, which should again encourage a primary market of students who are wishing with help in writing or editing, without me doing the whole job for them, opening a learning opportunity alongside the services. With this, I hope to work closely with Ufilms to provide my assistance in editing and writing products for them at reasonable rates without overextending into their business and encouraging a back-and-forth relationship, as well as open myself up to fellow students in the local area of York. My main objective would be to edit at least one third of the videos created by Ufilms, but a more long-term goal is to, in general, extend my services to local people and help create an open dialogue within the York St John Film & TV course. Primarily I’d keep an open dialogue with Ufilms to see what projects they do, and I would try and get involved with editing, especially on small projects that are far more reasonable and affordable, to provide my services, logging the number of Ufilms projects and the number I have worked on, to try and work out if I meet my 1/3rd quota for the year as a sort of benchmark for me to examine my progression as a freelancer with Ufilms.

Customers

As stated previously, I feel that Ufilms, my previous affiliation in college, will be my main customer as a freelancer in university, with keeping tabs on the members of the team, what they are doing and keeping an open dialogue about work they are doing to try and get involved. They are all of a similar age (with Danniella and Chloe being the only ones who are older) and they will all also be university students. If I extend my services locally, it would also be amongst students of a similar age, who don’t have a lot of money or, potentially, free time, but feel they lack the skills provided. As it is, Ufilms doesn’t have to purchase editors as myself and a few others with editing abilities are working under the name in college, but when we split off for university, only one of the skilled editors will be sticking with a large number of team members, opening up a potential demand for editors, and an open dialogue should help me maintain an ability to freelance with them for a very small fee with somebody they not only know and have worked with, but is in a similar position to them in university and is there to encourage them with their work, also. I aim to inform them about my freelancing opportunities via Facebook messages to them, as well as maintaining contact and offering my services whenever they require it.

Naming your business

As for a name, due to not being a business in the technical sense and working freelance for myself, the most appropriate titling would be to simply name it “Rhys Collins Editing and Writing Services”, so that people know who it is they are dealing with, getting a chance to know me, and those who are familiar with me will be able to not only find it easily, but will be able to know who it is and what it is that I do. The name is long, but as it is not part of a business collective I feel it is more important to be informative about my services and skills that I can provide over a meaningless title attached to promote a branding when working primarily for other people

Staffing

Freelancing means working by myself, but it’s possible to acquire assistance from people within my university to help me edit something. In this instance I would look for the best possible editors or writers within my course, as I would know they are at a similar level of education as me, and are therefore trained similarly. I would take them on based on a project basis, if I think something is too long, and I would make sure to not over manage and to let them work how they desire if they offer their help. I would give them the money based on the hours they work, and split it fairly, and while it doesn’t match minimum wage, it is still a large enough amount of money for a student to work around, especially if the project is particularly long and nets a decent profit. They will get the experience, the credit and some pay and help me towards my long-term goal of spreading my name to the local area.

Unit 4: Creative Media Production Management Project - PMP Report

Completed on Google Docs.


https://docs.google.com/document/d/1mFSpzwUQkXKE9prJYTXr3Y2hHBeB2U7CpxqWC-uLwZI/edit?usp=sharing

Unit 6: Critical Approahces to Creative Media Production - Debate Notes

While trying to do research and form an argument, Adam was getting actively distracted by the newspaper (The Daily Star), proving that he is indeed being influenced by the news in front of my eyes. The news gets very political, and one particular image that attracted his attention was one of a political cartoon showing the various parties as circus performers, with Conservative and Labour at the front of the pack, already showing immediately that they’re trying to disregard the other parties in relation to the main two that typically end up in power as of recent years. The front page itself is about “Tezza vs Jezza” (in reference to Theresa May vs Jeremy Corbyn), as opposed to the other parties. In regards to this, when you look at the other parties, Labour and Conservative ended up with over 250 seats each in the most recent election, while the Green party had a single seat at the end of the election. There’s no way that people weren’t swayed by the news telling them that the election was about Tory v Labour making them want to vote for these parties over the others. This is referred to as “Hypodermic Needle Theory”, the idea behind this is that people will see something in the media, in this case they see that either Corbyn or May should be Prime Minister, and they vote one of these ways without looking too far into it. This might not be necessarily true that you wouldn’t look into it, as many Labour and Tory voters are well informed and heavily believe in those parties, but a lot of people aren’t willing to give parties like Green or Lib-Dem a chance because they aren’t referenced as often in the news, and this supports the idea of hypodermic needle to an extent as it shows that people are ingesting what news sources say they should vote and don’t look into the alternatives. Would you be able to tell me that you know any of the policies the Green Party stands for? It seems obvious that there’s extreme influences to this from the news, as the publicity some of these other parties get is extremely underwhelming.

 

On the other hand, if a smaller party gets enough publicity then it’s possible they can have a real chance. Back in the 2015 election there was a massive scare (or a massive opportunity, depending on how you look at it) that UKIP would get into power, with many places having UKIP as their second most voted party overtaking Labour/Conservative. UKIP ended up nowhere near getting into power, holding a single seat in the end, but there’s a lot to be said about the publicity this party got from both sides, those who supported them and those who didn’t, that many people thought it was entirely possible that they could get a huge chunk of seats and really make some massive changes in parliament. In the end, they didn’t, but there was so much fear mongering about scary UKIP that everyone was worried the election would go poorly, it was clear that both sides were giving publicity, without anyone talking about the real changes in Scotland that were putting SNP into a position of power. Conservative supporters would likely have been against this and would have tried to change it, but the news was only speaking about big, bad UKIP, instead. This shows that people do listen to fearmongering. Nobody fearmongers SNP, SNP gets seats. Fearmonger UKIP and they don’t get seats. Even after the 2015 election, people were still talking about UKIP, because they were the ones who were in the news. You can’t say people aren’t persuaded by the news when the 2015 election seems to heavily suggest that, if something doesn’t get publicity, nobody cares.

 

Have you ever watched the news and just thought about it, or do you just look at, for example, the 2016 American election, and think “Yeah, this Donald Trump campaign is a disaster, hopefully he doesn’t win.” It’s highly unlikely that you were looking into everything both people stood for, because if the news says he’s bad, he’s bad. Donald Trump is, in my opinion, excellent at advertising a product. I saw an old advert for his own brand of steak that he created under his company name (Trump Steak, what a name). In this advert, he doesn’t tell you about the nutritional value of steak, about how much steak is in the steak or about how it’ll save the world. He sits down, giving you a comforting smile, and says that, in plain and simple terms, “This steak is the best steak, take it from me.” If a multi-millionaire who hosts an extremely popular TV show sits down and says something is good, you would think “If it’s good enough for a multi-millionaire, it’s good enough for me.” At a cheap enough price, everyone wants what a millionaire is having. If a millionaire wants to ‘save the country’ and ‘make it great’, people want that. Did they look into it? I’m sure some of them did, they may have been more active readers, looking into facts, manifestos and deciding that his travel bans, internet policies and overall political views were right for them, but would he have won without the publicity making passive viewers think that he was just simply going to make America great? I heavily doubt it. If you advertise it, people want it, and Trump had far more publicity.

 

You could argue that, similarly, Corbyn had more publicity than May, but unlike Trump, Corbyn isn’t a corporate advertising genius, a multi-millionaire or a guy from the Apprentice. He’s advertised as a local bloke looking out for local blokes. Who else was advertised as this? Nigel Farage, the fear mongered scary UKIP leader who was going to invade the country in 2015, apparently. By using the same advertising behind Corbyn, Conservative news was able to convince people that they were more or less the same, rather than trying to make them seem like completely unique individuals with independent views from each other. News can advertise somebody, and advertising is everything to get people scared. People were scared of instability under Farage, people were scared of instability under Corbyn. I, myself, trusted Corbyn, and did my best to look past the persuasion they were trying to force, as did many people and many newspapers, but just because 90% of people, for example, aren’t convinced by what someone says, still means that 10% are. If an aeroplane company landed 9/10 planes they wouldn’t be bragging about it, that would be a terrifying figure, and if 10% of people are prone to passive viewing of television, that entirely suggests that there are six and a half million people in the UK who will vote what the news tell them to. Conservative had less than a million more votes than Labour in the most recent election. If those 6 million people who passively viewed, for example, the Sun, looked at it and thought “Yeah, I don’t want the UK in the Cor-bin, so I’ll vote Tory” actually looked into what Corbyn stood for, it’s very possible that Labour could have won by a landslide, but, under the assumption that 10% of people don’t look into facts, it can be seen that the news does definitely influence people’s decision making. And that’s if the percentage isn’t actually higher, as there are no figures I can find on it (I assume more passive viewers aren’t aware they’re passive)

 

When somebody makes a news report, or a statement in general, they have a preferred reading. To bring back the Cor-bin point, they want people to be like “Oh no, can’t have any of that Corbyn ruining the country”, and will vote against him. This is their preferred reading, this is what the person writing it was hoping would happen, wanting them to think what they think. The difference here is the oppositional reading - somebody looks at it and thinks “Oh no, can’t have any of the Sun ruining our news sources”. Alternatively, there’s a negotiated reading, which is what people really should be going for, where people will analytically look through all the different debates, topics and points raised, think about it in comparison to their own thoughts and delegate to themselves how accurate they think it is in representing the facts. By arguing that the news doesn’t influence people, you think it’s going to always be negotiated readings. Why do preferred and oppositional readings would even exist if this were the case? There is obviously professional evidence that suggests there is influential persuasion within the news if there is any reason that these would exist, as there is the intended interpretation to change a person’s beliefs to that of the writer, and the opposite which is drawn from somebody resisting the influences the writer is using. If the news isn’t influential, why are people trying to resist its influence?

Unit 15: Developing a Small Business in the Creative Media Industries - Moving on from Ufilms

When the time doing something draws to a close, you have to consider what is and isn't going to happen as a result of moving on. As I grow to the closing days of College and get ready to move onto University, I have to start considering what is and isn't going to happen as a result of moving on in my life. One thing that bears thinking about is the Ufilms Business we started in college. It began as a collective, everyone owned and ran Ufilms, even if others were less directly involved, and we all had at least one piece of Ufilms work to be proud of when we leave. The issue is that people in the class are all going to different universities across the country - including Salford, Teesside and, for myself, York, on my own. When it comes to considering carrying the Ufilms name forwards to University, some of the more popular choices (such as the aforementioned two) will very likely be able to carry on the Ufilms brand, with enough members and a variety of skills to provide an ample enough amount of hands working on projects at all times.


I, myself, am going to York all on my own, without any other Ufilms members following me there, making me have to consider whether or not I feel I have a large enough variety of skills to provide a Ufilms service within the city of York or, in general, the Yorkshire area. I have a very particular set of skills, with my highest praised abilities from teachers and peers being my writing and editing skills. When it comes to the business, I don't see myself as being able to provide much paperwork or filming and as my camera skills are lacking, and without a dedicated Ufilms Yorkshire team, I feel as though I will be certainly unable to provide any Ufilms utility in regards to creating my own products within Yorkshire.


An appropriate business for me would be something in which I can create ideas for films without necessarily having to oversee the production, then I use the footage provided to me to mould it into what I had in my head, without ever having to direct, film or touch a camera, as those are skills that I lack in in comparison to other people inside and outside of Ufilms.


So my idea for moving on from Ufilms to manage a business in University is to work with a more creative method. I am going to go freelance, working for myself and simply working under other people who need a writer or an editor. In this regard, I actually intend to stick closely to Ufilms, and regularly offer them my editing skills (when I'm not busy with too much work) and also offering them my writing should they need it. The important thing here is working around my own schedule, and simply applying to help them out for when their schedules don't work with it, benefitting both myself and the remaining branches of Ufilms, giving everybody an advantage from me working freelance with them. This would also give me the opportunity to do some work on the side outside of Ufilms, be it editing or writing.


The other option would be to disassociate myself with Ufilms, and set up a similar business within York. This would be more difficult as it would require setting myself up in an unfamiliar area, with unfamiliar area with no - as of present - gauge on how difficult it might be to set up such a business in the area. It would be far more difficult to work in this manner, as it would be reliant on other people, as opposed to reliant on being offered work from a group of people I am already familiar with, as well as requiring me to take on a managerial position instead of being a simple worker for others. As a source of work, it seems far less logical than working freelance for the time being, and I'm much happier to consider freelance as a viable option than I am starting my own branch of Ufilms or independent company within York, at least until I have spent some time in York already.


My target would be to edit at least one third of all Ufilms Teesside or Salford produced videos within each year of university, to show myself as a valuable person and provide a large number of credits in films that I have written/edited for both showreel purposes, and to show myself as a dedicated worker in my time in and out of University over the course of my time there, giving me a boost in finding a job in the industry or freelance after leaving University, as well, without tying myself down to a specific business that I had already set up and managed in University.


My goals would be to work efficiently, getting everything edited within at most two weeks of being asked to. Being efficient, hard working, driven and effective at getting all work put before me completed to a professional, high-quality standard and doing it all without involving myself fully with their brand, recognising the integrity of myself as an individual above all else, without any external staffing beyond myself.


In terms of reaching customers, I will remain in contact with Ufilms, offering myself to any and all work they need assistance with. I will also try and acquire contacts in Yorkshire through my university or fellow students in any out of my course who may need videos written or edited, without getting myself heavily involved with filming (unless university thoroughly improves my skills in these areas, in which case I can start volunteering my services for jobs of that sort.)


Most importantly for me is that I will work for a profit, spending little money in reality and simply earning money for helping people on their own tasks.

Unit 4: Creative Media Production Management Project - Production Diary (May 29th - June 15th)

May 29th 2017
It rained.





May 30th-June 4th 2017
I made the executive decision to take the week of the half term as a bit of a break from doing too much work on this assignment, doing more work on other assignments, but I assured everybody I would schedule next week. Adam (the DOP) was unwell in this time after having climbed a mountain, anyway, and so having to reschedule yesterdays shoot wasn't a huge issue.





June 5th 2017
Scheduling week (as well as finishing up on other assignments or other peoples films). First step was to message the cast and crew about when they would be available so I knew when not to use.










I'll also provide backup evidence for Rebecca, confirming that she is, indeed, doing her PMP for her Makeup course, too.





June 6th 2017
I asked the actors for their work schedules, to make sure that they could film on the weekend. I also continued heavily on editing, making sure that scenes 4, 5 and 6 were edited, as well as a large portion of scene 7.



June 7th 2017
I pestered the actors a little bit more to make sure that the weekend was 100% okay.




We were all doing work for a separate assignment in lesson, so I did no more editing on this day. I also made an executive decision that, due to time constraints and a difficulty scheduling, as well as poor weather, that the beach part, which is mostly unnecessary to the plot and was added in late into the script, was best being cut from the film. This meant the film would not only be finished on time, but would be shorter, to fit the Ufilms Premiere ceremony better, and wouldn't cut into the actors own final projects; all without taking away from the film.


June 7th 2017
I finished editing up to scene 8, and showed it to my teacher. She seemed impressed, other than the issues with scene 3 that were already there to be reshot.


June 10th 2017
Back on set, it was time to finish up on all the filming and wrap up. We arrived at 10:30 as planned, ready to work all the way through to 3:30. We finished at about 2:30, having finished all of the scheduled scenes, plus the reshoot, with the help of Chloe, Adam (who had cancelled his previous plans to be out on this day), Rebecca and the actors, Connor and Ben. I gave them a huge thanks, paid for Ben's transport (Connors is still withstanding, but will be provided at a later date once I have received it from the Ufilms budget.)






June 12th 2017
I re-edited scene 3 with the new footage.


June 13th 2017
I edited the rest of the film on this day, making sure that it was finished to a professional, high quality standard that I could be proud of.