Personal Skills Evaluation

5 detailed examples of a practical skill acquired/developed for you AS coursework that will directly be used in your A2 coursework

In AS Media Studies; I learned how to use adobe editing software. Although I did have quite a bit of experience using a much simpler editing programme (windows movie maker), having this new skill has and will allow me to do more with my trailer with much more ease. For example, being able to add variety and uniqueness to my credits.

Having done 2 short films at AS, I know the planning stages I must go through such as organising actors, times and places. Knowing the mistakes that set us back from our deadline last year will help me avoid them at A2.

Camera work was also a skill that I developed from AS. Although I had a different role in my group so was not entirely in charge of the camera, I still had the chance to observe how to use the camera and the camera stand. I was also able to see how the camera had to follow the shots script precisely.

In the group that I was in at AS, my role was the script writer. This meant that I had to write the script for dialogue and camera shots. This will help me write the scripts for my trailer at A2 as I have had some experience.

I found that last year, we had a lot of problems with the lighting which forced us to change some of our script to adjust to it. I will hopefully take this and develop some more skills with adjusting lighting or planning my script around the expected lighting available.

How has your creativity developed though using digital technology to complete your coursework productions?

Using blogger, YouTube and Google documents for my coursework in AS helped hugely for many different reasons. Firstly, it allowed me to keep updating regularly what I have been doing as well as linking easily scanned in documents that are relevant through Google documents. This organisation assured me that there was nothing that I had forgotten to upload as well. I was able to add in some YouTube videos to show what films I had been researching as well as print screen of my progress in editing our final piece.

5 detailed examples of paper-based/research skill acquired/developed for you’re AS coursework that will directly be used in your A2 coursework

For the research, our group chose to look at old coursework film entries to get an idea of what we could do with our own. Seeing as this was very successful and allowed us to come up for an idea fairly quickly, I plan to do the same for my trailer.

Our group then went on to researching into opening sequences to films with the same genre such as 'hairspray' to get an idea of what music, camera shots should be used. This again will be used to gather ideas for my trailer.

Other research that I did that will help onto A2 is researching into my intended audience. This way I will know what my chosen audience will want and expect from the genre that I will be using.

Paper based work included planning the name, genre and audience. As I was in a group last time, this planning was more of a discussion, however there were some spider diagrams to help us. Although I shall be choosing these things on my own this year, I shall still be using the same method to decide as I found it helped.

Paperwork also helped when planning the best location to film in. As we had to draw an outline of the room and include things such as lighting, power supply, hazard areas etc, this made it clear that it was the right location. This will help me in A2 as I, again, will know the best location for my piece.