Live Brief – Project Review

Posted on December 9, 2019December 9, 2019 Posted in Microprojects, Projects, Surfaces and StrategiesTagged live brief, MA photography, microproject, project reviewLeave a comment

Live Brief – Week 10

Now that we have reached the end of the live brief project and delivered the final pitch, it is important to have a debriefing and review the project. As we are all approaching the deadlines for assignments this term and trying to keep up with the workload, as well as jobs and other life demands, it seemed that there was not time that we could arrange where everyone could be present to do a debriefing discussion. I took it upon myself to start a document and share this with the rest of the team so they could add to it in their own time. It seemed the best solution to allow collaboration for a team working remotely. These are some of the main points extracted from this:

What did we do well?

We understood the brief quickly and did very thorough research which allowed us to meet the brief accurately, identifying the most appropriate social media channel and understanding the organisation’s ethos and way of working collaboratively. These formed key parts of our campaign.
Communication was excellent with use of Whatsapp, conference calls, Google Drive. Weekly meetings were well attended and documented in the event somebody couldn’t attend.
We always worked respectfully and heard each others viewpoints even if we didn’t always agree. We were always able to give and receive feedback within the group and could adjust accordingly. We received tutor feedback very well and used it to develop the project further. We changed course quite dramatically in response to the feedback in our second review and this was a positive move.
We worked extremely well as a team. Great teamwork with people putting in as much time and effort as possible, and voluntarily covering when others couldn’t.
We were willing to take a creative risk and this was well-received.

What could we have done better?

If we had identified earlier that we were doing far too many different work streams, we would have been able to work with more focus and more efficiently. We could possibly have come up with more of our own creative content if we had gone with a narrower focus.
It would have been great if more of our own content had been included in final pitch (however, I know for all of us this was based on time constraints and the demands of work and studies).
It would have been more professional if we had agreed on a budget and minimum rates prior to the pitch.

What are the lessons learned that we could apply to future projects?

After the initial creative brainstorming, it is important to narrow the vision down so that the project becomes very focused, efficient and streamlined. Agree on a set of clear parameters so everyone can participate creatively on equal terms to produce consistent results.
More frequent reviews, both of project milestones and the creative output from the team, are important to ensure the project is staying within scope, timeline and according to brief, as well as working effectively. Question the plan if things don’t appear to fit and be confident in raising any issues or concerns. Being able to adapt and adjust accordingly is essential.
Make sure that every possible detail has been taken care of before the final pitch. A rehearsal of the pitch may be a good way to identify any missing information, areas that need more work or questions that may arise.

Looking back, this has been a very intense 9 weeks working hard on our studies and also on the live brief. Despite the challenges of working long distance and never meeting face to face, we managed to collaborate and create together. It has been a tremendous experience to be able to work on the live brief and gain valuable knowledge through this process. I think we did a great job to deliver our final pitch to deadline and it was a real pleasure to work on this project with Bloo, Raeann and Oliver, who were always positive, always willing to pitch in and do the work and considerate of each other every step of the way. We made a great team!

Live Brief – Pitch

Posted on December 9, 2019 Posted in Microprojects, Projects, Sustainable ProspectsTagged live brief, MA photography, pitchLeave a comment

After working together as a group for 9 weeks, the day has finally arrived for us to do the live pitch for Headway East London. Due to the time allocated for the pitch, only two of us could be present, as one of our members could not get time off work and the other could not attend because of the time zone difference.

We had agreed that Bloo would present the pitch as she was also the person who had so beautifully compiled and designed the visual document for the pitch. My role was to be in the background and provide support if necessary. This meant I was able to observe the reactions of our tutors and those of the team from Headway East London.

They appeared to be really engaged with our presentation and were particularly positive about our choice to focus on Instagram as the main social media channel for the campaign, and appeared to enjoy the presentation of the video clip. They were particularly excited about our workshop concept and said that this way of working collaboratively was precisely their way of working with their members.

We had loosely agreed on a budget but had not included this in our campaign pitch. This may have been fortunate as we were caught out by the fact that the other group who had pitched had offered to do this campaign pro bono. We both managed to field this question well and successfully navigate this unexpected development.

Afterwards, I managed to watch the recordings not just of the other group who pitched for Headway East London, but for all the groups who had pitched to other organisations too. I found it very valuable to see how these groups had worked together and how they had interpreted their briefs. Overall, I think we did extremely well as a group as we understood the client and their brief. We have worked exceptionally well together throughout the 9 weeks despite challenges and we can be pleased with what we have achieved.

Live Brief – Week 7 & 8

Posted on December 8, 2019 Posted in Coursework, Microprojects, Projects, Sustainable ProspectsTagged live brief, MA photography, teamworkLeave a comment

Live Brief – Week 7 & 8

As a group we arranged a very quick meeting to review the feedback we had received from our tutors, Anna and Jesse. Based on their feedback, we decided to adjust our campaign by incorporating the video and photographic stills. At the very last minute, we also came up with a way to integrate into our campaign the concept of having a ‘workshop’ and decided we could illustrate this effectively in our pitch by including a ‘sample Instagram page’ illustrating the workshop concept.

We agreed that we want to emphasise to Headway East London that the idea of having a workshop would be so that they have full control of creating the content of the campaign alongside us providing the technical and design skills required to create our videos and images. We want the members to at the centre of the campaign, co-creating it with us, as this would instil a sense of community, collaboration, accomplishment, authenticity, and inclusion.

I am particularly excited about this because the creative collaboration is exactly what makes our campaign ethical. In the discussion I identified certain key points that I will put together in a short blurb to be used within our pitch. We have agreed that we will work with the video that we have already from Oliver, use the final storyboard created by Bloo, and add any other creative content that we can and which is relevant prior to the pitch. Bloo is putting the final presentation together and we will have our final draft ready a week prior to pitch date.

I have noticed that there seems to be a little bit of strain within the group now as we approach the final weeks of this project. We are still working collaboratively but at various times we have each been pulled away from the project due to other demands. Occasionally I sense there is frustration building but our group always seems to remain positive and respectful towards each other. I think we have done exceptionally well with our communication and I am particularly proud of the way group members have stepped up to stand in when others are not available. We have done very well working together this far.

Live Brief – Action

Posted on December 8, 2019December 8, 2019 Posted in Coursework, Microprojects, Sustainable ProspectsTagged live brief, MA photography, microproject, projectLeave a comment

Live Brief – Week 4 & 5

After the review with our tutors, we met to discuss the feedback and reach a decision on the concept of our campaign. We reached agreement around creating a video which would illustrate the hidden aspects of brain injury by using the concept of not always being able to see everything that is actually there. As a group, we took on board the feedback received from our tutor, Jesse, about making short video clips rather than one longer video. There were a number of ideas put forward and Oliver, who came up with the initial concept and has experience with creating video/film, will be working on creating the first video clip. Bloo also has film/video experience and has agreed to create storyboards to illustrate the other ideas for short clips.

I expanded on the mood board concept that was introduced by Oliver previously and looked for images that represented the editorial look and feel that had interested our tutors and which also inspired us prior to the group meeting. We discussed this and came up with an artistic direction to try for the stills that we would use in the campaign – the approach would be to create images that showed our subjects ‘breaking through’ and emerging from paper or fabric to represent the experience of brain injury impacting on personal identity. In the group discussion one of the team members suggested doing a workshop with the members of Headway in order to create the photographic stills and possibly we could incorporate some of their artwork.

We each then created sample images for photographic stills which returned mixed results for various reasons. I was not happy with my image quality as I had to rush it to deliver on time while juggling work demands. I took quick ‘snapshots’ to illustrate my concept which was a person emerging through paper – I used newspaper because it was a resource I had, however, my vision was for our subjects, the members of Headway East London, to ‘emerge’ through paper covered in artwork they had created specifically for our project, in line with the workshop idea that we had discussed. I chose to repeat the concept with a second series of images which were actually self-portraits, something I have not done before as I am rather camera shy.

The other members produced images in their own unique styles, with Bloo cleverly emerging through white paper with reading glasses incorporated into the image, Oliver doing self-portraits with Stik-it notes on his face and our project leader, Raeann creating beautiful images working with a model. There was some stunning work produced but I felt we lost focus by working individually in this way as we have such varied styles and genres of photography. The ideas we have come up with as a result of this process are very creative and I still feel that we are working well together as a group, especially considering the challenges of working remotely from each other and juggling the demands of life, jobs and our coursework over and above this.

The one concern I have and which I raised with the group, is that I cannot see the link between our video concept and the photographic stills we are creating. This leaves me feeling there is a lack of coherence in the design of this pitch and it actually feels like we are almost creating two entirely different campaigns. We will continue this week to create more content for the presentation to put forward to the tutors next week and will start compiling a folder of the work that will be put into a presentation. I will not be able to attend the next group meeting due to work demands so this is rather disappointing but I will contribute as much as I can prior to the meeting and will rely on the group to update me on the feedback.

Journey Through the Lens

Tag: live brief