Group Meeting!

We conducted group meetings in class today to help get feedback and suggestions for our portfolio project from our peers. We have done group meetings before for our AS-level projects and they have been documented in previous blog posts (linked here and here). They are always very helpful and insightful; this time was no exception. 

My group and I! (Mya is holding the camera, Ace is on the left, then me, Samantha, Dana, Isabella, and Lauren)

We began one by one by explaining our plot, some issues we were facing, and some suggestions for ideas we had for our project.  Mya went first. She’s doing a sports documentary and her excerpt depicts flag football. She was struggling to come up with a B-roll because we are unable to use archived footage and was wondering how they are going to depict the full game with the coaches and players. Lauren went next and her project was also a documentary about different types of media forms of creation. She was having a hard time with the social media component and trying to come up with a way to get their project done with the conflict in their groups. Isabella is doing a continuation of her first documentary which was about her father’s experience as a business owner and an immigrant. This documentary is going to be about that experience from her (a daughter’s) perspective. She was really struggling with how to use Facebook as her social media page. Not being active on the platform, she is unfamiliar with how it works and is learning how to use it. I went next but I’ll talk about everything in the next paragraph. Ace was after me and talked about his short film. His short film is about a guy who does nothing with his life except rot away in bed, wakes up one day with a timer in his chest, and is tasked with living the day in a short amount of time, otherwise, he dies. He wasn’t really struggling with anything but he wanted some feedback on his script, so I read it and gave my constructive criticism. Dana went last and she is doing a documentary about the impact of animals in our lives and is focusing on a K-9 police animal. She was struggling to come up with ideas for their B-roll and securing a K-9 police animal. We all talked about ideas we had and ways to help each other overcome any issues we had. We were very productive and helpful to each other in this meeting. 

When I explained my project, I said that I was struggling to come up with a title. With my past projects, the title is always the last thing I come up with. I'm not very great at coming up with titles without them sounding tacky or cliché and with a documentary where my goal is to be the complete opposite of that, a good title is imperative. I explained the entire premise of the documentary further and was given suggestions to make it a synonym for the word experience, as queer experiences are a highlight of my piece. I was also given the advice that it comes with time and that if I don't find it now, I may find it in the interview I conduct. This is what I intended to do until Ace came up with the title, "We Are Young," inspired by the song of the same name by the band fun. I really liked it and thought it encapsulated the power of uplifting youth voices. I also think some of the lyrics of the song encapsulate the message of my documentary as well such as, "So let's set the world on fire, We can burn brighter than the sun." However, the title also needed to be obvious that it was also focusing on the LGBTQIA+ community. I had the idea for "Here and Queer" as a title but thought it was too cliche but still wanted to incorporate it, so I decided to make it a part of the title and act as a tagline. So the official title of my documentary is, "We Are Young: Here and Queer!" With an official title, I can create a lot of different aspects of the project, such as posters, teasers, and specific Instagram posts to help better promote my documentary.

The music video for the song my title is inspired by

Because navigating our social media pages was also a frequent discussion topic, I got a lot of ideas as to how I could approach my social media pages through our conversations. I want to start my social media page by promoting activism for queer causes and uplifting young queer voices. This was a technique used in two of the platforms I researched and was suggested by my group. Doing this provides a solid base for the page, sets the tone, and makes the theme of the documentary clear. I would then create more specific posts about shooting and behind the scenes as well as introducing the different subjects of the documentary. I also want to create interactive marketing posts such as lock screens of pride flags and colors as well as stickers that can be used both virtually and physically. With these ideas, I have a better idea as to how I can better utilize my social media platform but it still needs more.

The first group meeting was a success and very useful for multiple aspects of my project. I loved hearing about the different projects my peers were creating and the different ideas they had. We all worked well together and helped each other out in different ways.

I realized I forgot to add a quote in a previous blog post, so here are two:

"We're here! We're queer! Get used to it!"

- Queer Nation

"Openness may not completely disarm prejudice, but it’s a good place to start." 

- Jason Collins