Professional Practice: Production and Development Post 1: Individual Roles
My group consists of five people, each of which will have a different role to play throughout the project. Today was our first meeting in a lecture in which we decided on a hierarchy of power consisting of leaders and assistants to ensure the project is carried out as well as possible whilst also playing to each individual’s strengths in the group. We firstly decided that we needed a leader of the group to steer everyone else in the right direction and make sure job deadlines are being met whilst also carrying out work of their own. We chose Haassaan Khan for this role for a number of different reasons. He is confident that he can commit to the role and he has previous positive experience as a group leader, another main reason we chose him for this role is that our project will be largely film based and Haassaan has a lot of experience working with film. The next two group members are Julia Mazuraite and Tristan Hoad, these people will act as Haassan’s assistants and help him carry out the production of the film whilst also carrying out a lot of the pre-production tasks that will be set out by Haassan. Both Tristan and Julia volunteered for these roles as they felt it was the most suitable role they could play in the production of our project. The next member is Edwart Kvasnevsky, he too will be a leader however not of the main film, he will be the lead developer in charge of the app interface that will go alongside the interactive film. He also chose his own role as he has previous app development experience and was very confident that he could complete his duties to a good standard. I have been assigned one role and also chose another. The role I was assigned was Edwart’s assistant, to design and create assets for the application and to assist Edwart with the development of the application in any way that I can. The role that I chose for myself was lead researcher, this means that it is my responsibility to gather information surrounding the different areas of Hull that our project will cover. However although this is a role I chose for myself it was made clear that I will not be doing that alone and others will help where they can to ensure workflow remains consistent.
Our Project theme is interactive advertising, we have decided to further develop an idea created by Haassaan Khan. We are going to create an interactive video showcasing Hull whilst also creating it as a useful tool for visitors and potential new residents. Alongside this interactive video there will also be a video for a potential application in which users can use an interactive map to get information on Hull, such as tourist spots, cafes, restaurants, leisure centres etc. This will be different from other interactive map applications because it will only showcase Hull and all of the information will be available through text, audio and video making it as easy as possible to foreign visitors who may not speak English to learn about Hull.
Professional Practice: Production and Development Post 2: Organisation Skills, Schedules and Planning
During our first meeting, inside of a lecture, we very quickly established that we needed a channel of communication in which we could all be involved to discuss the project at any time. Our group leader Haassaan created an online group chat in which each member of our group was added. This now has made it easier to schedule meetings in which we can discuss our ideas and any queries we may have regarding production of our project. In week 3, via our group chat, we scheduled a meeting in a booked room in the library. Unfortunately due to last minute work commitments I was not able to attend. However the rest of the group members fully understood that I could not attend and it has shown me that our group has outstanding organisational and planning skills because not only did they have to relocate the meeting at the last minute due to a fire alarm, they also planned a later time with me to fill me in on the events of the meeting and also give me time to add my opinions and ask questions. This was done via our group chat in which Haassan told me what they discussed in the meeting and answered any questions I had. In the meeting we established the name of the application would be @Hull or At Hull in more formal terms. We also decided on our target audience and marketing strategy. Our target audience is made up of a few different groups of people that we feel would all benefit from our application. The first group that is our primary target audience is tourists visiting Hull. However after another discussion on our target audience we decided that foreign students or students not from Hull would also find our application very beneficial so we will also market our application towards that demographic. The group also went over exactly what our final project would be so we all knew our roles and what we had to do to get some momentum on work. We decided that the final project will consist of two parts. The first and main part will be a series of interactive choice videos, showing the user around Hull as if they are there themselves. This will be delivered via YouTube so it is accessible on a number of devices, however the YouTube element is currently being reviewed to ensure this method of delivery is plausible. The second element of our final project will be an interactive application allowing users to use the map to not only access our interactive videos but also voice tours and important information about the city.
Professional Practice: Production and Development Post 3: Teamwork and Leadership
Our group is heavily focused on the filming of different locations in Hull and due to all of us having experience working in film crews and playing different roles, on our previous film module, we were able to decide what roles we would like to play in the process of filming. This was done during a meeting inside of a lecture and the roles were finalised by our group leader Haassaan. Haassaan will be the director, Tristan the camera operator, Julia will be Haassaan’s assistant, Edwart will control sound management and I will be the boomstick operator. This would be the hardest test our group would have had to face in terms of working as a team. This is because from previous experience working in a film crew it is essential that every person plays their part and does their role exactly as the director intends them to. However our job was even more difficult because at each location we plan to film one person from the crew would have to get in front of the camera and speak about their chosen location. My location was East Park, so it is my job to ensure I have efficiently researched the location and put together a speech outlying the history of the park whilst also being informative on what the Park can offer tourists today.
However as our Director and Group leader was scheduling dates for filming and requiring the right forms for borrowing filming equipment the COVID-19 pandemic began. At first we decided to just delay filming as we were sure the restrictions on travel and leaving the house would not last longer than a few weeks at most. We were wrong. This had a very detrimental impact on the complete project, as we were completely reliant on ensuring we could travel around Hull to film various locations. This is the exact type of situation that brought out the best in our leadership and teamwork skills. Our group leader decided it was essential that we held a group call in order to effectively communicate on the problems we were facing and how we would tackle them. At first we thought we would have to change all of our plans and completely restart our project. However after a lengthy call and a lot of discussion we came to a conclusion that would have the least impact on our overall project. Julia has recently shown her capabilities in terms of drawing and we decided to put them to use. We decided that Julia would draw most of the locations we intended to visit. She also added that she is able to show a time lapse of each drawing she does in video form so although we could not get the videos we were expecting we were still able to have some sort of video on the application as a temporary measure or permanent if it was required.
Professional Practice: Production and Development Post 4: Communication and Effectiveness
As previously mentioned one of the first decisions our group made was to create a method of communication to discuss the project outside of lectures and meetings. This worked very effectively in the first few weeks of the project, there would be lengthy discussions between various people in the group about the project and their own personal role. We also had a lot of meetings in person, in which we would meet up and make notes face to face for an even more effective way of communicating. However we did not anticipate that this group chat made for the sole purpose of talking outside of meetings would eventually become our only way of communicating. Although the group chat we used was very effective it was just not as effective as being face to face with everyone in the group. At first when scheduling video calls and meetings our means of communication did not work at all. This was because of the fact that due to the ongoing pandemic everyone in the group was in a different situation and some were even in a completely different country and it was hard to create time in which we were all free. This meant that the first few online video chats were not a complete success and it was becoming increasingly difficult for me personally to either be kept up to date or to keep other people up to date with my progress. However after the first few days of attempted meetings, the group recollected and we were able to schedule meetings that suited everyone and on the few occasions that some people could not attend, notes would be supplied in the group chat. After a number of calls I eventually was certain of what I had left to do for the project. This was because our group project had slightly changed so therefore some of my contributions to the group had to also change. I now had fewer buildings to gather information on as it was impossible for Julia to draw them all as this was a challenging and lengthy process. I also had more work to do with Edwart. This was because I had less work to do in my role as researcher so I had more time to help him with the interactive application. As the whole group now had slightly changed their focus and their roles myself and Edwart decided to communicate privately when working on the application as we were the only people working on that specific area of the project. This became very useful as we would confer between each other about various aspects of the design and usage and then regularly update the group on our progress.
Professional Practice: Production and Development Post 5: Design Process
My main contribution to the project was the design of the interactive application. My role was to design the assets that Edwart required and create the overall design such as colour theme.I started with research that would affect my design choices. I decided the first design that I would create would be the colour scheme. This was because this would have to be implemented into all of the assets created after. Although this seemed like a quick task, I put a lot of thought and research into my decision. This is because I know colour can have a large effect on the thoughts of the user and is essential for making a good impression. As I am from Hull, I already have a large amount of knowledge on the city and I know that one of the largest events that the city has had in recent years was the revelation that Hull would be the City of Culture in 2017. I therefore decided to research Hull and how this could affect a colour scheme. After looking at articles and online sources I realised that the City of Culture had a logo that already had its own colour scheme. I also remembered this myself as at the time many volunteers walked around the city wearing the logo on various items of clothing. This is how I came to the decision to incorporate that colour scheme in my design. The colours Purple and Yellow. Not only are these colours symbolic with the city of Hull but they are also considered to be associated heavily with royalty which meets the group criteria of ‘showing off’ Hull.
Not only did this affect my work but it also caused Julia, who had designed our original logo, to change her design to incorporate this colour theme.
After establishing a colour theme, I then spoke with the group ensuring they felt this was appropriate for our project. They agreed that it looked professional and also had a connection to Hull. I then contacted Edwart for a list of more assets that he required. He told me he needed a museum icon for the map, a map location pin pointer, a search bar and also to help with font selection and placement of the assets in the final application design. The first asset I created was the museum logo for the map as Edwart needed this first. I did some sketching and came up with this idea. I again showed the full group who all agreed it was suitable for its purpose.
I then created a map location pin pointer. This would house icons such as the museums and had to stand out on a dull map to show users exactly where the place they are searching for is located.
After creating these and helping Edwart with various design decisions, I was asked to create the search bar with the same theme as I had previously made other assets. I decided to reverse the colour scheme as it was important that the search bar stood as it is the navigational tool to guide users through the application.
Professional Practice: Production and Development 6: Reflection
This project was one of the most challenging I have taken part in and it proved to be a lot more difficult than myself and the rest of the group first thought. We started the project working very effectively and efficiently, constantly communicating with one another and ensuring everyone had their chance to talk through some of their thoughts and concerns. However due to the pandemic this project became increasingly more challenging. It not only affected our means of communication but how we would carry the project out. However in spite of all the issues this pandemic caused it also made myself and the rest of the group work a lot harder and put in a lot more time than we originally thought was needed. It has taught me the importance of effective communication and also the importance of leadership. Thanks to Hassaan we were able to have various online meetings in which we were eventually able to create solutions for all of our problems. Without having the use of film we originally thought we would never get close to the original design that we had envisioned, but due to our online meetings and Julia’s drawing suggestions we were able to get our project back on track and to a very good standard when considering the challenges we faced. However although I believe we did an amazing job as a team to change our project to suit our current circumstances, this project has also shown me what we as a team could have improved on had we done the project again. We got very carried away with the first idea and the idea of filming because we were so passionate about the original project which is a positive thing to have in a team however this meant that we spent no time creating a contingency plan and relied heavily on the use of filming equipment. Although this pandemic is a once in a lifetime situation that none of us expected, we should have created contingency plans if for any reason at all we were not able to film. Although our planning and scheduling skills were very good, being able to reschedule meetings at the last minute and create time to keep others up to date, I do think that our organisational skills could have been better at some times. This was because there were brief moments in the project in which not everyone knew what they were supposed to be doing however anytime anyone asked for help or advice they were always helped and given advice on what they should have been doing. This project not only helped me see how well I work in a group setting, despite me not being confident at the start, but also elements that I could improve on for another time.