Collecting photos of the dead, getting a job with the BBC and how NOT to give an interview!
After only attending two of the seminars during day one, I had four scheduled for Tuesday. First we met Violet Fenn who runs a website called The Skull Illusion. I was particularly interested as the titled 'How I make a living from death' along with the warning that came with it was enough to draw me in. I found out that Violet was a student at Glyndwr and had gone on to own her own business, which she runs from under her stairs.It isn't the first time I have come across the types of photographs Violet collects. Post mortem photography is a predominantly Victorian invention, where the dead relatives would be laid, or propped up and photographed with their (alive) relatives or sometimes alone. There is a saddening number of very young children photographed this way, and although it might seem morbid, the truth is that for most of the children it would be the first (and last) photograph ever taken of them. There are a plethora of these very strange images to be found on the internet, and Violet's intention is to keep them stored in one place. As the photographers are well gone themselves, no copyright remains on the images and they are in the public domain.
"How I did everything wrong but somehow managed to survive anyway, despite everyone's gloomy predictions." Something in that sentence comforted me. Some days I wake up with no idea of where I am, and a sinking feeling that I'm just blagging my way through this life. To meet someone else who still really doesn't know what she wants to be doing 'when she grows up' was a comfort.
Violet explained that she fell into plush making after creating one for a friend, and was selling mostly to friends and family. Using an image of Colin Murray with one of her creations helped cement her in people's minds and after attending a free accounting course through business link she set up under her stairs and started making more of her creations.
We've all done it, you're supposed to be working but the call of the internet is too strong. So while browsing Wikipedia one day, Violet stumbled on an image of a man, dressed as a fireman. At first it looked like another Victorian image, but there was something not quite right, his waist was pinched in tight, and his eyes were blank. It was this image that started her collection of post mortem photography.
Bit strange when you really look at it, isn't it? So Violet began a blog to bring all of these images back to life again in a way. She got 800 hits overnight and now gets thousands of hits a month on her website which also encompasses her jewellery shop. The photographs remain a mystery, some come to her and it's hard to guess if the person is alive or dead, sometimes there are sure giveaways like the person being propped up with books, and their relatives.
"How I did everything wrong but somehow managed to survive anyway, despite everyone's gloomy predictions." Something in that sentence comforted me. Some days I wake up with no idea of where I am, and a sinking feeling that I'm just blagging my way through this life. To meet someone else who still really doesn't know what she wants to be doing 'when she grows up' was a comfort.
Violet explained that she fell into plush making after creating one for a friend, and was selling mostly to friends and family. Using an image of Colin Murray with one of her creations helped cement her in people's minds and after attending a free accounting course through business link she set up under her stairs and started making more of her creations.
We've all done it, you're supposed to be working but the call of the internet is too strong. So while browsing Wikipedia one day, Violet stumbled on an image of a man, dressed as a fireman. At first it looked like another Victorian image, but there was something not quite right, his waist was pinched in tight, and his eyes were blank. It was this image that started her collection of post mortem photography.
Bit strange when you really look at it, isn't it? So Violet began a blog to bring all of these images back to life again in a way. She got 800 hits overnight and now gets thousands of hits a month on her website which also encompasses her jewellery shop. The photographs remain a mystery, some come to her and it's hard to guess if the person is alive or dead, sometimes there are sure giveaways like the person being propped up with books, and their relatives. Violet's online presence is spread over several sites including social networking, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr and each site links back to The Skull Illusion. 'Cross pollinating' is a way to make sure people don't leave your site, that they're always linked back to the main website, and that each avenue is linked to another. It has spurred another website called The Spooky Isles to contact her to write for them, and a possible book deal in May.
It was probably one of the most interesting and useful talks I've attended so far during creative futures. I intend to follow the blog closely in future. A massive thanks to Violet for her talk!
Second speaker of the day was Wendy Rees on behalf of the BBC with a talk called 'Getting that job'. Wendy is the head of operations in North Wales for TV, radio and online content. After graduating as a law student, she didn't want to work as a lawyer and ended up in S4C which is the Welsh language channel, eventually moving on to the BBC.
There wasn't really a great deal to this talk, Wendy explained about the recruitment process, and how it is all done online. The BBC employ around 20'000 people over from technical to designers, on screen talent to carpenters there's something for everyone. They also have graduate schemes like a production trainee scheme that current director general Mark Thompson was once a part of. They take on 12 trainees a year.
Wendy explained that the BBC look for candidates that show passion within their field, have great portfolios and industry experience. They especially look for a flexible attitude towards work, as well as multi-skilled people.
It was a short talk, and there wasn't really as much depth as I'd have liked in regards to the recruitment process, but it was helpful and I would like to apply for work experience, which you can also do through the website.
We pretty much began with a drawing exercise, in groups of two one person had to describe the image on a piece of paper, while the other had to draw it from what the person was saying. It was amusing, and nice to be engaged in the talk instead of having to sit and listen (which can become hard to concentrate on after a while). The idea I think was to understand that you're trying to paint a picture with words to the audience with what you're saying. The only way to convey well is to be descriptive.
Several videos were played to us over the course of Matthew's talk. The first being a film called 'the bad interviewee' in which Matthew had interviewed himself, badly. It was stilted, the interviewee was fidgeting and nervous and used jargon (which can be confusing), was making eye contact with the camera, and was not enthusiastic. Matthew informed us that the footage could still be used as a piece, but that it was the longest answer, and not the best answer, that would be chosen.
As an interviewee, we were asked to think about what we would want our objectives to be, publicity? money? a political message? or just curiosity about being interviewed? And as for being the interviewer, is it just good TV? highlighting local or national talent? a news story or hook? It's always best to start with the basic questions, who, what, where, how, why etc with no agenda, advance questions and no ambushing the interviewee.
The next video we saw was between Ali G and Buzz Aldrin, and to his credit Buzz holds it together expertly, even though Ali G was doing his best to trip him up and confuse matters. We also saw Cassette Boy vs BBC News, if you've never head of Cassette Boy, he's someone that takes video clips of celebrities, news, programmes etc and mashes them together to make something new, usually risque with its fair share of swearing. Obviously when being interviewed, no one will mash up what you say to make it sound like you said something else! Well, probably...
So be passionate, show control, be animated and lively (but not crazy), speak naturally, explain any technical terms you use, keep it simple and get personal as people respond to human emotion. But don't get too personal, as artist Tracy Emin did in the next video we saw where she talks openly and personally about her past. Dramatist Dennis Potter, who sadly died in 1994 showed how to display emotion in an interview we saw. He explains, despite being in obvious pain that he learnt how fragile life was, and how knowing the end was near found peace.
We were shown a news piece about famous graffiti art-terrorist Banksy, despite not doing interviews, he gets his message, usually political, across loud and clear. Newswipe by Charlie Brooker was a funny video that explains how most news pieces are filmed in quite a funny way. Finally we saw a video called 'how not to walk out' by Christine O'Donnell was a nice way to end to talk, and showed how to walk out of an interview without making a fool of yourself.
So day two finished, and what have I learned? How to apply for a job with the BBC, that even if you're 42 with children it's OK to not know what you want to be when you grow up and that I should learn about how to give and take an interview and then forget it!
Coming up...day 3
Second speaker of the day was Wendy Rees on behalf of the BBC with a talk called 'Getting that job'. Wendy is the head of operations in North Wales for TV, radio and online content. After graduating as a law student, she didn't want to work as a lawyer and ended up in S4C which is the Welsh language channel, eventually moving on to the BBC.
There wasn't really a great deal to this talk, Wendy explained about the recruitment process, and how it is all done online. The BBC employ around 20'000 people over from technical to designers, on screen talent to carpenters there's something for everyone. They also have graduate schemes like a production trainee scheme that current director general Mark Thompson was once a part of. They take on 12 trainees a year.
Wendy explained that the BBC look for candidates that show passion within their field, have great portfolios and industry experience. They especially look for a flexible attitude towards work, as well as multi-skilled people.
It was a short talk, and there wasn't really as much depth as I'd have liked in regards to the recruitment process, but it was helpful and I would like to apply for work experience, which you can also do through the website.
We pretty much began with a drawing exercise, in groups of two one person had to describe the image on a piece of paper, while the other had to draw it from what the person was saying. It was amusing, and nice to be engaged in the talk instead of having to sit and listen (which can become hard to concentrate on after a while). The idea I think was to understand that you're trying to paint a picture with words to the audience with what you're saying. The only way to convey well is to be descriptive.
Several videos were played to us over the course of Matthew's talk. The first being a film called 'the bad interviewee' in which Matthew had interviewed himself, badly. It was stilted, the interviewee was fidgeting and nervous and used jargon (which can be confusing), was making eye contact with the camera, and was not enthusiastic. Matthew informed us that the footage could still be used as a piece, but that it was the longest answer, and not the best answer, that would be chosen.
As an interviewee, we were asked to think about what we would want our objectives to be, publicity? money? a political message? or just curiosity about being interviewed? And as for being the interviewer, is it just good TV? highlighting local or national talent? a news story or hook? It's always best to start with the basic questions, who, what, where, how, why etc with no agenda, advance questions and no ambushing the interviewee.
The next video we saw was between Ali G and Buzz Aldrin, and to his credit Buzz holds it together expertly, even though Ali G was doing his best to trip him up and confuse matters. We also saw Cassette Boy vs BBC News, if you've never head of Cassette Boy, he's someone that takes video clips of celebrities, news, programmes etc and mashes them together to make something new, usually risque with its fair share of swearing. Obviously when being interviewed, no one will mash up what you say to make it sound like you said something else! Well, probably...
So be passionate, show control, be animated and lively (but not crazy), speak naturally, explain any technical terms you use, keep it simple and get personal as people respond to human emotion. But don't get too personal, as artist Tracy Emin did in the next video we saw where she talks openly and personally about her past. Dramatist Dennis Potter, who sadly died in 1994 showed how to display emotion in an interview we saw. He explains, despite being in obvious pain that he learnt how fragile life was, and how knowing the end was near found peace.
We were shown a news piece about famous graffiti art-terrorist Banksy, despite not doing interviews, he gets his message, usually political, across loud and clear. Newswipe by Charlie Brooker was a funny video that explains how most news pieces are filmed in quite a funny way. Finally we saw a video called 'how not to walk out' by Christine O'Donnell was a nice way to end to talk, and showed how to walk out of an interview without making a fool of yourself.
So day two finished, and what have I learned? How to apply for a job with the BBC, that even if you're 42 with children it's OK to not know what you want to be when you grow up and that I should learn about how to give and take an interview and then forget it!
Coming up...day 3
No comments:
Post a Comment