Induction- Self-portrait evaluation

 

Evaluation of self portrait

 

My aim in creating my self portrait was to depict what forms my identity in a simple way whilst demonstrating my creative passions and skill. This includes my interests, passions and aspirations. I chose the medium of a video due to this being my main creative interest and hopefully will lead to my final business plan in video production.

I began the video with me writing my name on a newspaper, due to names being a main part of identity. I included a clip of Frida Kahlo to represent self portraits and art due to her famous self-portraits. Art and feminism are two interests of mine and I felt this artist encapsulated this at the beginning of my video.

I included a title, ‘what forms my identity’, followed by a clip of me beginning to sign my name due to signatures being a form of identification. Another title, ‘my interests’ was followed by fast-paced clips of art, books, music concerts which are some of my main interests. I wanted the clips to sync with the fast-paced music to emulate my enjoyment in music videos.

‘Passions’ included clips of protests to show topics that I feel strongly about. This included ‘women’s rights’, ‘animal rights’ and ‘climate change’. The pace of clips again followed the music to create a more pleasing viewing of the video. I feel the video clips I chose of protests represent passion in a good way due to the energy and mass gatherings of protests to demonstrate people's strong views about certain topics. 

‘Aspirations’ depicted my interest in filmmaking and what I hope to attain in the future. These were clips of people with cameras which I took from music video/ short film behind the scenes videos as these are my main areas of interest. 

Most of the clips were taken from YouTube whilst others were filmed on my phone. I edited the video on iMovie on my phone. The areas of the video which included mostly my own clips included the 'interests' section and this was one of my favourite parts as I had freedom to make the video clips how I wanted them.

 Throughout the video, I included clips of me gradually signing my name, which was completed by the end of the video. This was integrated with the clips of what formed my identity and created a cyclical structure to the video due to my name being at the start and end.

If I could improve this self portrait video, I would give myself more resources to film more clips myself, therefore I would have more creative freedom in how the video turned out. I would include a variety of camera angles and lighting as well as camera movement. My video was also quite short, and I would want to include more clips and areas to show my identity/ myself.

Unfortunately, I was limited with editing resources and it would have been helpful to have more improved technology to make my video look more professional.