The Devil is an Eichhörnchen
Wow, what this very first week has been informative to me!
We already learned a great deal about professional demeanour in film production, produced an establishing shot within 45 minutes and filled out an risk assessment form on a randomly given scenario. But I’ll try and establish some chronological order first:
Monday was our very first day into the Introduction to Filmmaking module with Andrew, who helped us grasp a pretty good idea of how to roam and act in the film industry if we want to be successful. The lesson about getting a thick skin was especially useful to me, since I still tend to overthink and overanalyse too much when it comes to criticism.
Yesterday, we had an extensive but worthwile introduction into health and safety issues and regularities on set by Lee as well as a lecture on risk assessments and - lo and behold - on campus printer usage (!), which I not only found pretty helpful but also eased my nerves a bit.
If you have not yet worked professionally with film, you easily underestimate the huge amount of thought, time and paperwork that may come your way when assessing the risk for your production, cast and crew. So when I read through numerous film production accidents since the 1910 in today’s independent study time, I was able to jot down a couple of things to consider when doing a proper risk assessment. The devil is an Eichhörnchen lying in the details, after all... Regarding that, I need to remember to ask my tutors for proficient literature on the legal requirements for film productions in England… And I need to browse the library as soon as it reopens. From what I could peek at during last week’s scavenger hunt with Mike, there seems to be a lot of beautiful, informative and helpful literature.
Furthermore, I dedicated yesterday evening and this morning to writing and designing the newspaper article for the Introduction to Filmmaking module, which was way harder than I initially imagined. The last time I was given the task to write an English newspaper article was approximately ten years ago... So I wasn’t entirely sure anymore on which style I want to approach on this one and whether it fulfils the task satisfactingly. But hey! It’s certainly a good lesson in creative and credible writing. I will dedicate a couple of more hours on rereading and rewriting until I am satisfied with it and see how it works out in the end. I can only learn and improve from it, after all...
Which reminds me that I need to become proficient in English as soon as possible. My writing insecurities still eat away to much time which I could use otherwise. Which reminds me that I need to read through the module handbooks and the Havard Referencing Guidelines as soon as possible!
Hmm… Better get going!