Alas, the video for this project has finally come together. The journey to finalising my concept for this 1-min video was not easy at all… but I guess I had the easier hand when putting the video together as it was largely made up of past footages based on my concept (so I did minimal filming). All in all, I’ve learnt a lot from this project – How to write monologues and also developing a story from a tiny little small idea you have at the beginning.
It was a challenging but super fruitful project. 🙂
The Dreamer
password: srt
Alter Ego: Sandra Riley Tang
CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT & RESEARCH | CHALLENGES
Identifying which character to portray was my first problem. I wasn’t sure which character to go ahead with. Even during the first in-class inspiration file exercise we did – writing a letter as a monologue, I was still undecided. I went ahead with Emma Watson, one of the characters I’ve narrowed down under the public figure category because of how I found an affinity with her because of her introverted personality beneath all the confidence she exudes when under the public eye.
Then came my second problem, the storyline. After consulting Lei, she advised me to go deeper into the character. If I was portraying Emma Watson though the quality I’m focusing on is the introvert side of her, I would have to give thought as to why she’s like this. Is it because of her family background? (the reasons behind it) but I was unable to get answers. Especially on the surface she comes of as a feminist with strong confidence but I’m the total opposite of that.
So I gave up portraying Emma Watson as my alter ego and moved on to the character as eventually portrayed in my final video, Sandra Riley Tang from local band The Sam Willows. Somehow it was much easier for me to come up with a storyline and act out the alter ego based on her. As mentioned in the earlier post, my affinity with her was her determination and drive to pursue the things she love and then the achievements you get out of being as such.
The concept: An inspirational one of sorts, with an influencer tone for the monologue. From young to me now present day, the things I achieved through the same passion I had since young using footages from my archives of the interviews I’ve done, the events I partook in etc. It will end of with flashbacks of my achievements and then an open-ended kind of feel for the end.
The underlying message: The last sentence in the monologue “Dream big and never stop trying. Who knows what you can achieve”. Basically being determined/driven to pursue what you love and to have dreams, the qualities of my character.
STORYLINE
Moving on to storyline… Following the identified affinity I had with my character, I came up with my own storyline of my journey in pursuing what I love, the arts and the things I was able to achieve with that same one passion since young across the span of growing up.
FILM/ARTIST REFERENCES
For my particular concept, it was more of referencing empowering speeches, inspirational and motivational videos of sorts given and done by public figures/influencers so as to figure out the right tone to have when writing the monologue.
Count myself REALLY lucky. Sandra recently put up a 2-part motivational video on her Instagram account. It even had a monologue. Thus, bulk of my reference for this project came from these videos. Taking inspiration from her video, I came up with my own monologue based on my story and had myself narrate it in an influencer tone to get the inspirational/motivational effect.
As for video angles since I was using a lot of past footages, camerawork was everywhere and somehow I felt that my video comes off seemingly like a vlog… And because of that my references were mostly of YouTubers and how they vlog to get an idea of how I’d like the remaining shots that I’ll be filming to look like.
STORYBOARD
To be honest, I don’t have the habit of doing up storyboards just because I’m unable to visualise my shots prior to shooting them. I think that I’m more of a get-the-feel-on-the-spot person. Meaning I’ll just try out a variety shots on the spot and go with the flow from there. Same thing happened for this project again. Only several storyboard frames went according to prior planning. The rest were spontaneous shooting or already existing camerawork by other videographers since I mainly used past footages of myself.
MONOLOGUE
Growing up,
I’ve always had a penchant for all things creative.Took up art classes at 5,
the one subject in school I would always score the highest in.
It was my favouriteFlash forward to 17,
I went into media studies.
Dabbled in areas like broadcast and even got to interview celebrities through assignments.
Still, I enjoyed the creative modules most.That was also when I found craftwork.
I was able to create something out of nothing as friends see it.
I love doing it as a pastime.Showcased my works through an art mentorship programme
and won my very first design competition all in the same year at 20.Those were things I never thought I could achieve with that very same passion I had since young. It was self-affirmation for me.
It made me feel like I was doing something… right.Dream big and never stop trying.
Who knows what you can achieve.
VIDEO FOOTAGE & MUSIC CREDITS
Since my video was pretty heavy on using past footages/online footages of the events that had me in it…(Footages not credited were self-taken)
SHINE Festival Urban Arts Mentorship Programme:
https://www.facebook.com/shinefestival/videos/1026106494092598/
https://www.facebook.com/shinefestival/videos/1021363687900212/
https://youtu.be/NCc65mjjfpA?t=1m51s
*SCAPE The Invasion 2016 (Design Competition):
https://youtu.be/kVwmT33VkoE?t=59s
Music: in love with a ghost – we’ve never met but, can we have a coffee or something?
https://youtu.be/0XZJ5mD6nSU
