Evaluation of Practical Skills

In terms of planning, I feel that I could've done a lot better as I more or less completed the work as and when I thought of it. Specifically, I thought a lot of my ideas on the spot and when it came to sitting down to plan my work for the coming weeks I struggled. Therefore, I lack a fairly prominent section of most of my units of work due to the lack of forward thinking. The planning that I was able to document seems minimal and I am not very impressed. What I am pleased with is that I was still able to make something on the days of filming and even though it may not be 100% accurate to what the criteria is but feel that as I was still able to complete work in a timely manor and still get a respectable grade for my efforts that I believe it's just about enough.
For most of the year, not a lot of planning was needed. For instance: 'Four Hour Challenge'. These exercises were on the spot thinking and with just a small idea each group was able to produce a piece of work that was appropriate to the topic. But the practical skills that I got for this was to work in a group and to come up with ideas and to be able to execute them effectively in a shot space of time and to still be able to produce a working piece of film.

Moving on the Contextual Studies Unit. Researching American New Wave, I had completed similar tasks in the past but in theory, I had to research films and the genre of the new wave in America and what establishes it as that genre. I chose to do a visual presentation that was recorded to be marked. I prefer talking about my thoughts rather than writing them down and if asked the right questions I'm able to answer and have enough time to think and speak my answer with enough evidence to support my case. I thought the practical skills leant from this were to speak in front of a group of people for around half an hour. Speaking in front of a group and to have the confidence is something I really appreciate, even more so when you have an active audience.

The practical skills that I picked up during the work on the film studies unit was communication with teachers and peers. This is something I still struggle with but I know now how I should go about things. Normally if things aren't going my way I'd bury my head in the sand in hopes that it'll be ok and of course it's not. I need to improve on how I should properly communicate withe people so that they can help me stay on top of work and to complete work to the best of my ability. This risks my grade for the end of the unit and is something I need to learn more on so that I don't fall behind. I know this due to the fact that I didn't do as well as I hoped on this unit and I knew that as my planning wasn't thorough and my research wasn't as sound as it could be. And the lesson of being able to utilise my time. The music video unit is a similar story but not as much, as I was able to stay on top of work but I didn't communicate as much as I could have so that my teachers can help push me in the right direction with the support I would've had if I just spoke to them about my ideas so that I had one piece of work that was really good rather than two pieces that were ok.

I leant a lot from the promotional video unit as it required me to work with other people outside of the college and to work to a professional standard that they'd expect as my clients are a professional company. I was happy with the level of communication I had between me and my client and how I was able to manage time effectively in order to stay on top of work throughout. I think I have leant my mistakes from past units and when it really matters, I've been able to apply those skills I've picked up and applied them to this unit which as given me a good piece of work that they're happy with.