Was I lost? My movie making journey

In my 9th grade, I had an idea for a movie, but I did not implement it. Then two years later, I picked up that idea, built on it and executed it. The result of that was the “Are you lost??” movie. I faced many challenges during the process of making the movie.

The movie is a compilation of several short videos and photographs of all the ways a person can be “lost”. For me coming up with ideas for the videos was the easy part. However I learned that I wasn’t specific enough when I was visualizing how I wanted each shot to look like. Yet that was a skill I got a little better at in the process, thanks to suggestions from friends and family.

Another valuable lesson I learned was the need to stop thinking and start doing. When I had all my ideas in place, I kept waiting for the right time with the right people, however I did not get people to act as everyone was very busy. This left me disheartened. Then at one point I decided to just start, with or without the exact cast list I had in mind. I made a few changes to the cast list and then everything started falling into place. I learned that it is okay to make changes to a plan in the middle.

Once the shooting was done, I had to do the editing. I started the editing process and was done with the entire thing except the background track (I did not know I had to do the music and editing together). Then when I came back, and tried doing it, I could not find the project. It was not in the recycle bin, it was nowhere. It was bewildering and extremely disheartening. I was very disappointed and I cried a lot. I wondered if names did have a power because ironically I had named the project “the lost project”. People told me I could do it again. I knew that too, but this was one of the situations where intellectually knowing something did not help.

I abandoned the project for a while. Then I got my new mac book. I decided to edit my movie using the iMovie (as opposed to windows movie maker that I had used earlier). This was a new software and initially I was resistant to it. But when I did figure it out, I realized it was a much better software and my movie came out much better than it had come out earlier. So maybe everything that happens probably happens for the good.


Learning outcomes achieved:
1. Increased awareness of my strengths and areas of growth
2. Undertaken new challenges
3. Planned and initiated activities
4. Worked collaboratively with others
5. Shown perseverance and commitment in the activities
6. Developed new skills

 

Making a textbook

As a part of another CAS project, I went to the local government school often to teach students of grade 7 and 8 English. My partner and I decided to create a learning guide with stories, poems, songs and worksheets that we could use to teach more effectively. This was the inception of "Fun with English".  My partner was as enthusiastic as I was and this was a major reason for the development of the idea. So I learnt again that it is not only necessary for me to be enthusiastic but also for my partners to show enthusiasm (at least for group projects). It is also possible that sometimes enthusiasm begets enthusiasm.

I thoroughly enjoyed the entire process of planning the learning activities and searching for stories for the book. However that was not something that was entirely new to me. The designing the layout of the book and effectively implementing it on the computer was something that I had never done and it is a useful skill that I have now picked up. I also learned that the way something looks on screen is significantly different from the way it looks after it gets printed and so I have to design things keeping that in mind.

In the end when I was writing credits and acknowledgements, I realized that I was not very okay with giving credit to people. I believed that if someone had not worked as hard as me, giving them equal credits as me was not fair or appropriate. However I later reached the conclusion that it is always better to give “undeserved” (or so I believed) credit than not giving it because it is possible to be biased and underestimate the role played by people. Moreover there is nothing to lose by crediting them. I learned to let go and give credit to people. I felt better after that. This is again a valuable lesson.

Another thing that I noticed in the process of making this learning guide is that I do not credit time properly. I spent at least 20 hours to make the book but I was under the delusion that I spent not more than 10 hours. So I figured that it is a good idea to keep track of exactly how much time I spend doing any work by maintaining time logs.

I was very particular that I wanted the book printed by a particular day. It wasn't necessary for it to be printed on that day but it was desirable. So the day before this “deadline” I actually ran about till about 10 in the night (without having dinner) to get it printed. This showed me yet again that if I am passionate about something, or if I have made up my mind very strongly to so something, I am capable of going to extremes to get it done.

The process of making this book was not just fun but also taught me new skills and also taught me more about myself.

Learning outcomes achieved:
1. Increased awareness of my strengths and areas of growth
2. Undertaken new challenges
3. Planned and initiated activities
4. Shown perseverance and commitment in the activities
5. Considered ethical implications of my actions
6.  Developed new skills