Marching on

The last week of February proved to be full of opportunities for me. Due to damages sustained from the snowstorm the previous week, all high schools in FISD (Frisco Independent School District) were closed, so all of my classes were asynchronous - meaning I didn’t have to attend any live Zoom classes.

Knowing I didn’t have to attend live classes excited me. I could cram in all of my classwork into the first two or three days of the week, creating days off in the middle of the week that I can use to further my progress on my original work project.

On Tuesday (February 23rd), my brother and I took a little road trip to Pilot’s Point, Texas. It was about a 40-minute drive from home, but the complete change of scenery made for a great photo op for both of us (my brother is a hobbyist photographer).

On our hour-long gallivant around a small town in Pilot’s Point, I managed to take some interesting stills and shoot b-roll for my original work project. Here are some samples of some stills I took that day:

The very next day (Wednesday), I went to a local park to shoot an interview for my original work project. Filming this interview tested my strengths in many different ways. There were three people total on that day, two of which were the interviewees - yeah, I was a one-woman band.

Simultaneously playing several roles that would normally be covered by a multi-person crew was tough. But when we wrapped our 3 or 4-hour shoot, I was proud of the work I did. It was far from perfect, but it was a huge step ahead compared to what I’ve done previously.

The day after was my birthday, on which I took some time to reflect on how much I’ve grown in the past year. It’s insane to see how much I’ve grown in just one year! I can even tell the difference between how I shoot things now compared to just a few months ago. I’ve learned so much this school year, and I’m incredibly grateful and excited to continue this journey - I think sometimes it’s good and healthy to take a look backward and reflect on the past (no matter how cringe-worthy) and realize how much you've grown over time.

As the week came to an end, I imported, organized, and began editing the footage I shot on Tuesday and Wednesday. My goal was to create a (somewhat) cohesive edit of my footage to show my mentor what I’ve been doing in the past few weeks.

Luckily, after almost 8 hours of sorting and editing my footage, I came up with a product I liked. In the process of editing just the first 20 minutes of the interview, I applied new organizational techniques (to help me not lose my mind) but I ended up changing my concept for the introduction of the documentary (which made things very time-consuming and more difficult).

In all seriousness, I’m quite happy with how things are turning out. It’s hard to anticipate anything, especially in this kind of project where I’m a one-woman team. My mind is on at least 3 things at all times when I’m shooting, and although my main focus is the content of what people are saying and how the footage looks, these things are hard to control and plan. This project (and my mentor especially) has taught me to be more okay with improvising and going with the flow of things. Previously, I was way too uptight and perfectionistic for my good.

I ended up with a 2-minute clip that serves as my introduction for the documentary, at least for now. I still have at least an hour of footage to look through and edit from the interview I shot, and I still have to shoot another interview with two more people! At least I know I won’t have a shortage of content!

This week, in the final stretch before spring break (even though it feels like I just came back from a two-week break) I will dedicate most of my time towards editing the interview. This way, I can create a basis for the content I'll include in the final iteration of my project. Over the break, I will probably try to get a hold of the other two interviewees and film the second interview, but until then, my main focus will be editing and maybe shooting some more b-roll.