The original idea for my project came from my own passion and interest in SFX makeup and I wanted to develop my skills further and educate people on the subject. I also wanted to aim my project at a younger audience as I know in schools, creative subjects, opportunities and options are being reduced and replaced with ‘academic’ subjects (including my own experience with my school subjects). I disagree with this as it shouldn’t be decided for the student whether they do creative subjects and there should be parity between the subjects. All subjects should be equally taught at a primary level to introduce the children to different topics and themes. I decided to aim my project at primary school children and try and create a fun tutorial for children to follow along with in a lesson. Throughout my project, I have developed my skills and met my targets I set at the start of the year. For example, I have developed my own personal SFX skills by practicing different looks and techniques and considering which would be easiest to teach to a younger audience. I also improved my personal confidence by speaking to big groups of people when presenting the focus group task. Completing an adequate YouTube tutorial is my end goal with the use of premiere pro and photoshop to make it more interesting and professional looking for the audience.
I completed primary and secondary research into the basics of SFX, ethical considerations into safeguarding of children and YouTube tutorials. In my secondary research, I looked into YouTube tutorials, their increasing role in people’s everyday lives and reviewed the more positive/negative things in the videos and took note of this when completing my own. I used reliable sources like Ofcom and YouTube’s official guidelines to add to my research, which makes my end product meet the ethical considerations of the criteria. I need to be careful of the content and the products I use and make it clear that if anything can be considered dangerous or harmful, to avoid showing this to them. I researched the different aspects like voiceover, music, interaction with audience and found that these were some of the key features of a good tutorial. In my primary research, I put together a short list of questions for my participatory group to answer. I had hoped that it would have been a group of children from a primary school, but I never received a response after sending an email, so I asked a year 7 form to participate instead as they were the closest to the age group I was hoping for. I found that all people in the focus group had watched and used a YouTube tutorial. I then found that about ¼ of the group (7/28) knew what SFX was and had potentially seen or used a tutorial involving that. I used this in a way that people have a basic understanding of what it is but don’t know how to use it and create a successful look. I was shocked at the number of children who knew of SFX as I did expect there to be no knowledge of it at all. I took my research and began to put together my tutorial, involving the key features that the focus group suggested and avoiding the things they didn’t like.
When it came to the production of the video, I used both premiere pro and photoshop. I filmed my video, showing what I was doing, including the products and tools used. I used a professional face palette but obviously I don’t expect young children to have this, so I only used the basic face paints and skin tones so that the colours I used are widely available at a low cost. I used a lamp to produce high key lighting directed on to me. I also used a clear background so that the focus was always on the face rather than any other distractions in the background. In Premiere Pro, it took me a long time to be able to get the finished piece. I found it difficult to cut down on the amount of footage I had as I had about 40 minutes’ worth, so I had to cut bits out that weren’t necessary. In the editing process, I sped parts up to keep the pacing of the video so it didn’t become boring to the audience. I added music as it was something that was favoured in the focus group responses so picked something that had a beat but was instrumental, so the lyrics didn’t become confused with the voice over. I filmed the voiceover at a separate time to the tutorials as I wrote a plan of what I was going to say so that I could include all the details instead of rushing it. I cropped the voice over into parts to match certain parts of the video and made the music in the background fade it slightly, so the music didn’t overpower the voice over. I also had to be mindful of the language I used as it is aimed at a younger audience, so they aren’t going to understand technical or advanced words, so I completed research into words that are commonly used among younger children. I used photoshop to create a thumbnail to make it engage to the audience and make it look more like a professional.
Overall, I think my project went well and was planned well. It was difficult for me to do this along with 2 other project-based A-Levels and it has been a challenge trying to get everything done to the deadlines. I met my plan each month and made good progress in my blog posts. I regularly met with my mentor to see if I was on track and explained my process and direction of my project. The only real problem I faced was when the primary school didn’t respond to my email as that was my main demographic but when I found a similar aged group, I changed my plan slightly to match my research and findings. I have also received some feedback from KS2 age children which has been useful in making some adjustments to my video.
