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All that is left from three years is one essay and one dissertation

Byrichard

Yesterday I handed in my penultimate essay.

There are two main assignments remaining. the first of these is a tech case study which should be fun to do. I already have an idea of a topic that I know fairly well. with the second it’s the dissertation and I should really spend a few hours progressing with that.

I had one of those classic nights on Saturday. You begin with the idea that you’re simply going to drop into the cinema and watch a film before going home and watching the lunar eclipse from the relatively low light pollution of the area around the halls.

This plan disintegrated as a friend encouraged me to stay out and go out clubbing instead. I knew I had the penultimate essay to finish. Most people hate the night bus because it’s so full of weird people, some are just drunk, others are in worse states and finally some are amusing.

On occasion you’ll enter the bus and a girl will offer you some crisps and you won’t say know, to which someone next to you asks whether you’re really going to accept them. Later on you understand that it’s the brother joking around.

In other cases you’ll find that it’s like a plane cabin. If you’ve ever flown easyjet and got up to go to the front of the cabin you’ll know the sight. it’s that of two hundred people having a nap. It’s a soothing sight to see so many relaxed people.

Occasionaly some people get cold so you lend them their jacket and you walk them home before rushing home to finish your essay rather than taking the time to get to know more about them.

There are a lot of people that hate the stop at Sudbury but having lived there last year I know a little secret. That there’s a 24 hour shop where you can buy jaffa cakes and lipton ice tea for the second part of the journey.

What I enjoyed most about saturday was the people I met on the bus journey home.

Much clearer

Byrichard

I went for a meeting today and the documentary idea is far clearer now than before. Thanks to the help of the tutor I’ve got a far more focused way of looking at the question I wanted to ask. I still need to write a third draft of the proposal and get it approved.

In the meantime I can already start writing the introduction to the dissertation explaining the context and setting the scene for the remainder of the document.

Going to be fun from now on.

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Deep blue

Byrichard

It’s fun to watch documentaries when you know that they spent at least two to three years in the making. I like the documentary because it’s an opera rather than a documentary. There is a minimum of comment and a maximum of shots. There are some sequences where you see things happening in front of the camera and it switches to a second camera. That’s because for sequences like the penguins jumping out of the water they filmed it with one film camera and one pole.

Doesn’t that make you wish you were studying a media BA. where part of your studies is television. Every field of studies has it’s advantages.

One person I know is studying James Bond films, another is doing Disney cartoons. I’m doing underwater documentaries between France and England. Another is doing something related to social elements and zombies. One is doing special effects

It’s a broad range and that should make it more interesting to those that have to read through all this content.

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On dissapointment

Byrichard

Student unions are one of the best places to meet people and make new contacts. It’s a place where drinks are cheap and normal rules no longer apply.

At least that’s what they’d have you believe. The undercroft is one of the worst student bars in the United Kingdom for a number of reasons, firstly the prices, highest in the UK, secondly the location, a basement with rats scurrying about. thirdly poor management, the reason for which many of the staff quit the job.

For over two months now I’ve been unable to go due to the management, not the staff, taking a dislike to me.

I went in today, not planning to get anything to drink because a friend wanted to drop down. The manager took a minute or two before he asked me to leave. I had not had the time to do anything of any sort.

I’m disappointed because tonight is the first night that everyone is back from holiday and I can’t go to be with those I’ve studied and had fun with for two years. I enjoyed the convenience of that bar being so close. After tonight the bar is so empty there is no reason to go anyway but tonight could have been different.

On the positive side, I’ve just started my six-day weekend and one friend in the same year is wondering what to do to occupy all our free time. Shall we find work, shall we live at home and commute only for the lessons? Shall we spend three or four days a week on dissertation work? I think so.

I need to find work. I need to carry out phase two of the research, interviews, and discussion groups before starting phase three, the first draft, and subsequent copies.

Last night I watched the Nile DVD and it’s interesting to see how different it is. It’s an anthropological documentary, taking time to speak first about the geography of the place, secondly about the people and thirdly about how they’re affecting the environment. It’s an interesting documentary that lasts about 100 minutes, 50 minutes per part. Already I’ve written notes about it and I’m getting closer to seeing how it’ll fit in as one of the case examples for what I’m talking about.

I still need to read through the two dissertations I have. It’s going to be interesting to have so much time to work on one project. A documentary about the differences and similarities between the two documentary genre.

Hours of fun as long as I organise my time so well as not to feel any pressure.

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On it being cold but sunny

Byrichard

It’s winter, I can tell. There are icicles hanging from the metal parts and the wooden covers are on fountains to prevent them from freezing entirely. Add to this my birthday yesterday and the winter tires today and there’s no mistaking this time of year.

I worked on my dissertation yesterday, seeing how familiar I am with certain elements of the documentary genre. I watched a few open university documentaries about the university and there’s one that makes me want to go back to Sienna to see the building in more detail. I’ll wait till the summer.

All that remains from this day

Byrichard

Today a friend of mine was in the news, after being arrested and released in China. He’s a photographer.

At the same time, I’m in England and I am no longer welcome to a place where I have spent many hours.

I have three documents loaded within the browser to continue work on the dissertation proposal I am going to continue on within the next few minutes or within the next day or two.

I’m going home in about 28 days or so, that’s four weeks.

I have a documentary meeting, a tutor meeting, and a  multicamera meeting, all for around the same time. There is also a globalisation meeting. After that, I may go home and edit what should have been edited already. This depends on what’s decided during one of the meetings.
It’s the daily life of a student.

Dissertations, documentaries and such

Byrichard

I’ve been reading about documentary makers and it’s interesting. Today I read about several of them, took notes, and explored the ideas that they demonstrate. The one that has confused me is Kossanovksy and his ideas of Dogma. I’m wondering how you do a documentary without having interviews or cutaways. Does he mean that we should not use them gratuitously or in some other manner? I need to do more search on this particular aspect.

Once more I’ve watched Control Room, the documentary about al Jazeera. I found it interesting.

Project progression

Byrichard

I’m only a few words away from the completion of the dissertation but over the past two nights I haven’t had as much sleep as I would like to have had, thanks one night to myself and thanks the next night, to the people I’m living with.

It’s a problem when you’re kept awake till 4 am and sometimes I wonder whether I shouldn’t take a hotel room and sleep there every few nights, just to catch up on the lack of sleep. of course it’s a waste of money so I would prefer not to.

Bad organisation

Byrichard

When you’re the producer one of the first things you do is make sure that the person you’re meant to be filming is at the location where you want him at the time you would like him to be there. A few days ago though, when someone else was producing the talents did not show up and we waited five hours for no reason. This was frustrating since i had at least two other things I could have been doing instead.

Today I have another more spontaneous vox pop gathering excercise around central London and probably Camden. I’m not sure about the best location but we should see this within a short amount of time.

I’ve been thinking more about the topic of my dissertation and the research queston and whilst reading Documentary In the digital Age I think I may have found an essay question. I have to fine tune it to be neither to focused nor too broad.