I was out of my comfort zone for a day last week and enjoyed it. This involved trying improv theatre for the first time. Vinyasa Tango Yoga and Bollywood dancing. I tried all of these things within the framework of the Refugee Cultural Festival that took place between last week and this week. I was assigned to the room where these activities took place and took the opportunity to try everything.

Improv Theatre

As an introvert I am usually happy to observe rather than participate in such activities. In most circumstances I would be there with a camera filming the event. I chose not to hide behind the camera this time. We were outdoors and we played a few games. Improv theatre isn’t just about acting. It’s about grown ups being playful and creative as a group. This is comfortable. This is fun. It’s fun enough for me to have changed my Sunday plans from hiking to trying this once again. I’m going to be out of my comfort zone but change is good.

Last night many of the volunteers participating in the Refugee Cultural Festival could come and meet who they will be working with for the duration of the event. Falafel, samosa, hummus, wine and beer were among the offerings available to those people. Along with this was a drive for them to tell their stories either as migrants, refugees or allies of both. This is within the framework of the I am a Migrant campaign by the International Organisation for Migration. As usual with most Geneva events this was a culturally diverse group of people. Just an ordinary day in Geneva but special for those who have not grown up with such cultural diversity. The Refugee Cultural Festival itself will take place on two key dates. The first of these is the 17th of June. The Swiss National day of the refugee. On this day there will be singing, dancing, international karaoke, discussions, music, yoga, photography and much more. You can find a full list of events on the 17th here. They will be around Les Grottes from 10am to 1900 and from 1800 until late at Perle Du Lac. On the 18th of June there will be interactive activities around Photography and Visual art from 1400-1800 at Bellevue. The 20th of June is World Refugee Day. This is the day where you get to “Celebrate World Refugee Day with a Grand Cuisine and Cultural Party made up of international delicacies from Syria, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Eritrea and more. This event will take place at Bois-De-La-Batie, 20, petit-lancy. On the 21st of June there will be a dinner hosted by Asile LGBT from 2000-2400 in Paquis and on the 22nd of June it will be the IFTAR dinner hosted by RMCA, Cusine Lab & Foodhack. Disclaimer: I am a volunteer within the comms team for this event.

Operation Apache

Ingress is a selfless game when you play as a team. The driver gets no AP. Other operators get a few AP for breaking portals. Three individuals gets hundreds of thousands of Mind Units (MU). Rather than feel a sense of achievement I feel fatigue. The first reason is to do with the hangouts. You have to be serious. When I work in a team I want to be able to joke around. The most fun you have is with people who know what they’re doing and despite the stress have fun doing it. When you do something for free this is even more important. The second is driving a hundred kilometres. I don’t like driving without something to do at the destination. I also prefer to be active during daylight hours rather than once the sun sets. I am not a vampire. The three day rains don’t help either. Three days of rain, seeing the Arve saturated and very high. The Pont Rolex is a metre from being flooded. Friday I drove three hundred and seventy kilometres for another operation. I drove an hour to the location and an hour back from the location. On this previous up the engine had run for six and a half hours. I drove up one slope and fire crews were present. They allowed me to go on and I drove up beside the stream running down. The water wasn’t too deep but there were a lot of stones and mud. I felt the car loose traction so tried to keep my speed up. I saw where a storm drain intended to take water in was overflowing like a spring. In total I drove 470km on half a tank of diesel so fuel wise it was probably still cheaper than driving to meet people in Geneva. I think I’ll take a break from communal activities and play solo. I’ll stick to Via Ferrata and hiking as team activities. I will feel good about the op in a few days, when the sun starts to shine again.

is twitter changing your blogging habits? (original post) Yes and no. Twitter is replacing instant messaging and chatrooms. It’s an open method by which for people to communicate instantly with others. It’s also about the overheard conversation although that term has dissapeared. What does “overheard” mean? Well simply that whenever two people discuss a topic hundreds of people are following this conversation and when they decide they have an opinion they can cut in. They do have that 140 character limit though, so they need to get to the point is efficiently as possible. When that isn’t possible then they can do the next best thing. Write a comment in a blog post or even write a blog entry of their own where the conversation that took place on twitter is synthesised into a more digestible chunk of information. As a result twitter is changing people’s habits but the question is why people want to chat publicly rather than in an enclosed space. Today people like transparency.

Nicole - Mar 3, 2008

hey! my avatar was that color before any team stole it. i’m just sayin.

I did not know it was a colour war, I just noticed I am followed by Aqua whatever, and then I followed back. Thanks for clearing it, I was totally clueless about the whole thing.

I joined my team of choice of a humorous whim - it was under my nose when I logged in and it appealed to my sense of whimsy. Then the socio-political rumblings started and certain people were using their colours as an excuse to snipe… and I wasn’t the only one who felt that way. If we’re REALLY building something here, then let’s be bigger people, shall we? Nice one :)

As if zombie slaying, vampire biting and sheep throwing weren’t enough the facebook lunacy has reached Twitter via Zefrank and the stupid colour wars. As if the conversation was not interesting and fulfilling enough for twitter users there is now a movement to create a colour war encouraging people to split into groups. I dislike this movement for a number of reasons. For a start it’s a complete waste of time because it does not require people to do anything in the physical world. Just change your avatar and you’ve participated. That’s similar to the zombie wars. As a second point it’s encouraging people to break into smaller clusters and groups, which although fun in certain situations where groups are too big is pointless on twitter. In particular I saw that for one colour the point was not to tweet but rather be tweeted at. Now why would you ask for people to remain silent when the whole reason behind twitter is status updates, firstly and conversations as a side effect of the first. When few people used hotmail it was clean and e-mails were worth reading but as chain letters arrived so the usability went down. When geocities became popular so pages became flooded with junk, same with myspace and later facebook. I really don’t want to see this junk making its way into the twitter stream. I spend too much time there to appreciate it. That’s why I won’t participate.

Teamwork is a pain because it requires the collaboration of others. As Social Media people this may not sound like a challenge to you since you love having un-conferences and such but to others it’s a real challenge. Someone currently living in my home was telling me about how she would have to do the work of two people because the person whom she was meant to do teamwork with did not understand the question. That’s where doing my university course has it’s merits. Whilst it’s called a Mickey Mouse course by those that choose to do more scientifically based studies there is great value in this area of studies. One of those is the ability to lead a team, to be no more than a cog and more. Over a period of weeks I was producer on three out of four multicamera programs we did during the second year. The team was comprised of about 20 people. Three crews of three for getting stories, three camera operators for the show, one vision mixer, one PA, one AP. one director and so on. You get the picture. Add to the size of this team that they’re students and you see where the problems will occur. The first one is motivation. You need to find the people that agree to work with each other, check that they have the cameras and that everything is in working order. You need to make sure that what they are gathering will fit into the subject of the program. That’s another phase. Script writing. On two out of three programs everything went well. The person that was asked to write the script did so and we had the presenters to deliver the dialogue. The problem occured one day when I had depended on a person to write the script but nothing had been done. It meant that the show would be less organized. Our guest also cancelled on us 30 minutes before the show so phone calls had to be made to know what the key points were. The other two shows went well due to the amount of work that went in. I’m naturally lazy which means I’m great at deleguating certan jobs. I enjoyed handing out the filming assignments, making sure that all the footage was shot, that the material was ready and that everything would go well during the show. I also liked that I could really depend on my PA for the paperwork side of things. Through professional placements I have had before doing this university course I was experienced enough with the technical side to resolve most problems without too much trouble. Through that experience what I learned is the importance of understanding what your role is and knowing how to react immediatly in case of problems. If there’s no script find someone that you know can write to prepare the script. If there’s no presenter select the same person rather than do it yourself. As producer your role is to oversee the whole project. You’ve got to be strong charactered and confident. You also have to be patient. That can be quite a challenge. When you work with people who know little or nothing about computing you need a lot of patience. “Do I look worried?” is a question I love to ask people I’m helping with their editing problems, “no”, that’s when I answer “Only worry if I look worried because that’s when something bad has happened”. As a result I hope it helps to put them at ease. I remember working with one person who knew absolutely nothing about computers and she’s about my age. She was so nervous and so worried that it took all my self control to remain calm. I did remain calm. It’s a high pressure environment (especially in the real world) and it is essential for everyone to be calm and pull their own weight. Through a variety of experiences in television work and student work I have learned about teamwork and what works best. As a result I feel that I have an advantage over people have never had the opportunity to have such big groups to work with. I enjoy teamwork and I’m looking forward to many more assignments in the near future. I’m impatient to get back into a professional television working environment where everyone knows their role and works well as a team. Hopefully with my efforts that will be soon.

I love working on my own projects, where I rely on no one but myself but occasionally I’m lucky enough to have no choice but to work with other people. It’s at these moments that I learn more. I learn about team scheduling and teamwork. I also learn about delegation. I’m not that good at it yet but I’m learning. Anyone working as a producer or director needs to learn that job and some are better than others. The recent myspace and Magician audition projects I worked on saw some good producers in charge. As a result, the project was good. Recently I’ve had to be a co-producer with someone else and I was asked what jobs still had to be done and I had to think about it before I could delegate the responsibility. I finally found some methods of delegating responsibility, therefore, I’ll have more material to choose from when it comes to editing. The project has to be finished by Monday because Tuesday I’ll be back in London with a three thousand word essay on technological determinism to hand in. On the Monday following that I have a presentation on digital content. I’ve been thinking about that concept and I think I’ll be able to produce a good product.

Directing a Multicam is easy, after being a cameraman at many conferences. it’s a matter of knowing which shots you would like to have had with just one camera but couldn’t get. It’s easy, switching from one source to another and making sure the pacing is right and that there are not too many screw-ups. Overall it went well and I enjoyed it. It was different today as I was a simple camera operator. I had to concentrate on getting the right shot and fight away the desire to sit down or do something else. On both days the last speaker was the more entertaining of the day.