Aaron Wilhelm

I love being able to put what I'm taught into practice, which is why being a Media Arts Production major works so well for me. The way I learn isn't with tests and studying, but doing what I am learning to get a more comprehensive grasp on it. This class really does that well in my opinion, where most of what we learn and are expected to know can be practiced within this group. The projects and writing assignments also help because they aren't just essays, but comprehensive projects that highlight what we do well and areas to focus on.

Something I have noticed and tried to continue working on is my revision and drafting process, but mainly revision. At the beginning of the class, it was difficult for me to make continuous and large revisions, as I thought the format of my draft was good enough, and the points flowed well. Now I can pretty easily pick apart my drafts and rework them with more relevant points, or grouping together things that are relevant to eachother. After being in this class and constantly working on improving my revision, I can say that I am most proud of my growth in that aspect.

The way I see collaboration, through writing and also content is two creators coming together to combine and share their niche tactics/ style to make something that supports both of their communities, whether similar or different. Collaboration is a good idea to not only branch out to find new audiences who like your style or topics, without having to do it alone, as well as giving your audience a chance to find someone they might like as well. It’s a symbiotic relationship when done correctly.

My writing process is something like a continuous circle where the first step will always be as valid throughout the process, same as the last step. I “research” or gain as much information as possible on the given subject I want to write about, and then put all that information onto a document. Doing this helps me create sentences that flow well throughout points and help me find connections to information I might be able to group up. Once I have the draft down I continue to look for information to support my base. Revising becomes a lot easier when the points you have laid out in your writing are easily listed out.

For this class, we test what we’ve learned through these Tumblr posts and projects throughout this semester, and looking back on our initial posts to now there is a level of comprehension that someone just entering this community now would have a lot to catch up on to fit how we communicate.

The way I see Critical Thinking is that it’s the response to a well written/ made piece of content. If you can gather a meaning just by looking at something, that’s neat. However, if you can also dig deeper and find why it’s so easily recognizable, and how they created it in a way to represent it in that way. It’s also about reading between the lines, there must be a level of context known to really critically think in a certain space.

I had about three separate introductions that I've tried and this is the one I eventually landed on. I think it explains the HTWG pretty well and shows the function of why it's made, who it's made for, and the platform and community the content will be shared. Something I am a bit unsure of is if the intro explains TOO much for an existing content creator, that they may feel like they know more than the guide, or that the guide is for new creators. I feel like sometimes when I explain I go into so much detail that it turns into rambling, and I want to really avoid that, especially in the beginning.

For the last step of my how-to-write guide, I added a "Bonus Step" to elaborate on the effects of sharing a post with other creators on Instagram. When I first put it on there it looked fine but after adding the visuals and content creation, it seems to be out of place and would maybe fit better in the tips and tricks section. Should I remove this bonus step and instead just explain more in my tips and tricks section. Or should I not explain too much because the existing content creators already know the premise of it?

I know I literally just posted this but seeing it made me think of something and I want to run it by y’all! I like how the content becomes more and more “complete” as the guide goes through the steps. What I’m wondering though, is if I should make another fake post with ALL of the tips and tricks at play to separate the “created content” from the content I made to help visualize the steps? Or would having two posts confuse the reader as to which picture the final step represents? I’m more worried about how the guide would flow naturally than having too many pictures

For my How to Write guide I wanted to add my created content to work with the step by step checklist for my style of the guide. So for each step I added things to the post piece by piece once it was mentioned. I think this will help the reader visualize and see the difference in the post, also serving as a tool to compare and contrast the formats and tricks being used to see if they use any of them or perhaps should pick those tricks up. I think it works pretty well, and even though I’m happy with it, it’s still something I’m looking towards refining.

For content creation it’s important to have consistent hashtags so your followers/ new viewers can easily find your post without searching your account. Some depth to that is while putting your consistent hashtags, add some that relate to the post itself. This can help find even more avenues of connection to your account, but instead of a general hashtag with millions of posts, a niche hashtag will always have less. For example if you’re posting a picture of an upside down cake, include something like #upsidedowncake along with #cooking #cake. That way you’ll be adding to the routes of connection to your account!