#reflective analysis

DNP 815 Week 1 Assignment Reflective Analysis Case Report Component Paper for $13 Only Max Points: 150

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In this assignment, learners are required to construct a reflective analysis incorporating a personal nursing philosophy which will directly relate to the case report assignment due in Topic 7. As such, learners are encouraged to review the case report assignment requirements in Topic 7…

For my final module of this course, space and place, i was assigned the location - Park Road, Ardleigh and from there, I managed to gain the idea of environmental issues due to there being a solar plant as well as a tearoom & garden’s there. When photographing the gardens, there were some images of trees with plastic over them, to prevent frost getting onto them, in my contact sheet. These stood out in comparison to the standard pictures of trees and other elements within the gardens which sparked the idea to experiment with different plastic materials and wrapping them around different trees to create sculpture’s of my own. 

Alot of photographers influenced me in this project for different reasons such as Stuart Franklin with his strong environmental issues context behind his work, which helped me develop more of an insight to these problems, Fay Godwin with the negativity behind the co-existence between nature and humans, which I implemented into my contact sheets of shoots, and Thomas Struth with his Untied Enemies series involving sculptures wrapped and tied up, presenting how I wanted my sculptures of trees to look. 

Throughout this project I feel that I managed my time alot better, in comparison to my first module and second, as I knew where and what to shoot so I didn’t have to spent time deciphering what/where to shoot. This could have been due to having access to a dslr camera myself plus, I personally enjoy focusing on shooting spaces/places more predominantly in comparison to portraits of individuals. I also feel my photographer research has really helped me gain strong influences in this project and helped me to build up more of an understanding to what I want my images to look like aswell as how I want them presented.

An issue I encountered was that I was very indecisive at the beginning as to what context and narrative I should choose to shoot due to the many different directions I could have taken it in. If I had spent less time being this way and more time knowing, I could have had more time to shoot more pictures to choose from. I also feel like I should have asked for more people’s opinions on my work when printing to gain a stronger insight to what others thought of my work and not just myself.

Reflective Analysis

I have produced an animated short film screenplay, titled ‘Baker’s Goods’. Throughout the writing I tried to incorporate several techniques from my influences whilst retaining from copying/parodying their works. This was in order to create a piece that would be appropriate for my target audience; which would include women and for the most part mainstream audiences. However, due to animation not being targeted at a large portion of the adult film audience, I now recognise that my film should be directed to an art-house audience even though I am still following the codes and conventions (for the most part) of a genre film.

Choosing romantic-comedy as the genre for my screenplay can be attributed to many of the animated shorts I had watched; such as Paperman, Blue Umbrella and Lava. It was also writing easier as I used the knowledge I had gained from AS genre studies and related it to romantic comedies instead of horror.

One of my main influences for this piece would be Charlie Kaufman, writer and one of the directors of Anomalisa. After watching this film I was able to see that animation was not only for children but instead could tackle other issues, it also lacked the constraints of reality which enabled more freedom to express and work within the ‘abstract’. Although I did not use this aspect of his film, I was influenced by him going against the tradition of animation being a stylistic approach that’s meant to cater to children, and instead creating a story which could be told as live action.

The mise-en-scene of my screenplay was heavily influenced by the bakery scene in Wes Anderson’s ‘The Grand Budapest Hotel’, I tried to emulate the levels of detail he produced in his screenplay in relation to set design and props by using similar techniques, such as using writing about the bakery’s store front and sign, rather than merely stating the objects existed.

A new aim that progressed whilst writing my screenplay was to show the main protagonist’s (The Baker) perspective on all the events that occurred; this was meant to keeps the audiences’ alignment with her and ensure that my preferred reading of wanting The Baker to succeed was taken on as a spectator response. This would ensure that the audience was familiarised with The Baker, by being able to see what he is seeing. The character was meant to possess a childlike amount of hope in that there was always a positive to whatever situation she was put into. I tried to illustrate this in several scenes such as when she first sees the flower shop and the sky loses its grey colouring in place of a bright blue. Originally the alignment within my screenplay was split between both The Baker and Florist (still favouring The Baker) however I did not feel as though both characters were properly fleshed out due to the constraints of the word limit. I felt that keeping The Baker solely at the centre was for the best for the development of my screenplay and didn’t completely take away from The Florist’s character.

My main concern was being unable to stay within the word limit, there were several factors which kept causing me to go over: such as my reliance on flashback which caused an over use of dialogue, as well as the inspiration I took from Brian Petsos’s Ticky Tacky which is a film that relied extensively on dialogue over action which was mirrored to my first draft. This did in fact have a negative effect on the development of my screenplay as it caused myself to rely too much on dialogue which only went against my original aims and context (to use minimal dialogue) but it also caused my screenplay to failed to fit well with how a majority of animated shorts were constructed.

I had convictions in terms of whether to use fantasy elements or keeping within a realistic approach. By writing a short film rather than filming one I didn’t have constraints of what I could produce, this lack of limitation only increased with my decision to write an animated short; however it didn’t add to what I wanted to portray. In the end I chose selective realism which enabled me to incorporate element of fantasy whilst not letting it mould the story I was trying to tell.

Wanting to have my characters easily digestible whilst not being one dimensional was extremely important to me during my writing process; I wanted the reader of my screenplay to want my characters to succeed, which I believe I succeeded in from the feedback I was given by my peers, this is why I chose to have the antagonist be the lack of success of the bakery rather than an actual individual.

I had intended my piece to be an easily enjoyable light hearted short film unfortunately the light hearted aspect which I clung onto so strongly ended up retracting from the screenplay’s form. In the first draft of Baker’s Goods there wasn’t a central conflict which made my plot too simplistic and had to be changed immediately. After some reflection I decided to make the conflict apparent nearer the beginning, as to help progression and avoid time/word count being wasted building up to it.

That One Where…Sage Went to College and Did the Thing

A Reflective Analysis

             Something I’ve always believed was a strength of mine was my ability to write, my ability to learn, and my ability to express my thoughts and ideas. When I was choosing classes at the beginning of the semester I remember looking online at reviews of professors and trying to decide if I wanted an easy semester with easy professors or if I wanted a bit of a challenge. I decided that I wanted a challenge. I decided I’d enroll in the class with the crazy, vegan pushing, lecture-giving professor that was said to challenge his students and push them to their limits.

            And boy was I given a challenge.  But before I go too much into that, let me start by saying this: I believe in the notion that everyone should have a basis of the written word not only for their own self respect, but also for the respect of their piers. I believe that in order to be successful in society, one needs to be well spoken and needs to be able to present themselves in all manners of communication. You literally use words at all times of your lives, even as a baby—being taught with words. So when I go into a classroom and on the first day of class my professor begins by talking about words, and the importance of words, I knew I’d made the right decision.

            From the beginning we were told our main objectives would be these essays ranging from 4 to 10 pages in length and that we would learn to write and be college students. This was kind of a strange idea to me at first; writing these papers would make me a college student? Wasn’t my enrollment and participation in class proof enough that I was a student? We would be assigned sections in our book to read and would be expected to understand the topics or to come to class at least with some questions.

            When the first quiz came I was semi-prepared; meaning I was given a heads up on how quizzes were handled and what to expect. I had prepared a handful of questions to be ready to asked so I would make an easy ‘A’ on the first quiz. However, even though I read the chapter, I quickly learned that I had not, in fact, read the chapter. Sure I read the words and studied key phrases and techniques, but what I failed to do was really grasp the concepts and understand what was being said. This was my first mistake. Of course, I didn’t do great on that quiz, only getting one or two questions right (and by right I mean slightly not wrong). So my goal was then to read the chapters with greater focus so next time, I’d do better.

            Of course I also was starting to write my first paper at this point. I will admit that I was confident in my paper and was pretty sure I was going to get a good grade on it. I got a B. Top 5 in the class, so that felt nice. Unfortunately, it only stroked my ego of my knowing writing was a strength I was proud of. So when it came time for the next paper, I was cocky and confident that I would again get a B if not better. That didn’t happen. Though I answered all the quiz questions correctly, I failed to grasp the concept of the paper I was writing. A minor setback, I thought. But it was starting to become a pattern.

            With our third paper complete, a whopping minimum of 8 pages, I panicked. I knew what I wanted to talk about, but I didn’t know how to get started. So I’d start writing this exploratory essay, get frustrated because I couldn’t figure it out, stop, ask questions the next day, and start all over again. When I turned my paper in, I didn’t expect it to be an ‘A’ paper, but I was proud of it and thought it was a nicely written paper.

            Again, wrong format. At this point I became disheartened because I honestly believed I was a good writer, and had been told so my whole life, and now I couldn’t even write a college paper? What was going on? After rereading the chapter and trying to figure out what I did wrong, the only thing I could really see was that I hadn’t given my opinion. Now, it’s the end of the semester with literally one class period left before finals. I have 2 papers with no grades and a feeling of despair dwelling within me. I have one more paper to write, a mere reflective analysis, and figure, I can’t go wrong with this one.

            But as I sit down and think about all the things I was taught in this class, all the things everyone would say, and things you, Mr. Hanson, would expect, it sort of dawned on me what I actually learned. I didn’t learn to write papers. Yes, I turned papers in, and yes I learned about rhetoric and whatnot, but I could have been taught that anywhere. No, what I learned was something I honestly never thought a college class could teach me: I learned that no matter how many essays I failed or how many points I got on quizzes, I never gave up. And I know that sounds really petty right now, like we’re in that Disney movie where the protagonist learns a hard lesson and has to realize their full potential (oh wait, that’s every Disney movie); but it’s the truth.

            I hadn’t completed a full semester of college in 3 years. I thought to myself many times that I should just quit while I’m ahead, that I should just work fulltime because it would be easier and I wouldn’t have so much stress in my life. But the fact that I’ve stuck it through this entire semester, wanting to prove to myself and to those who doubted me that I could, was one of the biggest and, in my opinion, most important lessons I learned. No matter how many nights I stayed up trying to be the “perfect student” and my mind kept telling me I never would be, I think that’s what made me a perfect student. College is supposed to teach you about life, about your surroundings, and about yourself. And I think the fact that I didn’t give up, I didn’t let the world dictate how I would run my life just because it was easy…I think that’s what makes the perfect student. Dedication. Honestly, I don’t care if they have all C’s. When you walk down that isle in your cap and gown and get handed that $50,000 piece of paper saying you graduated, a list of C’s isn’t going to matter. What’s going to matter is the drive you learned to study all night for that final. What’s going to matter is the day you learned to always, and I do mean always, have an extra copy of your lab report on a flash drive because your computer can and will crash, usually at the most inopportune times. What’s going to matter is that you pushed yourself as far as you possibly could to show yourself what you were really capable of. Sure, an ‘A’ would have felt great. Hell, an ‘A’ would feel A-mazing. But when you’re sitting with your kids remembering the good times, is your first memory going to be of that ‘A’ you got in Bio Chemistry? I highly doubt it.