Wednesday 27/1/21 - Initial Ideas

I decided to write down the initial ideas that I've had going into this project. The idea is to take the planning and development I did for the Altered States project and use that here as a starting point before further developing and changing it to suit the idea of Memento better. One of the biggest aims I have for this project is to have meaning and show that it has my personality into it, whether that's simply the aesthetic or the narrative behind it. This was partially inspired by Derek Jarman and his film Blue but in general my favourite artists are those who give the work meaning and style from their personality. Beyond that I like it to have connections to the audience, giving them the ability to look into the artists thoughts and feel a connection. For those who share experiences and traits to also feel a connection. After the research I made on Alan Bennett's Talking Heads and the challenges I faced in the past, I want to base my ideas around the restrictions of lockdown. Inspired by Talking Heads I want to incorporate the aspect of talking to a camera, a simple idea that I feel benefits from being stuck at home and also brings a connection between the audience and the person speaking.

Using this I currently have two concepts in mind, both relating to lockdown as I felt it was a topic that would relate to everyone and show my thoughts in a way of dealing with it. The first overall follows my storyboards with only some additions. It would start off with someone doing a video monologue for a project they are working on, this being seen from the perspective of their webcam. It would present itself in a way that my video is meant to be the monologue. However, they would be interrupted midway through but a red glow that slowly grew more noticeable until this point. From this point onwards it would follow the same narrative as written down in my storyboards. In the end despite all the events that transpired he's back at his desk doing the same monologue. It's implied that these events were his thoughts and imagination getting carried away, wanting to find something different in the same mundane life of everything being the same. It's a feeling I'm sure a lot of people have felt just not to the same extent, with lockdown for me things have been boring and it's been difficult to do the work I've been passionate about. The idea of the character following this light is sort of a representation of my desire to be able to do all of the things lockdown has restricted me from, such as my photography and film work.

The other would start before the lockdown following the weeks leading up to it, back when COVID was said to be just the flu. It would feature someone watching the news and talking to friends about it. It would then fade to black after a news report of the start of national lockdown and how it was initially supposed to last only 3 weeks. It would then cut back to now where it is almost a year later showing the person just working from home doing zooms and such.

Personally I find more interest in the first idea as it lets me still do something unsual whilst also talking about something important to me. The second idea is acting more as a backup should the first be more technically demanding. However, I still don't feel set on either ideas as part of me wants to look at the feeling of nostalgia and memory. I could even mix them together possibly.