REFLECTION
At the start of the year, I pitched two ideas - a narrative piece about a memory of the seaside, and a documentary exploring the pressures of respectability on queer people. After the pitching session, I decided to focus solely on the documentary. This was a slight risk, as throughout the project I have worked without a strict plan, keeping an open mind in order to respond to my interview recordings and explore different visuals. However, I have always had a strong idea of what I wanted to achieve - a thought-provoking, contemplative discussion of the topic that combines some humour and playfulness with more serious moments. I hoped to amplify the different perspectives of the interviewees, and challenge myself to be more experimental in my animation.
In November, I held a series of interviews with LGBTQ+ people, which were incredibly interesting, informative, and left me with fourteen voice-recordings, each between 30 minutes and 2 hours long. These have been the starting point for all my work, and I am pleased that I took this approach to making the film - speaking to different people has introduced me to ideas I would never have thought of otherwise, and I am very grateful for their thoughtful, personal responses. One of the biggest challenges of the project has been editing down this wealth of material into a short film, and I spent a lot of time thinking about different ways to put the voiceover together. In the end, focusing on one theme - the descriptions of the ‘ideal’ respectable queer person - and slowing down the pace helped me to find a version I was happy with.
My voiceover composition has been mixed properly by sound designer Simon Howard, who has also recorded foley sounds to create a lively, textural track that I think really enhances the animation. He seems to have really understood the tone throughout the project, and when I suggested minor changes he has edited the piece very well. Unfortunately the version I am submitting is not the final mix, as there are a small number of adjustments Simon still wants to make that he wasn't able to complete by the deadline. Personally I am very happy with this soundtrack and thankful for his work.
Because I wanted to base the artwork on the voiceover, my real decisions about the visuals came fairly late into the project. I knew that I wanted to develop some of the mixed-media techniques I have enjoyed in the past, and my original idea was to combine charcoal, paint and collage animation, with the intention of creating dynamic, shifting, unrealistic and textural images. It was slightly worrying to reach the end of the second semester without a clear plan for the visuals, but once my ‘narrative’ was decided I was able to throw myself in to experimenting, and in hindsight I am very happy with the approach I took. It involved testing out ideas, editing them together, and making decisions as I went along, and although this may not be the most efficient method, it has allowed me to develop a style and storyline that I never would have created if I had tried to plan the film exactly at the start.
Making mistakes and testing things that didn’t work has been a really important part of the process. It has kept the film-making interesting and exciting for me right til the end, and I think this has made the animation more fluid and energetic. This is most clear in the shifting, distorting faces - in each scene I started with an idea of the main movements, but for the details I enjoyed playing with the forms and following designs and pacing that felt natural. There are definitely moments where I can see flaws in the animation, and having practiced the technique I know I could do a better job in future. However, I feel that the film successfully discusses some of the pressures of respectability, and the animation emphasises the interviewee’s words and hopefully holds the audience’s attention. To me, the most important function of the animation is to express the ideas discussed, and I feel that I have achieved this fairly well.
As the project developed, I loved the black and white charcoal style, and felt that adding paint and other materials would overwhelm the already busy, textural screen. My biggest regret is that this stopped me collaging in artwork by some of the interviewees, which was my original plan. I felt that a glimpse of the speakers’ work would have added to the personal nature, but not if it felt overdone or distracted viewers from the core of the film. This concern also lead me to slow down the pacing; initially I had wanted lots of quick and changing images throughout, but I realised more variation and slow moments would help sustain interest and emphasise certain moments.
The section that I wanted to differentiate most was the discussion of one interviewee having a bottle thrown at him. I included this as an example of how not conforming to expectations can be dangerous, breaking with the more light-hearted tone earlier on. I initially tried out low-quality video for this section, then later experimented with film photography. I feel this is more in keeping with the textures and colour palettes of my animation, whilst still showing a significant change. I made this decision in the last few weeks of the project - I completed most of the film at the end of April, giving me time to consider and adjust my work. I am very happy that I returned to this section to improve it, and having that short period after the finishing the bulk of the film was very useful.
I have learned a huge amount during this project, and I have developed my skills in interviewing, working with sound, animating, editing and making decisions, and my confidence to work in more abstract, experimental and loosely-structured ways. Knowing when to hold back and not overwhelm the viewer, whether in sound, colour, pace or movement, has been a significant learning curve. There are definitely areas of my film that could be improved - for example, I could have made greater use of strange angles and perspectives in the bathroom sequences, built up to the first transformation more subtly, and been more skilful in some of my rubbed-out animation. However, I see this as a reflection of how much I have learned whilst making it, and I am excited to start applying this to new projects. I feel that I have challenged myself, and that overallI have achieved my intentions of creating a thought-provoking and visually distinctive piece of work.
Alongside my main project, I have also completed the commissioned film ‘Birdwatching’ which I began last year, and the community art project ‘Queering the Map of Edinburgh’, where I was employed to run a workshop about LGBTQ+ experiences of the city, and turn the participants’ work into a printed and online map. These have both been excellent experiences which have influenced ‘Acceptable Face’. I am very fortunate to have these ‘live’ opportunities which have taught me more about applications, working with clients, creating work to a deadline, and the other aspects of creating work such as festivals and launch events.