Media Diet…

Yesterday I was released from a short stay in hospital… I just stayed 4 days for a surgery… during these 4 days I was totaly off any Media – no newspaper, magazines, computer… I had a TV in my room, books and my iphone.But during these days, I haven’t had any demand for any information – just got some sms and checked once a day my emails. Usually I am a kind of information junkie – I check the news a few times a day, get information from the web, get inspired by design and articles from the web – which makes me constantly of thinking…. This could be really exhausting from time to time…

So the “Media Diet” at the hospital was such a relief and the 4 days felt a bit like beeing in holiday  -  sounds crazy, I know, but my mind and brain was sooo relaxed. I am sure there are a few people who think that people like me are a bit crazy, but I am also sure that there are lots of people outside the world who are dealing with the same problem – the information overload.

It sounds easy to escape from any digital information – it is just to turn off  the button of the computer – or a strict plan to check mails, read etc… But it is a big difference of knowing and doing. For a Marketers, Artists or any creative people who live from inspiration and information it is really hard to deal with it. The Internet is a land of milk and honey for creative people – u can get so many information and inspiration that you can get lost in it…

I felt the last days as such a relief and I decided to work hard on my own digital behaviour – not to be online all the time and take some time out – not to think all the time…

I am also thinking  about to put the  subject “information overload” more into focus for my project.

P.S. It is amazing to see how the project focus is changing with time. I am very excited where my journey is going to and how my final project will look like.

negative:positive…

I had a nice chat today with Jenni… Like me, she was also struggling with her subject about social networking – it had also such a negative impact to her. We both agreed that there must be a balance between the positive and negative way of seeing – but we also agreed that we can’t make the subject too positive – cause this is against our thoughts!

I think that after all the negative and critical way of seeing our project – there is also so much impact to visualize the negative sites – that at the end it will have a positive effect to the viewer! That he starts to think and reflect his own behavior!

“Giving people a small moment.”

There are so many moments every single day – but most of them we don‘t recognize. We tend to unconsciously reset our minds and forget what we have seen. To capture those moments with my photograpy or to do some artwork to make people think about a subject and reflect their own behaviour is one of the greates satisfaction to be an artist.

Struggle…

Here I am – back after months … Months of struggling with health condition and a knee surgery… Still walking with crutches but I am much more confident than the last months…

During the time beeing immobilized I was thinking a lot about my subject. I noticed that I was exhausted about my own media behaviour – I got a slave of my own digital media behaviour and had trouble to filter information and to de-energize… I felt that my project had a kind of negative influence for my life – but at least it was just my own behaviour. I was struggling with my project and thinking about changing the subject.

The last months I was more focused on living an analog life – escaping from the digital jungle. But soon I missed my digital life – I am a digital person… Living without digital enviroment isn’t possible anymore. There are so many people outside who feel the same like I do. We have to find a healthy balanced way between our own analog and digital life and behaviour.

I noticed from the last months of my studies that my focuse on my subject was primarily negative. I do see the developement of digital communication behaviour – especially about social media – critically… but I also feel that is has positive effects. I decided not to give up my subject and studies. My goal for the last year of my MA Studies is to have a balanced view about the digital behaviour. To use my own experience to develope artwork.

I started to improve my photoshop skills and learned new techniques for special effects.

I will restart my studies in September – till then I will use this blog to collect interesting information, videos and artwork.

Reflection…

The last few weeks and months, I didn’t have enough time to be focused on my project. A knee injury – give me the time now – to reflect some parts of my project and my project focuse. At the moment I feel like an information vacuum cleaner. Every single article about digital communication, social media, design and videoart gets inhaled. It is an exciting process. My brain is full of information – information, which has to be analyzed and filtered.

During the part of reading – the question came up if I should change a bit the project title and focus? Should I ‘d be more focused on social media or how digital technology change the society? Or aren’t at least both parts involved in the digital communication title?

CHANGE.. this is the word for me at the moment. The world and digital lifestyle is changing so fast – What is new and innovative today could be old tomorrow. How is the society dealing with this process? And how does this thesis involve my project?

Well, I will have some time to find it out. Get a knee surgery soon and enough time to get clearer about my project.

1W49.01_Tuesday evening…

… it is the first time after weeks, that I have  enough time and the mood to check up my classmates blogs. While I am reading the blogs, i feel that I do really miss our weekly chat, exchanging thoughts, ideas and see how everybody developes as an artist.

I am pretty busy at the moment with work – everything is very exciting. The good thing about my work is, that I still do some research for my project. Marketing and digital communication are so close, and so everyday I am researching social media developments, new marketing strategy, viral marketing etc.

Last week I bought the UK magazin wired. The Title is “You will buy me .  How persuaders are hacking your mind… to control your desires.” I still hadn’t have the time to read the full article. But it seems very creepy and on the other site very interesting. I always was interested how people get contolled by media and marketing. Maybe I will change my Project into that direction… I will see – I do have enough time during the next year to develope more the ideas…

1W40.01_Beeing offline…

Since I am back from my holiday I am enjoying beeing offline most of my time. It is a brand new feeling after weeks, months and years beeing offline and at the computer every day. The last days I just went online, checked my emails, read some news and checked my facebook account. I didn’t end up in surfing around the web – and getting lost somewhere… I felt very happy and felt that beeing on the computer was not just a waste of time. Sometimes, I just want to check my emails, and end up surfing from one website to the other – and at least I got stucked 2 hours in the web – and finally haven’t done anthing productive. So finally my experience in the holiday – with beeing offline most of time – was a great and successful  experience for myself! I think I have a better balance now – by using the computer and the digital communication tools.

My goals for next week. First I will start my new job – I am very excited about it! This will be the first priority for this week – but I hope at the weekend I will have some time to work a bit more with Adobe Premiere. I got a HD Camera 2 weeks ago and shot some clips in Thailand. I experiment a bit with the Programm tried some out some effects, which was fun… But at least I would like to make a little video…

1W27.01_Feedback Mid Point Review

Last weeks Mid Point Review was a great experience. It was pretty tough not to contribute the discussion.

It was interesting to see that most of us are caught in the digital world, addicted to emails, crackberries or social network platforms – especially we all are coming from different countries. Our daily behaviour has changed and it seems  and proves that it is really hard to escape from our own digital communication behaviour. A very sneaky process but with such a deep impact of all of us!

I also got very interesting links and ideas for my upcoming research. I liked Hassens idea of the 24 hour brainwave of a person or a blood pressure monitor.

The next steps for my research will be to observe my own digital behaviour. Pretty scary !

1W21.01_Structures

After beeing clearer about the final work of my project I felt it easier for me to restart my research process.

I will split my project into 3 sections.

1. proposal focus – digital communication behaviour in business and personal life and the mental and social effects to society

• mobile phones
• e-mail
• social-networks

2. technical skills

• improving my photoshop & illustrator skills
• learn premiere / Final Cut Express
• learn After Effects / Cinema 4D

3. Final Project

• Writing a screenplay
• Produce a storyboard
• Film
• Edit the Footage with sound, effects & photographs

I already did lots of reading for my project – but from time to time I felt a bit lost with all the information. While I do the reading process I need to write more down the main information – and not safe them only in my brain.  I hope that with this structure I feel a bit more comfortable.

So, my this week task will be reading the book “grown up digital” by don tapscott.

1W20_Flow…

Title: “flow” // February 2009 //

“Flow is the mental state of operation in which the person is fully immersed in what he or she is doing by a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and success in the process of the activity (Wikipedia).”

The last 2 weeks I was searching “my” flow… I recently got a bit depressed about my project. I felt that my project would end up in a total marketing study. As you know, my background is marketing & communication. One  ambition of mine is to leave the marketing person behind and be focused more on my art. I felt it really hard to combine the research process and the art process.

To get not lost and more depressed into the reading process I decided to be more focused on improving my software skills. Also, I read 2 books about digital art for hoping to get more inspiration. Throughout this process I was constantly thinking about how my final work could look like. I had a great idea a while ago but unfortunatly the idea is pretty tough to realize from the technical part/ which is into laser technology. So I gave up that idea (just for the moment/ it’s still in my mind..:) ) and was searching for another possibilty to combine my research and art. I felt it would feel easier to have an imagination how my final work could look like and then beeing focused on the realization and research.

It took me a while but now I have a great idea to combine both parts. My final work will be a little movie with hybrid media. The context of the movie will be 24 h in the life of a fictional person and how digital communication, modern technology change (and will change us into the future)  the social  and mental life. Thatfore I will write a script,  a storyboard, shoot the video, and do the editing and the video effects. I am not sure yet, but I think it also will include some of my photography, graphic designs and maybe 3-D.  It is a huge challenge, but I am very excited about the idea!

In my turial Andy recommended me to read a book of william gibson – Idoru. It is a science fiction novel. I hope to get more inspiration for my script.

It feels really good to be back on the track – and once again to feel my “flow”.

1W18.03_New blog layout

I decided to change my blog layout and design. The last layout was to dark and not very usability friendly. I am not 100% satisfied with the new look and I hope to improve a bit the css the next weeks.

For the new look I used the chance to overwork my categories, tags and organised my blog entries. I noticed that I have to focuse more on the guide for reflective blogs from our wikispaces site. I think it will be essential for the Unit 1 Assessment.

This week I spent a lot of time to think about the next steps for my research. I am a bit tired of reading and so I set my focus on improving my software skills. I ended up in watching lots of video tutorials about 3D and Motion Effect software. The variety of creative possibilities have blown me away! Unfortunatly software programs are getting more and more complex, that it takes a while to learn it.

To get not stucked – I decided to improve first my skills in photoshop and illustrator. I have subscribed the Computer Arts magazine which is filled with creative tutorials.  I hope to learn more techniques and be able to create innovative artworks.

I also orderd the new adobe production suite with the newest after effects and flash versions. I have to be very structured and focused to learn one software program after the other – and not ending up in a chaos.

Title: Chaos // January 2009 // © nicole struppert