Marion Phillini is a collective of artists 'researching how collaboration functions when making immersive moving image work'.

 

The MFA class were invited to collaborate at the beginning of summer in the making of a three-minute film/moving image work. After being given this task by Phillini [through a film] we divvied ourselves into groups. The group I was a part of consisted of Andrea Coltman, Jacqui Hodges and Tom Waring.

 

The task was asking us to address the theme of privacy, intimacy, exclusion or voyeurism; to collaborate; collect footage that fits the categories of setting, detail and action. I was entirely unfamiliar with film making as I had never made one and had never intended to. We went through several different ideas - flip book style, layering images over the other, changing the colour palette… Until the final idea, which was to be footage from around our own houses depicting everyday tasks, static films or instances where we are encroaching on personal space.

 

I was quite unhelpful in the idea making process [but had make some films to add to the footage pool] and so decided to contribute by doing the editing of our footage into one film. None of us in the group were familiar with the software [Premiere Pro] and so I took it to learn as I went along after watching some tutorials. The process of editing the footage, I found quite enjoyable as I likened it to making a collage - finding sections that worked together and layering different sounds over entirely unrelated footage. The result was called Personal Space.

 

The skills involved in making this project were time management, collaboration and editing knowledge.

 

Time management because even though we had a week to film the footage, we limited ourselves to edit the footage in one day. This was mainly because we did not want to drag the project on, and I, as the editor did not have the software at my disposal [it was only at hand at college]. Collaboration because we had to work together and film items that had a similar theme. And for me editing knowledge, I had no prior knowledge and so this was a very steep learning curve, but it was a good experience as it taught me a new skill.