9 Things #ACAM350 Taught Me; 1 Thing It Didn’t

… And with our “final cut” finally done, I am extremely relieved yet somehow unsatisfied with the version we have handed in. Now that I have been through the whole process of creating a documentary, I can honestly say that the blood, sweat, and tears behind the production of our film was worth it, mainly because I had so much fun with my group mates (I swear we work when we’re together and not just eat! though twitter might show otherwise). Despite our group being the largest with 4 members, I felt like it was the perfect number to have. Everyone had their roles–– sound (Kaitlyn), main interview camera (Kathy), b-roll camera (Mimi), interviewer (me; excluding Vietnamese interviewees). As we proceeded with our 6 interviewees, we all fell into a rhythm of our own. It was a familiar yet exciting routine that I looked forward to every time, as I would anticipate what would happen when we asked our questions, what would be said, what sort of fun would we have while filming. As the important thing is the journey and not the destination, I would say I thoroughly enjoyed my journey as a member of my group, and as a short-term film student.

the pains of editing

Through the course of these past three months, I have condensed a list of things I have learned while being in #ACAM350.
9 Things I learned from ACAM350, 1 Thing I didn’t (not limited to the classroom):

Editing sucks the life out of you.
B-roll is random but is also not; you need to know what you need, but sometimes what you don’t think you need can become what you need.
Translating is never really truly accurate.
Patience is a virtue that will escape you––trying to find music and syncing the film to it will have you ready to give up.
Interviewee’s opinions are important but ummm… uh…… sometimes it’s not relevant and we need to be ruthless.
There are way too many files and content that naming becomes super important yet super random.
I have FLAGGED1.prproj to FLAGGED8.prproj saved on my harddrive; premier autosave saves lives.
Audio consistency and levels makes a big difference.
Documentary film making is not as easy as it looks.

Setting up lighting was like trying to wrestle with wires and frames.

The technical process of setting up pre-interviews, filming the interview, logging, editing, cutting, music hunting, audio tuning, b-roll filming… That wasn’t as difficult as the creative process. From brainstorming to proposal writing, then interview question making, constructing the narrative, cutting out stories, re-constructing the narrative; all of these took way more time and effort, and gave me an insight into the kind of thinking and analyzing that goes into creating a film. The nuances and the little details of each segment is broken down and analyzed by us to try and understand the film we want to create. There were many times when we would be debating about keeping or cutting a certain part, each of us having their own reasons for their decisions. The dialogues that we had regarding the impact of the interviewee’s voice, to the meaning of their words sparked interesting conversations about our own narrative direction and what we wanted to say with the film.

The learning I have done through interacting and speaking with our interviewees as well as my group members has made me aware of issues I didn’t know existed before. Looking back, my school just did the bare minimum of educating us about history, but what can you do. The struggles and the pain and hurt that our interviewees carry over from Vietnam or from their parents linger within them, and how each of them chooses to express that becomes a personal story about the Vietnamese. Sadly, because of the topic of our film we couldn’t delve deeper into a single person’s story. The use of the yellow flag is controversial because of what it represents, whether it be the “lost” Vietnam, or “Freedom and Heritage”. Our video only brushes the surface of the topic and what the flag represents to the different Vietnamese people in Vancouver. With each interview, I learned more about a history I have never come across, and through the creation of this video have become connected––to people, to history, to culture. And not just the Vietnamese, but also to Canada.

Canada has a reputation for being a nice place, somewhere you can go to for better opportunities, somewhere that’s nice to live. I found this motif to be recurring with a lot of our interviewees; and that really speaks to the kind of place Canada is, and to what Canada as a country has to offer to Canadians, whether they be immigrants or first/second/n-th generation. The conversations about being Canadian and living in Canada made me question what being Canadian means to me, and what do I see Canada as, whether its a country of opportunities, of open discourse, of community, or of beautiful natural scenery.

All in all, the film has become a way for me to learn not only about Vietnamese history, but also of the conversations around being Canadian. The technical skills are definitely something that will be helpful in the future, but the dialogues we have had and the stories we’ve shared are ones that I will continue to think about and investigate. I really look forward to the screening, to see how everyone’s films turned out! Thank you for an enjoyable class, and keep creating #ACAM350! (:

A Stamp and A Soul

Because we were talking about oral history, I’ve decided this blog post will consist of my grandfather’s oral history. Maybe this will be the written record of his experiences in English. (:

Story time: My paternal grandfather was a young adult when he made his trek to HK from the outskirts of China. He was in HK when World War 2 happened. He was there at the time when the Japanese occupied the city, and was struggling to make a living after having followed in his brother’s footsteps. He tells stories of when he was young, starting out as a small business owner that sold ivory and the like, including chopsticks and name stamps. There was once when a Japanese soldier commissioned my grandfather to make him a name stamp, and he paid in advance for it too. My grandfather told him to come back in 2 weeks. He waited. The soldier never showed up.

I know of this because of a project I had to do in high school, where I had to interview a WWII survivor and listen and record their stories. I had to transcribe them and present it in a report to the teacher. The ones that wanted their works published in the HK Heritage archive could do so as well. There were many stories that were told, many that were recorded, but also many that was never heard. Having our discussion of oral history and the importance of it reminded me of the project. Through it, I got to know my grandpa and his struggles, his efforts, his toil and his fears (of the world wars, of the communists, of providing for his family). Oral history may be someone’s personal history, but it is history nonetheless. The underlying tensions between the Hong Kong people and the Japanese during its occupation, along with the stark realities of war can be easily understood with my grandpa’s story.

Of course, now that he is older, he constantly talks about the old days, of when the communists came. I always hear him talk about communists this, communists that, but the stories aren’t so clear. He doesn’t talk about it. He talks about other people’s experiences, where the communists come and take everything. According to my father, he was sent to America by my grandfather to start a business in order to have the whole family immigrate to the US. Dad worked hard, and the whole family moved.

I’m always confused at the timeline of everything, because I never know exactly when we were in the ivory business, and when it stopped. Grandpa apparently owned a restaurant too. Apparently lots of people went there. Apparently it was popular. I didn’t know that. It’s not there anymore. I ask my Dad about it too, but it’s not a really satisfying answer. Maybe I’ll ask more when I get back to HK (:

The Truth of a Lie

True or False: Mermaids have been proven to exist.

True, if you consider Discovery Channel’s Mermaids: The Body Found and Mermaids: The New Evidence.
False, if you read the post-script at the credits saying that it’s science fiction based on scientific possibilities and theories.

via GIPHY

I remember watching Mermaids on TV because my mother loved animal documentaries, and it just so happened to be on, so I watched it. I remember it being a really big thing because all of a sudden, mermaids exist!! They aren’t just fantasy and they’re real! Oh my goodness!

via GIPHY

Reading the articles assigned for this week reminded me of the mockumentary, and the fact that it generated Discovery Channel’s highest viewership ratings since it’s creation still astonishes me. The reputation of the Discovery Channel as a documentary channel (at least in my perception of it) caused the world to jump in on the hoax, believing in the existence of mermaids even when it was completely made up. The form of the story, in this case a documentary, had a huge impact on its reception and believability. With the production of Mermaids, Discovery Channel used the idea that documentaries are factual and grounded in reality to successfully draw an audience. The seemingly opposing form of the story and the content of the story caused an uproar in the online communities that have watched the film. The effects of this use (or misuse) of form and media generated discussions surrounding the question of viewer and filmmaker responsibility, a question we kind of touched upon in class. Is it the filmmaker’s responsibility to create content that is true, factual, accurate, and believable? Or is it the viewer’s responsibility to fact-check and make sure the content they are consuming stems and originates from credible sources? Where does the responsibility fall? The tensions between a formally represent “documentary” and the expectations of a documentary can be highlighted in a quotation found in our Winston reading Claiming the Real, where Discovery is essentially “grounding the documentary idea in reception rather than in representation” being “exactly the way to preserve its validity” (253).

The responsibility argument reminds me a lot of the “trigger warnings” that have been a prevalent in social media as of late. The idea of “trigger warnings” suggest that it is the creator’s responsibility signpost their content to protect others from viewing it. Is this the solution though? Is it not a kind of censorship? I ask a lot of questions in these blog posts that I don’t know the answer to. (:

problems become one, two, three, ta-da!

The “funnel” essay model––where big concepts are “funnelled” and become a single idea (thesis), which is then supported by several arguments, and is then followed by a conclusion that widens the scope once again. I think the funnel captures my way of thinking and information processing rather accurately. Whether it’s assignments or everyday problems, the model has become so ingrained into my thinking by English teachers throughout the years––thank you very much––that I naturally think through the steps of the funnel without realizing it. The idea of thoughts going from “big > small > big” mirrors the “general > specific > general” thinking that our minds go through everyday. Even in the realm of business, I think everything, whether it be products or services, is “concepts > details > concepts” turned into reality.

If I need to explain my thinking in terms of divergent/convergent thinking, I think my initial answer is selected from a quick diverging of possible options. This then converges into one single point to then diverge again to explore the array of solutions within that one point before converging again into a concrete answer… I’ve come to realize through this assignment that the way our brain processes information happens so instantaneously that explaining it step by step is a rather grandiose task. Nevertheless, I will attempt to explain the way my brain handles problems, how it makes its selection among the possible solutions, and how it decides to present that information.

Infographic of my thinking process

My thinking takes shape in the form of writing, if scribbles count as actual writing? My mind map isn’t so much a map rather than just blocks and points of sentences and thought segments that continue itself down the page. I guess you could say I organize myself with words rather than with pictures or by visuals (English major, go figure). Despite this, the way I present my thoughts could end up being very visual, as with the infographic I created in an attempt to explain the way my brain processes information (I hope it helps). As much as thinking and analyzing is involved to create a single idea, the effectiveness of transmitting the message is key if I want people to actually understand what I am thinking. No matter how efficient or how brilliant my ideas are, if I can’t translate that into comprehensible data, then all is for nought. Because of this, I consider being able to think through how to create an easy to understand and effective presentation is just as important as the whole thinking process.

Of course, showing is always more effective than telling, and luckily I have some outlines of previous papers lying around my desk. Exhibit A: Photo evidence shows an example of an outline to a research essay I had to write for an English course. The left page is my initial scribbling and brain blabbing on the possible arguments and theses, while the right is a more organized, well defined and explained version of the scribbles. Those are both incomplete as I suspect there was a third piece to the puzzle, but alas it is lost among the chaos of term papers and finals. Notice the use of colours too––I get bored easily and using colourful pens makes it easier to cope while making my thoughts easier to organize as well.

Exhibit A: My research paper outline

I look forward to the Business Innovations course as a way to further refine my way of thinking and problem solving, as well as finding effective and creative ways to present information to the world outside my consciousness. I am always for simple, beautiful and effective types of engagement, and if I am able to learn about design processes during my time in this course, I will for sure take advantage of this chance to further improve my skills.

As a wise woman (a.k.a my mother) once said: “We never focus on the effects of the problem, always on how to solve the problem. Because what is the point of getting emotional when you can do something about it?” And I truly believe this has affected my way of thinking way more than any other methods I was taught, because part of the fun of constantly thinking through problems is the smile on people’s faces once you’ve solved them, rather than being upset over how much the problem is well… a problem.

Contact: Land and Stories, The One “True” Version

Unit 2.2, Assignment 2.4 – Origin stories

Q1) …Why does King create dichotomies for us to examine these two creation stories? Why does he emphasize the believability of one story over the other — as he says, he purposefully tells us the “Genesis” story with an authoritative voice, and “The Earth Diver” story with a storyteller’s voice. Why does King give us this analysis that depends on pairing up oppositions into a tidy row of dichotomies? What is he trying to show us?

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In The Truth About Stories, King tells of the two creation stories of the pregnant Charm falling through the sky, and of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden in Genesis. He distinguishes the two stories by describing how he tells them differently and pitches the two against each other as representations of two separate ideologies of religion or thought processes inherent in the natives versus the Europeans. I think King presents this dichotomy in an effort to have his readers consider the ideas beyond––a way of saying that the dichotomies exist, I have shown them to you, now what is underneath that?

King talks about the authoritative voice he uses in his retelling of the Genesis creation myth, and how that is the basis of the European thinking related to hierarchies and power dynamics evident in the culture associated with royals and nobles versus peasants and slaves. On the topic of authority, there has been psychological studies which have identified individuals feeling powerful when in an authoritative position. Studies such as Milgram’s Shock Study and Zimbardo’s Standford Prison Study presents authority as being an idea which could cause people to act wildly out of the norm. In Patros et. al’s report of the “Underlying Effects of Authority: Past to Present”, they state that “[a]n unequal balance of power in a group setting can lead otherwise normal human beings to behaving tyrannically”. If, in such extreme cases, authority has been proven to have such adverse effects on people, then the effect of the “authoritative voice” used by King to tell the story of Adam and Eve is one which establishes power and dominance over the more peaceful and balanced Charm creation story. As Lutz writes in “Myth Understandings: First Contact, Over and Over Again”, “stories function to redress power relations between the native and newcomer” (13), and this is made apparent in King’s address of the difference in style of the telling of the creation stories.

The dichotomy between the two is not so much as a dichotomy but rather, perhaps, a pyramid, because there always needs to be one “true” story, and the one with the most authority, the one which seems to hold more power and command sits at the pinnacle whilst the plethora of other tales are spread underneath and creates a base of which the authoritative story has power over. In short, because of the nature in which the Adam and Eve story is told, it is unconsciously being labeled as a “true” story for containing authority.

King uses this distinction to highlight the inherent differences in the stories and therefore the opposing ideologies of a power driven culture versus a balance driven culture. Through the dichotomies he presents to readers, he is able to also emphasize the parts which do not fit so tidily into the row of dichotomies, of the influences and interplay of histories and stories of natives and Europeans outside of the obvious contrasts. By doing so, King paints the larger picture of the dynamics of the relationships between the two different peoples and the complexity of maintaining and managing such relations when the other is presented as otherworldly.

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Works Cited

Cherry, Kendra. “The Milgram Obedience Experiment.” About Psychology. about.com, 16 Dec. 2015. Web.

19 Feb. 2016. <http://psychology.about.com/od/historyofpsychology/a/milgram.htm>.

Lutz, John. “Contact Over and Over Again.” Myth and Memory: Rethinking Stories of Indignenous- European

Contact. Ed. Lutz. Vancouver: U of British Columbia P, 2007. 1-15. PDF.

Patros, Jennifer, et al. “Underlying Effects of Authority: Past to Present.” URC. Undergraduate

Research Community, 5 Nov. 2006. Web. 19 Feb. 2016. <https://www.kon.org/urc/v6/

patros.html>.

“The Stanford Prison Experiment.” The BBC Prison Study. N.p., 2008. Web. 19 Feb. 2016.

<http://www.bbcprisonstudy.org/bbc-prison-study.php?p=17>.

How Evil Came to the Little Boy’s World

Lesson 1.3, Assignment 1.5 –– This week is story time! I have a great story to tell you. It begins like this:

Once upon a time, in a land far far away, there lived a little boy. Now, this little boy was very naughty and he loved pranks, because he loved to have fun. To other people though, they saw him as nothing but trouble.
He would leave the shepherd’s gate open and let the sheep run loose, watching as they ran all over the place. He would let the pigs run through the streets with paint buckets tied to their necks so it dyed the town in all colours of the rainbow. He would take the baker’s bread and put it in the most innocent people’s baskets just to cause a scene. This little boy was not bad by nature, but he just loved to have fun, though he would always come home with some prank played on him. Not that he minded though, as long as people were having fun, right?

He wasn’t really afraid of getting scolded either, because the villagers would never get seriously mad, and surely they know he means no harm. It’s for the fun of it, you know? And so the boy kept doing what he was doing, each prank more elaborate and diabolical than the last.

But one day, after the boy played a particularly bad prank that resulted in some people getting hurt, the villagers have had enough. They refuse to keep up with his antics any longer, and anything they did to give him a taste of his own medicine was met with either laughter, a smile, or went completely unnoticed. So the villagers consulted the wise woman of the town, because she was the eldest, the wisest, and the mother of many. The wise woman listened to the villager’s complaints, nodding at appropriate times and waited for them to finish. When they have said their piece, the old woman thought and thought, and decided the best way to deal with the little prankster boy was to tell him a story.

“A story? What good would that do?” criticized a villager.

“Stories are wondrous things,” replied the wise woman, “And they are dangerous.”

So the old woman invited the little boy to her cottage one evening, after he had successfully pulled another couple pranks during the day, and gave him some dinner and a little dessert as well. Then, she started telling her story about a little boy in a land far far away, once upon a time, that loved to play pranks on people. The story included some details of pranks, some antics and some fun, but those things did not last. The story was overrode with misfortune and misery, accidents and injury, pain and trouble, and suffering and sadness shadowing any fun the pranks could ever provide. The little boy put his hands to his ears and shook his head, refusing to listen to the story, but the old woman continued anyway. Her voice reached the little boy through his closed ears, and when she was done, the little boy, crying, said “Okay, I understand. But what you said was not very fun. Take it back. Call the story back!”

But, of course, it was too late. For once a story is told, it cannot be called back. Once told, it is loose in the world. And the little boy dared play a prank again.

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When I began the story, I feel like I assumed a persona, or a type of storyteller-vibe. I could tell I was speaking softer and with more clarity than I would normally in everyday conversation. I was also speaking slowly and more articulate than usual. The story isn’t very flushed out, and I’m not sure if I represented it in the right way, but the “evil” was the little boy’s realization of his actions through listening to the old woman’s stories. Though the one written by King is about how evil came to the world as a whole, I think everyone also realizes and recognizes a sense of “evil” themselves. In their own world, when evil came, whether through criticism or self reflection; the evil that is entirely their own.

t u r q u o i s e .

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