The first of three assignments to be submitted for the Positions and Practice Module was the Oral Presentation. The instructions were to " Conduct and record a reflective presentation on your current photographic practice. Your presentation should critically examine the motivations and objectives behind your work to date. You should also discuss your plans for your research project, and explain how it will extend from your current practice.
- Your recorded presentation should be accompanied with examples of your work and/or other relevant material. Make sure you include clear references to any work that is not your own.
- Your presentation should be recorded and embedded within a page of your Critical Research Journal.
- Your presentation must not exceed 10 minutes, and submissions in any other format will not be accepted.”
This was the first time I had made such a presentation although I am used to lecturing live and writing academic pieces. It was also the first time I had used Adobe Spark Video. My initial draft presented to peers on the course described my journey in moving from my profession as a Clinical Psychologist and Clinical Neuropsychologist to becoming a professional photographer. I was using powerpoint and speaking live to the slides as I presented them in a webinar. I had been aware that I had drawn on my previous knowledge about presentations and this was confirmed when one of the comments described it as too academic.
A different approach was then taken and presented to peers and the course tutor. ‘Developing my photography’ seemed to work much better and comments received were positive about the change although I was having problems with the alignment of narration and slides in Adobe Spark Video which I was trying for the first time in this second version. I was also advised to take the music in the background off as it was distracting from my narration and given additonal references to people and activity in the area I want to focus on in my project. The comments also included reference to style and using Harvard referencing. I did try to rework the presentation using another programme Camtasia and the add-on for powerpoint (and will try this again in the future) but I ran into difficulties with audio recording and internet connections which meant I reverted to Spark Video for the final version. The programme itself is a quick way to make a file or slide presentation and offers templates with pre set fonts and layouts and a choice of music. However, the disadvantage is that you do not have choices and control over the visual presentation of the content. Again I had difficulties with the narration and slides not synchronising and spent several days trying to work out how resolve this (each time I reviewed it the overlaps in speech and slides occured in different places!). In the end, now it is uploaded for sharing, it seems to run smoothly much to my relief! I do hope you enjoy it.
https://spark.adobe.com/video/0Sufly16jZNYm
Sarah Newton Photography 