Christian Union Weekend Away
In 2015 the Christian Union was voted to offer the best trips in the whole of Coventry University. Therefore, when I found out that the Christian Union were going on a weekend away to Quinta, I jumped at the chance to go. However, the publicity available for the weekend away was limited, consisting of people answering Q&As on their experience last year to encourage new members to come on the trip. Therefore, I contacted one of the executive members of the committee and asked if they would allow me to film the weekend away and create a promotional video which they could use if they so wished.
As my university offers a range of equipment for media students to take out at no cost, I was excited for this opportunity to borrow some equipment to practice filming with. For my video I borrowed a Cannon 700D, a camera which I had not used before, so I spent the afternoon before the trip working out how to use it. During the weekend away it felt strange constantly having a camera around my neck, waiting for opportunities to film, as all my previous videos had a set purpose that I had story boarded before filming. However, as I did not know what to expect on the weekend away, this meant I had to be prepared for anything. During the weekend there were: big meetings, seminars, social time, walks, sports and games, a bonfire, a worship evening, and lots of good food and opportunities to make new friends from Coventry University and also Warwick and Northampton.
Overall I hope my video would encourage someone to attend the event, as I believe the upbeat music and the mixture of teaching and socialising seems appealing to all. However, when editing I realised a nice effect would have been to interview some of the people on the trip to ask them about their favourite parts, and if they would recommend it. Also I could have included a mixture of their favourite bits with appropriate footage, and at the end had an encouraging message from the group telling people to come! This would have helped give the video a stronger and more flowing narrative. However, I do believe that even without this narrative the video does still create a clear story of what happened on the weekend away.
I greatly enjoyed both being on the trip, filming the experience and editing the whole video together. Also the positive feedback I have received about the video has boosted my confidence and now I would be happy to try filming more videos either for this society or others. Over time the quality of my production will increase and a good way to help this would be through more practice which will help me adjust to the best way to use the cameras.
Watch my video here: