Trip to Open

Trip to Open Youth Venue on 12^th October 2010.

The Creative industries student convention was chance for us to get out into the local area and find out what jobs we could get in the creative industries. It was a very interesting day, however at points it was a little boring as it was designed for people older than our age group; so I found it a little bit hard to take in.

The day was spilt into 6 talks, roughly an hour each. We then had a break/interval where we could ask people questions on a one to one basis- this was really good as it meant that we could ask without being embarrassed. We had talks on:

Music (Adrian Cooke)

Dance (Derek Purnell)

Performance (Tony Scannell)

Graphic design (Bobby Barrage, Alex Jefferies)

Animation.  (Steve Bjork, Tim Edwards)

It was a good experience and I learnt many things:

·        To get into a dance school you have to do singing and acting so that you are a well rounded performer.

·        There are many different jobs that are needed at a dance school. (such as costume designer, lights specialist)

·        Acting is good but you need to get into a drama school if you really want to do it.

·        Graphic design is used in campaigns all the time.

·        Many times it helps to be original.

·        Used for a wide range of things (e.g. posters, TV, book, logos, CD covers, and arts.)

·        In graphic design and animation you really have to listen to the target audience.

·        In music many undiscovered bands make money by TV shows using a song by them this means that people who are watching the TV show will likely remember that song so the band will sell more ( for example I watch Gossip Girl and on the show they tend to use less well known pop songs. They have a CD on iTunes that is called OMFFG featuring music from the series. In episode 7 season 1 at the end they used a song called “With Me” by Sum 41 which many people – including me- have brought because it was in the show.)

The two talks that I found most interesting where: Dance and drama. Dance because I have done it since I was little and love it so much. Drama because it was quite a funny one and I was also very interested and learnt good technique (such as what to do in auditions).

At one point I did ask a question to the dancers:

“Do you think that recently films like; step up 3d, Street dance, Fame, and many others have influenced the industry?”

The answer that I got back were mixed many thought that people thought that it only portrayed one type of dance ‘street’ when many of the dancer who where in it have also learnt classical. But most thought that it was positive and has made more boys want to join the industry.

All in all it was a good day and although at times it was a little bit boring it has helped me think about a wider range of jobs that could be available to me with the help of my diploma.

After this trip I went to St Andrews hall to do the Choir festival. It’s a mix of schools in local area that have choirs, each school gets sent the music they need to learn for the festival so the choir members learn it at school. We then have a day of rehearsals and then the performance in the evening. Because of my trip with CAM I had 15 minutes rehearsal time.

We then went in to Norwich because the time that rehearsals finish and every ones ready to go all the buses at school have left and there isn’t enough time so last year Mr Horner said that we should stay in the city. We went to Pizza hut for tea after me and a few friends went into Build a bear workshop and brought a choir mascot (a cat that we named kitty!) It was a really good night but there was a lot of waiting around and by the end of the night I was really tired and my voice was really sore.