Creative Suburbs is a short marketing piece created by Karen Young, Patrick Rebakis and Trang Square as part of the Digital Story assessment for Contemporary Media Work Practices.
The video has a good mix of audio, video, text and graphics and communicates its idea clearly. In particular the use of the photos of people with blackboard signs gives a very clear indication that this concept is about people who have ideas for action and change. The three examples of current community actions (the bikes, street art, speed camera lottery) give a really good sense of what sort of ideas are possible. I saw a draft of this project a few weeks ago and it’s really great to see how far it’s come. For instance, the use shots of the woman with the money (speed camera lottery) adds a sense of fun to the piece. The end works really well moving from the graphic providing contact details to the group with blackboards and laughter added to the soundtrack. The music has a good feel and fits with the message of the project.
The start is very strong with a powerful image of people and cars indicating that this is about the urban environment. The soundtrack brings me in and gets me interested. I feel that the move straight into the graphics loses the momentum slightly as the graphics are not highly engaging. The words work well as does the light bulb but in an ideal world I would like these graphics to have more punch. But the energy is revived by the first person with the blackboard. This really matches the message and I’m interested again. To be picky, the image of the city and the river is not great quality and there seems to be a mark or light on the lens.
At the end of the video we are directed to the Creative Suburbs website for more information. However there is no sense from this piece what other social platforms are being used to extend this advertisement onto other social media platforms, there is no invitation to follow on Twitter or join on Facebook. This may give interested people other avenues to engage and follow this social action movement. An update on this comment is that the group have now provided a Prezi presentation which provides great information about the project and indicates that other modes of delivery will include a soundscape, Google maps and QR codes, all great ways to engage and involve potential community involvement.
The youtube video does not include a description of the project or name the creatives involved and it doesn’t have tags all of which would add to its discoverability and provide viewers with information on who and when and why it was made.
I would like to know who is speaking at around 0:31 “the one thing that holds each and every one of us together is the community”. Is this person an expert? If so who is he? Also this is an American voice so if he’s not an expert but is meant to be a local member of the community I don’t get that sense. I feel this speaker should be acknowledged at the end of the video and possibly introduced by Patrick’s voice-over. I would also love to have seen a brief interview with someone involved in a current or completed project to add to that sense that this is an idea that’s run by people and to get the energy from someone who has seen their idea come to fruition. I would certainly suggest seeking out a few people to interview and adding these in.
Overall a really good job at capturing what Creative Suburbs is about and to promote it through a number of different media channels.
This is the only CMWP Digital Story available to review at this time.
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