Creativity

                                                     What is Creativity?

Definitions of Creativity
Originality - I think I have used originality in my AS and A2 coursework to a certain extent although it is quite hard to use a lot of originality as I took influences and inspiration from similar pieces of work that were already out there. My A2 work was probably slightly more original than my AS as we took a slightly different stance on our video than most common ones.

Imagination - I tried to use my imagination as much as I could throughout both my AS and A2 coursework processes. I took inspiration from other work and similar texts and then tried to make them more suited to my audiences and their purposes by using my imagination in this way. I think I could have been more imaginative in both pieces of coursework and perhaps added more or changed parts to improve them.

Inspiration - For my AS coursework I took inspiration from current music magazines and then focused in more on music magazines aimed at my target audience. Similarly for my A2 work, I took inspiration from music videos from a similar music genre to the song we chose. Inspiration was the key thing that helped me come up with ideas as it helped me to see what conventions I liked or didn't like and what things I thought would be effective on my coursework.

Ingenuity - When I came across problems in my work I tried to show ingenuity to overcome them. The main problem I had in my AS coursework was when my memory stick broke the day before the final hand in. I made the big mistake of not backing up all of my work but luckily I had saved half of it onto my laptop at home so I could just use my memory to redo it. On the positive side, this helped me to be more ingenious for my A2 work as I made sure that I always backed up my work and had more than 1 copy of it saved all the time.

Inventiveness - In the same case of originality, I believe my work was inventive up to a certain point but it is hard to create something that is completely your own idea without taking aspects from other things.

Resourcefulness - When using resources for both of my pieces of coursework it was sometimes hard. I mainly used the Internet to get inspiration or magazines (for the AS work). Sometimes I found it difficult to get the resources I needed especially for my AS work as I only had a cheapish camera which wasn't great quality and this may have effected the overall outcome of it. However I just used the best of the resources that I had.

Creativeness - I was quite creative during the production process of my AS and A2 coursework but perhaps more so during the A2 work. We tried to produce a video that was slightly different by putting our own creative slants on the work and in some cases this worked  but in others I don't think they paid off. However, sometimes it is worth taking a creative risk as it can be successful some of the time.

Vision - During the making process of both pieces of my coursework my vision of how I thought they would turned out was constantly changing. This was due to several factors, sometimes because it wasn't possible for me to use the programmes or equipment or in the case of the music video we realised some things would be too difficult with the amount of filming time and resources that we had. However, it is important to have a vision as it gave me a guideline of how I wanted my work to turn out and it's something to aim for.

Innovation - It was hard to be innovative in terms of these pieces of coursework. As previously mentioned, I took a lot of my ideas and inspiration from similar texts already available and this means it can often be difficult to think of and introduce new ideas in the same way that it is difficult to be completely original.


How Creative Do You Think You Have Been And What Has Prevented You From Being More Creative?
On the whole and taking all the definitions of creativity into account I think that I have been quite creative. Although, there has been some limitations and some ways in which if I look back now I feel that I could have been more creative and used some of my own ideas more. I would say that the only thing that really prevented me from being more creative was the equipment we had to use as it could often be limited and some of the programmes we used weren't as advanced as they could have been to help with the creativity side of things.


Has a set menu of tasks made it easier to be creative or would you have preferred a free choice on what you could make? Were you pinned down too much by the task, or did it free you up to be creative within the boundaries of the task?

Personally, I think a set task was definitely a good decision as it was much easier to be creative because there was just one idea to focus on whereas if we were given a free choice then I would have found it difficult to pick a good idea for my coursework as I'd have probably spent most of my time choosing which task to do.
I don't feel that I was pinned down at all in either of my pieces of coursework as I could have been as creative or not creative as I wanted to be within the boundaries of the task. For example, in the case of the music magazine, there is so many different types of music, target markets and magazines already out there that it meant there was plenty of inspiration that enabled me to be creative in my own way.

Ideas and Theories

Quotes and Their Meanings

•  "A process needed for problem solving...not a special gift enjoyed by a few but a common ability possessed by most people" (Jones 1993) I think this quote means that creativity is something that everyone is capable of and we need to be creative in many situations. I do agree with this quote because I think everyone can be creative but perhaps some just more than others.

• "The making of the new and the re arranging of the old" (Bentley 1997) This quote, in my opinion, refers to the point made that new things that are created are simply reinvented versions of similar old things and nothing can be completely 'original.' I also agree with this quote as anything new that is made must have some sort of previous influence.

• "Creativity results from the interaction of a system composed of three elements: a culture that contains symbolic rules, a person who brings novelty into the symbolic domain, and a field of experts who recognise and validate the innovation." (Csikszentmihalyi 1996) I don't fully understand this quote but I would say that it means that creativity doesn't come from one person but that it comes from a variety of elements and influences. I agree with this quote for similar reasons to the quote above.

• "There is no absolute judgement [on creativity] All judgements are comparisons of one thing with another." (Donald Larning) I think this quote is true as to me it means that anything judged on creativity has to be compared to something else similar. Therefore, something could appear very creative or not at all creative depending on what it is compared to, meaning that it is hard to judge a level of creativity.

• "Technology has taken all the creativity out of media production." I completely disagree with this quote as I in fact believe the opposite of it. I think that advances in technology has allowed for more creativity as it is now easier to be creative in a more complex way.

• "A project that is too well planned lacks opportunities for spontaneity and creativity." I don't really agree with this quote as I am the sort of person who would prefer to have an idea planned out before I start work on it, and I think that more creative elements can be added as the production process progresses. However, if it isn't possible to change the plans then the quote could be true.

• "Media producers can learn nothing from studying the conventions of old texts." I disagree with this quote as I think that new ideas can only be thought up from looking at other, older texts. I think that old texts will help us to understand where new ideas have come from and so it is important to study conventions from those texts too.

• The creation of bringing something new into existence - "This particular understanding of creativity involves the physical making of something, leading to some form of communication, expression or revelation." (David Gauntlett) I am not entirely sure of what this quote means but I think it is referring to the point that creativity always creates something new.

• "If creativity is not inherent in human mental powers and is, in fact, social and situational, then technological developments may well be linked to advances in the creativity of individual users." (Banaji, Burn and Buckingham, 2006). I think that this quote makes sense and I do agree with it to a certain extent. I think that everyone can be creative, even if its just a little bit, and technology does help with this. However, I also think that in the cases of the most creative people it must just be part of them to be so creative.

The two quotes that I agree with most are; "The making of the new and the re arranging of the old" and  "A process needed for problem solving...not a special gift enjoyed by a few but a common ability possessed by most people" I can apply the first quote to my coursework over the whole two years as all of my ideas came from inspiration that I found. I took ideas and tried to use some of my own creativity to add to and change old ideas and make new ideas. I caa apply the second quote to my coursework as problem solving was a key piece of creativity that I needed throughout the whole production process of both pieces of work. I came across several problems which involved me rethinking or altering ideas and therefore me being more creative.

The two quotes that I disagree with are: "Technology has taken all the creativity out of media production." and "A project that is too well planned lacks opportunities for spontaneity and creativity." In terms of my own pieces of coursework, I disagree with the first quote because I feel that without technology I wouldn't have been able to be anyway near as creative as I was. I also think that if more technology was available then I would have been able to be more creative. I disagree with the second quote because personally I felt that planning helped me to be more creative as I knew what I had to do in order to achieve the end product that I wanted to.