Working the Birmingham Creative Scene...

Hi all,

As Jen has said our project has done a slight U-turn but for a much more exciting path, taking on Media Talent Bank will give us more scope to be creative. The background work has already been done and established so we can really use our research to make sure, that we make the site usable and appealing to our market. It also means our time can be spent on making it work rather than building the project, so overall its has been a great find.

One of the main things our research has brought to our attention, is that other similar projects and even Media Talent Bank, have lacked in PR and advertising amongst the target market. Through our research we have also found that networking seems to be a key way, to access the creative industries and get to know the different sectors. We have been trying to get into this scene by attending some networking evenings, with the opportunity to get some feedback on our idea.

I attended the RTS 'Breaking Into Broadcasting' talk at the University of Birmingham, where professionals from radio and television spoke about the best ways to get into the industry, and how they themselves got into the jobs they are in now. Many of the professionals spoke about student and graduate opportunities and how they like to see up to date CV's and portfolios of work. They said that one of the biggest turn-offs of a CV would be someone who had left uni and not carried on producing their own work. This I felt was an important point, as we originally proposed that our project would directly benefit students and graduates by aiding them in producing their own work, and finding relevant creatives to work with. This is an aspect of the site that could work really well, as it is something that Media Talent Bank don't currently do and a way we can evolve the site into something new.

I spoke to the panel and approached them on what they thought of the site, they gave some good constructive criticism in terms of, that they wouldn't necessarily use it for looking for students CV's as they get sent so many but they would be interested in the events and networking evenings and putting up work placement and job opportunities. This was an invaluable experience for me, as I learnt a great deal by speaking to the professionals in a professional context but also learning about their part of the industry, that I know nothing about.

We then went to the 'Producers Forum' re-launch event at Fazeley Studios in Digbeth, we wanted to go along for two reasons, networking and seeing how they constructed the re-launch. We didn't meet too many people as it was more of a formal event for producers in Birmingham, and not really for students. However, Dave from Media Talent Bank was there also and came to be a good opportunity to have a shared interest when we met for our meeting.

When we met with Dave and Sara from Media Talent Bank, they used the Producers Forum and the Animation Forum as examples of similar concepts that had really worked and got off the ground, which was also interesting as we now know more about them as models for analysis.

The event itself was good and it was good chance to have a look at the venue in the context we would use it. They had cupcakes which we loved! food, drinks and other than that there was some professional music provided and guest speakers. Overall, a great opportunity to have a drink and discuss ideas together!

Soooo this is our scouting the scene so far, will update with further progress. If anyone has any networking opportunities they think would be interesting please let us know.. and of course a final plug for our questionnaire..

http://freeonlinesurveys.com/rendersurvey.asp?sid=vpcuc5mju70wi91663181

Thanks,

Jaime

Here is the link for the Media Talent Bank website: http://www.mediatalentbank.co.uk

Have a look and let us know what you think!

Hello all,

Things keep getting better and better for us! Over the last week, we have had a meeting with Media Talent Bank who asked us to take on the website and implement our ideas to the website. Originally we were unsure whether to take it on because we weren't sure if it would fulfil our assignment brief, but after speaking to our tutor Julie, we realised it would really benefit us to do it and now it means we have a real client we will be working for.

The website already exists and so we do not have the problem of starting a website from scratch. As well as this, Media Talent Bank want us to have most of the control on the website so we will be able to create extra features. The main aim of this is to get more people onto the site and so there will be a massive PR push throughout. We spoke to Media Talent Bank about the event we want to hold and they have funding which can go towards it. The event will be a re-launch and we discussed with Media Talent Bank about doing little networking evenings in the the run-up, varying from various sectors of the creative industry which will hope to generate more traffic to the site.

From our very positive meeting, we went away to draw up a new proposal with our aims and objectives for the project. We put forward most of our ideas that we had initially set for our website. Media Talent Bank will get back to us with ones we can and cannot do, although for some of them we will need to pitch our ideas to them so let's hope it goes well!

We hope to take over the website in January, so before then we have time to continue with our research. We have been sending out various questionnaires asking whether people would use a site like this and what they want from it etc. as well as continuing with the professional context and market research.

So things are looking good and we are all very excited to get the ball rolling. We have lots of creative ideas for the PR and alterations/additions to make to the site!

I think that is about all to report from our eventful week, so let's wait and see what is to come....bye for now x

A change in direction?!?

Hi all!

Since our last post, our project has progressed a lot... where to begin?!?

Firstly, we created an online questionnaire which is up and running. We are getting some very positive feedback so far and some interesting comments for us to consider.

http://freeonlinesurveys.com/rendersurvey.asp?sid=vpcuc5mju70wi91663181

After this stage, Jen and myself met to research funding opportunities and decide which would be most appropriate for us to apply for. We also emailed some contacts we have in the PR industry to ask for their advice on funding. (We are still waiting to hear back from anyone)

Alongside this, we also emailed lecturers we felt would be beneficial to speak to about our project in terms of their expertise; this included Jon Hickman, a social media and web specialist. We wanted to hear his thoughts on the online network feature of the website and Alex (our web designer) in particular was interested in the feasibility of building the website and its features we propose in the time given for us to complete the project.

Jon was very helpful and told us about a similar website; Media Talent Bank. It is an online website with very similar features to ours and is funded by the university and created by Screen Media Lab. With none of us having heard of this website, Jon suggested we get in contact with the producers of it to discuss how the website was created and the challenges they came up against to educate our own project.

We took on Jon’s advice and got in touch with Screen Media Lab to arrange a meeting. We got a very prompt reply saying they were more than happy to meet and discuss Media Talent Bank. They also proposed a very interesting and exciting opportunity that may result in a change of direction for a project... the opportunity to manage Media Talent Bank for the duration of our project.

However, nothing is set in stone yet! We are meeting with Screen Media Lab tomorrow at 2pm so we shall see what comes of that and kick a few ideas around!

Will keep you updated on that...

With this potential change in the project, we have put the funding research on hold for the moment until we are clearer about the direction we are heading in. But we have started to put together a critical path analysis which will help us to determine what it is that our project involves and the stages in which it occurs.

Hello!!

Hello, and welcome to our blog - Creative Cluster!!

We are a collective of third year students at Birmingham City University, we are all studying Media and Communications BA Hons and as part of our final year work we need to produce a production project. This is where our blog comes in.. we have decided to blog about our journey and the highs and lows that come with it!!

THE IDEA....

We propose to create an online hub where students and graduates can connect with one another on a professional basis but also be part of a scheme to showcase their work, which will run in Birmingham giving creative students the opportunity to keep updating their portfolios.

We want the site to be like a social networking site for the Creative Industries in the Midlands, where students, graduates and professionals can network freely together. We eventually want to hub to become a space where students and graduates from all specialisms pro-actively produce work together, keeping their CVs and portfolios up to date. We will then hold quarterly events to showcase this work, however this is the future of the scheme. Our first major product from the website will be the launch.. but there will be more information on this as we go on.

So what have we been doing so far? We have been setting out our agenda from now and up to Christmas, and held several informal meetings where we have managed to distribute jobs between ourselves.

Our first formal meeting was held on Monday 2nd November: We sectioned out our market research and who was going to be looking at each area...

Alex would look at similar websites, how they function and the visual design and I am going to look at these websites also but look more into what organisations run them, who they target and how they are funded etc..

Sarah and Jenny are both looking at the potential income, costs, code of conduct and funding opportunities and sponsorship.

We also met with our tutor Julia O'Hare on 11th November to discuss the idea and make sure we were working in the right direction.

So, this is the beginning and hopefully whoever reads this will enjoy our journey and look forward to joining us when we are up and running!... as part of our audience research we are putting together questionnaires which we will post up here and if you could fill one out that would be great!

Thanks,

Jaime

(Managing Director)

welcome.

This is OUR creative cluster :)