Work Hard Play Hard
Written for Oct. 23 - Nov. 5, 2022
This blog is a combination of the two weeks I spent finishing my school projects for the first half of my semester in Amsterdam. Besides school work, I also celebrated a European Halloween, went to the Tuschinski Theater, visited Utrecht, tried Winkel 43’s famous apple pie, and had a museum day with my friends.
Finishing My Brand Identity Project:
After 8 weeks of working on my project for my Brand Identity class, I finally finished! We started the class by picking an item from the store that we thought could be rebranded. Then, we wrote long creative briefs about this product to explain the brand’s values, the current problems with the item’s design, the “market placement”, and what goals we had for a redesign. My item was a type of fruit drink: SPA Fruit Lemon Cactus. We then put these briefs into a hat and everyone in the class picked a different brief at random. I picked the store’s brand name 6-pack of kids' milk meant to be put in lunch boxes for school. I was excited about this because there were a ton of possibilities with the redesign of these little boxes since they were very plain. I went through a long process of brainstorming, sketching, explaining, designing, redesigning, printing, building, and presenting my new packaging. I also had to relearn Adobe Illustrator and learn about marketing to understand the goals I needed to redesign.
To see my results, check out the website I’ve also had to build for my entire program and look through Brand Identity and Graphic Skills (they go with each other!) https://megan.fordfyffe.wixsite.com/portfolio
On Thursday, we all gave our presentations in small groups to a few classmates, our professor, Micha, and another professional graphic designer. I was so proud that I had completed this massive project and put so much effort into it. I was also incredibly relieved that it was over. At this point, I still needed to put everything onto the website, but the hardest part was over. Some of my friends from class, Mathilde and Axel from Paris and Tina from Norway, went to a nearby Coffee Company to simply hang out for a bit since we all felt much more relaxed after completing our projects. Mathilde and I went to Oosterpark and sat in the sun for a while and took some pictures together. It was a wholesome and happy moment that I’m grateful for.
Photo Project Update:
After having to switch to a new topic for my photo documentary project, I was feeling discouraged and put a ton of pressure on myself to create an original and stunning collection. I feel like I should be doing a much better job than I actually am, but I have to remind myself that I’m growing immensely on this trip and have been having incredible life experiences instead of only focusing on photography. I was also stressed because of the looming deadline that was quickly approaching. I was so busy with the Brand Identity project that I didn’t have much time to focus on what I actually cared about: photography. I met with my professor, Frank, and showed him a few examples of portraits I had taken. The project was nowhere near where I wanted it to be, but he reminded me that the purpose of this project was to inspire me and push me to try things rather than stress about one deadline. I have certainly gotten out of my comfort zone trying to take portraits on the street, as street photography is not my favorite. I have also had to push myself to go out into the city and talk to strangers as often as possible, which I wasn’t always in the mood for.
The following Thursday, we had another presentation day, this time for the photo project. I arrived early to print out my photos and then we all put our photos up on the walls of the classroom. Instead of a critique, we spent the time discussing everyone’s project and the meanings, themes, and visual signs they used to portray their story. I loved this approach because it was so different to think about photography in this way. The classes I’m used to focus on the technical side of things — lighting, composition, styling, and camera settings. So many of my classmates had never done photography before, but their projects were beautiful and thought out. It was inspiring to see how much effort people put into their work and how excited everyone was to see the work of their classmates. I was quite impressed and very grateful for this kind of education. My project is ongoing, so I only showed what I had created so far. I plan on continuing this series in Amsterdam until I have to leave, but I want to continue taking portraits of people I meet during any of my future travels.
On the website I created for class, I wrote about the the thought process I went through to create this series and display the current results. To understand my project more, please check out the photo project section! https://megan.fordfyffe.wixsite.com/portfolio
Tuschinski Theater:
One thing my friends and I have wanted to do since we first saw it was to go see a movie at the Tuschinski Theater. This weekend, we finally went! This theater has been named the most beautiful cinema in the world and the interior looks like an opera house. We decided to go see the new movie Amsterdam because, well, we’re in Amsterdam. It was a wild movie about Americans, but nonetheless, we loved dressing up and attending a movie in a classy way.
Utrecht:
Even though I needed to take more photos for my photo project since it was due Nov. 3rd, I said yes to a very last-minute trip to Utrecht. This is a city just slightly southeast of Amsterdam and is much calmer than the touristy city I’m studying in. I walked around the city all day with two of my friends from my program, Mathilde (Paris) and Tina (Norway), and one of Mathilde’s friends. By the afternoon, we were all exhausted from a long Halloweekend and decided to call it a day. I went home and collapsed into my bed.
The Week After:
On the Friday before Halloween, I went to a large, international student Halloween Party with my friends at a venue called Melkweg — the same place we had a party for the end of Welcome Week. I had the challenge of choosing a costume only from the clothing I had brought to Amsterdam, and I had to consider the limited space I had to bring anything home. I learned that Halloween has only recently made its way to Europe in the 90s and that it is an extremely American holiday. Europeans don’t quite understand it, and there are very few festivities if any at all — especially earlier in the month of October. I was lucky that Amsterdam had a few events since this is a popular and inclusive city. However, at this large Halloween party, no Halloween music was played and costumes weren’t as creative as they can be in the states.
Monday was Halloween, but other than the Instagram posts from friends back home, it felt nonexistent. Aside from my hip hop class, I also signed up for a Premier Pro editing class at CREA which started on Oct. 31. It felt awkward because everyone there was Dutch and weren’t speaking much English. This was the first instance I’ve felt uncomfortable being an English-only speaker since coming to the Netherlands. The class will teach me some little things about transitions, audio, shortcuts, and so on to make video editing easier for me. Up until now, everything I’ve done involving video has been self-taught. It’ll be nice to see what process a professional video editor like our teacher goes through and ask questions in person. Things I learn here could also come in handy if I get more media jobs that involve photo and video.
On Tuesday, I spent the majority of the day walking around the city looking for more portraits to take. I started in Vondelpark and ended up walking to the Jordaan neighborhood. I photographed the dog walker who I had seen every time I visited Vondelpark which I was very excited about because he was such a character. He was obviously the leader of the pack, meaning he set an example for how confident yet alert the dogs should behave. He talked to lots of people in the park and chatted with each of the pups as they walked in a heard. Finding people naturally is a challenge when I’m purposely out to take portraits. Since I arrived in the Jordaan area, I visited the cheese museum again which is just a cheese store where you can try free samples of every cheese. I also decided to go to Winkel 43, a famous place in Amsterdam known for their apple pie. It was nice to finally go, even if it was alone, and the pie definitely lived up to the hype. I enjoyed the beauty of Amsterdam at night on my walk to Central Station to head home.
The rest of my week was spent creating the additional website that was required to present all of my work for my classes. I finally finished everything in our first block of the semester. The sectionns on this website breaks down every assignment, step in the process, and final result for both major projects and each class I had. https://megan.fordfyffe.wixsite.com/portfolio
Besides all of this schoolwork, I went to the Eye film museum and the STRAAT museum with a few friends Viola, Silje, and Acelya after my hip hop class this Saturday. I was in awe at the work in the STRAAT museum because I love murals. This reminded me of the time I visited a street art museum near Miami, Florida when I felt the same sense of wonderment. It was really nice to spend time with my friends all together because usually I only see them each one at a time.
