Final Capstone Blog Post

          Throughout the entire Capstone Project, I have acquired skills that will benefit me for my future. The skills I have acquired are necessary for success. This includes critical thinking, creativity, communication, and collaboration. As a reminder, my Capstone physical project was completed by assisting a photographer and videographer in his small business. In a general sense, I have gone on the field of a small business that specializes in photo and video. To begin, a majority of my Capstone project was focused on my collaboration and creativity skills. For collaboration, I had to always work with my mentor and follow all commands when asked. I worked with my mentor with videography and promoting his business. I always had to have the video camera on me for anything unexpected and interesting while my mentor takes the photo. This is where the creativity steps in. I had to figure out on my own of what shots and angles are necessary. I had to use a lot of creativity because anything that is filmed or shot determines how great the final product will be. For promoting, I had to come up with ideas on how to promote the business better. One of the greatest ones I had was an engagement contest. Basically, engaged couples submit their proposal story and people vote on which one is the best. Along with this, I had to make plenty of flyers for the business. As for critical thinking, I had to observe what the business’ strong and weak points are. By using the observations, I had to enhance those points so the business would become a bigger success. Communication is probably the least skill used in this project since it is the toughest one. Communicating with clients that prefer to speak in Spanish was difficult considering that I do not speak a word of Spanish. I had to always rely on a translator.

          From this entire experience, I have gained a lot. Intellectually, I gained the idea of how manipulating a single picture or video could be. An example would be how it is necessary that a top-notch video or picture has to be its best and highest quality in order to gain more clients. In social terms, I acquired better communication skills. I had to work with so many people despite the lack of Spanish I know. I had to constantly collaborate with my mentor, his fiancée, or their intern in order to understand what was going on while on duty. I had to really present myself confidently in order to look professional. Personally, I had gained the confidence of using my creativity. I was always afraid of using my creative side because I was scared of having my creativity being shot down. I had to learn that the negative response is just a way of telling yourself that you need to improve.

          The challenges I have encountered were really communication-wise and promotion-wise. As said, I do not know Spanish, so it was just hard to communicate with clients since all of the ones I have met have Spanish as their first language. Also, my mentor was always busy so I would always have to communicate with him to ask him what needs to be done. For promotion, it was hard to promote to everyone. A while ago, I had this idea for prom where there is a special photo session offer based on your prom. It was tough to promote that in my school because the school signed a contract that states that they cannot promote or work with other photography businesses except for the one they are bounded with. Potential clients that I have spoken with ended up not taking the offer of using my mentor’s business. I saw that it is hard to gain a lot of clients. What I ended up doing was to begin creating a lot of flyers for my mentor so he could advertise them since he is officially in the business. I also kept promoting the business to anyone that needs a photographer, too.

          Overall, this project was an eye opener since I have experienced hands-on of what a small business that specializes in photo and video (which is quite difficult to maintain). It gives a general consensus of what small businesses are like behind closed doors in the real world. As for myself, I enhanced my knowledge of videography and promotion. These two aspects are something I want to continue to do in my life. They’re great aspects since technical and media literacy is the future.