For the past five weeks we have been working on a project called Medium is the Message. The driving question for this project is “How does what we hear, read, and see influence us?” In this project the main thing that we did was work with a group to create an ad for a local business that we were assigned. I worked with four other people to make an ad for the Deep Cove Heritage Society. The Deep Cove Heritage Society is a registered charity that focuses on telling stories of the history of Deep Cove. Make sure to check out my group members’ blogs here: Brooke, Charlie, Kai, and Jessie.

The big idea of this project was to create an understanding of media and messaging. Our main goal was to answer the driving question in order to become better educated about the world around us by finding how easily we are influenced by media.

Before diving into the big project we did lots of other, smaller projects to build our knowledge of the topic. We learned about historical media and how ads had evolved over time by creating a historical media analysis worksheet, an advertising survey, and a design principles workbook. These helped us create a deeper understanding of how advertising has changed over time, how different demographics encounter advertising, and what goes into creating ads. We also learned about pathos, ethos, and logos witch are the three main design techniques that go into making an ad. We also got to question a guest speaker named Derek Hepburn, who runs an advertising company. He helped us understand how to make an effective ad.

When the big project came around, we started with our individual ads. They were kind of intimidating to create because it felt like a lot of responsibility to have to create an ad that would help shape the rest of the project going forward. After a couple drafts of individual ads, we started to get more comfortable with making the ads and began working on our group ads. We went through a couple phases of revision. Mr. Hepburn returned to help critique our ads and shape them into more effective ads. In the end, we emerged with an ad that we are very proud of. Based on the email we got from the Deep Cove Heritage Society, they seemed happy with it as well.

Throughout the project, there were a few strengths that I believe helped move my project towards success. I was able to form stronger ideas based off of other ideas created by my group mates and me. I was also able to take some leadership over certain steps that needed to get done, as well as make sure everybody’s ideas were heard. I was also good at giving feedback for other people’s ads. Some things I could work on is being less bossy, being a little less stubborn when it came to my ads and being more receptive to the ideas of others.

When looking back on the driving question, I realize that media is way more influential than I previously thought. What we hear, read, and see effects what we think, what we do, and how we view the world around us.