Week 2 Reflection - HNC

After this week's session I feel a lot more confident in my casting skills, this includes the preparation of the model, preparing the area, ratios and amount of product as well as how to apply. After having my own face casted today; we then moved onto sanding and perfecting the plaster casts that we had made. The casts from the previous week had hardened considerably and so they were harder to work with naturally but as mine was a fresh cast: it was easy and still quite malleable so I could sand it down with little hassle. Using an electric sanding drill with a small attachment on the tip we were able to remove the inner part of the nostril to hallow out the overspill of plaster to perfect the nostrils and complete the face.

In our theory lesson we discussed more about the research proposal for our assignment on "A Healthy Working Environment". Using nearpod to learn more on how to structure a research proposal: we collaborated on tasks and put forward our initial thoughts on what our key question would be. For my question I am pondering on this question: Do gender imbalances and homophobia affect a healthy working environment in the performing arts industry? From this I have then done some general bullet points of where I want to go with the essay and some points I will bring up in my final proposal.

There weren't too many things this week that didn't go to well, out of the 2 face casts they were both successful outcomes and we worked well as a team to apply the alginate and the cast. I think due to time and as we knew what we were doing we didn't do any research into casting or anything practical hence we didn't look at any books; only using prior knowledge from a youtube clip and the Todd Debreceni book that we looked at last week.

As mentioned earlier I did complete my task from the week before: I wanted to make progress on my research proposal draft and get a question to work towards. We also found out this week that our event with NNC at Worksop can go ahead hence I can progress and work on Unit 25 more. For this weeks task I think that I do want to work on my Unit 25 and look at some possible compound fractures on the limbs as well as possibly on the hands. I have decided to focus on the limbs and hands more as they aren't near the face and with the current COVID 19 virus it would be best to avoid the eyes, nose and mouth if possible hence I have decided to avoid the face where possible. For this I think I will start to do some sketches of my ideas before then using the Chavant medium toughness clay to sculpt one of my pieces. I would also like to create a brief draft of my Unit 1 research proposal ready for next week to show my intentions and what my aims will be in my essay.