Damani Douglas’s ePortfolio

Throughout this internship, I’ve learned about how to effectively conduct client research, use resources for quantitative and qualitative research, and how to conduct interviews for cultural research. I have also learned how to interact with clients and get cultural research. I learned how to thread insights together from information & how to work as a team. I also learned how to better manage my time and the importance of intention versus impact.

2a. I have produced various youtube videos that use a variety of different media. I used stock footage, unlicensed images, and meme videos under the fair use clause. But my biggest hiccups with copyright were with the music in my videos. Of course, I used free music from places like non-copyright sounds on YouTube, but much of those tracks left much to be desired. As response to this, I reached out to my musician friends and requested to use their original tracks for my youtube videos. Many of them gave me textual consent to use their music and one of them even made an original beat for an intro to my youtube channel. Although I would not get copyright struck, I made sure to attribute their music in the youtube description and sometimes even as on-screen graphics.

2b. The Shepard Fairey case is a perfect example of what can happen when designers ignore the ethics of design. Fairey sold & profited from his “Hope” poster featuring a photograph he did not have the rights to use. This counts as a form of plagiarism since he used the original image as a majority of his composition. Furthermore, the only changes he made were the color treatment and the text at the bottom. While some may argue that these edits show Fairey creating an original rendition of the photograph, monetizing a remix of a photograph you did not have the rights to edit becomes questionable. However, this case resides in a grey area. For instance, YouTubers & influencers constantly remix pre-existing ideas and often blatantly copy intellectual property for their own gain and they are still left unpunished. Perhaps because the scale of plagiarism on the internet has become so grand and the vagueness of the concept of intellectual property prevents efficient enforcement of these laws. Either way, Fairey sold an image without the licensing to do so and paid for it.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/03/arts/design/shepard-fairey-damaged-chinatown.html

Like everyone else in the Growth Initiative, I had been assigned two mentors to give me guidance throughout the program. One of them was an alumni of the growth program but they were both professionals in the advertising industry. I was responsible for setting up weekly meetings with them and building a bond between them. My mentors gave me support in various endeavors including and aside from the program. They supplied me with resources to aid in my research, my strategy composition, and my own personal projects and life skills to navigate my path to success. I greatly appreciate my mentors’ support throughout the program.

Throughout my internship, I have done nothing but strive for greatness. Going further beyond to be a reliable and valuable teammate, and devote all I could to ensure our project is as high quality as it can be. This drive to succeed and push our team to success has manifested in a myriad of ways. For instance, applying my presence and putting in work everyday despite the on paper time commitment of Tuesday – Thursday. Coming to every meeting with energy and drive to push further, even when I had to fight to find the fire to do that. Attending our individual team meetings, respecting team deadlines and overall team vision, and understanding that if we all hold our part of the ship we’ll have smooth sailing. And since the beginning, I’ve been praised for it. I have been known as the person who can be relied on for support and intuitive insight that can help multiple sectors of my team.

However, in doing so, I’ve also made some mistakes along the way. I’ve found myself overlooking the weight and gravity of what it truly means to work with a team. Realizing that, yes I have people to help me, but also understanding that there are eight other people that share ownership of this project alongside me. The project belongs to them just as much as it belongs to me. Throughout my experience in working on teams in Communication Design, I’ve been in countless scenarios where my teammates simply didn’t care about the work. They didn’t feel the need to put in work, to brainstorm and challenge ideas, all they wanted to do was skate off on other people’s work and attach their name to the spools of their success. I constantly had to overextend myself into the realm of my teammates’ work just to succeed in school. And unfortunately, the impact of those experiences bled into my teamwork throughout my internship. 

As I’ve said before, I’m a strategist on our team. Of course, I felt overwhelmed while creating the strategy, reworking and pitching it forward to mods, founders and eventually the client. But after we got the strategy buy off from the client the majority of my work should have been done. It was done. But I couldn’t sit still, I didn’t feel comfortable working less than my other teammates, or not being able to influence the direction and execution of the PSA. I was scared. Afraid to let the overwhelming weight of creative responsibilities and duties fall into my teammates lap, despite it being their job to handle it. And that fear manifested in stretching myself endlessly too thin in several different directions. I took up the mantle in Art Direction, working on slide deck designs with the other ADs, concepting ideas based on the strategy. I have also extended myself into production, helping with the shot list, choreographing, directing and shooting of the PSA. While I’m sure my team appreciated my help, I was completely burning myself out. I wasn’t putting time into my part-time job, or as much effort into my summer classes, or a passion project I had been building. I was completely blurring the lines between working hard, and working needlessly.

On top of burning myself out, my pursuit of greatness led me to a mistake that really hurt the team. I had found myself at 3am working on the shotlist the night before the shoot , as I had done the night before as well with the producer. I had encountered a problem, our current script did not fit the 30 second parameter for our PSA. With little time before our shoot day and the responsibility of the team that I, myself, had mounted on my shoulders, I changed parts of the script to fit the time frame when needed to reach without consulting the copywriting team first. In the moment I didn’t see a problem with the changes, the PSA was still more or less the same, it was on strategy I just took out a few words here and added a few there. But here lies my error. I imposed myself as the person who would tackle a mountain of work that was supposed to be the responsibility of my entire team. And with that pressure to be relied upon, my lack of boundaries of my time, and my desire to exceed expectation, I had completely overlooked the countless hours my copywriting team had put in to make the script how it was. I had overlooked the meticulousness of their job and the fact that by changing the copy, I had not only changed the vibe and flow of the PSA, I had also robbed the copywriters from being able to take ownership over the project. And when they had realized the changes I had made, it was too late to go back. 

I don’t want it to seem like my entire internship experience was just making grave mistakes and killing myself with work. I also learned a great deal about what it means to be a strategist, expanded my network into the advertising industry, and proved to myself that I am much more capable than I sometimes tell myself. However, the lessons that I feel have been the most telling, and most important to take away, have come from the previously highlighted mistakes. The failures that I have faced have taught me the importance of learning that sometimes good intentions can have bad impacts, and that over everything I must treat myself with the same respect as I treat my peers. I must set boundaries with my time and be realistic and candid with the expectations of my work and commitment. I must show others how to treat me by treating myself better. Opportunities will come and go, however, I cannot take advantage of myself in the pursuit of success.

My team consists of two Art Directors, two Copywriters, an Account Manager and Project Manager, another strategist, and one producer. Each role was assigned specific duties to fulfill throughout the entire internship process. Account Managers manage the relationship between the team and the client, Project Managers keep the team on top of deadlines, Art Directors manage slide decks, and the visual aesthetic of the entire project, Copywriters in charge of making copy & writing scripts, producer in charge of storyboarding, shooting, and editing, and strategy in charge of creating the concept and messaging that will lace the foundation in which the campaign will be built upon. I worked closely with my other strategist and moderators to create a strategy for our client. I also worked with art directors in creating the slide decks for our strategy pitch and rehearsed with the whole team before our pitch meeting.

On Saturday July 8th, our team met in person for the first time all summer to shoot our approved creative concept. We met up at our Account manager’s apartment in Harlem at 8:30 am to shoot the initial scenes of our PSA. We distributed the shotlist between cast members and met up with some of the talent to shoot the indoor scenes. We shot the bedroom and bathroom scenes and I co directed with the producer. I also shot a majority of the indoor scenes and had the experience of operating the on-camera rig. I also got the experience directing talent and operating as a cinematographer. After we got the indoor scenes we relocated to the nearest park that we had previously scouted. We met up with some other talent for the outdoor scenes, and picked up rented bikes, props, and food for our biking, fishing, and picnic CTA scenes. We got rained on during our shoot and had a chance to work closely with the production moderator that accompanied us in the shoot to create a quick edit to see how our shots to that point flow. We went through the rest of the outdoor scenes after the rain stopped and ended up finishing around 10pm. We also went out to eat afterwards to celebrate our meeting and successful filming.

A typical workday as a “rose in the garden” is for the most part, always changing. In the beginning few weeks of the program, in-zoom conversation was reasonably formal and a bit stiff due to the nervousness that dominated the calls. But soon enough, I found my stride putting my ideas and opinions out into the space and realized that there wasn’t anything to be afraid of.

Our Tuesday and Thursday meeting days were much heavier than our Wednesday meetings in terms of teamwork directly toward our client project. Tuesdays were normally client meeting days and Thursdays served as a substitute for when our client was busy tuesday. Wednesdays were reserved for sunnyside chats and other advertising industry professional presentations. So far we’ve had meetings with strategists from META, Intersectionality & Cross-Cultural Dynamics Training, and mentor meetings on wednesdays.

One day I recall was week 2 of the Growth Initiative. Tuesday we had our first ever client meeting. Since this was our initial client meeting, we would need to prepare with questions to get the most information about their brand vision and define their goals with their PSA and organization over the summer. The week and weekend was spent preparing for this meeting through brand research and question brainstorm. As the strategist, my partner and I did heavy research on the nonprofit organization we would be working with, called HBCUs Outside, a nonprofit organization aiming to equitize recreational spaces for HBCU students. Furthermore, we brainstormed questions that would give us information we couldn’t get easily from research. We sent the questions over to the Art direction team two nights before our presentation and I helped finalize the slide deck. I presented part of the slide presentation and recorded our meeting. 

The other days were spent communicating with my team via slack and establishing deadlines for delegated responsibilities. A day can look like, working on strategy pitch 1-4 pm strategy meeting, mod meeting from 5-7 pm, and team meeting from 9-10 pm. 

We had two to three meetings a week throughout this internship, meeting remotely from 8pm EST to 10 pm EST on Tuesday, Thursday, and sometimes Wednesday. We were given a roadmap of the entire program breakdown, outlining our itinerary for each meeting. Many meetings consist heavily of team work sessions towards the client PSA project, but also include 30 minutes or so of presentations from moderators and other industry professionals. We also had specialized meetings with various industry professionals outside of the Growth network called sunnyside chats. These meetings helped us grow our network and learn more about how to excel at our roles within our groups. 

We used slack to communicate among our team, the moderators, and the heads of the organization. Much of our work deadline and schedule depends purely on our role in the team. Most work was to be done and the team briefed several days before our Tuesday meetings. Much of our schedule was completely team oriented and self automated.

Throughout the 2023 summer semester, I have been interning with the nonprofit organization ,100 Roses from Concrete, which serves as a platform for equitizing the advertising industry for people of color and women through connection, opportunity, and collaboration. It acknowledges and addresses the challenges faced by individuals from minority backgrounds who often feel marginalized or overlooked within the industry (or often don’t know how to get in the industry). This organization provides a valuable space where people of color can find connection, community, and inspiration for their journeys in advertising.

The organization focuses on supporting underrepresented professionals and students in advertising, marketing, media, and public relations. They boast initiatives dedicated to the growth and development of young creatives in underserved communities. These programs offer resources like education, mentorship, industry experience, & scholarships, to aspiring advertising professionals. They also offer valuable professional development opportunities through workshops and training sessions.

The program I am in is called 2023 Growth Initiative, an unpaid remote internship where participants are split into teams, given specific roles that emulate those of an advertising agency, and tasked to collaborate to ideate and produce an advertising campaign for a real-life nonprofit client. Working with the nonprofit HBCUs Outside, I took the role of a strategist on our creative team. On our team we had a Project Manager, Account Manager, another Strategist, two Copywriters, two Art Directors, & a production lead. We also have moderators in our team, who are current advertising professionals at various companies, who act as consultants throughout the program. The organization has achieved significant success, producing ten televised commercials for nonprofit organizations, reaching an audience of over 20 million.

I learned about the Growth Initiative through an on-campus information session hosted by the founder and team of 100 Roses from Concrete. I don’t remember it being widely advertised within our major other than a television spot for the info session in the pearl building, but I was on-campus and decided to take the opportunity to learn about these mysterious people in the building. After going through a few minutes of their presentation about their mission to create an equitable advertising landscape for people of color, presented by people of color, I immediately resonated with their cause and wanted to learn more about the advertising industry through their program. 

The deadline to apply was only a few days away from that point, however, I was driven to take advantage of this opportunity for my summer internship. I had minimal difficulty preparing my application since I had already had a portfolio website, & a few connections to reach out for recommendation letters.  The most difficult parts of the application were undoubtedly the short answer questions. I had difficulty finding succinct and insightful answers that would both fit the word limit and relate to the theme of 100 Roses from Concrete. 

After I had passed the application portion, I had been informed that I was moving on to the interview portion of the application process. The group interview was relaxed and interpersonal despite it being over zoom. After acing the interview, I got an email a few days later that I had been accepted to the program!

2a. I have produced various youtube videos that use a variety of different media. I used stock footage, unlicensed images, and meme videos under the fair use clause. But my biggest hiccups with copyright were with the music in my videos. Of course, I used free music from places like non-copyright sounds on YouTube, but much of those tracks left much to be desired. As response to this, I reached out to my musician friends and requested to use their original tracks for my youtube videos. Many of them gave me textual consent to use their music and one of them even made an original beat for an intro to my youtube channel. Although I would not get copyright struck, I made sure to attribute their music in the youtube description and sometimes even as on-screen graphics.

2b. The Shepard Fairey case is a perfect example of what can happen when designers ignore the ethics of design. Fairey sold & profited from his “Hope” poster featuring a photograph he did not have the rights to use. This counts as a form of plagiarism since he used the original image as a majority of his composition. Furthermore, the only changes he made were the color treatment and the text at the bottom. While some may argue that these edits show Fairey creating an original rendition of the photograph, monetizing a remix of a photograph you did not have the rights to edit becomes questionable. However, this case resides in a grey area. For instance, YouTubers & influencers constantly remix pre-existing ideas and often blatantly copy intellectual property for their own gain and they are still left unpunished. Perhaps because the scale of plagiarism on the internet has become so grand and the vagueness of the concept of intellectual property prevents efficient enforcement of these laws. Either way, Fairey sold an image without the licensing to do so and paid for it.

Resources:
Shepard Fairey Fine

“Use of Photography” AIGA. (2001). PDF. New York City; Richard Grefé, AIGA.

“Guide to Copyright” AIGA. (2001). PDF. New York City; Richard Grefé, AIGA.