Content these days can be anything from a written piece to a video showing a product or something of interest. In fact, it’s anything that is physical or, more likely nowadays, it’s digital. I have always been creating content that is both physical and digital. But what exactly is my content? How have I been handling my content?
Ever since I can remember, I was always creating something whether other people saw it or not. I created everything from sketches, drawings, paintings, motion graphic videos, gifs, and anything else that is both physical and digital. Over the years I have certainly piled up quite a lot of content. However, I sometimes struggle with the idea of getting rid of certain content. There is always a question in the back of my mind saying “Well, what if at some point down the road, like a job interview or as part of my job, I can use the content by improving it to meet my current needs?” I never like getting rid of my content because I never know if I’ll need it again, even if it is a 0.0001 percent chance that most of my content will ever be used again, but if it does then I will have it. On the other hand, I do get rid of content that I know I will never use again in my life. This could be whether it is because I created it when I was much younger, it doesn’t interest me anymore, it doesn’t have anything to do with where I am currently at in my life and career, or even that I know I will never in a million years be needing or looking for it. There are many other factors that I go over before getting rid of my content and most of the time I keep a lot of my content as inspiration for future projects or even as guides for me in how I was able to apply different techniques and skills into a project that I will want to use again. Sometimes it feels like I have been hoarding content, but in all honesty it only depends on what the content is that I am trying to create. If it’s something I’m really interested in then I do tend to hoard that kind of content which isn’t great for my computer at all.
While keeping all of my content is great for future assignments and even looking back at them as memories, organizing them is like a whole other ball game. I do tend to overuse the folders on my computer. There are so many folders inside folders inside other folders that feels like they can go on forever. However, this helps me stay organized and shows the process of getting to the final look to the content. I organize my content by putting them into folders based on what they are and where and when they were created. Once that is finalized then more folders are used to easily distinguish what the different parts of the content are so everything isn’t thrown into one folder. For example, I created my own title sequence for the show This is Us for my motion design class in my senior year of undergrad, and so I organized the content into different folders like this:
Quinnipiac University -> QU Spring ’20 -> Motion Design II -> Title Sequence -> and then there were folders for images, screenshots, final images, after effects files, and final title sequence, and exports.
While it is great that I am able to organize my content to my needs, and I keep a lot of my content, I don’t have a strategy to really manage all of it like it should be. Eventually, I would like to be able to create a way to manage all of the content so that it doesn’t feel like I am hoarding it all for years and years.
All in all, I create so much content and now it’s mostly all digital. Content is such a major part of my life for both personal and professional reasons. So, in the future I do need to manage it better while still keeping it as organized as possible. After all, I rely on content for almost everything I do.
Michaela Ganezer 