The disconnect of perception

For my film essay, I plan on exploring the concept of (for lack of a better word) persona. I’m not really interested in “persona” in terms of style or overall appearance but rather the disconnect between what people feel they project and how others interpret them. I want to explore what’s lost in translation and the inevitability of misinterpretation. I haven’t really narrowed my focus yet—I’m not sure whether I want to discuss an individual person or if I want to make it more general. Regardless, I plan to use a lot of photographs and some semblance of animation in my film. I’m going to take a series of photographs (either of an individual or more random, inanimate objects) and show them on film as they are briefly. Then I’m going to start to draw over them, at times correctly and at others distorting the image, and taking photographs at various stages so it will be possible to see the evolution of the misconception. Initially, the traces will only vary slightly from the actual image, but as the film progresses, so will the divide between reality and perception. I realize I probably won’t be able to fill four minutes with this idea, so I’ll probably have to add another visual element, probably other examples of warped perception (i.e. prisms, reflections, shadows). The working title of my film is “Persona” (for obvious reasons) as this is the best single word I can think of to summarize my topic. I’m still not wholly satisfied with that word however, as I fell it has implications other than those I’m going for, so the title may change.