Continuing from the previous week, I spent the beginning of this week finishing up the data collection for the first category. In total, there were about 1000 distinct points of data across the Big 5 film festivals. The sample pleased me because it provides me with a lot more data to work with once I start the analysis and compiling visual representations. After finishing this dataset, I began to collect data for the second, third, and fourth categories of data. The second (tracking US exports to China) required me to reach out to academics and reporters who've worked with similar datasets in the past. It also required understanding of the Mandarin Chinese language in some cases (a few of the websites I ended with solely used Chinese). I appreciated the opportunity to interact with specialists in the field and learned a lot from them in the process. I haven't gotten everything that I've needed for the second category yet, but I'm confident I'll be able to in the next week or so.
The third and fourth datasets were fairly straightforward. I was able to use the website FilmFreeway (an affiliated of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences) to track down all the film festivals (their names, how long they've been going on for, their audience size, prizes, and more) in China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. For the fourth dataset, I found existing top 100 box office gross data online and did percentage calculations to track China's market share over the years. A great experience overall this week. I look forward to starting to analyze the data next week (I'm already seeing some fascinating trends, such as hikes in co-productions past the year 2000).