The internet opens up a whole new world when it come to the way we consume media. Now people can instantly share their opinions on what they are watching and have multiple ways to watch it. Instead of having to rely on your friend’s opinions of a movie or a television show you can go on Twitter, Facebook, IMDB or many other sites that people can instantly give their feedback to. People have even more power than that and can even take movies and write their own plot behind them, in essence creating their own spin offs. As talked about in the article fan fiction is a huge part of the online world when it comes to movies. Ever since the days of Napster, the media industry has been losing its power to the consumers and the trend doesn’t seem like it will be changing any time soon. Some authors don’t like fan fiction and believe it is copyright infringement, other see it as extra publicity. Some authors don’t like it but are too afraid of the backlash to do anything about it.

This is just one example of how much power the internet has given the consumers. One example in the reading that shows that shows how the content owners are trying to regain some of their power is one of George Lucas. He holds his own festival for his fans to come in and share their created content about star wars. George Lucas then picks the winners from what he feels is the best content. In doing this he can draw the line on where he feels the fans should be taking the story. In the end there will always be a struggle for power between the creators of content and the consumer and never has the winner of that battle been so blurred since the internet was introduced.

Milestones

So far our group has made some great progress on finishing our project. I would say that two big milestones that we have accomplished would be, that we finished our script/storyboard and the other milestone would be that we have basically finished filming. We have one more scene to shoot and as long as the video we have already shot looks good then we are pretty much done with that aspect of the project. We also still have to make our screencast and do our voiceover work as well. I would say two big hurdles we may encounter would be, trying to make everyone’s writing of the paper come together into one flowing cohesive paper, and I would also say that editing the video to make all of our shots look professionally done might also be somewhat of a challenge.

With all of this being said I don’t see us having much trouble getting by these hurdles because our team is very talented and we work well together. A couple people in our team have expressed how good they are with editing using audacity and other programs that we have learned in class. We can easily use the screencast tool that we were shown in class to add another element to our video that will help us further describe the mock interview process. We can then use the video editing software to drowned out the real sound and insert our voice overs. When filming we also used the filming techniques we were taught by filming the same scene from multiple angles. This will give us some options when editing as far as choosing the best footage for a certain scene. This will also make our video seem more professional and help the viewer more easily understand the point we are trying to get across. With our teamwork, the tools we were given in class, and the techniques we were taught there is no doubt in my mind we will have a great project.

Adding unlicensed media to our projects

Song

Video

Picture

 

So far my group has made some considerable progress on our final project. We have finished our story board, and wrote our script, now we just need to put it into action. Using the Creative Commons Search Engine I found a video, a picture, and a song that I think we can implement into our project. The video I found shows a time lapse of a busy city street which I believe we can utilize for our opening scene. I think we can show something like this with a voiceover explaining why career services is needed. The picture I found shows an official looking email that we can copy and use in our video. In our script we have a student that receives an email for an interview for a really good job he had applied for. We can copy the picture of the email that I found and use it as a guideline of how an official email should look. We can than create an email offering this student an interview and have him open it up so it looks like he really received it. The song I found I believe would be perfect to play in the background as our screencast is being played. Screencasts are usually pretty boring so adding some music in the background can help spice it up and make it a good scene. What our screencast is showing is the student going to the mock interview section of the career knight site and trying it out. Utilizing our script and some of this added media I am sure our group will continue its great work and come up with a great final product. We have all shown to have some value to the group and have all worked well together thus far.

 

Pre Storyboard

 

After meeting my group I have full confidence that we will put together a great video for this project. When we met in class we started discussing some ideas of where we were going to go with this project. After looking at the career services brochure we thought that the mock interview would be a good idea which I agreed with because their will not be much camera movement needed for that. We tossed around a couple ideas about what to do for the mock interview and came up with the idea of showing a student who did not attend the mock interview and one that did. We would then show how much the mock interview would help and improve the students’ performance. After speaking with the teacher we had realized that this is not the best way to go so it’s back to the drawing board. I believe we should show a student who is applying for an internship but is really nervous about interviews and doesn’t know what to expect. After doing some mock interviews the student realizes that it’s not that hard and not that scary and nails the interview and gets a good internship. I believe this will be easy to shoot and will really get the point across about the benefits of career services.

Midterm Projects

 

For my midterm blog I created a food blog. I tried to keep the blog personal by making it for people that are like me, young people who like Italian food and like to cook but do not have the funds to have expensive meals every night. I tried to accomplish this by adding dollar amounts to the ingredients I used to cook and also totaled the whole meal so my viewers can know if they can cook the meal and still be in their budget. I also tried appealing to the younger crowd by adding some humor into the blog and by referencing partying in my video. I also plan on adding some posts about cooking some kind of Italian food for a party or football game in the near future. I kept to the Italian food theme so people knew what to expect with what type of food I was going to be cooking. I made sure to post lots of pictures of the food so people could tell if they followed the directions and cooked the food correctly. I also added some pages like about, contact, and feedback. I made the about page describe me so give some background about myself so people can relate to it. The contact and feedback pages I added so people have multiple ways to contact me and give me feedback. This is very important to me and the blog so I know the direction to take the blog and so I can cater the content to what my viewers really want. The layout of the blog I tried to keep plain but sleek looking. I felt the text is big and clear and the posts appearing in boxes make it easy to navigate between posts. The pictures appear without having to click on the posts which is also useful in this type of blog so something I made can catch someone’s eye and draw them into that post. I thought keeping the color scheme as plain as possible, basically black white and grey, would be beneficial because it would make the pictures of my food pop more. In the future I plan to use a better camera, one that is not half broken, and as I said before I want to make some more videos about party food or something that will appeal to the college crowd.

Top 5 blogs

Single guy survival:

This is one of my favorite blogs. I highly recommend everyone to check it out. It has lots of pictures and good humor. I also like the cooking video. The food looked great and the editing made it easy to watch. I also like the layout of the blog itself. When you are on a certain post, if you scroll down to the bottom there are really nice looking next and previous buttons that have pictures on them, it makes it look very professional. As I said before this blog is great and I think you should all check it out.

singleguysurvival

 

Journeytofitdom:

This is another one of my favorite blogs. I would say everyone should go check this blog out because it gives a different way to look at getting fit, than you are used to. It takes you on the creator’s journey of losing weight. It gives reviews of the diet and even gives you workouts. The workout routine is also very different and creative, it seems like it would really work up a sweat. There is also a lot of content added for the short amount of time that we had to do the project. The author even goes into the mental aspects of exercise.

JourneyToFitdom

 

Sorority Scene:

This blog is another one that you could tell the creator put in a lot of work. There was a lot of content and it all worked well with each other. The blog layout was nice. It had a lot of white space and it was very clear and easy to follow. There are also tutorials teaching you how to do all kinds of arts and crafts. The only downside to this blog as of right now is that the video that was posted will not play, instead it just shows a snowy screen and says, “This video is private”. Besides that the blog is informative and I definitely recommend it.

SororityScene

 

ShowJumpingBlog:

This blog is in my top 5 because of how nice it looks. The header is high resolution and when you scroll down it looks like it sinks into the page. The video that was included was also interesting to watch and was very informative. In the about page it specifies that the blog is meant for amateur riders interested in or seeking advice and information about the exciting world of show jumping, and the blog does exactly that. It gives a lot of information about the challenges of show riding as well as some tips to overcome those challenges. If you are interested in show riding or just like horses at all, this is a cool blog to check out and I recommend it to everyone.

ShowJumpingBlog

 

HowToBeYou:

What this blog is about is reason enough to put it in my top 5. After reading the blog I was in vacation mode and wished I had read it before spring break so I could have taken advantage of the time off and went on a vacation like that myself. The video showed people diving off of cliffs into beautiful ponds with waterfalls and people zip lining through the forest. It also had some pictures of some amazing scenery. Even the header is nice to look at, it is a panoramic shot of an incredible beach with crystal clear water. So if you want to see a blog that will show you some great scenery and videos as well as maybe make you a little jealous I would recommend you check this one out.

HowToBeyYou

Video Editing

<p><a href=”https://vimeo.com/157808864″>E-Portfolio comparison screencast</a> from <a href=”https://vimeo.com/user49654749″>Mark Morgante</a> on <a href=”https://vimeo.com”>Vimeo</a&gt;.</p>

Creating this video was quite easy. The hardest part was setting it up because the screencast-o-matic site would not launch. I found out that my edge browser was the reason because of either a pop up blocker or some kind of security measure so I just used internet explorer instead and it worked fine. The editing with Windows Movie Maker was also fairly easy. The only thing that really gave me issues with editing was the jump that happened after my zoom which did not look very good. I also couldn’t figure out how to zoom until I went back and read the directions for the assignment again.

I think a game can convey politics in many ways. One of the first games I played on the PlayStation 3 was Assassins creed. To sum up the game in the quickest way possible, you basically go back in time and play as an assassin who needs to use stealth to take out his targets. Most of the games historical events are pretty accurate. The third version of the game puts you back in the time of George Washington where many of the same events that took place in real life, like the battle of Monmouth, were also represented in the game. Putting you in a game like this as the character who assassinates people or a game like Call of Duty where you battle foreign countries can be quite controversial at times.

Other games like Empire Earth, which was mentioned in the reading, was one of my favorites back in the day. You can start a civilization from the stone age and advance it into the future all while maintaining relationships with other “countries” by offering peace treaties and waging war against others. Games like these can teach someone a lot about politics and while some are controversial I believe they are just games and can be educational and should enjoyed by everyone.

Audio Editing 2

So to create the introduction for my podcast I chose to use audacity. I cant say it was my favorite program to use but at the same time I cant say I really had any complaints. Importing the files was easy, as all I had to do was drag the tracks from my desktop onto the program. I then used my PlayStation 4 headset to record the audio for my podcast introduction. Using the fade in, fade out effects, and drowning out the music to play my voice was also as simple as clicking a couple buttons. With all that being said it took about 10 minutes of editing and voila, I had my podcast introduction complete. I definitely would recommend the program to anyone who had to quickly edit some audio for free.

The next part of this weeks assignment was to watch a video from either redlettermedia.com or channelawesome.com. I chose a video from RedLetterMedia.com called Pre-Rec: Dragon’s Dogma. The video featured 2 guys sitting there talking about a video game.

There were a couple different camera angles, one of each guy, one of the game they were talking about and one of them imposed in the bottom corner of the screen while playing the game. They had images scroll into the screen of game cover art and even edited the video to make the words they were using to describe the game pop up in different colors. They used small microphones discretely taped to their shirts during the interview phase to record the audio. When they were superimposed on the bottom corner of the screen they used more professional microphones that you would see a radio host using. You can tell the main parts of the video that were edited were the parts of them playing the game because the audio was a little bit different compared to when they were sitting there talking to each other.

Audio Editing

 

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Audio editing can be a very useful tool no matter what you do for a living. I am a big fan of photography and I plan on getting a nice camera in the coming months so if I end up shooting some video I can use my new audio editing techniques to tweak the audio however I so choose. I also like making my own playlists for when I go to the gym or just for regular listening. Audio editing can be used for playlists to trim down parts of songs that are unnecessary or can be used to take out parts of songs you don’t like. You can also use it to combine tracks and make your own songs using acapella’s and  instrumentals. I have used programs in the past like Sony ACID to create all kinds of things. You can make long mixes of all of your favorite songs and basically be your own DJ. Audio editing can also be used in many professions. If you are interested in being a DJ at a club or being on the radio audio editing will be a major part or your job. You can also expect to use audio editing a lot if you are a producer or if you have any part in the music industry. Audio books are becoming increasingly popular so editing the audio for them is also a possibility. The movie industry has a major need for audio editing as soundtracks and sound effects are a huge part of every movie. Especially for animated movies, where the entire movie is one long audio track of people doing voice overs for the animated characters. In conclusion audio editing is an extremely useful skill to have and I am very excited to fine tune my skills in this next lesson.

Image Editing

I have a decent amount of experience when it comes to editing pictures. I had a class in high school (which was almost 10 years ago now) that taught the basics of Photoshop and I have edited a good amount of images since. I have not used Photoshop or any decent photo editor in a while now but I consider myself to be pretty tech savvy so I am sure I can pick up how to do it pretty easily. I am fine with the idea of learning it again and being an ITI major I enjoy learning whatever I can when it comes to programs and technology so I am actually pretty excited about it.

The Coleman reading, Phreaks, Hackers, and Trolls; The Politics of Transgression and Spectacle speaks about the origins of hacking and its progression. It started out in MIT where people found a way to “hack” a telephone by using a certain pitch these people were called Phrackers. The reading then begins to transition into what we now consider hackers using computers to gain access to things they shouldn’t. Then it mentions trolls and their impact on the internet. We see trolls on the internet all the time, always chiming in with their relentless unwarranted opinion. These trolls can also use photo editing to leave their mark on the internet as mentioned in the reading when Coleman says, “4chan houses a series of topic-based forums where participants, all of them anonymous post and often comment on discussions or images, many of these being esoteric, audacious, creative, humorous, heavily Photoshopped, and often very grotesque or pornographic.” We also see memes and other edited photos used to create havoc on the internet and is usually pretty successful. What Phrackers, Hackers, and Trolls all have in common is there desire to want to interrupt the status quo.

http://www.digital-photo-web.com/free-photo-editing-programs.html

Top Free Online Photo Editing Resources

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