The internet has had a very large effect on how people consume media in almost every format. The internet has allowed anyone with access to ability to find and create content at any time. The past 15 years in particular has seen a large amount of companies rise up to make that process a lot easier for a lot of people. The biggest change we have seen with the way we consume media on the internet is that the expectation for “on-demand” content has become the standard. Less and less people today are willing to turn on their cable tv and wait to watch a show because they have options like Hulu and Netflix that will allow them to watch exactly what they wanted to watch at any time. The internet paired with advancements in technology have also significantly lowered the barrier of entry into the content creation field. With platforms like Youtube and Vimeo, anyone with a camera and a computer can put together videos and movies and post them online for the world to see. Before this, the only possible way to get your content out to that scale would be to go through an already established movie studio and and spend large amounts of money to get your work in theaters. Now anything can be posted online for free for anyone who’s interested to enjoy. The Star Wars example from the reading shows how powerful the right people and content can be online completely independent of money and status. Kevin Rubio only spent $1,200 dollars on a 10 minute parody of Star Wars and ended up receiving recognition from George Lucas himself which led to him getting real tangible jobs in the film industry. The most important aspect of that story is that it was 17 years ago. The opportunity for similar stories has grown exponentially in that time and anyone can make similar films without the huge investment.
Things so far..
So far, everything is going well with my group. Everyone is getting along and collaborating efficiently. We all use the GroupMe app to keep in contact with each other and coordinate meetings and so far it has worked pretty well. We finalized the storyboard during class this week so now we know what direction we are going with the video. I personally think the premise of the video is good and gets to the point without getting too complicated. The rest of the group agrees so now is the time to move forward with production.
We filmed a third of the video this past week. I filmed the video so I am not in these scenes. I think the shots I got came out pretty well. I had the actors use their headphones to record their audio so that everyone could be heard clearly. Also made sure there was an audio cue in the beginning of each shot to make it easier for our editor to sync the audio up later. We filmed each scene a couple of times which is good in case there were some errors in the shot that I didn’t notice immediately.
My only worry coming up is finding some more time that all of my group members are free. Half of them are pledging into fraternities so their availability has been pretty random so far. I don’t think that we should run into much issues though since we only need to meet up two more times. Having a group chat has been very valuable for our group as it allows us to always know if something comes up.
Part of our video will involve a character doing a bit of work on the computer. Since we all know how to screencast now, we will be doing that scene using that method. I think having this segment in the video will be a very nice touch.
Post-Storyboarding
Now that the storyboard process is complete I can clearly see the true value of it. We now have the entire video laid out scene by scene with all the necessary equipment specified accordingly. I think overall the group did a good job at coming together and analyzing my idea for the video. They added a lot of useful ideas which translated well into the overall idea of the project. The brainstorming process was definitely the most fun part because at certain points there were a lot of different ideas flying around every second. Some were good and some were awful. The process itself is what allows all these ideas to come together into one cohesive project which I believe we’ve accomplished. Looking at the final storyboard, it is great to see all the different ideas together visually. Some things definitely did change during the creation of the storyboard. Some ideas that we initially thought were good ended up not meshing well with the rest of the video and so it had to be cut. There were also a few pieces that were added during the process because it became clear that it was a good fit midway through the creation of it.
Storyboards
I was always aware that storyboards were using in professional movies and tv shows but I never really saw the point. I always imagined that if you just followed the script, you would get the shots that you needed. After looking more into it for this assignment, I see that creating a scoreboard is essential to capturing the exact vision of the director on camera. Storyboards are the best way at conveying a clear and concise version of whatever idea it was that you had for a video or movie. I think storyboards would be especially useful if you had a few people brainstorming over the direction to take and couldn’t reach an agreement. If everyone created their own storyboards for their ideas, it would be much easier for everyone to see the ideas and come to a better conclusion. In the end it was my idea that was agreed upon by the idea. I am glad about this because it means that I was able to successfully convey my idea for the video with just words. Now the process of putting together a storyboard for it will really help cement the idea together so that we can start working on it.
Midterm Blog
My midterm blog was titled “Hard Cider” and it was designed as a place for objective discussions about Apple Inc. I am a big fan of Apple as a company and I personally like all of their products. I am also someone who enjoys debate-like discussions. Even thought I like the company, I recognize that there is a lot of people out there who hate it. Instead of alienating them, I figured it would be best to post neutral questions after each article to incite discussion from both sides. If the site had a real audience, I would gladly participate in discussions there all the time.
The aesthetics of the blog took inspiration directly from Apple. Apple has become known for simplicity and it shows in their products, their website, their content, and their overall culture. I tried to implement that same simplicity and design aesthetic into Hard Cinder. The blog has a white background with a gray horizontal menubar across the top of the page just as apple has had on their site for a long time. My introductory video also has Apple-like qualities throughout the whole thing. The fonts match up with the fonts that they typically use (Helvetica Neue in this case). I also used one of my favorite songs that appeared in an Apple ad in the past, Gold by Chet Faker.
Overall making the blog was a fun experience. I think I really made something that, if nothing else, is something that I would personally use if I happened to stumble upon it. I had never made a blog for any personal reason before and I’m glad this project gave me the opportunity to see what it was like to really take an idea and see it through. I look forward to continuing to update the page with more and more content as necessary.
After reading through many of my classmate’s blogs, I have narrowed them down to my top five blogs. In no particular order..
- K.F.A.M (Korean Fashion And Music)
- I thought this was a well made blog and about something that I have always been fascinated by. I went to high school with a pretty substantial Asian population. Since I am not Asian, I often looked from the outside at the music and culture that my friends liked to talk about. I think this blog is a great way to show people like me how things currently are in Korea since typically the barrier for entry in the culture of a foreign country is usually pretty high. The video is also pretty cool and serves as a good sample plate of the current fashion and music trends in Korea.
- The View From the Promenade
- I enjoyed this blog because it is about sports and is loaded with content. Even though I am not really a fan of baseball, I do enjoy the sport to an extent. This blog is great for people looking for a nice analysis of what’s currently going on in the league. The header image is a great shot from over a baseball field and first the theme of the blog perfectly. I also like that some of the posts have embedded tweets in them which adds to the interactivity of the blog. Just based on the writing of his posts, I can tell that the author cares a lot about the sport and I trust that his opinions hold enough weight that it is worth it to tune in to see what he has to say.
- Diary of a PR Girl
- This blog was great because it opened my eye to a field I previously knew very little about. The author of this blog has been working in PR for the past 7 years and has a lot of experience with the workings of it. For someone who has this kind of background, it is a perfect idea for them to share their stories in a diary-fashioned blog. I think it was a great touch that she included a page titled “What is PR” on the blog which details what the field is all about (PR is Press Release btw). The video of her accomplishments so far gives a lot to the credibility of the author and I feel like I am getting a true picture of the life of a PR agent by reading her blog.
- Frat Mixology
- I liked this blog because it appeals to an audience that is most prevalent around Rutgers University’s campus. College students! The video on this blog gave a good simple tutorial on how to make “Juicy Pumpkin Shots”. I can definitely see myself as a frequent visitor to this blog because I love looking to try new things. Because these drinks are simple and inexpensive, they have a great appeal to college students. I can envision this blog posting recipes for different kinds of drinks for different days of the week (Cocktail Tuesdays, etc.) and I know a lot of people who would enjoy trying each one.
- Busting the Bracket
- With College basketball at the height of its excitement for the year, it is a great time to visit Busting the Bracket. The blog covers the events of college basketball. The blog itself is well put together. The header includes a picture of a regional championship trophy which fits the theme quite well. For someone who doesn’t know much about college basketball, the posts do a good job at explaining the current standings of the teams so readers know who to expect to win which games. Also the video shows a lot of great highlight clips from big games which does a good job at getting the reader in the mood to watch some basketball.
ePortfolios
ePortfolios from Andrew Christie on Vimeo.
I’ve edited a few videos in the past using iMovie so I enjoyed getting back into it with this assignment. The concept of an ePortfolio is definitely interesting and I did not know people did this. I think it a cool progression from the traditional resume that we are all used to. I actually have seen one before done by a web designer and it was a very creatively done “minigame” that walked your character through his accomplishments.
Clearly, being a narrator isn’t my destined career. I always feel awkward recording audio but I actually think this one came out alright. I can see how using screen casting software would be great for things like demonstrations and tutorials for things on the computer. Screencast-O-Magic was very easy to set up and use and I had no problems with the software at all.
I liked the actual video editing itself for this assignment. I think video editing is one of those things that the more work is put into it, the less you notice. I used a lot of cuts and pans to get the video to focus on the sections of the web pages that I was talking about. The original videos that I screen casted we’re broken up a whole lot to make that happen but hopefully if I did a good job, you wouldn’t notice. There are some sections of the video I’m not proud of as it looks a little choppy but overall I think it looks good.
Because I like to program, I think it would be cool to make a couple very simple programming tutorials to put on my midterm blog since it would be relevant to the theme. Even if I know how to do something, explaining it helps solidify that knowledge in my head so it would be a fun project to do.
Hard Cider
For this week, I put together an introduction to my made up podcast. I listen to a lot of podcasts actually and they are all by really interesting people. I’m not that interesting so I had a hard time thinking about what I could make the podcast about. I wanted it to feel real even though it wasn’t. So I knew if i tried to pretend to have a podcast about sports or something else I didn’t care about, that it wouldn’t be fictionally genuine. I really like Apple as a company so I figure that its a topic I can see myself making a podcast about.
The intro contains two songs that I personally like at the moment which are Trap Queen by Fetty Wap and Bitches and Marijuana by Chris Brown and Tyga. Since its a podcast, I made sure to get the instrumental versions of these two songs so that the focus could still be on my words as they played over it. I liked the first song for this podcast because the high pitch quick tempo beat is very exciting and upbeat so it is a good song to get everyone hyped to listen. The second song has a lower tone with i nice bass heavy beat that I think complements my speaking voice.
I enjoyed putting this together. I had very basic experience with Garageband before this but I never really know how to do anything with it. Learning about the the sound level automation was very cool because it opens of a lot of room to really be able to mix together different sounds with smooth transitions. If I ever decide to create my own podcast, I would definitely use Garageband when I’m starting up. I could even potentially run one to supplement my next blog. I guess we’ll see.
Designing a Header
This past week I used Photoshop to design the header image for this blog. I have used Photoshop in the past for several projects so I felt pretty comfortable using it. To learn how to do it, we used Pixlr in class to put an animal head on another animal head in a humorous fashion. This exercise helped me get comfortable with Photoshop again so I was able to put the header together quite quickly after that.
My background for this blog is an image of a mountain range in Yosemite but the way it is set up only shows the sky which I personally think looks great. After pondering over what to use as my header, I figured it was a no-brainer that the same image would fit perfectly in the header as it allowed me to still show off the beauty of the range in that picture in a way that didn’t clash with the existing image.
The hardest part was figure out what to do with the image in photoshop. I am sticking to the “DIY” theme of the class for my blog (could you tell by the blog title?) so I wanted to give my header that homemade look. I decided the natural object to see looking at a mountain range were birds. Instead of your general run-of-the-mill eagles and falcons, I decided to have some fun with the bird choices (Angry Birds, Daffy Duck, etc.) to stick with the DIY theme.
The trolling and the lulz from Coleman’s article bring me back to my time in high school. My friends and I would
“troll” each other all the time just for the “lulz” but I never actually knew the origins of the words and how far back they go. I also feel as though I should revoke all past usages of the word “troll” because after reading the article I can see that our silly Facebook pranks were not actually trolling and that the term encompasses much more mischievous actions. It is also interesting to see that there is an actual disease, Chronic Troll Syndrome, that makes it hard for people to differentiate between real life and online. I think my header can actually serve as a visual representation of the disease. 
Blog Experiences So far
This past Monday I setup this blog using WordPress. I have used WordPress in the past to design a website for a school event in high school. Right off the bat I noticed that a lot has changed since I was last here. WordPress managed to streamline the process of getting a page running even more than it was before. I got right to work selecting a theme and making all the changes so that it looked the way I wanted it to. I am pleased to see that while things have changed, the basics are still intact and it is very simple to add/remove content and change the way it looks.
The professor in this class instructed us to use tags in all of our posts. I never used tags in my old website and I can immediately see why they are important to use. I posted the blog posts that we have posted for the class so far onto this one and tagged them. I’ve already had people I don’t know find, read, like, and comment on some of the posts. This was very exciting to see as it put my small blog posts into the hands of viewers I otherwise wouldn’t have been able to connect with.
I have taken the time to check out some of the blogs of my fellow classmates and I can see that most people have had similar success setting up blogs to their liking. I think the customizability that WordPress allows is important in a website because if you can’t express yourself in your site and your content then you can’t expect anyone else to really be able to connect and figure out what you’re all about. I look forward to creating more content for this blog and hopefully creating a personal blog as well.
I referred to two articles to help design this blog. One by Gregory Ciotti and the other by Fred Turner. Ciotti’s article provided great instruction on how to create a good looking and memorable blog without spending a lot of money. While I will not be utilizing all his tips, I definitely agree with all that he said and I will be referring back to it if I decide to create a personal blog. His main points are that you should have a clean site that looks professional but with enough of twist that it looks unique and memorable. I believe that from following this guide, this blog looks consistent and clean which is great.
The Turner article focused more on how to create content for the audience you are trying to appeal to. I feel like that article will also be very valuable when running a personal blog as it will help you figure out what your users want to see and how to give it to them.
Audiences
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The audience to this video and every video on their channel is any english speaking person who wants to learn something new. With this current information age in full swing, the amount of people looking to learn online is growing. Humans are inherently curious and the internet now has a ton of data online for anyone to access. The youtube channels that make videos like this are simply taking that online data and turning it into easy to understand content. The early people of the “masses” were the same way looking for some medium to trust and learn from. These kinds of videos would be considered information and entertainment. |
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