Final project propsal

For our final project, we were given the task to create a interactive digital story. I planned to work with Mary-Lynn for this project. We were thinking to use either Twine or HTML. I believe Twine will be our best platform for the story we intend to tell. Although we have not completely decided on the story, we are thinking to tell the story of college students. Twine allows for different endings to the same story. 

I was thinking to have the reader start out with a pretty linear story where they are just clicking through the introductory parts about the basics of college life; class, homework, group projects, friendships, etc. Then giving the reader the option to choose what type of college life they want to experience in the game. Do they want to follow the rules and do their homework every day, do they want to party and sleep through class, or are they an athlete that is stuck between excelling in the classroom or on the field? 

Twine will allow us to incorporate sound and images but video clips may be a challenge for us. This video project will really put our talents to the test. We both have used Twine before to make simple and smaller projects, but this will allow us to expand our knowledge of the program. It also will push us to create stories like I never have before. We will have to be creative enough to not only write one story, but one story with multiple endings. This project is going to be challenging but the outcome will be well worth it!

Video Project

My video project is a promotional video for Sodexo dining at UPJ. I am an employee for Sodexo, and I also interned with them a few semesters ago. When interning, I learned how their marketing department operates. We are currently in need of new employees and we were trying to think of a good way to let people know what it is really like working for Sodexo; thus, came my video project idea. I got together with the Human Resources manager and the marketing manager and we set up a plan. We discussed what positions to highlight, key employees to speak with, and also logistics on when the best time to film would be for everyone. They really helped me get my ideas flowing. 

The form for this video is a compilation of photos, video interviews, and voice over descriptions. I did this so that it was not just my voice being heard the entire time. I wanted to feature different employees for my video. 

This video was a challenge to make, but actually a lot of fun! Since I work there, and know all of the employees, I felt comfortable speaking with them and taking photos of them. My favorite part about this project was hearing people's responses to "Why do you love working here?" There were a few responses that surprised me, but it definitely made me realize how lucky I am to have such great co-workers. 

The hard part about making this project was the editing part. I had no prior knowledge of video editing, so I basically taught myself how to use iMovie. Luckily, iMovie is a relatively user-friendly application. Although it was challenging, I found out that I actual enjoy video editing. Quite honestly, I surprised myself on what I was able to create. Did you know that it really is not that hard to take just the sound from a video clip? (I thought that would be impossible to do!)

Stylistically, I wanted the color scheme to be professional and to be the same colors as our company colors; blue, white, and red. The segments that were just text, I wanted to keep simple because the rest of the video was a bit busy. I also wanted to keep everything consistent throughout the entire video. For instance, in between the video interviews I would use 4 or 5 five photos. Also, I realized that some transitions work better between some photos than others. Also, I really like the "Ken Burns" feature for showing the image, but sometimes that would not work with photos, so I would put a more intricate transition with those photos. 

This project has taught me much more than I had anticipated. I learned how much goes into video editing. I also realized that just a few seconds a film, requires so much editing time. I really liked figuring out how to layering all of the components, such as, the videos, my voice, and the background sounds. I also learned what it is like to film in a work place. I had to be able to use my judgement of good photos. Because I was filming for a company, I had to make sure that everything happening in the video or photo adhered to company policies for safety, dress code, etc. Another important thing that I learned that I am sure I will use for my career is understanding photo release forms. As well as, trying to figure out what to do if people do not consent to the photo being used. This was especially hard when filming in a group setting.

Here is my project: https://drive.google.com/file/d/10SBAloqytnygAmmVxNzQwScJVwzcrZEN/view?usp=sharing 
or
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OX6cd6m1xac&feature=youtu.be

Poem #3

This poem was inspired by the words that my friends and family say when I go home for the holidays. There are some good things, but mostly things that stress out college students!

http://www.pitt.edu/~aep56/poem/home.html

Three Videos

During this segment of the course, we are discovering how video essays are created, and the significance of pairing sound with images. The three videos that stood out to me the most were How The Beatles Changed Album Covers,One Step Away, and A Brief Look at Texting and the Internet in Film. All three of these films pair sound and image together to create a video that allow the two factors to compliment each other perfectly.

In the first film, A Brief Look at Texting and the Internet In Film, they show the evolution of showing text messages and internet browses in films. Up until recently, film makers would often just avoid showing the messages by having the actor read them aloud or by cutting out cellphones or technology all together. In this video essay, they show clips of films that have used this old fashion technique. They also show how they were able to start integrating text messages into film, the main film that they referred to was Sherlock. In the video essay, they would have the scene with the messages playing, while havind a voice over playing in the background explaining facts and the timeline of the evolution of integrating texts in film. They would play short sounds from the film in the video to fill in empty space and for transition scenes.

The other video essay that I watched this week was, The Beatles Changed Album Covers. This video essay explained how the Beatles were the leaders in the album cover world in an informative way. He was saying how in record shops that the album covers are what caught people attention and when he said that is when the video was showing people looking through albums at a record shop. They would play some Beatles tracks while talking about it, but for the most part just had light instruments, like strings playing in the background. Description with texts can only go so far, so he showed the album covers as he spoke about them and when he showed The Beatles album he would highlight the specific things he was discussing. He used this imagery to show the audience what he was talking about, and it made it easy to follow along with. This essay could have been just a podcast or voice recording, but pairing it with the video allowed for the audience to understand and visualize the pieces that the speaker was describing.

The third video was titled One Step Away. This was more of a video poem, than an essay. This poem was based off of a dream that the author had. It could have easily been just spoken words and not have video. Although, the video adds emotion that hearing the words would not have been able to evoke. The tone in her voice as she reads, and the video as it takes us through this world of confuse evokes emotion in the viewer. I believe that the author would have paired this poem with this video because they wanted us to see the certain things, rather than just leaving it up to the imagination. She wanted us to see walking in the streets, and nature from strange angles. The music and words, paired with the images created a beautiful and emotional video poem. 

I believe in each of these videos, the pairing of audio, text, and images worked very well. I think that the first two films were informative and so the mono toned voice, and limited background sound was appropriate. On the other hand, the video poem had background music for most of the video and that was fitting because it was an emotionally driven video. I think that when I create my video, it will be more informative so I will most likely look at the first two films as models, but if I was filming a more creative video, like in the poetic genre, I would use the third film as an example.