There’s something really simple and beautiful about the way Benjamin Alire Sáenz writes. I’ve read this particular book, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe, a few times now. I’m always amazed by how much he says in so little words. The book is poignant, and real, and painful sometimes. I decided to read chapter seven for this assignment because I think it’s the perfect example of all those things. In this chapter, the reader can tell how much Ari, the main character, is struggling with something in him that he can’t see. In that same vein, the reader and tell how much he yearns to feel equal to Dante. I chose to do a lot of still shots of objects or scenery for this video for a few reasons: I wanted the viewer to be able to focus on my words, and I wanted it to feel a little lonely. I also tried to pick images that would enhance the words I was reading. For example, when Ari points out that Dante’s smile is sad, I filmed a shot of the cracks in my deck to show that even things that are solid have gaps. There are more literal shots too, such as when the discussion turns to God. I also wanted the video to follow the narrative of the scene, so I started out filming in my room and then moved away from it, as the narrative and conversation moves from Ari’s room to bigger things.

I chose this assignment because I love reading and I love the thought of a film making a reading more powerful. Originally I wanted to film more of a ‘summer’ themed video, with shots of the pond and trees outside my apartment and things like that, but chapter seven of this book caught my attention and thus the video was filmed mostly indoors.

To create this film, I used iMovie on my phone. When you open up a new project in the app, you get a blank film reel to work on as well as some tips for using the app.

The first step to creating your film is to add a clip. To do this, you simply click the  icon, tap ‘All’, and then tap which clip you want to add onto the reel. After that, you can tap the  icon that appears, and the clip will be added onto your reel.

After I added on my first clip, I could then record my reading. You can do this right from the iMovie app. By tapping the  icon on the main reel screen, you are given the option to start a recording over your clips. You can retake the audio as many times as you need to (unfortunately, I needed to a lot).

Once I had my recording, I added in the rest of the clips and adjusted the length as needed to fit what I was saying. I also muted each clip by tapping the  icon and lowering the dial to zero. That way, my reading could be clearly heard.

The main bulk of the reading video finished, the only step left was to add title and ending credits. I debated a long time over adding in music too, but in the end decided I wanted people to be able to focus more on the words, since it was a quiet moment in the book as well. Rather than having a still photo for my title screen, I decided I wanted those to be part of the video as well. I went and got two new clips that I felt opened and closed out the video well. To add text to a clip, you tap where it is on the reel and then the  icon.

You’re given quite a few options for text in your video; it’s a good idea to sit down and consider what effect you want your video to have, and also how much text each title screen will need.

Text chosen and credits written, I decided that my video was done. I tapped ‘Done’, and then uploaded my video onto Youtube.

Guidelines for this assignment can be found here.

This is my first of two video assignment this week. In this assignment we had to create a video of just our shoes that tells some kind of story. I chose to do this assignment for one of my assignments this week because I thought it would be a fun assignment to do because I could just take videos at any point throughout my day to show what a day in my shoes look like. I thought it would be a good idea to show what I do every weekday by recording some of the things I do at work. I wasn’t able to record a lot of the stuff I do at work by just recording me feet, but I was able to get enough footage to make sure everyone got an idea of what my work day is like. I knew it would be easy to get videos of me walking because I do a lot of walking at work everyday.

I started off with me waking up and getting out of bed in the morning. This is obviously something I have to do every morning so I thought it would be a good idea to add this part to my video. I also showed me getting into my car and driving to work. Everyday I get to work, I start off by changing into my boots because those are very important when you are working at a lumber yard. I showed a little bit of me driving a forklift and me cutting corners with a saw that we use for deliveries. I also had to add my favorite part of the work day to this video, my lunch break. This is when I can sit down, relax, and get out of the 90 degree heat. I added another video of me riding around on the side of a forklift that was driving by because I was tired of walking throughout the lumber yard. The last video of me finally getting off of work and being free for the rest of the day.

I added the song “I’m gonna be (500 miles)” by The Proclaimers to the background of my video because I thought it fit this assignment very well. I also chose this as the background song for all of my fellow “How I Met Your Mother” fans because whenever I think of this song, I think of Ted and Marshall’s road trip. I also used some techniques that we learned about earlier this week from two of the required videos in my assignment (video 1, video 2). I used slow motion and fast forward techniques throughout the video to help add extra detail to my assignment. I put me throwing my lunch away in slow motion because my least favorite time at work is when I have to end my lunch break and go back to working. I also transitions that had examples in the videos like jump cuts and wipe transitions. I used other transitions in my story that we didn’t have examples for because I thought they provided a good transition between two events at work.

Assignment: Where Do Your Shoes Take You?

Stars: 4

I got the music for my video by transforming a youtube video into a mp3 sound on onlinevideoconverter.com.

Step 1: After finding a video you want to convert, copy and paste the url for the video into the section that says “paste link here.”

Step 2: Click the “START” button in the middle of the screen.

Step 3: Click the “DOWNLOAD” button on the right to save your song.

I created the video on iMovie.

Step 1: Click the “New” button at the top and select no theme.

Step 2: Click the “Import” button at the top to import a video or sound (do this step until all of your videos and sounds are imported).

Step 3: Click on the first video you want to add that you already imported and then click the + button in the bottom right of the video to add (repeat step until all of the videos are added to the bottom.

Step 4: Click on your song and add it to your video by clicking the + button in the bottom right of the song.

Step 5: Edit your videos.

Highlight your unwanted footage and click the delete button on your keyboard to delete that part of the clip.

Highlight a portion of your video you want to fast forward or put in slow motion and then click edit at the top and then your desired action.

Step 7: Add transitions or titles by clicking transitions or titles in the bottom left.

Step 7: Click File -> Share -> Email to email it to yourself and save it.

My days are pretty peaceful; the one I’ve filmed for this assignment is no exception. I chose to do the ’60 Second Day’ assignment because I like watching vlogs sometimes, and I thought it would be fun to try my hand at my own vlog-type video. Compressing everything down into 60 seconds was difficult, but I managed somehow. I like the aesthetic of writing out the title and ending credits scenes instead of using a video editor to do them, so the video starts and ends with my own really mess handwriting. It feels more personal like that, which I thought worked because this is me filming my own day. I think the most challenging part of this video was figuring out how to indicate movement and also time passing. When I went to the movies, I didn’t want to be at my house and then suddenly at the theater. So I filmed clips of me closing my laptop and a few of me in the car, as well as progress clips of me getting stuff for cereal out of the pantry and fridge. These sort of transitional clips are what made it so difficult to make the video only 60 seconds (leaving out the credits). However, I think that was also the most interesting part of making the video. I wanted the viewer to be able to clearly follow along with what was happening. I think the video could have been improved if I’d had a better camera; unfortunately, all I’ve got is my phone.

To put all of my clips together, I used the iMovie app on my phone. The picture below shows what the main video editing screen for iMovie looks like. Right off the bat, I’d like to point out the little question mark icon (  ) in the top right corner. Clicking on that will give you helpful hints as to how to make your movie great.

The theme that I chose for my movie was called ‘Simple’, and I felt it fitting for the kind of average day vibe I was going for. If you want to look through the themes available, you can click on the little gear icon (  ) at the bottom right.

As you can see, there’s a lot of themes to choose from. There’s also a few other options, like video filters. I chose not to use a video filter, wanting to keep my film neat and straightforward, but I did tap the option for the video to fade in from black. That done, I started to add in my clips. By tapping the film reel and music note icon (  ) you bring up the screen below on the left. Tapping ‘All’ should get you to the screen on the right.

Notice at the bottom of the screen that you have three options: Video, Photos, and Audio. Right now we’re just working with Video, but I’ll get to the Audio tab later.

To insert your clips, you simply tap them on the screen and click the downwards arrow icon (  ). This places them into your film, and you edit them from there. The next step I took after adding all of my clips was the adjust the audio. To avoid copyright infringement, since this video was going on Youtube, I used the music provided by iMovie itself. To adjust audio, tap the audio tab on the bottom right.

As you can see, you have a lot of options regarding what audio to place in your video. I knew I wanted to keep it simple, and make it more like a miniature vlog, so I just went to the theme music section. From there, you can tap each title to listen to a preview. Just like when adding clips, to add music to your video, just tap the downwards arrow icon.

The theme music I ended up choosing was ‘Travel’, because I felt that it fit the mood I was going for. Music selected, I went back to the main video editing screen to take out the audio from my voice clips so that the music could be clearly heard. To edit audio within the clips, tap on the clips and then on the speaker icon (  ). From there, you can raise and lower the dial as needed. The only clip I left the volume on for was at the end, where I turn off the lamp. I liked the finality of the sound and felt that it closed out the video well when combined with the light shutting off.

By tapping the icon in between each clip (  ) you can edit the transitions between them, but I decided I liked the default transitions the best. From there, I decided that my video was done! I saved it and posted it on Youtube from my phone. There were a few iMovie features I didn’t try out making this particular video, but I’m planning on checking them out later.

Thanks for joining me on this average day!

Guidelines for this assignment can be found here.

My band is currently in the studio working on our debut album, and we’re planning on releasing at least two music videos for it. One we’re going to be shooting at a show, but the other, for our song “Into The Badlands”, we’ll be using stock western footage and various show clips. Now, we previously recorded the song on out first demo, and I put together a small draft of the music video using the old version of the track, but the final cut will be much cleaner, and with the new and improved recording of the song. I used the Kdennlive software, as it runs on GNU/Linux, and grabbed a few live clips of my band, and some stock western clips from Archive.org, which are all free.

For my last assignment I chose to do the assignment Capture the Beauty. I chose to do this assignment for the same reason as the other one, I’m in Tennessee for my grandfathers birthday and I thought doing the videos of the Ripley’s Aquarium would be fun and enjoyable. The assignment wanted you to capture the beauty of Downtown Fredericksburg but I decided to change the location which I figured would be fine. You were supposed to create a vine of something you find beautiful, in this case it’s the shark lagoon at the Ripley’s Aquarium.

Steps to Creating This Vine Video:

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For my first video assignment of the week I choose to do the Time Lapse Assignment. You were to record 1-2 second videos all day as many as you can and then create a video with all of the clips combined together. I choose this assignment because this week I am visiting my Grandparents for my Grandfathers 73rd Birthday and today we went to the aquarium so I felt these clips would be something everyone would enjoy.

Steps to create this Time Lapse using Wondershare Filmora
1. open the application and then click new project

2. The next step is to import your videos

3. The next step is to add each clip to your video by hovering over the clip and hitting the red plus sign

The last step is to export and create the video

This week one of the assignments I chose to do was What’s Your Skills? It was worth 4.5 stars. The goal of this assignment was to show the world something you have a passion for.

I chose to show a video of my horse’s first show jumping round she ever did. During a show jump round, the horse and rider combo are timed from the time they start to the time they finish. At this particular show, the stopwatch is started when the pair rides through a set of two orange cones, and it is stopped once the ride through another set of orange cones. The goal is to finish the course in the time allowed so as not accrue time faults, and to not have any refusals — the horse does not jump — or any poles knocked to the ground. If either of those two things occurs, the pair accrues jump faults. Both time faults and jump faults are added to your score, which is not ideal because you want a low score. I chose this particular video because it showed not only something that I am passionate about, but it also showed that not all a rider’s show jump rounds can be perfect, as you will see at 1:08.

My horse was a five year old when she had this event and it was the first show she had ever been to. It was down at the Virginia Horse Center in Lexington, Virginia. The Virginia Horse Center is a large facility that hosts many shows throughout the year.

Take a look at her first jump round.

One of the assignments I chose to do this week was Classic-Modern Mashup, worth 4.5 stars. The goal of this assignment was to take a modern music video and combine it with a classical composition.

I chose to use Sia’s Chandelier music video and Beethoven’s Fur Elise composition. I I chose the music video for Chandelier because I remember thinking it was an interesting video when it came out and I still think that. I chose Fur Elise because it was one of the first classical pieces that I learned to play on the piano and it has always been one of my favorites.

In order to create this video, I used the QuickTime Player application on my computer to do a screen recording of the music video on YouTube, as downloading videos from YouTube legally is a tricky thing. I got the video from Sia’s Vevo page on YouTube. To get the audio from Beethoven’s Fur Elise, I used QuickTime to do an audio recording of the piece from Georgii Cherkin’s YouTube page. I combined the video and audio pieces together using the iMovie application.

First, I chose the Modern theme for my video because I wanted it to just be simple.

Then, I imported both the audio and video clips by selecting File>Import Media, and selecting the pieces.

Following that, I simple dragged and dropped each of the files into the “Media” area in the iMovie window, aligned the starts and finishes, and then saved the project.

I had to attach the link because WordPress would not let me upload the video since the file was too large.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qqd2t71YueA&feature=youtu.be