For my last assignment of the week I did the 4 1/2 star mini-documentary on my character Bob. You can find all of the info on Bob here. For this assignment you had to create a 2-3 minute documentary. I did it on my character because I needed one more star to fulfill my 10 for my character (My weekly total was 18 overall). For this assignment I used iMovie, Freesound.org and google for pictures. I simply just went through like you would with any documentary, starting from his childhood to where he is now. Freesound.org allowed me to add bird, chicken, cow, and horse sounds to add to my documentary. I am happy how it turned out seeing as it is my first time doing a documentary!
Worth 4 1/2 stars, I did an assignment called I am me. Instead of doing this video about myself though, I did it about my character Bob the rancher. The instructions tell you to make a video of showing pictures or things you like or like to do. Seeing as Bob is a rancher, I went in this direction (such as riding his horse, country dinners, cowboy boots, his family, beer, etc). Seeing as my character is a guy and I cannot make a video of myself doing anything because I am a girl, thus I had to go with this assignment even though it wasn’t my first choice to do. I uploaded all the pictures into iMovie along with background music I got off Youtube; My Favorite Things of course from The Sound of Music. After this I uploaded the video to Youtube. I am sort of happy how it turned out. Not super creative, but I did the best I could!
Continuing on with my 16 stars for the week, I did an assignment that did not deal with my character. This video assignment is called Sport Team Pump-Up Video and is worth 4 1/2 stars to bring me to a total of 9 thus far. This assignment tells you to pick your favorite sports team and make a montage video. My favorite team is the Boston Red Sox. I am actually going up to Boston to see the home opener series in two weeks (so excited). What I did for this assignment was looked up a bunch of famous Red Sox pics on Google and then uploaded them into iMovie. After this I selected to use the song Shipping up to Boston by Dropkick Murphys. I selected the instrumental version because I just like it better. I then added the audio to iMovie maker along with some transitions. Then I uploaded it to Youtube. It might not pump up the team, but it sure pumps me up for my trip in 2 weeks. I am happy with how it turned out! Yankees fans might think otherwise though…
This week I was to complete this mini documentary assignment . I chose to create this documentary about my western character, Talie. You can read more about Talie here. I focused on certain aspects of Talie’s life such as her job, where she lives, what she finds important, and her personality. As such, in this documentary Talie tells the listener about where she lives and what she generally does in a typical day. Talie lives in the small town of Tombstone, Arizona and works on her ranch growing crops and taking care of all of the farm animals. She sells the items she produces on her farm to the local town store. Even though her parents and brothers moved away she is never alone, while she does her work on the ranch and goes into town her trusty steed, Smarty is always by her side. After her daily work is done for the day she heads down to the town saloon to meet and relax with friends. Talie really values her little town, her friends, and family so she keeps an eye out for trouble and tries her hardest to protect what is important to her.
I used Windows Movie Maker to create this documentary video. It shows clips of where Talie lives such as her ranch, her little western town, and certain elements in her life she finds important. I used images within the video that I felt would fit Talie’s appearance and personality. I recorded myself talking as if I were Talie and added sounds from Freesounds.org and imported the recording into the video. I used text, special transitions, and other features to make the video more interesting and dynamic. Lastly, I added a credits slide providing the details of where I obtained some of the images. Then I uploaded it to youtube so I could embed it within this post. The assignment was worth 4 and a half stars contributing to this week’s 16 star requirement.
This week we have to do 16 stars worth of video stars with 10 of them being for out character. My first assignment I did was Live Turned Video which is worth 4 1/2 stars. This assignment instructs you to take pictures of an artist during a live performance and make it into a music video. In order to make this work for my character I had to make some changes. Again, my character is Bob who works/lives on a ranch. I selected the song Dirt from Florida Georgia Line and uploaded it to iMovie. Then I went on google and basically looked for pictures on how Bob’s day would be. He would wake up, eat breakfast then go out on the ranch then eat dinner and go to bed. So this is a video of Bob’s live performance that he does everyday.
I completed the four and a half star assignment Signing Words.
Using my iPhone I filmed my hand using american sign language to spell out some words. I chose to spell out the name of my character.
Admittedly, the only language I’ve expressed using a single hand has been impolite. A single gesture not hard to learn at all used few and far between. Surprisingly, it wasn’t hard to pick up on other hand gestures needed for this assignment. Stringing them together in a smooth fashion was somewhat difficult. So before shooting the video, I practiced signing a couple of times. The end result is seen above.
The only trouble I had was steadying my phone at an angle which would make the shot clear and with enough light. I placed my phone between two books looking at the ground underneath a lamp. The shadow to the left of my hand is derived from the surface on which my books and phone rested. With the tools I had at my disposal, ridding the shot of that shadow was impossible. It doesn’t obstruct the view of my hand however. It just looks misplaced.
In the future, I’d try to figure out how to rid my shot of that pesky shadow.
I used a website (http://morsecode.scphillips.com/translator.html) to create a phrase which relates to my character. Using the morse code translation of this phrase, I proceeded to take pictures of my interpretation of the dots and dashes which were in the forms of goldfish and pretzel sticks. (They were the only items representing dots and dashes I had access to at the time.) I uploaded these pictures to a website called Stupeflix where I compiled the pictures in proper order and added sound. However, the sound added is not reflective of the morse code being showed. I obtained the sound portion from a random morse code video on youtube and converted the video using an mp3 converter. The finished product is seen above.
For this assignment I was to create a six second video of myself creating art. This week I have to complete ten stars worth of video assignments that incorporate my created western character, Talie. You can read more about Talie here. I chose this assignment because I do like art particularly drawing (even though I am not good at it). I find it to be relaxing just to doodle and let my imagination roam. As such, when Talie has some downtime at the ranch she likes to sit on the porch of her ranch house and just look out at all of the crops and flowers. Sometimes she picks up a pen and paper and starts to doodle and draw some flowers. Even if she doesn’t come close to replicating the plants, she feels it helps her relax from a hard day’s work and allows her to notice all of the amazing detail in nature (that she can’t even come close to incorporating into her drawing). As such, in the video below you can see how Talie draws one of the flowers she is observing.
To create this video I used my phone to video myself (acting as my western character) drawing a flower in six seconds and I saved it to my computer and uploaded it to Flickr so I could embed it into this post. This assignment was worth two stars contributing to this week’s 16 star requirement.
This week we are required to complete 16 stars worth of video assignments and 10 of the stars must involve the western character I created this semester. As such, for this video assignment I acted as if I were my created western character, Talie. You can learn more about Talie here. I chose to complete this 5-second film assignment because I thought it would be fun and I would be able to use a western themed joke to fit my character’s personality. Talie is a cowgirl in the little town of Tombstone, Arizona. She works on her family’s ranch and takes care of all of the animals such as the cows, chickens, etc. I thought the little joke I chose as my 5 second film was fitting for a rancher even though it is a bit cheesy. It is a bit longer than 5 seconds but I hope you get a little laugh out of it!
To create this video I used windows movie maker to display images and overlapped it with a recording of my voice acting as my western character saying the joke. Then I uploaded it to youtube so I could embed it in this post. This assignment was worth 4 and a half stars contributing to this week’s 16 star requirement.
For this assignment, we were required to create a public service announcement, whether funny or serious. I took this opportunity to create a PSA for my Western character, Riza, who is a saloon owner. In this video, she complains of supermarkets which are running her business out of business.
When I first recorded the voice over, I wanted to create it in a radio style, sort of like a commercial you hear on air, but considering this is week two of video week, I added photos and text to keep the video aspect, but I did add music and sound effects to add the pop sensation.
To create this, I typed out what I wanted to stay, then recorded a voice over. I added text, images, sound effects, and music, together on iMovie and created the final video.
FULL VIDEO TEXT:
Hello, everybody! If you’re currently watching this, well thank you! If you’re not, then you who are watching this, please share this with your family and friends. (PAUSE) Today I am here to speak of an issue that has been affecting our community at large, and wait, it’s not only affecting the community, but the entire United States. Phew! Can you believe it? (PAUSE) Now you probably have no idea what I am talking about, but the issue that is hitting the US as an epidemic is the growth of supermarkets. Yes sir-eee. Local saloon owners, like I, are going out of business because folks, like ya’ll, are no longer coming into the saloon for a drink, or to even speak of your daily problems. Instead, you’re going to supermarkets to buy a drink at your convenience, but of course, not mine! Selfish little… (MUMBLES)… anyways as I was saying, stop buying those nasty imported beers, but instead support your local saloon’s. Heck, if you come in today and say you heard this public service announcement, I might as well give you a free drink, on me. (PAUSE) I cannot believe I just said that, but I’ll do anything to run those places out of business.
Any who, thanks for listening to this public service announcement. Don’t forget to share this message with your friends and family, and to come right in for a free drink!
