This assignment (4 stars) required me to “explain something” to an audience.

This was actually pretty difficult for me. At least content wise. I’m not extremely sure of myself when it comes to teaching others. It’s just a skill I haven’t had much practice in. Same goes for just doing something in front of someone in general.

For a little while, I just sat around my room thinking about what I was really good at. About fifteen minutes in, I glanced over towards my desk and noticed a single sheet of origami paper. Things clicked right then. I knew what I was going to show you guys.

Paper Cranes.

My knowledge of making paper cranes goes way back to elementary school. There was this book called Sadako and The Thousand Paper Cranes. It was an incredibly emotional, perhaps too emotional for a small child. Still, I did enjoy it.

Hi! I’m the most depressing book ever!

Without spoiling, it’s basically about this young girl who comes down with Leukemia who begins to make paper cranes. The idea was to make a thousand paper cranes and in exchange be granted a wish. (This is a real thing, to read more on it click here!)

So of course my little elementary school class decided to learn to make cranes too. Of course they were all terrible because we had no patience. But it was a starting ground. And as years went on I got better at it.

Moving on to the video, the filming aspect went really well. Everything was filmed using my cellphone and a tripod. I did it all in one take. For editing I used iMovie on the mac. I imported it in and cut the video into separate clips.

This is where things got a little weird. In my head I knew how I wanted the video to be. However prior to this, I had never done the timelapse thing. So I had to figure out how to do that.

Turns out it was incredibly easy. There’s a button you hit and then just chose the speed you want the clip to be.

4x faster!

Little rabbit tells you the speed has been changed!

After all that was settled, I added in some music. After a little time on google searching through different Royalty Free Songs I found this one. It’s called Pixel Peeker Polka. It’s really upbeat and happy and I thought it fit well in my video.

Overall, I really like how the video came out. If I can figure out another subject I just might make another one. ( ´ ? ` )?

This video assignment, worth 4.5 stars, wanted us to show off a talent or something we are passionate about. I have spent the weekend horse showing and decided to post a video of one of my rides. In my eyes, riding is more of a passion than a talent. The reason I say this is because becoming an effective rider is not something that has come naturally to me. I have worked hard and continue to invest as much time as possible to continue to learn and improve my knowledge and skills.

A friend of mine took this video using my iPhone. I then uploaded the video onto my MacBook Pro and then dragged the video from my documents folder into iMovie. All I did in iMovie was mute the sound. There were a group of girls having a very snobby and ungrateful conversation so I figured I would spare everyone from having to listen to it by taking the sound away. I wanted to add a song, but nothing came to mind that wasn’t overkill or super corny. If an appropriate song comes to mind, I will probably go back and add it since I actually know how to do that now!

This assignment we needed to lip sync a song.  The first song came to mind was Whitney Houston’s “I Will Always Love You.”  I thought it would be a fun song to do and also I want to prove to everyone out there that I was a better singer then Whitney Houston.  Growing up my parents told me that I could do anything but sing so I been trying my whole life to prove them wrong.  Even though I know I am one of the best singers out there I still am trying to prove that to other people. The probably know it also they just are jealous of my skills.

I would say that practicing for many years is what got me to the point I am at singing but that would be a lie. It is natural raw talent that I was just born with.  I recorded the video with a cellphone and placed a monitor with a lyrics right under the person who was recording.  After I noticed we recorded it upside down and the file size was to large to be uploaded so I imported it into Windows Movie Maker to turn the video right side up and to change the file size by changing the video quality slightly.

It was a fun assignment because I enjoy karaoke and flexing my singing muscles from time to time.

3 Stars
http://assignments.ds106.us/assignments/lip-sync-along/

For this assignment (worth three stars), we were asked to create a highlight reel for our favorite actor/actress.

I decided to do this assignment on Jen Aniston because I thought highlighting one of my favorite actress’ many talents, is necessary – I call her Jen because I feel as if we are close enough, where I can shorten her name.  She is one of my favorite actresses because of how she handles herself on and off screen.  She is very down to earth and very determined.

Not only has she starred in, and gained her fame in one of the most iconic TV shows of the 90’s, Friends, but is very humble and is an advocate for St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital.  Since starring in Friends, she turned her focus to movies.  She has starred in, mostly, comedies such as Marley & Me, Just Go With It, Horrible Bosses, We’re the Millers, and many more.

To do this assignment, I first googled how to take videos from YouTube and convert them to be used in Windows Movie Maker.  When doing so, I found a website that did such a thing.  All I had to do was find the video on YouTube, copy the URL and paste it into the website’s converter bar and click Catch!.  It then lead me to a new page that gave me the option to choose what I wanted to convert the video to.  Every time, I chose MP4.  The video would automatically download to my computer and all I had to do, was select the Add Video or Photo button in Windows Movie Maker and it would appear.  I did this for every video I added into the highlight reel.

In Windows Movie Maker, I added a Title page and Credits Page.  To create the Title page, I selected the Title button on the Home Tab and added in my text.  I changed the background color to a light purple by selecting the Background Color in the Edit tab.  I chose purple as the background color because I thought it reflected Jen’s personality – easy going and humble.  To create the Credits page, I selected the Credits drop down arrow and selected Credits.  I then added in my text.

While creating the highlight reel, the videos I selected had parts that were unnecessary to the highlights so I decided to cut them out of the highlight reel completely.  To do that, I selected where I wanted the clip to start and selected the Set Start Point button under the Edit tab.  I did the same thing for where I wanted the clip to end and selected the Set End Point under the Edit tab.  In addition, I added animations between each of the clips.  To do that, under the Animations tab, I selected the animation on the far right for each one.

I used the following videos for my highlight reel:

Hope you enjoy my highlight reel of Jen Aniston!

For this assignment (worth five stars), we were asked to create a montage for someone special in our lives.

While scrolling through the video assignment bank, I came across this assignment and I knew I had to do it.  Originally, I was going to make a montage of my mom but I couldn’t find enough pictures of her to make a successful one.  Instead, I created one of my best friend Emily.  Her birthday is coming up in the fall and I think she would really love to see this.

To do this assignment, I opened Windows Movie Maker and added pictures and videos I had on my computer; by selecting the Add Videos and Photos button on the home tab.  I adjusted the timing on each slide by clicking on the picture, selecting the Edit tab, and adjusting the duration to five seconds.  I did that for all of the pictures individually.

For the title page, I selected my first picture and on the Home tab, there were AutoMovie Themes available.  I clicked the one I liked; which happened to be the second one from the left.  What’s nice about the AutoMovie Theme is that it automatically has different transitions for each picture and it changes the filter on them.  I liked that it did that for me but there was an option to change that, in the top left corner of each picture.  Before my video, I wanted to add a transition page.  I did that by selecting the Title button on the Home tab and added my text.  Then, to create a credits slide, I selected the downward arrow on the right of the Credits button.  I then selected the Starring  button.  There, I added in Emily’s name and a little message to her below it.

Then it occurred to me, I have to add “You’ve Got a Friend In Me” from the Toy Story Soundtrack!  I think it’s the best song to use when making a video for a friend.  I went to YouTube and searched for it in the search bar.  I selected this video and listened to the entire song.  I downloaded the song using a YouTube Converter.  I copied and pasted the URL to the video in the converter box on the website, and it automatically downloaded to my computer.

I added the song to my movie by selecting the Add Music button on the Home tab.  It asked me where I wanted to get my music from and I clicked on the Add Music… under Add Music from my PC.  Then, My Folder appeared in the downloaded file and all of music appeared.  I scrolled through and found the “You’ve Got a Friend in Me.”  The sound waves automatically appeared under all of my slides.  I adjusted the start time and ending time of the song using the Start Point and End Point options under the Options tab.

To screen shot the picture of my Movie Maker page, I used Gyazo.  I downloaded it earlier on in the course to make GIFs.  Luckily, it comes with a screen shot option as well.  I clicked on the screen shot button, found at the bottom of my screen, and my cursor became an x.  I clicked on the top left corner of the screen to the bottom right, and my picture appeared.

Here is my finished product.  I hope you enjoy it!