I put a slight twist on the ‘Special Person Montage’ assignment for the week of 3/16 to 3/21. It is worth 5 points.

I wanted to use this assignment as an opportunity to show my significant other how important they are to me. I dug through old footage we filmed together last year and attempted to edit it into a coherent narrative that still comes off as a slide show. Since the Movie Maker editor is already somewhat in slide show format, the result is a video that is not high quality, but has the perfect feel of being made with love (I hope).

This is my way of saying thank you for allowing me to constantly stick a camera in your face and use you for various artistic endeavours. This is my way of saying thank you for being my intellectual counterpart before anything else. This is my way of saying thank you for letting me take care of you, and for taking care of me.

This movie is an assembly of clips that summarize what we spent the early part of 2014 discussing. We did our best to impress each other with our theories behind the meaning of the universe. We searched, and referred to what we hoped to find as ‘The Fifth Wall’. We tried to determine exactly what this ‘fifth wall’ would be made out of.

The narrative is hopefully not too difficult to follow: one character walks away, and the other attempts to find them, getting help from memories of their discussions together.

Above all else, this movie is meant to be a love letter, not only to my significant other today, but also to our younger selves, and to the act of falling in love.

Here is the letter:

5 Stars

Take a journey through the friendship of Shirley Mayfield and Veronica Smith. Shopping pals, with a flare for fashion and fun this video from Veronica to Shirley is a symbol of their friendship. Friendship is very near and dear to Veronica’s heart and she created this video to honor her best friend.

This video was no easy task. At first it seemed easy but I quickly realized it would take time. I first found several period pictures on Google. I tried to keep all the girls within the pictures looking some what the same… to create a visual identity with Veronica and Shirley. After I found all the imagines, I knew I wanted to add words… but how? I searched and searched on YouTube to see if such a thing was possible. If there was I couldn’t find it. So plan B! I used PowerPoint to type out my slides. I used a black background to stick to the black and white theme. I used courier font because to me it looks like typewriting and therefore more 1940s. I typed out my sentences on 7 slides and then made them into photos. I finally uploaded all the slide photos and other pictures and arranged them in the order I wanted. I played around with the slide transitions and durations. I also added a jazz tune for more 1940s effect. This assignment was fun to make but was also tedious at times. I hope Shirley enjoys Veronica’s video montage!

For my first video assignment, I chose the Special Person Montage because it immediately made me think of how much I miss my niece. My niece, whom my brother and sister-in-law named Cassryn Jane, was my brother’s first child and the light of me and my family’s life. She’s the cutest, most energetic little 1 year old ever. My brother, an amateur photographer takes photos of her often and posts them to Flickr. The following photos are a compilation of memorable events in her life during her first years.

I chose to include an instrumental version of the song “Ain’t It Fun” by Paramore. Although Cassryn is only 1, she’s pretty advanced for her age. In fact, it scares me that she knows how to operate an iPad/iPhone to watch her kid’s songs. Every time Paramore comes on, she sings along. So excited to celebrate her 2nd birthday this coming January!

For my third (5 star) video assignment I chose to commemorate my daughter. She just recently enlisted into the United States Navy, with Veteran’s Day just passing I thought this would be a great tribute to her. I dropped many tears in the process, still absorbing the unselfish sacrifice that she has chosen to make. A beautiful girl in the flesh and in her spirit, a child I had always known would be capable of extraordinary things. She has made me a proud parent and assured me that my job was efficient and complete. Enjoy a brief but private moment into the life of a new soldier!

All pictures and video were uploaded to Movie Maker. Audio, after being suggested by my fellow classmate and “Biddie 4Life” was uploaded to audacity for minor trimming to silence video coverage within this video. I then uploaded the final edits to YouTube and embedded here.

Having my son is one of the greatest things to ever happen to my life and no words can express how much I love him. This video is for you my little man.

This assignment was perfect! Someone special to me is my niece, Colbie Joy. She just entered our lives in August, but has already made such an impact in this world. Since she lives so close to UMW, I get to see her often, which can only mean a million pictures will be taken of her! I created this video montage from the day she was born up until today.

Process:

First thing was to find the pictures to put into iMovie.. this took me sometime because I got so distracted looking through them all.

Once I narrowed it down, I placed them into iMovie and rearranged them to how I needed it. Once, that was all done I added a theme to the video. I found this website extremely helpful given I don’t know much about iMovie. I used the theme ‘scrapbook’, which was perfect for this type of video!

I then looked through the already preloaded sound effects and used the theme music ‘modern’. Once that was all set, I uploaded it to Vimeo.

Another of the video assignments I decided to complete was one that I created. I decided to kill 2 birds with 1 stone by creating a video assignment for ds106 as well as completing it for my weekly assignments. I am naming this one Special Person Montage. Basically, you are to choose someone who is special to you. Whether they are related to you, friends, a celebrity, or anyone they must just be special to you. A few weeks ago my grandfather passed away at age 95 and I wanted to create a memorial video for his memorial service. He had 7 children, 10 grandchildren, and 1 great grandchild. So first I contacted each relative and asked for them to send me any pictures they had of my Pap (that’s what we called him). What took the most time was trying to find pictures from his earlier years prior to digital. I had to go through countless boxes of pictures and then scanned the ones I wanted to use. It actually worked pretty well just was really time consuming. I had to crop a few photos but they turned out pretty good. I created a similar video 5 years ago for his 90th birthday party so I had an idea as to what I wanted to do. I didn’t want to make the video super sappy and what not so I chose some background instrumental music that was neutral. I used My Eyes -Blake Shelton, All You Need Is Love – The Beatles, 100 Years – Five For Fighting, Isn’t She Lovely – Stevie Wonder, and Good Life – One Republic. Like I said I used instrumental for each of these and I used an online converter to get the music from youtube. My video is about 20 minutes long but no one should make a 20 minute long video for this assignment. I did this because I wanted to created for the family and the memorial service so obviously I put a lot more into it than anyone should for this assignment. Using windows movie maker I imported all the pictures, added some animation, a beginning title slide, and music to top it all off. I don’t expect anyone to watch the whole movie but just skim through a couple areas to see what the general idea of this video assignment is.

I chose my Pap as my special person because he has always been there for me. He has provided me with wisdom and life lessons throughout my entire life. He was a WWII Veteran, raised 7 kids, a faithful man, hardworking, and much more. He has been such a significant part to me life and is beyond special to me.

I decided to rate this 5 stars because the time it takes to gather old photos of someone special to you is hard and time consuming. If the person only has pictures in the digital age then this may be a 3/4 star assignment but I think 4 is fair if you have to find old pictures and scan them in order to use them.