We are Wizards

           The Internet has come a long way, it has changed the way we consume media differently.  Today, accessing  media is much more simpler and also more accessible due to the Internet. Without the Internet back in the days it was hard to follow the media and follow the things you liked because it was expensive to attend concerts, movies and buy magazines that would talk about them.  Furthermore, the internet has made the life of those that love something like the wizards loves Harry Potter, much easier for them to create their own band and follow their passion. It also has made his or her passion to be spread much faster, convenient and larger since the internet can be easily accessible by everyone.  They are able to target a higher audience at one time.  From this movie we were also able to see that the media can influence easily from different ages. A great example of this was the 2 little kids that are around 7 years old, which have their own little band and use their guitar and garage band to make their own music.

       When Warned Brothers first found out about these Harry Potter fans website they did not like it, because they could be going against the policy of Warner Brothers and that they are using their ideas and their intellectual properties.  However, the fans started to boycott and stopped buying anything Harry Potter except the books, to show to the Warner Brothers that they are a powerful community.  After this incident, the Internet has become a threat to this group of fans that became so large for the fans of Harry Potter. Creating fan sites about Harry potter was actually crossing the border of Warner Brothers law. The fan culture of Harry Porter has change for the few years some people keep saying that “it is evil” and parents shouldn’t allow them to watch it. This has affected the community in a way that a lot of members are restricted to join this embarking journey of Harry Porter fans and books. 

Final project draft

This week we were able to finally film for ou project. We met with Katherine at my apartment and completed all the filming that we had to do. we didany footage, actually more then we had too. We just wanted to be sure that we had more then enough materia. To make our video. We had many difficulties on the wabe because of our video camera. We couldn’t locate the cable of the camera in order to transfer the video. After some time looking we found and it was able to complete a rough draft of our project . From what you can see we filmed our video in a very quite setting without any background noise. We want our video to be very serious  to show the seriousness of this whole project. Katherine the girl we interviewed was very nice and was willing to help us on whatever we needed. The interview got very personal with a lot of details and information that can be very useful for our video. We want to publish this video everywhere we could in our facebooks, twitter, istantgram and also tumblr, like this we will be to find the video in alot of places. We also want to place it on youtube and also try to get a very catchy name that can be easily found through youtube and google. The camera that we used it was very good and the quallity of the video also came out very nice.We have very high expectations for our video and I believe it is going to turn out great. This is our rough cut and I hope you guys enjoy it.

 

Final Project Ideas

After looking over Creative commons I came across very interesting pictures, videos and music that would be useful for me to use in my project.  For my final project my group and I are going to interview someone that had a car accident and after that accident she was affected by spinal injury. She has been doing many treatments and her life has changed severely after this situation.

Picture:

http://s0.geograph.org.uk/geophotos/03/12/54/3125411_d577cf55.jpg

The first picture I came across was of 3 individuals racing on a track field. These individuals all have spinal injury, which does not allow them to walk, in words they are paralyzed. The most important aspect of this picture is the fact that even though these people are not able to walk they still found the strength and the energy to find a sport that they enjoyed and they were still be able to practice. I feel that this picture is very important simply because it can be an inspiration to many individuals that just recently suffered from spinal injury or for those that have had but hasn’t yet found a motivation to their everyday lifestyle.  Individuals needs to feel that they CAN do a lot of the things they did before, but just in a modified way and that life should not stop because one can walk.

Video:

When I came across this video I couldn’t look at any other video. This video describes everything I had in mind in order to show my ideas for the final project. This video is fantastic because this project is designated to help those with spinal injury to walk again. I feel that this video is also an motivation video that can be very effective in my final project as the last scene in order to capture the attention of my audience. The most interesting aspect of this video is that idea that almost every state has their on Project Walk and a partnership with the foundation that we are working with would be very good.

Music:

When it come to music I thought it was very difficult deciding what style to choose or even if I was going to find one. After looking over some samples I thought the best type to choose was to eb a calm song. Our video is going to filmed in a very quite ambient with barely any sound, so when we have transitions between pictures and clips in our final video including this calm song would give a nice transition and a nice feel to the overall theme of my video. The video is supposed to be informational so having any other style of music such as rock, pop or reggae would not fit in.

Changes after the storyboard

I have to say that my group and I have worked very hard on our storyboard. We searched online for many pictures in order to show what exactly we wanted to show on that specific scene. We were also veyr detailed in what that scene should represent to our viewers. The person that we are going to interview has a very interesting story and that is shown on our storyboard, because we focus most of our boards on her !  I think an element that my group needs to include in this process is also finding another video or scenes of other people that have these problems in order to show different points of view and different ideas to our audience. I know it is goingot be more challenging for us to find these video because of copyright , but we are going to try our best to find one that will allow us to cut some parts. On the begging of the story board I though that my group was not going to finish because it was very hard communicating virtually on such a big topic on WHAT IS OUR MAIN THEME! HOwever, some days had passed and my group have been working very well together and so far we have been doing a good job on our story board together.  My group and I have very big visions for this project mainly due because we found a great candidate that was willing to participate for this project. I am very nervous to meet her because I am not sure how I would react to such stories. But, I know Christine is very outspoken and has very good communications skill so she will definitely help out in terms of communicating with the person on the day of the interview.  I am very excited to see the outcome.

Groups Creative Direction

The interacting that I had today with my teammates was very good. The amount time we were given was very good because it allowed us to get our thoughts together and to talk about certain things that we want out project to have, such as videos or questions. My team members so far has been great they are very proactive and definitely wants to get the work done ahead and deliver a great project that would be very successful and potentially be picked by one of the founders of the foundation we are making the videos for.  My team overall is very creative and during our mini meeting today we had discussed different approaches we could take if our main idea does not become effective or when it comes to filming we find out that our idea is not very effective.  We also brainstormed different ideas when it comes what we should do when it comes time to film. We thought about asking the our interviewee different questions about his background and how been paralyzed affects them and if there are some tips that he can give to others that are going though the same problem.  In our storyboard, we want to show different actions such as zooming in and out in different storyboards to show in our video. I think it is very important not to make the video all in one zooming because it makes the viewer a little bored.  In addition, we have to make our storyboard very detailed because when it comes to filming it would be easier since we already have a very well done outline on what to do.  We are going to start working on our storyboard this week and I hope we are able to contact the person we are going to interview in order to go further on with our ideas that we have planned. 

Midterm blog Overview

Here is a list of my top midterm blogs…

1. Kim’s Midterm Blog
< http://dressforsuccess2013.wordpress.com/ >

I have to say my favorite blog was Kim’s blog. I love fashion, however I cant always get on what is on style and what the celebrities are always wearing. First its very expensive and secondly sometimes a lot of their outfits are very unique and its only made once. Coming across Kim’s blog she showed different things that really capture my attention. First was the app that was so amazing that I downloaded instantly.  Coupons are great not only for us young folks but for anyone who loves saving a few bucks here and there. A few days ago I had went to target and thanks to the app that Kim showed us I was able to save $5 dollars that I spent on some things at target. I was extremely excited and happy that I was able to use the app to save me money.  In addition, the app is so broad that it allows you to save the coupon and they made the cuts and its very easy for the workers to simply scan it without any problems. In addition, I really like the fact that Kim showed different items that the celebrities were wearing in a much affordable price that is found in most teens everyday shopping stores. Kim’s blog was a total hit!

2. Christine Collins’ Midterm Blog
< http://christineacollins.wordpress.com/ >

Another blog that I truly enjoyed was Christine’s!  Christine’s blog was very interesting and unique because it was about her and the things that she does and what she watched and some of her opinions too.  From this blog I got to learn a little bit more about Christine and thought it was very unique her radio show participation. I personally never met someone who participates in a radio show, and finally having her as part of my new group is definitely interesting. You could see that her charisma and her communication skills are very good and that is great because it helps her a lot when is time for her to talk to others or present her radio show.  Furthermore, I really liked Christine’s header. I thought it was very intimate and relaxing just like her whole blog was.

3. Amanda Jiang’s Midterm Blog
< http://jiangamanda28blog.wordpress.com/ >

Amanda’s blog really captured my attention because it was very unique, different from everyone else and most important it is very useful. I have a boyfriend and when we go out on dates there is always that question about what we are going to do or what we are going to eat.  Having a blog that dedicates to dates is a great way for couples to get a sense of ideas of what they should do when its time to go out with their significant other.  I must say also that I loved her banner and it really captured my attention with it.  Finally, I was very connected to her blog since the audience was directed to people like me who sometimes find it hard to choose places and find out what to do with their boyfriends when its time to go on dates.

4. Julian Sieczkowski’s Midterm Blog
< http://juliansieczkowski1.wordpress.com/ >

Even though I am not very into sports I must say that Julian did a very good job creating his blog. I had gone to a hockey match only once at the prudential center and I must say it was very fun and exiting. So, coming across his blog I felt that I was a little bit more interested because I had see hockey before.  However, the thing that captured my attention in Julian’s blog was his use of colors and also his content that he included in his first post. He did a very good job designing the blog with attractive and capturing color like the yellow and black.  Also, his post included a lot of information that a hockey fan would be every interesting to read and would like to follow his blog.

5. Michael’s Midterm Blog
< http://michaelmusicblog.wordpress.com/>

I really enjoyed looking over Michael’s blog because it was very interesting the idea of incorporating a video about our school and finding out one of the events that happened at our school.  I like the fact that he incorporated different music in the background instead of only showing the people screaming. This video was unique because the Harlem shake has become very big and for him to create a video that incorporated our school in this huge trend is a great way for out school to get involved with the rest of the internet sensations.

Creative Process

When deciding what to do for my midterm blog I couldn’t resist the urge to do a blog about traveling.

I love traveling and creating a blog about it would be a lot of fun and would be interesting also for my own informational purposes.  The hardest part for me when it came to post on the blog was to decide which country should I feature first in my first post.  While watching my Brazilian soap-operas they showed tiny films and pieces of Turkey and I absolutely felt in love with it. I felt in love with its colorful mix of cultures, the beautiful buildings and also the amazing culture.  So my first blog post had to be about Turkey, because I would share with my followers the beautiful things I found about this amazing country and I would also be learning a lot from doing research and finding all sorts of different things on the country.  My first post I incorporated a lot of pictures and different information in a way that it was sort of a like tour guide through the country. I included things they should do on while they are staying there and also some tips too for the tourists.  I had a lot of fun learning about the different customs and different ideas that they have. The second part of my blog was thinking about what to make my video about.  I had a very hard time deciding because since my blog is a traveling blog I didn’t want it to be featured just in one country only; however, I didn’t want it either to include the whole world because time was also limited.  After some thought and brainstorming I decided to make my video about only some countries that are unique and shows different cultures. I tried to show different footage that I found in Vimeo from other users that have been to that area and I also tried to include different facts that I found about that country.  The main reason I decided to include the facts in each video was because it was a way to capture my audience attentions. Overall, I thought my whole blog was very interesting and unique and it really captured my audience.

 

Imovie Creation

Hungry Bird from jolr c on Vimeo.

The Hungry Bird

When I was first given this assignment I started to freak out and had no clue on what I was supposed to do. After getting home and viewing the instruction and sample video that was provided, I finally started to see a light at the end of the tunnel. I used Imovie to create this video and I must say that the software is pretty easy to use! It is very user friendly and there are tons of tutorial videos online that shows how to use Imovie.  The biggest challenge for me was not editing the movie, but it was choosing a clip! I searched hundreds of videos at Vimeo and some where too long or others were too boring. At the 26th page of Vimeo I came across this mini clip of the bird wanting to eat a popcorn and I couldn’t resist on not using it for my assignment  I know this video does not have to do with the overall theme of my blog, but I wanted to show my audience something funny that would make them laugh.  This clip instantly reminded me of a game that I used to play on my phone called “Angry Birds” and that is exactly where the first image in my movie comes from and also the theme song of the game is the background noise of the video. I thought that both ideas matched perfectly and the short clip that I created actually came out very nice! Another big challenge that I faced was stoping the music from the first image and allowing the clips music play until the clip was over and restarting the first song for the credits at the end.  After watching some tutorial videos on youtube I was finally able to figure out what to do and overcame this challenge that took me over 30 minutes to figure out.  Using Imovie was a great experience and I must say is an experience that will be used many times.  For my mom upcoming birthday I wanted to make her a video and had no clue on what software to use, and after this assignment I finally found the perfect tool! This technique can be used for many things such as photo slideshow and other school related materials that could come handy sometime in the future. I hope you guys enjoy the video!

My Podcast

 

Podcast? Garageband?

Those are all foreign terms that I was introduced this week.  In the beginning of this assignment those terms were like “mosters” to me; they were scary, big and I did not want to deal with them.  However, we can’t run forever, sometimes we just have to face our fears and overcome the challenges. I will tell you how I overcame the fear of Garageband and killed the “monster”! While in class, I watched the informative tutorial on Garageband that was provided and I must say that it was extremely helpful. The instructor showed many shortcuts and introduced many new concepts that were very useful while making my podcast such as fade out.  This fade out concept allows the music to be decreased gradually in order to end the song or to blend two songs together.  This concept was extremely successful especially when I was about to talk and when my second music was going to start playing.  I must say the biggest obstacle that I faced during this assignment was to find the right time to split the song and introduce the other one.  It requires one to be playing close attention not only to the song and what the person is singing, but also to the temple of the music. Finding the exact place where both songs are going to gradually blend in is a challenge that takes a long time to accomplish.

In my own experience, I had tried with three different songs and none of them worked well with the temple; however, after some attempts I was able to find the one that matched and the one that I liked it a lot. I think that my final work was very good. I am extremely proud of my accomplishment that I even shared this podcast introduction to some friends and family. I believe it was a good production especially for someone that never worked with such tool before.  Podcasting and using Garageband is amazing and can have tremendous use for those that are willing to put enough time and effort into their work, like I did for this project.  Using garageband requires a lot of attention spam and I believe that the person needs to be somewhat creative in order to achieve a great ending project. Podcasts is huge in todays culture, because it allows one to listen to their favorite subjects without hearing adds and other stuff that is presented in radios today. Finally, I really enjoyed playing around with Garageband and creating this podcast and I wished we were able to create a full podcast instead of just an intro. It would allow us students to show a little bit more of our creativity.

Below you will find my podcast, and I hope you will enjoy it. 

 

By the way the two songs name are :

I am Day Dreaming by Reed

and

Deep in Love by Tom Boxer & Morena

The World of Pixlr

WOW…I must say that this week has been rough. Working with Pixlr is not easy, I had a lot of trouble! Even though Pixlr is a web base application and it is supposed to be simpler and less complex than Photoshop it was still very difficult dealing with it.  I must say that the hardest part of this whole header process is figuring it out how to clone and blend in two different images in one. I spent a good amount of hours trying to play around with the saturation, sponge and the lasso tool in order to figure out how the two images were going to blend in. As this process of messing around, I found the tool called the “wand”. The wand is much simpler than using the lasso tool because it automatically knows where are the parts or backgrounds that you want to remove.  In other words the wand is very convenient. Finally, I realized that messing around with the saturation, brightness & contrast was not going to help me much blend in the two images together.  The main tool that is need is called “opacity”, and of course this tool was hidden very well.  I took a while to figure out where this tool was located. After, I learned a little bit about Pixlr I could definitely use it to edit some of my own photography pictures. I use Picassa, which allows you to do some changes but nothing major. However, now that I am getting the hang of using Pixly my photography editing are going to come out much better and I can do much more with it  such as cloning  and removing unwanted things from my pictures. So, now let me explain a little bit about my pictures.  I wanted to show my readers a little bit about myself and what I like, and there was no better header to create than blending in a camera and the beach. Taking pictures and messing around with a photography camera is one of my hobbies.  I love taking pictures of objects and uncommon things that are not seen by an ordinary eyes.  On the other hand, the beach is one of my favorite spots to hang out. Since I was little I used to love the beach and how the waves was so different time to time, I simply loved everything about the beach! In this header, you may wonder why is the camera on top of the beach, but the idea behind it that I am using the object I love which is the “camera” and shooting a picture of my favorite place, the “beach”.  I hope you guys understand where the idea behind my banner comes from and here is some pictures from my personal portfolio that I edit using Pixlr…

Here is the Portuguese sentence for the week:

Como esta você?

(How are you?)

See you soon!