Final Reflections

This is my last class as a Mass Communication masters student and my first IT class.  I found out about it when Dr. Yuen sent out an email to my department chair.  I am glad I took the class.    I enjoyed it so much that I considered an IT minor in the PhD program.  (Note:  I decided to continue my education at another university.) 

Dr. Yuen took the time to explain every project.  He also posted instructional videos for every assignment.  His style was casual and encouraging.  He created a safe learning environment.  By that I mean I never felt intimidated.  I always felt like I could ask questions in class or out of class.  Dr. Yuen also has a great sense of humor.  He made each class fun.  I would take another one of his classes and recommend him to other students. I hold Dr. Yuen in high regard.   He never missed a class or showed any signs of displeasure even with all of the upheaval his department faced.  He was always a professional.  

I had never taken a hybrid course before this one.  It was a little confusing at first.  I had to keep track of when we were meeting.  I am proud to say that I never missed a class because of a schedule error on my part.  However, I did feel funny on the nights we did not meet face to face.  I felt like I was missing a class.  I kept wondering if I should log on to some site or something to prove I was still a part of the class.

I liked some of the programs we used and disliked others.  I will never use Video Toolbox again. There are other free or inexpensive programs out there.  Movie Maker and iMovie come with the basic packages of most computers these days.  I doubt I will use Dropbox after this class.  It has a good concept, but there are other ways to store data.  Fuzzwich was fun to play around with, but it was too limited.  On the other hand, I will use Jing again. 

I liked the text book.  I know some people did not like it, but I work in video production so it is a type of book I would use.  I will hang on to it for future reference.  I may even use it in a production class one day.  However, I will say that I did not like the exam. I’ve been in video production for five years and I couldn’t answer all those questions.  My mentors have over thirty years of teaching and professional experience between them and they couldn’t answer some of the questions.  I know we had to have a test but did it have to be that long?  Couldn't the test have been based on the projects we did or things we discussed in class?               

Oh well, moving on to the social network.  I thought it was helpful.  I liked looking at my classmates’ work. I also used it for reference many times during the semester, especially during this last project. 

Last of all I will make a few comments about the blog.  I found out that I like to blog. I will most likely redo this blog and keep it up as a professional outlet.  I will also create another blog for personal use.  I have already started collecting photographs and stories to post on that one.   

This class seemed easy when I started it, but it did challenge me.  I learned new skills.  I was humbled more than once.  I appeared on one of my own videos.  (Y’all have no idea what an accomplishment that was.) I even blogged for the first time.  Although I enjoy writing, I do have trouble sharing my thoughts with others.  This forced me to take a bold step forward. 

Assignment 8: Fuzzwich Animation

I loved cartoons when I was a kid.  I didn't just enjoy them.  I didn't just like to watch them. I loved them! My parents couldn't pry me out of bed with a crow bar on school days but come Saturday I was up before sunrise.  I would be on the couch with a bowl of hyper sugared cereal on my lap before the Farm Report ended.

My childhood was filled with Manta and Moray, the Super Friends, Web Woman, Super Stretch and Micro Woman, the Mighty Orbots and Spiderman and His Amazing Friends.  (I think I just showed my age with those choices.) Sure there were other cartoons-Smurfs, Punky Brewster and the occasional Kid Video, but those were just the filler you settled for until something better came on.  I was pretty hardcore from an early age and saw through the networks’ clever ruse.  I knew if I waited through Pac Man and The Littles they would come off the good stuff-Dungeons and Dragons, Blackstar and Thundar the Barbarian.  Oh yeah, I was into the hard stuff and there was no going back.        

Soon Saturday morning wasn’t enough for me.  It started with a little Tom and Jerry after school, but then someone slipped a little Battle of the Planets (aka G Force, aka Science Ninja Team Gatachaman) into my afternoon lineup. It was unlike anything I had ever seen before.  It had complex storylines, real character development and semi-realistic violence. I was hooked instantly.  Before I knew what hit me I had become a sad little eight-year-old strung out on Manga.  But it didn’t stop there.  Long after my friends moved on to ‘more important things’ like puberty, hair ribbons and boyfriends I was at home catching episodes of The Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers, GI Joe, Silverhawks and Transformers.  I moved into drawing characters, comic books and even-gasp-fanfiction. I was the only teenage girl I knew that had a poster of the Thundercats on her wall.   Sure there were boys in my life, but if they couldn’t hold their own in a three hour conversation about the merits of Lion Force Voltron vs Vehicle Voltron then I didn’t need them.  (No actually, I didn’t date that much in high school.  Why do you ask?)

Then one day I ‘grew up.’  I’m not sure when it happened.  It was somewhere after my hardcore gamer days and my unlimited access to Manga phase (And by gamer I mean role playing games, not video games.  Remember, I’m old school.)  Somehow the thrill of animation was lost to me.  I got a ‘real job,’ paid my bills on time, had the house and the cars and the zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz…………

Oh, sorry I dozed off for a decade.  Now that I am older and wiser it occurs to me that one can be an adult and enjoy animation.  I can just as easily apply for a job at Cartoon Network as I can an ad agency.  I can choose to continue my education in Orlando-home of Disney & Universal Studios or Boulder-home of a lot of hippies.  I was never able to develop my artistic talent, but I am a kick-ass writer and a creative force.  I think I’ll go polish up my resume now. 

Oh almost forget the critique.  Fuzzwich is a good basic program, but lacks choice.  I would rather create my own characters with Flash or Toon Boom.

PS

Zombies rule!      

Assignment 7: Showbeyond

This was by far the most meaningful assignment of the semester for me.  The last months have been difficult for my family.  We have had to deal with a terminal illness, two deaths and a host of other serious problems.  It has been one thing after another after yet another.  My mother was under a ton of stress and I knew she needed a break.  So I checked out a Nikon D60 DSLR camera with a couple of lenses for her to use over the weekend.  She was thinking about buying one so this gave her a chance to try it out to see if she liked it.  It also gave us a chance to get away from all the awful things that were happening.

We spent a whole Saturday taking pictures.  We crossed the county from city to swamp. We photographed a 150-year-old church, an old school house, my nephew’s little league football game and dozens of other things.  We spent the longest amount of time at the greenway.  It usually takes about twenty minutes to casually walk the length of the trail.  We were there for over two hours. My mother is a nature lover and she passed that on to me.  It seemed like there was something new and beautiful to look at with every step we took.  All the wildflowers were in full bloom and the light was absolutely perfect.  Although it was a beautiful day there were very few people out on the trail.  For the most part we were there alone in the peace and quiet of nature.   

I had planned on using some photographs I had taken at the county fair for my Showbeyond project.  They were bright, fun and colorful but the greenway held the most meaning to me.  The hardest part of the assignment was choosing which photographs to include in the slideshow.  (I had taken hundreds of pictures that weekend.)   My favorite among them all was the picture of my mom looking through her camera.  At that moment she was not thinking about my uncle’s cancer or my niece’s passing.  She wasn’t thinking about all the bad things that were happening in our lives.  She was just taking a photograph. She was happy, calm and completely relaxed. 

I found Showbeyond to be an easy program to use for the most part.  There were a couple of glitches.  First some of my pictures got out of order for some reason and I had a little trouble rearranging them.  Second, I had the most trouble getting the background music to fit the slideshow.  I used Audacity to cut the length exactly to the preview.  However, every time I tried to drop the music into the show I got a warning that it was too long.  So I tried to cut the length shorter.  Then it was way too short.  It stopped before the last two slides. This is why some of the slides are short and some are longer than others.  I had to get the length as close as I could in Audacity and then adjust the slides after the music was dropped.  I have to say I prefer programs that allow me to see the audio and video timelines and work on each as needed.    

Assignment 6: Prezi

Ah Prezi.  I had such high hopes for this program.  It looks good.  It is easy to use.  It makes any presentation look amazing, but two little words bring it down.

Motion Sickness!

I have seen two Prezi presentations used in class.  Both gave me motion sickness.  One was not too bad.  The guy used a slower transition speed and kept the project fairly simple.  The other was a nightmare.  The girl that used that Prezi had these long swooping transitions with blinding speed.  I had to turn my back to the screen.  It was so bad that I could not look at it without instant vertigo.  I know my case is extreme.  Not everyone will get motion sickness watching a Prezi. (At least I hope not since it really is a good program.)  My problem with motion sickness prevents me from watching 90% of the video games on the market today.  It also keeps me from enjoying virtual reality rides with flying monkeys on magic carpets, but that is another story involving mega doses of Dramamine and a thoroughly miserable night in what is supposed to be the happiest place on earth.     


Having said all that, here are some words of advice for anyone that uses Prezi:
1.Slow down.  Slower transitions are easier on those of us that suffer from motion sickness.
2. Shorten the transition space.  Long swooping transitions might look good to you, but they set off the motion sickness like crazy.  Really, it’s like riding a roller coaster, but without the fun.

I chose to do a Halloween project because it was close to Halloween. I could have just as easily done it on Valentine’s Day or National Fried Chicken Day. (Yes, that is a real holiday that is celebrated on July 6.)   OK maybe I also did it this way because I really like Halloween.  My birthday is in October so I always kinda thought of Halloween as my holiday.  Besides, you get to dress up, eat tons of sweets (sorry Erica) and transform any mundane home into a haunted house complete with crazed pumpkin eating jack-o-lanterns. 

Yes, this was my house and it is also the same décor base I used in the Video Toolbox project.

I chose a dark background for the Prezi to give it a more ominous appearance.  I got the video from YouTube.  That was the easy part.  I found the video on the first try.  It was a good short length, but gave a lot of information.  From there I just collected pictures from the internet and filled in the story.   

Assignment 5: Video Toolbox

I had a lot of fun with this one. I got to use my camera again. (And for
anyone who is wondering I use a Canon Rebel T2i-the most super awesome camera on the market right now. It takes amazing photographs and HD video. I love, love, love it.)

Like I said in an earlier post, it is an addiction.

I was not sure what to do with this project.  As usual I had waited until the last minute to decide. Lucky for me the weather held or I would have had to find something else to do.  I needed to start the fall decorating so I combined the two projects.  Usually I am one of those crazy people that starts planning the Halloween decorations around Labor Day.  My husband and I used to live in an old house.  It was perfect for doing a creepy haunted house every year.  This house is newer and nicer and I doubt the neighbors would appreciate some of the things we did at the old place.  We were surrounded by college students there.  They loved it when the undead toy armies clawed their way out of graves or giant spiders feasted on trapped fairies.  Here we were given strict orders not to scare the neighbor’s children. 

How boring is that?

 So I decided on a subtle fall decoration instead of going all out like I usually do.  There were no tombstones this year, just some hay bales and a few flowers. I set up the  camera and went to work.  I didn’t bother to record any audio because I knew I was going to speed up the action from time to time.       

This is also a VERY rare occasion. I hardly ever get in front of the camera. The fact that I did it is probably the most significant event for me this semester. I videoed myself and I posted it on YouTube!  No one has ever gotten me to do that before. 

Video toolbox was a very user friendly program.  It is simple and that was, to me, the main drawback.  I normally use more advanced editing software.  In fact, I edited my video in Premier Pro and then dropped it into Toolbox.  Personally, I would not use this program again, but this is because I have access to better editing software.

One thing I would have changed is the screen size.  It was way too small.

Assignment 3: Audacity

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/11537815/kristiedillistone-assignment3.mp3

This one was easy for me because I have worked with Audacity and volunteered at WUSM as a DJ.  I first worked with Audacity in MCJ 111-Introduction to Radio Production.  The instructor made sure we all downloaded the program so that we could use it in the lab section of the class.  WSUM uses it to record voice tracks for public service announcements, news updates and other re-recorded things.  Everything is then put into another program with the music tracks.  All the DJ has to do is record introductions and station identifications and she is good to go. I did the jazz show on weekends, but usually recorded my show on Tuesdays.   Thanks to the wonders of modern technology I was able to live out my dream of being a DJ and never had to give up a single Saturday night to do it.     

This project was also fun because I won free weekend passes to Bayfest!  I went ahead and did the project early because I knew I would have a busy weekend.  Doing a spot for the festival was an easy choice.  I had already looked over the schedule a million times to see which acts were playing.    


I chose several music clips from different acts that were appearing at Bayfest.  There was an amazing variety of music there that weekend. Everything from gospel to heavy metal to country to folk to hip-hop to blues was on the stages.  I selected an assortment of music that represented the widest range I could find.  There was some Motley Crue, a bit of Reba and a touch of Mary J. Blige thrown in the mix along with some gospel and jazz.   Each clip was brought in as an individual track then edited together as a master track. 

Finding the information and selecting the clips was the easy part.  The hard part was coming up with a voice over.  I stopped counting how many tracks I recorded for that part.  Some were a few sentences long.  Others were just short clips. It took me a while to get everything together, but I was satisfied with the final product.

I did do something very wrong on this project.  I was supposed to turn it in as an MP3 on a CD.  Instead of doing this I combined this project with another project on a single data disk.  Big mistake!  It ended up costing me a whole letter grade.

Assignment 4: Jing

http://www.screencast.com/users/KristieDawn/folders/kristie_dillistone_assignment4

     

Grrrrrrrrr.....Worst project ever!

Ok I have to take full responsibility for this one.  I completed the project and turned it in.  However, there were some things missing.  I was supposed to capture some video and do some narration or something.  Heck, I don’t know cause clearly I misunderstood the directions.     


Honestly, even though this was the most problematic project as far as grades go I have found Jing to be very handy. I have it on my laptop and my desktop.  I would use it again, especially if I needed to explain something.  There are so many uses for it. 

If I have questions about something I go to YouTube.  You can find answers to almost anything on YouTube.  Need to know how to color correct in Premier Pro?  Go to YouTube.  Need to know how to build a raised bed for your garden? Go to YouTube. I see Jing (or Jing-like programs) all the time on that site.  I see it on Photoshop tutorials, SPSS tutorials, Final Cut Tutorials and more.  I wondered how they captured some of the images/video.  Now I know. 

So why did I choose a boring old tour of the USM library databases for my project when I could have done something better?  (Did I mention that I misunderstood the directions?) The main reason I did it was because of my husband.  He is an under grad in Mass Communication and Journalism with an emphasis in Media Production.  He had to write a paper and asked me where he could find some information.  I told him EBSCO Host would be good for what he needed and he gave me a blank stare. As a graduate student I visit the databases several times a week.  I know how to navigate the system with my eyes closed.  He is a junior in a largely project based program and hasn’t had to do any major research papers yet. After a quick tutorial on the library website he was ready to go. 

So after giving him the nickel tour I decided to sit down and do the same thing again as my Jing project.  I thought it was an ok project.  Sure it was a little dull, but EBSCO isn’t the most exciting thing in the world.  It was informative and it was helpful to anyone that had not used the databases before.  Alas, it didn’t have any video or a voice over.  And for that I got a bad grade.

Next time I’m going to break out the After Effects and make someone’s head explode.