PROJECTS
This semester I created a variety of videos that focused on convergence journalism that ranged from feature stories to news stories to intro videos.  I really enjoyed creating all of the projects, but there were a few that were my favorite.



Olathe Northwest: 1 in 2,000
One of the earliest projects I created was ONW 1 in 2,000. This video focused on explaining the story of one student at Olathe Northwest and what they do that is unique. I chose to interview Ryan Burnett on his taekwondo lessons that he completes and teaches to other students at Ko martial arts. This video took around two weeks to complete and was mainly completed during the seventh hour class period. I learned a lot of skills through this video. I learned how to create titles and more efficiently edit videos in premier pro. I received mainly good feedback on this project, but if I did this project again I would add more interesting shots and a stronger voiceover. Overall, I was very happy with this video since it was one of my first news stories I had ever made.



Electrathon Feature Story
Another video I created this semester was a feature story over Laurie Gilson, a Senior and leader in the Electrathon team. This feature story project focused on interviewing a specific student involved in a club or activity at Olathe Northwest. This video was a lot different from the first because I had to communicate with students and teachers to find someone to interview. I really learned communication skills through this project as well as how to film effective b-roll. The main challenge with filming this video was the location of the interview. There wasn't a good location to film in the Engineering Academy hallway and Laurie didn't have enough time to travel to a different classroom.  If I was to film this again, I would definitely find a better location that would be more interesting and have less back ground noise.  Overall this video was also very enjoyable to make and it taught me how to find students to interview.



Blood Drive Feature Story
The next video we made was a feature story on a club or event at Olathe Northwest. I chose to interview Bessie Bauman, student councils president, on how the blood drive is run and how it effects the community. For this video we had a little over a week to film and edit and it was stressful to complete the project on time. I had only one day to film my video and it was challenging to get enough shots because of the privacy of patients donating blood. I also didn't film enough stable shots and had a lot of pans that created a very busy video. If I was to re-film this video I would shoot more b-roll and close ups.



Raven Remarks: Holiday Edition
The final project we completed in video production was an episode of ONW now. For this video Ryan and I decided to create a news story over ugly sweater day by asking students and teachers questions on the holiday season. This video was done in around 2 weeks and we only had one day to film the video. We ran into a few problems with audio in this project because we used the microphones for the first time.  Because the hallways were so busy, it was difficult to hear students and at the same time the microphone wasn't plugged in correctly and only picked up a little of the audio. This video, however did teach me a lot of skills. It was a really different style of video because I had to go into the halls and ask students questions. It really taught me communication skills because at times it can be intimidating to ask people questions but I learned how to effectively. Overall, I really enjoyed filming this video and would definitely want to do similar videos in the future.

TIME IN CLASS
In class I use my time very productively. I always make sure I focus on completing my video on time and that it is to the best of my ability. Sometimes, I finish early and I use that time to explore graphic design projects or going through my video and finding tiny mistakes to fix. I also spent a lot of time throughout this semester filming and editing videos outside of class. I filmed the majority of the school b-roll outside of class as well as editing on my computer. Most of my projects are edited at school and perfected at home. I also do a lot of other projects outside of class. I am on the media team on 1710 FIRST robotics at Olathe Northwest and I spend the majority of my week filming video and taking pictures of the team. I also volunteer at a variety of robotics events. I took pictures and film for the Engineering Academy open house as well as photography and video at the FIRST Lego League competition hosted at Olathe Northwest. I also love photography and use any free time to take pictures of my friends and family. I spend a lot of time editing pictures of my dog as well as my sister and sharing them on my flickr page. Photography has taught me a lot of video skills such as angles and editing that I can take into entertainment next semester.

STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES
I think one of my strengths is time management. Although I am very busy with other clubs and activities, I always spend time editing at home to make sure all my videos are completed on time. However, I am still learning how to take good b-roll and how to make sure the audio is working every time.

SUMMARY
This semester I really enjoyed the freedom on certain projects to choose who I wanted to interview and how I wanted to tell the story. It was also really exiting to learn how to make an episode of ONW Now and to see how the whole class has improved in our videos.

If I could change something about this semester it would be the location of my videos. I now know how to choose good lighting and location and that is something I wish my videos consisted of at the beginning of the semester.

Overall this semester has really shown me how interesting other strands of video are. Although I know for sure I want to go into entertainment, it was cool to see what goes on behind every episode of ONW now and how the feature and news stories are used.

Next semester, I hope to take the skills I have learned about filming and editing and incorporate those skills into the entertainment projects I make next semester. I am really exited to create short films as well as music videos and I think it will be very exiting to see how much more I can develop as a journalist and director throughout the next year.

SEMESTER PROJECTS

This semester I really enjoyed creating infographics, designing personal logos, as well as creating a powerpoint on a graphic design movement or person. One of my personal favorite projects was creating an infographic. For my infographic, I chose to create it over the varsity cross country team because this year the varsity girls qualified as a team for state. For this project, I used a simple blue color scheme and included several graphics that related to the sport. This project took around 2 weeks to completely create and I am very pleased with the way it turned out. On this project it was difficult to come up with a layout that I liked that would be organized and relative to the topic. However, from this project I learned how to create graphics to represent certain topics or ideas. All my feedback on this project was positive. Lot's of students in my class enjoyed my graphics as well as color and typeface selection. 


Another project I really enjoyed was creating a personal logo.  In this project I got to design a logo that would most represent my brand. Since I am very interested in hand lettering I decided to add a cursive L into my design. I chose an L along with my last name to represent who I am as a designer. The fun design of a decorative L really adds a creative style to my brand. I also have a patch version of my logo that uses the word designs to explain what occupation my logo represents. I tried not to use sharp edges and shapes because I wanted my logo to be more friendly and in a creative style. I also have a darker color scheme to balance the very smooth and creative graphics. This project didn't take that much time and was around 5 days max. It was really hard for me to come up with an idea for my logo, but I am happy with the way it turned out. If I was able to have more time on this project, I would probably have perfected the L more and created some ways my logo can be used in branding. As a class we didn't review each others logos, so I didn't receive much feedback on my design. Overall, being able to create a logo was really enjoyable because I got to come up with my own ideas in a less structured step by step procedure.

By far, my favorite project was the powerpoint project.  In this project I got to design a powerpoint in adobe illustrator about a specific graphic design movement. For this project, I got to research Swiss Design. The first part of this project was creating a 2 page essay on this movement. Although, the research wasn't that fun, it really helped create a more interesting powerpoint.  Swiss Design is most known for its bright colors and geometric designs along with sans serif fonts. I was able to incorporate that style into my powerpoint by developing a blue and purple color scheme as well as a combination of two sans serif fonts. This project took around two weeks to complete and involved a lot of time at home. Since I wanted to create a tittle slide for each idea, it took a long time for me to make it match the color scheme as well as the overall aesthetic of the powerpoint. I tried to make each slide contain a geometric style along with bold fonts with clean designs. A few challenges I faced was having to come up with new ideas. It was sometimes hard for me find new ways to add graphics and find new ways to use the same color scheme. I definitely learned a lot as a designer through this project. I not only learned about Swiss Design, I also learned who to create a simple clean aesthetic along with a strong color scheme. This project definitely challenged my creativity because of all the different slides I had to make with new designs on each. Overall, this project was very enjoyable because there wasn't many limitations on what you could do as a designer. The project was very open to any ideas you had and you were able to use your creativity to create a design that you liked.

This semester in graphic design, we also used behance to post our projects. I have really enjoyed using behance to publish my work to the world. I also really enjoy being able to design a theme for each project I post.



Throughout, this semester my graphic design skills have definitely improved. I now have a larger understanding of using adobe photoshop and illustrator. My portfolio in graphic design has also really expanded. My blog posts have begun to be more visually interesting as well as my Behance page.

TIME IN CLASS

In class I spend my time very well. With my very busy schedule, I try to make sure I can get as much of my graphics designed in class so that I won't have too much to do at home. Even though I try to get most of my projects done in class, I usually end up spending several hours designing again at home. I am fortunate to have adobe illustrator and photoshop on my computer and this has really helped me design more projects outside of class. In some projects, I have finished early in class and have had free time to design extra credit projects such as the swinging monkey project. I have really enjoyed the extra credit projects because they are another way I can expand my understanding of illustrator.




With the skills I have learned in graphic design I have also been able to help with graphics for my friends and family with any extra free time. For my brothers robotics team, I helped design their informative posters for their signs. I have also been able to help other friends choose good fonts and graphics for their school projects.







STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES 
Throughout this semester, I really developed my skills in photoshop as well as in adobe illustrator. I have always been familiar with the adobe tools in photoshop and now I understand how almost all of them work. By creating the collage of the girl near the beginning of the year, I learned how to make layers and expand backgrounds. This project helped me become very skilled at removing marks or objects from backgrounds by using content aware fill as well as the patch tool. I have also gained several strengths in adobe illustrator. Illustrator has always been my favorite program and now I can easily use the pen tool to trace images or to create unique shapes. I am also very strong at creating color schemes and designs that work together and are simple, clean, and organized.

However, there are a few areas I could use improvement. The pathfinder tool is still a skill I have yet to master. The pathfinder in Adobe Illustrator allows you to rearrange overlapping shapes to create new outlines and designs. This tool is very helpful in graphic design but it does take some time to master. I was able to get more practice with this tool in my powerpoint, but I will continue to practice with the pathfinder tool throughout the rest of this school year.


SEMESTER SUMMARY 

For my second feature story, I interviewed Bessie Bauman for Student Council to describe the blood drive that takes place three times a year at Olathe Northwest. The blood drive at ONW is one of the most successful in the state of Kansas. In my narrative lead, I thought it would be important to include this fact to explain how much ONW advertises this event and how STUCO is looking for even more students to break the previous record of 316 pints of blood. My narrative lead impacted my work because it describes the ultimate goal of the video, to inspire more students to donate and make the blood drive even more successful.

Although my videos general focus was on the blood drive, I also wanted to have interviews from students involved in the process and students who have donated. I chose Bessie Bauman, the student council president as my main interview because she helped organize this years blood drive. Bessie had an important role in organizing the event and the specific committees that helped make it possible. For my second interview I chose Andrew Ost who decided to donate for the first time this year. Having a student who has donated really helped the video because it showed why students have donated and not just that they should. It adds a more personal connection to the story. These two interviews complimented each other well because they described how the blood drive helps the school and the community and how anyone can donate.

Filming the video was a more difficult process since it was only one day. I had to miss class early in the day in order to film my interview and it definitely made the video more rushed. It was also hard for me to get enough b-roll of the blood drive since there was a lot I couldn't film. Editing the video was a lot smoother of a process. The interviews fit together nicely and it was very easy for my to organize my clips and put them together into a video.

The feedback I received from my class was mainly positive, but the one thing I needed to fix was my pan shots. I used quite a few pan shots because when I was filming I was mainly filming still objects and I wanted to make it more interesting. However, in the editing process I realized these clips did not work, but I didn't have another chance to collect b-roll so I had to work with the clips that I already had. I also talk really fast and I need to slow down in my voiceovers.

Altogether, this second feature story really taught me communication skills needed to find a person to interview and finding a time that would work. It was also a new experience in filming a one day event that made the video a little bit more challenging. Even thought there are still things I would change, I am happy with my end result and I have learned several skills I can take into the filming of my classes semester final.

In the article, "Drought has given one woman a new mission in life" Diana Marcum tells the story of the way Donna Johnson helped others throughout the drought in California. Donna Johnson a 72 year old, saw the need for water in families that could no longer supply themselves with water because of their wells drying up. The state saw no need to help these families, but Donna did. She collected donations of bottled water and whenever a family requested water, she was always open to help grant their request.

This article used strong quotations as well as outside reports and statistics to add facts behind their claims. Diana used quotations from Donna that had a strong impact on the article and what the paragraph was talking about. To help support the needs of the families without water, Diana used statistics from state reports to show how many wells have dried up as well as how much water is needed.

One of Diana's strengths was her ability to really describe the droughts situation in California. She used strong details and visual words to help the readers visualize how the drought has had an effect on California citizens. I did not notice any weaknesses in this article. The author did a good job at fully describing the story and using lots of detail.

The authors general conclusions was that even though the whole state was suffering under drought, one person was able to make a difference about the awful situation and find a way to help others. The main conclusion of this article I believe is important and was well thought through. The article is an inspiration to others to find ways to help others and that it doesn't matter who you are or where you live because we can all do something to help the community.

The evidence is very convincing because it uses statistics from other companies and well known businesses.

This article can apply to the way to write a feature story in video production. The feature story does a really good job with including a strong narrative lead. The story was very well written and provided a lot of facts and information that I should work to include in my feature stories that I can write in class.

Altogether, I thought this article was very well written and that it created a good story that incorporated several facts and strong quotations.

Check out the article:



Drought has given one woman a new mission in life 

In video class, after analyzing several feature stories I concluded what parts of a feature story are necessary to create a visually interesting video that also shares informative information about a chosen topic. One of the most important parts of a feature story is choosing an interesting topic. It is important to chose a topic that will have an interesting story as well as having enough facts or stories to make it informative. The next important part of the feature story is filming the video in good lighting. If the environment is too bright the person you are interviewing can be easy washed out by the lights, making the video have bad video quality. It is also important to film in a quite environment so that it is easy to hear the persons interview. Also, when you are filming the interview it is important to use the rule of thirds to align the person in the left or right third of the shot. Once you have filmed the video there are several important ways to edit the video. You want to make sure that you incorporate a strong voice over in the intro and throughout the whole feature story. You can use voiceovers as well as b-roll to transition between questions and answers. You want to try to not make any jump cuts in the editing process. It is also good to add b-roll throughout the video to make it more interesting. Altogether filming feature stories are very enjoyable, but you must make sure you find a good story, film the video in good lighting with good set up, as well as edit the video smoothly with strong voiceovers.

FEATURE STORY EXPERIENCE

This quarter in video production we filmed and edited a feature story video. I chose to create my video over the Electrathon team at Olathe Northwest. Once I created my video I wrote my first feature story. I have only really created videos before and it was a new experience to write a story

The first part in writing my feature story was creating a narrative lead. In the narrative lead I had to describe what was happening in the video with lots of detail. The purpose of the narrative lead is to draw the reader in and create a more interesting opening. The next part of a written feature story is describing the topic. Since I chose the Electrathon I gave background information on this topic and described what the team does. After introducing the club I described who I chose to interview and why.

In the feature story I used quotations from my interview to describe what the video was about. It's important to put the quotations in a new paragraph and saying who said it after the quote.

The final part of the feature story was creating a narrative ending. The narrative ending basically summarizes the purpose of the video and describes it more visually.

Altogether writing about a feature story was an interesting new experience. It was a little difficult to write the narrative lead but describing the content was pretty easy. I'm excited to continue and create feature stories throughout the semester and develop my skills in filming, editing, and writing.

FILMING EXPERIENCE


Laurie did an amazing job at answering the questions I asked but unfortunately I couldn't fit all of the information into the minute and a half limit. I had to shorten several responses but ultimately I believe my video ended up good. Having a female perspective on the Electrathon team really helped with the story. Interviewing Mr. Edmondson also worked out well because it showed how teachers are trying to get more woman involved and that its something that definitely needs more outreach.

Creating the script was pretty easy because Laurie did a good job in answering my questions in complete sentences. I also learned to film the voice over in several different clips for each section that needed a voiceover so that putting the video together would be easier. I was easily able to import the voice over and trim it to fit in perfectly with the rest of the video.

Shooting my video was a little bit difficult. It was hard to find time to come into the electrathon class and shoot. The first time I went into film the students were working on presentations and I couldn't get any footage of them actually working with the car. I came in to film another time and Mr. Edmondson was very nice about getting the students to work on the car for me and get some b-roll that I could use. For the actual interview footage I wish that I had filmed it in a more quite workspace and in a better location. I was pretty rushed on time and if I was to film it again I would go to a desk or classroom.

What I like about my finished video is that its about a topic that isn't very well known in the school. Lots of students know about the football team or the theater department but very few know about the activities that go on in the engineering academy. I have been around the engineering academy for a while with my dad but in the process of filming this video I learned new information about what actualy goes on with the electrathon team. I also think that having my video about woman getting involved in engineering is important. Most people don't want to get involved in engineering because its seen as a "guy" carrier. Its important to encourage other woman to try engineering and the best way to do that is by woman encouraging other woman.

MY FAVORITE 

After filming and writing a feature story I enjoyed filming and editing the video more. I don't enjoy writing that much but it was still an interesting experience to learn how to write a correct feature story. I really enjoy being able to use my creativity to show a story in a video. It is way more interesting for me to be able to interact with the person I am interviewing and to film where they are working. Altogether, I enjoyed filming the video feature story more. 

WATCH MY VIDEO

The first part of the project was creating a basic raccoon and making it unique. I was able to master the use of shapes to make objects and animals. Once I created the raccoon I added a turtle neck sweater with a texture as well as a hat and a Starbucks mug to relate to a fall theme. We then made leaves to add an even more fall environment.
                                                 Front:

The next part of the project involved creating a 4 x 6 postcard. We could choose any theme we wanted but I decided to continue with the fall theme. I also used handwritten lettering to add a more personal touch to the postcard. The raccoon is surrounded by pumpkins in a pumpkin patch with a darker sky.



Back:


Once we finished our postcard we created a layout and posted it in behance. I created a theme for my behance that involved a handwritten style font and a purple/pink color scheme. I learned how to layout projects in illustrator and then how to post them in Behance.

The video above explains how you can create a new bin in adobe premier. Bins can help you organize your clips into specific folders. These bins are very easy to make and rename.

The first step is to click the new bin button in the project panel. It looks like a folder and is in the bottom right corner. After you click this button a new bin will appear where you will be able to rename it how ever you would like to. You can choose to name it based off of location, who was filmed, or whatever you may like. Find a way of organizing that works best for you. By clicking on the bin to open it you can then use the key board shortcut command I to import clips. You can choose whatever clips you would like from anywhere on your computer to go into this bin. If you want to rename the video you can right click and choose rename. Once your clips are imported to premier you can begin the editing process.

One way to edit your clips is to drag the clip from the project panel to the source panel. In the source panel you can use the keyboard shortcut keys I and O to choose when the video will come in and out. Remember the phrase enter late leave early when deciding when people or objects should come into frame. You can then drag your clip to the editing panel on the bottom right of your screen. If you cut your video too short just drag the edge of the clip out to get a more precise edit.

Once you have found a way of organizing clips that works for you it will become easier to edit your videos a lot quicker.

For ONW 1 in 2,000 I interviewed Ryan Burnett. Ryan is a black belt at Ko martial arts and I was able to discover how he spent his summer. Taekwondo is one of Ryan's main activities and is something he is very passionate about. I learned the many other skills that come in to competing in Taekwondo such as being disciplined and having endurance to work hard to become better. Ryan spent many hours this summer learning forms and perfecting moves to be able to compete in a competition. At the competition this summer he did not place but last summer he placed first.

For this video I learned how to script a voice over for an interview. In previous projects I used voice overs but this was the first one I had to use when interviewing someone. It was fairly easy to write the voice over. I had to use questions to incorporate into my video because in the actual footage it had several jump cuts. I recorded my voice over on my phone which didn't have the best quality but it ended up sounding ok.

When shooting this video it was easy to find a location and begin shooting. I decided to film in the e-Communication pod so that it would look more professional. I had Ryan wear his uniform so that it would fit the theme of the interview. The lighting was also very good because it had a more blue tone compared to the lighting in the rest of the school. If I was to film this again however I would use more angles and more the camera to show more of the actual chair.

What I like most about my final video is the smoothness of the voice over and questions. When I filmed the interview Ryan said um.. a lot and I had to find a way to make the transitions more smooth. By summarizing the question with a voice over and showing footage from a Taekwondo competition it made the video a lot smoother and more professional.

The past few weeks I have developed new skills in photoshop. By watching several video tutorials I have mastered use of tools such as the quick selection tool, clipping masks, and the clone stamp tool. In the first couple of projects I used the quick selection tool to remove backgrounds that didn't work with the image.  The quick selection tool is important to remove problomatic areas and photoshop will automatically replace the are with a similar background. I also used the clone stamp tool to remove specific areas by covering it with a specific selection of an image.


 The clone stamp tool and the quick selection tool were very helpful in removing imperfections  and unnecessary elements of a photo.  The image to the left originally had specs of dirt all along the boys face, but with the help of these two tools I was able to quickly and effectively remove them to make a more clean looking photo.

The past few weeks I have developed new skills in photoshop. By watching several video tutorials I have mastered use of tools such as the quick selection tool, clipping masks, and the clone stamp tool. In the first couple of projects I used the quick selection tool to remove backgrounds that didn't work with the image.  The quick selection tool is important to remove problomatic areas and photoshop will automatically replace the are with a similar background. I also used the clone stamp tool to remove specific areas by covering it with a specific selection of an image.


 The clone stamp tool and the quick selection tool were very helpful in removing imperfections  and unnecessary elements of a photo.  The image to the left originally had specs of dirt all along the boys face, but with the help of these two tools I was able to quickly and effectively remove them to make a more clean looking photo.

The first project we created this year in video was of a procedure at Olathe Northwest. We were given the option to choose whatever topic we wanted that demonstrated a positive action that takes place in our school. I chose to demonstrate the use of the water bottle stations and to refill your water bottles instead of throwing them away.

The first stage in completing this video was story boarding. On story board paper, I created a general idea of what shots and actions needed to be filmed.  Next, I began filming which took several days in order to get enough shots. For this video, it was my first time filming with a new camera and I was able to learn how to use zoom, pan, and use white balance. Lastly, I began editing the film. This was also my first time using Adobe Premier to edit a video and it was a lot different from final cut pro. Overall Premier was fairly easy to use but had a little different of a format and can be a little more challenging. The first time I made this video I used a little bit more relaxing music, but when I re-edited I decided to use a more upbeat song to make the video more interesting. I tried to sync some clips with the music as well.

Altogether, this project was a good start to using new technology and software in e-Communication my sophomore year. Although, it wasn't a very challenging assignment it was very helpful to receive feedback from classmates after presentations. I also enjoyed being able to choose my partner since it made completing the project run a lot smoother. If I had to film this video again, I would choose a location with better lighting and add a better ending to the video.



 The middle of the video is Sarah actually going to the water bottle station and filling her water bottle up. I also demonstrated the use of this station with all types of water bottles.
The ending is of Sarah and Ryan holding several water bottles. If I was to film this again I would defiantly add a better ending. I tried to demonstrate the footage the best I could and it is a more humorous ending.

The second project we made in the animation rotation in e-9 was of a smiley face bouncing across my name. This project combined what we learned in the previous project with our own creative touch. When the ball hits my name, it changes to a new facial expression, a squashed face. Then once it bounces back up it changes to a smiley face once again.The last step was to add our own idea to how the ball would end up at the start again. I decided to make the smiley face get larger before it would spin back and disappear. 

More on Animation Principles: 

Arcs in Animation:


Digital Arts: 12 Rules of Animation

Ball Bounce Animation in Photoshop