The Start of Something New!

        Recently I have been introduced into the complicated and new world of Convergence Journalism. The experience has been interesting and I think it is the complete opposite of what we have been working on all year. The process took a lot longer than I would have thought, but I feel pretty proud in what I created.

The Lego Set
       First thing we did was one day we picked up the cameras and just shot someone building a Star Wars lego set. I thought this was interesting because I am used to storyboarding everything before I shoot. This made me a bit unsure of what to get, do I just filmed whatever shots felt like I could use later in editing.  I sadly  filmed everything in one clip and this made the editing process take a lot longer cause I had to select different sections of the clips to make smaller clips. Another challenge I faced while filming was making the camera steady with only my body, no tripods was allowed during this project. I also struggled with finding a way to incorporate nat noise into my film.
   
     My partner also talked about a bunch of random things while I was trying to get the shots in so I had to cut all of those random thoughts out of my video which took a lot of my shots away. For the editing of the project I mostly spent my time cutting the clips like I mentioned earlier. Then I picked my favorite clips and looked through all my audio to find the sounds I wanted use in my video. Then I wrote a script of what I wanted the audio to be and recorded the voiceovers for my shots. Finally I re-edited my film to match the sound up with the shots I wanted them with. This whole project was really hard for me and it took me longer to edit then I wanted it to.

Blood Drive day

      The next project I got to film was the annual ONW blood drive which was cool because it was the first project I got to do using students, not just E-comm kids. This also provided a challenge because they answered the questions very close-ended which made the editing process hard because I didn't have much audio that I could use in my film. I then cut out all the audio and clips I couldn't use and put what I wanted into the timeline. Then I cut out all the clips that didn't fit with my theme and wrote the script I wanted to use for this project. 

   

I got to use some new technology when I filmed my voice overs because I had a portable microphone at my house and I used it to film my voice overs directly into Final Cut Pro. Overall  that taught me a lot about how to use different kinds of tech. I also learned about story telling and how to get a persons story in. This was a challenge because I figured out that I didn't have enough footage during the editing process and I had to use another groups footage to help my video along. I also ran into trouble when I was told that the person I had filmed wasn't actually eligible to donate. In hindsight I should have filmed two stories just to ensure that I got a person who was eligible to donate. Well you know what they say, Hindsight is always 20/20. Anyway I think this video turned out pretty well and I just wish I had gotten more shots to make it longer and follow a better story. 

   

 A struggle that I ran into consistently was my Informal interviews. I feel like that is a skill that I need to improve on. I had a lot of problems getting the people to talk and I also had a problem getting people to answer openly and not just with yes or no answers. I know that I can be an introvert and that I need to work on that skill of mine. Anyway all in all I feel pretty happy with how my projects went and I know the skills I need to improve on for next time.