Category: Uncategorized

The Feature Story was one of my favorite projects. I really enjoyed the process that included all of the different types of mediums. The audio section was fun for me because I am currently in the class Audio 2. It was fun using the skills that I learned in that class and transferring them over to New Communication Technologies. I think the interviews came out pretty good. I used the Rode shotgun mic on my camera. Then I edited the audio on Adobe Audition. I think out of everything on the project. The audio came out clean and full after I put on some effects on it to improve the quality of the audio information. I think the interviews were well structured. In addition I had really great responses from the people I interviewed. They gave me full articulate responses that really tied into my topic quite well. I wish I could have interviewed them for my video project as well.

Video is the thing that I do the best. In this project I didn’t use my full potential. I didn’t read the rubric and forgot about the B-roll. In addition I could have found better people to interview. Because of these reasons I am not super proud of my final product but I also know I can be overly critical on my own work. The main thing with videos is having enough time to get them done at a high quality. Coming off of a very busy week I had to rush the shoot and edit. This is one thing you really shouldn’t do when it comes to video production. That being said this project was a fun one. I enjoyed telling the same story through different mediums. It really made you think about what information and content should appear in each.

I feel that our meme presentation went very well. We had several great things that went into the presentation. The first being the meme it’s self. We chose the Roll Safe meme because we felt it was one that was easy to replicate and the narrative of the meme wasn’t too complicated and was easy to explain. I personally make multiple meme’s a day and post them on my meme page so this project was especially fun for me. I have personally used the Roll Safe meme many times and probably will many more in the future. It was fun to dive into the research behind what makes a meme spread and why they reach and connect with such a giant audience. Twitter is one thing that really elevates the spread of memes. Retweeting and sharing are so instrumental to the growth of a meme. Platforms that don’t include this feature are at a disadvantage to ones that do. Instagram for instance doesn’t have a sharing feature. Because of this it is not an ideal outlet for meme pages. Twitter on the other hand has pages for only one meme format and through retweets these pages can explode very quickly. The pages on Instagram have to be varied and constantly posting different material.

In this class I have learned many things. About the ever-changing landscape of modern media and communication. As our technologies change so do the dynamics of communication through them. The many to many dynamic that the internet has provided us is for the most part still being studied and understood. This class put us in several situations within this topic to understand the dynamic and changing relationships.

We learned about how cell phones have created new solutions and problems. We read articles and reviewed the effects of social media and how it is constantly evolving our interaction abilities. We studied how fast the changes are coming to the landscape and how each change alters the communication between two people. The article reviews helped me to really read in depth and understand the material. I enjoyed the group work that we had in the class and all of the presentations. It was nice to collaborate and bounce ideas off of one another rather than just doing it alone.

I really enjoyed the content we studied and it is going to directly into my career. I actually run my own meme page and it has gotten quite big so it was really fun for me to study the history of meme’s and what makes them spread. This was probably my favorite thing that we did in this class. I also like the studies we did on all the discussions we had that were video related. The industry is ever changing and it was a lot of fun for me to discuss these changes in class. In conclusion, I really enjoyed this class and would recommend it to anyone in my major.

My paper’s topic is one that really speaks to me. My career is going to be predominantly filmmaking. This paper is going to dive into how the industry is changing and becoming more saturated. Social media and video creation is something that really interests me and I know I will be able to write plenty of content on the subject. At the moment I am focusing on working ahead so that I don’t feel the effects of the long paper on the last week when everything else is due. I am running into several difficulties with my sources. There are not as many scholarly journals on YouTube filmmaking as I had hoped. While this is an obstacle I’m sure I can overcome it is frustrating me at the moment. And other social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram haven’t had specific videographers long enough to have a scholarly journal written about them. The marketing potential of social media is unparalleled therefor the need for video content is much higher. If I can find another article that touches on this a little bit more it could really help my paper. This next week will be a big week for working on the paper. My goal is to have my first draft done by Friday.

While starting this research paper, I am committed to finding a good topic. I think that there is a lot of information and content for some subjects while others lack. I want to try to find sources on my topic before I commit to it so that I can get an idea on how saturated the research market is for that topic. My first thoughts went to the gaming world. Fortnite and modern communication through games seemed like a topic that I could get early momentum on. Then I factored in the fact that it takes a few years for a scholarly article to get written, so I knew there would be no information on the topic for another few years still. I think Snapchat might be interesting to study or Instagram. An idea that I can really get into though is the ADHD gained from regular cell phone use. There is also the angle that it is making us less socially conscious. I like this because I almost feel that I need breaks from my phone because I am so connected to it. I am always responding to some new notification or alert that my phone has sent me and the result is that I am never without it and never go long without checking it. Another topic that I might be interested in is the new age of filmmaking and how because cameras are much easier to acquire so the market has flooded and therefor the format has changed. Many traditional filmmakers have gone to YouTube or Vimeo because of the ease of connection and the instant revenue off of traffic to a video.

I Just finished my feature story. I learned there is a couple of logistic problems that you run into when scheduling interviews. The camera work and editing is a strong point for me so that wasn’t that difficult. It was difficult to take pictures for the project. I felt as if I was being too redundant. I learned that you wan to have a very solid list of questions that are good for leading conversation. I did one interview that I cut because while I had solid questions they did not facilitate conversation the responses were brief and I forgot to prep them to repeat the question in the answer. After that interview however I worked out the kinks and think it turned out pretty well.

I think this week’s articles all touch on an idea that is very important when it comes to the internet and social media. That idea is that these tools can be a steroid or a drug. If they are used as tools then they hold unbelievable potential. A potential to connect people from miles away and build knowledge with the ease of sharing information. This being said they can also be used in the wrong way. There is plenty of research in the articles to support this. So, the question isn’t using the internet and social media but what are you using it for? This is the distinction between the two. Many people use social media to launch their career and some even make their entire living on social media. Google does not make us stupid, it gives us the opportunity to be lazy.

The internet is a very public sphere. To connect with almost anyone we want seems to cost us personal information. Without this information you can not be found. To most people it is in their control. If you don’t want someone to know where you live, don’t post it online. There are exceptions to this however. In the case of the lady and her dog that pooped on the subway. Her privacy was invaded by people when the video of her was viral and she gained a level of notoriety. This is interesting because growing up with the internet we were taught not to put anything up that we didn’t want people to see. Now it seems that it is almost out of our hands. The rule now is don’t do anything you don’t want people to see. Was it wrong of her to not pick up after her dog? Yes, but if she had known the backlash that she would face, she would have done anything to clean up that floor. Being in the google generation our information is not as private as we think. I know just from placing at state in wrestling anyone can find out my height, weight, high school and college from one google search. This is information that I never consented to being posted and while it seems like innocent information to give out the idea that I was never consulted by Track Wrestling is concerning to me. It is interesting to me that the article explores the idea that in todays age a lack of privacy is the only way to restrict free speech. I’m not sure if I agree with this or not but it is defiantly an interesting idea.

This story touches on not only the connection of people through technology but also the class system that wealth can create. When Ivanna lost her phone, she responded like anyone would, she tried to find it and when she couldn’t she reluctantly purchased a new one. Sasha, the girl who found Ivanna’s phone acted in a way that I myself would not have had I been in her situation. The connection between Ivanna and Sasha was something that couldn’t have happened 20 years ago. While this connection is interesting and a little uneasy for Ivanna. The story was much more invested in the class structure and how it was a replicable device for Ivanna, but for someone of a lower socio economical background like Sasha it was a phone she had no other way of owning. There is an obvious resentment toward Ivanna from Sasha. In an age where more can be shared online. The culture of wealth and appearance of wealth is a quite interesting trend on social media. I have seen a huge effort from my generation and even millennials to appear rich and successful on social media. The formula is as simple as that of a music video. Let’s get a lot of money and expensive cars to show the viewers how amazing we are and how much wealth and power we have. The same thing is happening more and more on social media.