I thought this assignment was very cool and creative. I decided to make the retro fit the departed to appear to be a silent movie. The first thing I did was download movie clips and trailers from YouTube using Real Player and then put them into Windows Movie Maker. I then found an old style countdown from ten that I added to the very beginning of the clip for some dramatic effect. I used about five clips to make this and took varying amounts from each one, after I put them into the order i wanted them in and added the title and credits slide. I also used an effect to give them a brown tint so they appeared to be an older movie which I think works great in Movie Maker. The last part was finding music because most silent films had music, the hardest part was deciding which song to use because I felt it had to fit the theme of the clips and the overall movie. I ended up using the theme intro to the game Mafia I or II I don’t remember but it reminded me of Al Capone or the Godfather music so I thought it fit perfect sense the Departed is a crime boss type movie. I really enjoyed the creative aspect of this assignment and using real movie clips was very enjoyable I hope you like it here it is below.
Archive for the ‘Assignments’ Category
The Departed Goes Silent
Friday, July 13th, 2012Remixing Everything
Friday, July 13th, 2012When I first saw this assignment I thought it was solely about how Hollywood re makes movies constantly oh was I surprised. The part that really stuck out to me was when they referenced Star Wars because to me Star Wars was as original as it gets. The author of this obviously does a great amount of research or really likes watching tons of old movies all day long. Being born in the 90s I had never heard of most of the movies that were referenced as predecessors to Star Wars. The first thing I thought of when I saw this was I hope he covers movies that should not have been re made, In my opinion I thought it was crazy to re make the karate kid because I grew up watching the original like it was my job I loved that movie, and although I like Jackie Chan I still did not want it remade. I found this movie extremely interesting because I was completely oblivious to how much re occurring themes there were and how directors will just take a scene from an old movie and just bring it up to date in thier movie.
One thing I am skeptical about is how purposeful the directors are in reusing old content. In some cases it is clear that it was done but in the vague references I find it hard to believe that the directors took all that time to put a plot together using old movies I feel like that would be a painstaking and long process but I have no experience in professional movie making. It is my opinion that for a lot of the re use the directors and writers came up with it and it either just is a common theme and it just happened to be similar or that they had forgot about seeing the older movie earlier and thought it was their own idea. I think that there is a mix of both scenarios going on and I would like to see an interview with George Lucas about where he got the ideas for the Star Wars scenes so if you know of one let me know. Overall it was an awesome clip and thanks for making us watch it because I would have not found it on my own.
Pulp Fiction Dance RE-DUB
Friday, July 13th, 2012Although I said I was originally going to re dub the John Wayne movie I decided to do the dance scene from Pulp fiction. I decided this because on Monday I found myself watching Pulp Fiction for the hundredth time probably and I was reminded of this scene. The way they dance was so funny to me I could not pass up the opportunity to re dub it with different music. The program I used for this is Windows movie maker. The first thing I did was get the video off of YouTube by downloading it using Real Player. Real Player is very useful i would recommend it because it has built in converter to many different formats. So I used Real Player to download and convert it to Windows Media format and then dragged it into Windows Movie Maker. I then edited it down to the parts I wanted because I did not need or want the entire clip.Then came the difficult part, picking the new music. The way Uma Thermon and John Travolta dance is hilarious to me because it seems so dorky if you put it to modern music. After trying countless songs that just didn’t seem to mesh enough for me I settled on Tik Tok it just seemed to work, you may disagree or you may like it I don’t know its just my opinion so enjoy here it is.
What Makes Me Laugh
Friday, July 13th, 2012This clip always makes me laugh because growing up playing soccer and now coaching some rec soccer some of the stuff is not to far off. This movie really made me laugh because so many people take youth soccer far to serious and this movie basically makes fun of all of that. Also I haven’t really found a Will Ferrell movie i didn’t think was funny. And also its not really highlighted in this clip but the rivalry between Robert Duvall and Mike Ditka is hilarious in this movie.
Carding a Deeper Me
Wednesday, July 11th, 2012My story is simple. A good girl, lost in a bad world. Not knowing whom to turn to and when. Wondering why no one understands that not all my days are good days. Even though I pretend as if they are.
When I saw this assignment, I thought about it for a long time. I had seen several of these kind of videos on Youtube and they were all serious. Some were very depressing and some people talked about how they wanted to kill themselves. Now, mine is not that deep, but I do express somethings.
The Process
1. Turned on my webcam
2. Wrote down my story on notecards
3. Played “Cry” (instrumental) – Rihanna
4. Hit “PLAY”
5. Hit “RECORD”
6. Showed the cards to the camera and held them up for a few seconds
7. Repeated step 6 several times
I hope this assignment let you all see another side of me. That sometimes I am outgoing, but sometimes I go through things and I feel alone. I’ve never been “depressed” but stress has come into my life. I hope this video inspires someone that is going through; that life is hard, but you will survive. Find your outlet and be yourself.
Animated Rock Starts
Tuesday, July 10th, 2012Phineas and Ferb is the best cartoon known to man. For those who aren’t big on cartoons, you should really consider watching it. It cones on at random times on Disney Channel and is on a lot. When I saw the assignment to animate a music video, I honestly almost fell out of my bed. This has to be one of the best assignments yet.
THE PROCESS..
1. opened up WINDOWS MOVIE MAKER
2. clicked. “NEW PROJECT”
3. went to Google images and typed in “Phineas and Ferb Rock Stars”
4. downloaded 18 photos and saved them to a folder
5. went back into Windows Movie Maker, and on the left hand side, clicked “PICTURES”
6. selected the 18 photos
7. downloaded PARTY LIKE A ROCK STAR by the Shop Boyz
8. repeated (step 5)
9. selected the song
10. added a title page and typed what I wanted into the page
11. dragged and dropped the song into the Timeline
12. dragged and dropped the pictures according to the lyrics (matched them as much as possible)
13. reviewed the work and made adjustments so the lyrics and pictures matched.
14. made a “credits” page showing where I got all of my work
15. uploaded my video to YouTube and embedded it into my post.
I have said many times before the music is my life. I know about a lot of songs and the Phineas and Ferb episode of when they were rock stars was my favorite. This assignment took a longer time than normal because I had to match pictures with words, but it was easy. It took me about 35 minutes to do, but it was fun so it didn’t feel as if it was that long. Once you understand the flow of how Windows Movie Makers works, it gets easier. I hope my video was interesting and my steps were clear and easy. Enjoy!
For more. Click here. –>>[Animated Music Videos]<<–
Video Prep Work
Tuesday, July 10th, 2012Video week is really two weeks! Oh, what fun!
Last week we were doing a lot of prep work, familiarizing ourselves with the available software programs for video editing and starting to plan our assignment completion for the unit of study in ds106. Here are the assignments that I’ve scoped out and started planning:
Video Assignments 376—Return to the Silent Era (5 stars) gave me the challenge of using a modern movie trailer and creating a silent, black and white version reminiscent of the Silent Film era of cinematography. I’m going to use the trailer for Act of Valor, a movie from last year where the “actors” are genuine Navy Seals. I think this trailer will lend itself nicely to this task.
For Video Assignment 435—Serenity now! (3 stars), I will make a calming video like those displayed in a spa or used for meditation. I find the beach, especially at sunrise to be a soothing, peaceful environment for me the walk, think, reflect and just exist. On a trip to the Bahamas a few years ago, I was trying to use the time away to put things into perspective and re-prioritize my life. My soundtrack for this vacation was Led Zepplin…mostly because I love the lyrics, the melodies and the instrumentals in the songs. For these reasons, I will create a video of a beach sunrise, overlaying it with at least one Led Zepplin song. The hard part will be choosing which song to use…maybe Kashmir or something similar.
While I would love to go to the beach to film the video myself, my Outer Banks vacation isn’t until September, so I will be using a video from Creative Commons licensed video from YouTube (with the proper credits, of course) like this one:
Video Assignment 463—Watching Movies with the Stereo On (3 stars) directs me to take a movie clip and replace the original audio track with a song that somehow fits the movie scene. I picked the arrow roulette scene in the hilarious movie Grown Ups. I’m thinking I’ll dub “Moves Like Jagger” by Maroon 5 over it.
Stay tuned for the final products of these assignments!
That’s all for now, but I did get a great idea for a video assignment to add to the repository! I hope I have the time to flesh it out and develop an example later this week!
World of Remixes.
Tuesday, July 10th, 2012Kirby Ferguson’s videos about remixed material was amazing. He took some songs and movies that I thought were original and showed where the artist or directions got their inspiration from. Many times younger directors and artist want to create an “original film/song” but they get their inspiration from older films that were thought to be GREAT. If a younger director or artist wants a great movie, they have to look a great movies from before and basically “copy” the framework. It was astonishing to see in Ferguson’s video to see who younger artist and directors looked up too. Some of these people aren’t even in the same genre of work, but they find ways to take on genre and make it work for another.
Now music, is something that I love and there are some songs that I know for a fact came from other songs. For example, I made a video of two songs. The original track is Michael Jackson’s “Wanna be Startin’ Something” and then Rihanna puts it in her song called “Please Don’t Stop the Music” Which goes to show that old music will never die.
I honestly, do not think that I have seen an “original movie.” All movies in my opinion are made up from another movie, but uses more modern/recent dilemmas so that modern people can relate. For example, the Rocky movies are all about a underestimated boxer that wants to win. He trains long and hard until he achieves his goal. But there aren’t too many aspiring boxers for filmmakers use other sports to prove that same point. If you are underestimated, train long and hard until you get what you want, like the Gridiron Gang. I am not as much of a movie person as I am a music person, so I could be completely wrong, but I haven’t seen an original film.
Personally, I think it is enjoyable to see recent films based on past films. Mainly because it shows that we won’t forget great things that came before us. Like Michael Jackson’s music will never die, and a young singer(compared to him) used his music in her song. It always can be seen as a sign of respect or “thank you.” Rihanna could be using that clip in her song to show to Michael Jackson that she appreciated his music and it helped her. As far as movies, I think we enjoy seeing things from the past because it shows us they everyone is almost the same. Everyone from past, present, and future, all want some of the same things. Rocky was underestimated, and wanted to reign, the Gridiron gang (juveniles) wanted people who underestimated them to see that they had some positive aspects.
Basically, history lives on forever. People who came before us have paved the way for entertainment. We pay them respect by using their impressive works and show that everyone is more similar than we think.
Story de Words = )
Monday, July 9th, 2012I am a very random person. I love saying random things at random times, just because its funny. When I saw this assignment I instantly became excited because I had a chance to be random. For once in my life, I can use my randomness for something productive.
I chose 10 words off of the top of my head. I chose to words, MAN, FUNNY, CHEERLEADER, LOVE, ALSO, PURPLE, SING, MUSIC, HAIRY, UGLY. After I had chosen my words, I tried my hardest to make a sentence that made sense, but it was hard. This assignment was overall easy to do. These are the steps to how I created this project.
1. I googled my 10 words on Google images
2. Saved the images to my computer
3. Opened up Windows Movie Maker
4. Imported the 10 pictures in
5. Dragged each word separately, and placed it into the timeline
6. made the pictures smaller, so they would flow faster, yet smoothly.
7. Imported the instrumental version of “Disturbia ” – Rihanna
8. Dragged the song onto the timeline under the pictures
9. Made the song fade towards the end
10. Matched the music to the pictures
And that was the whole assignment, it took me about 10-15 minutes to do and it was fun as well. I hope you enjoyed it.
For More. Click Here. –>>[A Word. A Picture. A Story]<<–
Preparing…Myself…
Monday, July 9th, 20121. Play by Play
I like sports, so I am planning on doing a “play by play” of a video of when Shaq broke the backboard when he dunked in his younger days. I just need the video of the event and use a video editor that allows me to record my voice over top the video. While the video is playing, I will give a “play by play” of the events leading up to the big crash. Even though I told the ending, I still hope that I can make it better with my commentary skills.
2. Make a Scene from a Horror Film
I am personally not a fan of horror films, but I have watched some scary movies. I personally want to use this as an opportunity to make my own “scene” from a horror film. I plan on creating a scene that involves my mother and my sister. I do not want to tell everything that I plan to do, but it will take place in my house, outside of my house, and in my car. HOPEFULLY. If everything goes well with the editing and recording, I am hoping I’ll create a great scene.
FOR BOTH OF THESE I PLAN ON USING WINDOWS MOVIE MAKER(WMM), UNLESS I FIND ANOTHER PROGRAM THAT WORKS BETTER THAN WMM. HOPEFULLY EVERYTHING WORKS OUT AND I CAN MAKE SOME AMAZING VIDEOS THAT EVERYONE CAN ENJOY
