For my third video assignment this week, I chose Movies by Numbers. My task is to artistically present a single number through visuals and relevant music. There is to be no narration and only the visuals and the music should tell the story.
I used Compfight to search for CC licenced images that have the word “five” among their tags. The music I chose is Take Five by Dave Brubeck. I used Animoto once again, so I added Animoto’s own videos to my story. Animoto lets you determine the beginning and/or the end of each video, so I stopped the countdown videos immediately after number 5 and I did the same with the clock.
Here is my video:
The most complicated thing in this assignment was creating a full list of images used so that I could give attribution where it is due. Here it is:
Creative Commons images used:
cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo by Tabsinthe: http://flickr.com/photos/tabsinthe/4820084267/ cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo by woodleywonderworks: http://flickr.com/photos/wwworks/3196112134/ cc licensed ( BY NC ) flickr photo by Lst1984: http://flickr.com/photos/lst1984/493522912/ cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo by Pink Sherbet Photography: http://flickr.com/photos/pinksherbet/2001899627/ cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo by Javier Volcan: http://flickr.com/photos/jdvolcan/5456792325/
http://flickr.com/photos/neychurluvr/3369607260/
cc licensed ( BY NC ND ) flickr photo by Jon Matthies: http://flickr.com/photos/jmatthies/7181077141/
cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo by Michael | Ruiz: http://flickr.com/photos/simax/3390895249/
cc licensed ( BY NC ) flickr photo by Amrit…: http://flickr.com/photos/aksphotography/367363319/
cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo by ncracker (Boyan Syarov): http://flickr.com/photos/syarov/4534118874/
cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo by christing-O-: http://flickr.com/photos/christing/2457051794/
cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo by { pranav }: http://flickr.com/photos/neychurluvr/3369607260/
cc licensed ( BY SA ) flickr photo by ginnerobot: http://flickr.com/photos/ginnerobot/4552277923/
cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo by flyzipper: http://flickr.com/photos/flyzipper/432622379/
cc licensed ( BY NC ) flickr photo by Pandiyan: http://flickr.com/photos/pandiyan/75545427/
cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo by Leo Reynolds: http://flickr.com/photos/lwr/101655312/
cc licensed ( BY ) flickr photo by jenny downing: http://flickr.com/photos/jenny-pics/2681981423/
cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo by bara-koukoug: http://flickr.com/photos/bara-koukoug/6941685781/
cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo by YanivG: http://flickr.com/photos/yanivg/96918791/
cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo by gonzalo_ar: http://flickr.com/photos/gonzalo_ar/644154294/
cc licensed ( BY NC ) flickr photo by bitzi ? ion-bogdan dumitrescu: http://flickr.com/photos/bitzi/230188091/
cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo by bobbygreg: http://flickr.com/photos/bobbygreg/168206195/
cc licensed ( BY SA ) flickr photo by marfis75: http://flickr.com/photos/marfis75/5780056202/
cc licensed ( BY NC SA ) flickr photo by voyageAnatolia.blogspot.com: http://flickr.com/photos/fotogezi/3511876129/
cc licensed ( BY NC ) flickr photo by tochis: http://flickr.com/photos/tochis/3124403063/
For my second video assignment this week, I chose to make a video compilation of some of my digital stories. At this stage in the course, it is logical that I want to look back and reflect on what I have done so far. This compilation consists of visual and design assignments and some of my Daily Creates.
I used Animoto to create the video, which is, I suppose, a shortcut. Animoto does the boring, repetitive part of the job for you and it even gives you a large choice of video styles and background music. It also lets you upload your videos to YouTube, which is what I did this time.
I am back at Camp Magic MacGuffin after I was absent last week. This is the second week of video and it took me a couple of days to go through last week’s materials and pluck up the courage to use Windows Movie Maker for the very first time.
The assignment I chose is Return to the Silent Era. The goal is to take a scene from a modern movie and render it in the style of the silent era.
I chose one of my favourite scenes from LOTR - the one in which Eowyn kills the witch king. I had just watched Return of the King for the thousandth time and it struck me that this scene would look good in black and white. I was lucky enough to find a clip that already had subtitles, which made my task of turning it into a silent movie much easier.
I was surprised at how intuitive Windows Movie Maker is. I had wanted to learn how to mash and edit videos for some time, but had always put it off. I was afraid it would be too hard. I have only made this one clip so far and the task was relatively simple. I just added two effects (“black and white” and “old film”) and I added some Bach. I didn’t remove the original audio, but I muted it instead.
I am running out of time before I start packing my suitcases. I am afraid I haven’t got time to record a weekly letter, so instead I will just share this week’s Daily Create assignments.
Above you can see a toy car that is not really a toy car, but my favourite USB stick.
This creepy crawly critter is what I would be terrified of if I saw it in my bunkhouse:
And now I will say goodbye to my friends from the camp and everyone else who is reading this. I am going to a spa and I promise I will come back with a lot of photos and stories to tell.
As I said in my previous post, we are expected to collaborate on a group radio show project within our bunkhouses. In Slaughterhouse 4 we chose travel as our main topic and the title of our show is A Tourist’s World. I chose a story I often tell – the one about how I visited India and saw the Taj Mahal.
I am not sure whether I am supposed to share my part of the show on my blog or not, but since I am travelling on Sunday and will not be here next week when the show is broadcast, here’s my five minutes:
It is Week 6 in Camp Magic McGuffin and I am running out of time, since I am travelling on Sunday and will be away during Week 7. Still, I have managed to finish my main assignments. I have created a radio bumper for the show I am collaborating on with other members of Slaughterhouse 4. I have also finished my 5 minutes of the show. I wish I could have worked more on it, but there was no time.
At my bunkhouse we chose travel as our main topic and the title of the show is A Tourist’s World. That’s why I decided to play with the magic carpet metaphor. I recorded my voice in Audacity, then used sound effects to make my speech faster and my voice deeper. My idea was to sound a little like a British butler. Then I uploaded the Audacity files to Myna and continued editing the bumper. I chose the tracks from the Adventure section in Myna and I almost happy with it. At least, I like it much better than my last week’s bumper, but then that means that I am learning. Here it is:
So, fasten your seat-belts and listen to Slaughterhouse 4.
Since Week 5 in Camp MacGuffin is all about audio, we are sending audio messages home instead of letters:
This is not so different from leaving a message on an answering machine and I felt it was OK to improvise rather than read from a paper.
As I have said in the recording, Week 5 was about stepping out of comfort zone. For one of my Daily Creates I had to sing. I mean, I didn’t have to do it, but I did. I don’t want to repeat what I said in the recording, but the atmosphere in the Camp is such that singing felt quite OK. I will even go so far as to embed the recording right here:
The Daily Create 165 – Share a campfire song on audio. Sing of bang drums.
Two days later we had to draw. I am terrible at drawing and I said so:
The Daily Create 167 – Draw a person using only geometrical shapes
Today’s Daily Create wasn’t difficult. We took a closer look at where we spend a lot of free time and photographed something we had never noticed before.
The Daily Create 168
It is not that I don’t notice Leonardo, it is just that I don’t notice him enough. Placed behind my back while I work at my desktop, he has kept me company through all my web adventures.
The Daily Crete 166 – Take a picture of something that makes you sick
I connected one of my Daily Creates with an audio assignment here. Partly to save time, but mostly because I had a hard time remembering something that makes me sick. Because I was working on Audio Assignment 351, I thought I could take a screenshot of the spam I was reading and post it as a photo. A good idea, except that the screenshot didn’t look very nice, so I decided to edit it using Pic Monkey. Then I got carried away a little.
And here is the recording:
Bonus track – Reverend Connor Strikes Again
I couldn’t resist this. It only came yesterday, otherwise I would have used that one. It somehow tricked my Spam Guard. Maybe Google now thinks I love spam?
For Audio Assignment 466 I created my own alarm clock. The goal was to use sounds around us (no music, no voice). I am not one of those people who wake up easily and there are very few sounds that don’t irritate me early in the morning. However, I remembered the recording of nightingales I made last spring when I was in my holiday house in the country. My first idea was to use them to help me fall asleep, but instead they just woke me up even more. So, reassigning them to their new role was a logical thing:
For Audio Assignment 152 I created my own ringtone. I used Roc by Aviary, which lets you create your own music. The drums I chose all come from the African Percussion section:
Roc is easy to use, especially if you watch the tutorial first. If you decide to play with Roc (it is highly addictive), you will find out that, due to its repetitive nature, Roc “music” is suitable for ringtones and alarm clocks.
I like this assignment because of its practical purpose. Whether you decide to actually use the ringtone or not, you will have good fun.
Camp is now over (see the final story. If you are craving an experience like this, head over to ds106 and see how to participate. For more on the Summer of Magic Macguffin, see.....
