#5

One final thing this class has done for me is ruin movies. I can no longer watch a movie without thinking of the rule of thirds. Now I always have to see which scenes fit the rule.

Teledramatic Art Final, Spring 2012

From the first day of this class i learned that I underestimated filmmaking and editing as a whole. Even simply getting the video in the right format was difficult. In my third uploaded film, (my first edited film) you can see that I did not "Export Media" the correct way. The screen of is super tiny and it is difficult to see. Another thing I learned early on in the year was the importance of making clean in and out points. It is also important to know where where to make a good cut. In the same film, you can also tell that I did not choose good spots to cut the interviews. The clips that I used had people whose answers were long and lengthy. I obviously did not cut the clips in apropriate places. Later on, on the next few videos were practice showing that I knew how to do certain edits, titles, and cuts. Specifically, you can see that I learned how to do an instert, overlay, and extract edits. And after that you can also see the short videos where I learned how to add two different types of titles. One video that shows some of these edits and the titles is my cyberbullying video. In the video we have both types of titles; lower third, and the normal one that takes up the whole screen. Later in the year, addig titles became easier, and that was the least of my worries for films. The next big thing I learned was the special effects. At first, it was difficult to learn how to animate them because I got confused with the key frames and which one to press. I eventually learned how to do this and it is shown in the "Thomas the Train" video. Practically all that video is is animated pictures. This is one video where I am very proud of the animated effects. My final video is very short. 53 seconds isn't long enough to include everything i've learned. However I am proud of it because I got it done in a short amount of time, and I know in the beginning of the year, getting a short video done in 2 days would have difficult for me to finish. It does include some things I've learned such as an overlay, an animated title, rolling credits, and breaking up one lenghthy clip into two simple clips.

"The Water is Wide" Reflection

1. The story my partner and I were trying to convey in this film was Thomas the Train Engine and his daily life. It starts with dawn and the world waking up, and then Thomas waking up and starting his day. It goes on, and the toward the middle, Thomas comes to an obstacle, and to overcome this obstacle he needs to believe that he can do it. The obstacle is making it up a hill with a bunch of cars to pull. As the music begins to get intense, Thomas is going up the hill. He finally makes it, and rejoices in his hard work, and then he rides off into the sunset. 2. I am most proud of the images from 2:32 to 3:05. During this moment of the film, we were trying to get the point across that Thomas was working hard to get up the hill, and then he makes it and is happy because he had accomplished his difficult task. The flashing picture of the steam coming from the engine was supposed to evoke the idea of actual steam coming from the engine as he worked to get up the hill. During the happy part of the sequence, we used bright colors because most of the time, happiness is associated with many bright colors. 3. I believe about 20% to 30% of our film was abstract images. No, we did not use one consistent color or shape throughout the video. 4.I realized that abstract images or videos makes the idea behind it much more hidden and complicated to figure out. When an artist or filmmaker makes something with the intention of it being abstract, they have to keep in mind that that will also mean that it is the viewers discretion on what the piece of art, or film, means. 5. I realized that music has a large effect on images. For example, if you show a picture of a gift on a front porch with happy and upbeat music, it is easy to assume nothing bad will happen. Most likely it is a holiday, or someones birthday when there's a gift. If you chose the same image, but put suspenseful music with a lot of quiet, or low sounds, it can be assumed that the gift is bad. Depending on the context, it could mean something is going to pop out, or it will blow up. 6. My partner finished adding titles and most of the special effects to the video. 7. I think I did a good job in editing the pictures and timing them with the music. I also did a few of the special effects in the beginning of the video. I was absent for AP testing, so that's why my partner had to do most of the special effects.

Birds

Zoie and I chose this topic because we couldn't think of anything better to do. Later on, we decided that birds were symbolic of this school year, and highschool in general, and how it goes by so fast.

Thomas the Train

Special Effect Two

For this effect, I chose "Lense Flare" in the "Generate" folder. For the first part of the effect, under Effect Controls, you want to adjust the first number next to "flare center" down to the 100 range. Doing this will cause the flare to move to the left. To move the flare back over to the right, you toggle with the first number next to "flare center" again, but this time the number will be up in the 400-500 range depending on where you want the effect to stop. Do not change the second number next to "flare center," Flare Brightness, Lens Type, or the Blend With... sections. You might use this effect if you want to give the impression that it is really hot outside, and the sun is hitting the camera/character in direct light.