6. What have you learnt about 6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of technologies from the process of

constructing this product?constructing this product?

Samridhi Virk

HD Digital CamcorderHD Digital CamcorderOne of the most important pieces of technology that we used when constructing our film was a digital camcorder. This camcorder was very useful since it shot in HD which meant that our footage came out a lot clearer and brighter, I think this was especially useful since we were trying to create a romantic comedy and they tend to have bright and vivid colours in all the shots to make the film seem happier. The HD camera allowed us to do this.

The camcorder was also very easy to film on since all you really needed to do was push a button however by playing around with it we were able to learn how to create things such as depth of field which we used when we had the shots of Naomi applying her makeup, she was in focus but the background was not.

I learned many things through using a HD camera. I learned things such as depth of field, different angles, and I also how to create effective looking shots and frames. I also learned how to adjust the lighting in our locations in order to have the best looking colours in our footage.

Apple MacApple MacDuring this project was the first time I had ever used Apple Mac’s before. I had been using my trusty Dell laptop for everything and, since I had never done a subject like Media Studies before, I had never needed to use anything else. I was quite hard adapting from Windows to Mac to start with since pretty much everything from the desktop, to the programs, and even the commands were different but once I got the hang of it I realised how much quicker and easier it is to do things of a Mac.

Since Mac’s are a lot more advanced and specifically designed to make creative activities easier, I ended up using it for almost everything, from research, to editing and even blogging. I learned how to used the different programmes such as Final Cut Pro, iMovie, Garage Band, Safari and Open Office. As well as also learning a basic skills to navigate my way around a Mac such as the command functions, e.g. “Screenshots” and “Copy & Paste”. I now have the “Apple Bug” and I’m dying to get a Mac for myself!

Final Cut ProFinal Cut ProA great advantage of using an Apple Mac was that it had a programme called Final Cut Pro. It was my first time using this as well and I found that it was much easier to learn than I had imagined.

We used Final Cut to edit our movie and I think that the quality of our opening sequence is as good as it is because we used it. We were able to do a lot of different things other than just normal cutting and trimming however that was also made much easier since we were able to trim things down to the slightest point, this made things such as our match on action shots, e.g. Naomi entering her bedroom, much more fluid and helped with the continuity.

We were also able to add in sounds really well like in one of our shots where Naomi was writing in the mirror we were able to remove the sound from the original shot, add background music, and the sound of the squeaking mirror over the top; if we had been using something like Windows Movie Maker we would never have been able to do that.

Lastly we were able to create our titles exactly how we wanted them to be. Since we were trying to recreate girly, romantic comedy titles we had to be able to change the colour and the font of the titles as well as where we positioned them and their duration. After we figured out how to do this it became a lot easier to make our titles precisely how we wanted them to be.

Since we used iMovie to edit our preliminary task; I learned how to use the trimming and blade tools, how to import and insert media (videos, pictures, music), how to share the video by uploading it to youtube, how to remove sound, as well as many other techniques.

Garage BandGarage BandAnother programme on the Apple Mac was Garage Band which came in very useful when creating the music for our opening sequence. When we researched the music we could use we had two possibilities however one was from Garage Band.

Carolina and I had found a really great pre recorded track on Garage Band called “Yearbook” which sounded exactly like something you would find in a romantic comedy. The problem was however that the loop was on 30 second long so Carolina used Garage Band to trip and merge the different loops together so that they flowed into each other and there were no jumps, this would not have been possible to do without a specialist music programme like Garage Band.

I learned how to import audio clips, how to trim them, how to merge loops, how to speed up and slow down tracks, how to add effects to the music, and how to save the project as an actual audio track.

BloggerBloggerIn order to upload evidence of our research and planning, construction and our evaluation we had to create a blog where we could document everything. To do this I used a website called Blogspot.

I had never used a website like this before and I had never even written a blog before so it was quite interesting. Blogger was easier to get a hang off than I thought because it was really just like writing a word document except it gets uploaded online. I was also able to embed images, videos and music onto the blog which made the uploads more interesting.

Apart from learning how to write like a blogger, I learned how to do things such as inserting images, changing the styles, and embedding video and audio clips using html codes. I also learned a lot about different media products and different ways of presenting media through blogger, e.g. powerpoints on slideshare, presentations on prezi, videos on youtube, and music on soundcloud.

SlideshareSlideshareSildeshare was one of the creative forms of technology that I used to present my evaluation questions. I made a powerpoint such as this one and then I was able to upload it to slideshare and then embed it onto by blog. Since I had never used it before I learned how to upload powerpoints, view them and then embed them onto by blog using a html code.

PreziPreziPrezi was another way I answered one of my evaluation question. At first I thought Prezi was going to be very complicated but, like most things, it was actually quite easy. I really enjoyed making a Prezi presentation because I thought think that it looked really interesting and because it was a lot of information I was able to break it down into quite nice chunks and add pictures and videos to make it more interesting. I learned how to use this entire programme from scratch, e.g. how to do things such as add text, frames, pictures, videos, arrows, pathways, etc.

YouTubeYouTubeThough I am constantly on youtube to watch other people’s videos, I have never actually uploaded a video onto youtube myself. I learned how to upload straight to youtube from Final Cut Pro and also to upload videos directly from the youtube website.

SoundcloudSoundcloudBecause I wanted to be able to embed music onto my blog and I didn't want to have to make a video for it and upload it to youtube, I created a Soundcloud account. I didn't really know what soundcloud was before this but I was able to upload songs onto it and then embed them straight onto my blog. I learned how to upload a audio track and then embed it onto my blog using a html code.

HotmailHotmailAlthough I have always used my email account to receive e-mails such as newsletters from clothing stores or order confirmations for purchases (I’m admittedly a slight shop-a-holic), I had never actually used it to communicate with people.

Though doing this task I learned how easy it was to send e-mails to people. Phoebe, Carolina and I would sent each other emails of sound clips and images that we needed as well as emailing each other documents such as scripts. This made it much easier for everyone to be up to date with important information and it was also much easier to share things between us, especially out of class.

I learned how to composed messages on the new outlook layout, attach pictures, documents and audio clips and send them using the skydrive. I also learned how to open and download the attachments I had received, and save them where I wanted to.