Music Video Finale

Welcome Back! On to the next project, Music Videos. For our new project I have three teammates and the team leader is Alaka'i then my other teammates names are Mele and Makaio. The song that we picked is called When I Was Your Man by Bruno Mars we all agreed to it. We choose this song because we like Bruno Mars songs, he is a very passionate singer and soulful. I like this song personally because Bruno Mars is usually kid friendly so my family and my dad used to always listen to his songs and I felt like if we did this song it would be more relatable for all of us. This reason is because we want to kind of make this song more comedic and funny instead of the normal way he sings the song. We want to be unique and different from any other music video out there. Keep reading for more information about this amazing project.

Our story basically is me, Ala and Mele were companions with the chicken all before Makaio took her from all of us so basically we are the chickens exes. Yes the chicken is our main character because we wanted to make our music video more comedic then all of the other ones that were made before. So first me, Ala and Mele are going to be holding the chicken and then all of a sudden the chicken runs to Makaio and leaves all of us. Then Makaio has his moment with the chicken and after Mele tries to go up to the chicken to take her back but Makaio protects and guards the chicken from Mele. Then I try to take the chicken back but the chicken again chooses Makaio instead of me. Our storyline relates to the lyrics because in the song it says "That I should've bought you flowers and held your hand" and Makaio is finally that man who gave the chicken flowers not me, Ala or Mele. Another example would be "my pride, my ego, my needs and my selfish ways" this would match with the storyline we have which is Mele walking away sobbing because now she feels like she shouldn't have hurt the chicken in the first place.

The music video that we are making and editing now showcases our best works for lots of reasons. One of the reasons the music video showcases our best work is using the shot types or compositions techniques correctly to lead the audience into watching our music video. Another example would be sequences and making sure that we have no jump cuts or long shots. Most of all especially for music videos, It would be helpful and more interesting if the clips were cut to the beat so that it can increase the fast changing shots and it can also make the audience more interested as I said before. In the music video we try to look for lots of setting but since the setting is based around a chicken coop we just walked around or for the lipsyncs we went to rivers and streams to make it more interesting. In my opinion I think that this is the best Music Video I have made with the team throughout my three years in this class and I am very proud of our work.

When I Was Your Man
By: Bruno Mars

Same bed but it feels just a little bit bigger now
Our song on the radio but it don't sound the same
When our friends talk about you, all it does is just tear me down
'Cause my heart breaks a little when I hear your name

It all just sounds like oooooh…
Mmm, too young, too dumb to realize
That I should've bought you flowers
And held your hand
Should've gave you all my hours
When I had the chance
Take you to every party
'Cause all you wanted to do was dance
Now my baby's dancing
But she's dancing with another man

My pride, my ego, my needs, and my selfish ways
Caused a good strong woman like you to walk out my life
Now I never, never get to clean up the mess I made, ohh…
And it haunts me every time I close my eyes

It all just sounds like oooooh…
Mmm, too young, too dumb to realize
That I should've bought you flowers
And held your hand
Should've gave you all my hours
When I had the chance
Take you to every party
'Cause all you wanted to do was dance
Now my baby's dancing
But she's dancing with another man

Although it hurts
I'll be the first to say that I was wrong
Oh, I know I'm probably much too late
To try and apologize for my mistakes
But I just want you to know

I hope he buys you flowers
I hope he holds your hand
Give you all his hours
When he has the chance

Keiki to Career Kaua'i

Keiki 2 Career PSA from Kapaa Middle School MEDIA on Vimeo.

Welcome back to my interesting blogger! Recently my team and I created a PSA and if you don't know what a PSA is I'm about to tell you. A PSA is Public Service Announcement with the objective of raising awareness or changing public attitudes and behavior towards a social issue. My teammates names are Makaio, Alaka'i and Taylor. Our PSA project is for a non-profit organization called Keiki to Career Kaua'i and its about sharing family meals. We wanted to create a video that would connect the audience into listening and understanding why sharing family meals are important. If you wanna know or contribute to this non-profit organization visit Keiki to Career Kaua'i.


More into our PSA announcement our plan was to get interviews with people around our community and ask them why they like having dinner with their families. We got about seven people to contribute to the interviews. At the beginning we have visuals of like quick montages of the kids and then towards the end of the video we have a shot of kids on their phones transitioning into them putting it away to talk to their families. One challenge we did face was everyone not doing their work. One success we had was actually finishing the video.

Overall, I think we did a pretty good job on our video besides some people not contributing to discussions or doing their job. We could've done a better job by getting more b-roll and more people signing out a camera. Our interviews were actually really good but we were just lacking on some b-roll. In conclusion, our PSA was high enough quality for it to be accepted and we tried our best to make it perfect.

Movie Trailer Premier

P1T2_Grandpa's Goodbye from Kapaa Middle School MEDIA on Vimeo.

Welcome back! New project, New week, Now we are working on a Movie Trailer project. Basically our project goal is to plan & create a 90-120 second invented movie trailer that entertains the audience without giving away the ending of the movie. While doing this we have to have a dramatic voice actor who can actively hint at why our movie is a critically acclaimed “Must See”. Including those two things and also an original movie poster. Most importantly, we have to provide the audience with the highest level of production value so their eyes & ears stay glued to the screen. I contributed to the plan by editing the synopsis, figuring out what types of shots we are going to use for each scene, going over the script and editing it and also making sure that everyone on our team has at least something to do.

There is mostly always success but with success comes challenges. Speaking of challenges, one of the major challenges we had were communication and meet ups. This was due to not answering phones and not planning the right day to shoot so only two people showed up to the meeting. Even though only two showed up it was in our luck that it was the two main characters and they got some filming down so that was one success. Another challenge is probably getting all the scenes done in time because due to only having a limited amount of people they couldn't film as much. Also the lighting issues because our movie trailer is mostly at night or in the dark and so we came to a conclusion to put a dimmed white light next to the shots. One more challenge would be agreeing with everyone but that didn't help with anything so we just gave everyone a job to do and now we know what to do and contribute to the team. These are the successes and challenges that my team and I faced but we did solve the challenges.

For our critique results, I think that we deserve the votes that we got because our project was meant to be scary but turned out to be way more funnier so the audience was maybe confused or it just didn't get their attention. For the creativity it was absolutely creative and I agree with the votes on that because no one really did a movie trailer based on a grandma who killed the grandpa and then the boy tries to look for the grandpa with help from his friend. Lastly, for the requirements I agree with that because some of our shots were dark because our movie trailer was mostly based at nighttime so we tried to use a white light to make it look natural like the moon was coming through the window. Fortunately, we did get picked as the top 5 movie trailer from our class receiving 4 votes for the best overall movie trailer. That would be the red colored from the pie, I think we did deserve that because we did get the whole class laughing about our movie trailer and that's what made them vote for us as one of the best movie trailers in the class. From this project I have learned how to plan meetings, communicating and not relying on the other people on the team to do the work for you. I really enjoyed this project and hopefully in a later time will be able to do it again.

Metamorphosis Animation

The project goal is for our team to pitch their 2 best focus statements & story ideas, then complete a collaborative production plan all together before producing their 1-2 minute animated movie with custom soundtrack. The people that are on our team are, Taylor, Mele, Me and Micah. The type of animation types we will be using are stop-motion and also whiteboard animation. Stop-motion for the more active scenes and whiteboard for like the less movement ones. Another goal for this animation project is to get everyone to work on what they have to do not make other people do it for them. We believe that stop-motion and whiteboard are the best choices because we are kind of more experienced with using those techniques from past animation projects.

Our focus statement is "Rock Sprouts Flower" and basically its about a dirty old rock that gets kicked and thrown around and then eventually it gets thrown into the ocean. A little girl walks along the shoreline of the beach and the rock washes up right next to her foot. In the first scene, it shows the rock getting kicked and then someone picks it up and throws it. In the second scene, The girl is walking on the beach and the rock washes up and then she picks the rock up. In the third scene, she walks home and she places the rock on her desk. In the fourth scene, Taylor takes the rock to wherever she goes and the flower on the rock starts to sprout. In the fifth scene, she notices the little flower on the rock and at the end the flower become beautiful and big. The conflict is a sad looking rock gets thrown and kicked around. The resolution to the conflict is that the rock gets found and cared for by a little girl.

The critique of my team and I was pretty accurate for our metamorphosis animation project. We got mostly threes and I agree with that because our project could’ve been better but everyone learns from their mistakes. Even though we could've done better on our metamorphosis, In the amount of time that we had we tried to do out best but didn't reach our full potential. Our scenes were high quality so maybe thats why we finished our animation right before our critique. Overall, I am pretty proud of what we made and hopefully will be better next time.

Geometric Portraits

Easy

In my opinion I think that facial expressions are universal because people affect other people and to me people make other people have types of emotions. Expressions are universal because everyone in the world can make someone mad, sad, happy, excited, and etc., expressions are simply what type of emotions people have. But getting to the fact I am actually uncertain if facial expressions are universal I found a website actually its Facial Expressions. It says that everyone has emotions but there might be a different way they show them so I am still uncertain about facial expressions. As I said before even though I am uncertain I am leaning towards the side where facial expressions are universal because thats more of what I believe.

Poly-1

First I had to take a picture of myself and it had to be from the top of my head to close to the end of my chin. After that, I opened it in photo shop to a 8.5 by 11 layout and size my image so it was equally spaced. I went to image at the top then adjustments and then levels and selected auto. To show the grid I went to view>show.grid. Then I locked my portrait so the image couldn't move. After the grid was shown I picked a color for the outline and I picked red because its easy to so on your face. Then I put a straight line down my face but in the middle of my face so when I stretched my image it would be equally parted. After that I outlined my face so I could begin making the triangles. I started to make the triangles around my face and make sure that they are triangles not trapezoids. I made the triangles big around my face and hair and I also made sure that when I got to my eyes, ear, nose, and eyebrows I added a little bit more detailed triangles. Trust me this is the most time consuming thing out of your whole project. After you get all of that done you start outlining your triangles with the polygonal tool and start selecting triangles one by one and keep on going to filter>blur>average. After you got that done then you trace your one side of your face and use command J to copy it twice. Then drag one of those layer to the side to make it equal and label one left and label one right and turn off the picture layers. Then finally go to outline then to color overlay and pick white. I saved mine and then I saved it as a JPEG.

Poly-2

For me I am most proud of my poly-2 instead of my poly-1 because the second time I knew more what I was doing. To compare I think that both could have been improved by the nose because I always have a hard time figuring that part out. In the poly-1 I didn't know what kind of triangles to make and how big they were suppose to be and just didn't understand the concept of it yet. In my poly-2 of my cousin Makenzie it was more vibrant and she had facial expressions while my poly-1 was really dull. I felt the emotion in the one of my cousin because it looks like she's yelling but in the one of me I just looked bored and not like myself. I think that I didn't know how big or small the triangles should have been in the first one because I couldn't see the image while I was coloring the triangles in and that kind of threw me off. Overall I think that the best one out of these two poly images was the poly-2 because as I said it was vibrant and just more expressive and I kind of knew what my image would turn out as because without the outline I can see the face and tell if it still looks like that person.

Verbal Landscapes

AlfilerA_Retime from Kapaa Middle School MEDIA on Vimeo.

Nature impacts my life because when I am outdoors surrounded by trees and grass or when I am at the beach I just feel like I have nothing to worry about at all. It also takes all the stress of me and the anger but when I am indoors it is back to reality. Nature also impacts my life because theres always something about the ocean breeze and the sand when I am at the beach it makes me happy and joyful. Nature impacts my life when I am just outside I like to climb trees and swing on my cousins swing that's attached to her tree. So nature makes stay active too and that's good because everyone needs a little bit of running, jogging or even climbing every now and then. Nature makes me go outside and explore this world like going to beaches I have never been too or maybe even a hiking place I have never been too.

Time lapses are created by an amount of frames that go at a certain frame rate and when it is played it feels like time is going by way faster then usual and this is called a time-lapse. For time-lapses its good to show something in action but a slow moving action like a plant growing or pills dissolving. For the project that I am doing we are filming one third of the time lapses land and two thirds of it will be the sky to see the clouds moving past the frame as if time were passing by really fast. Slow-mos are created by capturing frames at a rate much faster than it will be played back. When replayed at normal speed, time appears to be moving more slowly. This is a slow-mo and it could be best to use a fast motion like rocks dropping into the ocean or a dog running. Slowed down it would have more effect and be more appealing to maybe an audience that is watching it.

The hardest part of time-lapses are trying to hold the camera still if you don't have a tripod also trying not to get man made stuff like wires or fences. Personally I think that if you were at a pasture and there was a fence then that would be a good time-lapse. The hardest thing about slow-mos are trying to keep the camera still especially if you are at the beach trying to catch a wave in motion but trying to get close because your camera might get wet. But the hardest thing about both time-lapses and slow-mos are just stillness. My favorite part of it is how beautiful it is once you make your final edits to it. Also when I go out to take them I always get to stay at that location like the beach. This project felt really hard but its turned out to be actually really simple to me.

Critique Reflection:
To be honest I don't think that my video was developing so I don't agree with the critiques I got. I think that it was either exemplary or accomplished. One thing I could've done better though in my project was get a better timelapse for the last shot. Overall I think that I should've gotten exemplary and accomplished for this project because I really do think I tried my best. I had one shaky shot but the rest of them were pretty good so maybe instead of ending with the shaky shot I could've ended with a better shot and put that one shaky shot in the middle or closer to the beginning. In conclusion, I do not agree with the grades I got but my video could've just improved a little.

Poetic Personal Statement

Hey guys it's my first blog post of the year! Even though I am not a poetic person I think that poetry is a type of literature that uses rhythms to make meanings to a poem. Poems can be any type of emotion or feeling and poems sometimes for me it makes me feel calm. I think that poetry is used for making somebody feel what the poem is saying. For example if the poem is talking about happiness it will most likely make you happy and if its talking about sadness you'll maybe feel sad. You don't need to be a poetic person to create a poem just find the words that rhyme and what makes you or the audience feel a type of way. Poetry can also be used to calm somebody down because you can vision your at a relaxing place like the beach because of how the poem describes it.

Once in a while I smile
Fears appear to clear as I cheer worthwhile
While having a Solid idea of Knowledge to go to college in style
And Yearning for Learning every once in a while
My accomplishments have been made through trials
I will succeed, this local girl from the Hawaiian isles

The way I use rhythm is when I am having trouble I use rhyme zone it helps me find words that rhyme with the words I already have. I used rhyme zone because I can't rhyme that well myself in fact I don't really like making poems that rhyme because It is very hard to do. I used rhyme words because it made my emotions feel real in the poem. I also used rhythm because the audience can also be excited when they read it instead of being tired and bored the whole time. I used rhyme by finding words that have the same syllables as smile like worthwhile, style, once in a while and trial. If words sound the same or if some sounds at the end sound the same then it can be used as a rhyme. I also used rhyming words because I like the way it makes a poem flow when you read it because it makes you vision what the person who wrote it was describing.