Hollywood #3

I began going all out. I edited our movie on Friday and Saturday. On Friday, I made the mistake of pasting clips over other clips. On Saturday, I finally figured out how to insert clips so I fixed all of Friday's screw ups and did some of my own editing, in particular on the introduction.

We have to share our suite with another group, which is slowing down the process. I think we will still produce a solid film. Not a super interesting one but it should be clean.

We took a chance using a rather simple idea, and while that helped make editing easier, it was a little banale maybe.

Cap Hollywood Reflection #2

Just like I expected, our film is a pretty straightforward edit, so while we are not done yet, finishing the editing should not be a problem. We will continue to edit on Friday and starting next week, I can begin coming in to edit. Right now the group is taking turns editing, which isn't too productive, so next class we will split into two groups: one editing and one making a movie poster.

It's all about finishing the project now. Now that APs are done, CAP Hollywood is now a priority. My group is responsible so we won't miss the due date for the film. At this point we could complete all editing in probably just a couple hours. Fixing audio levels often takes time, but since we'll be using music, we're going to put the background sounds very low, which shouldn't take long.

CAP Hollywood Reflection #1

My group went filming on Tuesday and Wednesday and we are all done. I thought overall the process was very smooth. I think I can say that this is probably the best script one of my filming groups has ever used. I tend to be one to enhance shots on the spot, but nonetheless, my group had a great foundation coming in. I can't really think of a single obstacle we encountered, beyond a shadow here and there.

My contribution to the group was acting in the film, something I really didn't want to do. I did my best to avoid the role, but once I saw that nobody was keen on acting, it made sense for me to do it. I'm not a very good actor, but I can make things entertaining, intentionally or not. With me as the talent, a serious film can easily turn into a comedy. Fortunately this was already somewhat of a comedy so whatever stupid looks I had shouldn't really be a problem.

Next week is all about editing. There is no time to do work at home until after my AP exams, which both fall on Tuesday, the 14th. After that, if we still need to do some edits, I have some version of Final Cut Pro at home that I could use to finish the job. This should not be too complicated an edit, one that in reality could be done with iMovie.

Two people will have to work on the movie poster next week. I probably won't be one of them because I showed up for filming both days and have a pretty good idea of how the final product should look.

Kars 4 Kids

Every day I have to wake up early, usually for school, I use the radio as my alarm. I give myself about 30 minutes to wake up listening to a program, sometimes WAMU, or lately, a local sports station. Oftentimes this process allows me to get up nice and slowly. But lately, as now I'm listening to commercial radio, I have to listen to commercials. Most people would say it's not the end of the world, and normally I would too. But sometimes, for about a minute, it feels like my life is coming to an end. There is some non-profit organization called "Kars 4 Kids", which does something with old cars to somehow benefit kids. Anyway, they have a jingle, an infamous jingle. It's been on making people deaf for a few years now, and it frequently brings about a rude beginning to my day. My prospects for a good day take a huge hit once I listen to the Kars 4 Kids jingle. I'm now starting to just shut off my radio.

Here's a link to the jingle. Note: If you want to leave this post with your ears intact, I'd recommend not clicking this hyperlink.

Of course, I know you did click on it so now I will explain to you the problems I have with the jingle and the organization as a whole (although everything I know about it comes from the commercial). While I might have made it seem more out of tune than it actually is, when the voices of the kid and the older guy are still ringing in your ears next month, you'll wish you had never clicked the link. This image kind of sums up my reaction, only, I can't drive my bed of a cliff. Sorry I have to link to the Blog because the image is too big.

So the commercial tells me to dial 1-877-Kars-4-Kids. First, they don't even specify if one should dial the number "4" or the preposition "for". Second, I'm pretty sure telephone numbers are supposed to be only 10 digits in the United States. They've got their consumers dialing 12 plus that additional "1".

More importantly though, what do they mean by "Kars 4 Kids"? Because it seems like they want me to donate my old car to let a six-year-old drive. There's a couple problems with that. First of all, six-year-olds can't see over the steering wheel. And secondly, it's nearly impossible for somebody not to drive off a cliff after hearing the jingle. Presumably the car that they were supposed to donate is now deep in a valley.

So if they don't mean for me to give up my car for a kid to drive, then there is only one other possibility. This has to be some kind of orphanage where they sell kids for cars. They don't specify how many cars for a kid on their website, but I'm sure I could find out easily with one simple dial of "1-877-Kar-S4Ki".

I have big ambitions for my rival business, which has a very similar jingle. "1-8-7-7 Beer for Kids. K-E-E-R, Beer for kids. 1-8-7-7 Beer for kids. Donate Bud Light today!" Admit it, you sang to this.

I found a confirmation that indeed Kars4Kids does not sell kids for cars. Therefore they must sell the cars for the kids to use for recreational use. Here's proof.



Here's a parody of the jingle. I feel that if I were to waste my mind finding new lyrics to the jingle, I'll bet I could come up with 50 in an hour.

A piece of my documentary reflection

Documentary Project Reflection

My group did a documentary about what the United States should do in the conflict between Israel and Palestine. Coming into the project, I can go as far as to say that I didn’t know that there was a conflict between the two nations. Honestly, all I knew was that the Middle East was having problems. Now I am definitely keeping up more with U.S. foreign policy.

Part of the reason I ended up with those two was that I wanted to submit a video to C-SPAN and nobody else in the class did besides them. Had we started the process on the first class of the year, then presumably more groups would have wanted to enter the competition. I think that is one way to improve the project. Since our group did most of the work outside of school anyway, it would have been helpful to get the assignment earlier. I could have then gotten ahead of the research and then contributed more. Otherwise, I could have been in a different group that submitted. One way to make groups next year would be to divide up the class, with those who are prepared to put in extra work and want to submit to C-SPAN on one side of the room, and those who just want to do the process mostly in school on the other. Then the big groups could do brainstorming sessions, and each nominate one idea for a vote. Depending on the size of the group, the individuals could vote to nominate a certain amount of them. Then, like we did in Ms. Fillman’s class nominating the CAP Hollywood films, people could rank their top three choices. Because much of filmmaking is collaboration, ranking the top three people they would want to work with would also make sense. Then you could make groups based on similar interests.

Dagger!

I finished my homework just in time to hear one of the greatest (worst) calls of a sports announcer of all time. The Washington Wizards were down by one point against the Detroit Pistons with what I recall was about 12 seconds left on the clock. After the ball is nearly thrown out of bounds, Martell Webster is able to tap the ball to Trevor Ariza for a contested 3-point shot at the buzzer. He puts up the shot, and much to the amazement of just about everybody in the arena and presumably at home, the ball hits nothing but net. Steve Buckhantz, the Wizards play-by-play announcer, clearly thought it went in.

He shouts his signature line, "Dagger!" This one happened earlier this year, but unlike Wednesday, he didn't walk away looking like a total fool.


I consider that a pretty exciting call, and I'd definitely definitely replay this video. Now this coming video of what happens when a "Dagger" goes wrong never gets old. Forget that the Wizards lost the game; this was ten times better than a win!


Now here's what this scene looked like to me. I'm being perfectly honest. I wasn't exactly sure what had happened, but it for some reason just didn't look like it went in. Maybe it's because by the time I was able to process what had happened, I saw no Wizards players celebrating and saw a Pistons player with his hands in the air, as if to celebrate. I caught on what felt like about 15 seconds before Buckhantz, and as a result, I was on my couch dying with laughter. I had totally forgotten that my favorite team had just lost a nail biter.

Anyway, I will give Buckhantz credit for generating a highlight from that lowlight in his life. "The dagger has been retracted," said Buckhantz. 

Real News #2

Here's my second post of "Real News."
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The first news is courtesy of the Huffington Post. So... Montana never ceases to amaze me. Now all of the "moose[s] and antelope[s]... killed by a car [can] be harvested for food." This a fantastic new law, because now the animals' families won't feel that their loved ones died in vein.
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A little boy calls for help! This is pretty funny. He didn't want to go to sleep so he called the cops. Not exactly sure how that would hep his cause.

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This was an incredible shot... by a cheerleader.