08 March 2018

Youtubers

Youtubers are a weird class of celebrity that both are, and are not, famous. You say the name "Robert Downey Jr." and while some people may not be able to point him out in a crowd, they've heard of him and know he's a movie star. Same thing with Brad Pitt or George Clooney or Emma Watson.

Youtubers aren't quite like that.

They're more of real people instead of some famous, unattainable dream person.

Through the lens of their webcam, you can see more of the ~real person~ behind it. They're more in tune with their audience; many gaming youtubers ask for suggestions on games to play, while artists can ask what song the audience wants them to cover or deal with next.

There's much more of a back-and-forth with youtubers than "Proper Celebrities," so I think that may be why we see them being more of friends than distant stars.

Youtube

It's strange to think of how YouTube has progressed as a website. It started in 2005, which makes it 13, depending on the month it was released. It grew from a weird website that hosted videos, to so much more. Today it could be worth up to 75 million, which would be more than 5 Twitters. Of course, that was as of July 2017, so it could be worth much more now.

That in itself is really weird to think about.

The hierarchy of website values.

Also the fact that July 2017 was almost a year ago wow.

https://www.cnbc.com/2017/07/25/top-google-analyst-says-youtube-is-worth-75-billion.html

05 February 2018

English for New Media Video

Picking a proper song for this thing was the absolute worst. I wanted it to come from a free music archive, but everything I had been looking at from one just didn't fit for me. I finally settled on a variation of Clair de Lune.

I made this in Windows Movie Maker. I wanted to start with a gif of the MGM lion roaring, but the gif wouldn't work for me. I also wanted to include Warcraft, since it is a series that didn't originate as a book, but I wanted to keep it short and sweet.


music -> http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Podington_Bear/Clair_De_Lune_Variations/Clair_De_Lune_Warm_Electric_Guitar_Arr

30 January 2018

English for New Media Promo

So, my closet shelf does not seem to be the only thing to explode this week. 

My computer decided it wanted to shut down. I have a bad habit of not saving things, so as par for the course I hadn't saved this thing. Computer rebooted finally, tried pulling it up in that stupid program - Window's Movie Maker, 'cause I'm too much of a poor college student for a decent program - and it had ~saved~ it... ish. Tried pulling it up, did so for about three seconds before it started to not respond. It closed, pulled it back up, and everything was gone.

This week is the best.

I'm not posting the ~rough draft~ here, simply because I had twenty minutes before class to remake it and it is absolute scheiße. 

I did have an idea in mind for this thing though. I did start with the roaring lion of MGM, simply because I thought it'd be cool. I was going between the countdown and that, but the lion won in the end. I wanted to show different iterations of the same thing; Alice's Adventures Through the Looking Glass, the Alice in Wonderland animation, Alice: Madness Returns video game, the live action Alice in Wonderland. I did it for Alice as well as Pride and Prejudice (throwing in & Zombies for another iteration of it). I was going to add another, but time was a concern for it.

The audience, to me, was definitely perspective students to the major. I think it would turn out the same (or maybe just incredibly similar) if I had chosen the class as the audience. 

My goal is to show iterations of the same base story. We are so used to the same basic story, but just because the story started out as a giant book doesn't mean that's the only way to do things. English books, comic books, animations, live action, video games, this thing, that thing.

(Plus, rewatching the thing I put together in that twenty minutes I had between class, the cuts are wrong. Gifs don't work. It has the lion for ten seconds - not working as a gif - two quick pictures of Alice (book/animation), and then speeds through the others faster than you can tell what they are.)

--

EDIT: Another idea I'm getting based off of seeing other videos is to include Warcraft. It goes from a video game, to a movie, comics, books... It's an example of a world that did not start as a book.

25 January 2018

Presentations (Day II)

Last day of our first presentation in this class. I'm going today... Goodie. It's not that I don't like talking in front of people - I act for goodness sake - but presentations just suck in general. As with day one, I'm only going to sum up a thought for each presentation. I'd much rather listen to the presentations than to take notes during them. I also type kind of loudly, so it can get distracting for all parties involved and blah.
  • I saw that it was over the art studio and I automatically checked out. It's horrible, I know, but the way someone there treated my friend still ticks me off. For a while, a couple friends and I would flip off the studio whenever we passed it. 
  • My transitions wouldn't work. Boo. Also I think I made my classmates hungry so that's a plus.
  • cats.
  • Pottermore! Liz and I actually met when we were in the Harry Potter class together so I thought her choice was pretty cool. Plus, I'm on Pottermore so I'm a fan.
Technological issues galore! 
  • Smith-Zimmermann Heritage Museum... I should really visit that sometime before I graduate.

23 January 2018

Presentations (Day I)

Did a few presentations today in class. Only five of us went today, meaning there are five of us left. Huh. Never actually realized there were exactly ten of us. Well, I knew, but I never really knew. It was really interesting to see what everyone did, but I summed up a thought for each one. I was too busy watching and listening to really write down much.

  • It was interesting to hear about someone in college has a successful clothing business. 
  • KJAM's website has the most hits on its obituary page, which is both interesting and kinda sad.
  • It's cool to see how theater companies tend to advertize the same ways.
  • It's really cool to see how the Poe story 'Annabel Lee' has changed throughout the years.
  • I didn't realize someone could make a business out of cleaning up pet poop. Wow.

18 January 2018

Given the list we made in class on Tuesday, I really don't use many different forms of media, or at least not the technologies we use to receive media. I use a cellphone, a computer, and books. I occassionally use a 3DS, a printer, and television.

The first thing I really remember media related would either be playing Doom as a young child (bad idea, do not let your children play Doom), or watching Sailor Moon with my parents as a kid. Since, I've been really interested in technology so I've used media a lot growing up.

I do have one specific rule for using media, video games in particular. If I missed school as a child for any reason (other than snow days, of course,) I was banned from playing on the computer for that day. As I was raised this way, I feel strange playing video games on a day where I miss class.