I did not want to do ANY work during the snow days but I persisted. Starting off, I commented on my classmate’s posts, as well as just scrolled through some of their blogs.
Daily Creates
Daily Create #1
For the first daily create of the week, we had to edit a national monument in a different environment. With growing up by the beach, I wanted to put Mount Rushmore under the sea! Sort of an underwater monument or Atlantis type deal.
Daily Create #2
For the last daily create of the week, the prompt was pretty silly. It was to give a backstory on why plates of banana’s are randomly appearing in Britain. A lot of people had a similar thought as me, that monkeys had something to do with it. I thought it would be funny to say it is a underground resistance movement by them to take over. This daily create was definitely unique, and it was fun to think outside the box for this.
Video Essay
Then, we had to make a video essay. I decided to watch the episode of Black Mirror, Hated in the Nation. I go more in depth in my blog post linked above, but overall, I really enjoyed making the video essay, and analyzing the shots themselves and how they impact the story. I used Clip Champ on Microsoft to edit it, and I found the scene on YouTube, which is a little low-quality but it was the only one I could find. I then recorded myself talking on the Voice Memos app on my phone, and inserted it into the clip.
Overall
Overall, I think I handled the work this week pretty well, as there wasn’t as much as the past couple of weeks. Making a video essay was very fun, as I love to watch them on YouTube, so being able to make my own was pretty cool!
I love watching video essays on several different topics. Whether it be pop culture, movies, tv shows, you name it. So making my own video essay sounded like a blast, but also sounded difficult.
The episode of Black Mirror itself, Hated in the Nation, I found to be pretty interesting. The world itself was technologically advanced, but also still looked like the world we live in now. Instead, there are more species going extinct, such as bees, more high-tech cars, as well as automated drone insects who do the pollinating. The plot itself was very long, but kept me on the edge of my seat until the final scene.
For the video essay itself, I wanted to the scene where everything comes to a turning point. They re-activate the ADI’s, thinking that will solve everything, but it fails, ultimately killing 387,000 people. The shots and vibes in the scene were consistent throughout the episode, with close-ups and cool tones and colors. And the breakout scene was calmer than I expected, just showing a couple of people’s reactions to the ADI’s becoming widespread over the city before cutting to the aftermath.
Overall, I enjoyed making this video essay, and breaking down how the filming techniques were used to reiterate the messaging behind the episode.
Again, starting the week was rough. I had been sick over the weekend, so I am still fully recovering. While recovering, I thought I would get some work done, so I started off with the Daily Create of the day, as well as commenting on others posts. I also cleaned up my site to make it more personal and easy to look at. Lastly, I started to brainstorm some radio show ideas, and came up with a couple ideas but did not pick one yet. Some of the ideas were maybe a late night talk show or a murder mystery. I will decide later in the week which one is better.
Listening
In terms of listening, we had to listen to an audio story called Moon Graffiti. As I said in my blog post, audio storytelling can be difficult because if you need to convey a message or plot, it has to be done in a specific way where the listener can understand it. Moon Graffiti did this perfectly in recreating possible dialogue that Neil and Buzz could have had when they landed on the moon, such as their first reactions. I also listened to the ds106 radio show. I went more in depth in my blog post, ds106 Radio Show, but in summary, it was very interesting. The stuff that they were playing while I joined was a fictional podcast called “Limetown”. The plot was intriguing, and I was able to catch on since it was in the middle of episode 5. It got me hooked and now I think I want to start listening to the full series. I can’t want to tune into the ds106 radio show every once in a while, as I want to see what other podcasts, songs, or other media it can get me into.
Radio Bumper
For the radio bumper, I wanted to do something lowkey. As I said in my blog post, I wanted to replicate the lofi music lives you could find on Youtube that can play in the background while you are studying and doing work. It was weird to incorporate my own voice (as I do not like hearing my own voice), but it was still fun to make it!
Assignments
The sound effect story was one of my favorite assignments from this week! It allowed me to be a bit creative, and to think about what I want the story to be. For my sound effect story, I decided to do a day at the beach gone wrong. It was fun to find to the different sound effects and to think about the usual sounds that you would hear at the beach. Overall, I enjoyed this assignment!
For the second assignment, I did the soundtrack to Veronica’s life. I saw a lot of people were doing this assignment to share their personal music tastes and favorite artists, so I thought I would do it a bit differently. I would make a playlist of her 10 favorite songs in order to characterize and visualize her a bit more. To see the playlist and see my reasonings behind it, read Soundtrack to Veronica’s Life.
Lastly, I had Dr. Oblivion make a podcast intro for my podcast, Liv Loves Movies. As mentioned in my blog post, Dr. Oblivion Podcast Intro, my podcast was created for my introduction to digital studies class, and I have been planning on continuing it (if I find the time). His intro explained it perfectly, with how I dive into the pieces of media and cinema in order to analyze it’s significance and messaging. Dr. Oblivion’s wit also added the edge that it needed to stand out.
Daily Creates
Daily Create #1
The first daily create of the week was to do visual poetry. We had to pick a body part and draw it with words. So, I listed the five fingers, pinky, ring, middle, pointer, and thumb. I thought it was fun, and almost satisfying.
Daily Create #2
For the second daily create, it was to draw a t-rex, which was easy enough. I don’t consider myself the best artist, but I am proud of this drawing as I was able to do it free-hand.
Daily Create #3
For the last daily create of the week, it was to make a poem out of anti-spam words. Spam is universally annoying, so it was fun to get a bit creative to create a rhyming, quick poem. Here it is below:
Block, delete, report as fake Phishing links? Big mistake! No click, no trick, no shady site… Spam be gone, out of my sight!
Overall
This week was a bit tough for me in terms of motivation, but the assignments themselves were pretty fun in terms of using my creativity and thinking outside the box in order to complete them. As usual, I think my favorite assignment from this week would have to be the sound effect story, as I found it amusing to look through the different sound effects and find the ones that would create a narrative.
For my radio bumper, I wanted to make the background music, more lowkey. I wanted to replicate the music you would hear when listening to the lofi radio on youtube. Something that you could relax and listen to while you are studying or doing work for class. I found the background music off of a free music and image website called Pixabay.com. I then included just a simple “You’re listening to DS106 Radio”, just to let the music have the spotlight itself. I found this to be fun, as it didn’t take me very long and I was able to figure out what vibe I wanted to go for pretty quick.
I asked Dr. Oblivion to create a podcast intro for my podcast, Liv Loves Movies. I made this podcast for my intro to digital studies class, and have been planning on continuing it. In the podcast, I talk about the cultural significance of certain movies, compare them to each other, or even just talk through ones that are just fun to watch. Dr. Oblivion did a perfect job at explaining what the core purpose of my podcast is, which is to dive into cinema through a cultural lens. I also would like to add that I loved his comments such as “a podcast, ah so original” and “go make the world a better place with your podcast about movies”, I appreciate his sarcasm.
I have had a couple of ideas over the past week about a radio show. And I have still yet to think of which one is my favorite so I will list them all out.
First, I thought a cool idea would to be a late night talk show interview with each of the characters. It would sort of be like a “Jimmy Fallon” or “Stephen Colbert” style show, with one of the characters hosting and the others appearing as guests. The interviews could be a bit comedic or chaotic, while also staying within the tropes of film noir. We could also have segments of listeners calling in, or maybe some of the characters playing quick mini-games. It would be fun to try to imagine our characters who come from a genre that is quite serious and brooding, be a bit silly.
Another idea is to do a true-crime murder mystery. We could come up with the classic “Clue” tropes, and have it where one of the characters is murdered, and the others have to work together in order to figure out who is the murderer. This could be more serious, but have some humor sprinkled in here and there.
I feel that these ideas would allow the group to step out of the box, and to think of their characters and how they would act in certain situations.
I think audio storytelling is a very creative, unique way to tell a story. It can be difficult, because it is harder to convey a message without the listener being able to see what they are hearing. The sound effects and dialogue have to have a certain tone in order for the listener to infer and connect what they are listening to, to the story. Specifically, Moon Graffiti was very interesting. The beginning speech immediately grabbed my attention. My first thought was, “I do not remember them dying on the moon so this is a twist”, but hearing that it was an actual speech that Nixon recorded in case they did not return was crazy. Also the details of adding dialogue between Buzz and Neil as they are trying to land on the moon was very cool. Hearing their first reactions to the little things, such as the how the dust moved made it realistic and really puts into perspective what it must have felt like for them to land on a different planet. Overall, I enjoyed Moon Graffiti, and listening to all these audio stories makes me want to look into more.
For the sound effect story, it made me think of one of my favorite activities when going home for break, going to the beach! I am from Virginia Beach, so I was practically raised on the water. Some of my happiest childhood memories are being at the beach, swimming in the ocean, building sandcastles, even boogie boarding on the tiny, non-existent waves. When creating the story, I wanted to incorporate the usual sounds I would hear when trying to sunbathe at the beach, kids playing, seagulls, water splashing, lifeguard whistles, and the wind blowing. It starts off with the slamming of the car door, then walking on the sound, slowly starting to hear the crashing of the waves and the shouts of the children. Then, I decided to add a little dramatics with two girls getting swept into the tide and needing to be saved by a lifeguard. But, of course, it has a happy ending of the girls being saved, and everyone going on with their lives. I found most of the sounds off of the free sound effects sites that were given.
The radio show was so fun! I joined in a couple minutes late because time got away from me. But, I was able to connect the dots on what was playing when I joined. The audible ad was talking about a fictional podcast show called “Limetown”. After doing some research, as I had never heard of it before, to quote, a synopsis said “Limetown is about a journalist Lia Haddock attempts to solve the mystery behind the disappearance of over 300 people at a neuroscience research facility in Tennessee”. So far in the episode, which I am pretty sure it was episode 5, Lia was interviewing a woman named Deirdre, who went with her ex-husband, Max to be a part of an experiment. He was convinced by a man named Oscar Totem to participate in the experiment, where he would get an implant to talk to other people non-verbally. Only half the town has the implant, and the other half, the “Old School”, doesn’t, including Deirdre. This puts a strain on Deirdre’s and Max’s relationship. Max then convinces Deirdre to get the implant in secret, which the “Old School” group eventually finds out, causing a riot. This ultimately gets Oscar killed, and someone called The Man sending out messages in order to calm people down. It is then revealed that The Man is Deirdre’s uncle, Emile. The episode ends there. Overall, I was able to catch on to the story, and I found it pretty interesting. I would compare it to a Black Mirror episode, as it has the similar elements of advancements and technology and messages about our society. There was also a “film noir” shoutout, which I thought was funny since that is the theme of our class!
When I saw this assignment, I immediately knew I wanted to do it. But, I wanted to do something a bit different since I already love making playlists for a specific experience and wanted to challenge myself a bit. So, I decided to make a playlist for my course character, Veronica Malone. I go more in depth about her in my blog post, my Course Character, but basically, she is a detective, and has a hard-shell personality with a strong moral compass. When thinking about what music she would listen to, I knew she would like older pop and rock bands, such as Fleetwood Mac, No Doubt, and the Animals. She would also like classic singers such as Nancy Sinatra and Nina Simone. The genres do range a little, going from rock, alternative, pop, jazz, or blues. She likes the complex emotions that these songs address, as she can relate with the high-intensity field that she works in.
