Author Archives: M. Marshall

Weekly Summery #4: Audio!

M. Marshall 2.7

I have definitely enjoyed getting to learn about and experiment with audio. I had never done anything like this before so it was very cool to learn about. I particularly liked Audacity, it seemed like a great place for people trying things out and I look forward to continuing to try it. Here’s what the week looked like!

I started with the daily creates for this week.

Post #1
Post #2
Post #3

Honestly, I hate how the posts look embedded into the page, I may need to go to the DKC again just to figure this out. It is so ugly it makes me unreasonably frustrated and I’ve tried everything I can figure out. This is just a learning curve, but still frustrating.

I tuned into the DS106 radio on Tuesday which I enjoyed a lot!

Live Listening Session!

I created a radio bumper, which was cool, but I am interested in how I can do better.

Radio Bumper

I considered ideas for a radio show with my character.

Radio Show Ideas

I listened to Moon Graffiti by the Truth Podcast. A line that was super eerie to me was, “How many people do you think they’ll bury by the time they’re through?”

Moon Graffiti

Then I worked on the audio assignments!

I did assignment 2820 from the audio assignment bank. A news report on the Nigerian prince email scam.

Breaking News!

Then assignment 2724, where I created a short song (really a blip).

Chrome Music Lab

My sound effects story was of a racer running across the finish line.

Sound Effects Story

I’ve really been enjoying this class. I’ve definitely struggled to connect my posts to the TechNoir theme of the class and my character, but I think as time goes on I will get better at it.

Moon Graffiti

M. Marshall 2.7

Listening to Moon Graffiti was a very cool experience. It is interesting to think about a timeline where the mission to land on the Moon failed and to contemplate how worthwhile it is to go to the Moon. Last semester I took Writing About the Moon with Dr. Scanlon, and we talked a lot about the history of the Moon landing. Pretty much as soon as Apollo 11 landed back on Earth, pink slips of paper to fire employees were being handed out because the project was over and they could no longer expend the resources necessary to fund NASA. I wonder if Apollo 11 had failed if they would have continued to push for it, or if they would have just given up. The radio-sound of the podcast makes it feel like a real historical audio of something that happened.

Breaking News!

M. Marshall 2.7

I used the suggested website, Collosyan. I didn’t have any great ideas so I did a news story based on a common scam technique from the 2000’s and 2010’s (ish), where a person receives an email from someone claiming to be a prince from Nigeria asking for money to unfreeze their bank account. The news story covers the request for $40,000 and the rewards for helping the prince to unfreeze his bank account. The AI created a video which I made into an audio file. Here it is!

Radio Show Ideas

M. Marshall 2.7

When considering a potential radio show for my character’s world, I’ve thought about a news radio show, documenting what is happening in the world and basically observing my character. Another thing I’ve thought about is my character was someone’s pet, so there could be a podcast for the person who had them as a pet where they talk about what has been going on to document it… My character is a cat, so it would be difficult to have her talking, which adds complexity to how I should create a radio show around her. None of the ideas feel perfect but I feel like I’m at a good start!

Live Listening Session!

M. Marshall 2.7

I listened in on the live session on the DS106 Radio on Tuesday (February 4th). I really enjoyed the experience of getting to listen to a story alongside the class and professor. The story line was very interesting, following a woman doing research into a town called Limetown that seemed to be experimenting with mind chipping. You can listen to the story yourself here!

I felt like I learned from this is that in audio work, what seems like small details are very important for getting a listener to be fully immersed in an experience. Sounds like waves at a beach, a voice getting closer to signify that one character is walking towards the other, or an echo to help visualize the size of the space, makes a listener feel like they are there. It was cool to react to things at the same time as other people, so I was glad to get to try that out.

Weekly Summary #3: Getting the hang of it

M. Marshall 1.31

Another week another summary, let’s get into it.

I felt pretty good about the work I did this week. I definitely did better with the procrastination issue. I am taking 17 credits, which gets pretty overwhelming pretty fast. To counterbalance this, I made sure to spread out the work for this class instead of having to do it all Friday night. Of course, I am here Friday night, so the process isn’t perfect. I think sometimes I feel like if I do an assignment before the last minute, then I will realize that there was something I need to fix, and doing it last minute puts just the right amount of pressure on me to do it well and in a good amount of time. In reality, when I do something early, I am completely relieved and don’t feel so stressed.

This week I leaned in to the design aspect of this course with my assignments, these turned out pretty cool and I was pretty proud of myself. I showed my girlfriend my guess the song photo, and she got it immediately.

I was relieved to only have 3 daily creates this week, as keeping track of them every day last week was pretty tiring and I would get stressed when would accidentally leave them to the end of the day.

Edit: I tried to embed these, but WordPress did not like the link. Maybe next week I’ll have the hang of it.

Day 1: Design a header for @creating

Day 2: How woke is your sandwich?

Day 3: Obviously photoshopped

Day 3 was definitely my favorite. I got to combine my two favorite things!

Overall, this week was pretty fun and I’m glad I’m doing this class. I’m excited to continue learning and trying new things. I can’t believe next week will have been a full month of classes.

Designs!

M. Marshall 1.31

This is my response post to the two videos we watched. First, Movie Poster Expert Explains Color Schemes.

White background: Controversial opinion: I’ve always hated red and white. I understand from a marketing perspective why you would want a poster that immediately grabs people’s eyes, but there are so many other ways to do it that would be visually appealing for me personally. I also don’t really care for raunchy humor, which may explain my distaste for this style of poster.

Groan Ups, 2019

White (in general): I find these to be cleaner and classier than their red cousin, which I appreciate. It also stands out in a similar way which is good for marketing. I thought it was interesting that he said it portrays what to expect from the movie. I can appreciate honest advertising.

Forrest Gump, 1994

Blue: I enjoy a sleek blue that provides a mysterious vibe to the movie poster. They are often used in action/thriller posters and have the (main) character running in the middle. To me, this poster specifically was a great example of this color scheme and I really liked how it looked. And, he says it, “has its roots in film noir”, very cool!

Paycheck, 2003

Film noir: Definitely my favorite so far. I love old time-y movie posters. It reminds me of Archie comics.

This Gun For Hire, 1942

Yellow: Apparently this is used to represent low-budget indie movies, which I wouldn’t have been able to guess, but it does make sense. I like yellow so I definitely appreciate this one,

Capitalism, A Love Story, 2009

Xerox Quality: I know I said film noir was my favorite, but this definitely takes the cake. I imagine that maybe one is based off of the other? I love these kinds of posters. This is the kind of movie poster I would put up on my wall. I know technology is all about getting better, more impressive, and more modern, but you just can’t beat perfection.

Wake in Fright, 1971

Black, white, & orange: I don’t know if it’s me and my lack of interest in action movies, but I don’t care for this at all. I find it to be too severe and has too much going on. Can’t say I like it, unfortunately.

Transporter 3, 2007

Blue and Orange: I knew I loved it as soon as I saw it, but them, when he said that the orange is used to “lead the eye to the key focus of the narrative”? Too good. I loved Star Wars: A New Hope as a kid, if it could be made even better. No notes.

Star Wars: A New Hope, 1997

The second video was from Vox on Stranger Things’ Retro Title Sequence

When I watched Stranger Things, I didn’t really watch the title sequence because it creeped me out too much. I liked seeing the other typographics they looked at before choosing theirs. ITC Bengat is very recognizable so I thought it was a great choice. Using the kodaliths to look even more 80’s was very impressive to me. It’s cool to recognize the work that goes into something that I wouldn’t even notice, like a title sequence.