Final Reflection Post

I have enjoyed taking this class. I am thankful for the foundation it gave me in utilizing multimedia programs to create and design whatever I wish. I think my favorite project was this most recent one, the video project. I spend a lot of time watching television, movies, and Youtube. I’ve always played around with the idea of starting a Youtube channel because I love the sense of creativity and community one can get from it. The video project was most fun for me because I got to feel like a Youtube creator.

 

I will hopefully continue practicing the art of making videos in the future because it is such a unique and useful skill. The level and range of expression and entertainment one can get from making and watching videos is almost unrivaled. Besides videos, I think photoshop is the most all around useful for the future. I’ve had some interest in photography because I enjoy traveling, food, and capturing memories of people. I think I will use photoshop the most in the future because of how useful it really is.

 

Because I want a career that involves food, travel, entertainment, writing, and people, the tools and skills I have learned from photoshop, recording, and video will all be extremely helpful to me. I can see myself recording video projects of travel and food, or interviews with people. I would also take inspired photos of my travel, food, and people along the way. All of those multimedia platforms will complement my love of writing as well.

I can’t really think of skills I wish I had learned in this class. This class already had its share of surprises as I was not familiar with adobe sounds and illustrator programs.

Youtube was a very useful website for me when I had to find copyright free music for my videos. Youtube is also just a great source of inspiration for videos, logos, and whatever else. It really is a mecca and hub of creativity and love of all things creation.

Overall, this class taught me a lot and it also was a unique challenge and introduction into taking a more independent class. I hope to take what I have learned and apply it to my passions of food, travel, culture, writing, entertainment, and just life in general.

Final Comm 210 Vid

Sources:

ON AND ON by Nicolai Heidlas Music https://soundcloud.com/nicolai-heidlas
Creative Commons — Attribution 3.0 Unported— CC BY 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/b…
Music provided by Audio Library https://youtu.be/Skxx0KnGGHw

I am pleased with the feedback I received from my peers. They were very kind and encouraging for my topic of a cooking tutorial. I did agree with the feedback to try and have a shot of the finished product, but alas, I could not do this because I didn’t want to reshoot my footage and we didn’t have the ingredients at the time to remake the dish.

I went ahead and added music and some transition effects to keep the viewer more engaged. I was happy I was able to find a happier and lighter music to fit the tone of my video as it is suppose to be educational and a fun and simple pastime.

 

I implemented the iris effect at the end title screen to make the video pop for a nice finish. I also tried to create a transition using dips and crosses throughout the video. I used one between the cooking of the fish and the cooking of the veggies and rice because they are more or less to separate things.  I’m also glad I was able to add a title screen for the rice and veggies because it makes a smoother transition rather than abrupt cooking of something else.

It was also important for me to have transitions like the dips from title screens to actual video footage. I also made sure that the volume of the music in the background did not get in the way of  my narration because I wanted that to be clear and still helpful for any viewer that watched the video.

 

Overall, I love the edits I made to my video and I’m happy I can teach people how to cook something simple and healthy. This has been a fun class and I’ve learned a lot!

Video Rough Draft

My inspiration behind this video was my love of food and cooking. I watch a lot of cooking tutorials online like Tasty or even Gordon Ramsay’s. I tried to emulate a similar style to them by having very clear movements of the actual cooking and a strong voice over for clear and easy directions. I also had some ingredients liked the rice already cooked, so people didn’t have to watch through that and wait for a long period of time.

The video was fun to make because I got to teach people how to make something very simple and quick for lunch. It’s amazing how a few ingredients can make an impact on how we eat. Fish, vegetables, and rice are all packed full of nutrients, so it makes a healthy lunch too.

I created a title screen for the start because I wanted to have a little introduction. I also included voice over and edited bits I didn’t need, but I tried to follow the pace of the actual cooking itself. I also edited and cropped some of the footage sequence so the video could be condensed and made faster so people aren’t just watching slow movements.

I shot the footage in 2 30-second sequences and I tried moving the camera around for up-close shots of the food, side views, and aerial so the cooking directions could be very clear in visuals and easier to follow along if someone were to try it at home. I also was very careful not to bump into the person that was making the food and tried to stay clear of him so we could get better and more effective shots.

Overall, this was an enjoyable rough draft to make and I look forward to hearing people’s feedback because I love sharing my passion of food with the world.

Raw Video Footage and Storyboard

 

 

 

Storyboard: How to cook a simple lunch!

0:00-31 Seconds: Oiling the pan and placing fish into pan and wait for it to cook	Narration over how to oil pan and cook the fish properly and music in the background
31-62 Seconds: Sautee the frozen vegetables and stir in rice and let cook	Narration over how to cook the vegetables and stir in the rice and for how long with music in the background.

 

Premiere Tutorial Vids

Final Audio Story

The main goal of the audio story was to capture the idea that food can be a canvas to tell great stories. Food is a building blocks for people’s identity and what people eat says a lot about who they are as a person and their own history or stories.

I wanted to pose the famous or infamous question of what someone would want their last meal to be. I then followed that up by asking the who, where, and why to give the story more weight and to really emphasize people’s sentimental attachment towards food.

The first thing I did was interview my friend Demi. She is someone that clearly understood the prompt and my vision for the project. I also recorded myself giving a short intro into what I wanted the project to be. I thought it might make it easier for the listener to understand.

The initial rough draft recording didn’t go as well as I would have liked. There was a lot of distracting background noise and Demi wasn’t a very loud speaker. That was a majority of the feedback I got from my peers as well.

They seemed to concur with my thought on noises or music in the background might have been a distraction. I don’t think music would have added much to the story. And in context, I don’t like to listen to music when at the dinner table, and the theme of dinner table conversations was also something I wanted to capture.

I then re-did the recording with a different friend, Jenny. It was in a quieter space and she was also able to understand what I wanted from the project, There were a few instances where Jenny said like and umm a lot and it was difficult to deftly cut those out. I kept a couple in because I didn’t want to tarnish her stylistic voice too much. I mostly cut and re-arranged some parts of the story so it would sound more cohesive and tuned overall.

I am pretty pleased with the final project!

Draft Audio Story

 

I had the idea of my food interview/story for a while now. The main inspiration was the common question of what people would want their last meal to be. The question may seem a bit morbid to think about, but I think it can be something powerful and beautiful as well. The other inspiration behind the story was from a book called 50 Great Chefs and Their Last Meals. The book asked the same question to some of the world’s greatest chefs; Gordon Ramsay was featured for example.
The book also asked some follow-up questions like whom they would like to share the meal with, who would cook it, where the setting would be, and if there would be music playing etc.

I think the question is a great way to explore people’s identity through food. It is very much a part of our culture and intrinsic to who we are as a species, but individual people as well.

The actual technique and construction of the interview were fairly simple. I wanted to keep it pretty straightforward and didn’t really feel much of a need to add any kind of sound effects. I did record myself asking the intro question because I thought it would help as an easy opener and give context and a framework for the rest of the story to begin. Unfortunately, there was a bit more background noises then I would have liked, but I plan to have the interview in a quieter space for a bit better quality. I was appreciative of the fact my selected person really understood my vision for the story without me having to tell her. She was also pretty adept in speaking without any awkward pauses or “buts, umms, or “likes.”

I loved the story she shared with me and overall I’m happy with the rough draft version.

Raw Footage Food Story

 

I wanted to ask someone the prompt of what they would want their last meal to be. I think this is such a powerful question because it gives access to someone’s story through food.

Soundcloud Tutorial Files

 

Logo Design Final

My logo was something I had envisioned for a long time. I’ve always wanted to make a logo or shirt design based on the pun “Tastebuds.” I believe food is a universal tool to be able to connect with people. The idea that meals can bring people together, or to cook for someone as a labor of love is something profound and special to me.

My inspiration was cute Japanese amination. I used similar images as a reference and tried to draw a similar shape to those figures.

I utilized different colors of the ice cream and pizza. For the etched cone lines, I used the line tool in different directions to create the grid like pattern. For the pizza, I used the circle tool to make the pepperoni slices. I used the rounded line tool for the specks of cheese scattered throughout the pizza’s face. The eyes were made using the circle tool and the smiling mouth was circles cut using the scissors tool.

I took into consideration the idea of a border to help enhance the visual background instead of just a plain one. I used the circle tool again and simply sent it to the back and colored it a dark maroon for contrast. I didn’t have a background border in my original design, but I appreciated the feedback I got from my peers. I also loved the feedback of having the foods hold hands as that further emphasizes the idea of friends. I used the pen tool to draw out the arm and circle to have them connect.

One of the consistent suggestions I got from the original logo was making the text fancier. I decided to download a unique font to stick with the cute cartoon-like feel of my design. I didn’t want the text to be too fancy because I didn’t want that to distract from the logo. I tried to keep everything fairly simple in look. I decided I could at least warp the text to fit the circle background.

Ultimately, I am very proud of this design and very happy with the way it turned out. I hope to put the design on a shirt and share it with food friends AKA “Tastebuds”