Germs recording

The second recording project that we did was we did a story on the places on campus that could spread the most germs. We interviewed people at the gym, in the library and in health services. The project was a lot of fun and we had some solid interviews, although there was one that gave us such short answers that it was easy to cut it out.

My team thought this project would be easier because we have used Audacity before, wow were we wrong. Editing the clips was the most tedious part because one of our sources kept saying "um," so it took us quite a while to take out that word. Some of the interviews was also too quiet, so we had to make the person louder, which I say we succeeded in that.

The interviewing was the best part because we got some really good answers from our sources. If our editing was as fun as our interviews, we would have gotten it done swiftly, however, we failed to do that. What I did learn is that when a reporter gets all of the information, it is so exciting to see how the story can turn out because when you listen to the recording, you can picture what is going on.

Photos

I took some photos of three different things in Beverly, Massachusetts, my hometown. The first set of photos I took was a cross country meet between two elementary schools St. Mary's and St. John's. I was attracted to it because when I was driving home, I saw the parking lot that was filled with cars and I figured what could be going on. I say a field of people and children walking across. When I asked, a man told me what was going on. So I took some shots of the girls racing against each other. It was hard to get an action shot of them running because of my inexperience using a camera.

The second set of photos was the construction of Beverly High, which the city had to close down a very popular and beloved elementary school, McKeown so they can have the funds to build it. The project will be finished by next summer and it seemed to be close to being finished. I figured getting a photo of kids in front of the school because it represents the old soon to be the new.

The final set of photos that I took were the Massachusetts Registry of Motor Vehicles. It was recently closed and it will be moved to another location of the state, which is unknown at this time. There are some pictures of the place having a lease. This is significant because it hurts the people in Beverly that will be forced to find another RMV.

This was the most fun assignment that I had, but the most difficult. The hard part about the assignment was finding the right news and get the best shots. Since I just take photos for fun, trying to take it seriously was hard for me, but it was a learning experience.

Recording Project

In my audio recording project with Danielle Curtis and Sylvia Rosen, we interviewed Sheila Mosley, a house keeper for Smith Hall. I felt that interviewing Sheila is the best source because not only do I have a acquainted relationship with her, but I feel she was a good source to our story. In fact, our recording was a lot better than I thought. Her social background was very interesting and it had a good mix of information, humor and intelligence.

The recording was a little difficult at first because the first recording had no sound. Once we fixed the volume of the recorder, the sound turned out great. Listening was the best part because when I closed my eyes, it brought me back to the successful and fun interview that we had. While my team was listening, we were constantly looking for what can we improve and what we can delete. The editing was also fun because whenever we heard something quirky, we would laugh a little bit and then fix it. We organized an order that fit really well with the story. A couple of times, we had to choose an option of fading in and out between sound and it was better. Editing was the most difficult part because we had to be sure that the sounds worked with each other and whether we should insert sounds in the right places. Once we figured that it, the operation went really smooth.

We were a good team. Each of us contributed equally. Even though Danielle was good with Audacity, Sylvia and I also suggested a certain order of sounds of the interview. The computer was slow at times, but combining our computer knowledge and a couple of staff members in the Parker Media Lab, we overcame that problem. We had fun as a team because we all wanted the same thing with this project: a good story and to learn how to use this kind of journalism.

I have learned that audio recording can be fun because you can listening to what the source is saying. However, as a journalist, I have to be careful on which sounds should stay in or take out. Also, I have to put the story in the inverted pyramid style. After this assignment, I have a slight idea of how to actually use Audacity and how to record. Now, I just need more experience with these instruments.

Websites

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/ is a fascinating website when it comes to pictures. It shows the pure definition of the sites and the people. In journalism, a picture says a thousand words, before you read the article of course. These photographers must have used expensive cameras to make the pictures look so smooth.

http://www.ap.org/OVN/video.html If you are crazy about media videos, this is the site to be. The AP are the people that are the first to report the stories, so the audience may be the first to hear about the stories before other news medias.

http://masteringmultimedia.wordpress.com/ Even though this blog may seem like it is blogging propaganda at first, the rest of it really grabbed my attention. since I am taking a multimedia course, I think it is worthy to understand the goods and bads of the new media. Since I am a new blogger now, it is a good way to give them advice to jumpstart their new way of journalism.

Multimedia

Hello everyone. Welcome to my blog. This is the first time that I have ever taken a class that incorporates multimedia. Since the world of journalism has changed rapidly with the advanced technology, I was advised that if I wanted to compete getting a powerful news story, I needed to learn how to use these gadgets. I think taking this class will benefit me on the long run. I have read some stories that shocked me this week; most of them on msn.com. One story was a couple who were going to conceive their 19th child. Each and every one of the 18 children have been born naturally. I did not think that was physically possible. I also read an article about how Curt Schilling is interested to run for the late Edward Kennedy's seat in the Senate. We all know that Schilling is known for the loving the spotlight, but this is a big one. Since I went on a study abroad to London in the previous semester, I am more interested in the world news. What I want to be looking for is more pictures of people in the international world and see how they live. What makes me nervous is weather the multimedia I put on this blog can satisfy my viewers, since I am already intimidated by this course. But I will conquer my fears and do what I need to do to improve myself as a journalist. Since I live in an international dorm, I want to do profiles or feature stories about the international students that live in the dorm. I hope that this will be a good semester and I am looking forward to learn how to use the technology required in this course.