What Enslaves You?

1. A project of mine that really excited me when I first began was an interactive video project for library. The University Library comissioned my partner and I to create some kind of interactive YouTube experience for students to help promote the library. The thrilling part about this was that I was being paid to do this and at the same time it was something I really wanted to do and had fun doing. It was like a dream project come true and being paid to do it! I had plenty of ideas circulating in my head and couldn't wait to begin with my partner and start working on it.

2. Completely different experience when I actually started the project. It turns out my partner didn't do NEAR the amount of work that I thought he would do and it ended up being a huge burden on me. I thought we would all be doing equal amount of work but it turns out I had to do every single aspect of the project. This as it turns out didn't excite me at all. It became too much work on my part and zapped the fun out of it. It quickly became a chore.

3. The limitations that forced my project to change were:

- The amount of work
- The little time I had to work on it due to school and my job
- The little amount of help I was getting from my so called partner
- The due date because it was coming up fast and we were nowhere near done.

4. The limitation with the bead was completely different. With the bead there were no limitations so I had a fun time coming up with all sorts of different ideas. Now maybe the limitation was that I could just do ONE idea out of the many. But the usual limitations applied here as well. (The due date and all)

All in all the library project worked out fine. (sort of...I'm STILL working on it and am the only one working on it) It frustrates me that my partner and I got payed equally to do far unequal amounts of work. I guess this is a lesson learned to choose my partners wisely next time!

The Seckint Day of Class

A topic that stood out to me in class today was the concept of choices and how we have too many to choose from. The video we watched from TED.com was interesting to me because I agreed with pretty much every word he was saying. It's almost as if I knew what he was saying all along but it was just subconscious and not brought to the surface.

Daniel brought up that he had low expectations when he went to see movies like Green Lantern and Captain America. Then conversely he had high expectations when he went to see Harry Potter. He ended up having a different experience each time.

To me, I end up having super high expectations when I see movies. For example, I saw the comic book movie "Thor" over the summer and aboslutely hated it. I have yet to find a friend who feels the same way because they all loved it. When asked why I hated it by a friend, I told him I was comparing it to great comic book movies like The Dark Knight or Spiderman 2. My friend then said, "Well of course you're not gonna like it if you compare it to Dark Knight. You can't compare the two."

But then I ask, "Why the hell not?" I SHOULD have high expectations because I'm paying 10 dollars to see something I want to at least partially enjoy. In some cases I would pay 14 dollars!! If a movies like Dark Knight is so fantastic it should set the bar for future movies. ALL future movies should strive to be like it or reach the same amount of entertainment as it. That's how I feel about all expectations as a whole. Everything should have SOME kind of bar to be set otherwise we wouldn't be striving to SET any bar? Am I making sense??

The Bead

I sat there on the first day of class, ready for Beth to pass out the egg that will surely have all the noobs confused. I had it all figured out what I was going to do with my egg the day I signed up for classes. Then she pulled out a Shamalayan-esque twist and handed us all BEADS instead of the usual egg because she thought people were catching on to the egg thing. Damn it.

This had me for a loop for several days as I pondered several video ideas to do with my Bead. I knew it had to be a video idea because I want this class to really let me explore just what I can do with my talents.

In a stroke of either brilliance or coincidence, I happened upon Thomas Lewis who was talking about his electronic microscope that he had in his office. He described to me what it could do and it opened up so many possibilities. He let me borrow the Dino Scope from him and after a long and busy weekend I set out to accomplish my vision.

I wanted to see what the Bead saw. I wanted to see everything through it's eye but obviously I couldn't because the human eye can only go so far. The Dino Scope let me capture the Bead's perspective and I was able to see straight through it. It's sort of paradoxical that you are able to see straight through the Bead yet what you are seeing is not very straight forward.

Everything is zoomed in at microscopic HD quality and it turns the most common objects into very perplex and amazing patterns. It gives a sense that you are the Bead and this is what it sees. I placed the Bead atop of many objects including tables, chairs, rugs, blankets, shirts, fruit, pop tarts, remotes and even beards. That's not even half of what I placed the Bead on. In the end I chose the ones that looked the clearest on video so it could demonstrate my point further.

I thrive on attempting to see what other people see and view the world as others do. It's important to know that not only people have a certain perspective on things, but so does the ground you stand on, the keyboard you type on or the steering wheel you turn. It's weird to think about but all those things view the world around them in a very unique way. Even though you could study the mental perspectives of certain people and the physics of certain objects, no amount of psychology could have you gazing upon the microscopic wonders of a kitchen table or a bottle cap.

First Day of Class

What happened in class today? Well I knew coming into this, and having taken at least 3 classes with Beth in the past, that this would be a unique experience. What I saw today was a Beth even MORE open and extroverted than in the past!

I've heard a lot about this class and it truly was a smart move to change the egg into a bead this semester because I had a plan going into the first day of what I would have done with the egg. If it had been the egg than I probably wouldn't get the full experience this class offers.

As I had predicted before coming to class, I knew for sure after today that what I'll get out of this class will be exactly what I make of it. Meaning, if I decide to bullshit through the semester, what I'll get is bullshit. If I put my thought into it and try to grow from this semester than there is nowhere to go but up. I look forward to this semester and what it will bring to the table for me when it comes to videos/films. I hope to strive off the beaten path and try to do something unique each time.

Oh and Beth, is this what you were looking for??

JK!