Reflection Blog

 Hello everyone!

    This project has been quite the roller-coaster, and I wanted to start off by saying that I'm so glad you all were along with me for the ride. Overall, I think learning and experiencing all these new things was totally worth the aggravation and effort put into this commercial. I learned so many new things along the way as well. So let's recap.

    The first thing I learned was actually how to work Blogger. Thankfully, it's an easy-to-use website so that didn't take much learning. However CapCut was quite the opposite. It was at first very overwhelming. I really didn't know how to do anyhting, and everything was so confusing! But, I just took things one step at a time. One detail after another, I started to understand a little bit better. For example, there are so many transitions to pick from, but if you just stick to one, it can be less overwhelming, and will also make your commercial look cleaner. 

    Same thing with the fonts. I had an idea for the aesthetic I wanted for my commercial. I wanted a relaxed, almost sentimental feel. And one of the ways to achieve this, was with the fonts. I needed a dark color, and a font type like cursive. But again, it seemed like there were hundreds! I learned that it's best to just look through the options once or twice, and stick to only about one or two diferent fonts and colors, to make things less stressful.

    And finally, I learned to have fun, and experiment with different layouts and orders of pictures and/or videos. Without having fun, you won't enjoy what you're doing, and for me, that can really negatively affect the outcome of my work. So, if you add that personal touch to whatever you are working on, it feels as though your work will be just a little bit better.

    I want to thank you all again for coming along with me on this journey, it was so much fun! I really did learn a lot, and I'm so excited for my next project on CapCut! I think I will focus on exploring some different themes, to expand on all the options CapCut has to offer. Who knows what I will learn next. But, I hope you join my for the ride!

Commercial About me - AICE Media Studies

Hello everyone!

This is it, the video everyone has been waiting for!

It took me quite a while, and lets of effort, so I hope you enjoy.

Production Blog - Final Editing

                                                                   How I feel right now↓

 Hello everyone.

    I have some bad news. So, it is partially my fault, because I should have been a little smarter, but none the less, I'm still upset. I checked the rubric for the assignment recently, and the only other time I checked it was at the beginning of the assignment. And from what I remember seeing, it seemed as though there wasn't too many rules for the assignment, so I didn't think much of it.

    However yesterday I was curious on how long the commercial should be, so I looked back at the rubric. I didn't see anything about a time limit, but what I did see, shocked me. It said we had to have 3-5 pictures, and 1-2 videos. THREE TO FIVE!? My blog right now has, lets just say, certainly more than that. I got so nervous. Was all the work that I did for nothing? Additionally, it said we had to have 2 songs that describe ourselves, not just one, which would totally change the structure of my commercial. I really feel stupid that I let this happen to myself. I mean honestly, who would do a project without paying attention to the rubric? Me, I guess.

    So now, I'm not sure what I should do. Would I get points off for having way more pictures than I actually need? Should I really start from scratch, just a few days before the assignment is due? I really don't know. I'm thinking I will just delete most o the photos I have, add a second audio in somewhere, and include the videos that I need, because I don't have any right now. 

    It's a shame, but again, I should've known better than to do a whole project without knowing the rules! My next blog will be my reflection, so stay tuned! I have a lot to talk about, and so so much I learned about CapCut and editing in general.

Production Blog - Music

 

Hello again!

    This production blog is solely for the music portion of my commercial. In the last blog, I talked about editing and trying to get used to editing with capcut. This blog however, is focused on music. And let me say, it was quite aggravating, to say the least.

    As you may know, I wanted to have my music be the song "There She Goes", by The La's. The only issue was that I didn't know how to put that song into my video. However my friend Makenna, who is also in Media helped me out. She said I had to download a clip of the song from TikTok into capcut. But of course, it wasn't that simple.

    As I went to look for the song, it wasn't there. To be honest I wasn't sure why. Makenna said I had to make sure it's not copywrite, but I swear, I tried so many different audios of the same song, and it just wouldn't show up. So, instead I decided to look through my previous audios that I already had saved, and one caught my eye. It was a slow, mellow song, with no words, and I just really liked it. 

    It was only about 30 seconds, so I had to sort of overlap them and then have them added into each other so you couldn't tell the audio was being replayed. I was pretty happy with what I had, and was almost done. The last thing I did was add a fade-out at the end, and it was the perfect touch. My commercial is coming together very nicely! In the next blog, I'll talk about my "final editing." This will be things like filters, and effects. Let's hope its not as annoying as the music was...

Production blog - Editing

 

Hello!

    I'm continuing the production of my commercial. In the last blog, I talked about trying to get used to CapCut. I feel like I am slowly starting to understand it. 

    I inserted more pictures into CapCut, and started moving them around. I took my soccer photos first; I tried to include some that was my whole team, and others that were a small group during tournaments. I did this so that they all wouldn't look the same. That reminded me that I should add one or two soccer photos in my "baby pictures", or younger photo pictures, because I have a few from when I was really young. 

    However, my biggest issue was that it felt very repetitive. I was putting in pictures and videos, but the effects and editing was so similar to each other. And it also sucks that I don't have the premium version, because there is so much more to do. I feel like my commercial could look so much better if I had access to the their effects. And I'm still not very good at using CapCut, so it's hard for me to find ways to be more creative with the tools that I have.

    I'm still looking for good pictures to use through my phone. I don't have very many good photos, especially baby photos, so I think I'll go on google photos and look through some albums. Or, I can ask my mom if she has any that I can use. In any case, I'll get back to you when I've completely decided and figured out how to upload sounds/songs to CapCut. 

Production Blog - intro

Hi!

    My production for this commercial is going slowly because while trying to create my commercial, I am also figuring out all the details of how to work CapCut, the editing app I am using. However, I feel like I'm learning fast.

    The first part of my production stage is getting all the pictures and videos I want put together. I did this by looking through my photos in the photos app in my phone and gathering the ones that I think are best. Then, I put them into CapCut and organized them based off each "category", or theme that I wanted in my commercial. This included soccer, school, baby photos, etc. It was, how I felt, the best way to organize my commercial.

    The next step I took was deciding how many photos I wanted to have on the screen at once. After some thinking, I decided to just alternate between multiple photos/videos at once, to only one on the screen. This was so I could make the commercial more diverse, and hopefully, a little more entertaining. But I wasn't done there.

    My next step was editing the photos/videos. This included transitions like fades, dissolve, split screen, etc. It was probably the most tedious part of the start to my production. This is because I really had no idea how to work CapCut, so all the editing I was doing was very new to me. I was essentially learning how to use the app and at the same create my commercial. But this was all part of the learning process. 

Research and Planning Blog

Hi again!

    For my research on the commercial project, I just wanted to have an idea of what I should put in my commercial. I looked up some inspiration and not much came up. However, there were still plenty of videos on other types of commercials that were from AICE Media. So, with a general consensus of knowing what I wanted to do, I  then began working on planning.

    I first began choosing a song for background music. Because this is a commercial about myself, I wanted it to be a song I already know and enjoy. I looked on Spotify for what I thought would fit the commercial. I ended up choosing "There She Goes" by the La's. I did this because it's one of my favorite songs, and I feel like it fits the theme.

    I chose the pictures in the commercial because I felt like they were the best ones to portray whatever topic I was showing at the time. For example, when talking about soccer, I showed some pictures of myself, my team, and a few of my favorite players. Having multiple pictures to describe a certain thing about me felt like the best approach, rather than just picking one for every topic.

    Some of the videos I put in were put there because I thought it would be better for the viewer to understand and see whatever was being discussed. Photos are great for showing, but the videos were put in for experience. Sometimes I did both videos and pictures, and other times just videos. I did this for some diversity so that everything didn't always look the same. In the end, I think that the research and planning went very nicely, and it was a lot of fun as well!

Intro Blog

Hi everyone,

    My name is Madeleine Merrick, and I was born on March 17, 2008. I have a few hobbies, which include sailing, drawing, and soccer. I am somewhat serious about soccer, and I've been playing it ever since I can remember. I have been playing for the same club for about 7 years now. I only really sail over summer break, and I volunteer at a sailing camp in Martin County, getting about 200 hours' worth of service hours every summer. I've been going there for a few years, and it's one of the many things I look forward to when summer comes around. 

    

    I was born in Florida and have lived there all my life. I've never left the United States, but I really want to travel around Europe and visit Lithuania, because that is where my dad's side is from. My dad owns a business, and my mother works for outdoor education around the world, specifically for preschoolers. I don't know what I want to do when I'm older, but I've always loved science, math, and space.

    I don't draw anymore, but I miss when that was practically all I would do. In 8th grade, I participated in a statewide holocaust reflection contest and won 1st place, along with a $1,000 reward. It was such a great experience, and all the winners from every category were able to meet a holocaust survivor, and that was one of my favorite parts of the whole experience.