The artist's favorite.

Critique of classmate projects

Nikki

- text slides were too fast. I read very slowly. Therefore, I missed some of the info.

-very candid, very intimate. The camera angles and shots portrayed a level of intimacy that made the story more heartfelt and poignant.

DJ

- volume was really low; bump that up, son!

- great interview backdrop, at the stacks at WUNH. Great way to incorporate physical items of music into your piece.

-too much video of rather poor quality. Good photos can do the job just as well.

Brit

- What the hell can I say? What can any of us say?

Like I said in class, you might as well have gotten naked on screen, with the level of intimacy you gave us with your piece.

- Just because we don't say anything bad or give you any critiques doesn't mean we weren't moved by it.

A job well done my dear.

Keeley

-Nice auxiliary shots of NMKT and hockey team and arena. Like Cam said of his presentation, don't afraid to outsource photos. Smart move.

- Audio drove the story so much so that too many cookie photos didn't bother me.

- Excellent job at getting thoughtful answers out of your subjects, instead of canned or timid responses that fail to due describe the situation. For example, Micaela's comment, "Athletes at UNH are very fortunate so it's important for me to give back" (paraphrased).

Amie

- You have a GREAT voice! I could listen to you all day. Your narration was pleasant to listen to and gave a newsie feel to your piece.

- Up beat music didn't bother me, as it did some of our classmates. Your story was about success during a tough time, so why wouldn't you have up beat music?

- Great shots of people working. I liked seeing them in action.

Val

- Texts slides WAAAAY too short. You talk a mile a minute, but I can't read that fast.

- Great old photos. Those were exactly the shots you needed to compliment the audio about the history and construction of the dam.

- Too many "Bro" photos. Get some shots of them riding to past the dam, like he mentions, not just shots of them pretending to have an animated discussion.

-Snyc up the "Bro" photos with the audio about the low water level.

-Great wildlife photos.

Mine...

Well, it turned out pretty sweetly.

Sandy said something great.

My treatment and presentation gave him a new respect for tattoo artists. He said, that because of a possible generational gap, that he thinks of tattoo artists as a lower caste of artist, but to hear them speak so articulately about their pieces changed this opinion, that it elevated his opinion of them.

That was great to hear.

"The artist's favorite" is done!

"The artist's favorite" is exported.
DONE.

I watched it and caught a couple of little things, but overall it's solid.
Tight editing; when people say something, like a specific element in their tattoo, that image is there.

I desaturated the images then brought back to life with the 'history brush tool' to emphasize the tattoo being discussed.
I think I missed a couple of pixels here and there, so there are a couple of little gray spots on the tattoos.

I didn't show any of their faces because... well, I'm not sure.
The tattoo is the thing in question, not the artist.
But the tattoo is on the person, so why shouldn't you show their faces?
The tattoo is a permanent choice to their physicality, but on the other hand choosing NOT to alter your physicality can be permanent as well.

There very well could have been ways to show their faces, in order to round out the character sketch, but I don't think it was necessary.

I think that the audio and the photos paint a full enough picture of the five tattoo artists that faces would neither add nor subtract from the overall presentation.

Finally, I would like to thank Jason and Tony from Hobo's Tattoo, and Stina, James, and Erik from Tattoo Junkies, for their gracious cooperation with this project.

Last day to edit

Things are going well.

I am becoming more and more comfortable with iMovie.

I am making that shit tight. Real tight.

two and a half days til deadline

I have all the photos and audio I need.

I am putting it all into iMovie now.

RIGHT NOW!

Between...

...these...

...keystrokes.

It's looking good.

But I think I might have to cut down my audio even more.

I have enough photos, but I think I need to go back to the audio, for a fourth time, and cut it some more.

progressssss

oh sweet lord....

sooooo much photo editing.....

My eyes feel like they're going to pop out of my head.

I have 90% of the photos I need.

I have 100% of the audio I need.

I just have to fire it all into iMovie and arrange all the parts.

I had an epiphany at work on Friday, as to how to present this bad boy.

However, I can barely explain it to my dear subjects -- should have story boarded it -- so I am not going to try to explain it on here.

Maybe a glancing blow...

I had to think of a way to make it less monotonous; I couldn't have just -

Bam - super close up

Bam - audio interview

So, I figured that I needed some sort of interlude and way of introducing the artist.

I got some audio of a tattoo machine. I will make some text slides with the artist's name. These two things will serve as a means to interlude and introduce each segment.

You'll see.

I think it will work out nicely.

Today's progress report

I talked with three lovely people at Tattoo Junkies last night.

Erik, James (not Jason, as I incorrectly called him a couple of times -- Oops) and Christina.

As I edit the audio, I have to kick myself for talking over/with people during interviews!

I do it all the time! GAAHHH!

I don't want to hear my voice! I want to hear YOUR voice!

Then when I edit the audio I have to leave me voice in there because the end of my question and the start of their answer overlap.

Oh well...

Thoughts about editing audio:

Plush, soft, acoustically damped rooms (like Erik's interview) are good, but man, oh man, when you look at the file on screen it is so FUZZY! All the dead spots, where no one says anything, look scribbly and lumpy.

But, when you record in a hard-surfaced room (like Stina's room), Wow! The audio profile is super sharp. The dead spots are flat; dead flat. It's great because when you cut out the "umms" and "uhhs" and "you knows", you don't get those -what I think of as annoying- ticks and clicks when profiles don't quite match up.

My thoughts about the interview thought;

Erik has a great voice! He has spectacular tone, inflection and enthusiasm! Oh man! You can just feel him through the audio!

Stina is a "So" started, which works out great for editing.

I love it when people start with "so". For some reason, it's just easier to pick up after a "so" -rather than an "umm" or "well". Umms and uhhhs and wells can run into the first word of the sentence, making it hard to eliminate them.