HOW DID YOU USE MEDIA TECHNOLOGIES IN THE CONSTRUCTION AND RESEARCH, PLANNING AND EVALUATION STAGES?

Leanne Westbury

EQUIPMENT A variety of equipment was required throughout

the research and planning, creating and evaluating stages. Filming equipment was required (images from

Q2, right) such as the HG Canon HD camera we used

to film footage, a tripod and sound recording equipmentwhich consisted of a directional microphone, headphones and the necessary leads. We also used a scanner as the majority of research and planning was paper-based and an apple Mac to access all of the software we used.

RESEARCH AND PLANNING

We used the internet to conduct research on our topic as well as audience research which required the use of Microsoft Word to create the questionnaires. We used sites such as BBC News, Spotify and YouTube to carry out both topic research and research of similar products and recorded out findings either directly onto the blog or onto paper which was later scanned in and uploaded to the blog.

BLOG

I used a variety of technologies to present information using Blogger. Prezi, Slideshare and Scribd were used for presentation whereas it was Microsoft Word, Microsoft PowerPoint and Microsoft Excel (within PowerPoint to create graphs) that enabled creation of documents and recording of information.

BLOG

Scribd, Slideshare and Prezi all feature an option to embed the document you create which provides a clear and simple way of combining technologies by embedding documents directly onto the blog so everything is presented in one place.

CREATION OF THE DOCUMENTARY

We saved all of our footage to a folder located on the hard drive of an Apple Mac. We started by logging and transferring every clip in Final Cut Express and renaming each one so that the editing process would be more simple when referring to our edit decision list and selecting clips to insert into a sequence. Each clip had to be added to a queue in order to be transferred.

To insert a clip into a sequence you double click on it in the list of all clips, this plays the clip in the preview canvas and allows you to choose a section of the clip by pressing marking an inpoint and outpoint. The ‘i’ (in) key on the keyboard marks where you want it to start and ‘o’ (out) where you want the clip to end.

This inserts two small arrows to show the selection. You then press F10 on the keyboard to insert the clip into the sequence.

Some clips had to be modified so that the speed of the clip was faster of slower. For example, during the tiled vox pop sequence we had to increase the speed so that is would be on screen for an appropriate amount of time whereas we chose to slow down the blurred clip of the public for stylistic purposes. Once the speed was modified a percentage would appear next to the clip name so you could see if the clip had been altered.

The Razor Blade tool allows you to cut clips so that they can be arranged and moved as separate clips. For example, this clip from a formal interview was cut so that background footage could be inserted in between.

The Pen tool is used to draw dots that can be moved to adjust sound levels. We used this tool to fade music such as when narration began and to adjust sound levels in order to make them level.

The ‘Text’ folder under ‘Effects’ contained several options. We chose Lower 3rd for the text that would appear on the formal interview and used the controls below to edit colour and font. I used the Pen tool to draw dots on the text clip in order to make it fade in and out accordingly rather than just appearing and disappearing.

We used only straight cuts and cross dissolves in our documentary. The cross dissolve effect could be found in the Effects tab under Video Transitions > Dissolve> Cross Dissolve. This could be simply dragged onto the break in clips that you wanted to fade between.

We created several seperate sequences in order to focus on certain sections before exporting te sequence as a QuickTime movie and inserting it into the main sequence. This could be done simply by going to File > Export > Export as QuickTime movie and saving the file.

Doing so combined all of the clips into one sequence ready to be part of the main project.

The colour of the bar above the clips indicated the status of the clip and whether the clip needed to be rendered. A red line indicated that the clip needed to be rendered and could be easily sorted by going to Sequence> Render All> Both to ensure both video and audio was rendered.

PHOTOSHOP (TITLE SHOT)I used dafont.com to select a font and used Photoshop to edit the text to create a JPEG that we later printed out and used to film the title shot. The design was simple, I started by creating a new file and changing the orientation of the canvas by going to Image> Rotate Canvas> Rotate 90° clockwise. By pasting a print screen of the chosen font from dafont.com and cropping it so that the text was central to the canvas I had the basis of the title. I then inverted the colour so that the background of the canvas was black and the text was white. Finally I pasted ‘The TruthRevealed’ and

cropped and positioned it before saving the file as a JPEG and printing it.

RADIO TRAILER

To create the radio trailer we used a combination of iTunes, GarageBand and Final Cut Express.

Going to Track> New Track would open the screen showed below which provided the option to either insert a track from iTunes or use a Software Instrument Track which could be chosen from a wide variety of beats and melodies. We used a combination of both so that we could insert our voice over and layer a beat behind it. To create our voice

over file we opened the recording in Final Cut Express, edited the clips so that we had only the audio we wanted to use then removed the video before saving the sequence as an audio only file and opening it in iTunes.

By pressing Command and T you are able to split a selected track so that the pieces can be moved and edited separately. We did this several times to the voice over file so that we was able to experiment with order and arrangement of clips. This is similar to the action of the Razor Blade Tool in Final Cut Express.

This is the sound controls that can be adjusted for each separate track. We used these controls to control the sound levels and attempt to make them as even as possible.

Mute control- used to mute individual tracks in order to experiment with different sound combinations

This tool could be used to zoom in and out so that you could achieve accuracy when cutting and arranging clips.

Basic controls allow you to play, pause, add tracks, adjust volume and more.

This shows how multiple tracks can be selected by holding shift and clicking on different tracks and sections.It also shows how several tracks are combined and layered to create the final product.

DOUBLE PAGE SPREAD

We used Adobe InDesign to create a double page spread and Microsoft Word to write the featured article.

To place an image in InDesign you use the Rectangle Frame Tool to determine the space that the image will be placed in. Then, by going to File> Place you are able to find the file and insert it into the design.

To export the finished magazine on InDesign you go to File> Export which opens the box shown on the left. You have to tick the ‘Spreads’ box and ensure that the Resolution was 300 before exporting the file.

Text could be pasted from Microsoft Word into InDesign by creating a text box using the Text tool in the toolbar. By selecting the text a range of options appear in the upper tool bar, one of which being the option to organise the text into columns. By typing in the amount of columns and justifying the text the article looks instantly more professional.

OVERALL

All new media technologies used to create both the main and ancillary texts were fairly simple to use once you are aware of which tools needed to capture, edit, create and present successfully.

The hardest software to use was Final Cut Express as it was the most technologically challenging with regards to amount of tools and the importance of using them effectively. However I feel the quality of the main text reflects the use of such tools and the skills used to apply different ideas.