Expansion

So it has been a few months since the last time that I visited the "Found" blog...It is a new semester and with the new semester comes a new direction for the "Found Project" One of my mentors mention trying to get the "Found Project" to spread through the university. So in the spirit of expansion, my goal is to place a miniature found board in each building on campus. I hope to see a lot of participation and hopefully the writing that I find will reflect the buildings in which the writing was housed. For those of you who aren't familiar with the original project, here is the video I created:

http://www.youtube.com/user/japeshyperbole#play/all/uploads-all/1/GqB7n4VMauE

The Project Begins

The “Found” Project

Drawing inspiration from Pete Vandenberg and Mindy Bowden’s video “Who is a Writer” and FoundMagizine.com, I created The “Found” Project. The project is based on the premise that we are all writers and that one of the inhibitors for people seeing themselves as writers is the lack of a space in which to present their writing. Using a portion of the bulletin boards on each floor in the Hall of Languages, I provided a space for writers to display their work. I kept a photo journal documenting the success of the project and used the photos to create a video and blog. I have turned the footage into a short video looking at who and what is being written about when a space is provided.

The Trailer

Here is the Trailer that I made for the final project. I am really happy with the way that this video turned out. I was able to use two different audio clips by saving each section as a different video and them importing them into movie maker separately.

The Final Cut x 2

At some point, I decided to make a trailer for my final project and then with a little persuasion from one of my class mates, I fused the trailer and the final video. This is The Final Cut x 2. I made use of mutliple audio tracks in this film by placing seprate completed videos into a movie maker project. Post Script: this movie was muted from youtube for having audio from a Warnwer Bros. artist. I think it is within educatinal "Fair Use" criteria, but I can still post it here.

The "Found" Project Writing Assignment

The “Found” Writing Assignment

Purpose:
The purpose of this sequenced writing assignment is three fold: To help students learn the conventions of Audience and Purpose in written discourse, To help students use inference in analysis of written discourse and to help students effectively integrate sources and personal opinion in written discourse.

Step 1 Theoretical Framework

a. Read: Lauren B. Resnick’s article “Literacy In School and Out.”

b. After reading Resnick’s article, write a one page journal entry in which you both summarize
Resnick’s article and respond with your own opinion.

Note: Pay special attention to the categories of writing that Resnick discusses as well as the
characteristics of each category.

Step 2 Research

a. During the next week, log onto foundmagazine.com each day a observe the “find of the day.”
As you observe the ‘find of the day,” look for both literal information and information gain
through making inferences from the text. Pleas pay special attention to the rhetorical
conventions of Audience and Purpose.

b. Each day that you observe the “finds of the day,” please write a one page journal entry
detailing your observations. (We will discuss the entries in-class each day)

Step 3 The Paper

a. Now that you have read and formed a theoretical framework and done research, pick your
favorite “find of the day” from the past week.

b. Using your favorite find, write a 2-3 page analysis of the find, please include the following
areas of interest in you paper:

1. A brief Summary of the find (this may mean a verbatim quote of the find’s contents)

2. A discussion of the audience and purpose of the find
(using both inference and literal information)

3. Relate the find to Resnick’s categories of writing, making sure to cite both your find
and Resnick as support for your argument.

4. Please make sure to include your personal reactions and observations.

The Final Cut

Here is the final video! There are still some things that I would tweak if I could but I feel pleased with the way this version turned out. Enjoy...

Found VII

Music, music, music, finally and Oops, I forgot the credits...

Found VI

I thought I was done, but I still wanted some music.

Found V

I thought I was done, until I found one slide that I had forgotten to place a white boarder around. But for all intents and purposes this is the final draft. In the last two versions of the video I had one thing...see if you can find out what it is?

Found IV

At some point between the third and fourth version, I downloaded and began to use Picasa photo editing software. This version reflects a lot of my "playing" with the new technology. I added backgrounds and a lot of color to the video. This is also the first appearance of a new logo I made for my fictitious production company. This video also shows the "poster" image I mad for the "Found" Project. I ended up redoing all the board images because the were all different sizes...

Found III

For my third attempt, I decided to try a couple different things: First, I played around with transitions between some of the frames (which I didn't keep). I also added still images of individual cards and superimposed titles over the cards. I took this version to class and received a lot of feedback, especially about the still images at the end of the movie. So once again I went back to the drawing board. But I will point out that the same set of images on the boards is used through out the remaining reiencarnations.

Found II

Round two...I decided that I could use my existing images and just do a patch job, umm I don't think it worked as well as I had hoped. I used photoshop to superimpose a Jpeg image over my blurry NCOW images. I thought it made the images too jumpy, so I ended up re-taking all the pictures.

Found I

The original plan for this video was to use all video footage. My plan was to take short videos of the "found" board each day and then splice them all together in movie maker. This idea faded away fairly quickly and I decided to use stop animation. I borrowed my wife's Canon camera and went to work. These pictures really show how much of an amateur photographer I am. Can you see the giant glare on all the poster cards in the middle of each board?

The Grad Students Demonstrate the "Found" Board

There are two lessons that I have learned from this project:

1) You always have more footage than you will actually use in any production.

2) Everyone loves to ham-it-up in front of the camera.

Keeping the lessons in mind, here is what happens when grad students attempt to demonstrate the uses of the "Found" board. I hope you will enjoy it!