the party's over...

It’s hard to believe that our time at the Virginia Ball Center has come to an end. I remember being so very nervous at the beginning of the semester. I was questioning if it was really a good idea, if I would get anything out if it, wondering if I should have taken regular classes, etc. However, this seminar turned out to be one of the best experiences of my college career.

Even though it’s been said a hundred times, the VBC felt like a workplace to us. It felt as if we were going to a job every day rather than going to class. Rather than attempting to please only our professor, we were attempting to please both the staff of the Ball State University Museum of Art and high school students and teachers. Which, in case you’re wondering, is much harder than it sounds. We were working for clients, on a project that will actually be used in the world. It won’t just be something we show to our professors and them only. It is a tangible, usable, product.

Going into this project, I knew very little about art. I knew some things; I had obviously taken art before in school. My sister is an art teacher, and I’ve learned a lot from her over the years. Art was often discussed in humanities classes here at Ball State. I think my real problem was I never really understood it. When we would go to an art museum or exhibition, I would look at the art for a minute, then just try to mimic everyone else’s facial expression. I never knew what it was I was supposed to be looking for. This class though, made me realize it’s okay to just look at what’s there. I didn’t immediately have to start deducing the meaning of a work of art; I could just stand there and absorb the fact that a painting is of a sponge. By simply looking at something, my ability to decipher it’s meaning grew. While I’m sure I’ll never have quite the appreciation as some other people, I know as a result of this class I have more appreciation for art than many other people.

One thing that was important to me in this project was improving my technical skills. I wanted to be able to get in Dreamweaver so I can say I’ve done work in there. I wanted to sit down in Final Cut Pro and start applying editing techniques I hadn’t had the chance to. I wanted to listen to what professional’s had to say about the work I wanted to run off with the Sony Z1U and learn more about it. I can happily say I did all of those things. As I packed up the Z1U to turn back in yesterday, a small part of me died. I am so sad I don’t have 24/7 access to one anymore. A fun part of this project that I normally don’t get in the tcom department was free reign. I was free to take the cameras, take final cut, and really make what I wanted. I had some stipulations, but for the most part, it was the project of students.

While obviously everything I learned in the seminar is invaluable to me, I cannot say enough how incredible this group of people is. First off, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a group work together so well. We had plenty of issues, but for the most part, we were a well-oiled machine that could get work done, and that could do It will. Secondly though, pretty much everyone in this group was just fun. We all enjoy each other’s company so much. The other night we were out and I told Laura that I am deathly afraid of drifting apart from everyone and not staying friends. However, I will stop here because I could ramble about the people forever. For that you can refer to my post titled “why we’re awesome.”

After all this, I can safely say that my semester at the VBC has, so far, been the best semester of my college career.

Finishing Up

Week 15:

This past week was definitely a week for finishing things up. My main focus was on the documentary. While I had the majority of it edited and put together, I had about 3 minutes that still needed edited, not to mention all the color and audio editing I had to do.

Putting the last 3 minutes on wasn't very difficult. I knew essentially what I wanted, so it wasn't terribly difficult to put it together.

What WAS difficult was the color correcting and audio editing. I tend to be a bit of a perfectionist when I begin editing videos. Even if a clip is only on the screen for 2 seconds, I want it to look just as good as the rest. So, I obsessed over the color and audio for 3 or 4 days until I was happy with it. I will never be done with the documentary though, I'll be editing it for the rest of my life. It's something long and varied enough that I will always make changes. It will never be completely done in my eyes, this is just the first finished version.

why we're awesome

Week 14:

One thing I was very nervous about coming into this program was meeting new people. It always takes me a long time to make friends and start hanging out and getting along with people. I don't know why, it's just the way I am.

Naturally, I was a little terrified going into a program where I really didn't know anyone. I had previously had classes with some people, and come in brief contacts with others, but I can safely say I didn't know anyone coming into this seminar. To my happy surprise however, I discovered that this group of people is AWESOME.

First of all, I don't think I've ever worked with a group that was so productive. Looking back, it's amazing to see how much we've accomplished this semester. We have an entire website nearly complete. We wrote the content (and edited it 4 billion times), we put it up on the page, and we did it well. We all seem to work really well together, and even when we've run into roadblocks everyone has done an awesome job of working through them. I think over the semester we've really learned to trust each other with things and have become a well-oiled machine.

Also, I never expected this group of people to be so much FUN. I can safely say I've made a lot of new friends this semester. When we're not working hard we're just sitting around talking about life, watching silly youtube videos, and just having a fun time. We also spend a lot of time hanging out outside of class, just playing games, watching movies, etc.

For me, it's just exciting that I get along with almost every single person in the group. They're people I want to continue hanging out with the in future, and people I'll really miss when they graduate. I know I've even tried to overlap my schedule with a few people for next semester.

As Laura said, it's almost like we're at summer camp. We've had such a good time and met so many friends it's hard to think of a time where we don't spend everyday together.

I've done all sorts of stuff. and everyone else has too!

Week 13, Post 2:

Throughout the semester, I'm proud to say I've accomplished quite a lot, and have made many contributions to this project. However, it's always important to remember that I wouldn't have been able to do a lot of that without help from other people. So here's a reflection of what I've done, and what other people have done that have enabled me to finish things:

Tour Group:

I wrote two scripts. Then I rewrote them approximately 4 billions times.

I recorded, edited, and put the audio tracks on Dreamweaver.

Special Thanks to:
Cara and Amy for all the revision work they did. None of the scripts would have been finished for recording.
The Museum of Art for providing us all access to object files, as well as Tania Said for revising our scripts.
Stan Sollars for allowing us to record on campus and getting my ID access.
Finally, to Laura Gilbert and Austin Hepp for being the voice talent on the audio tracks, because I sure as heck wasn't going to be.

Tech Group:
I helped put together mock-ups for both the tour landing page and tour interior pages.

I've been helping put the tour leg of the website into Dreamweaver. (See previous post to see how much we accomplished in just one day!)

I helped design the Art In Sight logo.

Special Thanks to:
David Hentz for making the templates and getting the site up and running in Dreamweaver.

Laura Gilbert for coordinating all of us and getting the style sheet completely put together.

Sarah Burns and Kelly Laffin for helping put the mock-ups together, as well as putting the site on Dreamweaver. (They did most of it, I just put in the audio files)

Valerie Morris, Rachel Hartley-Smith, and Steve Schuler for teaching us about web work and helping us out.

Documentary Team:
I've filmed a lot of b-roll and many interviews.

I've been editing away. I have the opening, and a section and a half done.

I put together the plan for the documentary so we actually know what we're doing. (Or, I do at least)

I've written the interview questions for all the interview questions.
Special Thanks to:
Laura Huffman and the VBC for giving me all this equipment to work with. I will certainly miss the 24/7 access to HD cameras.

Rick Henry and David Hentz for the extra filming they've done. And to Rick for taking over filming interviews when I just couldn't do it anymore.

Rick Henry for editing all the youtube content.

I think that just about sums it up. I'm sorry if I left you out. But know that I appreciate all of you and all that you do =)

productivity is an artform in itself

Week 13:

Today, most of the class took off to Monroe Central High School to "test-drive" the website. That's all good for them, but Sarah, Kelly, and myself stayed behind to get the tour leg of the website put together.

Wouldn't you know that with just THREE of us we were 10 times more productive than usual. Here's a list of what I finished today:

I finished editing the tour recordings that I was able to. I have 2 to re-record, and 2 more which need music added.

I edited a small section of the documentary.

I added the 10 recordings I had done into dreamweaver.

We put the website on the server.

And I wrote this blog.

Plus, we took a long lunch at the Sunshine Cafe today.

Furthermore, Kelly and Sarah got all the pictures and text up on the tour pages. Granted, some of the pictures are distorted and not quite right, but we're going to fix that.

All in all, it was one pretty productive day. I think I accomplished more today than I usually accomplish in a week.

Recording the Tour and Near Death Experiences

Week 12:

For me, this week was dedicated to recording the tracks for the museum tour. Until this morning, everything had been going extremely well. The recording equipment was working. I knew what I was doing, the readers were awesome. Our only problem was coming across a few words that no one could pronounce. It's resulted in the need to re-record a few scripts, but nothing too major.

Of course, then today came. We went in a different studio, which apparently didn't even HAVE the program on one computer, and the computer that did have it wouldn't allow us to open a session. It was frustrating to say the least. No worries though, we'll finish up Monday.

On the bright side, every script that has been recorded has been edited. It wasn't terribly difficult to do, and sometimes I even amaze myself with my mad skills. I successfully edited a few things mid-sentence, and it's impossible to tell. My new goal is to edit mid-word and make it sound flawless. In either case, I'm hoping the audio tour will be recorded and exported by Tuesday night.

Laura, Sarah, and I all had a near death experience today (that may be a bit of an exaggeration). As we stepped onto a Ball State shuttle, we were overcome by some sort of...gas. Needless to say, everyone on the bus was unable to breathe and subsequently was coughing. We were trying to open windows to no avail....it was like a bad horror movie. Thankfully another bus came and we all got on that one instead.

So all in all, it was a pretty productive week for me.

well this was a random week.

Week 11:

I have to say, I really didn't accomplish that much this week, but in my defense there was only so much I could do.

One thing I did was finish revising one of my tour scripts. I think this is the last time, and I will rejoice over that fact. Looking back though, I am pretty proud of myself. For someone who isn't exactly an art aficionado, I thought I did a good job compiling scripts about.....art. One thing I strove for was to make sure the students listening to the tour could relate to my scripts. I worked to make sure I was talking about things they will find interesting, I said it in a way they will understand, and that at the end, they'll be able to relate to the art at least a little bit. I like to think I've accomplished this goal with the two scripts I wrote.

One exciting thing that happened this week was getting Final Cut Pro installed on the G4 computer. This means I can work on the documentary while others are working on the website. It's an exciting moment.

This week I also discovered an awesome Facebook game called SimSocial. I've only been moderately addicted.

interviews, revising, and setting things on fire

Week 10:

I have to admit, I really don't remember a lot of what happened this week. I probably should have written this blog Thursday or Friday, but I just wanted to chillax and be lazy those days.

I know I spent a lot of time shooting interviews for the documentary. I had a schedule that fit everyone in the class in. I only shot interviews for about half the class. However, they were excellent interviews so I decided that was ample.

Furthermore, I CAPTURED the interviews. That's right, I sat down and got that 2 1/2 hours of tape captured so I don't have to do it next week. Now all I need to do is find a time to start going through them and to start really editing this documentary. I'm realizing this is going to be a difficult feat, because everyone needs that G5 for the website. We'll work something out.

I'm also looking into scheduling times for recording the audio tours. I guarantee recording those is going to be QUITE the adventure. I say this because any time I use ProTools it turns out to be an adventure.

Finally, I spent some time (surprise!) revising this week. It was fine actually, I didn't have TOO much. I did suggest setting our podcast scripts on fire in the end. For some reason, Beth wasn't as enthusiastic about that idea.

I LIKE using the words piece and create.

Week 9:

This week was full of revising. It's just as exciting as it sounds. For me, this meant editing my tour scripts. The real challenge for me was the script about abstract expressionism. I think I was convincing myself I didn't understand it, but I really do. It was just the articulating it that was the problem. After meeting with Tania and bouncing ideas off classmates I think I have a workable script.

I know for me one the most annoying part of revision is the list of "forbidden words" we received from the art museum. It includes words such as artwork, piece, and create. One might think it wouldn't be that hard to write without these words. That person would be wrong. Artwork I can do without, especially because we can still use work of art. Piece killed me. In my scripts, it was mostly replaced with the word object, which I loathe. When I think of an object, I think of random items laying around my apartment, not a piece (that's right, I used the word piece) of art. Also, I never realized how much I like the word create. I definitely like it more than make or paint. Needless to say, it was very frustrating trying to replace these words. I became particularly annoyed when I found a sentence that ended with "created the piece of artwork." or something along those lines.

Another small portion of my week was planning out the documentary. I have a general idea of how it will flow, but it made me realize I need to do some more in-depth interviews with students at the VBC. So next week is interview week. I know all my classmates are looking forward to it =)

And from our laptops a website is born

Week 8:

This past week we made a lot of headway on the website. We made many of decisions we had previously been putting off or kept changing our minds on. Also, we got initial designs for the interior pages completed.

One issue that has been debated for an extremely long time is color. Somehow our color decisions never seemed to work and were ever-changing. To solve this, we decided to form a color "committee." We chose a few people to be the Gods of color, and whatever decision they made, was the law. This has worked well for us.

We also put our foot down and developed a style sheet. This way, when we're making templates, we know how big everything should be, what fonts to use, etc. When we put everything together at the end it looks cohesive and actually makes sense.

It seems to me that the next step to the website is putting the templates up on dreamweaver, and then filling them with content. It should be quite the adventure, but I'm very glad we're up to this point.

I'm excited that we've basically completed all of our designs and can start getting it live in the near future. It's taken a lot of work getting to this point, but now we've gotten to the point that we're moving along quite smoothly.

Week 7: I Can Collaborate. I Rock.

This week I was assigned the task to talk about myself and how I roll with collaboration. Well actually, I think technically that's supposed to be next week's post, but I like the idea of writing about it right now.

Obviously a big part of this project comes down to collaboration and group work. One thing I've noticed is that everyone in this seminar is really good at sitting down and discussing things. We can discuss like no other. We can lay out 40 million options. We can look at the pros and cons. This started out as a good thing, but especially in the last week or two we've noticed it's time to make decisions and quit just sitting around and talking about it.

That said, I like to think that recently my role in collaboration has been in keeping the group from getting hung up on details. Instead, I try to steer the conversation so it's focusing on the big picture. I think doing this helps keep the conversation focused and relevant.

For example, we might be trying to make a decision, but somehow the conversation has devolved into a battle between two different types of purple I try to calm everyone down, table the color conversation, and lead everyone back to what we were originally talking about. That's what I try to do, and I like to think I succeed at least some of the time.

I will say my biggest weakness in collaboration is delegating. Usually when I'm assigned to a task, especially one I would HAPPILY do by myself, I have issues delegating tasks to other people. I realize this is something I should work on, because if I don't, the last three weeks of the semester I will most likely combust from stress. Although, that would be an interesting segment for the documentary. In either case, it's my goal in the coming weeks to actually articulate all the insane ideas in my head to other people and hopefully delegate tasks to them. But, I have improved. I give other people the camera now. =)

I think Rick summed it up best though. I asked him how he thought I was at collaboration and he responded by saying that I was "swell."

Also, the above picture was taken outside the art museum. We went on a picture taking expedition, and kept taking pictures even after we left.

Week 5: Wait, what does this have to do with my class selections?

I figured this would be a good week to discuss my class selections and how all this work at the VBC is actually relevant to those. That said my class selections are: Writing in the Workplace, Scriptwriting, Telecommunications, and an Honors Colloq.

For me, it's pretty easy to see how these class selections relate to what we're doing, but I'll go through it piece by piece.

Writing in the Workplace:
I know one thing students in this class on campus focus on is writing proposals. One thing we did here was do a pitch for the Museum of Art staff. We all had to prepare for it and plan out what we were going to say. Also, just that I often am writing to professional to get their opinion or set up appointments requires at least some formal writing style.

Scriptwriting:
This comes into play in the virtual tour group. We are each writing two podcast scripts pertaining to a gallery in the museum as well as a piece of art in that gallery. So, these podcast scripts are basically what is giving me my credit for scriptwriting.

Honors Colloq:
To me, learning so much about art has to go towards SOMETHING, which is where the honors colloq comes in. Since an honors colloq is pretty flexible, it's easy for me to simply envision it as an art appreciation class, and I've learned so much about art in this class it's easy to fit it in.

Telecommunications:
I'm getting immersion credit in my major for this project. This one is pretty easy to fit in, because I'm working on the documentary for the semester. It requires planning, shooting, and editing, which I think are important elements for any sort of TCOM immersion experience.

I think that pretty much sums up my schedule! This next week will be full of revision and capturing tape, so I can't promise next week will be a terribly exciting post, but I'll do my best! :)

Back to High School

Week 4:

It's been another productive week at the VBC. The highlight was on Monday, when we took a trip to Monroe Central High School to sit in on Jeff Wagner's art class. It was definitely a good experience.

I think the most important thing Jeff talked to us about was adding the "human" element to art. Instead of just bombarding a student with facts and technique, drawing them into a piece by saying something interesting about the work or the artist. Making it easy to relate to. I think it's going to be one of the most important things on this website. The only way these kids are going to go through everything is they have at least some interest in the subject.

Furthermore, going back to high school art class was just fun. He was teaching gesture and contour drawings. In an effort to make the students more comfortable with the presence of 10 college students and their professor, we decided to participate as well, and it was good fun.

One last comment on this week is that the groups are definitely moving from the planning stage to the "doing" stage. We've spent so much time planning, and it's definitely just time for us to plunge in and start putting together a physical product. That said, this week should be quite the adventure :)

Week 3: FIELD TRIP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The best part about a VBC immersion project=FIELD TRIP! For our field trip we took a journey to the Indianapolis Museum of Art and the Dayton Art Institute.

The tour group decided to take advantage of the cell phone tour the IMA offered in their gardens. We were disappointed. If there is anything this tour taught us it was that you have to have a clean audio recording that doesn't sound like poo in the listener's ear.

The rest of the IMA was lots of fun though. I especially enjoyed the contemporary art area.

After the IMA we drove to Dayton where the VBC treated us to dinner and Max and Erma's. So. Very. Delicious. I mean, if you tell me we're going to a nice restaurant, there's no limit to what I can spend, and I'm poor an haven't been out to eat in months, I am GOING to take full advantage. And I did. It was amazing.

So after we recovered from that delicious dinner, we took off to the Dayton Art Institute. Their audio tour was much more satisfactory. DAI in general seemed to be more education oriented than the IMA, which was a good change-up. I also found a birthday present for my sister there, so that was a plus as well.

After Dayton we took the ride back to Muncie (and then I took a ride back home). Overall, it was an enjoyable and eye-opening trip. It's the first time I've gone to a big art museum. I've been to plenty of exhibits and obviously the BSU MoA, but not a bigger one. I was surprised I was as comfortable as I was there.

The other fun part about this field trip was just hanging out with everyone in the group. We really are an amusing and fun group of people. I got a lot of good footage of the random antics that took place on the trip.

Week 2:

Wow, what a week. I'm not even sure where to begin.

First, the reading. This week we read and discussed the book Getting It: A Guide to Understanding and Appreciating Art by Becky Hendrick. I actually enjoyed reading this book, because I felt as if the author explained everything well, and in a way which was fairly easy to understand. I liked the idea of analyzing form to discover content, and to compare pieces of art to things you're already familiar with. She let her opinion show a little too much in the book, but I felt like it was a worthwhile read.

This week was full of making group plans and figuring out who is doing what. I think this week I realized just how much WORK this project is going to take. Between three sub-groups, we're all going to be keeping very busy! I am a part of the virtual tour group, tech/web design group, and documentary group. I think we're off to good starts in all three of these groups, and we're all starting to realize how important teamwork and collaboration is going to be for this project.

The only group I'm concerned about getting along and collaborating well is the tech/web group. We almost immediately came to head on the entrance to our website, and how students and teachers would navigate it. Ultimately, this decision will be left up to Tania Said, which is the appropriate route. What worries me is simply that there was so much bickering over this one element, a few spats rose up, and even in our meeting with Tania I felt like we were a bunch of middle school students fighting over something. It was almost a little embarrassing. I'm hoping as time progresses we start to learn to compromise better and to discuss things rather than bicker. Otherwise, we are in for a very long semester.

A New Class Experience

Week 1:

This past week was definitely one of the most interesting of my college career. It has been strange adjusting to a new schedule and new way of learning I suppose. It has been refreshing to get out of the usual running around to 4-6 classes and juggling all that at once, and just focusing on one big project instead.
One thing I learned this week is just how important collaboration is going to be in this project. We have a major project to do, and no one person will be able to accomplish many of the elements by themselves.
This week we did a fun collaboration activity. We divided into four groups; two groups were given cakes, frosting, and candy. The other two were given fabric, sewing materials, and a whole assortment of craft items. The assignment was to simply create a piece of art within your team. I learned two things from this activity, first, you have to delegate to get things done, second, the best ideas always come from a group brainstorming and bouncing ideas off each other.
There was no way any of the groups could have finished their projects without working together, it was all too much work for just one person. I feel our group did a good job of dividing up the tasks, making sure everyone had something they were working on, and making sure we got done on time. We also tried to make sure no one was delegated to a task they didn’t want to do. We worked to make sure it was fun for anyone.
Our group had kind of a hard time coming up with an idea. We were all staring at the pile of art supplies thinking, what the heck are we going to do with this. Had I been by myself, I would have made a miniature pillow, because I would have never thought of anything else. However, by talking together and bouncing ideas off each other our group was able to come up with a good, fun idea for our project.
This week I also learned a lot of just how much goes into setting up and maintaining and art museum. It was very interesting going on the tour with Tania Said and hearing from her how they constantly have to decide what to put on exhibit, what needs to stay in storage, and how they make their decisions. Also, by walking through the museum both on my own and in the group, I kept thinking about how there was always a method behind the madness. Obviously someone had a good reason for hanging some particular painting where it was. Overall, it was an interesting and enlightening experience for me.
One thing I am very excited about for the project is working on the documentary. While I realize it is obviously secondary to the website and the ultimate goal of this seminar, I still can’t help but think about it and come up with ideas in my head. By watching a couple of the documentaries from past classes, I came up with a lot of ideas, and got a good idea of where we really need to be going with this. I’m looking forward to getting started with it and watching it all come together.