Color Me Curious
untitled
"I'm Dorothy Gale from Kansas"
pixel skylines
almost home
Lint Roller? I Barely Know Her
EXPECTATIONS
cherry valley forever
Noah Kahan
tannertan36
Fieri Frames
occasionally subtle
Not today Justin
Jimmy Eat World
No title available
Claire Keane
PUT YOUR BEARD IN MY MOUTH
Cosmic Funnies
#extradirty
YOU ARE THE REASON
seen from Belgium
seen from Italy
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Argentina
seen from China
seen from Panama
seen from United States
seen from Netherlands
seen from Uzbekistan
seen from China
seen from Ukraine
seen from Germany
seen from Indonesia
seen from Colombia
seen from Türkiye
seen from Malaysia
seen from Indonesia
seen from United States
seen from United States
@melyssacantor-blog
I wrote a basic SEM test and would love some feedback!
I wrote a basic SEM test for the company I work for, but I feel that some of the questions still need a bit of work. Is the test too basic to give to someone with a reasonable amount of SEO/SEM experience? I would really appreciate any thoughts/feedback you might have.
Thanks!
Shot List
Emerson Entrepreneurs:
Shot: Action:
Wide Shot Tech working in studio
Zoom in Tech's hands
Zoom in Phone in tech's hands
Cutaway Sit down of tech, discussing his business
Cutaway Interview with customer
B-Roll Person dropping phone on sidewalk
B-Roll Cracked phones
Cutaway Tech talking about business
Cutaway Interview with person who went to another store first, tech is cheaper
VO Tech talking about why he's cheaper
B-Roll Other places to try to get phone fixed.
Some Video Terminology
If you ever wanted to learn the lingo of journalism, there are a bunch of terms you need to know if you're ever going to shoot a video.
Do you know what a pan is? That is fairly easy. It's a camera motion that is either horizontal from one side to the other, or vertical in an up-and-down motion. But, did you know you should avoid doing it in a package? I didn't.
Pan. That is fairly simple. How about TRT? Yeah, I didn't have a clue at first either. Total Run Time. And now you know.
Luckily, my awesome professor gave us a cheat sheet of all the terms a journalist should know when making a package. You can check it out here.
Also, anything that also pertains to an audio package is highlighted in yellow. Happy Journalizing!
Old Gray Comes Together Again
This is the script from my latest Soundslides package. I am having technical difficulties with the actual package, but it will be up soon.
(Open with Vulcan Death Grip SOT 6:30)
THE SONG YOU’RE CURRENTLY LISTENING TO IS CALLED VULCAN DEATH GRIP, BY A BAND CALLED OLD GRAY.
OLD GRAY IS JUST BEGINNING TO GAIN A FOLLOWING AMONG THE EMO/SCREAMO SCENE.
THE TRIO IS CURRENTLY MADE UP OF CAMERON BOUCHER ON VOCALS, GUITAR, AND BASS
RAPHAEL BASTEK ALSO ON VOCALS, GUITAR, AND BASS
AND CHARLIE SINGER ON DRUMS.
THEY ALL MET IN THEIR HOME STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE, AND FORMED THE BAND WHILE STILL IN HIGH SCHOOL.
OLD GRAY HAS COME A LONG WAY OVER THE PAST YEAR. THEIR FIRST OFFICIAL GIG WAS IN April OF 2011 AT A BATTLE OF THE BANDS COMPETITION.
SINCE GRADUATING HIGH SCHOOL, THE BAND HAS BEEN FORCED TO SPREAD OUT.
CAMERON ATTENDS COLLEGE IN CONNECTICUT, WHILE RAPHAEL AND CHARLIE ARE IN DIFFERENT PARTS OF NEW HAMPSHIRE.
THE BAND JOINS TOGETHER AGAIN WHENEVER THEY HAVE A GIG, LIKE THE ONE THEY PLAYED AT THE DEMOCRACY CENTER IN CAMBRIDGE ON Saturday.
FANS GATHERED FOR THE SMALL INTIMATE SHOW, ALSO FEATURING THE BANDS AVIATOR, BURNING BRIDGES, PANGEA, AND DEAR LEAP.
20-YEAR-OLD MEGAN PARNELL IS A BIG FAN OF OLD GRAY.
(1:09) SO I WAS REALLY EXCITED TO SEE THEM LIVE, AND THEY WERE REALLY FANTASTIC. I MEAN THEY WERE REALLY INTO IT. ONE OF THE MEMBERS OF THE BAND CROWD SURFED, AND EVERYONE AT THE SHOW, I MEAN THERE WEREN’T MANY PEOPLE HERE, BUT EVERYONE WHO WAS THERE WAS REALLY EXCITED ABOUT IT AND REALLY INTO IT, AND IT MADE FOR A REALLY FUN SHOW. (1:26)
PARNELL DESCRIBES OLD GRAY AS “TWINKLY EMO” WHICH SHE SAYS IS HER FAVORITE TYPE OF MUSIC.
“THEY JUST INCORPORATE SO MANY DIFFERENT ELEMENTS INTO THEIR MUSIC, ITS NOT ALL JUST ONE GENRE. WHICH IS SOMETHING I REALLY LIKE ABOUT THEM. THEY INCORPORATE SO MANY DIFFERENT GENRES. IT’S LIKE SCREAMO, SCRAMS, EMO, AND THEY HAVE A LOT OF SPOKEN WORD STUFF. AND ITS COOL BECAUSE YOU CAN SEE HOW MUCH THEY HAVE GROWN BETWEEN THEIR VARIOUS RECORDINGS.
THEY PLAYED A NEW SONG AND IT WAS JUST COMPLETELY DIFFERENT FROM THEIR OTHER STUFF. THEY’RE VERY DIFFERENT FROM A LOT OF THE BANDS IN THAT SCENE...IN THAT EMO SCENE. THEY’VE BROKEN OUT AND DONE SOMETHING NEW AND ITS REALLY COOL TO SEE.
OLD GRAY PLAYED A FIFTEEN MINUTE SET, AND CONCLUDED THE NIGHT BY JUMPING INTO THE CROWD OF ABOUT 50 PEOPLE TO CROWD SURF.
FOR JR-364, I’M MELYSSA CANTOR.
(Fade out with Vulcan Death Grip)
While I have been keeping up with the class that I originally made this blog for, I have noticed that I am beginning to gain some followers outside class. For those other people reading the blog, I apologize for not posting as many journalism-musings as I used to. After I am finished with the original class this was made for, I do intend on maintaining this page as a place to post other work I have done.
And, since I would like to begin posting my outside work now, I thought I would share my biggest outside project.
Besides being a student of journalism, I participate in many other on-campus activities. The one that I put the most effort into (by far) though is WECB. WECB is Emerson College's only entirely student-run, online-only radio station. I currently hold the position of news director. One of my major projects this semester has been re-building the news website because, let's face it, in this day and age EVERYONE should have a wonderful website. So, here it is. I proudly present my baby, wecb-news.com.
Kerry and Duncan visit Emerson College
Well this was a process. There's a funny thing about interviewing underground bands. Sometimes, they're too tired from their shows the night before to return your calls. Awesome.
It's a good thing I had a backup for this audio package assignment. It might have nothing to do with the underground music scene, but I made this package about Senator John Kerry and US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan's town-hall style meeting with students at Emerson College. Check it out, and please, let me know what you think!
http://melyssacantor.wordpress.com/2012/02/11/audio-package/
Tips for a Great Voiceover
Angela Grant's tips for preparing for recording voiceover are wonderful ones. I do a lot of voice work already, so some of these will come in really handy for me. Some of them, I already use each time I step into the studio though.
For example, breathing exercises are helpful. Sometimes, it might seem strange to do yoga before entering a studio, but it really relaxes your muscles and clears your mind. Personally, I do my best work after stretching fully. In the past, I haven't done any voicing exercises other than clearing my throat. Grant's suggestions are awesome though, and I'm going to give them a try next time.
She mentions tongue twisters are as a good way to practice ennunciation. I used to do a lot of theater, and they always taught us to do toungue twisters prior to going on stage. However, I have found with voiceovers that these do not help whatsoever. They honestly confuse me more. I supposed in the end it really is to each his (or her) own though. It’s a great suggestion, just something that I personally do not use.
The best part of this article though, is that Grant includes suggestions of what to try. She doesn't leave her readers completely hanging. I'm definitely going to give it a go next time I record.
I have used audacity frequently in the past, so I was fairly skeptical when beginning this tutorial. It seemed fairly basic at first. Play, pause, and stop. I’m aware of what the wave file is already. But, hey, you never know when you’ll learn something new. As I watched it, I remembered how I taught all this to myself though, and how this video probably would have been very helpful, and saved me a lot of difficulties. Now, looking back, it’s funny how basic the program is. It’s just like working in word. You cut, you paste, you delete, you save EVERYTHING. Basic commands any person with a computer knows.
As I’m watched though, I remembered how useful the program has been to me. It as saved me a lot of heartache and long hours working in an office. Yes, I might know the basics, but it never hurts to learn something new.
I mean the fact is that this program is free, and it has gotten me out of so many binds in the past. I work at the radio station frequently, and when editing an audio file, I don’t always want to go down there to do work. Sometimes, it is so much easier to do work in the comfort of my own home. The one issue I have with Audacity though is that it is not nearly as complex as the program I normally use, Adobe Audition. That program has many more settings, and allows me to do much more with it. However, Audacity has the magic word “free” attached to it, and it doesn’t get much better than that.
Why have I never heard of this wonderful tool before?
TweetGrid allows users to follow up to six topics on Twitter at once. All you do is type in a topic, hit search, and watch it automatically refresh. Then you type in another topic, and another. I could imagine doing research for a story, and coming up with some great ideas just by doing this. The grid makes everything so easy. It's so clean with no fuss about it. Users just sit back and watch as their topics continue to update themselves.
This is exactly what social media is about. It's about being able to see what multiple people are posting about multiple topics in a timely fashion. TweetGrid allows just that.
#Easy
You might want to check your sources...
After reading three fascinating articles about Twitter, I have come to one basic conclusion: Twitter causes earthquakes. Don’t get me wrong, it is an amazing tool for journalists to use. Mashable’s Leah Bentancourt provides “The Journalist’s Guide to Twitter,” which truly shows how a journalist can best use Twitter to help further a report or a story. She mentions one point that journalists should use it to interview people; Pose a question and gain responses through the inter-webs. Is this the new version of man on the street interviews? Has the most basic part of reporting gone digital on us?
But, how do you know what someone is saying is true. It’s the age-old question, and in the age of digital media it becomes even more important to check your sources, check your sources, check your sources. You might even trust someone, but you never know if they received a faulty tip that has now been passed along to you. This is one of the ideas expressed strongly in Ryan Sholin’s “Five Ways to Gather and Report News with Twitter” and the Brambleton Buzz’s “Twitter Journalism site gives How To Use Twitter Effectively as a reader tips and tricks.”
Exhibit A: This past weekend, former Penn State football coach Joe Paterno passed away. Or did he? Reports of the coach’s death surfaced hours before he actually died. Did reporters fact check their stories? Probably. Where did they fact check them? Who knows? I suppose we’ll never know who sent out the original first Tweets about Paterno’s death, but they certainly caused one of the larger Twitter-Earthquakes the internet has ever seen. This right here is the problem with Twitter. News gets out so quickly, to anyone who wants to see it. All it takes is 140 characters, and the click of a button, and all of a sudden a man is dead. Or is he? Fact check it.
How to: Find Your Voice
My own personal voicing on Philip E. Agre's essay: Finding Your Voice: Writing a Webzine.
Personally, I'm choosing to go the more public route to express my opinion on this one. In his essay, Agre theorizes that there are two types of voicing: the public voice and the private voice. The public voice is a commercialized one. This voice is supposed to induce something in its audience. If it doesn't then the author isn't doing their job appropriately. However, the commercialized voice (which Agre suggests could be a part of any non-independent publication) doesn't leave much room for creativity, or any sort of thinking process. From what Agre says, in this situation a writer must write simply what they're told to write. They don't get to think or feel, which is why many people choose to be writers in the first place. They want their voices heard, and generally they have a lot to say.
However, this can all be done through Agre's second option, the private voice. This is the voice that says whatever it wants to. This voice thinks, expresses, and presents ideas. Unfortunately though, this is the voice that can never be published in any sort of commercial publication. Why is it that a writer must choose one of the two? Shouldn't writers be able to express themselves in their work, even if it is getting published publicly? I suppose that's the beauty of something like a zine, your voice truly is your own. No one can take it away from you, because zines are all about the self expression.
But still, I can't help but wonder where your voice goes in these commercial publications. It's still you writing, and it's still your name that goes in the byline. According to Agre, the voice is never really your own if it needs to reach out to the whole community. But my take is that your voice is always your own. Sometimes you must simply express a little self control rather than freedom of expression, but it is still you.