Since I didn't blog about my video, here goes. This was interestingly one of the most fun projects I have had to do in my college career. Trevor and I decided to do a parody of Expedition 360, in which a man is chronicling his journey around the world. For our video, we decided to do Expedition OU. We probably put in a bit more effort than was needed, recording over a half-hour of footage for this project, but it was just plain fun.
When editing we took a map of campus, and in After Effects created the red line to follow our jouney. We layered this on top of footage. Then we pretty much cut out all of the massive amounts of excess footage, getting just enough to fullfill our time requirments.
When puting it up online, it was a balance of file size to quality. I ended up using an h.624 compressor at medium quality, bumping the aspect ratio down t o 400 x 300. To save a little bit more space I lowered the audio to mono, 44.1k, and 8 bits. I'm not sure how much this did, but I think I was able to export the video at slightly higher quality as a result.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Saturday, May 26, 2007
Thursday, May 17, 2007
Political Blogs
Blogs representing politicians are an interesting entity. These are not actually blogs from the candidates (usually), but instead blogs about them- generally created and maintained by members of their staffs. This provides an interesting attempt at a balance between truthfulness, and positivity. These blogs want to have some sort of credibility, but of course, not say anything damaging.
I'm sure how much credence I would lend these blogs. The example that I studied was about Sam Brownback. As I stated above, this entires are not posted by Brownback himself, but by a member of his staff. It's still fairly early on in the campaigning, so there was not a tremendous amount of news that they were posting, but there there were still posts dated from almost every day (three from May 15th alone).
It seems that Brownback is essentially using the blog to its potential. Most of the entires are well written and informative. There's only so much stock somebody can put into just another arm of a politicians campaigning. When you look to a blog put out by a candidate, you're not going to get unbiased factual news. In Brownback's, some entires were attacking other politicians, and others were spent glossing over and explaining away his faults, while the last third were dedicated to touting his accomplishments.
This particular blog does its job in promoting Brownback. In the end, I doubt it would really influence anybody who doesn't already follow him. However, the blog is just a small part of a much larger, and impressive website, which may hold a bit more clout.
I'm sure how much credence I would lend these blogs. The example that I studied was about Sam Brownback. As I stated above, this entires are not posted by Brownback himself, but by a member of his staff. It's still fairly early on in the campaigning, so there was not a tremendous amount of news that they were posting, but there there were still posts dated from almost every day (three from May 15th alone).
It seems that Brownback is essentially using the blog to its potential. Most of the entires are well written and informative. There's only so much stock somebody can put into just another arm of a politicians campaigning. When you look to a blog put out by a candidate, you're not going to get unbiased factual news. In Brownback's, some entires were attacking other politicians, and others were spent glossing over and explaining away his faults, while the last third were dedicated to touting his accomplishments.
This particular blog does its job in promoting Brownback. In the end, I doubt it would really influence anybody who doesn't already follow him. However, the blog is just a small part of a much larger, and impressive website, which may hold a bit more clout.
Monday, May 7, 2007
Our Case Against YouTube
The Washington Post article "Our Case Against YouTube," by Michael Fricklas provides a very convincing argument against sites such as YouTube and Google video. Fricklas alleges that these sites have knowledge of copyrighted material on their sites and don't do anything to prevent this. In fact, he claims that this is an aspect they not only allow, but even go so far as to promote.
There is no doubt the YouTube contains copyrighted material. Users can watch entire TV shows and even movies. Other sites such as Daily Motion, or Yeoh Vision are even worse, containing whole libraries of copyrighted material. These sites, however, are not under the same fire as YouTube, because they are located outside the United States. YouTube, however, still contains a large share of copyrighted material. The issue at play is not whether the content is there, but whether the moderators of the website have the obligation to monitor it.
According to the Digital Media Copyright Act, websites that provide space to host content are protected from copyright law because they are simply providing a service for users. Fricklas claims that this does not apply to YouTube, because they are reaping the benefits themselves of the material that they host.
For the most part, I agree with Fricklas. YouTube cannot honestly hide behind that clause, meant to protect operators of server space, and email providers. YouTube is an entertainment site, and it's well-being depends on the content that it hosts. It reaps a monetary benefit from the material, whether it's copyrighted or not. The responsibility of finding this material, therefor, is left squarely on YouTube's shoulders. It is difficult enough for them to monitor all the content on their own site, and it would be exponentially more difficult for the actual copyright holders to locate their material. This may hurt YouTube's viewer base, but I don't think so.
The quality of video offered on YouTube and similar sites is of such low quality, that it is no substitute for actually watching a TV show or a movie. In the end, I think that YouTube does not hurt the copyright holders, but at as a matter of principle, it is still copyright infringement. It seems that YouTube was created for another reason anyway. With the internet being the most democratic medium available, and YouTube offering the apitome of this concept, it seems more attractive to people wanting to get their own work out there. YouTube is great for distributing small videos that would have previously never seen the light of day. YouTube would still thrive without hosting copyrighted material.
There is no doubt the YouTube contains copyrighted material. Users can watch entire TV shows and even movies. Other sites such as Daily Motion, or Yeoh Vision are even worse, containing whole libraries of copyrighted material. These sites, however, are not under the same fire as YouTube, because they are located outside the United States. YouTube, however, still contains a large share of copyrighted material. The issue at play is not whether the content is there, but whether the moderators of the website have the obligation to monitor it.
According to the Digital Media Copyright Act, websites that provide space to host content are protected from copyright law because they are simply providing a service for users. Fricklas claims that this does not apply to YouTube, because they are reaping the benefits themselves of the material that they host.
For the most part, I agree with Fricklas. YouTube cannot honestly hide behind that clause, meant to protect operators of server space, and email providers. YouTube is an entertainment site, and it's well-being depends on the content that it hosts. It reaps a monetary benefit from the material, whether it's copyrighted or not. The responsibility of finding this material, therefor, is left squarely on YouTube's shoulders. It is difficult enough for them to monitor all the content on their own site, and it would be exponentially more difficult for the actual copyright holders to locate their material. This may hurt YouTube's viewer base, but I don't think so.
The quality of video offered on YouTube and similar sites is of such low quality, that it is no substitute for actually watching a TV show or a movie. In the end, I think that YouTube does not hurt the copyright holders, but at as a matter of principle, it is still copyright infringement. It seems that YouTube was created for another reason anyway. With the internet being the most democratic medium available, and YouTube offering the apitome of this concept, it seems more attractive to people wanting to get their own work out there. YouTube is great for distributing small videos that would have previously never seen the light of day. YouTube would still thrive without hosting copyrighted material.
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