1960's Heisman winner Reniya.

Film Your Issue

This via email:

Film Your Issue Global Competition
High School and College Students Invited to Create Short Films for FYI -

USA Today, the United Nations, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and
other organizations and media leaders have joined forces to engage young
adults (14-24) in contributing to the public dialogue on pressing social
issues using the power of the Internet and user-generated content.

In its 4th year, FYI - Film Your Issue has grown into a global
Internet-based competition that invites high school and college students in
the United States and around the world to express themselves on pressing
contemporary issues by creating and uploading short two-minute films on
issues that impact them and their generation.

Beginning February 15, films can be uploaded to multiple participating
platforms, including MTV, YouTube, and American Film Institute Screen
Nation, as well as promoted on MySpace TV.

Awards and prizes include internships at USA Today, the United Nations, the
award-winning PBS Series "P.O.V.", and the Humane Society of the United
States; a $5,000 college scholarship from the Gates Foundation; having your
film broadcast on Starz; having entries distributed by the Associated Press
to its 1,800 Online Video Network media outlets; being profiled on MTV News
and presented at the NAACP annual conference; VIP Pass/film presentation at
AFI Silverdocs; the Walter Cronkite Civic Engagement Leadership Award and
Eleanor Roosevelt Humanitarian Award; and many more.

Visit the program's Web site for complete program information, filmmaking
tips, and full descriptions of the program's awards and prizes.

Moving Pictures

Vincent and Kearia looking for breadcrumbs.



Marlene capturing footage of a good young adult gone bad.



Buster the Clown autograph session.



Luis the interloper.



Holy cow...did the earth move? Productivity from Dictionary!

Pics from filming

I've been trying to snap some pictures of you guys working the last few days. Here's a few:

We promise you that no one was harmed during the shooting of this film.

Now that's what I call working towards good shot composition.

Checking the footage.

Canisius Poetry Presentation

Today Sababu Norris brought in his squad of poetry performers. Here's some pics. Click to enlarge.

Genre Movie Trailer Rubric

Today we're going to stop for a second to take a quick look at the evaluation tool I am giving you.

Oh Wow!

Now it's even easier to find new posts on other student's blogs.  Check out the new widgets I've added to the sidebar.  When you post, my sidebar is updated.

Food for thought:  Give a catchy a title to your post to see if it attracts more comments.

Tidbits

I want to address a few things with you this morning.

1. I will accept no late blog postings after Tuesday, February 26th. At midnight, those little horsies turn into pumpkins.

2. I love the comments so far. Here is an exchange that I was especially impressed with. Also, there is an interesting exchange going on with someone from outside McKinley right here. Don't feel the need to praise. Try to stick to the question the writer raises. If a writer doesn't raise a question, avoid responding to that post.

3. Don't lose points for stupid reasons. Again, there is a specific format I want you to follow:

Title Field: Post Title
Blog Post Field: Title, Author
Pages Read
Response

Here is a response utilizing the ideal format.

4. Some of you folks are reverting to plot summary. Choose a question from the response prompts linked to your blogs.

Hard at Work

Saw an interesting site today. Here's Kaysha setting up a shot with Brittany and Ladazia while Ashley takes charge of holding up the sheet. Nice work gals!

Commenting on Your Peers' Posts

Hey folks, just a quick reminder. I am not asking you to comment on other people's posts for the purpose for evaluating them. You need not point out spelling or grammar mistakes.

What I'd like you to do is wrestle with the ideas expressed. Answer their question. Raise a question. But don't correct...people hate that (and that is coming from an English teacher!). I'd like us to focus on higher order concerns.

Lastly, if you'd like an easy way to find out who has recently posted on their blogs, you can do the following:

1. Download this XML file to your desktop.
2. Go to Google Reader
3. Make sure you're signed in to your Blogger/Google Account.
4. You should have a Google Reader account already. If not, accept one.
5. At the bottom of the column on the left side click on "Manage Subscriptions"
6. In the yellow toolbar click on "Import/Export"
7. "Choose File" and figure out where you saved it.
   
8. Upload it.
9. Oila. If you were successful, your Google Reader should now look like this.

Every time one of your peers publishes a post, it will be sucked (for lack of a better word) into your Google Reader. Now you can be kept up to date with what your fellow classmates are doing, and comment accordingly. You can also easily subscribe to other blogs, news feeds, etc.

Looking for Alaska

Today I showed you John Green's response to a handful of Depew citizens' call to ban Looking for Alaska. If you're home, here's that video:



If you're interested, here's his website and here's that Nerdfighter's site. After all, these guys are made of awesome. Here's an article about the Nerdfighter's cause.

Digividra

Here's that video we watched in class today.

Movie Trailer Project

Over the next 2-3 weeks you will be using digital video cameras and iMovie to create movie trailers selling your genre. Here are the assignment sheets.








Here's a picture of the MPAA green screen. You can import it and use it as the first shot of your film. Click on the image to bring up the larger version. Then, right click (or option click) on image and save it to your desktop.