Every week [or so] the morning class likes to give you guys a little more Cobraction with a new installment of Cobra Cam. So far, it’s been a huge hit throughout the classes and you guys really seem to dig it.
For the lurkers of the interwebs, Cobra Cam is a web cam booth Mr. Diaz cleverly stuck on the gym landing at our school. Students are encouraged to record themselves doing silly things we suggest or silly things they come up with.
For the rest of you: Friday, February 5th, Cobra Cam got a make over! Our very own Michael Collado gave it some checker stripes, color’o’spice, and everything nice! Personally, I likes. I’m uber proud to work with such talented people. Mush aside, here’s a link to the Fist Pump edition of our Cobra Cam segment, in all its re-edited glory:
PS: I know! It’s blocked by MDCPS School filters. Bummer. I’ll get Diaz to upload it to the site, then we can work our magic. Til then!
I admit, the New Year thing doesn’t really set in with me til February. Don’t judge. I finally reached that point where 2010 has been acknowledged, acquainted, and embraced. With these new developments come new resolutions:
Organize the blog and site. If you’ve had the chance to foster the thought, “NONE OF MY LINKS WORK ANYMORE!” good for you. Bookmarking is a valuable skill, and for the next couple of days, completely futile. Seeing as most of the blog entries end up under one category no matter what it’s about, there is going to be a lot of moving around. I’m going to try to have a place for everything and everything in it’s place. Wish me luck.
Make things pretty. I have a lot of perfectionism issues, I’m not going to lie. I want our site and blog to have serious aesthetic appeal. Not that it doesn’t now… it can just be… better… by… a lot.
Get more people blogging. Besides comments [which are all kinds of mandatory] the only real contributors are meself and Sir D. And exciting individuals as we are, I’d still like to see some variety. There is a true injustice in my being able to boast about the morning class in posts when the afternoon class lacks a representative. The anchors don’t really have the chance to connect to their viewers as much as I’d like. And there isn’t much of an open forum with the student body. If you want to start contributing to the blog, please e-mail me [please notify you've e-mailed me] and I’ll help you set up a WordPress username and sign you up as a contributer. It’ll let you post blogs, make comments, and get e-mail notifications. I could also talk to Diaz about making them count as afterschool assignments or hours or whatever you need.
Get people TALKING! I would like to launch an advertising campaign for all our jiucy interweb feats of awesome. Yes. That’s how I’m describing it. We already have a lot of people going onto the site for CobraCam and misc. videos, now we just need them to use the blog to tell us what they want.
Teach Diaz the difference between a blog entry and a Tweet. The real challenge. You may have noticed a lot of the blog entries are basically titles and questions. These are great and all, but kind of defeat the purpose of even having a blog. I’m thinking about using a news anchor story v. an outside report analogy. I think it might take.
Well, that’s it [for now]. Five things I am going to get on ASAP for the mutual improvement of the program. Hope it didn’t bore you too much, and kudos for making it all the way to the end.
I’ve been thinking about spicing up our website profiles with new, strictly online segments, called “Meet the Crew”.
Imagine something along the lines of the Team Fortress 2 promo videos only featuring our above and below the line personnel. This could be part of a behind the scenes series I’d like to call “Video Blueprint”. Just because… well I learned how to make a blueprint graphic on AE.
Ideas? Comments? Concerns? – This is a First and Second Period Affair, but, as always, the kiddies are welcome to play.
Some of you may have, at some point, noticed the lack of morning newscast [the better of the two] on Wednesday, January 27th, 2010. Instead of getting the script ready, setting up, and going on live, TV Production students from first and third block assembled for a guest speaker.
A Mr. Bill Glass, Producer from CBS4 and news photographer extraordinaire, graced us with his presence. After going through the school’s superb security detail, Mr. Glass spoke to a room of attentive students who he encouraged all sorts of questions from-”Except,” he warned, “any questions about salary. I will not answer questions about salary, and I’ll tell you why…” he stopped for dramatic pause, “I don’t want to discourage you.”
We laughed.
Mr. Glass showed us his Video Reel and we showed him two SMSH Newscasts, one from each class. We were open to criticism, which he openly gave, and open to new ideas on how to improve our performances, which he gladly presented.
He spoke as genuinely as possible about a career choice that takes serious dedication. Starting off, even with a four year college degree, he admitted a first year of hard labour and gruff work. To make it in the industry you have to pay your dues, take chances and opportunities when presented, and keep an open mind.
We all listened.
All in all it was an experience for those who had heard it all before, and those who needed a little time to get over the shell shock. We thank Mr. Glass for taking the time to visit our humble studio, and hope to have him again sometime.
