Final Project

Video Project 2

There are many health issues that occur to students who are newly introduced to the college life, or happen to be under a lot of stress or work.  With hectic schedules, students can get caught up in unhealthy behaviors. 
          
According to a website for the “Science Daily”, the 2007 College Student Health Survey Report traced a series of health problems including Menningitis, Obesity and sleep deprivation. 

One of the most important to a healthy college life it what your diet consists of.  Many college students resort to cheap items such as Ramen Noodles or any other boxed processed food.  Eating “food” like this is a fast way to increase your blood pressure and also increase your chances of having a heart attack. 

Obesity is a continuous problem for America today, especially among college students.  Studies from UNH (in 2007) showed that about 1/3^rd of their 12,000+ enrolled undergraduates were either overweight, or obese. 

The first step any college student can go to is taking a look at the Food Guide Pyramid.  This Pyramid is an outline of what to eat each day based on the “Dietary Guidelines.” 

The bottom of the pyramid contains the largest proportions (6-11 servings), containing foods such as bread, cereal, rice and pasta groups.  As you move towards the top of the pyramid, you have your veggies, fruits, milk yogurt and cheese, and right at the top at the smallest amounts you have fats, oils and sweets.        

Even though dieting is a huge part of living a healthy lifestyle, exercise is just as important. Contrary to making efforts to eating healthy, many college students seem to stay on track with working out and going to the gym. 

Our group randomly surveyed ten people on the Lyndon State campus, and six said that participated in some sort of exercise at least 3 times a week, whether it was going to the gym, or running.   Now even though we only surveyed ten people, it already shows that students up here in Northern Vermont are making an effort to live healthy.

The gym is a great place to go and get your exercise needs, but for people starting off, they need to have an idea of what they are doing.  They need to make sure they have a routine so their body can continuously recognize what it’s doing. 

It is also important to remember to not work the same body part two days in a row.  For example, if you lift arms one day, focus on legs the next, or take a day off from lifting and go out for a run which helps your cardiovascular endurance.

These are just some small tips for anyone who wants to boost their college lifestyle in the healthiest way possible.

Video Project 2

For the next video project we will be focusing on the reliability of technology. 

We will be highlighting the evolution of smart phones, laptops, the internet etc. This project will consist of interviews with random people asking them questions like "could you last 24 hours without a smart phone" or "how does technology impact your life?" 

We will also show video while the interviews are going on of that person utilizing the technology.

Filming/Photos- Dan Weiner

Interviews- Alex Farnworth & John Kazar

Written Essay- Alex Farnworth & John Kazar

Editing- Jianchuan Zheng

Final Project

For the final project our group will be focusing on the play "Pippin" that Lyndon State will be hosting.

We will be using voice-overs, video, still photos and interviews to enhance our project. The contents of this project will include an interview with an actor (behind the scenes feel), and a review of the play.

The work will be split up evenly for the most part.

Filming/Photos- Dan Weiner

Interviews- Alex Farnworth & John Kazar

Written Essay- Alex Farnworth & John Kazar

Editing- Jianchuan Zheng

Video Project 1

http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-774378

“A hobby is an activity or interest pursued for pleasure or relaxation and not as a main occupation” according to one dictionary. Another dictionary describes it as an activity someone does in their leisure time for pleasure.

A hobby can be virtually anything: playing video games, sports, cards, cycling, collecting items or even reading (yes, some people may like to read). Most people find hobbies in their younger years and end up sticking with them throughout their lifetime.

The most common hobbies today are playing sports. When children are young, either: their mother, their father or older figure gets them into sports because it is a great way to make friends at a young age.

Sports are great hobbies because they reflect your personality, when playing active sports you exhibit: dedication, passion and teamwork.

Although sports are great, they aren’t for everyone. One of the more popular hobbies on the Lyndon State campus is playing video games. Many of the students (mostly male) like to play video games with fellow students. Not only does it help create friends, but it also fills a competitive need that most college men seem to have.

A hobby isn’t something that you have to do all the time or something that everyone else does. It is simply something that you enjoy and do it because you love it.

Yesterday, (Tuesday, April 10), there were a couple students on campus demonstrating a “new” hobby of theirs…slacklining.

Slacklining is an activity where a 1” wide nylon rope is tied to two anchor points (trees in this instance) and you use the said rope as a balancing exercise. You can essentially do whatever you want when slacklining: jump on it, do flips, use it like a balance beam or even do yoga on it.

The versatility of the activity is what makes it so addicting and fun, but there’s no doubt it takes some practicing and getting used to to.

Another common hobby that LSC students have on campus is trading card games such as Yu-Gi-Oh or Magic: The Gathering. Without getting into too much detail, these games have thousands of different cards in which you make your own deck (usually 40-60 cards) and you use these cards in an effort to get your opponents “lifepoints” down to zero.

These games can actually be very complex because there is so much strategy behind the cards, and each card has its own different effect.

Interview with Lyndon State Janitor

Our group's idea for the video project is to interview different people's hobbies and shoot them doing their hobbies as well.
Dan will do the shooting. Alex and John will do the interview part and script and I will edit the video.
It will include about three people with them doing their hobbies.

Slideshow Project 2

  Being a News7 reporter is certainly no easy task.  Right when you begin your shift down in the newsroom, there are expectations of you.  No matter what, the first thing any News7 reporter needs to accomplish is finding a story. This can either be done by the reporter himself, or by searching through “INews” to see if the producer has a story ready for the reporter.

           Once the story is found, it is up to the reporter and his partner, the photographer, to go out on the story, and of course making any appropriate calls.  The location of the story has to be done within the “squiggle”, which is an outlined area the covers much of northern/eastern Vermont and a small portion of New Hampshire.   The reporter’s main job out on in the field is to interview and ask questions to supplement the video of the story. 

            Back in the newsroom, the footage captured out in the field will then be revised in the “editing bay”.  The reporter needs to find the best quotes and “sound bites” to use for the finished version of the piece.

            In the course “Local News Gathering” (prerequisite), you are asked to create a Finder Binder. This binder holds an enormous amount of information that can help you spruce up your stories. Finder Binder material ranges from the definitions of newsroom lingo to profile sketches of politicians to everyday tips of being a reporter. 

            In the newsroom/editing bay, the station personnel use words that aren’t everyday jargon but are common while at work. Not only are some of these words bizarre, there are also about three other synonyms per definition.

            For example, an OTS is an over-the-shoulder graphic. Also called a: box, topic box or OSG.  Then you have a Vo/Sot, which is a more common term in the edit bay. It is simply an easy way to say “voiceover-to-sound on tape.” Which is further defined as the anchor reading a script as the video is transitioned to the television, and then the interviewee’s voice and picture is shown.

            Evan Coughlin is an alumnus of Lyndon State College and the Electronic Journalism Arts program. He had a lot of great things to say about News7 but he also said you need to make sure you are ready, time management is key and you need to have your priorities straight.

            Coughlin later went on to say that the transition from the classroom to the newsroom is difficult and scary, however, you learn quickly. He also stated that the three hardest things about News7 are: meeting deadlines, finding story ideas and getting interviews. (He did not ever mention technical difficulties).

            The media might not be for everyone, but everyone can appreciate what it has to offer. There is an exhilarating feeling when you barely meet a deadline then you see your story on the news. 


Credits
Photos-Daniel Weiner
Soundslides Editing- Jianchuan Zheng
Text: Alex Farnworth & John Kazar

Audio Slideshow Project 2 Synopsis

       For our second audio slideshow project, we will be conducting an interview and taking many pictures of Phil Alexander, essentially making it “A Day in the Life of a News 7 Reporter.”

        We will be specifically taking pictures of what he does throughout the day down at News7, so people can get a general idea of what he does, or accomplishes in a complete shift. Some examples of photos might be him going out on a story, or him editing/shooting his footage.

        We plan on using an iphone camera for the photos (the quality is adequate) and for the voice we will be interviewing him, but not including our voices in the slideshow, so it will just be Phil talking the whole time, but feeding off of our questions.

        This will be an interesting project because not everyone fully understands what people go through down at News7, and this will give them a pretty good idea. Our intended audience is college students, but particularly underclassmen in the EJA major who are not down at News7 yet.

Audio Editor: Daniel Weiner
Interview/Synopsis/Story: Alex Farnworth and John Kazar
Photos and Photo Editing: Jianchun Zheng

Idea for Slideshow 2

Our second project of slideshow is President Steve Gold's one day life.

Critique on CBS Internet Output

1. CBS Atlanta (TV Show)

Posts on the website are updated very fast. I stayed on the page for about half an hour and three new posts came up.
Also, because the number of people who "like" it is pretty big——17,823 when I was there, there are a lot of people who commented on each post and "like" each post.

A lot of posts are single sentence with a link of the whole news and a thumbnail as well. It's pretty concise and attractive to web readers.

Because it's Facebook page, the settings are pretty the same to other Facebook pages——with different categories on the left side of the page, photos, videos, twitter, events...very neat.


2 CBSAtlanta.com

Like a lot of other News stations' website, it has a horizontal tabs which include different categories. The first one usually is "Home", and then news, videos, photos, weather, under which are many sub-tabs that can take readers to more detailed category. I think it's very useful and convenient. That's why so many news websites use it.

This website consists of mainly three columns, mixed with photos, videos and links of headlines. At the bottom, the more detailed categories can bring people to different programs. Again, it's a very useful tool section.

One suggestion for the website, on the top right, it can have a sign-up section to ask readers to join CBS and follow it, so that the website can have more follow-up influence. Also, if it adds some slideshow instead of some still pictures, it would be better and more attractive.

Audio Slideshow Project 1

Lyndon State College freshman Dylan Chase is an avid sports fan and loves to play as much as he loves to talk about it.

Chase was a self-taught basketball player and has come extremely far from where he started. This New Hampshire native only started playing basketball so he could fit in with his friends.

Moving on to high school ball, Dylan said he was always the second best player on his team. The former New Hampshire All-State player said his favorite part about basketball is playing defense and that is what he works on the most.

Considering he went to a small high school (only 22 in graduating class). Lisbon Regional won the championship in his senior season despite being knocked out in the first round of the tournament in recent years.

After going through the competitive stage in high school, Dylan wanted to take a more lackadaisical approach and try out intramurals at Lyndon. The reason for playing he said was just to stay in shape and have fun.

Although it is only intramurals, Dylan said he still likes to bring his competitive edge. He is a very passionate and grateful athlete, he mentioned that he loves intramurals and doesn’t take it for granted because other schools might not offer them to students.

Keep in mind, we aren’t talking about high school, or college varsity basketball, we are taking about intramurals. Although Chase is grateful to have intramurals, he still feels there could be improvements made.

The referees are the focal point of what Dylan is talking about when he says improvements could be made. No one is solely to blame; it is because of both the referees not making the calls and the players not being respectful.

Dylan is a classy athlete; he plays hard, gives it everything he’s got and he does not argue with the officiating.

We asked Dylan who he felt he represented as a player, he jokingly said Dwight Howard. After spectating a game, I suggested he plays like Luol Deng from the Chicago Bulls. He chuckled and said in a humbled voice “I like Luol, he’s a great player.”

Only a freshman, but Dylan is one of the most skilled basketball players in the intramural league. He said he is going to stick to intramurals and has no intent on playing for the varsity team.

Like most players, he is in it for the sheer fun of playing.

Fish X

Slideshow Project Synopsis

For our project, we will be portraying a narrative on Jeff “Moose” Russell who is student (sophomore) and intramural basketball as well as an intramural basketball ref. Jeff is very active and vocal on the court when plays, so after we take photos of the game on Monday night we will interview him asking various questions on the game he just played, and his thoughts on being a player and a ref as a whole.

We plan to include some natural sound from the game, but also some music (still deciding) to compliment the slideshow. Our intended audience is young people, specifically college students or athletes. We feel it will be interesting because it shows youthfulness, enthusiasm and an activity or role students can have on campus. 

This slideshow can work out well because we can show the photos of him during the game while playing the sound from the interview. We’re not sure whether we’re going to start off with music or end with music but we’ll figure it out before it’s finished. 

Roles of Team Members:

Photos and Photo Editing: Jianchuan
Audio/Interviewing: Alex and John
Music and Audio Editing: Dan

Slideshow and Photo Gallery Critique

One of the slide shows and the photo gallery are in Chinese. Hope you guys can understand.

Website #1 slideshow without sound http://news.qq.com/a/20120226/000570.htm#p=4

This slideshow tells a real news that is fiercely discussed now by the whole Chinese nation. It's a great shock. A young man, who is the son of a government official, disfigured his girlfriend, who is only 17 years old, after he was turned down by the girl. There are 16 pictures in total, each one with explanation written in Chinese beneath. It's pretty explanatory together by the pictures and texts. I was shocked and attracted by the first picture, which shows how the girl looks like before and after she was disfigured. The case is still under investigation. The webpage has quite a lot good functions, like full screen display, slideshow display. You can also comment and share it to Chinese twitter.

Website #2 slideshow with sound http://www.miamiherald.com/slideshows/

This slideshow definitely tells a story. This audio slideshow covers the big earthquake occurred in Haiti in 2010 by a journalist from the Miami Herald. The length of each photo perfectly matches the audio, explaining how  the victims suffered from the earthquake and cherished hope to rebuild their nation. The second photo shocked me the most, showing a dead woman body which was pushed by a bulldozer to a hole. There were just too many people who died in the earthquake. This slideshow tells better story than the slideshow without sound, especially to those who can't read. The voice of the journalist is very deep, which pulled readers into the story instead of being distracted by other things.

Website #3 photo gallery http://bbs.news.qq.com/t-1014871-1.htm

This photo gallery also tells a story, but not as good as the slide shows. It shows people's life in the poorest village in China's south western's Yunan Province. It mainly focus on children's life—they have to work when they are very young in order to make a living. It has no pavement there, all under their feet are either wood or dirt, and they don't have shoes. A new bridge was built to replace the dangerous ropes. In the mountainous area, kids like to see  fireworks and eat rice dumplings once a year, which are very common in other parts of China. The photos are not in order, but they show different perspectives of people's life in that poor area. I was touched by the photos.

Duk Byrd

Duk Byrd is a big guy here, who is a jack of all trades at Lyndon State College. Not only is he a student but he is also a very talented basketball player and most of all a skilled rapper.

Born in Hartford and raised in Waterbury, Connecticut, Duk has been rapping and balling his whole life. Byrd transferred from Holy Cross High School and attended Cathedral High School (Springfield, MA) and played basketball for the team. He graduated from Cathedral in 2009.

With dreams of playing Division I basketball not being fulfilled, Duk attended Lyndon State College as a Music Business major. Byrd played on the basketball team his freshman year but he has taken this current year off in order to take care of his academics.

During his year off from basketball, Duk has released his mixtape "Still Chasin" which you can find on many hip-hop websites and he has just recently started working on his newest project which is untitled. In January Duk performed at Higher Ground, a venue in Burlington, Vermont and many people from the Lyndon State student body made the trip to support. 

One thing that makes Duk special is his character. I know the rapper on a personal level and he is about as humble as one can be. Whether it is in the Dining Hall, the classroom, a dorm room or even on the basketball court, Duk is always willing to help people out.

There is a sense of karma in his philosophy; with all of the kindness and sincerity he presents it all seems to come back to him with the amount of people that support his music.

If you talk to Duk you will quickly find out that he is ambitious; the feedback and love he receives drives him to keep making music. With everything he has to offer, Duk is definitely one of the most intriguing students that attend Lyndon State.

You can download Duk's mixtape "Still Chasin" at 

http://www.hotnewhiphop.com/duk-still-chasin-mixtape.32912.html. 

You can also stay updated by: following @Duk203 on Twitter or 

Facebook.com/duk203

Test

Outline of the Podcast Team Project

For this project, Alex, Daniel, John and I chose an interesting student—Duk to do our interview.

About the interview, we will have two topics: one is talking about him as a rappern, like his performance in Burlington sometimes; the other is talking about him as a basketball player for the Lyndon basketball team.

For each topic, we have a bunch of questions, like how coming to Lyndon helps or hurts his rap aspirations, where he has performed, how many mix-tapes/albums he has, how he found his  talent of rapping, his plans on playing next year, etc.

We are going to interview Duk in the VIC (the room about the theater) at 7:30pm, Tuesday.

Podcast Critiques

CNN News Update


The first podcast I chose is CNN News Update, because I like CNN in general and I like listening to breaking news.

It's a two-minute hourly update from CNN with news from the U.S. and around the world, which means the news will be the very latest ones.

I like it because it's very convenient for me to quickly grab  headlines and general information that is related. If I'm interested in some news, then I can decide to search in-depth information. 

Also, it's only two-minute long, so listeners won't be bored psychologically while listening. It's very concise, straight forward and attractive.

I do dislike some aspects of this podcast. Since it's hourly update, some news and information overlap a lot. I don't blame it, because it's very common that no big news occur between hours.

I will keep listening it, especially when I don't have much time to read news carefully, but I may not put them in my player. I will just listen it through my laptop.

60 Minutes

The second podcast I chose is 60 Minutes of CBS. I like it long time before I came to the U.S.

Contrary to CNN News Update mentioned above, 60 Minutes usually probes into the very heart of  news. Also, topics it chooses are pretty intriguing and fascinating.

For example, the latest one I watched is the interview of the new Defense Minister Leon Panetta. The host Scott Pelley followed Leon Panetta to his house, on his private plane, listening to him playing piano and talking about his father other than his work as the Secretary of Defense.

It has both audio and video. I like to watch its video version, because I learn from Scott Pelley about how to  

build up good relations with the interviewee. 

One thing I don't like is that it's 42 minutes long. It's not I don't like it, but I can't focus on it the whole time. I need to take breaks.

I will continue listening it on my MP4 and watching it on my laptop. It's a such a good program.

World Story of the Day

The third podcast I chose is also about news—World Story of the Day.

This podcast lies between CNN News Update and 60 Minutes.

It only reports international news. It picks the story from the day's international coverage from Morning Edition, All things considered and other award winning NPR programs.

It's likes neither CNN News Update, broadcasting a couple of different news from both domestic and international, nor 60 Minutes, talking about one hot topic in 42 minutes. It only covers one international topic in four to six minutes. 

When I feel I have some free time, but not very much, I will listen to this podcast. For the reason that it only covers one topic, the information it provides is pretty in-depth and it won't let you wait a long time.

I don't really dislike anything about this podcast, it's neat and concise. I will try to keep track of it on my laptop.

Robbery at Hometown Sunoco in Swanton, Suspect At Large

A lone male entered Hometown Sunoco at 166 First Street in Swanton and robbed the cashier at gunpoint on early Tuesday morning.

The assailant, described as 5'8'' to 6'00'' tall, escaped on foot with an disclosed amount of cash and items.

No one was injured in the incident.

Anyone with any information is asked to contact the Vermont State Police in Albans at 802-524-5993 or Franklin County Sheriff's Office at 802-524-2121.

The case is still under investigation and an update will be issued when more information becomes available.

A Man Arrested for Aggravated Assault

ALBANY- Vermont State Police and game wardens are investigating a hunting related shooting in Albany, VT.

Conrad Masse shot his partner Wayne Goff, age of 58, while they were hunting bear together.

Masse opened fire at least three shots. One of the rounds struck the bear, one struck a tree, and one entered Goff, who was in a red and black checkered jacket in in the pelvic area.

Goff was taken to North Country Hospital and transferred to Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center for treatment and has since been released from the hospital and is in stable condition.

Masse was issued a citation to appear in the Orleans Superior Court on Feb. 28 to answer to the charge of Aggravated Assault.

He was also issued Fish and Game tickets for shooting from the Road, having a loaded rifle in his vehicle and not having proper display of permits for the bear hounds.

Blog Critique !

I went through some of my favourite Chinese bloggers' websites, but unfortunately, some are blocked or the websites are distorted. Then I thought of one of my American friends, who is now in China, blogging regularly. It will be a good choice for me to critique.
Here is the link:

http://jian4feng1.livejournal.com/

My friend's name is Jianfeng, I don't really know his English name. The most important reason why I like it is because it depicts life in China from an American angle, like food.

 He is now in Sichuan Province, where my mom is from. Food in that province is the spiciest in China. As a saying goes, Sichuanese are afraid that their food is not spicy enough.

Also, my friend is learning Chinese, sometimes he would post in Chinese and I will pick errors from the posts. Besides Chinese, he is learning Chinese martial arts, which has a long history in China. In conclusion, there are a lot of Chinese culture in the blog by his observation, which is main factor that attracts me.

What I dislike about the blog is that it has too many ads on it. This blog has categories on the right side, like food, martial arts, Chinese, etc. Each time when you click it, relative posts will turn up, which is a good setting, but each category has its ads, which are a little bit annoying.

It's updated about twice a month, not very often, but at leas, it's not dead. Like most blogs, it has pictures together with text, but no videos. It doesn't have too many comments under each post, because not many people know it. It's just like a diary things to keep things happened around when he is in China.