Tuesday, January 11, 2011

Video Treatment

Video Treatment
Topic
The whole subject of power, privilege and difference is new to me and I am still learning and still trying to get a grasp on a subject that is so expansive in material, emotions and viewpoints. However, racism is something that I have been aware of at least in some sense since a child, and I feel that I have more of an understanding of racism than any of the isms that we have studied thus far. Therefore, I will be choosing racism as the form of oppression that I want to discuss in the digital video.  Another reason I wanted to focus on racism for the digital video is because it can be observed and interpreted in so many different ways. This will allow me to delve into the issues of racism and try to understand it from different angles which will hopefully allow me to have a deeper understanding of why racism exists in the first place.

Story
For the project I have decided to make a video poem which is an “original poem you write and then illustrate with music and images” but with a different spin (JRR). A lot of the time, I can be very black and white in my thinking and in my writing. I think that some form of a poem/artistic collaboration will help me take a more creative approach on the subject and will push me to think about what words I want to use and how I want to portray what I believe racism is and how it affects our society. Words can say a lot, but music and images can say just as much, if not more. By combing words, music and images I hope that I can create a strong video that will have more of an impact than if I just used one of the three alone. There is a lot of information on racism, which includes articles songs, poems, essays-the list is endless. The spin off for my video poem is that I want the content of my video to be a collection of poems, songs and quotes written by those who have experienced racism whether they are famous or non-famous people. I will accompany the writing with images and music that I feel describe all of these forms of expression I will also write my own poem, which I think I will have somewhere towards the end of the video.  I want to show what I have learned from the research I have conducted and what I have taken away from reading and listening to all the works that show the experiences of those who have suffered from racism.


Software
The software I am going to use for the digital video will be Windows Live Movie Maker. I saw Power Point on the list and for awhile I was planning on using this because this was the only resource for producing a short digital video that I had used before. But, I figured this assignment was about creativity and this will probably one of the last chances I have before I graduate to do something different, and hopefully more creative, than what I have done before. Plus, I could potentially learn a new skill in the process. I have no experience with Windows Live Movie Maker, but I looked at the tutorial on You-tube and it was very thorough. I’ve downloaded everything I need for the program and if I need any additional help I have looked up and made sure there are more explanations available for the use of the program in case I need it.

Research
The research part of this project is actually what I am looking forward to the most (besides actually seeing the finished product). I am going to look up quotes, songs, poems and other articles that I can find online, through databases, online books and our own class textbooks that discuss racism first hand from those who have experienced it. The goal of all this research is to show to viewers how large and vast racism is and how much of a negative affect it can have on all of us.


Timeline
The timeline for my project will be as follows:
Wednesday-Research: Gather quotes, poems, songs, names, and images for the video.
Thursday-Finish gathering research and get music that goes along with the images/words. Start writing poem (finish is possible). Start making video.
Friday-Finish poem (if not finished Friday). Continue making video and works cited page.
Saturday-Finish the video treatment. Make sure everything flows smoothly and portrays the messages that I want viewers to understand. Upload it to You-tube and make sure it works correctly there as well.
Sunday-Process piece. Post on the blog.

Take Away Message
What I want viewers to take away from this video is how prevalent racism still is in our society. I want them to see how deep its roots are in our society and how much everyone suffers because of it. The more people see how much it hurts everyone, the better chance there is that they will fight for equality and for a racism free society for all.


3 comments:

  1. I think racism will be a good topic to expand on if you already know a little bit about it. I also was going to use Powerpoint as my form of software because it was what I was most familiar with. I decided to use Xtranormal because like yourself, I want to be creative and learn a new type of software. It will be interesting to see how the different topics and programs will turn out.

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  2. This sounds like a very interesting and creative video project. I like the use of poetry and quotes. I look forward to viewing it and seeing your take on the topic.

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  3. I was thinking of doing similar for my project. It sounds like we may be doing something a little different but I plan on using racism as a topic and incorporating music and quotes with images as well.

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