Final Project-Resorts of the North East Kingdom

Burke Mountain

For Diana and my final project, we will be covering the changes of Burke Mountain in the form of a Podcast. We will use stills, an interview, voice overs and video.

Video Write-Up

The story we reported on was the discarding of books in the library. This was a good story to report on because a good amount of people on campus don’t know about it.

The process of making this video was very smooth. Everyone we worked with a very helpful with their information.

I was told a lot of background information by a librarian before I even started filming which gave me a base knowledge of what I wanted to film. He was a huge help, but I never had a chance to get him into the video.

When I first started filming, I was worried that we were not going to get the best natural sound because the nature of a library. After getting the correct shots, I noticed in the interview that there was enough natural sound from background noise.

In fact, there was so much background noise that we needed have a voice recorder to actual pick up the sound of Garet Nelson’s voice. This made editing the video and sound a little harder because we had to match the audio of his voice to the video of his mouth moving.

That process of matching was the most difficult thing to do while editing. The voice over was a little complicated too.

I edited the footage together before I saw Diana’s script with I personally wouldn’t do again because of timing. I had a rough idea of how long the voice over but some parts I was wrong which made more work for me in the long run.

Overall, this video went was smoother than other video I’ve done in the past. There were no program issues while exporting.

If I had to do this assignment again, I would get more footage of discarded books. I feel like be lacked in that area because we only have two shots of the older books.  

Lyndon State College's Library Changes

Video 2 Synopsis

For out group's second video, Diana and I will be filming the paranormal club.

The paranormal club is a group of students that ghost hunt around the school and the community. For this project, we will  get an interview with the president of the club and get footage of a ghost hunt.

Diana and I film, edit and conduct interviews

Casino Night Video 400-word back story

The Casino Night presented by the Lyndon State College CAB had a poor turnout, to be completely honest.
 Dianna and I arrived an hour early to the scheduled time that the event was going to start to film the teacher/ volunteer training. When we arrived, the room was completely vacant except for the CAB director.
 I noticed that he was on the phone talking to the casino company, giving them directions to the campus. The training didn’t happen until 7 pm, which was when the event started.
Cab had to push the event back an hour so it started at 8. After learning this, Dianna and I decided to come back to film at 7:45 to get some shots of the training.
 While we were filming, everyone gave us the OK to film them. No problems whatsoever.
We had a variation of shots of casino activates and all of the tables. When 8’oclock came around, there wasn’t too many people there.
The group of people there seemed to have liked blackjack because that was the first table they went to and spent the most time there. The way they set up the chips were, the player had to go up the front table and receive chips (obviously no cash value because it’s a college sponsored activity.).
 The person who had the most chip value had the opportunity to pick a prize. The prizes were actually something to be competitive about.
 Overall, Dianna and I got some good footage; enough footage to work with. We were really concerned that the camera didn’t pick up enough natural sound, but when we reviewed our footage, the natural sound was beautiful.
 We had perfect Nat sound of the roulette table, poker chips hitting the table, dice rolling and background talking. After reviewing the footage, I edited it the story together.
 Once when the story was complete, we need to add narration. Writing the narration, in my opinion was the hardest part.
 We had to write a script that matched what was going on in the story. After we wrote the script, we recorded the entire narration on audacity with a microphone.
When that was all done, we edited the script in with the video. This part was a little complicated but after a few tries the video was complete.
 Overall, this had to have been one of easier videos I shot in regards to the people in the video. We had consent to film everything and we were never once brick walled.

CAB Presented Casino Night at Lyndon State College

Video 1 Assignment Synopsis

The topic of our video will be casino night which is put on by cab. Dianna and I will be covering the casino night that is presented by cab.
We will have an interview with the people who put on the production as well as getting Nat sound. We will capture footage of the event and use that in our video.
Team Assignments:
Video: Dianna and Chris
Interview: Chris and Dianna
Editing Dianna and Chris

Hartford Courant: Newspaper Website With Videos

I went on to The Hartford Courant's website and I found some videos that were offered.

I found that a lot of the videos that were on the website were FOX CT affiliated and they were clips from the news cast from earlier in the day.  I went to the sports section of the website and I did find that The Hartford Courant did have some videos they produced.

The video The Hartford Courant had, used highlight reels of previous baseball games but did their own narration. Overall, I felt like they did a professional job presenting the news via video.

The average length of the videos were 2-3 minutes. For the most part, the videos offered an interesting story.

CNN iReport

CNN iReport is a website for the public to post news stories that write. Upon entering the website, it asked me if I want to to sign in or create an account.I created an account and the process was very easy. What I had to fill in was very basic information and was short.
The website
What I liked:
It was easy to navigate. There is a dashboard that will bring you to the main page, explore, assignments and my profile.
This is very open and community based. The website lets anyone who wants to report a story do it.
The steps of uploading pictures and stories seems basic and easy to do.

What I didn't like: 
 When I first used this website, it was very easy to confuse the CNN website dashboard and the iReport dashboard which is located directly underneath CNN's. I found that I was hitting CNN's home page when I intended to hit the iReport homepage. This was frustrating because it would bring me to a completely different part of the website.

Jon Huber- Hardcore Music

Jon Huber- Hardcore Music Feature Story

Jon Huber is a senior at Lyndon State College and is studying Music Business Industry.

Huber is also a musician who guitar and focuses on hardcore music. He has a respectable resume of bands that he has played in.

The latest band he was in was a hardcore called Perceptions where him and the other guitarist, Jeremiah Bouchard trade off the rolls of rhythm and lead guitar. Perceptions was a six member hardcore band and have recorded a five track EP. The band had struggles booking shows on the Lyndon State College’s campus because of the nature of the music.

Perceptions have played multiple shows around northern New England. Jon touched on what instruments he plays at a show : Ibanez Iron Label7 String guitar,  Sheffield Cabinet (the amplifier) and Behringer Head.

There is an obvious lack of hardcore fans in the Northeast  Kingdom. This was an obstacle the band had to get over. The school didn’t want ( but eventually allowed it) that genre of music because it is usually associated with moshing and or hardcore dancing. I have seen the band preform live and the crowd was energetic yet respectful.

 Huber has been working on new music with the other former guitarist Jeremiah Bouchard. Bouchard and Huber have been still recording hardcore music and are trying to perfect everything they write.

The entire process of the interview was enjoyable. I am personally friends with him so the conversations were smooth and organic. The pictures were taken by Diana with a professional grade camera. We also used picture off social media sites with his permission.

The music that is played at the beginning of the interview is off Perceptions’ Ep, called “A Man, an Image.” The outro song was off the same Ep called “I Led The Horse To Water And It Drown.”

While creating this slide show, Diana and I ran into bumps in the road when trying to put it together. When we were exporting the slide show, the steps were unclear so it took unnecessary time to upload it. Once when we figured out Soundslides, the process was simple.

Interviewer: Chris Moriarty

Interviewee: Jon Huber

Photograhs: Diana Herlehy

Band pictures: Ashley Heath

Music: Perceptions “A Man, An Image” “I Led The Horse To Water And It Drown”

 Audio Editing: Chris Moriarty

Production: Chris Moriarty and Diana Herlehy 

*New Synopsis* Perception (Instead of tour of the Campus)

Last night I posted in my blog that I would be making a slideshow tour of the Lyndon State College's campus. Dianna and I discussed it and we decided to make a slideshow of the former band Perceptions instead. Perceptions was a hardcore band on campus. Three of the six musicians still make music together so we will be interviewing the three of them. We plan on using their interview as well as our narration to help tell their story of their band. We also plan on sampling their music for a portion of the interview. I also am aware that the three members of Perceptions are working on new music under a different name. We will ask about that and have some of their new music featured in our slideshow. The slide show will tell a story of the band's beginning, middle and end. 

  Making a slide show of the band will be interesting too because of their genre. There aren't any Hardcore bands on campus, so this will give students a chance to explore different styles of local music.

Slideshow of the College Synopsis

Dianna and I will making a slideshow of a tour of the campus. A tour of the campus with up to date pictures would be ideal for a prospective student. I remember when I was freshman, I wish I saw a slide show to actually see what building/ areas were; opposed to just seeing the names of the place on a map. We plan on narrating the slides as the show is going on. We will describe what goes on and the importance of the building or room that the slide is on.  Also the slideshow will have music playing in the background as well as talking. We will have pictures of all of the important areas on campus such as: The library, Student services, President office, Vail museum, Veteran's Park/ fountain, Writing center, Stonehenge ( and or other resident halls) and other important places around campus.

Soundslide Practice

Slideshow Critiques

http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2010/06/07/movies/20100607-silent-7.html
This is a slide show of older movies ranging from 1910-40. All the the stills are in black and white. The slide show came from a segment in the New York Times call "Silent Treasures". I am not the biggest fan of older movies of that era but it was interesting to see the art from that time period. There is a small caption explaining each photo and what movie it came from.

http://www.reuters.com/news/pictures/slideshow?articleId=USRTXV2BU#a=7
This Slideshow has 25 photos of weird thing. These photos ranges from street performance to odd things in nature. I felt like these photos where interesting to look at because they are so unusual. The website that the slide show is on has links to other slide shows that are similar in nature. I do like the fact that they give the viewer an option to continue looking at slide shows that are similar.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EaZf3UZb6EU
 This is a slideshow of nature. This slide show features music and pictures ranging from deep in the woods to beaches. I do not like that a lot of the pictures look like computer screen savers. I did like how the pictures transitioned into each other.

Picasa 5 Picture Slide Show

News Linc

What I liked
I really liked Newslinc. I felt that it was very simple to navigate. If I was a first time user of this site, I would have no problem finding what I needed to find. I also like the pictures they offer on the site. It seems like a great way to find very localized news.

What I didn't Like
I wish there was a little bit more going on in the home page. The white background is a little boring. 

Living Off Campus Podcast: Chris and Dianna

Dianna and I decided to make our Podcast about the pros and cons of living off campus. We also discussed the different aspects of living off campus such as landlord rights and tenant rights. We discussed this by using personal experiences and tenant laws of Vermont. To site where we got our information from, we used CVOED Renting in Vermont Informational Handbook for Tenants and Landlords.

While recording the podcast, we found that it was better to jot down some key topic points and elaborate with what came to mind. We covered topics like: Landlord rules, Tenant rues, General safety, Heating, appliances and what to expect when living off campus. I am personally glad that discusses the topic of heat because the house that I live in now was built in the mid to late 1800s, so heating the house is going to be rough. My advice to someone looking off campus is to make sure they have the heating situation understood and know how to deal with it.

The process of making the podcast was relatively easy once when we figured out all of the factors that went into recording. We used a voice recorder to record our podcast; that was the easy part. When it came time to upload the audio files that we had, we ran into some slight problems. First, we tried to upload our files onto Audacity, but we had to convert the Audio files into a WAV format. To do that we just had to convert the files using a website. That was pretty easy to do once we figured it out. We had multiple files to convert because we would stop recording if we made a mistake or wanted to redo what we just said; that took a little bit of time. Once when the files were all converted it was smooth sailing from there. We just edited out piece together and the project came out just fine.

Overall, I hope that people would take our advice when they are thinking about living off campus. I do feel that there are a lot more pros than cons to living off campus; rent is cheaper, you have more freedoms and it’s a great life skill to know how to live on your own before you graduate and get a place of your own.  Make sure that all of your smoke and carbon monoxide detectors are working before you move into a new apartment.  

Podcast idea

For the podcast assignment, Dianna and I will be discuss the pros and con of living off campus. I feel like this podcast will provide good advice for a Lyndon State College student thinking about living off campus.

lsc eNROLLMENT  | Infographics

Ted Talks- Apollo Robbins: The Art of Misdirection

I am usually a fan of Ted Talks because then speakers on their show always talk about cutting edge technology or explaining mind blowing topics. The speaker of this video podcast, Apollo Robins addresses the fact that attention steers out perception. He explains that its harder to pay attention to whats going on in your surroundings when you are focused on one thing. He explained that by using a "random" audience member. Robins used slight of hand tricks to illustrate what he was talking about.
What I liked and Disliked
-I liked how Apollo Robins demonstrated what he was talking about with a person in the audience. He has so serous slight of hand skills.

 -That being said, Robins needs to work on his public speaking skills. I didn't like how I could hear nervousness in his voice.

-The tone of his voice was sometimes awkward .

Overall, I thought it was an entertaining and educational video podcast. Would I watch it again? Probably not. Would I want to watch another demonstration by Apollo Robins? I think I would. His stage presents seemed to be nervous and a little awkward but he does have a good talent with his hands.

Doug Loves Minis

I listened to the comedian Doug Benson's Podcast which is title "Doug Loves Minis". I am a fan of Benson's comedy routines but never listened to his podcast before. I wasn't sure what to expect. The podcast I had listened to was titled Alamo Drafhouse Yonkers. Benson basically answered fan mail and talked about his previous show in Yonkers. After he talked about his show, he played the opening clip of it.

What I liked and didn't like

 -I like how he has an easy, yet comical tone in his voice when he speaks. It makes the podcast more enjoyable to listen to.

 -I like how he played a clip of his show from the other night. Although, I thought he played a little too much of his show. (it took up half of the podcast)

- I didn't like how long of a sales pitch he gave for his upcoming shows (I do understand the marketing aspect though.)

VSO's Fall Foliage Tour Stops at LSC

(Lyndonville, VT)Vermont Symphony Orchestra is booked to play a concert at Lyndon State College on September 26th.

The Vermont Symphony Orchestra annual Fall Foliage Tour, the Made in Vermont Festival, will be making its stop at Lyndon State College. Ticket Sales will start on September 23rd.

VSO is conducted  by Jamie Laredo who is also a professional violinist who will also be play Bach double concerto. The orchestra will also have featured artists performing other concertos composed by classical music legends such as Vivaldi, Bach, and Mozart.

The 2013 Made in Vermont Festival State Wide Tour will be an educational yet entertaining night out. All tickets are general admission and start at 10 dollars for children's ( under 18) seats. Senior tickets are discounted at 23 dollars and adult tickets are 27 dollars. A student discount is offered too.

WOOD TV

After looking at the Wood TV 8 news channel, I felt like I was looking at an average local news sight. I saw a lot of similarities between my local news website and this one; which is good and kinda bad.
The good thing about having the website being in an average layout is that its easy to navigate. The bad thing is, is that the website is not too unique.

Bridge Rebuilt

(Caledonia County,VT)- A bridge over roaring that has been washed out by last years flood is just now getting replaced.

The bridge building has been an on going process since the flood because of funding. The opening of this bridge will make life much easier for the residents of Oak Grove.

Subhead

The cost of replacing the bridge was $700,000 which the County of Caledonia was not ready to pay for according to department head of Caledonia Department of Transportation . "We already had some money in the county budget for repairs. Problem was, we didn't have enough to replace the bridge. We were just going to repair it."

(Not Finished)

Fatal Accident In Lyndonville Restaurant

Lyndonville

Lyndonville, VT- A car accident proved to be fatal early this afternoon.
The accident involving Annie Coulter, 86 Swerved to avoid a pedestrian when she drove into the front window of Central Restaurant. Victim John Barker, 59 who was not struck by the car, but died from a heart attack when he was helping Coulter out of her vehicle.

Break Failure 

According to Coulter, as she was swerving to avoid the pedestrian her breaks failed causing the accident. 

Barker was eating his meal at the restaurant when the accident happened. Although he wasn't struck by the vehicle, he received minor cuts from flying glass.

Barker stood up and helped Coulter out of the vehicle when he complained of chest pains. Barker shortly collapsed after helping and was declared dead at the scene from a heart attack. 

Early Morning Robbery

(Swanton, VT)A lone Man robbed a local Sunoco at gun point on 166 First Street in Swanton Vermont. The robbery took place on December 7th at 1:15 am. The suspect described by the cashier is a white male who is approximately 5'8-6'0.
The suspect fled on foot and no one was injured during the robbery.
 Anyone with information pertaining to the robbery to is requested to contact the Vermont State Police in Saint Albans at 802-524-5993 or Franklin County Sheriff’s Office at 802-524-2121.

Bear hunting: A dangerous game (exercise)

Albany, VT- Conrad Masse, 76 has been charged with assault after shooting a fellow hunter Wayne Goff, 56 in a hunting accident.

The two men tracked a bear on Urie Rd. where Masse dropped off Goff and parked his truck 514 feet down the road. The men waited for the bear to cross the road then Masse opened fire down the road.

Three shots rang out; two of which hitting the bear and one hitting Goff. Goff was taken to the hospital with nonlife-threatening injuries.

About me

Hi, I'm Christopher Moriarty. I am currently a junior at Lyndon State College, in beautiful Northern Vermont. I am from the small town of Higganum, Connecticut. I study Electronic Journalism at Lyndon and hope to someday start a career at a news station in New England. Music is a big part of my life. I play the bass guitar and love to play music with my friends. I'm looking forward to the last two years of my college experience and my future in journalism.