Monday 14 April 2008

Last Post

Well apparently the last post that I write on this blog has to be about my Easter vacation and what I got upto during it.

Well the majority of my time was spent in London which is were I'm from. My girlfriend Terri came to stay at mine for a week or so and we mainly ended up going shopping in the west end at the huge primark store. I don't know why this is. We did try going onto the London eye (which I haven't been on). We booked tickets and the day on which we arranged for... it had broken down. Apparently people were stuck on it for 90 mins which is kind of stupid. We decided to go for a Chinese in china town instead which was alot better value for money.

We also went to Glouster which was pretty fun and a great change of scene it was cheaper than going out in London but busier than going out in Preston so it was a welcome change from both places.

Overall I had a good easter traverling all around the country and partying everywhere that I visited and as this is my last blog I must say that I have slightly enjoyed the experience. It has been rewarding documenting my progress in the classes and will give me something to look back on for a while.

Friday 14 March 2008

Tilt Shifting

http://blog.georgegumpert.com/2007/03/27/photoshop-tilt-shift/

Just posting this so I don't forget the website.

10 Reasons not to answer your phone in lectures.

This blog is about someone who used their phone in a lecture. Here are the top ten reasons I came up with for this brilliant task.

1. You might wake up the person next to you. (Rude)

2. Everyone can hear your conversation. (Stupid)

3. It makes you look stupid. (This goes to that guy who was on his phone in two different lectures thinking he’s awesome because he has an iPhone. He was probably just talking into the mouth piece with no one on the other side just to show it off to everyone in the lecture. He wasn't cool he looked foolish. iPhones are not that cool...)

4. It's a waste of battery.

5. Everyone will hate you because you will get tasks like '10 reasons not to answer your phone in lectures'.(Dedicated to previously mentioned)

6. You can't get a decent conversation any way because your going to have to be whispering.

7. Some lecturers are actually quite nice and don't deserve rudeness on that level. (Same to the other students who are paying £3070 for the benefit of listening to you discussing last nights Holyoakes/Girlfriends or lack of/How cool your iPhone is)

8. iPhones are not that cool. (No 3G)

8. It can disrupt other electrical equipment.

9. Your wasting your time even turning up if your going to be on the phone. Best thing to do is walk out then answer the call.

10. Its written in the rules, on the lecture room doors and it's pretty obvious you shouldn't do it.

Wednesday 12 March 2008

Superheroes Videos

This blog is all about superheroes.

The task for this week’s class was to film in a group and edit it on windows movie maker. Unfortunately I was unable to find a group to do the task with in class. So I decided to take matters into my own hands and do it in my own time with some mates. Once I thought of an idea for the hero and villain I approached my brave mates with this idea.

I then borrowed a camera off of a flat mate and then began to film. I filmed in the hall way of my flat because its private and saved embarrassment (haha) I made sure not to use camera angles that are too tight because of the space in the flat and to avoid confusion. I used a mixture of video and photos to achieve my desired result and used some of the built in transitions in movie maker to switch between these.

I didn't add any music because I think the video is more humorous with out it. However this was something important to be considered because the choice of music can really set the scene.

This task was to prepare for a part of the assignment which is to make a video titled 'A day in the life of...'

Saturday 23 February 2008

Facebook Applications

Hi,
In this weeks blog I will be talking about facebook and more specifically certain applications on facebook. Ill list my top ten in order of preference and say a brief sentence about why I like them then I will talk about my favourite two in even more depth.

My favourite ten are:

Texas hold em poker
I like playing poker so it’s good fun playing on facebook against real people who are also on facebook. Your not only playing poker you get to talk to people all over the
world while playing and as your not playing for real money no one takes it too serious.

Cities ive visited
I like this because it is a cool travel map of all the citied i have visited and as I love travelling I make sure that I update it every time i go somewhere new so that if any one is actually interested they can see where I have travelled.

Fantasy football
This is basically just fantasy football but its on facebook. So you select your favourite players and whenever they score you get a set amount of points you can compete with everyone on facebook for the top spot and it isn’t very time consuming to play.

Horoscopes
Horoscopes are always fun to read whether you believe them or not and sometimes these ones are scarily accurate.

Towerbloxx
Towerbloxx is the most addictive game on facebook. Everyone is always trying to get the top score but people don’t stay at the top for long as other people often knock them off.

Pac man
Pac man is a retro game but its still really fun and addictive and now that its on facebook you can compete with your mates for the top spot.

Nicknames
With nicknames you can give names to your friends and they can name you. What ever nickname that you can think of you can name them.

Arsenal fans
I like this application because it just sits there on my page and lets everyone know I’m a gunners fan.

Superpoke
I like superpoke because it gives me an excuse to seek attention from friends that I haven’t spoken to in ages in fun ways. I can throw a sheep at someone or dropkick them and because many other people also have the application they can do the same thing back.

Handy calendar
Puts a calendar on my profile so that people can see what events I have summing up and gives me a visual reminder of all my friends birthdays as it updates its self automatically.

My two favourite applications are probably Texas hold em poker and fantasy football this is because I like playing games online.

With the poker you compete to win fake cash so there are still good incentive to win. Its not as addictive as real gambling would be so there isn’t that financial danger but when you win big you sometimes do wish it was for real cash. Sometimes arguments happen; this is funny. People argue over the simplest of misunderstandings but generally everyone on here is really friendly and as you are playing against people all over the world you can even make new facebook friends if you wish.

Fantasy football isn’t played out in real time so its not as social. But it is still fun to play and it only requires 5 or 10 minutes of attention every now and then. It’s good to log on every now and then and see that you have new points because on of your players has been performing well in real life. Its downside is the fact that it doesn’t require much attention as it doesn’t keep you entertained for that long and as it isn’t very social you can’t tease your mates when you are doing better than them.

So... what makes a good facebook application?
In my personal opinion a good facebook application is one that doesn’t force you to invite 20 friends before you can use it. Ones that is addictive and allows you to invite your friends are the most popular as facebook is a social site, applications that involve your friends are the best.

The vampires, werewolves and slayers application was very popular a while ago. This is because it had all the properties that I listed. Even though you were not forced to add friends there was good incentive to do so because you got more points if you did so people were often spammed with many invites to join this application. Others such as the superpoke are very social as you have to actually have friends to enjoy it to its extent.

Friday 22 February 2008

Ethics of Photo Manipulation

Hi,

Carrying on with the previous weeks work, this weeks task was to manipulate the pictures that we took last week. In this weeks blog entry I'll be talking about the images we took, why we took them and why they were manipulated in the way that they were.

Below are the images:


This is the original image of the Harrington lecture theatre whilst it is empty. We took this because lectures are a large part of student life.





This is it after editing. The girl has been removed and a picture of a monkey has been added and changed so that it looks like it is being projected onto the screen. I did this because I wanted to make it look like a class was in progress.





This is a photo of one of the hallways in a flat in the Ribble halls. We thought it was important to document the type of habitat that students live in.







As the picture was taken at an odd angle and of an empty hall I thought it was appropriate to add a ghost to the picture and dim the lighting.







This is the original image of the student refectory. In this image two women are talking in the foreground but having so many people in it makes it look cluttered.



In this image I decided to remove one of them from the picture to make it look less cluttered. It now looks like the other woman is talking to the wall.

Thursday 21 February 2008

A detailed description about the work I did with the camera and why I did it.

Hello. Today’s task is to create a photo album on student life at the University in a group of people. In our groups we went out and took photos of our accommodation, night life and classes. I was in a class of three; Faridah, Terri and I. It was decided that I take pictures of student night life. We decided that each member would take pictures of different subjects so that we get a different outlook. Once we had all taken our individual pictures we transferred them to a computer and put them all together so that they could all be arranged in a photo album. We then made a PowerPoint presentation so that the photos could be made into a slide show. I enjoyed this task as I got on well with all my team members and we all got on with the work and there was no arguments on creative control over the work. Another reason why I liked this task is that I like taking photographs and editing them in my spare time so doing this as a task in class was great fun.

From this task I learnt that in this age of digital photography it is still important to arrange your photos in some way as less people have carbon copies of their photos. Whether it's on online photo album or a PowerPoint presentation.

Ashley