Photo Gallery

Here it is. Brewing Beer with the Best:

brew masters from Michael Carney on Vimeo.

Nature Montage

I wanted to get my Nature Montage done as early as I could so I could hope for at least some sort of fall color (I was still about 2-3 weeks late).

This first video is the assignment: clips of nature with ambient audio only.

This second video is the same montage but with the music that I used to edit it. IMO, much better.

What do you think?

Podcast

Here is Group One's Podcast:

Two Vids: One for Kicks, the Other for Lernin' Gud.

Kicks:


Just a quick video from today's interview with some football players. Same setups as before, but this time I used my Tascam DR-07 recorder and the Audio Technica Hand-held mic for audio instead of the shotgun mic (way too much wind noise).

Fer Lernin' Gud:

This video was not done entirely by me. Most of the work was done by Jeremy. He started on as a videographer this summer and is sticking with us (thanks!).

What I wanted to point out here was the difference in audio. The audio from the callout itself (when John Cox is talking) is recorded with the on-camera microphone. These microphones are put in merely as after-thoughts so the average joe-shmo can shoot a complete video straight out of the box. They are low-quality and pick up about every sound imaginable (but not in a good way).

The voice over, however, was recorded using the Tascam DR-07 audio recorder directly (it has a pair of stereo microphones). I think you can hear the difference for yourself.

Lesson learned: Always record audio separately, or at least plug a nice mic into the camera.

Mass on the Grass

Last night was St. Thomas Aquinas's annual Mass on the Grass service on Memorial Mall.




The setup was similar to the coaches' interview except for the lenses and stabilization.

Instead of using the 35mm f/1.8 I opted for the Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8 for the wide angle shots and the Nikkor 70-200 f/2.8 VRI for the telephoto shots.

I also used a Manfrotto Tripod and 701HDV fluid head for support instead of just a monopod.

I still used the Sennheiser MKE 400 mini shotgun mic for audio, but I dropped the recorded audio as it conflicted too much (even at -35db) with the voice over.

Speaking of Voice Overs, the VO for this piece was recorded using a Tascam DR-07 audio recorder and an Audio Technica hand-held microphone.

I still forgot to include the location in the lower third identifier (face-palm). But at least it was mentioned in the VO. After all, if I get it perfect the first time, there's no room for improvement, right?

Notes: Coach's Interview 8-25

Notes is a segment where I will break down a multimedia piece I complete and describe what I like and don't like about it. I'll talk about how it's made and why somethings happened (or didn't happen).

First Up: Coach's interview on Wednesday:



Aspects of New Media:
Video - hopefully you've gathered there is video footage involved with this piece ;)
Audio - Audio is one of the most important aspects of video, yet can stand on its own too.
Graphics - While not the main aspect here, it adds information and gives a more professional touch

Now for the detailed breakdown.

Video:

This video was shot with my Nikon D300s and a 35mm f/1.8 lens. I used a monopod to help stabilize the video, but I can't wait until I get a shoulder mount!

Overall it looks okay. I had some exposure differences from one interviewee to another, especially with coach Hope. I fixed it a bit with some color correction in post, but going from direct sunlight to shade is going to cause problems no matter what. I also had a slight focus problem when talking to coach Clark (0:50).

Audio:

The audio was capture with my Sennheiser MKE-400 shotgun mic mounted directly to the camera and plugged into the audio input.

I opted not to use a less sensitive mic like a hand-held or lavaliere microphone simply for the ease of use. I didn't want to spend the time syncing the audio in post so I traded audio quality for speed. A great example of using a strongly directional microphone like the Sennheiser is audible at 1:15.

You can also hear the wind moving across the microphone and some handling noise throughout the piece. I used the foamie that came with the microphone, I really need to get a dead-cat wind screen.

Graphics:

I added a few things at the suggestion of Maura. I made all of the graphics in Photoshop and saved them as .TIFF files with transparency layers.

Firstly I added a date-stamp in the upper right. This was pretty simple, and while anyone can look at the upload date, its quicker to just see it in the video to see if its current.

Secondly I added a "bug" to the lower right. This is a simple graphic used as a watermark.

Finally I re-vamped the super so it looks cleaner. Overall doing all of the graphics took about 20 minutes and I think it was worth it. They provide some basic information while giving the whole piece a more professional look.

Well, that's it for now. I'm off to bed!

New Media Includes...

Today in class we discussed some aspects of what new media includes. I think this is a beautiful example of three of those: Audio, Video, Graphics. Plus its just really cool to watch (and informative).

Michael's Media Manifestation

This blog has been launched for a number of reasons. First among them (and really, it wouldn't have started without this) is it is required. As part of a communications course (New Media in Journalism and Convergent Technology) we are required to keep a blog to not only detail our progress on our final presentation, but to also "hand-in" assignments.

Secondly, I named this blog "Michael's Media Manifestation" because of what I am hoping to get out of it. In our present time, journalism and media are evolving about as fast as nano-bots in an oil pool. I am trying to define and manifest what journalism and new media really are to me.

Well That's it for now. But check back soon, I'll be updating frequently. I'll also be updating my normal blog with a new recipe and photo soon.