Posted on

The Making of “The Story of Mickey”

Final Project Process:

My last blog post was my final project telling the story of Mickey Mouse using some digital and some written techniques.

DS Phase 1:

The first digital storytelling technique that appears in my post is my timeline of Mickeys life.

I went on canva and started with an empty timeline template. I deleted the template text and added my pictures then I added my own text.

DS Phase 2: 

The next digital storytelling techniques that comes up in my project post is my photographs. I went around my house and found a few of my little Mickey figures. The first is an example of the 1930’s Mickey from the short The Band Concert that I have that sits on top of a moving Christmas ornament. It is also a good example of depth, you can see the Mickey front and center, bright colors and very defined. In the background you see the blurred trees and sky pulling focus back to the Mickey.

The second example is my sorcerer Mickey figurine which is an example of 1940’s Mickey from Fantasia. This picture is also an example of lighting. The bright light gives the figure a neat effect and keeps the focus on it because it is the only thing you can see.

The final one is a picture of a statue I got from my grandmother for graduation. It is a good example of the 2000’s Mickey, happy, well defined, and still cartoon like. I took the picture from a lower and side angle to create a different perspective, making Mickey look larger.

DS Phase 3:

The final example of our digital storytelling techniques that appears in my project is my video with audio. I researched my Mickey pictures then uploaded them into my Magix Movie Edit Pro Plus program then used my techniques and limited tech knowledge from the past videos to create a few neat transitions and effects.

After that I went over to Audacity and used freesound.org to find a Mickey mouse voice, a ticking clock to match the timeline theme of the video, and some music that, to me kind of sounds like it could be Disney music.

Next I cut the Mickey voice to just the first few seconds, then I started layering.

The last step was to take the Mickey voice out for the rest of the slideshow and just layer the music and clock noise.

Finally I added the audio to the video and got my Mickey creation.

Finally I put it all together and added my written word to create my story.

Daily Creates for the Week:

The first daily create for this week was Mondays, which was to appreciate the beauty of nature by posting a picture of a sunset. I had a beautiful picture in my camera roll of a sunset that I took one day on my way home from work. I liked how the colors layered and the clouds looked like one long layer.

The next daily create was Tuesdays which was to decide what animal you might want to be. I chose a dolphin, they are smart and happy, and playful, and beautiful, not to mention they get to swim all the time.

 

The last daily create was today’s which was to find a quote that I really like or that I find interesting or inspiring. No surprise here, I chose the quote I used earlier in the class from Winnie the Pooh. “Always remember, you are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.” –A.A. Milne.

 

So I think that is it, I have officially finished DS106. So I believe this is me signing off.


 

Posted on

The Story of Mickey

For my final project I decided to tell the story of Walt Disney’s Mickey Mouse using the new knowledge I learned about digital storytelling, some online resources, and my own knowledge of the Mouse himself. I will be telling my story through a combined use of written word, photography, video and audio, and design, with a few random GIFs thrown in for fun.

Buckle up, lets follow the life of Mickey.

 

First Creation:

In 1927 Walt Disney, who at the time was an employee of Universal Studios, created a little character with floppy ears and a button nose called Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. Universal immediately ordered the creation of multiple short films of the new smiling little character, in 1928 however, Disney met with producers to renegotiate the contract but was told that they would be retaining the rights to Oswald and had hired out all his employees. They told him that he would only be rehired if he was willing to take a lower salary, obviously Disney said no.

Disney along with his last loyal animator, Ub Iwerks continued to draw and sketch many many long nights until they got a shorter, rounder version of Oswald with smaller ears and a bigger nose. They had turned Oswald into a mouse and named him Mortimer, however, that name did not stick, no one is really sure why but the rumor is that Disney’s wife did not like that name. So he became Mickey.

First Debut:

Disney and his small team began to put together their own shorts using Mickey and overall got no response, until they released Steamboat Willie. This drew attention because it was the first film put to synchronized music and the people suddenly loved Mickey. It premiered in November 1928, creating Mickeys unofficial birthday and starting his success.

The Many Faces of Mickey:

Since then Mickey has had many faces and many designs each only slightly different than the one before. Not to mention the addition of his friends, and his park.

In 1931 Mickey reappeared in his next short just slightly different than before, he looked the same but moved smoother and had more abilities than he did in 1928.

In 1935 Fred Moore started to work on Mickeys first “makeover”. Up until then animators and sketch artists had drawn Mickey as circles, limiting how many ways they could draw him. Moore changed the view and made the mouses body pear shaped, as well as his eyes, and shortened his nose, making him look happier and more friendly. He also became colored for the first time and between 1935 and 1936 a few more films were released and used this new Mickey. The film The Band Concert was the first and had an astonishing use of Technicolor, another was Walt Disney’s Silly Symphony.

By 1937 more films were being produced a year using Mickey as all sorts of rolls, from conductor to football star. Walt Disney now provided the voice, making Mickey more recognizable and popular than ever.

Mickey got another makeover in 1940 when he became the Sorcerers Apprentice in Fantasia. Again in 1941, where he became slightly more animated and another in 1947 in the Mickey Mouse version of Jack and the Beanstalk.

In 1955 Mickey got another new look for the logo of the Mickey Mouse Club . The new TV show was  watched by children all over on the television and would win more popularity and love for the little mouse. His new makeover was not permanent nor widely applied, it was really only used for the Mickey Mouse Club.

For around the next thirty years Mickey went into a “semi-retirement”, he did not have many new films or shows and only made appearances in other things such as Who Framed Roger Rabbit?.  Then in the 90’s he started to become more popular again and got a little bit of a makeover making him somewhat modern and vintage at the same time.

Finally in the early 2000’s Mickey Mouse became what we most commonly see today,  the clean but detailed cartoon happy mouse.

In 2006 Mickey was made 3D for the very first time, marking a milestone in his “career” and creating Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, a  show that airs on Disney Jr in the mornings.

Most recently is the new rather odd show on Disney Channel following our beloved Mickey and his friends in what could be there lives and looking at what they might be like today if they were real.

All three 2000’s versions of Mickey can be seen pretty commonly around social media, the internet, the Disney Parks, and other Disney merchandise. Although it is not uncommon to also see pictures and merchandise of the older versions of Mickey as well.

Below is a video to show off all the stages of our beloved Mickey Mouse.

 

So there you have it, the story of Mickey Mouse. It was fun to write this and create all the stuff for it. Read my next blog to find out how I made everything and see what tactics I used, as well as my daily creates for these last few days of class!

 

 

 

 

Posted on

Videos, Videos, and More Videos

So this week has been rough….

I started with a normal week, trying to get all the assignments done and going to work like normal. The first half of the week was relatively easy, the second half was not so much. I had trouble finding a good video making software and figuring out how to get it to work, on top of doing my job. Then I was in a minor accident on Friday morning, no one was hurt but I currently have no car, and am not sure if I will get my car back or have to begin a search for a new car.

Part One of the Week:

Part one of this week was fairly easy, all that was required was to read some information and watch some videos about how to make videos and the principals of design in videos. I actually learned a lot from these assignments and noticed things that show up in movies that I overlooked before.

Then of course there were the daily creates both focused on beauty, one was a beautiful tree and one was how to define beauty. For both I used pictures from my camera roll, the first of a beautiful bonzai tree, and the second of my cats paw.

Finally came the question of the week, what nursery rhyme would we change if we could. I chose the rhyme “Do you know the Muffin Man?” because the question, if asked in different tones can be taken to mean different things.

Part Two of the Week:

Part two of this week was to do twelve stars of visual assignments, I am not going to lie I was a little worried about being able to do so. Once I started looking through the assignment responsibilities I actually did find plenty that I wanted to do and had to narrow it down to what I thought I could get done in the time limit and what I thought would be most fun to do.

I ended up picking four assignments that when added together equaled more than enough stars but that is okay, they were fun to do.

Assignment One:

Three of our twelve stars had to relate to the question of the week, since my answer was the song “Do You Know the Muffin Man?” I chose to make a lyric video of the song for four and a half stars. I used PowerPoint to make a video then posted the video on YouTube.

Assignment Two: 

The next assignment I did was the two star video assignment called “Pupper Appreciation”, it was to make a video of photos of dogs. I used a mixture of funny dog memes and pictures of my own dog. For this one I used Magix Movie Edit Pro Plus for the first time and had a lot of fun figuring it out, as well as finding the pictures. I was able to insert a song into the video that I already had on my computer through iTunes. The program itself reminded me a lot of audacity in the set up and the way it was used.

This assignment meant a lot to me because I recently had to put my dog down, so doing this was a way for me to have fun, get my assignment done, and do it in her memory.

Assignment Three:  

The third assignment I did was called “Where Do You Want To Go?” and worth four stars. The goal was to make a video showing some destinations I would ideally like to visit on vacation. This one I also used Magix for but slightly differently. I again searched and found photos for each of my destinations then imported them to the program and messed around with positioning and transitions. This time however I added some music that came on the software rather than downloading the song off my computer or offline like I did in the previous assignments.

Assignment Four:

The final assignment I did was for three and a half stars and called “It’s Vacation Time”. The assignment was to pick our favorite vacation and find some pictures or videos of it, put them in a montage to music, and create a video out of it. I did so using Magix yet again, this time another different way. I put all my pictures in then used a special slideshow setting that I could pick my transitions and effects then the program would assign them randomly making the video flow better and be a little more interesting. I used pictures from my 2017 band trip to Disney and Universal in Orlando, I do not know if I have a favorite vacation but if I did, that would be it. We had a lot of fun all together and got to march at Epcot Center. I started the video using “When You Wish Upon A Star” and “You’ll Be In My Heart” but I got a copyright email when I uploaded it to YouTube so I had to delete it and redo my video, I ended up using Celine Dion’s version of the song “How Can A Moment Last Forever” from Beauty and the Beast (not copyrighted as long as I do not monetize it). I was happy with the way this one turned out, and had more fun with it than any other.

Daily Creates:

There were four daily creates this half of the week.

Thursdays was about gaps, the daily create site did not post during the time of day that they usually do and they called it a gap, then we were supposed to post something that had a gap and explain what it was. I chose a cookie which had broken, there was a gap between the head, arms, leg, and body of the Julius Caesar cookie.

Fridays was all about food, we were supposed to post a recipe to our favorite food and describe it a little. I posted a picture and what it was but did not realize until Saturday that I had forgotten the recipe so I wrote it then.

Saturdays create  was about what makes your heart sing, choose one or more pictures to show what makes your heart sing. In other words what makes you smile. I chose my boyfriend and some of my friends, they all make me happy but I could only use so many pictures, not to mention my family.

Finally, today’s create was to make an ending, not for anything specific, just make a powerful ending. So that is exactly what I did.

Looking Ahead:

I really learned a lot this week and I think I had the most fun with this week even though all the weeks were fun and interesting, this one taught me the most and was the most fun to learn about.

So the final week of assignments is over, it is time to look ahead to the final assignment, I am just going to put it out there, I enjoyed this class, I will be happy when I do not have to stress about keeping up with it but I am very nervous about what the project will be. I am looking forward to what the project will be but nervous about whether or not I will complete it to standards and in time.

 

 

 

Posted on

Mickey’s Kingdom to Music

My last visual assignment was the three and a half star “It’s Vacation Time” assignment, which was honestly my favorite. As much as I said I liked the dog assignment this one tops it.

The montage in this video was supposed to be made up of pictures of my favorite vacation, however I do not have pictures in my possession of every vacation I have taken and I do not feel like I have a favorite vacation. If I did though, it would probably be the one we took last year with my high school band to Disney World and Universal Studios, we spent three days there, one in Magic Kingdom, one in Epcot, and one where we could travel on the Hogwarts express between the two Universal Parks, and we marched in Epcot center on day two. Being there with my parents and sister and all my friends then getting to march was the best experience of my life so far, the only way it could have been better is if my boyfriend could have come with us.

I again used the Magix Edit Pro Plus and inserted all my pictures, however, I found a new setting that would help me do it faster, I picked my favorite transitions and effects then set how often in the show I wanted it to appear, after I hit the apply button it automatically randomly applied the effects. I watched the video and was able to switch around what I did not like.  After that I added the sound and trimmed it to fit the length. I did have some issues with the sound, at first I used “When You Wish Upon A Star” and “You’ll Be In My Heart” for the two songs, I loved the effect and the mood it gave the video. Then I got emails saying the songs were copyrighted and would be blocked in some countries, when I looked at the list of countries it was pretty much all of them…

I ended up using Celine Dion’s version of “How Does A Moment Last Forever” from the newest Beauty and the Beast movie (can be used as long as I do not monetize it) and I still liked the way it turned out.

 

Posted on

World Traveler

The next assignment I did was the four star “Where do you want to go?”. The directions were to make a montage of pictures or videos of places that I would like to go on vacation and put it to music. 

In order to do this I had to first decide where I would like to go. In all honesty I am not a big traveler, I like seeing new things and new places and the beauty of the world is astonishing to me, but I am not a fan of the travel portion of vacations. I decided on Barbados, Italy, Wales, France, Ireland, Bermuda, and Australia, then I ended my video with some beautiful pictures from my home in Fauquier County, where I will always come back to, no matter how far or how much I travel.

I again used Magix Movie Edit Pro Plus to arrange and add to my pictures then add music and cut and trim the entire thing to fit well together. I used a different transition animation for each destination rather than each picture like in my previous movie, just to keep each destination connected, as well as the first picture in each destination series having the name of the area on it. I also started with a picture of the world saying “Lets Go Travel” and ended with a picture saying “Home”, to start and close my video. Finally came the music, I was able to download a music package through the program called “Around the World” where there were a few songs from different countries, unfortunately there were not some from every country so I used the Island one, not so much because of my beach destinations, but because tropical music like this makes me think of vacation in general.

My final assignment is also related to travel and I am actually fairly excited to work on it and see what I can do with it.

 

Posted on

Appreciate those Pups

I really do love dogs, they are always so happy and sweet and most of them are gentle as well, not to mention all the love that they hold for just you and your family. Because of that, my next video assignment is all about dogs.

Assignment:

My next assignment, for two stars, is called ‘Pupper Appreciation’ and I thought it was perfect. I used a mixture of dog memes and pictures of my own dog to create a fun montage of dog cuteness that lasts about three minutes. I used a program called Magix Movie Edit Pro Plus that my dad had bought for something a while back and was able to put onto my computer, once you get the hang of it it is actually quite easy to use, it reminded me of a video version of audacity. Once I had the pictures uploaded I was able to add special effects to each and (even though there were some complications along the way) rearrange them into the order I wanted. After that I chose a song to put it to and trimmed the song (in a way not dissimilar from audacity) and add effects to it to match the time and effect I wanted.

What this Assignment Means to Me:

I was really excited when I found this assignment because not only do I love dogs, but we recently had to put my dog, Brindy, down. The dog of mine that is featured in the slide show (and also the picture on my website) had to be put down during finals week of spring semester, she meant a lot to me and my family and we raised her from a puppy, she was twelve years old. I chose the song that I did, Carrie Underwood’s “See You Again” because it makes me think of her and our other dog that we had to put down several years ago. For me, making this video is in memory of her.

I still have five and a half more stars to do….Moving right along here in this last week of class!

Posted on

Do YOU Know the Muffin Man??

The first of my video assignments this week is my assignment that relates to the nursery rhyme from the question of the week. I chose the song  “do you know the muffin man” I thought that would be a good one to be able to change the mood of.

Assignment:

I chose the four and a half star assignment of making a lyric video (harder than it sounds in case you were wondering). I was actually able to use Microsoft  PowerPoint which I have a feeling was a little easier than trying to use a video creating software, at least while I play with my new video software and figuring it out. I inserted the pictures just like a normal PowerPoint as well as the lyrics, transitions, and music. Next I used the ‘Rehearse Timing’ button to record when each slide should change and when the words should come into view based on the song. The hardest part was exporting it from PowerPoint, which I did not even know you could do until my dad helped me figure it out, and uploading it to YouTube, which took a long time.

I have already picked most of the other assignments I want to do and I am looking forward to trying to make them work.

 

Posted on

Learning About the Moving Pictures

So far this week we have started to learn about videos and movies and how to edit them, we have not technically learned how to make them, but there was some stuff on camera angles and filming techniques.

Part One: 

The first assignment was to read the article “How to Read A Movie” by Robert Ebert. In the article he talks about how to pull apart a movie and the scenes of a movie to find the techniques and placements. The biggest thing I took out of it was that the placement and angles matter, just like in photography, the placement and angles of the subjects and cameras in video has a very big influence on the atmosphere and the viewers emotions and opinions about the final product and it’s subjects.

Part Two:

The second part of the week was to pick and watch four different videos about techniques and rules in video making. I chose four of them and as I watched each I tried to find the rules and techniques and lessons in each in order to get out as much as I could. I chose to watch “Examples of Editing Techniques”, “Top 20 Amazing Cinematic Techniques”, “Camera Angles and Techniques”, and “Hitchcock Loves Bikinis”. Each held their own examples and lessons but the one I got the most from was the last one. I was not sure exactly what I was getting into by watching that one but the lesson from it made the most sense and gave the best example. It talked about how putting two different scenes together changes the mood and opinions of the characters. Like in his example about the old man and the mom and baby, versus the old man and the girl in the bikini.

Daily Creates: 

Onto the daily creates, both covered beauty and both were fairly simple compared to some of the past assignments. In the first we were supposed to describe a tree that caught our eye and in the second we were supposed to define beauty (something that really cannot be done in all honesty). For the first I used an interesting bonzai tree from a presentation in the fall and in the second I used an adorable picture of my cats paw and described how I see and “define” the word beauty.

Weekly Question:

I am not exactly sure how to approach this weeks weekly question, I would not even know how to change any nursery rhymes but I have to try it and see how it goes.

One that could be changed would be “Do you know the Muffin Man?”, this could be turned from happy to sad or maybe happy into serious depending on how you read it. It sounds like you are asking someone if they know the muffin man just in a curious conversational way, however it could be taken sad or seriously by asking in a way that implies that no one knows him (as in he has no friends) or that no one knows where he is, which in the time period would be a different way of saying it, making it serious (he is missing).

I have said it twice and I will say it again, I am both nervous and excited to see what the assignments for the rest of the week will be….

Posted on

Beauty and More Beauty

This half of the week required two daily creates, coincidentally, both required an aura of beauty.

The first one was about trees, we were supposed to find a tree and talk about it. By the time I was able to sit down and work on my assignment it was a little dark to go out and try to find a nice tree to talk about so I found one that I already had in my camera roll. The one I used was a bonzai tree that I saw in a presentation I went to for my religion class in the fall semester, they had trimmed and grown the tree to look like it was being struck by lightning, which I thought was really beautiful and interesting.

Next came the literal beauty create, it was simply to define beauty. As I scrolled through the other responses I noticed everyone was also using a picture so I decided I would too. In my opinion beauty is a matter of perspective and “in the eye of the beholder” . We all see beauty in different things and there is no one exact definition or perfect example for the word. For my example I used a picture of my cats paw, something so simple and also so essential is calming and exciting at the same time, giving it its own beauty. Not to mention the physical beauty in the coloring of her fur and pads.

I continue each day to look forward to when I get a chance to do my daily creates and look at what others have responded. I love being creative!

 

Posted on

First We Read, Now We Watch

Part two of this half of the week was to watch some videos about some stuff about working on movies, things such as camera angles and editing techniques.

I chose four of the videos to watch, the first was “Examples of Editing Techniques”.

I found this one really interesting because even though it did not give explanations it was easy to find the examples of the different techniques from just the examples. It was also cool how many examples they found especially when compared to the next video, “Top 20 Cinematic Techniques”, which was the same, it showed a lot of examples of different techniques, each with the movie title and technique listed at the beginning. What was impressive was how specific some of the examples were and how none overlapped with the other video.

The third video I watched was the information video about Camera Angles. That one was more a tutorial or lesson than the others, the man in the video explained what he was talking about while he showed examples, it was something that, in a way, connected to the photography unit. He talked about the different angles and techniques and how they effect the viewers experience with movie and video.

When it came time to pick another video I had no idea what to do since they all seemed to be example videos and I was not sure about watching another one of those. Then I saw the one titled “Hitchcock Loves Bikinis”, and decided I had to watch that one. It turned out to be something that was actually educational, he used the bikini example to prove that different images with different reactions produce a totally different point of view. His example was a shot of a woman and a baby going to a shot of a man that smiles at them, portrays a nice man who likes babies, where a woman in a bikini going to a shot of a man smiling looks like a creepy old man.

So learning these things in these videos were actually beneficial and hopefully will be helpful in the unknown assignment in the other half of the week. Something I am still a little concerned about to be completely honest.