Now that the semester has come to it’s end, I have officially finished taking the DS106 class. Throughout the year DS106 has changed the way I look at the internet. When I look back at my personal cyberinfrastructure post on Gardner Campbell’s essay, my first response is “wow, I was quite confused”. In my post I discussed the saying digital facelift, I said that technology simply gets added onto in order to create more innovated technology. After taking DS106 and I ask myself what is a digital facelift and what does it mean to me, my answer is completely different from my last. I now think that a digital facelift is simply DS106. DS106 gave us the education to alter the use of technology in order to satisfy our own needs. I don’t necessary think it’s the innovation of technology, but I think it’s the innovation of our minds to use that technology. Cyberinfrastructure isn’t just using social media tools and the internet, but it’s using them for personal use such as having your own blog, or sharing your story with others.

Before I took DS106, I never really looked at the internet as storytelling. I simply just thought the internet was what people used to search wikipedia, interact with others on Facebook, or sign up for college courses. DS106 has completely changed my mind, and thoughts about digital storytelling. I now look at the internet not as just a question and answer forum, but as a huge book filled with everyones stories. Now, each and every DS106 student has their own story on the internet, just just a Facebook or wikipedia story.

DS106 introduced my to so many new concepts and skills, but I strongly believe managing and creating my own website allowed me to gain the most. Knowing how to create and manage your own web sight isn’t just a temporary skill, but a skill that can be used for the rest of your life in any profession. DS106 also taught me how to use photo and video editing software such as gimp and iMovie. Prior to DS106, I didn’t know one thing about either of them, in fact I didn’t even know what iMovie was used for even though I’ve always had a MacBook.This class gave me that knowledge, and so much more. In the beginning of DS106 during our photography unit, if I was asked to edit a picture in gimp it would take me hours. After so much practice and knowledge from Professor Levine, I can now say that I can create a DS106 bumper sticker in no more then fifteen minutes. Now back to managing and creating my own website. The goal of DS106 is to learn about digital storytelling, and having our own websites I believe was was taught us. It’s one thing to get helpful hints and lectures from Professor about digital storytelling, but you can’t truly experience it unless your part of it. Having our own blogs allowed us to be apart of it by creating our own story, and interacting with others. Our blogs are even our story of DS106. It shows how much we’ve grown and learned throughout the course, and what obstacles we’ve faced throughout.

Through the course we were had to complete assignments, and do three daily creates per week. Daily creates were posted online every morning at 10 A.M.. The daily creates ranged from take a picture of a shadow, to recording yourself saying your favorite joke. I believe daily creates were a important part of this course because they helped practice all of your assignments, and remember how to do all of the editing. For example we did our design unit in the beginning of the year, and daily creates helped us keep sharp with them by doing them throughout the year. The assignments ranged from visual, audio, design, video, to remix. Each assignment would correspond to the unit that we were doing. For example, in our video editing unit we would have to complete 15 stars worth of video assignments. In order to do this you would just got to the video assignments and complete any ones you would like to, however you must complete 15 stars worth. Stars were assigned to each assignment created, and each assignment was worth 1 through 5 stars depending on its level of difficulty. For example the eyeballing visual assignment is to take a picture of someones eyes, and it’s worth 1 star. On the other hand, the video essay video assignment would be 5 stars because you have create a video describing special techniques used in your favorite movie. My favorite assignments to do were video. I enjoyed completing them because it allowed me to use my favorite movies and edit them in my style. For example my favorite assignment was the video essay because I it allowed me to take scenes from The Dark Knight which is my favorite film, and talk about the techniques used which made it so good. Heres my video essay so you can take a look at it. Another one of my favorite video assignments was the opening credit redux assignment. This assignment was simple, redo your favorite movies opening credits. I chose to redo the opening credits for Superbad, which is another one of my favorite movies. Here’s my opening credit redux assignment. Video editing was made says because of iMovie. iMovie has so many great built in functions, so once you get the hang of it it’s so easy to do.

For all you future students I have one recommendation, take this class. I took this class because I heard from so many students at the university that you will never take a funner, and more important class then this. They were definitely right. My advisor even recommended it to me since it was so helpful and interesting. This class allows you to deal with social media, video edit, photo edit, and use youtube in class without getting in trouble. How much better can it get? However, I do have to say one thing. Don’t take this class if your not going to put in the time and effort. DS106 requires a immense amount of time, simply because your learning so much so fast. However, don’t let the workload scare you because Professor Levine makes sure he guides you slowly through the process and will help you in any way possible.

If I was the professor of DS106, I wouldn’t change a thing about how the class is taught or what the class is about. This class is perfect the way it is. Not only do you go to class and receive a lecture, but you also have reference material posted on the class sight after each and every class. For example Professor Levine will go over video editing in class one day, and immediately after class he would post up video’s and references from what we spoke about in lecture. Professor makes sure that if you don’t leave class fully understanding the material, after you go through his class follow up page that you will. A lot of people began slacking with the daily creates towards the end of the year, and Professor Levine questioned if it was work it. My one response to this is keep doing the daily creates, and if anything require the students to do more every week. Doing daily creates every day doesn’t take much time, but doing them allows you to better learn the editing software and most of all it allows you to think like a photographer. For example when I saw a daily create that said take a picture of a shadow, I had it in the back of my mind the whole day. However this allowed me to think like a photographer and ask questions such as is this a good picture. Throughout the day when your thinking about it you’ll come across a good picture and see what’s the difference between a good and bad picture, and to me this is the most important learning amongst all.