Ladies and Gentlemen, let it be known, that at the end of week 10, I have finally procrastinated to the absolute last minute to do homework for DS106. I actually have to say I’m pretty proud of myself for keeping up with everything I’m involved with over the past 10 weeks. However, I’m started to burn out and the grind is getting to me. I unfortunately am seeing the ill-effects of having to work, volunteer, and do final projects for classes. I’m cutting back on my work hours and completely turning away from having fun so that I can continue to have good grades as I have my final project in GIS, a research paper in Geography, and the final project(s) in DS106. I still have other classes, but those are mostly tests and busy work. Any way, this week has been tough because I have spent most of my week down at the rescue station. And I have ran EMS every single day this week one way or another. A lot of us saw the effects of Hurricane Sandy in the beginning of the week, and I did my duty to make sure that Fredericksburg city would be safe. So I was here Monday, Tuesday, AND Wednesday. I then worked at my paying job on Thursday, and back to volunteering on Friday, Saturday, and here I am Sunday night, STILL at the station! I deserve an award…

Anyways, this week was Reading Movies, and getting us to start training and thinking about video editing. We weren’t allowed to take the training wheels off just yet and start video assignments, but for me, that’s a good thing because I had absolutely no time to do homework this week. We were asked to explain the tools we have to work with editing video and so far I have the PwnYouTube tool to grab videos, as well as MPEG Streamclip to do some minor editing. I enjoyed using the PwnYouTube bookmark this week, but as for MPEG Streamclip…we got in a little tussle this week. I was unable to work magic like @cogdog for one of our assignments and I think the issue was that I was using Windows and he had a Mac…CURSES!!!

Our big assignment…since we weren’t actually doing VIDEO ASSIGNMENTS, was to Listen, Look, Analyze. I chose to do a scene from Training Day. 1. Because I have seen it multiple times 2. I have seen it multiple times because I think the movie is pretty badass. 3. Denzel Washington IS a badass 4. I <3 Denzel Check out my review of the audio, video, and then the extras that I piece together in my full analysis!

The second assignment was to explore further into the movie. That post can be found here. I found a good source of information on the IMDb website for the movie. I also typed in Training Day spoofs in Google and found numerous sites with information on interesting spoofs and gimmicks. It even made me go back and re-watch the parts on YouTube, and sure enough, they were all true!

The last assignment was to pre-produce for Video Assignments next week! Woo-hoo, or beginning of the end? Errrr well find out! anyways, my pre-production was a little…well maybe a lot a bit slackass. I’ve just been run into the ground this week and I really just want to finish all my work and go get some rest…just so I can do this all over again! (5 more weeks+finals?!) To be honest, my awesome girlfriend asked me what I was doing today and I replied “Writing my paper for Geography and then hanging out”….she replies, “what about ds?” Screw it, a picture will better explain

As you can tell, I didn’t know what she was talking about, but then BAM the DS106 Train smacked me right in the face.

So since I was at the squad, I was limited on my TDC creations this week, but I made due!

First I did TDC298 which asked us to make something big, look smaller. WELL lucky me, I have huge trucks here, so I worked with my resources!

In this picture, I was trying to give the impression what I was playing with our response vehicle as a toy car. I had to stand on a chair to get a better perspective, but I still think it worked out well!

Lastly, I did TDC299 which asked to take a picture of something that represents how old I feel:

These are my brand spanking new boots that I got on Wednesday! Sure, I, in no way, shape, or form feel brand new….(I actually feel extremely tired) but I feel YOUNG and that goes with it right?! I’m up until the wee hours of the morning, waking up multiple times when the tones drop, get up early, class, work, repeat. I feel like these boots represent me well because they are made to take a beating! (and waterproof, but not sure how to tie that to myself right now haha)

And as a parting note, I promise never to wait until the last minute to do DS106…nor will I forget that I HAVE DS106 work…duuhhhhh it’s a given, Digital Storytelling never stops! #DS1064Lyfe