New Media Workshop

Note: The due-date for this assignment is March 17

• Interview one of your classmates about the topic of his or her final project.
• Edit this into a 3-minute audio segment.
• Create a blog post that includes three things:
  1. the audio file;
  2. a picture of the classmate;
  3. a picture he or she took related to his/her topic;
  4. Maximum 200 words describing the classmate’s topic and motivations for doing the topic. The text should not be a repeat of what was said in the audio segment; it should help to introduce the person and draw our interest to listen to the audio interview.

Grading criteria:

• Quality of the audio recording, showing that you did your best to record clear sound as possible using available equipment;
• Quality of the audio editing: is the editing smooth and seamless without abrupt beginnings, endings or choppy edits in the middle
• Audio plays correctly after you have uploaded it onto your blog (make sure you replay it to check!)
• Photo is correctly cropped, resized, and formatted in the blog
• Explanatory text is coherent and of professional journalistic quality

Examples of similar assignments from previous semesters are here and here.

If you’re doing your assignment from home, you need to download Audacity and the Lame Encoder. Click here for instructions on downloading Audacity, and click here for instructions on downloading and installing the Lame Encoder.

I do not recommend waiting until the night before the assignment is due to download Audacity. Save yourself a lot of grief and get your software situation set up in advance so that you can get help from Ben during his weekday working hours.

If you don’t remember how to do anything discussed in class, remember that you can refer to several handy how-to guides for audio editing posted in this week’s class notes. You can also refer to the photoshop guides posted in the Week 5 class notes.

With the help of guest instructor Joyce Wong, in class today we will learn to do the following:

• Record clear sound on an MP3 player
• Transfer sound files from the MP3 player to the computer
• Use Audacity to edit your sound file
• Export your edited sound file as an MP3 file
• Upload the file to your blog.

So just to be clear, for your in-class work today, you need to do the following:

• Record a very brief interview with the classmate sitting next to you
• Transfer the sound file of that interview to your computer.
• Use Audacity to edit your file
• Export your file as an MP3 from Audacity onto your desktop
• Upload the file to your blog and publish it.

Important resources for your future assignments using audio:

• Super-Fast Guide to Audio Editing (PDF) and Editing Audio With Audacity (PDF) by Mindy McAdams.
• Audio section of the J-Learning website.
• “Chapter 7: Digital Audio and Podcasting” from Journalism 2.0
• Handy Audacity Tutorials

If there is time at the end of class, Joyce will do a show-and-tell about online storytelling. Here are some examples of projects she h as done in the past, primarily for the Holocaust Museum:

• Life After the Holocaust
• Silent Witness
• Reconciliation + Reconstruction
• Yearbook 2006

Due on Monday, March 10th at 10am.

This assignment has three parts, all of which need to be documented and correctly linked in a blog post on your blog:

1. Create an account for yourself on Wikipedia. While logged in, add some new information to a page on Wikipedia that relates to one of your projects or Hong Kong’s environment in some way. It doesn’t have to be a lot of information: just a couple of new facts are fine, or you can correct or refine existing information. (If you really want to start a whole new Wikipedia entry about a subject that you think ought to be addressed but isn’t, you are welcome to do that too, but that is not required.) Then on your blog, link to the specific changes you made via the history pages. If somebody else makes changes to or deletes your contribution, please make note of this on your blog and link to any discussion that you might have with other Wikipedians about what happened. (If you have any questions or problems while doing this assignment be sure to contact Ben.) Then in a short paragraph please tell us what this experience taught you about Wikipedia. Has the experience of editing Wikipedia changed the way you view the credibility of its information?

2. In class we created a collaboration page for each soundslides team. Work with your teammates to devise a plan, schedule, and division of labor so that your project can be completed on time. On your blog, link to your team’s collaboration page and specifically to the contributions you made on it.

3. In class we created a resource page to collect online information related to your projects. Contribute at least two new links to it. On your blog, link to the history page or pages showing the contributions you made.

(Be sure that you are logged in under your own username when contributing to the class wiki.)

Today the class will be divided into two parts:

Part 1: We will use the class wiki to brainstorm about your Soundslides topics and final HKStories topics. We will also create a page for sharing online resources about the environment in Hong Kong. Your in-class work will be:

• to contribute your ideas to the class wiki
• help set up the collaboration page for your Soundslides project team

Part 2: Introduction to Wikipedia. How it works and how to contribute to it.

We’ll also watch this funny video about Wikipedia from Stephen Colbert.

Be sure to check out these references. These will be useful for your Week 5 assignment:

• Wikipedia Welcoming Committee
• Wikipedia tutorial
• Wikipedia cheatsheet

Some good articles about Wikipedia and debates about its credibility:

• Donna Shaw, Wikipedia in the Newsroom, American Journalism Review, February/March 2008.
• Stacy Schiff, Know it all: Can Wikipedia conquer expertise?, The New Yorker, July 31 2006.
• Noam Cohen, Courts Turn to Wikipedia, but Selectively, The New York Times, January 29, 2007.

This week’s assignment is in preparation for the Week 5 class, when we will use a class wiki to map out story ideas and Soundslides project teams.

By 10am on Monday Feb. 18th your assignment is to write a blog post suggesting at least one idea each for your two main projects this semester:

SOUNDSLIDES PROJECT: You will divide up in groups of three people to complete one audio-visual slideshow, telling a story through pictures and sound. (Examples of professional and student soundslides projects below.) You can use narration or interviews, or a combination – it’s up to your team to decide what works best for the subject. Think about what environmental stories in Hong Kong would best be told as a slideshow instead of as an article or some other way, and suggest one or two ideas on your blog, linking to the online sources for your ideas when appropriate. Your group will be decided on Feb.18th in part based on common or overlapping story interests expressed in your blog post.

FINAL “HONG KONG STORIES” REPORT: At the end of the semester you will complete an individual online report using multiple media about an environmental issue or phenomenon in Hong Kong. It will combine text, links, pictures and/or graphics and audio, as appropriate. The written text is not supposed to be too long, the point is to show that you know how to tell a story in an innovative way by combining visuals, text, and audio. Suggest one or two ideas that you would like to explore in this format, for further discussion on Feb. 18.

NOTE: This is not a final commitment and your ideas can change upon further discussion with classmates, and as collaboration and research continues. You are just being asked to propose ideas which we will work with in the Feb. 18th in-class brainstorming session.

We will kick off class this week with guest photographer Ting-li Wang, who will evaluate and discuss your photography assignments.

Steve will then lead the class in learning the basics of Photoshop:

• which features you need to know for basic photo work;
• importance of appropriate file size, resolution, and quality.

Today’s in-class work, using at least one of the photos you took for this week’s assignment:

• Crop the photo
• Make necessary adjustments (levels, contrast, and color)
• Resize (maximum 300pixels wide for horizontal photos, 200 pixels wide for vertical photos)
• Save your photograph for the web, using appropriate resolution and quality.
• Upload your photograph(s) to your blog
• Format your photo so that it is justified left or right on the blog post, with descriptive text about the people and events in the photo wrapped around it.

RESOURCES:
The Knight Digital Media Center has a very handy Photoshop tutorial.

Other important Photoshop how-to’s from the J-lab:
Preparing Images and Photos for the Web
Checking and Changing Resolution
Getting Familiar with Photoshop I
Getting Familiar with Photoshop II
Editing Photographs