YouTube videos finally posted!

Hey guys, it took me a while to figure out some file issues, but I’ve finally posted all of your videos.  Make sure to check the titles and read the info on the right side.  Let me know if anything needs to change.

“Tap out bottled water”

Shannon McDonald, Chris McNamara

“The Ecoteers do an Extreme Green Makeover”

Fred Giliberti, Kevin Anderson, Rachel Weinrich

“Check out the New Brunswick Bike Library!”

Lynne Ricicki, Kimberly Shubert, Lila Nadelmann

“Green Bob and Pals”

Kimberly Lourenco, Jaclyn Mandelbaum, Janine Oman

Congrats everybody on a semester well done!

I learned a lot from each of you and am so happy I took this class.

 have a great summer everybody!

blasty blast

That’s really the way I would describe this class to other students, a blasty blast! It has been so much fun to not have to do a paper that no one but my professor will read.  Finally I get messages to the people that they are aimed for!

I know this class has taken up a lot of our time outside of the classroom and though it was nice to have it over with, I’m going to miss the freedom of the projects and the experiences with you guys. I know we’re all an awesome group of students but it says something about us  as people when you consider how willing we were to help each other out.  For instance how  Lila did the part for the first bottle podcast and how Fred helped us out in the end.  Everyone was always willing to share comments and tech advice.

This course gives us skills beyond the classroom.  It gives us social skills to help us work in groups, accept personality differences and work towards a common goal.  You can’t go through life without interacting with people. You don’t sit in your cubicle and never go to a brainstorming meeting.  Yet unfortunately that is how many classes are set up.  Thankfully this class helps us all fine tune real life people skills.  As Janine said earlier in class to me “we didn’t just get the tech skills we got the people skills too” or something like that…

hope you all have an awesome summer… and hope to see you guys around!

-Kim L.

Not quite over…

I am going to use the “sick” excuse  for my podcast being late (and short).

I am going to miss you guys.  This class has been one of the most exciting, collaborative, creative processes that I have been privileged to enjoy.   Without a doubt, I have never participated in a better class.  I say “participated”  because I did not “teach” in a conventional way.  I believe that Jesse and I set a context for students to learn as much as possible.

You guys worked tremendously hard.   But not because I made you do so.  You set your own standards.

Will another class develop this synergy?

I don’t know.  You guys are an exceptional bunch. Smart, creative, hard-working, open, conscientious…and more.

I am very excited about the screening tomorrow.

Goodbye!

As almost everyone has mentioned in their posts, the end is finally here.   It hasn’t always been easy, and it took a lot of time in and out of the classroom, but our hardwork has paid off.  Our video podcasts are done!

Everyone’s done a truely amazing job, and it’s been a great class.  I loved how interactive the process has been. In a way, I feel like we’ve all been working as one big group, in addition to working in our smaller groups.  I’m going to miss the class, especially Kimmie and Lila. This project would have been an impossible to go at alone, and I couldn’t have asked for a better (or more dysfunctional) two people to share it with.  Also, thanks to Caron and Jesse for all their help and guidance and for creating such a unique class. 

I can’t wait to see everyone’s finshed podcast at the viewing party tommorow.  It’s gonna be great!

Season Finale

The time is upon us for our last blog and the big season finale of our episodic podcasts/videocasts. What an incredible journey it has been. The coolest part about this class is that you could take it every year and never run out of new ideas, new environmental issues and new group members. I am so excited to be a part of the class next semester as an assistant and watch students go through the same learning process that we did. We have come along way and I applaud Caron for creating such a modernized, creative, innovative class. I can see many classes in the future taking on similar projects. Maybe one day this class will be a prerequisite for other classes in similar fields because it really does give students the foundation for several forms of digital media. As the world evolves so must college course and I really think Caron has taken the initial step that will foster great success for the college as a whole.

The Eco-Teer movie is very close to completion and we all look forward to the big premier on Thursday. This semester flew by but our podcasts will last forever and their legacy will live on to educate, inspire and produce habit changing solutions for all who watch and listen. I will always be an Eco-Teer:)

holy bajeezes!

“Holy Cow!” is all I can say about this last week of the “Tap Out Bottled Water” project.  This is a whirlwind pace of making the magic happen, though yet again, just as Shannon and I thought we might spontaneously combust- we did audio.  Man, that’s some ridiculous (and we think very funny) stuff right there.  We both really squeezed the creative juice out of what has been a consistently RENEWABLE bucket of ideas and laughs.

Often I’m not sure how this project has come together to what it currently is, but I’d say that the project itself has become a third member of the group- seeming always to pick us up and create when the two of us are delirious.  I said to Shannon today, “though I’ve put more work into this project than most things, it is definitely going to be one of my proudest things.”

We’re meeting for many, many, many hours tomorrow to ensure the last pieces are in place, and it’s gonna rock for Thursday!

Look forward to all the videos and hope y’all’ve had fun,

chris mc

The End is Near

AHHH! Guys! We are almost done with the semester.  How crazy is that?  It went by so quickly.  I can honestly say that even though this class was very time-intensive outside of the classroom, I did not mind putting in the extra hours out of class.  The other members in my group, Kim and Janine, were a pleasure to work with.  We had a lot of fun in our editing sessions and I’m glad I worked with them.

 

Class on Thursday proved to be a hurdle for Kim and myself.  Due to information we were given, we had to rework our script a bit.  After a lot of thought, we finally got one that everyone (including Professor Chess and Jesse) thought was “tighter” and had a clear message. 

 

After class we had Fred record his voice as Green Bob!!! He was so good at a squeaky cartoonish voice —almost too good?  Anyway, it was so hard for me to not laugh while he was recording.

 

Earlier today, I had stopped by the Human Ecology building to fill out my three course sequence forms.  I ran into the Ecoteers (bummmbummdummm).  I got a sneak peak of the green carpet for our premier on Thursday.  Great job Fred!!

 

 

Tonight, we are adding Fred—I mean Green Bob’s voice over to our clips.  We have to clean up some pictures and make a few adjustments.  I hope all goes well tonight and we will have a great finished podcast!

 

Now that I have successfully blogged pretty much entirely about Fred, I think it’s time for me to go.

 

See you guys Thursday.  This is so exciting.

Weekend Wonder..

Alright, so.  I heard SO much complaining this weekend that it was ‘too hot.’  Talk about a buzz kill!  I don’t know about you guys, but I live by the beach and when it is hot and sunny, we beach bums get down.  While some people were couped up in the a/c all weekend, I wandered around in the beautiful sun.  I hope everyone went out on Ag Field Day, even if it was only for a half hour.  There was so much going on on Saturday and I wish that it continued thru to Sunday because I worked right in the middle of it all and only got to enjoy some of it. But I am grateful for what I did get to do.

Down to business, Lynne, Lila, and I will be working on our hopefully final cut Tuesday afternoon.  We want to try to tighten everything up and make it look good for the viewing so that way on Thursday we can make a really silly gag-reel.  We have (probably along with all of you guys) so much silliness on film that it is only necessary to share it with you all.   Good luck to everyone with the final days of editing!  I can’t wait to see all of your final podcasts.

PS- Fred, High Five on the green carpet!

THE INVITES!!!!!

Hey guys

Here’s a rough idea for the invites. Tell me what you think by monday I will add remove and improve!

The microwave is off?

Well the Eco-teers did our FIRST Extreme Green Eco-Makeover on Tuesday and it was a green hard hat full of cake. We went in there like Chris and Shannon on a mission.  We greened the room like whoa. We shut off their lights. Replaced them with CFLs. We turned off all the appliances, even the microwave which someone left running for 5 minutes! and we plugged all the appliances into the power strip.

****Eco-Teer Fact*******

Remember in our visually enhanced podcast the Vampire Load which refers to the leaking of electricity when your  plugged in appliances are turned off? Well, just so you are all environmental/energy jargon savvy I wanted to inform you that another name for this is the “parasitic load.” Interesting visual, eh?

Back to my story.  We had a great shoot, full of laughs. Fred was the only one crying since such a transformation can be sometimes emotionally pulling. I love podcasting! Can’t wait to edit tomorrow and make this movie a reality!

Have we kicked Princeton’s butt yet?

 

I think so.

 

Rutgers represent.

Almost finished….

This week Chris and I went to work finishing the scenes that we needed to get to finish our video, we are missing the final scene but it should not take long at all.  Tomorrow we have some heavy editing to do, and then all we have to do is put the voice over in and it’s all done!  I have to say, even though filiming (or taking pictures in our case) is time consuming, it is alot of fun.  And like Chris mentioned in his post I enjoy every minute of the mayhem.  Hopefully by the time our project is done, he won’t be having nightmares involving wrestling clad dolls and I won’t have nightmares consisting of frustrating cameras.  I really love the way our project is going, and I hope that when we are done everyone else will enjoy it too!

Green Apple Fest

 

So this weekend my roommate, my girlfriend, and I hopped in the man van for a little road trip to our nation’s capitol. Last year the innagural Green Apple festival was a lot of fun despite the torrential downpours and lightning that eventually forced the event to be cancelled early. This year the weather was gorgeous and was hosted by the hilarious Chevy Chase. He has a certain way with words that is so expressive but at the same time comical that he has become a wonderful spokesperson for the environmental movement. The crowd was once again a great mix of college kids from the surrounding area, parents with their children and puppies, and environmental activists of all walks. My interest outside of keeping in touch with my activist side was the music( I know, what a shock!) The first act we saw was the Howard Drum Line. These guys can lay down a groove. They were especially well recieved by a crowd that was ready to dance. The jam band superstars Moe. followed up with a killer set including one of my favorite songs “Captain America”. Lisa Jackson, head of the EPA, had the priviliage of introducing one of the most fun bands on the scene today, The Flaming Lips. The lead singer, Wayne Coyne, wasted no time to display his playful antics by putting on his humongous pair of hands to raise them everytime Ms. Jackson finished a phrase. She quickly realized what was going on and allowed them to take the stage to a large applause. They played hits off their last two studio albums as well as the classic “She Don’t Use Jelly”. Since most of songs have a sing along nature, the crowd was involved through out the show. Needless to say, a good time was had by all. As a two year veteran I can definitely say that I do not plan on missing a Green Apple Festival on the national mall any time soon. Im keeping my fingers crossed for Phish next year!

Check Out Garbage Man!

the final stretch…

Hey there, eco-types.  Sorry for the late posting, a giant nap took me hostage for the better part of the day.  Anywho… so this week is the beginning of the final stress, I mean stretch, of course.  Shannon and I have sorting and editing to contend with for the remainder of the project, which will have us meeting mucho throughout the next week.  I think we’re gonna have enough bloopers to create a whole 1/2 hr prime-time show, but we’re pretty confident that we’ve captured the essence of these damn little action figures’ movements.

I’ve, personally, taken to speaking with the dolls, and often taken their actions, and un-actions, personally- much to the amusement of my partner.  Barrating and, occasionally, complimenting the dolls have overtaken self-control and reason at this point in the process… but I think in the end we’ll all be stronger friends for the experience.

By the way, I will be presenting the visually-enhanced audio podcasts in Environmental Policy and Institutions class this Tuesday night; Professor McHugh is excited about it.  Should be fun.

Hope all’s podcasts are easing into the end here,

chris mc

EcoCom

I am disappointed with most environmentalists’ communication.   Self righteously blaming those who are environmentally irresponsible rarely works, according to much research.

Similarly, information is not a cure for bad behavior.  More knowledge does not necessarily lead to more appropriate behavior.  Social science theory and much empirical research show that links between information and behavior is tenuous at best.

But I am excited by trends in digital media.  My latest find is a site that connects environmental “change agents”  with potential “backers.”   The agents and their backers are inspiring.  The communication concept and implementation are impressive.

One of the featured change agents is Scott Harrison, who “launched the September Campaign, asking everyone born in the month of September to give up birthday presents and ask for donations instead. 100% of the money raised was used to fund freshwater projects in Ethiopia. The campaign raised $1+ million, funding over 200 water prjects in communities in need. This provided 500,000+ people with safe, clean drinking water.”

Happy earth day!

Caron

Lights, Camera, Action!

Yes, ladies and gents, it is true… Our very own classmate, Fred, is going to be a superstar!

We were killing ourselves trying to figure out who would be the voice of Green Bob. We spent a good portion of time looking for software that can alter voices. Turns out, no need for software… We have Fred! After we do a few minor adjustments to the script, he will be ready to roll.

So our progress thus far isn’t horrible. We have the sequence of video and pictures all lined up and complete for the most part. We super-imposed Bob into some scenes last week during class, and will finish doing that this week in class. After that… all we have left is to add the audio and adjust the timing.

I don’t feel overwhelmed but I know we have a lot to do before the big premier. With some hard work we should be okay.

Happy studying guys. BOO finals!

EPA Announcement/random thoughts

So in the Spirit of Earth Day (yes, it’s all capitalized since the spirit is a powerful thing) I hope you all go out today! Granted, not the banginest weather, but still decent enough to go appreciate a little fresh air, pick up a few pieces of litter, and reuse your plastic bags. (which should be an everyday thing)

And, with Earth Day here already, the EPA has announced (last Friday) that CO2 and 6 other greenhouse gas emissions are hazards to human health (duh) but (YAY) cause now that it is a health risk and not just a “greens” movement, maybe something will actually happen, maybe legislation will actually be passed? Maybe more people will start to realize the implications of higher temperatures, higher concentrations of greenhouse gases and melting of polar ice caps.  We can only hope!

(This is a very bouncy post)

Can’t wait to see what’s going on with everyone’s videos! i’m so excited! Each group had such amazing work last week that I know this week is going to be awesome! Can’t wait to see the progress!

I am SO diggin’ Lila’s picture on her post.  It makes me think you might have a little too much time on your hands, though.  ONLY KIDDING!

I hope you all had as great as a weekend as I did in the beautiful sunshine!

Anywho, I just got the okay on showing my Intro to Media Systems class our podcasts and they will be viewed next week.   Hopefully I can get a group of students interested in taking the class, too!

As for this week, I feel like we’re going to be SO close to finishing our videos by the end of Thursdays class.  I am so so so excited to see the finished product and have probably already mentioned that in previous blogs.  And I’ve been telling my friends about our viewing party because they all keep bugging me about when they can see the finished product of Lynne jumping around in a chicken suit.  Also, agreeing with Lynne, I can’t believe the semester is almost over!  It’s so exciting!  I can’t wait to get home and wake up 7 minutes away from my favorite place in the world: the beach..for a week.  Then it’s back to New Brunswick for 6 weeks of summer classes..BOO!  But it’s okay.  July 4th will give me another reason to celebrate.

As for now, I have my first final tomorrow.  Eek!  I feel pretty comfortable with the material so I’m not really stressing.  It is awesome, though, to just have to go sit in class for the next week and listen to group presentations without having any other work to do!  I know Jaclyn’s happy about that, too! (She’s in my class)  But for everyone else, try to keep it cool for finals.  It makes it much easier to deal with if you’ve got a plan, which I’m sure most of you have already discovered.

I’m off to grab some dinner and study a little more.  See you guys Thursday morning!

drop it like it’s….

this party is gonna be

I made up a song:

e is for the way we’re environmentally friendly

c is cause all the groups are cool, whoopie!!!

0- is cause our work is not so ordinary

and casts – cause’ are eco-casts kick a**, you see!!!!!!!!!

I know its not over yet but I’ve got to kvell …

There is a lot of reason to be proud of this class. Caron and Jesse instructed it beautifully. They met us at our level and worked from there up.  I wouldnt want any body else to teach this class. I wish more classes showed faith in the students like this one did. Having some say on how the course should run encourged us all to work hard and have fun, which made the hard work pay off. Our ec0-casts perfectly illustrate the communication and techincal skills that we’ve all acquired this semester. Not only did we benefit ourselves by taking this class, we also have helped benefit this University. I hope that the classes in the future have as much of a voice in how the class is conducted. It is both a blessing and a curse that we have so many interesting environmental issues to communicate- so many changes we want to see. I’m sure that this class will never get dry. Good job y’all. I’m lookin forward to the finale

Distribuition Decisions…

We are finally on You-Tube!!!  That’s awesome!  According to an article I’ve read in Streaming Media Magazine, a magazine dedicated to business and marketing on-line, based on our purposes and funds (i.e. 0$), You-Tube was the right way to go for us.  Though we’ve solved part of our distribution problem, I thought I’d share other solutions and explain some pros and cons for future reference. The article provides three major ways to distribute video. 

Host the video yourself on a personal website 

Use a UGC (User Generated Content) site like You-Tube

Pay a SaaS (Software-as-a-Service)

Embedding the video ourselves would be way too difficult for our current level of techy knowledge. It involves choosing a bunch of techy stuff I’m sure Jesse is familiar with, like codecs and bitrate encoding (I’m not even gonna try to explain). 

UCG is right up our alley not only is it free, but it can provide additional viewers and an actual community, which is fundamental to market our ideas.  Most UGC sites also allow embedding the video back at your own website without all the codec and bitrate mumbo jumbo.  Some negatives involve loosing control over the video (anyone will be able to use our videos on their own website which may not necessarily be a good thing).  Some resolution and video quality may also be compromised.  Below is a graph from the article illustrating some features to consider about various UGCs when distributing videos on-line. 

As for the SaaS sites, these distribution providers are fee based and more commercially oriented.  They take your video and help distribute it on other websites solving the codec, bitrate, and resolution issues for you.  They also make the video interactive allowing viewers to click the video and advance to the next step in the marketing strategy you planned out.  Some of these providers also allow you to view statistics about viewers so you can make changes to your marketing strategy.  The article is a hard copy, if you’re bored and at the Human Ecology Student Lounge you can read it there!

The end

It’s very exciting that our class is coming to a close.  After working hard all semester, I think we’re all very happy that, in two weeks, we’ll have two great finished products.  The viewing party will be awesome, and hopefully, everyone else will like our podcasts as much as we do.

There have been a lot of obstacles along the way, but overall, the class has been a great learning experience. It’s been the most unique class I’ve taken during my time at Rutgers, and a true challenge.  It’s great to look back at the time we spent at the bike library, video taping, and editing, and then look at the final products (on you tube!) Unlike my papers, which once they’re printed and graded, end up in the recycling bin, my podcasts are something I want to share with other people, even after the class is finished.

Though I may be getting ahead of myself (the video podcast isn’t quite finished), I still feel good about what we’ve done.  During the next two classes, Kimmie, Lila and I will focus mainly on audio and final touches.  I really think audio will bring everything together!

M.I.A. Our Whole Project!

So for the second time in two weeks the ecoteers came into the computer lab, eager to get to some hardcore editing, but we stopped abruptly when we could not even open our project. This time is even more frustrating because we had a lot more done and we are going to have to start from scratch. So what is going on? Why does the comupter lab seem to have it out for us? I truely have no idea, but I have had enough of the PC world. The ecoteers are officially going APPLE!

400+

So what’s with my blog title?  Well that’s the amount of still photos we took for our project this week, 400+.  It was fun though!  We found a great place to film (my apartment) and rolled with it.  We re-did the grass scene to make it more flowy and more consistent. And thank goodness tomorrow we get to edit, because we really need those 3 hours for some razor action.

On a side note I just want to say how much I love this class.  Today I found myself gushing to people about how awesome it is and how they should take the class (one person was a journalism major and the other was an EPIB major) and I’m thinking they might try and take the class for next semester!  YAY!

Late-nite blogger!

Well, it’s technically still very early for me, but I know that some of us like to get to bed early.  Anyway, when I started this blog, I didn’t know what I was going to blog about, but now I know.  As we all know, registration is in process, and as a marine sciences minor, I just got the biggest bomb dropped on me tonight.  Being an absolutely AWFUL mathematician, I just found out that I now need Calc 1 as a pre-req for the requirement to graduate as a marine sciences major.  Needless to say, my hear was just shattered.  So, I let the anger out by yelling at innocent by-standers and realizing that I need extra credits in order to graduate, so I’ll change my minor.  So, I am now a Journalism and Media Studies major with a minor in Communication.  With that, I am just going to take some marine science classes to fulfill my credit minimum to graduate.  I’m still bummed about it, but I think that it will be okay in the end.  I was looking forward to graduating with my sister next spring, but she makes a very good point that I should know what I want to do and not just want to graduate.  It’s hard to put my finger on that because I am ready to graduate and go out in the real world, even though I still don’t know what I want to do, but, I guess I just have to come to grasp with that.

For the late nite readers, thanks for listening to me vent a little bit more about something that Rutgers students like to call the RU Screw.  And, Thank you, Rutgers, for mis-advising your students.