Blog #4: She's too preoccupied with 1985.

Our documentary covered the decade of the 80s. Everything about that decade was over the top and bright and crazy and we wanted to capture all of that in our documentary. The first thing we needed to do was brainstorm what we were going to talk about under each category. I was away the first day of planning but Rachael and Justine came up with some great ideas. After talking and browsing the internet we got some pretty good ideas and started to think about how we could make it all work.

Once we decided what we were going to talk about in each part we basically just went to the internet to see what information we could get about a bunch of different things. Some things were harder to find information for than others, but we managed to get what we needed. We also decided what videos we were going to use along with what we filmed ourselves. We decided that Rachael and I would speak from the present and Justine would act like she was a host on MTV in the 80s.

Filming wasn't too difficult. Once we decided where we were going to film and Justine got her outfit together we were ready to go. Because we already knew what we were going to talk about for each part we simply wrote out a quick script so we could memorize what we wanted to say and then we filmed. We filmed small bits at a time so there wasn't a whole lot to remember at once.

We didn't encounter many problems filming, the main thing was getting the backdrop for Justine to stay up on the wall, I was afraid it was going to fall on her head while she was talking. Then we also had to figure out which order we were going to do each section in. We didn't want to have some of the less interesting topics at the end, we wanted to keep people entertained.

And who could possibly resist the awesomeness that is jazzercise?
Of course we messed up our lines a few times (which can be seen in the blooper reel) but other than that everything went relatively smoothly.

Once we had all the footage that we were filming ourselves we took the photos and videos we had compiled already and Justine began putting most of it together on movie maker. While she put our footage together along with some of the other videos, Rachael and I worked with pictures and put them all together with subtitles and narration.

When that was finished we put everything onto Justine's computer and added narration where it was needed along with music. Downloading the videos we needed took a bit of time because the program we used only let us do so many per day, and we needed to decide what clip of the video we wanted to use because we really only needed a couple minutes at the most.

After we cut the videos down and organized everything it was all put to music. Then Rachael did the intro and Justine was left to finish it off. I revised the story board so it matched up with what we did and did the works cited page.

We were pretty much finished and at school Justine surprised us with some awesome footage of her little sister. With just a little fine tuning we were all finished and I was really happy with how it turned out.

I would have put the finished product here, but after 4 hours of Blogger uploading it it told me that there was an error and to try again later. I doubt I'll be trying again. It was kind of an epic failure.
However, I feel like I shouldn't leave you with nothing, and therefore I'll let you enjoy this video right here...



Don't even lie. You laughed. I know you did.

After watching the rest of the class's documentaries I was pretty impressed with what people did. Most were very well done as far as what they covered and how they put everything together. I think that people should have taken into consideration the distance from which they filmed people speaking. Sometimes it was hard to hear someone because they were so far away, but that never happened throughout anyone's documentary.

I liked a lot of the music that people used, as well as the video clips. Most of those were really well done. The only thing was that some people, when showing pictures, didn't have any music or narration and I think that they should have so it wasn't just dead silence. I also think what people chose to film was done well, there was a lot of creativity.

There were also no documentaries that were too long. I didn't feel like any of them were dragging on and on and on. They were all very interesting, even when it came to topics that aren't necessarily as interesting such as architecture.

Overall I thought they were all really well done. I didn't have any major complaints about them. They all looked like some planning and thought had gone into them, which is important. It was really cool watching all of them.

Blog #3: Hey! Hey! You! You!

After listening to the songs “I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend” by the Rubinoos and “Girlfriend” by Avril Lavigne I will say that the songs are not exactly the same, however, there are some striking similarities. I listened to both songs from beginning to end at first nothing really jumped out at me. I didn’t think there was much that was the same.

However, when the chorus rolled around one can’t help but notice that they sound very, very similar. While listening to the chorus of “I Wanna Be YourBoyfriend” you can practically sing along with the lyrics for “Girlfriend”. You can easily listen to the Rubinoos’ song by clicking here and skip ahead about 40 seconds into the song for the chorus.

Hey, You,
I wanna be your boyfriend.
Trying to say I wanna be your number one.
Hey, You, I wanna be your boyfriend.
Gonna make you love me before I’m done.

Compared to Avril’s:

Hey! Hey! You! You!
I don’t like your girlfriend.
No way, no way, I think you need a new one.
Hey! Hey! You! You!
I could be your girlfriend.

In response to the law suit Avril says that it’s ridiculous that the claim is based on five words from the chorus, however, that isn’t the case. As most can tell from listening, it isn’t just the words that are similar. The rhythm and tempo are practically identical. You can easily sing either chorus with the other song and it would fit without a problem. There’s a lot more to Tommy Dubar’s case than just five similar words.

I do think copyright has been broken. The chorus to “Girlfriend” is the hook, it’s the most memorable part of the song and what makes it so catchy. Even if the rest of the song doesn’t sound all too similar, at least to me, that’s the most important part of the song and it sounds like it’s been taken straight from the Rubinoos’ song.


Just think about it.

I don’t think this will greatly affect Avril’s career. Some people might stop listening to her music but overall people who like her music will continue to buy it and make her songs popular. It’s like the instance with the Huey Lewis song “I Want a New Drug” and the Ghostbusters theme. Even though they are practically the same song it didn’t stop people from watching Ghostbusters and making the movie, along with its theme song, so very popular.

This may, however, play a part in Avril’s image. People might view her as dishonest and now the word “plagiarism” is associated with her name whether she is proven guilty or innocent. It also inspires videos such as this one:


Videos like this one certainly don’t help Avril Lavigne’s case and it doesn’t help her image either. It questions how much talent she actually possesses. It’s one thing to be inspired by songs; it’s another thing to rip off another artist’s work. It seems only time will tell whether or not this claim of plagiarism will greatly affect her career.

Blog #2: Hurry turn it on, turn it on, get your 15 minutes.

An issue that I think I have a different opinion on is the craze of reality television. Reality TV is one of the biggest trends in media right now. It seems like almost every other show on the air is a reality television show. But why do we watch it? Personally, I think it’s all a waste of time. Perfectly good shows get dropped by networks and yet somehow these ridiculous reality tv shows continue to thrive. So many people I know love the shows but I can’t stand to watch them.

I understand that sometimes it’s funny to watch people embarrass themselves or do silly things on tv, but it just gets to a point where it’s too much. The people in these reality shows are simply out for their 15 minutes of fame and are willing to do anything to be seen on television.



How real are these shows anyways? There is a lot that goes into the production of reality television, which isn’t really what one would think about when watching. The whole idea of a reality show is to put people into certain situations and get their initial reactions. However, with the powers of editing and everything else, producers can get shows and the people in them to look a certain way.

Not to mention most things that occur on reality tv shows is far from anything that any normal person would experience in their day to day life.

It’s not only the situations that are carefully planned out, but the people on the shows as well. The producers to these shows use an awful lot of stereotypes and even though the people differ from show to show you can normally pick out the characters such as the underdog, the liar, the partier, the naive one, the eye candy, etc.

People put on acts in order to get more air time on the shows, which kind of defeats the purpose of it being all that “real”. It makes it more like any other television show and to me that’s just another thing that lacks appeal. What makes one reality show better than the next? They’re all just loud, crazy people doing stupid things on television in hopes of becoming rich and famous.

Don't believe me? Meet 'Crazy James'.

When you get right down to it, there really isn’t anything all that “real” about these shows. It all goes back to media being a construction. They want you to think and feel a certain way about each different character and what they’re doing on the show. The shows are made with producers hoping you’ll see what they want you to see. Really, all they’re doing is exploiting innocent people for profit and entertainment, with no real regard for who might get hurt in the process, as long as it makes good television.

So why do people watch these shows? It’s beyond me. Although I did find this article on About.com which questioned the ethics behind reality tv, I think it makes some very good points. You can find it right here.

Reality tv is just another one of those media creations designed to create profit for the creators and make the people in them obscene amounts of money while people sit at home finding some form of entertainment in all the insanity. I just don’t see myself getting caught up in the hype. I’d rather be living life than watching other people do so on tv.