Rationale

I  collaborated with Brian Goulet for The Big Project. We exhibited a tour of campus in two fashions through song and video. Our song is about the campus and the overall experience students get while attending UMW. The video is a showcase of a variety of students showing off their talents in a number of on campus areas. This will help to show just how many places there are to be on campus and it shows that we have people with many different backgrounds, who all love UMW. Both of these aspects display a plethora of attributes constitutive to the diverse makeup of the university. The purpose of this project is to promote the university and the talent that exists here. The audience is members of the UMW community who will be able to view their fellow eagles showcasing their talents and then share it to their friends and associates. It matters because it will create a sense of pride and and unity among the UMW community and at the same time, advertise the university to potential new students.

Risk and Rewards

The things that went well were definitely filming each of the students as we got to experience them while they show their passion. One of the major things that went well was the final stages of editing both video and song. I  think this is evident through the final version of the video that was produced. There were a couple of things that went wrong, but not so much that our video was damaged. The hardest part of the entire project was trying to get the students out to record. It was just  hard to find a time that worked for all parties tat needed to be present. The beginning stages of recording the song were pretty rough as Brian and I both put in hours upon hours work in the recording booth trying to master our voices. Then, once we were through recording, we struggled a bit at first trying to edit the vocals. It all came together nicely though. If I could do it over, I would definitely try to put more effort towards knocking the song out quickly so that the time constraints for filming the students weren’t so significant. That about all that I would change.

Resources

The resources that were most helpful to the success of our project was my microphone, Logic, which was on the computer in the recording studio, Brian’s camera, and the camera equipment from the DTLT. These all definitely made this project a success and with different resources, I don’t think we would have achieved the same quality for our project. We are very grateful for any outside equipment that we had the opportunity to use, because it helped us to create this wonderful project.

Schedule

As the semester began to wind down, Brian and I definitely fell behind our target dates. We spent so much time recording the song that we fell out of posting updates because we were both a little frustrated with how things were going. It definitely was not an easy task trying to even record the song, much less, to stay on schedule. The majority of our time was taken by recording the song and we were limited in the amount of time that we had to film each of the students. Filming each of the students, took way longer than we expected, but it helped by giving us a lot of options to choose from. In the end, I think the pressure of having to have the finished product completed so soon really made us focus the majority of our attention to the project.

Outcomes

According to the assessment section of my Final Project Proposal, The success of our project is hour clear both, the song and video are, whether or not the video portrays UMW at its core, and the synchronization of the song and video. For the first statute, clarity, I think that we were successful in our efforts as you can clearly hear the words we are saying in the song and that the video is not blurry unless the effect was intended. Both, the song and video were clear, therefore, we satisfied the first requirement. The second statute, representation of Mary Washington’s core, I also think we achieved. I think showing the people who are not always represented or presented by the school, we were able to show what UMW is really about. It’s not all of the flashiness of the varsity programs, but more of the passion that lives inside of the students. The final statute, synchronization, was definitely achieved as the cuts for the video match the beats of the song. When the song would have hard hits, the video had jump cuts that added a serious tone. The overall synchronization of the song and video was superb which added to the entire success of the project and the positive assessment of the project.

Executive Summary

All in all the Eagle Nation song and video created by Brian and I was a success. We were able to show the talent that goes unnoticed on campus while also showing places on campus where people spend a lot of time. At the same time that we were showing of the talents of our fellow Eagles, we were exhibiting pride in our University and from the reaction on campus, we definitely enhanced the pride of UMW. While there were both ups and downs while conducting this project, Brian and I definitely learned a lot about how to work together and how to be more time sensitive. We used all of the resources necessary to bring forth a project that will help to raise the pride throughout Eagle Nation and to show that we are more than what meets the eye. As we did fall behind schedule, we were able to put a lot of effort into the video at the right time in order to show off our project. We successfully provided UMW with another means of esteem for our university to be able to display and be proud of.