The first step of the final production phase is to evaluate.
Sometimes getting started can be the hardest part.
In my project, I have been continually evaluating where I going with my work. I still have a lot of editing and tweaking to do on my project. As my work continues I have encountered obstacles, as is expected. One of my biggest obstacles has been slow communication with interview subjects. During the final production phase, it is important to understand your skills and abilities. In crunch time understanding what you can do quickly and what will take you more time allows you to budget your time accordingly. What will push my project to be the best it can be is having a visually compelling video. This requires proper planning and execution. In an article written by Tom Kenny he discusses the importance of imagery. While he is focusing on images on websites is message also translates to video work. “Poor use of imagery can really drag the design of a site down and poor quality images (saving with too much compression) can make a design look messy and unprofessional.”
Chasing Creativity
This is the time to dive deeply into your work and make the adjustments that will take your work from adequate to excellent.
Let your personality shine through in your work through the effort you demonstrate.
In this final production phase, I am putting my energy into infusing personality and personal taste into my project. This is the opportunity to indulge my creative energy into the details. This type of work requires acute attention and dedication. I am planning color schemes and film locations. “Data storytelling is the blending of two worlds: hard data and human communication” (Katy French). Data storytelling is an important element of my work that I am working to incorporate. It is important to me that my work is taken seriously because it is about a topic that often isn’t.
Reflect
The last step of the final production phase is to reflect on your progress.
Understanding where you’ve intended to go and where you ended up can help you see a path moving forward.
My project has evolved tremendously over the semester. It is closer to my original plans than some plans that developed along the way through. I am on track to reach my goals. What I have learned about producing a comprehensive project is that having strong contacts makes your work run smoothly more than any other component of your work can. I have also learned the importance of having a strong narrative from the beginning and refining this work first and foremost.
This project has had a long life for me, considering it is something I started Fall semester 2018. I knew that I wanted to expand the project into a multimedia long form, but I didn’t know what a turn it would take.
I wanted my project to speak to all, but I found that goal unrealistic and instead had to find my niche market. Those interested in Global Citizenship are the ones who will find my site and what my site should be doing is taking the role of guiding those specific people to more information. The information I provide cannot just be listed in a aesthetically pleasing format, it must also grab the attention of my readers. I must create “unique, thoughtfully designed, premium experiences and stories.”
Global Citizenship Brand
I am now using the phrase “Explore the World” which I have incorporated into a still image that a friend of mine took. I am using this to spear head the changes I have made in my storyline.
PC: Sophia Pessagno & Edited by Kirsten Mintun
My story started off with how I wanted people to be able to spark an interest in global citizenship without having to leave home. Slowly but surely, my story has begun to shift. While I do want people to be knowledgable global citizens from wherever they call home, I also want them to expand their horizons. In my opinion the way to do this is to get out of the home! There are many things to be learned from the world and the best way to learn is to experience. I am still sticking true to my belief that people can work on their global citizenship from anywhere and do not need lavish, extensive international trips, I now believe that it isn’t all about researching from the comfort of one’s bed. In fact, global citizenship isn’t really about comfort at all. The comfort zone can be limiting to both body and mind so I have found the need to encourage people to go beyond what is comfortable. It is time to “Explore the World” and that doesn’t have to mean physically travel the world. I found that my writing subtly includes these ideas, but it is my video that I think hits the “call to action” part of my story right on the nose.
Yet again my vision shifted and I did not mind. In fact, I have thoroughly enjoyed getting to think more on what it is to be a global citizen. The idea can start small, by trying something new and it can be as easy as trying a new, authentic cuisine from another culture. Culture expands beyond the land you can travel to- Culture is within people and luckily, the US has a large melting pot of people from various cultures and beliefs.
Ethos, Pathos & Logos
In a past reflection I included an infographic with statistics about the world. Now I am playing around with different ways of incorporating the data into my website, particularly using GIFs. I’m working on establishing my official color scheme so that I can utilize eye drawing colors within the GIF. I am hoping to create a sense of credibility by using the skills of data journalism. There can be draw backs to statistically driven stories, but luckily my story has my voice.
I truly believe that I have succeeded in the task to be human, which is to “Be trustworthy, transparent, and approachable with human interaction preferred over machine interaction.” My story no longer lacks the human interaction, and it has by far exceeded my expectations for my end product. My story is emotional in that it peaks a person’s curiosity. A new figurative door is opened for my audience, because they have an idea of how they can kick start their global citizenship.
Lastly, producing this project has taught me to value logic above all. I very easily over think things and I often overcomplicate tasks. Throughout many of course readings readings, I have come across a few ideas that have resonated with me; “Users Want Clarity & Simplicity” and that less can be more. I can have less content, but have a better project, because I can put more time into what I already have.
Now that the body copy of my story is edited and well organized, it is time to focus on the details of my Wix site that will really elevate the aesthetic of my overall project. Seeing as though my story is centered around my own graphic designs, it is crucial that the design of my Wix site mirror the design elements found in my branding of Visit Copenhagen.
Beyond the Template
Wix has hundreds of great templates to choose from, but don’t be afraid to use those templates as a jumping off point for your website design. The templates lay some sharp-looking groundwork, but it is up to you to really tweak your site and make it your own. I had previously only ever utilized Wix to create straight forward sites for business or academic use, so getting to learn and play around with the more dynamic and interesting graphic elements that Wix has to offer was really fun. This YouTube video offers a step-by-step tutorial of how to incorporate motion graphics into your website. This clip was really helpful for my particular project when I was looking to use motion graphics in place of more animated gifs of my graphic designs.
Words in Motion
This article from awwwards.com was extremely helpful in laying out all of the design elements that take a website to the next level. One of the first tips is to consider the power of contrast. While this typically means using contrasting typefaces or type sizes for the copy text and the heading text, this can also extend to include using motion graphics in your headings. The bulk of your writing that has to remain still and legible can be easily contrasted by a header text that moves in a subtle motion.
Designing in Layers
As a graphic designer, I am very familiar with the notion of creating designs in multiple layers. The Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop software not only utilizes layers as an organizational tool, but as a pivotal design tool. Adding subtle design elements on individual layers creates a truly dynamic and dimensional end result as opposed to visiting a website with merely a white background with black text on top. The Youtube video referenced above really made me open my mind to using layers in my website design much like I do with my own graphic designs. During my time creating a visual identity for Visit Copenhagen, I really played with layering my illustrative elements with my textual elements. One of my favorite examples of the dimensions that layering brings to a design is the event poster that I designed for the Copenhagen SlutWalk.
Taking this existing model of layering the translucent illustration of the “slut” over bold black text was a great jumping off point for the design of my website. I knew that I could layer less opaque graphic elements over bold parts of my body copy in order to create that dimensional, layered effect that I wanted to capture.
While platforms like Wix and WordPress provide you with excellent web design templates, don’t be afraid to make your own adjusts to those templates to really elevate your design to the next level.
Today, I finally sat down with all materials for this project to see how they fit together, and for the first time, I am seeing this project about branding come to life.
A screenshot of the final stages of video production.
Production is done, and now we head into the post-production phase. The narrative is 90% done, the graphics are 85% done, and the video post-production will be complete by the end of this week. With the final product due next week, this final editing stage will decide the success of my story after publication.
Comprehension and Retention
According to my last post, I was stuck in an internal crisis on how to effectively brand my project, and you’ll be happy to know that I finally I decided on a color scheme to integrate into my design elements. While I toiled with the idea for a while, would these colors be “too girly” or too distracting? But, this story details my experience and I needed colors that suited me and my experiences.
So here is my color scheme:
While I had an ample amount of “data” I was struggling to see how all of this information could be delivered, and while my original idea was to only incorporate quotes I quickly realized that the user experience would play into how well this article was received.
I wanted my story to have “the best of both the analytical and emotional experience” and with help from this article, I learned that were tools and resources that would help me create graphics, that would help in my credibility as a writer and with the ultimate point, I am trying to get across.
My focus shifted to three elements that Katy French says “Will Make Messages Stick”
Comprehension: “Our brains are hardwired to process visuals faster than language. Being able to “see” the data makes it much easier to understand. Coupled with the language-based context, the data comes to life.”
I needed to make graphics. These came in the form of an infographic, charts, and putting a spin on the traditional quote
Retention: “Information visually processed makes it easier to recall later.”
My narrative is right at 4,500 words. It’s a long read, so by adding these elements it only adds legitimacy to my arguments and assertions if my readers can recall previously stated information
Appeal: “Data visualization is visually stimulating, making the content more attractive to the viewer”
Keeping consistency with my color scheme and choice in typography
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Next Steps
As I move into the final stages of post-production I am figuring out where to publish my story.
I am currently editing my site as I want to give it a facelift before graduation. My thought process behind this is that it would be the first ‘major’ piece on my site and I would be able to gain interaction and engagement on my site if I link this article on my social media accounts.
Idea #2: Publishing it on Medium
Medium is a more credible source than a personal post from my personal site, and I obviously could then link the story to my personal site. So I am not worried about that. However, After doing some research it seems to be slightly harder to get community engagement since it is a popular site for bloggers, and I do not intend on becoming an active blogger on Medium. However, there are ample resources on how to build an online presence and format posts.
As I enter the final phase of my multimedia project, I feel as though I have several little aspects of the project to complete. First, I have to nail down the written portion of my project, which I believe will be very easy after already going through two different drafts. I am excited to tweak and edit the words to finally finish the development of my story.
Then I have to continue gathering the multimedia elements of my story. I have completed my first multimedia element which is comprised of the pictures of Winnie, Esia Atta, and Joyce. I have developed captions that fit the pictures, while also going along with the narrative. I feel really good about my first multimedia element, as these photos are not only beautiful, but form a deep part of my Ghana story.
The Struggles Begin
My second multimedia element is making progress, as I will be interviewing three people from our trip this week! I am excited to interview them and hear about what their favorite memories were from our trip, while also looking at their photos. I believe that pictures hold deep memories, therefore I am excited to see which pictures they choose that correspond with a certain memory.
Although I am excited to interview these people, I know that compiling the pictures and interviews into a video will be a challenge for me. I am not the best at videography, therefore creating this second multimedia element intimidates me! I have confidence
This is a picture of me and Mary Kate Frey, who is one of the people I am interviewing for my second multimedia element!
that I will get it done while also making it beautiful.
Another struggle I know I will encounter is publishing everything on a multimedia platform. I believe I will be using Medium but I could also use Wix! When it comes to publishing my story on one of these sites, I know that I want the story to appear as engaging as possible. I know that I am properly equipped to utilize these sites to publish my story, but I still have nerves! I know that these will subside when I begin posting the story.
The Final Phase
As I enter the final phase of publishing and tweaking, I feel a little more at peace knowing that I have finished a large majority of my project. I am continuing to encourage myself, while also making small tweaks, in little bits of time, rather than getting overwhelmed by the whole project. I found that the article, “What is your website for” that we read in class gave me some good ideas on how to publish my story on Mediumor Wix. Reading this article last week made me feel more equipped to finish this segment of the long-form project.
I believe that this final phase has to be the most fun part of the entire project, just because we are getting so close to the final product! Being able to display all of the hard work we have done is honestly exciting! Although I am nervous about publishing on a platform, I know that it will all work out with time, as well as trial and error. A quote from the article, “What is your website for” that made me excited about publishing my story was:
“Your website is where you can create unique reading experiences. With more of your content going to the platforms, use your website to deliver an experience that is different to everyone else’s…. You can experiment with new forms of storytelling. You can bring in third party technologies to create experiences for your audience that they can’t get from the platforms. That’s what your website is for.”
All I could ask for is for my story to be published on a platform that is engaging, while utilizing technology to make my storytelling impactful. I have confidence knowing that I will be able to do that!
As I enter the final phase of my personal multimedia project, I am starting to fine tune my production. I am still running into some problems and still having to critically evaluate how I can tackle that barrier. I am still needing to re-record my audio and shift the storyline ever so slightly to compensate for lacking some images. Curiosity motivates me to undertake these huge projects, like this one. I have 367 raw videos that I am trying to condense and tell a story of travel and admiration. I am currently still grabbing videos from my archive to add to the storyline. It’s a tedious task but I believe it will add another level to my storyline. With music, voice-overs, videos, stills, and moving transitions I am starting to see my final goal.
From “Good to Great”
Applying the thought processes of W. Ian O’Byrne on Digital Portfolios, I can better look at my project with an unbiased eye. O’Byrne suggests to:
Evidence — Show me what you’ve learned. Individually or collaboratively collect, archive, and present evidence of learning over time.
Reflection — Show me what you think about your learning. Students consider and discuss their perspectives on their work process and product. This documentation of thinking helps develop metacognitive skills and comprehension of content.
Assessment — Let’s talk about your evidence and reflection. This ongoing discussion focuses on feedback about the assembled materials in the portfolio. This feedback loop may be provided by others (instructor, peers) or in some cases may be a self-assessment.
O’Byrne, Medium
Three main ideas of thought when assessing your portfolio are also applicable to multimedia projects. Look at your evidence (your digital media) how can you edit so that you tell the story you want. Reflect on the edits you make and discuss with others. Create a better story and build off what you have. Assess the final production and receive feedback from peers and self evaluate your work. Through this process, you can create something good to something great. Being able to continually criticize and fine-tune a piece allows for growth. You not only will create a great piece that tells a fluid story but you will also be able to learn new skills that will let your piece to reflect the time and thought you put in.
I look forward to hearing feedback from Dr. Kwami (my instructor) on my long narrative so I can re-evaluate and adjust accordingly. Editing is a constant cycle and I believe it is a crucial part of creating a project that is great.
Moving from the pre-production phase to the actually production, I asked myself what is the most important thing in my media project. It took me no time to give an answer: The Story. A boring story won’t attract any reader even with great rhetorics, just like a stuffed bunny with pretty appearance doesn’t compensate its lack of content.
Since I have already planned for the multimedia contents I am going to gather during the production, the next step was to follow the blueprint. The first thing I did for the production phrase was to schedule and to conduct my interviews with my participants. The topic I am focusing on was the Chinese students’ experience at Furman University. Therefore, I designed the environment for the interviews to encourage Chinese students to speak out their real feelings and memorable experiences in college.
Choosing the Material
I started with my most familiar friends, which are my roommates, Miss M and Miss T. It was a Saturday night; we were sitting together in the living room and watching a television show together. The conversation flowed to our daily trivial in that week. Miss M then complained about the difficulties she met when applying for the drivers’ license.
“You went out early in the morning but got nothing done when you came back.”
I could recall her tone even for now; it was great for making people sympathetic. I realized that it was an opportunity for them to open up so I started to ask more questions about their thoughts. I was inspired by this conversation to use the second person narrative for my storytelling.
I finally found a suitable material to sew the cover for the bunny.
Gathering the Content
Soon after the first conversation, I participated in three major events involving many Chinese students. The first and the third ones were the recent CLPs on Chinese performance and the international dancing show. These activities gave me insights into the acculturation levels and the efforts to promote Chinese culture among Chinese students. The other event was the Lunar New Year Banquet at Koi Chinese Cuisine. There were around twenties Chinese students presented at that night including from the first-year freshmen to the fifth-year seniors at Furman. As many pope might have known, the dining culture in China is closely associated with group conversations, especially during the festival banquets. The topic ranged from new year wishes to the sharing of fun moments. This brought many positive aspects of international education experience. In addition to my own experiences, I interviewed seven other Chinese students about their individual stories at Furman. Most of the interviews were conducted in Chinese so it took me a few days to translate and to transcript these interviews.
Now the a bag of Poly-fil is ready to be stuffed into the toy bunny.
Piecing the Parts Together
Structure is a crucial part of a story. The book Show Your Work! by Austin Kleon introduced three ways to structure the story as following.
Image in Show Your Work!
Since my stories were gathered from different people and with different contexts, the structure is extremely important for attracting the readers’ attentions and for guiding them through the story. When I finished my first draft, I did not realized that my narrative curve was like the one of Metamorphosis with a upwards tail in the end. There were too much negative aspects in the narrative and the tone became monotonous after a while. I am currently working on editing the plots to make the story more interesting. After all, I believe the key to success is to keep improving.
After this step, the bunny should have its complete shape…
Adding Some Decoration
The other important aspect of this project is the multimedia elements. The biggest challenge I have in the current stage of production is how to incorporate sound, images, videos, and infographics into the written narrative of the story. For the next phase, I will spend most of my time solving this problem.
The first step of the production phase is to get started.
Sometimes getting started can be the hardest part.
Put your pen to paper your finger to mouse pad or your camera to capture. However, this looks for you – just do it. It doesn’t have to be perfect. You might not even use what you first create, but create something. Just getting started can make your vision become more clear. You are going to generate new ideas and you are going to throw out old ones. But this is a time to be fearless. Take the first step. Don’t be too concerned at this point about the quality, and see what you produce. In my individual project getting started has been intimidating. At the beginning of my work on my individual project, I questioned if the story I was pursuing was plausible. When you take on a heavy and meaningful topic such as sexual assault you can become caught up in the fear of not sharing the message gracefully or in the right way. In Austin Kleon’s book Show Your Workhe states in big bold letters “YOU DON’T HAVE TO BE A GENIUS.” I had to remind myself that my work doesn’t need to be perfect right off the bad, and it’s okay if I make some mistakes. Any issues can be addressed as I proceeded. Peer review is a great asset for discovering errors you might have in the form you choose or the way you share a story. Ellen Lupton describes the use of others insight in her book Design is Storytelling“When developing a new product, service, or app, designers often seek knowledge from users.” Peer review and insight from my audience will be a crucial element of my project in later stages and choosing peer reviewers wisely will give me confidence in sharing my work.
Get Your Hands Dirty
Second, once you have taken the first step to get things moving roll with that momentum.
Play like a little kid in the mud.
Let it carry you forward along your timeline of tasks. Be methodical in your work and try to stay your steps and timelines as closely as possible. Of course, your timeline and steps might shift over time and you might add or subtract elements as you see your vision coming to life. Get your hands dirty – heck, get your whole body dirty immerse yourself in your work and bring your vision to life.
Getting my hands dirty in my project has been moving slowly. Now that we have all our camera equipment I am excited to engage with visual elements of my project. Above you can see a gif I made with tweets from the hashtag #whyididntreport.
Get Problem Solving
Along the way, you will inevitably encounter obstacles. These obstacles may be big or small. Regardless, you are going to have to problem solve to surmount them.
Never be fearful of problem-solving sometimes the solution brings about the ultimate improvements
Problem-solving for me so far in my project has mostly surrounded my mindset. In feeling self-conscious about my work my problem solving has involved exploring the work of others to build my confidence. In my later searches, I have found great inspiration and outstanding storytelling. I have even worked on research communicating with sheriff offices throughout South Carolina to learn about rape kit procedure.
Did your mother ever tell you your eyes were too big for your stomach after ordering a meal you simply could not finish? Or that you bit off more than you could chew trying to finish it? Well, mine certainly did. And not much has changed. I have this perpetual tendency to approach projects from the most out of left field direction. I like to take the scenic route when getting to a destination, which is the root of my struggle.
This project means more to me than just getting a letter in the gradebook, it’s an opportunity for me to manifest something that has been boiling inside of me since November. I appreciate the breadth of this project and want to make it as beautiful as possible; yet, that just may be what is causing me to run into ruts. I am trying to bite off more than I could chew. I hypothesize too many ideas at once and get wrapped up in the ideation of production. The problems I have encountered in my production phase have primarily been a result of trying to get too complicated with things, belaboring my creative aspirations, coming up with too many ideas and losing track of a common theme, and ultimately trying to perfect the story in my head before actually putting it on paper.
CONTENT
I knew I wanted to break up my story into three different chapters: 1. Novelty, 2. Mundanity, and 3. Beauty. That being said, incorporating multimedia elements to break up the narrative was a necessity, for reasons of logic, structure, function, creativity, clarity, engagement, and aesthetic. This was where I brainstormed my first whirlwind of ideas on how exactly I wanted to implement this. I explored a variety content online to try and find further inspiration in my production process. But, I still need to consider the fact that my story is pertaining to a particular audience: Furman. I think that is where I have fallen short in terms of my content, both written and multimedia. I need to do a better job tailoring the artifacts I am choosing to use to appeal or resonate with my future readers. More than anything, I want this to be a story that people WANT to read. That being said, I did learn the value of asking for help where the suit fits. I am by no means a graphic designer. I’m a creative thinker with strategic hands. SO, I decided to use my network and find outlets of support. I shared my ideas for how to break up the three sections of my story with a few graphically skilled friends around the block and asked for assistance. They were thrilled to help! You never know just how much you can improve by using your network as an asset until you open your mouth. My biggest assets in my life have been people, so why not use them to help create assets for my story??
CHAPTERS
To set the scene, I will begin my story with a quote from the one and only Einstein:
The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom the emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand wrapped in awe, is as good as dead; his eyes are closed.
Albert Einstein
Then, each chapter will have a paralaxing entry with an animated image serving as their introduction or visual header if you will. Each chapter has its own methodical theme with a hidden representation of the word itself. The visuals will be followed by a clear definition of the word to make it clear that the story is transitioning to new depths.
Chapter 2: Mundanity
In terms of the other chapters, I have shots for Novelty but have yet to cement a powerful idea for bueauty. Both will include practically identical layouts: using an image in the footage for the first letter, followed by a visual and auditory typewriter effect of the letters spelling the whole word. I am working with friends to get those polished.
COLOR
I began to toy with color schemes. At first, I instinctively thought to carry over the same warm aesthetic of the personal blog I made whilst abroad, which is the source of some of the anecdotal discoveries I include in my story, plus the blog will be linked somewhere within the narrative. I thought this would maintain a motif and I liked the warmth that it provided to an otherwise cold, curt topic. I want to add a sense of endearment to my story, and I figured I could do this through the power of my multimedia elements. However, other ideas were battling for room in the creative side of my brain and I began to feel fogged with too many ideas at the forefront at once. I began to realize that the source of my headache was from overthinking all these ideas and constantly (and I mean constantly) running them through my mind and thinking about each creative prospect or implication, hypothesizing what things COULD look like without actually implementing them to see what they DO look like. I was not initiating trial and error and it was killing my process. I’ve always been told that it’s never a bad thing to have too many ideas, but overthinking is certainly a burden, a time consuming burden. So, to escape this polluted arena of thought, I tested out one of my alternative color scheme ideas: BLACK&WHITE. Having a B&W theme was something that crossed my mind right away when starting this project. I mean, what’s more mundane than a lack of color? The only thing I am worried about with eliminating the aspect of color is that it is a crucial element of the raw beauty or sheer simplicity in some of the pictures. See below. I tested out both to see which I like better and, to be perfectly honest, I still haven’t fully decided, but I’m leaning towards B&W. We shall see!
Processed with VSCO with a4 preset
Processed with VSCO with fn16 preset
Processed with VSCO with fn16 preset
Processed with VSCO with a4 preset
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I’m a firm believer in the idea that there’s always room for improvement, but I would say I have achieved quite a bit in my multimedia production process. I have learned that my biggest feats with this project may be the result of ditching my original ideas and coloring a little more inside the lines. Now that I have a good idea of what images I will be using to represent the messages conveyed in my story, I will be focussing on the flow, outline, and direction of my narrative. I want it to be easy to follow, using a Z format with imagery, and also have a place in the minds and hearts of Furman students.
In my experience, the pre production phase and the production phase have proven to be incredibly similar and here’s why. I am continuing to find long form media that uses multimedia and I have lists of what I like for inspiration. I am researching long forms often so that I can expose myself to the most content, templates and formats.
Moving Forward
As I have continued on to creating the content and deciding how best to use multimedia, my vision is constantly changing. With the implementation of ideas taken from various sources of inspiration, I have started to find what works and what doesn’t. Throughout the production phase I find myself constantly asking myself,
Where am I?
Okay, hear me out. I know where I am. I am physically sitting in my bed working on this assignment, but in my writing I want to know, where am I? Where is my voice? My story? My influence? This question is one I fought with through my pre production phase as well, but I thought it would be easier. Essays are easy. They are informative and formal, whereas the world of writing for the internet can be intimate and influential.
I am struggling to write in this informal format even in this very blog post. With this post I am practicing what it can mean to have MY VOICE be the driver of the story. My thought process matters in such a personal setting, because I am what and who will make this post different and interesting- this process I struggle with. And because of that I have turned to outside help.
I have my writing content finished. Now its about fine tuning it. Making it MY STORY. And damn has it been hard, but it has also been extremely rewarding. I feel like the creation of content that showcases me has made me more proud of my work and my passions. I want people to read my story and I want to make a difference in their ways of thinking about Global Citizenship. My own passion feels stronger than ever, all because of how I am being taught to write the story. It’s all much more interesting when I get to make it my own story.
Execution
I conducted an interview with Ben Efird, Assistant Director of Furman’s Study Away office and he gave me such wonderful material to work with. I didn’t even see the potential it has until recently. Beforehand I edited the video to fit the time constraints of an assignment and did little to make it very engaging. I came across the same problem in the video editing as I did in my writing. The video is informational and interesting in content, but not visually stimulating. Now how do I put my own twist onto someone else’s words? How do I make someone’s voice fit my story? The answer is simple.
Experience.
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I have photos and videos from all over the world. Truly my travel experience is what ignited my passion for global citizenship so why not start with some of that footage to take them on that same journey of the glamour and excitement that then turns into something more meaningful and reflective. This is how I will make my video reflect
along with the narrative. I feel really good about my first multimedia element, as these photos are not only beautiful, but form a deep part of my Ghana story. 
Advanced Multimedia Storytelling 