What a week!

So this week has almost beat me. First on Monday I was extremely sick and had to get a replacement to produce sports. On Tuesday my teacher in my Lithics class decides to expand the assignment that the class was suppose to have done for Thursday. So instead of an outline on our research projects, it was changed to a 10 page starter on our research. So I had to rush to get the paper portion of the project started... no simple outline anymore. I had to check out several books from the library, I even went to the public library but had no luck. I spent ALL night Tuesday working on it and finally got a little sleep from 6 am-9 am. Wednesday I had to go back to the library for more sources and I sat down and got to work on the paper only taking a break to eat the food my boyfriend brought me. I couldn't work my KOMU.com shift either, so I will have to make that up some other time. Thanks goodness at about 4 am on Wednesday I finished my research methodology for Lithics. However I was not done because I also needed to score my script and practice my sonnet for Vocal Techniques class because Thursday was also final performance day for that class. So at 5:30 am I was able to get to bed. I woke at 10 am and got showered and ready for my Vocal Techniques course at 11 am. I had my performance and I think it went pretty well considering I am the only non-theater major in the class! At 12:15 that class ended and I headed back to my room to get changed into my suit and to grab some grub. I left my house at 1 pm and got to KOMU quickly. I grabbed all my gear; camera, tri-pod and batteries and then was on my way to the Hearnes Center. I had to meet the coach of the gymnastics team at 1:40 pm for an interview for a package I have been working on. The coach actually didn't show until 2 pm. I got the interview though (finally at 2:30) and also an interview with a couple of the girls. I was able to get some b-roll during the practice and then at 3:15 I headed back to my car to get to my Lithics class at 3:30. I needed to get to the Lithics class to turn in my Methodology. After loading all the gear into my car it was only like 3:20 so I was good to get to class on time, all I had to do was drive to CCH and park and walk to class. I could do it. WRONG! As I started to drive away from the Hearnes I didn't even get out of the parking lot when my car puttered, the check battery light came on, and then it died. I tried several times to start it but no luck. I called Micah (my boyfriend) and he was able to find some jumper cables to come help me. First though he got me and dropped me off at class. I had to leave my car dead in the middle in the middle of the Hearnes parking lot. I made it to my Lithics class at 3:50 pm, only 20 minutes late. At least my teacher was cool and didn't take points off for being late. I think he could tell by my suit, sweaty face, and panicked eyes that I had had a bad day! So while in class Micah and his roommate went to jump start my car. When I got out of class at 4:30 they still had not got it started. Sadly, they had to call Triple A to tow it to CCH. The guy with Triple A said it wasn't the battery but either a fuel filter or plug (or something to that nature). In short my car is now dead because fuel is not getting to the engine, but I can't drive it anywhere to go get fixed. In fact, as I sit here typing this I can see my car sadly outside my window. So because my car caused so many problems the hour I thought I would have to eat some grub with Micah was turned into time spent on getting my car here. I ended up eating Mac and cheese which was not enough substance to balance out all the stuff I already had in my stomach. While studying and working through the night I forgot to mention I had consumed 3 coca-colas, 1 big Red Bull, and a Starbucks coffee without any real food. I believe a pop tart was the only food I had found time to scarf down. So anyhow, Micah left at 6 for work, and I had 2 hours until I had to be at the rec. center, so I passed out. I slept for 2 hours and then had to get up to go play basketball. Believe me, I didn't feel physical well enough to play basketball but because I am the Coordinator of Rec. Sports for CCH I was the captain of this team. I had to be there to sign in and also because of the small number of girls I had to play if only to make sure my friends didn't die! So I played and actually, for being sick, tired and starving I didn't do too bad. We lost the game but I had a couple baskets and at least I got a work-out this week since I had not been able to fit one in. After basketball I got back to the house at 10:00 pm and decided it was time to eat. So my friend and I cooked lemon pepper chicken and pasta salad for supper. It was 11:30 pm before we ate but it was worth it. I stayed up a little while sorting out my schedule, watching House, and working on some things for my I-pod group because of the meeting the next day before I hit the hay at 1:00 am. At about 8:00 am this morning however I woke feeling terrible, I don't know if it was the combination of being sick, stressed and tired that did it, but I was sick! I missed a ministry I do, which is going to the hospital to visit with people (I figured if I were sick I didn't need to bring that into the hospital). I pretty much slept all morning and had my alarm set for noon so I could get up and shower and get to my capstone class. I woke at 1:50 pm having somehow managed to have laid on my cellphone to stop it from going off. So I realized I had also missed my capstone meeting. Awesome... what a week. After realizing I had missed the meeting I rushed to my computer to find e-mails from Jennifer Koveleski about the meeting. After answering those I decided to blog...as a way to get all this stuff out of my head, to cope with my crazy week and to also make whoever reads this chuckle to themselves. All in all, it was a crazy busy week BUT I do feel it could have been worse. All I need is a little medicine, some food and a couple days to get myself caught up on sleep and homework. YAY for the weekend!

A lil bit of editing practice

I had to speak the other night at church so I created a little video just using I-movie and rather enjoyed it. I have attached that video below.

In fact I ALWAYS enjoy editing video and playing around with new tricks and ideas. Which is why I am sure that I will get loads of enjoyment out of flash, it is pretty awesome and since I am now officially "dangerous", I will most definitely be practicing around on that some more.

Dabbling in Flash!

Today on my KOMU.com shift my partner, Phil, and I decided to get a head start on learning how to use Adobe Flash. It was a bit confusing at first, but we were able to get an interactive map up and running. Neither of us had ever used Flash, and since we haven't officially been trained on Adobe Flash, all we had to go off of were online instructions. Phil sat at the computer and I was at his side trying to read instructions. Our goal was to create a map of Missouri with 4 different locations of Gluten Free Bakeries marked. We wanted to also have it work out so that when someone scrolled over the City's mark that the Bakery's name and phone number would pop up. We only had to start completely over once! ha! But finally we were able to complete the map, preview it to make sure it worked, saved it and eventually load it into ACM. It was nice to get a look at Flash before our official training by Jen, maybe we won't be completely lost when that time comes.

Click here to check out the map!

Sports Producing and the MU vs. KU basketball game!

Well tonight was my third night of producing sports. The shifts are longer ranging from 1:30 or 2 to about 11 or 11:30, but they are worth it! I have been training with Ashley Farrell and she has taught me a lot. By far the most exciting night was tonight though. We were sadly not able to attend the MU vs KU border showdown but we WERE able to watch it, cut highlights, and produce the sports show for Chris Gervino. I think tonight was a great learning experience because I was caught up in the hustle and bustle of the evenings event and there was no time to piddle around. I think it helped me to stay focussed and really key in on what needed done. I also loved the energy in the sports department. I know as journalists we are suppose to not be bias but I was not the only one who was cheering when MU's Zaire Taylor put up a game winning shot. It was a great game and a great night for me to get some truly hands on, in the moment type training. I think the show turned out well and I will be able to handle myself in similar situations from now on. The fast-pace of the KOMU sports room was something that made the night for me, even if I wasn't at the game cheering with my peers.

Experiments with Light-- my Photography side

So I have been doing freelance photography for years now and I learn a little more as I go. I have been in 3 different photography classes through the Art Department at MU and now I am in a photojournalism course. I love it! I recently tried working more with long-exposure times. By leaving my shutter open longer I was able to get images like this:








But HERE is what I want to be able to do sometime! The photographs on this website I have linked are AMAZING!!!

Web Work from KOMU.com

I have been working for the past 3 weeks on KOMU.com. I help edit stories and post links and web extras. I have posted a few stories from different reporters.

Below are some examples of the work I have done:


This is a "Your Health" story that I posted

MoDOT Stimulus story edited by me

Pharmacy story edited by me

KCOU story edited by me

Job Cuts story edited by me

I-touch project

This week two students from our project group met with Brian Brooks, Jen and Keith Politte to talk about the ideas we have for our project. I found what we talked about to be real exciting and I really believe this project is going to turn out well. We are helping in gathering content and developing an application that will be available next fall to incoming freshman. Through the program on the I-touch freshman students will be able to guide themselves through campus with interactive GPS maps, as well as each journalism building. The other students and I will be in charge of filming these video tours of buildings as well as other introductory videos. Other cool ideas were to include a list of food hot spots around campus, a list of places where student charge works as well as emergency info. and important phone numbers on campus. Stanford already has this application available through I-Tunes for their students and I believe that our group will be able to take it a step further. Efforts will have to be made by several other people to get this project off the ground and running but both Keith and Jen seemed to know just the right people to talk to. Brian Brooks was very enthusiastic when it came to this project and will be helping us with finding funding.

As an added bonus to being in such a great project group each one of us will be allowed to check out an I-Touch from the J-school library for the semester. I already have mine and have to say it is quite fun to fiddle around with. I can't wait to see what comes about from our work through the semester.