Kyle Breen Senior Project: Proctor PRO tips

 Today May 24th, was the last day of senior project. I started off the day by driving to my beach house and rye and setting up on my deck to do some final edits to my video and finish writing my final reflection. I can say now that my video is in its final form after I watched it multiple times today. I spent the rest of the day reflecting on the entirety of senior project as I wrote my paper. I actually enjoyed writing the paper as it was a good recap of the fun that I have had the last 2 weeks. Im looking forward to express fest tomorrow where I will be able to finally share the product that I've spent the last 2 weeks constructing. It will be interesting to see what other peoples opinions are on my video. It will be fun to share the video with the parents of the people who I interviewed. I have enjoyed writing down my journey throughout senior project and may honestly invest in a journal of some sort to write down my everyday endeavors moving forwards. Im happy to be done but de...

 Today May 20th, I began to navigate iMovie to start place all of my edited clips in there. I think the hardest thing about the initial editing was removing some background noise from my interviews that I completed in the library. First I went in and calibrated all my videos to the tone of the interviewees skin, this made it so the background looked brighter in comparison making all of my interview days look golden. Secondly I went through and made sure that I was putting the people in the correct order, as I wanted to create a good mix of boys and girls in each question. Lastly I made sure that the background music wasn't too loud in comparison to my interviewees voices, I found that the right balance was a very very low amount of music to a much larger quantity of voice. Im starting to really get the hang of iMovie as I move into my last week of senior project. Not to brag but I may be the next Spielberg... project hours may 20th-5 total project hours 56.25

Today May 23rd, I completed the editing process for my final cut of my senior project video. It was definitely a lot of work today as I spent almost all the day editing, other than a short 3 hour gym session. I feel as though I really got into the swing of things when I just sat down and got the editing done. I added a lot to my interviews, creating a multimedia masterpiece. I'm not saying I should be in the voting for the oscars but I most certainly should be a honorable mention. I am very very happy to be done with editing because now I can finally see it all together. This project is coming to a close with express fest on Wednesday and I really am proud of what I have created. I would like to thank everyone who made my video possible, a huge thanks to Ryan Graumann for overseeing the process and giving me the b roll I needed to really make this video perfect. Reflecting on senior project in its entirety the editing pieces I really see as something I could use in the future. Navi...

 In the second week of senior project, I rapped up the interview portion of my project and began editing the footage that I had received. I started off Monday interviewing Brynne Makeckhnie in Slocumb hall where I used the blue ceramics wall as my background, thanks to Kate Austin. This week I really became familiar with the editing process, as im currently using iMovie. Lucky enough iMovie is not exactly "Rocket Science" so I was able to figure it out pretty quick. I began the process by sorting my clips and cutting them into sections. Some of my answers were better in certain parts so finding those good parts was really the beggining. On Tuesday I drove to campus to get some footage of Tucker, Tate, and Josh playing baseball, so I could layer the video of Josh getting a hit over the audio from his interview answer relating to baseball. I enjoyed filming the baseball players as it gave me an excuse to watch them play. The rest of the days of the week I spent reviewing and ed...

 Today May 19th, I stayed home with the intent of sitting down and grinding out the majority of my editing. I spent the majority of the day separating audio from video and finding photos of campus to put over my questions. As I go through my edited footage finding other types of media to thread into the video is important. At this point in my project their is not many exciting things going on, it is mostly editing that is quite laborious. All I can say is that Ryan was not exaggerating when he told me that editing would be 3 times the amount of time as the filming. Luckily today was quite rainy which created a perfect environment for me to sit at my desk and edit video. As senior project is close to its end Im excited to finish up my video and share it. I still have a lot of editing to complete in the next couple days, so let's just say I'm in the 7th inning of this project.  hours may 19th- 4 hours total project hours 51.25

 Today May 18th, I traveled to campus to get some more footage of my interviews during their afternoon activities. I spent the majority of the afternoon at the varsity baseball game getting footage of Tucker Deyett, Josh Reed, Tate Matte and Cieron Britton. Both Josh and Cieron gave me answers relating to baseball during our interview so I thought it would make sense to get some clips of them in action. After the game I Headed to the library to export all of my videos from baseball from my phone to my computer and iPad for editing. I spent a while just shortening and editing just clips from baseball to very small sections so I could insert them into my iMovie, along with the audio of Josh and Cieron explaining what makes the baseball team special to them. Currently I have 9 students whose clips I will be using in the final video, despite me wanting to interview a couple more. I think the majority of seniors have now become so deep in their senior project that it is quite difficult ...

 Today May 17th, I started the editing process for my final video. After interviewing Brynne Makechknie in the afternoon, I felt I had enough clips to start cutting them down and placing them into the iMovie reel. If I happen to stumble upon some more people tomorrow to interview I will but for now I feel confident I have enough clips to start building my draft. I think the editing is definitely going to be the longest, so far just today I spent about 3 hours just working on some of the initial pieces of the edit. I have found that just sitting down and in a quiet spot and doing multiple hours of the editing really is worth it, as in all it will help me get ahead. So far the editing process has gone well, I have somewhat of a understanding of how to use iMovie but will definitely face some challenges later in the process.  hours may 17th- 6 total project hours- 41.75 hours

 Today May 16, I started the editing portion of my project. In the afternoon I traveled to campus with the hopes of interviewing at least 5 more people, sadly my candidates were too busy and I had to reschedule to tomorrow. Later in the afternoon I downloaded iMovie onto my computer and began going through the clips that I am gonna use in the final cut. I found the most laborious piece of the beginning of editing is just trying to download all the videos onto my decently old MacBook, as that took around a hour just to fully finish. Meanwhile I went through some of the older clips from my first day of interviewing and began to separate the clips into shorter segments. With every answer being around a minute or two in length I have to cut them before inserting them into iMovie. I hope to rap up the final interviews tomorrow so that I can really sit down and grind out the editing for the rest of the week. Im both nervous and excited to start editing as it is both the hardest and argua...

This week I started the process of creating a video to be used in the admissions office at Proctor Academy. So far, I have really enjoyed the experience. Walking around with a camera and capturing moments during the day has been very very fun; for example Charlie Davis and Alicia's halftime report during the girls varsity lacrosse game was great. Though my project is not for ESPN, I felt that those more random funny moments have really made the experience for me. On a more serious note, I have learned a lot of important skills when it comes to cinematography and all around scheduling. Having to film and record a decent quantity of interviews so far, I feel that I have become a lot more competent in filming and all around more comfortable when it comes to recording. I have discovered so much about the work that is put into the videos that I view everyday on the Proctor instagram. I have been lucky enough to have my mentor be Ryan Graumann the mastermind behind those staple Proctor v...

 Today May 13th, I spent the majority of the day getting some extra film of my interviewees. This morning I continued to go through my raw footage and place it into categories, location, people, and quality of answer. I arrived on campus at around 12, when which I helped Tate Matte record some footage for his senior project. This afternoon I traveled to the baseball game to get some film and photos of Tate, Josh, and Tucker to use in my final video. With several games happening this afternoon I was unable to find anyone to interview. tomorrow I hope to track down at least 5 more people. I have done 8 interviews so far, I think 13 is a better number to have as I need just a little more footage before I can start the editing process. Im starting to think about possible options for background music and other "fillers" in my final cut. just walking around today filming was a very enjoyable experience for me, being able to capture some of the fun during not only the baseball game,...

 Today May 12th, I spent the entirety of the day at home. I used today as somewhat of a setup day, meaning I spent the majority of it making sure that later this week going into next week when I begin editing everything will be set up. I spent a while looking through my current footage to determine where there are gaps in content and voices, and began ordering the footage. Just simply ordering those clips gave me a small skeleton of what my end video may look like. Just simply laying the grounds work for my final piece will now make it easier to go into my next set of interviews because I now know what questions I need better answers for and where there are some gaps. After doing some directorial work, I reached out to my next group of interviewees who I hope to interview either Friday or Saturday. I look forward to creating a better outline and preparing for a deeper dive into the editing stage, after my final interviews of the week.  hours may 12th- 6 total work hours-24.25

 Today May 11th, I spent the majority of the day planning and reviewing my past interviews to see what I could improve on moving forward. With only 2 interviews today in Kally Bryant and Tate Matte, I spent the rest of my time making a list of pros and cons when it came to the question/answers and the directorial pieces of my interviews. For example Tate and I found that it is quite difficult to interview someone while they are being devoured by black flies, moving forward every interview will most likely be held indoors. I think today and yesterdays interview were the best when it came to scene and camera quality, moving forward I hope to replicate the background and angle of my videos today. I have found it fun to be walking around campus asking people for interviews or even just filming "B roll"( B-roll is  alternative or supplemental video footage that is intercut with the your main shots.)   as Ryan and Scott would call it. The majority of the next couple days w...

 Today was very similar to the last, I spent the majority of it scheduling and completing interviews with my fellow peers. I spent the morning researching what camera angle is most commonly used in close up interviews as I struggled to find a solid one yesterday. After watching some interviews on YouTube I found that making my camera more high angled would be the most optimal when it came to seeing the entirety of my interviewees face. later in the afternoon, after arriving on campus, I interviewed cieron and Emily in the art building. I found the art building a perfect place to film as the lighting and the background were very positive bright colors. Filming both interviews with the proctor pond in the background really gave a more upbeat tone to the interview. As my goal of the project is to make a tool for admissions I hope to create a well rounded, good quality piece of work, and today I think was a good second step in doing so. My mentor Ryan offered me some strong advice to b...

 Today May 9th, I started the interview process for my senior project. As I look to create an admissions video full of interviews with members of the class of 2022, I have had to schedule a hefty quantity of interviews for this week. I enjoyed interviewing Colin Shaver, Brody Chipman, Josh Reed, and Tucker Deyett today because it gave me a good first draft as to where I should be placing my camera and how I should frame my questions differently moving forwards. All 4 interviews I found very interesting as my questions weren't something I had talked about yet with my interviewee's which made for a better look into who each kid is and what they enjoy/enjoyed about proctor. After a conversation with my Mentor Ryan Graumann he proposed the idea that moving forward I should try to interview a broader range of people to get a better understanding of the way proctor has shaped different people from different backgrounds. Ryan also gave me his phone tripod to use moving forward which w...