Week 15: Shooting footage

This week our group has begun shooting footage for our solar energy project. Our content development group is creating videos for the Kukui Cup Dorm Energy Competition. We've interviewed Deans, homeowners and solar companies to find out about photovoltaic solar panels. Over the course of our filming and research we got some really interesting material.

The first interview was with Associate Dean Bill Chismar of the Shidler College of Business. He graciously talked to us and gave us a lot of insight on the PV panels installed on the BusAd building. I also got my first experience with interviewing someone on video. I was kind of nervous, but I found that I just needed to stay focused and maintain my eye contact. You never think about it, but videos require people to act very slow and calm. If you move your hands a lot or move very erratically, it can become distracting. The footage was good and we also got pictures of the panels. The only challenge we had was the rushed schedule. We got a message for an opportunity to talk to the Dean and we had to figure out very quickly whether we could do it. We were grateful for the opportunity and so needed to get things set up ASAP. I thought we did great with the time we available to us.

On our second shooting day, we went to a Sunetric open house at Hawaii Kai. We talked a Suntric representation and the homeowner that was trying to sell a home that had PV panels installed. What's amazing was that she had installed 24 panels on the roof and it was enough to offset all of her eletrical usage. Her electrical bill from HECO was $18 just as a base charge for using the electrical grid. One of the challenges in interviewing at this site was that we didn't know what to expect. We didn't know if the people there were going to agree to being interviewed and we were lucky to get the amount of footage that we did. The homeowner and representative was so forward and willing to talk about the topic of PV panels. Since they were so willing, it was very easy for us to just listen to what they had to say.

Overall, our efforts this week has been in coordinating our shooting project and getting everything ready. The people we interviewed were really giving and willing to share what they know. I learned a lot about photovoltaic panels and the information about using them. A lot of the insights we gained were somethings you couldn't learn from straight research.

For the coming week, we'll work on putting the videos together. From the amount of material we're thinking about making a few videos out of the material. We'll need to write a script with some commentary about what photovoltaic panels are and how it works. This way the audience will know what it is before it suddenly jump to the subjects we go into. I think people watching the interviews are always going to have the question in the back of their minds if we don't address what photovoltaic is.

Week 14: Solar Energy Idea

To educate students in the University of Hawaii about energy conservation we're creating a competition to encourage lower usage of electricity..

Our professor has proposed a idea for the new video we will be working on. It will be about Solar Energy. This new video project will need us to interview people, and gather information to for the video. Unlike our last video, where we just created our rules for energy pong, we thought this video will require outside sources of information. I had some work done this week specifically in research. I learned a lot about relying on outside sources. So far I've sent out two emails out to the Shidler College of Business Building and Saunders Hall and one came back with some information, but it has been hard to try to contact people to respond to your requests.

The basis of this video is about the present infrastructure of Solar Technology in UH today and what Solar Energy is. It occurs to me now that more than ever, we need to emphasize that Hawaii is a great place for solar energy technology. Even if we can't get interviews, I think we could still make great content by showcasing the solar technology used around campus. Dolly Omiya of the Shidler College of Business has graciously provided photos of the solar panels mounted on the Shidler building.
Photos:
here

I think with some great narrating from John Mack like in our Energy Pong video and editing, we can make the pictures work great. Right now all I can do is wait for replies and also look at other sources of information.

The main type of solar technology we we want to talk about is photovoltaic cells. I have a inkling of how it works. But as I began thinking about how to explain these concepts, it made me more worried. Narrating about how this works will not be enough.

So these are all the worries I have about the video project. I am going to work on these this week.

Solar Energy Video Research

Week 13: Reshoots and a new Video.

To educate students in the University of Hawaii about energy conservation we're creating a competition to encourage lower usage of electricity..

As we are creating content for the competition, this milestone reflects how far we've come. This week our content development group did a re-shoot for our Energy Pong video after getting critique from our first draft.

This was our first attempt.


We quickly scheduled another filming day with volunteers. It was actually smoother than our previous shoot. This time we had some experience and knew what we needed to film. I was there just like last time doing the little things. I reminded the guys about lighting, made suggestions for how to show the scenario and also to use old footage rather than shoot again due to time constraints. I really wanted to keep some of the old footage from the first video because some of it was just classic. It couldn't be better.

The challenge this week was in critiquing ourselves. We had to reorganize the video and take the suggestions from our professor and making the changes. We had a discussion where we had to decided whether to re-shoot the entire video or to add more footage. This was a major decision, and helped me understand what it's like a in a project like this.

We decided to re-shoot the video and add some old footage that was good. We also wanted to add some footage of girls participating in the video. This was a challenge as well. It was really hard to find girls that were excited about video making.

This is the newest version we shot and uploaded.


Overall, I think I got some great experience from working as a team.

Week 12: Video shooting is a lot of fun!

To educate students in the University of Hawaii about energy conservation we're creating a competition to encourage lower usage of electricity..

Thanks to the efforts of my teammates, we gathered a few friends to shoot as extras in our Energy Pong information video. We did it over the weekend. As part of the Kukui Cup Energy Dorm Competition, we are creating content that will help students during the competition and maybe teach them a little something which they can remember for a long while. The purpose of Energy Pong is to teach and reinforce facts and practices that we have introduced to the students about energy literacy.

The shoot itself was our main labor this week. We discussed over the details of the preparations. Equipment was borrowed from the UH CIS department and from Scott Wong one of the team members. And with the suggestions from Professor Johnson concerning copyright laws, we also printed out release forms to the actors in the video in order to keep everything legit. I myself am in the video and will probably be reminded of this years from now. yeah..

During the shooting of the video, we didn't really follow a regiment. Instead, our team followed the screenplay and focused on creating the scenes we needed. This was our biggest endeavor. It was actually quite an effort. Since most of us were new to this video making, we had to learn right away how to make this video better looking. It was pathetic. Even the lighting was bad until we took a makeshift lamp to improve the lighting. We learned a lot about the things that are necessary to create the scene. Moreover, getting one scene exactly right took us a better part of half an hour. One particular scene required that one of the ping pongs was spinning and then be dug out. Well since we're not exactly a Hollywood studio, someone had to spin it and create the illusion. I mention this because it was our most frustrating task and should be remembered for all time. Let it be known that the students of the content development team were very dedicated to this!

Even with the frustration, we had a lot of fun. It's just funny remembering all the laughs we had. This is probably a good example of the type of team work that helps to organize a group. A rough cut of the video is coming soon..

Meanwhile take a look at our screenplay.