We just finished our project for the Arc of St. Charles. For this project, we made 9 videos for the Arc. That consisted of a 30 sec tv spot and a 1 minute psa for each of their 4 enterprises, and a 2 minute overall psa for the Arc. My group was responsible for the “Throw me Something Mister” enterprise. Throw me Something Mister is the mardi gras store owned and operated by the arc. The store employs individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities  to give them experience and training in the workforce. To complete the project, we had to first become familiar with the Arc. We researched and visited the Arc to gather information and ideas for the video, then began to map out the voiceover. We then recorded the voiceover. After we went back and filmed, we put the shots in an order that followed the voiceover to make everything coherent. We edited meticulously to make the videos fit the time limits and to seem as professional as possible. Even after the video was complete, we went back several times to making slight changes and perform a few finishing touches.

I really enjoyed this project as it took our experience outside of the classroom. By this I mean we made commercials and psa’s that will be used in the real world and on tv. That was really beneficial because it came with real world requirements and new standards which we aren’t accustomed to from making videos for in-class projects. The only part I didn’t like was having to cram our information into 30 seconds of video; but, like I said, it was beneficial because in the real world we will always having to make a certain time requirement for commercials that will air on tv. I learned that it is difficult to make a video seem really professional like the commercials we see on major tv channels and that is something i hope to learn how to do.

This wasn’t my first time working with an outside client, but it still comes with the same difficulties and expectations. As provider, you have to take charge of getting the information you need and being self-reliant. You have to be confident, responsible, and intuitive; especially when interacting with the client. I think my group worked pretty well together as far as cooperation and sharing the same vision. We didn’t have any problems as far as working together, but maybe an unbalanced level of participation. I don’t think it was due to laziness, but rather some teammates felt their help wasn’t wanted or needed which wasn’t the case and I myself feel bad for letting that sentiment carry on. I was very involved in most parts of the video and feel I definitely helped make it the success it was. I did a lot of editing, the voiceover, and kept the overall vision pointed in the right direction.

Our video pretty much met my expectations, however it is sad we couldn’t reach that extremely professional look you see on bigtime tv. I think our video was better than a lot of the other commercials if not all of them. Solely because of the extra effort and concentration we put into the video which shows up in the final product. The creativity, precision, and strive for professionalism made it stand out the way we intended. The feedback we received from other groups  allowed us to fix any hiccups we had visually, and make changes based on things we, as the creators, didn’t even think about. As far as the other groups reception of feedback, I feel the pm class did much better than the am class. The problems in the pm videos weren’t anywhere as big as those of the am, but the pm still tried to fix them. The am class had some very big issues but took no heed to our recommendations.

If I did this project again, I would make sure all my group members were able to participate the way they want to and also try to find out how to get that professional vibe I’m looking for. For next year, I would suggest keeping a more strict schedule and watch on the groups because even though we had weeks to complete our videos, several groups are still not finished even after the deadline. There was a lot of time wasted, which had to be made up for in a messy rush at the end of the allotted project time. Maybe keeping a more disciplined and concentrated atmosphere during project workdays would help get things finished sooner and vastly improve the quality of the videos. So, if I could talk to the students next year, I would tell them to really put effort and concentration into the project.