Week 10

Hi guys, today I am going to be talking about how I would do my own podcast. Now, I know podcasts these days are popular and all, but quite frankly I have never been that interested myself. I don’t listen to them much. So, when it comes to writing about how I would do my own, I am kind of unsure. A podcast to me is someone just talking about well, whatever they want to talk about whether it be educational or entertaining.  But my interests are pretty limited so that is probably the reason I don’t listen to them is because someone just talking inst that exciting to me. It takes skill to make just talking entertaining, like adding emphasis to words. Maybe if I found one that was on a topic I could relate to like for example, music, I’d stick around. But if I was to do my own personally, I would try to sound out-going and enthusiastic about what I was talking about. My topic would probably be on something like heavy metal. With this I could add some of that music in for examples. But the cool thing is I edit a lot of music so I could create something of my own that would fit into the podcast perfectly or to the tone of the video.

Week 9

Welcome back everyone! Today I’m going to be writing about how I would make my own web series. After watching some of the videos this week I noticed that these videos had a lot in common. The main thing that stuck out to me was the lack of any form or music or sound aside from the person talking. I don’t watch many blog videos so this actually was quite striking for me. The second thing I noticed was there was not really any shaky camera angels. It was stationed and focused precisely on the person so they could be in the middle of the frame. These two elements helped the story because it helped you stay focused on the person talking. If I was to start blogging and making videos about me and my life I would defiantly keep out the music. Even though it would be hard for me, I learned that for this style of video it benefits the video having it out. If I was going on a road trip, I would also use text to describe what was happening around me, maybe my feelings too.

Week 8

Hi again everyone. Today I am going to be discussing what makes a good story. Everyone is going to have different opinions on what makes a good story. For me it would have to be how much it relates to stuff I like. For example, I like fantasy and horror subjects, so a good story for me would maybe be set in a far way fantasy realm with unfamiliar and deadly entities. A story that would not be so interesting to me would probably have to do something with nonfiction like history. But what makes a good story isn’t just things we have an interest in. Now I don’t do a lot of reading now a days. But I can tell you that both paper and digital stories both require some of the same things to make them entertaining. Lots of things can make any story interesting like conflict; obstacles the character has to face. We can relate to this because everyone has to deal with some sort of obstacle in their life. Conflict in a story is relatable and entertaining. Through conflict we can learn more about the character and their true personality and how the people around them will react to this. Conflict and the hardships we go through define us, or as my parents would say “it builds character.” Another thing that makes a story entertaining is what is the risk the character is taking? If there are high stakes and a lot that the character can lose if they fail, it draws us in. It makes us want to cheer on the character in hope that they don’t fail their quest. This makes the story more suspenseful and intense.

As a writer in the past, I related to the last point they made in the video we had to watch which was what else made a good story was how in depth the character was. How advanced is their personality? How deep is their conflict? How far are they willing to go? Coming up with characters and their backstory’s whether it was tragic and heartfelt or fairly average was always fun. Sometimes it was relatable and maybe based on your own life, sometimes it was completely made up. Either way, even if people had not gone through the circumstances themselves, they could still understand how hard it was for your character. The cool thing about story telling though is even if you have not gone through a scenario which the character has gone through, through good story telling it still makes you feel as if you had a connection to them. It brings out emotions in us. And digital story telling can use some more elements to bring out the story better such as music. Which of course, normal books can’t do.

In conclusion, what makes a good, entertaining story is things like conflict, risk, and character development and depth. Without these key elements, your story and character would be bland, dull, and overall just pretty boring. There would be nothing to thrive for and nothing to lose which would make your audience lose interest. “For a given audience, a story is a sequence of content, anchored on a problem, which engages that audience with emotion and meaning.” (Alexander, Brian 13)

D4Darious. “What Makes A Good Story?” YouTube, YouTube, 24 Mar. 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=394&v=DCzcoyDp2fY.

Alexander, Brian. “The New Digital Story Telling.”

Week 7

Hi again everyone. Today I am going to be discussing what makes a good story. Everyone is going to have different opinions on what makes a good story. For me it would have to be how much it relates to stuff I like. For example, I like fantasy and horror subjects, so a good story for me would maybe be set in a far way fantasy realm with unfamiliar and deadly entities. A story that would not be so interesting to me would probably have to do something with nonfiction like history. But what makes a good story isn’t just things we have an interest in. Now I don’t do a lot of reading now a days. But I can tell you that both paper and digital stories both require some of the same things to make them entertaining. Lots of things can make any story interesting like conflict; obstacles the character has to face. We can relate to this because everyone has to deal with some sort of obstacle in their life. Conflict in a story is relatable and entertaining. Through conflict we can learn more about the character and their true personality and how the people around them will react to this. Conflict and the hardships we go through define us, or as my parents would say “it builds character.” Another thing that makes a story entertaining is what is the risk the character is taking? If there are high stakes and a lot that the character can lose if they fail, it draws us in. It makes us want to cheer on the character in hope that they don’t fail their quest. This makes the story more suspenseful and intense.

As a writer in the past, I related to the last point they made in the video we had to watch which was what else made a good story was how in depth the character was. Coming up with characters and their backstory’s whether it was tragic and heartfelt or fairly average was always fun. Sometimes it was relatable and maybe based on your own life, sometimes it was completely made up. Either way, even if people had not gone through the circumstances themselves, they could still understand how hard it was for your character. The cool thing about story telling though is even if you have not gone through a scenario which the character has gone through, through good story telling it still makes you feel as if you had a connection to them. It brings out emotions in us. And digital story telling can use some more elements to bring out the story better such as music. Which of course, normal books can’t do.

In conclusion, what makes a good, entertaining story is things like conflict, risk, and character development and depth. Without these key elements, your story and character would be bland, dull, and overall just pretty boring. There would be nothing to thrive for and nothing to lose which would make your audience lose interest.

D4Darious. “What Makes A Good Story?” YouTube, YouTube, 24 Mar. 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=394&v=DCzcoyDp2fY.

Week 6

For this week’s reading I will be answering if the game “A Summer Story” is a story or a game or both. After playing it, it is safe to say that it is definitely a story. But is it also a game? It is not as interactive as some of the other activities we have done in this class like the cave game last week. In A Summer Story all I did was basically click enter and sometimes get the choice to pick if I wanted to venture off or turn off my phone to conserve battery life. I think this could have been enhanced if the story was longer but I got through it relatively quickly. Now this story definitely isnt something as advanced as an MMORPG (which is what I play a lot) so for me to say it is a game is kind of hard for me because I am use to using a controller and having combat and an open world experience, not just reading and getting to choose two options a couple times. However, letting me even choose a few options does enhance the story because it makes it more interactive, it personally makes me concentrate more so I can pay attention so I feel like I can choose the best option for me to make in the story. One literary element that made this story more entertaining was the sound effects. When I chose to go wander around the town looking for Ai’s café but ended up getting lost at night and heard the jingling sounds of something metallic brought on more intensity in the story.