Post the Second: The Research Begins

So I am now into school week number two in the Tech Ed program. Aside from some frustrations regarding computer ineptitude, I am feeling alright about how things are going. I have read all of the Genius Hour questions that have been posted on the Forum and there are some really good ones in there. I somehow whittled my Genius Hour Question down to 30 words and we’ll take it from there. In essence, the question “Can I teach myself how to use Apple’s Final Cut editing software to create a short film which educates the viewer on the international presence of Reggae music across the globe?”, may seem a bit daunting at first, but I am going to work on this so as to try and make it clear, concise and cogent. I feel that the project at hand, attempting to use to learn the editing software by myself, is one major aspect of this task I have set out. The other major task is that of the narrative of the film. It may just be almost as important as the technical project of learning how to use the software itself. I know that the instructions to the Genius Hour project state that if the finished product doesn’t work, then that is alright, but I would like to succeed at creating an understandable narrative that is captivating and thought provoking. Nevermind the part about starting from scratch with an editing software that I have never used before. I will have to import many clips into Final Cut, create sequences with them, import audio into the system, record and import voiceover and somehow learn to use the basic attributes of the software. OK, challenge accepted.

I have learned a few things thus far this week. I have learned how to create a basic slideshow using Google Slides and I was also able to post it to my blog. I learned how to create a Twitter account, which was pretty simple and painless. I learned how to get my avatar to look different and have a million different reactions and sayings. In regards to my genius Hour project, I learned that the majority of the artists I would like to profile come from Europe and Africa. I found some good websites for research, but I also found that Twitter/Instagram/Facebook profiles were also helpful for giving out up-to-date information about the artists. Some really helpful sites are allmusic.com , reggaeville.com and wikipedia.com. I am not delving into the technical questions of learning the Final Cut software just yet as I am still in the information gathering phase. I plan to have some YouTube instructional videos ready to go for the next blog post, as well as having begun to written some of the voiceover narration that is to accompany the short film. I had a few glitches with getting some items up on the blog, but through trial and error, I now think that I have it figured out. The next steps are to process all of this information and pull out relevant bits to create a story. I also will need to find clips of reggae artists online. I am in the process of selecting a succinct group of international reggae artists whom I am to profile in the short film that I am going to make. I am not sure how many different artists that I am going to use at the moment, but I think that I may only have time to profile somewhere between 5-8 different artists. I am compiling a list of artists and I shall make a selection of the ones whom I think are the best Reggae ambassadors. So far I am considering:

Tiken Jah Fakoly (🇨🇮Côte d'Ivoire)

Alborosie (🇮🇹 Italia)

Gentleman (🇩🇪 Deutschland)

Fat Freddy’s Drop (🇳🇿 New Zealand)

Alpha Blondy (🇨🇮Côte d'Ivoire)

The Emeterians (🇪🇸 España)

Macka B (🇬🇧 England)

Ciann Finn (🇮🇪 Ireland)

Mungo’s Hifi ft. Eva Lazarus (🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 Scotland)

Lucky Dube (🇿🇦 South Africa)

Jr. Thomas and the Volcanoes (🇺🇸 USA)

The Frightnrs (🇺🇸 USA)