How did it go?

I presented my project on Wednesday. I thought it went well expect honestly my judge stopped me halfway through my project. I showed her my video and that was supposed to be the halfway point. After the video, she started asking me questions instead of letting me go on to present my website. I did not mind because she asked me the questions that I was gonna answer anyways, but I kind of wish that she would have let me show her my website. I really liked my website. She was a really really nice judge though, so I did not want to be rude and be like, "I'm not finished talking!!" Overall, it was good, and I am glad that everything is over and all the stress will die down and let me focus on my other classes now. I cannot believe the year is ending. I am excited to finish, graduate and move on to university, but I think I am going to miss high school so much. I am going to miss the memories and people the most. Best wishes to Class of 2012! :)

The Big Presentation

Today is my day to present my final capstone project. I have prepared a website, poster, and posterboard to present to my judge. I'm dressed up and have a sketch up of a proposal for my end product, ready to take on questions. Goodluck to us all :)

Capstone Class 5 Minute Presentation Today!

So at 1:00 PM, I'll be in my Senior Project class having to present my Capstone project for my class. It is not the official presentation, but it still counts for a lot of my grade. I actually woke up really late, but ironically I'm more dressed up than usual because of this project. I am ready to present and get this day over with! I will most likely just present my website as my technology support and just talk about who I am, my project, and my goals.On the actual day, I plan to present my website and do the same yet have a prototype or some product as visual aid to get more of the gist of the idea of my end product as a solution. I am excited to see how all of our projects turn out to be. I'm so glad it's almost over, and we can have a little less stress in our lives afterwards.

The link to my website is below:

WEBSITE :)

If I already graduated...

...and finished school completely, my title would be "Orthodontist". I would be Dr. Lavarn the Orthodontist to be exact.

The pluses to the Capstone presentation:

• Gain a learning experience 
• Learn to really research
• Be able to write a 15 page paper
• Use your imagination and your brain
• Organization is gained
• Learn how to present and give a speech well
• Gain the ability to put technology to use

The minuses to the Capstone presentation:

• Working on a project for a whole year that may not be of your interest
• Stress
• Too many restrictions and not so much lenient say
• Ideas being rejected too much
• You get bored of it after working on it for so long
• So much research
• The idea of messing up and failing scares you

There are probably more pluses and minuses, but those stated above are the ones that just popped up in my head.

Summing up my efforts

I believe I am completely done and through with my 15 page paper. I thought we were finished dealing with it in our capstone classes, but apparently we are giving it another peer editing later today. My blog is fine the way it is. My website needs to be redone and re-uploaded. My poster is pretty much completed. My video has been done with for weeks. The only thing I need to actually have or do is my final end product. The professors say it has to be tangible, but I do not think I can actually make a retainer-like product that actually works to kill the bacteria in your mouth and freshen your breath as it dissolves while you sleep. What I am thinking to do is just to design a prototype on the computer and explain to everyone about it. I might bring Crest white strips to show how I would like the creation to somewhat be like. I am ready to get all these presentations and projects done... at the same time, I am totally not ready for it! Good luck to us all!

Poster Design and Rereading

Some of us turned in our poster designs today. I learned how to make my Photoshop version flatten and become a PDF file. It looks the same. I did not want to change anything really. I think it is cute, simple, and to the point. The only flaw is that it lists the website link to this website telling you to learn more about Halitosis here... but on this website I just post up updates and notes about my project not necessarily my research.

I took the time to reread my 15 page Capstone Paper again. I still do not see why we had to write so much over something most of us are honestly not passionate about. It was so hard to actually focus on my own topic and stick with what I wanted to do because most professors judge too hard and find mistakes for every little thing. I honestly kind of wish that Senior Project did not make us do this kind of thing. There really is no point in wasting our time because the majority of us will not further our studies and research about our projects in our futures. I bet after we graduate most of us will not even think about our projects anymore and forget everything we learned. I read over my paper and am not satisfied with what I have written. I feel like I could have written it better if I did not worry about the length or having a certain amount of citations in my paper. I feel like I could have written it from my heart if there was less requirements. Honestly, Senior Project made me so stressed and frustrated over something that will not mean as much to me in a year from now. I would hope that RCHS would change the system for future students and actually focus maybe on getting them to volunteer more or work alongside a nurse if they want to become a nurse, a firefighter if they want to become a firefighter and on forth. My old high school did this at least. Some of my friends I know now who want to be EMTs are actually working or volunteering as EMTs, working with firefighters and in ambulances at the age of 17. I feel like that is more amazing than what we are doing right now. I would rather be put in my field of study than have to write and focus on topics that barely go with my dream career. I am sorry that this was more like a rant than anything else. I just needed to get that off my chest.

Haven't updated in a while...

Today, we learned more about the intercultural festival, and it sounds like a fun event to take our minds off of stress for a little while. We also watched a video of a Ukraine's Got Talent auditioner. She played music and made drawings out of sand. I thought it was really cool. I think that is real talent. We are supposed to be working on finishing our posters to print. I think I like my poster how it is. I do not think I am going to change anything. I just want to keep it simple.

I need to remember that capstone presentations are during April 16th through the 20th. Now time is going by super fast. I cannot believe we have been doing this project for nearly a year now.

Video Presentation Day

Today our final video projects are due! yippeee. Class was cut pretty short. We got in at about 8:20 when we were supposed to be in at 8. Class ends at 8:55. So far only a couple people have presented their videos. I think this is the case of Senioritis! Well here's my video at least:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=54yfIY1OhDY&feature=related

Video Planning

Although I have not started actually creating my IMED Video Project, I know exactly what I am going to do. I am planning to get all the footage and necessary points done this weekend and put it all together in class on Monday... and Wednesday if I have to. I am just going to do a quick "how to" that points out the ways to get rid of bad breath. I am keeping it simple and sweet. Clips and/or pictures with music and a voiceover by me. I will record my own voiceover at home. I am planning to include a script/written dialogue, music, a voiceover, and actors.

On a side note, I feel gross today. Not just because I dressed up as a tacky nerd today but because I have a sore throat, cough, and I lost my voice. I just want to go home and sleep. I am so tired. My day just began though. I am determined to make it through my last class that ends at 2PM. Here goes nothing!

Website

I updated my website that I created on Dreamweaver and uploaded it to Filezilla. I barely even know what a Filezilla does and where all my work goes. I think I am pretty satisfied with how my website looks. I finally got to insert pictures that coincide with my project onto the front page of my website. The words with the pictures make sense. I got my poster design up and running with a link for people to be able to see it big and clearly. The only thing I might want to change in the future is the way my Capstone Essay is presented. I might just copy and paste the whole document on my site just for easy access. Right now it just has a link to download the attached file. I do not know which way is better yet.

I need to start and finish my actual PSA/Video for my project. I know exactly what I want to do. I just have to record it. After that, I am set!

Beginning Unit 2

What is next?

• Finish up everything from my website design to my video to my poster design
• Figure out if my capstone project's end project is okay
• Keep on keeping up with my blog and its posts
• Get through this unit just as strong as, if not stronger than, the first unit

My proposal update:

• I am still planning to fight off Halitosis by creating a retainer-like product that does not just cover up bad breath but uses its natural substances to kill the bacteria in a person's mouth that causes bad breath. The retainer is planned to be easy to use and dissolves as a person is sleeping.

My choice of media:

• I like the idea of having a website and a blog to keep things updated and in check. The video idea seems not to have a huge impact on my project really. The poster design is a great way to advertise.

What worked?/What did not?

• I did not like the fact that my website gave me the most problems, but I do want to keep it as part of my project. My video idea will hopefully turn out okay. Everything else seems to be fine.

Today is a very rainy and cold day. I came to class a little late because of the sad weather. The weather today is the kind of weather that makes me feel sleepy and sometimes gets to my bad side. I hope that it stops raining soon. I have two tests and I have to walk from bonham to yegua and back to bonham. I do not have an umbrella either :( Goodluck to me and all the ones without umbrellas!

Poster Design!

Today I finished making my first draft for my poster design. I think it is cute and pretty simple. I liked the colors and the simple font. The picture was found in Google images and recolored by me too.

Update for the past week/s

I haven't gone on here for a while and posted anything lately. I've been caught up with working on my website for this class. It keeps giving me problems though. I created it on Dreamweaver. I think I should have just created it on Wix. The Dreamweaver one won't show up correctly when someone else clicks my link. I'm so confused. It's perfectly fine when I'm working on it and looking at the previews after redoing something on it, but I guess it just hates me :( I really like how it looks though. I uploaded my blog, essay, and video on there and made the design simple and easy to read. The only things I need to change are the pictures, and I need to add my poster design. Everything else is fine and the way I want it to be, so that's why I hope Professor Curtiss can fix it or something. I really don't want to start over.

Today we are continuing to present our websites and work on our poster designs or anything else we need to work on.

UMMMMMMMMMM.

Mondays are always kind of hard to wake up to, but I got here on time. The door was locked for a good ten minutes into class, so we only had like 40 minutes of class today. We finished watching the video presentations and then had about 15 minutes left to pretty much work on our website or poster design or something. The website is due next. I need to decide what exactly I want to do with it and work on it next class or something. I pretty much have the layout all ready to be detailed. I am not sweating about the website right now. Let us hope I do not start to procrastinate again.

In other news, Happy Chinese New Years! YAY. It is the year of the dragon I think. Hmm! Good luck to everyone! May happiness and success be with us all. :)

IMED PSA Videos

In class, today, we are presenting our 30 second PSA Videos. I think most of them are just rough drafts and not the finished project. Mine is totally not the finished product, but here you go:
Click here!

First Day of Spring Term

Our class is back in IMED yet in a different room.
Our PSA rough drafts/samples are due this Friday.
I pretty much know what I want to do, but I need to actually put everything together.
I need to stop procrastinating.
Senioritis is horrible.
I need to do my website and poster design still too.
Time flies by quick in this class now. Weird.
Well hope everyone has a good first week!

Last Day of JanTerm

It is the end of the first two weeks of the new year! On to the Spring 2012 term, on Tuesday! :) I am excited at the same time scared. Graduation is so close. Time flew by so fast. Life is content.

All I really did today was start over on my website, clean up a few things, and made sure to save everything correctly by transferring copies to my flash drive. Everyone seemed to be busy making videos for their classes especially the photoshop students. IMED is chill today. It feels like a good friday though it is friday the 13th. Spooooooooooky.

Reminder: WORK ON YOUR CAPSTONE VIDEO THIS WEEKEND!

Website

Today, I worked a bit on Dreamweaver and found different free website templates online. I found three templates I like a lot, downloaded them, and attempted to work on one. I changed the header, footer, and tabs on it so far. I will probably change it up a lot more tomorrow. I am liking the way my website is looking.

Things I need to do:
-Work on and finish my video
-Clean up my website
-Make a poster design

Man, I feel like I have a lot more to do! :( Oh well. If there is a will, there is a way :)

SOUNDS.

Later... we are going to start creating and working on our websites. Honestly, I thought this was our website, but I guess not. It is okay though. At least we can gain more experience.

Today... I worked on finding out how to do a lot of stuff with sounds and audio. I learned some stuff in my photoshop class yesterday about mixing sounds and creating tracks. It came in handy for today too. The class went to the sound room and learned about the mixer and how to kind of work it when we want to do voiceovers for our videos. 

"How To" Blueprint!

 This is a list of what I plan to talk about/should include in my video:

• mouthwash
• brushing teeth
• tongue scrapping
• flossing
• natural mint plant/parsley
• do not smoke
• tictac/gum/cinnamon
• breath spray
• maintain a healthy diet/carbs like bananas/apples are cool
• good oral hygiene
• the right toothpaste/chemicals
• doctor/surgery/laser
• avoid dry mouths
• drink water/have saliva

In the beginning, introduce the topic by having someone's breath smell not so great. Maybe have a plethora of different moments throughout the day to the point where you know this person needs Halitosis help. Afterwards, discuss the processes listed above to help prevent the odor. In the end, support the processes and have the person have great smelling breath. Have some people compliment them or something. Let them go to sleep smiling, happy, or something. I hope this idea works out pretty well when I start shooting it and putting it together.

Today, all I did was layout everything I did above, and my professor also showed us a bit of how to use premiere to work on our videos. I need to remember to bring my headphones to class. I keep forgetting them, and it kind of slows me down when I want to listen to potential audio tracks for my video. I also need to actually start shooting videos for my project and getting things together.

Storyboard for My Capstone Video

Storyboard Ideas:

Issue: Halitosis

Commercial: Like a "wakeup in the morning and got bad breath?" kind of commercial.

Short story: Original cheesy idea. Girl gets bullied about her Halitosis, she is isolated, meets guy that helps her, she gets better, everyone loves her, she does not go for any guy except the one that helped her, they fall in love. The end.

PSA: Could be like the one above? Could also be the life of someone less fortunate with Halitosis asking for help.

How to: Get rid of bad breath :)

Today, I just thought up new ideas and rethought about my whole video project for capstone. I am still brainstorming though. I am really leaning to making a "how to". I hope everything turns out okay. The class also watched a video and learned how to do the basics of working on Premiere Pro. We are supposedly making our videos on Premiere. My professor just told me since we are in the gaming computer room, our computers do not have all the programs we need. We are going to be moving classes. How fun. I hope I will remember! For the last part of class, I decided to work more on my photoshop skills again. I changed the colors on some tulips. For the left half of my picture, I changed each color manually, the long and more tedious way. For the right half of my picture, my professor helped me find a way to replace the colors more faster and easier.

 

Preliminary Identification of Presentation Capstone Elements--Beginning

The scope or approach to my presentation:

• My capstone will definitely include constructing and/or purchasing explanatory props. A presentation is nicer with more support and material to go over and look at.
• I will present poster material by taping it up, holding it up, using a small stand, or just simply using a poster board that can stand by itself. (The last idea is probably what I will use.) 
• I will be fabricating a model or a 3D prototype. I will either actually have it made out of materials I find convenient and goes with my point and/or draw out or design on a computer a plan or overview of how the product will look like, what it will be made out of, what it will do, and all the details and everything needed to be known. 
• My appropriate attire will probably consist of a nice formal attire for maybe like a job interview or business meeting. If decided, I could also go with a lab coat or scrubs to look my part as an orthodontist or dental lab technician.
• The important points to present in my verbal presentation will be to remember and know what I am talking about, to take it slow and breath, not to panic, remember to introduce myself and ask my audience if they have questions, have clear diction and confident voice, etc. 
• I will most likely be presenting a brochure to sum up my thoughts about my project or end product.
• I will definitely mention my website and maybe my video/animation.

Today, I pretty much thought more about what I am going to do about my video. I am still in the brainstorming process. Our class pretty much started focusing on photoshopping pictures for the last hour of class too. I just played around with a picture I found in the computer since I did not have any pictures of my own yet. I was just practicing using tools on photoshop. It was a lighthouse with normal background, and I changed it to where lava was the sea, and the sky was the lighthouse's window. I just did it for fun and did not really have time to make it perfect, but here it is!

 

 

Issues

My presentation will be laid-back and casual. It will not be too serious to become boring and uninteresting, but it will not be too comical to become like a joke. The colors I will probably focus on are blue, white, black, and gray. The fonts I will use will be easy to read and not too strict but still organized. My design layout will just be clean-cut and simple with pizazz. I do not know what graphs I will use yet but probably statistics. The photographs I will use will pertain to my project and future career as an orthodontist. Other imagery that will be used will just be used to emphasize characteristics of my project and for decoration. My site and print material will be persuasive due to the fact that it probably contains all of my ideas, thoughts, and research over my project. My video will be persuasive hopefully because of the thought of Halitosis will be brought back to life and change the views of many. I will make my point of view understood by just being very detailed and answering any questions or concerns anyone will ever have. I am intending to create a presentation that will include this blog along with my video, facts, and pictures of my project, my Capstone essay, my end product which is a retainer-like product that benefits people to fight off Halitosis, and much more ideas that I am working on at the moment.

Side note! I just drew up my storyboard for the video we get to make in class today :) Well we get to make the video later, but I drew it up today. I think it is going to change when I actually start filming, but at least I got some ideas on a paper right? To sum it up, someone has a horrible breath condition in the beginning but finds true love in the end. YAY. Interesting twist... I am excited.

Capstone Project Statement of Intent

A little something about me: There is something about teeth and smiles that attract me to people. One person's smile can make another person's day and even change view points of a population, of even the world. Smiles come with confidence, and confidence is one of the best things you can wear. My career goal is to become a successful orthodontist and own my own practice one day, specifically around ten years from now. Using a variety of instruments and braces, to be exact, an orthodontist corrects jawlines and straightens teeth over a period of time. With ideal healthy teeth, people gain confidence and most smile more than ever.

A little something about my Capstone Project: Because I want to become a successful orthodontist, I realize I would have to interact with many people. Humans are all different in their own ways and take care of themselves differently too. Some may be healthier than others concerning all kinds of health. Oral health is what I am most concerned of for this project. The goals of my project is to innovate and improve ways of getting rid of Halitosis, or bad breath, and fighting off the harmful bacterias that cause it. We all know we have bad breath sometimes, probably at least once every day, especially when we just get up from sleeping a night away. Like how I said we all are different, some people unfortunately have it worst than others. Certain people may be born with extreme or chronic Halitosis and cannot really control the way their breath smells no matter what they do. My project is to create a retainer-like end product that persons can wear conveniently while they sleep. The product would have certain ingredients that can help kill germs and bacteria that cause Halitosis, freshen breath, and even maybe help whiten teeth. The product would work as if a hard candy or dis-solvable whitening strips and dissolve and evaporate on a person's teeth or in their mouths. To have a better way of dealing with Halitosis is important due to the fact that people interact with each other all over the world all the time. We should care and know that it is important to help fight off bad breath because appearances and first impressions with the way we interact with someone, no matter what, does affect the way we live. If you have smelly breath all the time, people tend to want to keep your mouth shut or not be as close to you as they would people with normal or good-smelling breath. With great-smelling breath, confidence is gained and the world can change for the better with these little things in life. The littlest things in life seem to always make the biggest impacts. My project gives back to society in that way: to boost confidence and have oral health be at a good high.

If anyone has any comments, concerns, or suggestions for me... please do tell :)

First day!

Today is the first day of January Term. It is also the first day back at school from winter break. It is very cold this morning. I'm wearing a T-shirt and a light jacket. I should have brought a thicker jacket! I drove my best friend, Cynthia and I to school today. When we arrived and went to meet everyone up, everyone was so excited to see each other. Everything was just so exciting actually! Many people were all sleepy and hated waking up early though. Life goes on. My first class is IMED with Mrs. Curtiss. I think she is new at teaching at Richland. It is a chill class so far. In IMED, making this blog was our first assignment. I actually like blogs and writing what is on my mind and all that jazz, I am kind of enjoying this. I am anxious to see what this year has in store for all of us. Have a wonderful day :)