I just needed to upload some screenshots to use in my final portfolio.

Reverse Product Placement, Draft 2 from Emily Evans on Vimeo.

I just posted my photography media page on the Amalgamnation site for our assignment Monday. I like my photography media page the best of the three I've done this semester (maybe because I really like photography...also because I was able to find lots of cool information to link in.) I made a few edits (most of which are also reflected on the version posted on this site.) I will admit posting on Amalgamnation had its challenges- I had to change the layout a lot in order to make it look good in that new space. Also, the preview option on the Amalgamnation site didn't, at least for me, give an accurate preview spacing-wise- it was a much wider space than the final page once I hit save. And for some reason the site kept telling me it though I was spamming it- so every time I made a change it made me type in a CAPTCHA! But overall it wasn't a bad process and I'm pretty happy with how the final product turned out. Find it here.

As I was finishing up the first draft of my third media page, I thought it might be good to reflect on the process of putting these things together. It seemed a little unnatural at first, but after making three I've decided that it's my favorite way to write an essay! We did a playlist assignment in my English and Computer Studies class last year that was slightly similar to this one, but I enjoyed the more text-focused feel of this assignment. I really felt like I was writing essays! The composing style definitely reminded me of a sophisticated news article, with lots of multimedia and links to relevant sources. One of the biggest challenges for me was definitely figuring out links (and I'm still not sure I have figured out the best way to do this.) In my first media page, I added lots of links in the text but didn't really describe where they led- I thought that by doing this, readers might see the link and wonder where it took them, adding another dimension to my essay if they were interested or not making them think they were missing an important part of my point if they weren't. I realized, however, that this technique was actually pretty confusing for readers. In my next media page, I tried to clearly explain where each link led, by saying things like "click here for a page about ....." But that felt a little clunky. For this final media page, I tried to find a balance, linking to companies' sites or TV shows, for example, by using their names, or to relevant articles with a little more explanation.

FINALLY- after tinkering with different controls I was able to export my video into a format that was small enough to upload on vimeo. Unfortunately my parents didn't tell me that the hotel we were staying in over Thanksgiving doesn't have free Internet-I didn't know hotels existed like that anymore! But now that I am back in Chapel Hill with Internet access, I am excited to finally be able to get some feedback on my video. Like Emily's video on Chocolat mine is more of a video essay than a montage, though it's different from hers in that it uses clips from several places. It is clearly a first draft but I would love any suggestions for improvement-especially with transitions between the different clips and examples.

I changed the focus of this video multiple times during its creation, but think I finally know how I want it to fit in with the rest of my media page on Product Placement. The video focuses on the phenomenon of reverse product placement- where a fake product used in a movie or TV show (like Buzz Cola in the Simpsons) becomes so popular that eager fans who want to buy it actually help it get created. I think this will work well as a sub-set of the page.

Researching my product placement video has led me in so many interesting directions! I've gotten a lot of ideas for things to put on my media page vs. in the video. In class today while I was hunting around YouTube for some famous product placement clips (the Reese's Pieces in E.T., for example) I stumbled on a bunch of videos related to subliminal advertising. I'm not sure they're all real but they're definitely interesting to watch- and a little creepy! What does everyone think- should this type of thing be legal? And what about when it spills over into the news? (see my third example below)

McDonald's on Food Network
KFC Sandwich
Fox News

I found this article about a new cafe in Japan. Its sole purpose is to market new products to customers- they actually have to register to be allowed in, but they receive free samples of many new products. I wonder if these will ever catch on in the U.S.... or if we'd even want them to!

After my experience with making my movie last year, I at first thought I wanted to make another video about "O Brother Where Art Thou"- it was a great movie to work with, and there was so much there. But upon thinking further, I realized I didn't want to overlap what I had done before. I am now toying with the idea of focusing my film on product placement in movies. My dad works in advertising for AT&T and it's always interesting to hear his opinions of ads- as much as the rest of my family tries to fast forward them or escape them during our favorite TV shows, for example, he spends his day figuring out ways to reach consumers that we can't avoid. Some movies and shows are really obvious about the way they integrate products (like the Coca-Cola cups American Idol judges drink from), while others (think nationally televised football games...ever notice the logos on the coaches' headsets?) are a little more subtle and insidious, and the laws and contracts surrounding them can get really intricate. For example, here at UNC, AT&T sponsors many of UNC's sports teams- like football- yet Verizon, one of their competitors, has the in-stadium rights to advertise. So if you're in Kenan Stadium, you'll see Verizon ads on the big screen and a few signs- but if you're watching a game on TV you'll see AT&T commercials. I find all this really interesting, but I'm just not sure how to make the idea fit the media page/video format- should I focus on a single product for the video, or maybe a single movie as an example, with my media page as a whole describing it more broadly?

I worked a lot on my media page tonight, and the one thing that frustrated me the most was trying to get all of the photos I wanted to talk about off of the Flickr site. The artists had given me permission to use the pictures, but how did I get them from their photostream and onto my page? I tried downloading and that didn't work, because I didn't remember how to put them on my UNC web space. After a lot of thinking I came up with a solution- I searched for the photos on the Google image search. It worked great- I was able to link to all of my photos in jpg format by clicking the "see full size image" link for each and I was then able to adjust them to whatever size I needed through my html. Just a suggestion if anyone else is having the same problem!

I found this Web site through the profile of one of the photographers on Flickr whose work I'm planning to use...it takes the complicated legal language of the Creative Commons License rules and translates them into "human readable" language.