Finale

I think what worked about the film was how it's put together -  the editing and how it transitions. What was challenging was that we didn't know what B-roll to incorporate into the film. When we recorded Taliek's mom and went to his neighborhood, we came back to school to upload and include it into the film but, we found out that the sound wasn't working. So it's like we spent all that time going to his house to record his mom and neighborhood, for nothing.

I learned that filming can be more complicated than it looks. You have to make sure the sound works, that the people in your group actually attend the classes to be able to film, know when to film - like what time is best for everyone in the group, and where we will be filming.

My favorite part about working on this project was when we got good footage to put into the video, such as the B-roll and the interviews that we did. My least favorite part about working on this project was when we went to record Taliek's mom and his neighborhood, and then the sound didn't work. The interview with his mom would've been a good element in the video. It's now the end of the semester and we won't be able to re-record his mom. We still have to upload the finished video to our blog and we're proud of what we have accomplished.

Updated Website

I'm the manager of the website and wanted some inspiration to improve our team's website. I decided to look at the Inocente website and I liked the idea of having a issues tab, so I decided to add it to my team's website. I also liked the clear lay out and how it was easy to watch the trailer from the homepage.

After looking at the Inocente website, I decided to update my team's website.  I added a tab where you can see posts that Taliek wrote about his middle school life, an issues tab, and a tab where you can watch the full movie when it's up and ready. I  also re-arranged everything else to organize the website a little more.

Yes, I believe that the website is done. The only thing I need to add is the official video of the film, when it is finished.

How many African American are likely to go to jail?

As you know we are doing a story on Taliek who left a gang to continue with his education. So, I researched the statistics on African American males being incarcerated because if Taliek had stayed in the gang, he could've been one of these statistics. 

I found that approximately 12%-13% of the American population is African-American. African Americans, however, make up 40.1% of the almost 2.1 million male inmates in jail or prison (U.S. Department of Justice, 2009). This means that the percent of blacks incarcerated was five times greater than the resident population in 2009.

Here are some general statistics of African American males being incarcerated:

• A black male born in 1991 has a 29% chance of spending time in prison at some point in his life.
• Nearly one in three African American males aged 20–29 are under some form of criminal justice supervision whether imprisoned, jailed, on parole or probation.
• One out of nine African American men will be incarcerated between the ages of 20 and 34.
• Black males ages 30 to 34 have the highest incarceration rate of any race/ethnicity.

Prison vs. College

Many institutions researched the prison vs college rate on African Americans going to prison vs how many of them attend college. The justice department found that in 2003, 193,000 black college-age men were in prison, while 532,000 were attending college. While it sounds good, they also found that more black male high school dropouts aged 20–35 were in custody than in paid employment.

It's a good thing that Taliek won't become one of these statistics. 

Accomplishments

In the 3rd quarter my group and I interviewed Taliek. I finished the website for the group. We scheduled to go to Taliek's house and interviewed his mom. We finished the trailer.


To finish the film, my group and I just need to re-do a couple of videos. We need to film Taliek reading poetry on a stage standing up. We interviewed his mother but the sound ended up not working when we uploaded it. We need to have a longer sound track with different moods to fit well with the clips. We made the film longer. We need to reschedule another time when we go to Taliek's house to interview his mom again. We worked together as a group and are editing the film to extend it. We also got some B-roll and would need a little more. 

My personal next steps is to get everything done. Have everything that I need to finish in this class done, so that my grade can go up. To do that I need to be on top of what my group is doing, and work as a team to get those things done.

Research

As a manager of the group, I was looking at different film websites to make my film website look better/ more professional. I came across Inocente Film Website and found some helpful tabs that I can include in my own website: http://taliekstory.blogspot.com/.

The Inocente website has 6 tabs. The first tab drops down, It is named ABOUT the Film. The drop down says: Synopsis, Filmmakers, and Press/News. It has a tab that says watch, so you can buy tickets to watch the film, at a place near you. There is another tab that says ISSUES and it also drops down saying: Arts Education, Homelessness, and Undocumented Children. The fourth tab is named PARTNERS.

From the Inocente website I saw the ISSUES tab and thought that I could use it too, to talk about the issues that African American teen males in the city face. I will also make a About the film tab to write a Synopsis on the film to tell what it is about.

The Road Forward

My project is a film named "Taliek" and it is about a boy who used to be in a gang but he got out. He got out because he realized that it was stupid and he didn't want to be apart of it. The only reason he was in it was because it was 'cool' for him in the sixth grade, he wanted to be down. When he got out he also realized he wanted to go to high school and to do that he had to stop cutting school. What helped him through that phase was poetry and his family. He wanted to be a role model for his younger siblings, and wants them to follow in his footsteps but the positive way. The progress I've made in 1st semester was interviewing him.

By the end of 3rd quarter I need to have done the trailer for the film. The mini milestone is to have B roll such as Background, and images. The milestone is that the film needs to be 6-8 minutes. 

The qualities that will be key to my success will be teamwork and finishing interviews to put them together and create the film. We will need to plan days to get interviews, and B rolls done. We need to cooperate with each other in getting these things done, and when is the best time to get them done to create a well done film. 

Hip Hop: Beyond, Beats and Rhymes

In mediastorm class, Scott showed us the trailer to the film Hip Hop: Beyond, Beats and Rhymes. I got the opportunity to watch the whole film at a theater during a class to get an idea of what to do with my own film. This film is about how a guy, Byron Hurt, used to love hip-hop and then he was watching music videos one day and found out all of them were alike. They had guys with nice cars, throwing money at the camera, and women half naked in the background dancing. He says, “The more I grew and the more I learned about sexism and violence and homophobia, the more those lyrics became unacceptable to me,” Because of this he started making this film that took him six years to make.

In the video you see Byron interviewing famous rappers such as Mos Def, Fat Joe, Chuck D, Busta Rhymes, Jadakiss and hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons. He talks to them about what he has come to notice, about the people he listened to. He also asks their opinion on what they think about the rappers nowadays, the videos, and how they feel about homophobia. 


I think this film is very interesting. It highlights aspects that I agree with. It also made me realize things like how in the music industry there are a lot of homophobics and you don't see many famous gay people in the music industry. They also show women as objects in music videos, they don't value women. I also realized that there is a box in which men seem to follow, acting tough and having to act tough to not seem weak or get called out. In hip-hop there are a lot of rappers who talk about killing people and whenever Byron recorded guys battling or free styling they all seemed to mention the same thing - gun violence. This film showed me that you can use films to bring awareness to social issues. For my film, I hope to bring awareness to how when adolescent boys join gangs nothing good can come out of it. And how they can improve their lives through education.