Claymation Reflection Essay

Over the last quarter our class has been working on claymation videos. These are movies made from hundreds of still frame photos played at a high speed. We have finished this project and I am going to tell you about my favorite part, the most difficult part and the most important thing that I learned while working on this project.

First of all the most enjoyable part of this project. I have to say that the best part has been learning about the iMovie software. I had heard of the program but did not know what it was capable of or how it worked. This project was done almost completely on the iMovie program so I learned the just of what this program could do. I was very impressed, it has everything from special affects to pitch changing your voice. For claymations this is the best and simplest way to create a high quality movie. I loved the fact that all I had to do was take the pictures, then I could do the rest on iMovie. I like to learn as much as I can about computers, because I am not very good with computers and I want to be. Another thing that I liked about using iMovie was that I could put music and voice into it so easy. I hope you can see why iMovie was my favorite part of this project.

Of course, this project wasn't all easy. The most difficult part was working by myself. Everyone else had a partner but I chose to work by myself because I thought it would be easier, IT WASN'T! Not only did I have to take all the pictures but I had to do all the voice. Sure the voice isn't that hard but I had to change my voice for the different characters. This was very difficult because I had to be constant with the different characters. Another bad thing about being by myself was that I had to buy all the clay. Also where other groups have one person taking pictures while the other moved the clay I had to do it all by myself so it took twice as long. There was one good thing about working by myself and that was that I could take pictures at my house and not have to be dependent on anyone else. Well maybe I will reconsider next time and have a partner.

The most important thing that I learned while working on this project was that I work better by myself. Even though it was more challenging and even the most difficult part of this project for me. I learned that it made me feel better that I didn't need to depend on anyone else to get me a good grade. Also the fact that I could work on it at my house in my own time made me work harder on it. I talk a lot, and if I had worked with a partner I probably would have talked the whole time and failed the project. Well after learning that about myself I would only have a partner on a project again if they felt the same way. I always get stressed when I have to depend on someone else, especially when they don't care as much as I do. I have to say that working by myself did make the project much more work, but it was worth it to be able to take pictures at home and do everything at my standard. I am very glad that I learned that about myself and that I will be able to use that to my advantage in the future. That is why it is the most important thing that I learned while doing this project.

In conclusion, I have learned a lot while we were working on this project. About myself, the computers and iMovie software, and the pros and cons of working with partners. From all of the things that I have learned from this project I will be able to do much better on future projects.

My Family

I don't have much to talk about so I'm giong to talk about my family. Well I have three brothers and no sisters. My mom has a P.h.d. in accounting and teaches at the University of Washington. My dad works at Whidbey Telecom. My grandpa was a medic in the Vietnam war. My grandma is not my real grandma because my dads parents got divorced. She is korean. My other grandpa has alshiemer. My other grandma makes a mean apple pie. On my moms side my grandma and grandpa come to stay with us while my mom is teaching. My uncle has a stunt plane and is getting a kidney from my mom. My secong uncle is the vice president of Sanyo. And my other second uncle lost his home in both Katrina and Ike. Anyway that is pretty much it for my family but I finally thought of something to talk about. But that is for next time.

Donating a Kidney

This month my mom is going to donate a kidney. She will be donating it to my uncle(her brother). I am kind of scared for her because she will be under he knife for a couple of hours. Also she will be gone for my birthday. This is the second year that she will have missed my birthday, but I wont complain because she will be getting surgery. Also I am sure she would rather be here at my birthday than having surgery. I feel bad for her. My uncle has been at 12% kidney life for a long time and now he is at 11% so he needs a kidney. My mom is leaving in two weeks to go get tested to make sure she can donate a kidney. There is a one in seven-hundred-fifty chance that my mom was born with only one kidney. I hope that she will be ok. Wish her luck!!!!!

Duck Hunting

This weekend I went duck hunting with my friend Mr. Terral. We left at about noon on Friday to go set up the blind. We paddled out to the spot we had chosen before and began to set it up. This took about three hours, and because the season didn't open until six fifty Saturday we did the work of setting up the blind on Friday. Once we were done we paddled back to the car and went home to get a good night sleep, because we had to leave at three forty-five the next morning. Well, the next morning we woke up and got the gun and some shells, then we went down to the lake and began to paddle out to the blind. When we got there we placed the decoys, put on our camo, and loaded the gun. After that we got comfortable and waited for a couple of hours for the ducks to join our decoys and for the season to start. Then, the first shot! The shot rang through the morning, and then boom, boom, boom, boom, boom! The other hunters began to unload on the incoming ducks. The ducks didn't stop coming and and after a few minutes we had shot three ducks. The ducks had thinned out, so I paddled out to pick up the ducks. This continued for hours and the time came for us to leave. Well we paddled out and went home. We had gotten six ducks and we went home to clean them then I had to go home so he drove me home. It was so much fun!!!!!!!!!

My Life Graph

This my life graph, it shows many of the things that have happened to me in my life. The one event I am going to talk about is when I went to Las Vegas. Well as cool as going to Las Vegas was that isn't the reason that I am telling you about my trip to Las Vegas. The reason that I am telling you about this is that I found $500 in an ATM at Las Vegas airport. The weirdest part is that a week before I had a dream that I found a significant amount of money in an ATM. Then low and behold I found $500 at the ATM by the bathroom. Well we had just got off of the plane and we had just got out of the bathroom and we were waiting for my mom when I remembered to check the ATM by the door, I walked over to the ATM and slid open the slot and I saw a stack of bills. I pulled them out and decided not to look at the here because someone might be wanting them so I tucked them away. Then on the way home from Las Vegas I we left a message saying that we had found some money and to call us if they had lost any. Well now it has been five months and we still have not herd anything.

My Weekend in the Tunnel

This weekend my family and I went to an abandoned train tunnel. It was very cool and the saying, "the light at the end of the tunnel" has a brand new meaning. The coolest part was that it was raining outside so that when we went in the first part of the tunnel the water that soaked into the ground would drip down through the roof of the tunnel. Luckily it was only for the first part so we were only dodging water falls where we could see them. After we were a ways into the tunnel water stopped, but it got very dark so we had to bring out the flash lights in order to see. Once we had gotten about a tenth into the tunnel my brother and I decided that because it was so straight we didn't need our flashlights anymore so we walked far enough ahead that the light from the rest of our group didn't light up our path, then we just walked toward the pinhole of light that was the other end of the tunnel, 2.2 miles away. It wasn't very hard to walk in a straight line because we just had to walk toward the only speck of light that we could see. Well as we got closer to the end of the tunnel the small speck got bigger and bigger until we got to the end. When we first emerged we had to wait for our eyes to adjust to the light. Once our eyes had adjusted to the light we saw a small waterfall coming from out of the the rock wall near the tunnel which became a small stream that trickled down the steep hill. I went to look over the edge and saw a part of the track which had been thrown off the hill, so I went down the hill as far as the steepness would let me. In the hill I saw a rotting piece of wood, so I went down to look at it. When I looked at it closer I found three railroad spikes, then I saw another in the dirt on the way up. After I got to the top we took a few pictures then we began the long walk back through the tunnel. The way back was much faster because we had already seen the tunnel so didn't stop to look around. We passed the waterfalls coming from the roof then we went back to the warm cars and began the one hour drive back. All in all the trip was very fun and definitely worth the walk. I will remember my weekend in the tunnel for the rest of my life.

The Story

Once upon a time there was a robot named George. George was a robot from the planet Robotron, he lived with his mother even though he was 40 million years old. He was a one of a kind robot, so he was a reject in society, but he knew that he had a very important mission to do. His mission was to take a message to planet Earth. The message that he was supposed to take was top secret and so that is why his maker made him so different. He knew that the first thing that he had to was escape his mothers watchful eye. One day he was home alone and and so he sneaked out! Once he was out he began his important mission. He knew that the one way to get to Earth was to get a Smocmobile, but he also knew that the only way to get a Smocmobile was to defeat the guardian of the Smoc hanger, Edna vivacious. That ment that before he could go to the Smoc hanger he would have to arm himself. So he went to the upgrade store and he got an atachable beam ray shooter. After attaching it he was ready to go to the Smoc hanger, and fight Edna vivacious!
When he reached the Smoc hanger Edna was waiting, so he hid behind the shed by the hanger and then in a flash he shot his beam ray shooter at Edna. Edna had already seen the ray comeing and wasable to dodge it, and then she turned to George and said in her robot voice,
"how dare you shoot at me". Then she threw an electronic jammer at George. The jammer hit George, and immediatly paralyzed him. George was jammed and he could not move!!!!
"Hahahahaha!" Edna laughed. Then she pulled out the her power knife and rolled up to George. Then she said,"This will teach you to mess with the Smoc hanger". She lifted the knife over George and... WILL THIS BE THE END THIS WORLD MAY NEVER KNOW

Adam's summer

I had an awesome summer. My summer was packed with fun vacations starting with the week after school ended. Here are a few of my vacations this year. First I spent a week at the base of Mt. Baker with my grandparents, here we went on a few hikes near Baker. Then I went to lake Chelan for a week and stayed at a condo. While we were there we went to a water park, and rented a boat so that we could go inner tubing. Next I went to a summer camp for a week and while I was there I had to sleep in a shelter that I made out of things in the woods. After that I went to California and stayed at our friends house, the husband works at Google(he was in the top 25 first employees) there house was huge and very high-tech. While we were there we got to go stunt flying with my uncle in his small stunt biplane, we also got to have a personal tour of Google. Upon getting home from California, I had a week to get school supplies. Lastly my family and I went on one last camping trip at Fort Ebey for memorial day weekend. We then had 3 days of nothing planned before school started. In conclusion my summer was killer and packed with fun vacations.