WRITING POLITICAL HUMOR

WRITING POLITICAL HUMOR

Poli 311.01 (W,IT)

Professor Sammy Basu

Assignment Six

“Soiled Shorts”

The goal of this assignment is to essay (i.e., articulate and render) your political point of view on a topic of some moral and political importance to you and potentially others (with prior approval from the professor) in a format that takes advantage of multi-modal digital possibilities while also being funny. You must work in groups of 2 to 4.

Your 3-4 minute digital video short project must include:

Opening titles and closing credits,

Film clips produced by you, involving edited use of multiple takes,

at least one still with ken burns effect,

Audio clips i.e. ambient sound, dialogue, voice over, music chosen/recorded/ produced by you,

It can but need not include:

Human beings on camera talking,

It can but need not include in addition:

Some text,

Video and Audio from external sources provided they do not exceed 20% of whole work,

For the purposes of evaluation you must also submit the following hard copy materials:

1. Concept:

Brief (200 words) statement of issue, genre, and humor intended.

Issue - describe the moral or political issue, and the position you intend to advance.

Genre -identify the genre to be abused, e.g. documentary, music video, news report, man-on-the street interview, hand-puppets.

Humor - specify some of the ways in which you intend to generate humor. Employ the theories and dynamics discussed thus far in class.

2. Treatment

Brief (400 words) prose narrative of the film to be shot.

Explain the issue in greater detail, make your argument, identify the views you hope to discredit, cite online sources of these targets, and cite your own research sources.

3. Video Shoot Shot List (use handout):

Specify the principal sets of shots, actions, and locations, etc.

4. Storyboard (use handout):

Provide rough freehand pictures that layout or outline the sequences of images, together with decisions about type of shots, angles, transitions, and modes intended, and the intended sound/dialogue/voiceover.

5. Division of labor:

Report on who did what. This is your opportunity to indicate how well you contributed to the team in relation to the other individual members.

Equipment

Videocamera, tripod, and firewire cable for connecting to apple computers (all of which will have the imovie software on them) can be obtained from WITs.

Sony MiniDV Tapes can be purchased for $5 each from WITs (WITs requires that you use SONY tape although it need not be purchased from them).

Help?

Drop by the Multimedia Workroom, Smullin 38, during scheduled hours (most days and some evenings). A trained WITS student should be there who is specifically hired to help with these kinds of questions.

http://www.willamette.edu/wits/resources/facilities/mmwr.htm

You can also have access to the Multimedia Workroom, Smullin 38, afterhours by requesting a punch-code from Chris Gramlich, cgramlic@willamette.edu

Eaton 424 may also be available.

WU WITS equipment

http://www.willamette.edu/wits/resources/classrooms/

Mac

http://www.apple.com/support/imovie/

http://etc.sccoe.k12.ca.us/i2000/00mod/l_mm/imov.html

http://tewinkle.nmusd.k12.ca.us/imovie.html

http://www.apple.com/education/documentary/

Sources and Examples

http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/1999/07/21/short_films/print.html