Highlights for Childre... er, CLAMmers

From Morguefile.com

Your colleagues blogs form a network of rich resources to help you as you work toward refining your digital and cultural literacies this term. The links to the right ---> will take you to the blogs of the other members of your community of scholars. Visit them. Check out their posts. Post comments. Ask questions. Share ideas.

Here are a few examples of your classmates work from which you might draw instruction or inspiration:

• Your Colleague Karen (http://cuinbelgium.blogspot.com/http://cuinbelgium.blogspot.com/) has already taken lots of photos, without waiting for specific instructions on "what" to shoot. This will come in handy for her later. So, follow her lead - take lots of digital snaps and lots of b-roll video. You can always get rid of footage you have, but you can't add footage you don't.
• CLAM Alum Keith McGregor remembered to have someone help him shoot, so he could be in some of his pics. (http://abrilliantexpedition.blogspot.com/2009/04/day-of-elderlyand-some.html) I always forget to do that!
• CLAM Alum Zach Cerny took some unusual photos that later added some unique flavor to his projects: http://zachcerny-clamchowder.blogspot.com/2009/07/spring-break-pics.html
• Your Colleague Elizabeth posted a really cool video about the rise of social media at her cleverly named entry, "A Facebook in the Crowd": http://elizabethbarcus.blogspot.com/2011/01/face-book-in-crowd.html
• Your Colleagues Ellen & Robert have good examples of the photo editing exercise in conventional format; Patty & Leigh both have horrendously messy huge photos (OK I exaggerate a bit here, for effect) that illustrate just how many pixels lives are saved by responsible photo editing.
• CLAM Alum Jennifer McAmis used Picasa as a way to keep and organize her pics - and to keep handy for posting and project building: http://jennmcamis-clam.blogspot.com/2010/04/pictures-while-you-wait.html. Others have used similar photo sites like Flickr, etc.

Blog 3 - "Rightsizing" Images for the Blog

Students, you will be posting digital photos often to your blog, so this first digital editing exercise is one you will put to use early and often. Don't post more picture than you need! A size of 800 x 600 with a resolution of 72 dpi is plenty! (OK - 96 dpi if you got a Mac.) Let Tommy's Joynt help explain...
I've posted two pics below of a cool restaurant I visited in San Francisco. Do you notice any difference?

The first one is untouched exactly as it was downloaded from my iPhone. Go ahead, click it. HUGE Picture! Over a 1.2 MEG!*

The second one is the same photo - but reduced to 800x600 in size with a resolution of 72 dpi. perfect size for web viewing and only a fraction of the size - only 140k! (and a fraction of the upload/download time!)

Of course, I saved the smaller pic under a new name so I could keep the higher res photo for later use. This tip will save you lots of time in posting, so practice it early and often. (Dr. Howard's videos will provide much more material for you to continue to deveop your image editing skills, but this skill you will use many times!) You can do this in any photo editing program. I use PhotoShop on my lab computer, PaintShopPro on my home computer and GIMP on my laptop.

Don't have a digital image editing software? GIMP is free! Get a copy here now: http://www.gimp.org/


*(1.2M uploaded - conerted to 285k by blogger - still twice as long to download, and ten times as long to upload.)

ROFL about my Blog Lingo

What kind of writing is appropriate for blogging? When faced with new and evolving new media practices, it is good to observe convention as a clue to the language of that medium. Every medium has literacy practices that are unique to that medium. For example:

• Delivering a live speech is not the same as writing an essay. (Orality has demands writing knows not of... such as tone, pace, etc.)
• Phone conversations are not text messages. (If you actually SAY "LOL" in a conversation, then there's a problem.) 
• Text messages are not tweets. (A lion's share of business communication is now done via email, and 140 characters is just enough message to guarantee misunderstanding and inefficiency.)
• And blogs are not articles for publication, but neither are they live chats.
• Technorati published a list of the top blogs. A survey of these blogs reveals that the writing is grammatically correct, thoughtful and vigorous. The tone, length and pace may vary from blog to blog, but certain conventions of "good writing" carry across all of these.

Check Out Some Top Blogs

So, what am I saying? Write well. even in your blogs. even in short blogs. Even in blogs where other media predominantly carry your message. Because, come on, you don't ever want someone to say, "I liked your blog, but TMZ and Perez Hilton have much better grammar and writing that you have."

coz, like OMG that would be so lame, IMHO. k?

Here We Go Again...

"Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts."    Mark Twain, Innocents Abroad

Pretty soon, a new crew of Clemson University Students scatters across the globe on adventures to be chronicled in these blogs. This group of CLAMmers, our biggest yet, will share their cultural engagements in stories, anecdotes and reflections, as well as through photos, video and interviews. 

Yep, pretty soon, the links to the right will be populated with many new links to the blogs of many new students exploring new cultures. So, buckle up and stand by as we prepare to kick-off CLAM Spring 2011!