Week 7

TOTAL HOURS: 56 out of 80 hours

Welcome back to another wacky episode of "Sean at Shaklee!" You ready? Can you handle the anticipation of all the fun in store? What? You don't think we'll have fun? That's absurd! When the title has consonance/alliteration, it must be good! You'll see...You just wait.

First things first: Final product news. At this stage, my latest idea is to present my 3-4 Get Clean Demos and show the average walk-through from conception to completion. I really hope to integrate our sound studio and even run a "mini" recording session with my teachers. I could set everything up, hand them a short script, and simulate the real deal. I wonder what I'll make them say....Oh yes. This will be fun. If the studio happens to be in use, I could always run that to show how it's done. But I think everyone would have more fun if they could actually be a part of what's happening.

So all in all, I'd cover filming, scripting, voice over, editing, revisions/reviews, etc. The whole long nine yards for something as simple as a video on a website. As for the exact date of the presentation, I'm not 100% certain. I wrote down the final day of the internship May 12, but I don't know if I officially have that spot. Whatever happens, I'll need to know so I can make sure my mentor is available and everything I want to use can be used.

So enough of that boring final project garbage. On to the boring events of my day! ...And by boring I mean "absolutely enthralling". And by enthralling I mean "fine". So yeah, my day was absolutely fine.

I finished up my demos so they were solid. The next step is getting them reviewed. They need to be sent out to a few people who will check, offer revisions, approve, etc. Whatever edits need to be made will be made, and once everyone is satisfied, online they go! I burnt a few DVD's with all the movie files, and we're set to have a meeting next Monday. Incidentally, my teachers are supposed to stop by next week. Hopefully they don't stumble in mid-meeting. Come to think of it, I wonder what I'll show them when they arrive. I don't exactly want to unveil the demos, cause they're my final product. I guess I'll just have to let Joan gush about me. OH WELL...

So after the DVD's were all burned, I mentioned a fourth demo that I never tackled because of a lack of script. And guess what happened? I was put in charge of making a script! What are the odds!? I mean really...I never would've guessed that might happen in a milli-NO! A BILLION years! Yes, that's more reasonable. So I took on my new responsibility with care, and whipped up a script in about a half hour.

The tough thing about the new demo was that it used the product to clean a blood stained sock. Now, this raises an interesting dilemma. The rest of the demos are all happy and positive, and now we're presented with a mysterious blood stained sock. How did the blood get there? Furthermore, how am I supposed to give a positive spin to the spot? It's harder than you think. "New Fresh Laundry cleans even the toughest stains, like blood!" :D

Not quite.

My first draft script ignored the blood factor all together. I just referred to is as a "difficult" stain. Joan said that was all fine and dandy, but marketing might really want blood to be mentioned in one way or another. After all, blood is actually a pretty stubborn stain. The fact that the product can deal with it so easily is a rather strong selling point. So, I experimented with different lines. I tried to give it a kids spin, like soccer and scraped knees, but that was equally difficult without the proper footage. In the end, I came up with "Accidents happen. But even blood is no match for the power of Fresh Laundry Concentrate." Humorous, simple, acceptable. It doesn't really kill the mood. So the plan of attack is that we'll record the version that ignores the blood issue, and if marketing wants to be picky, we'll pull the revision out.

After I finished the scripting, we managed to grab Cynthia to do a recording session. She didn't have much time, so we rushed it. Joan was busy at the time so I got to handle everything completely by myself. Quite the exciting event if I do say so myself. Cynthia pretty much nailed it on the first try, so we were able to do the entire session from beginning to end in a little over 5 minutes. Skill. That's all I can say.

With recording done, I transferred the file over to my main computer and immediately got to work on the demo. I tell you, once you have a system, you can pump them out. I edited a full rough draft together in about a half hour, which brought my total up to a tremendous 4 demos. Joan scheduled a meeting next week with some of the higher-ups in marketing to review them and give whatever input they feel necessary. If all goes well, they may sign it off then and there. While I don't expect that to happen, that would be quite awesome. It's always nice to get it right the first time, unlike certain graduation portfolio reflections I would like to burn. If you could burn digital files that is. And not like CD burning but the burning with fire. That burning. The fun kind.

And there you have it. My absolutely fine day all nicely laid out for you. Enjoy it? Of course you did. I told you you would. That should be enough right there. I better wrap this up before my fingers start crampi