Claymation Reflection

This entry is about me and Mikes claymation project. This was a project for Mr. Bergquist's class. Claymation is when you take a bunch of pictures of the clay figures moving and make a movie out of it. My partner was Mike and we had a lot of fun with this project.

The most enjoyable part for me was watching the video when it was all finished. After watching the whole video I thought we did a pretty good job. Mike also made some credits that were pretty funny. If I were going to do this project over again I would have added more information about Christopher Columbus. My favorite scene was probably scene 4 or 7. My least favorite scene was 2. The characters for this project were mostly made up of soft colored clay. And we used construction paper for the back round. I did a lot of the picture taking and Mike did a lot of the computer and audio work. I also enjoyed seeing the finished video of other people in my class.

The most difficult part was the picture taking. I did most of the picture taking for this project. The picture taking was fun at first but by the end it was very frustrating. Mike had a nice camera so it made it a little easier. The lens on the camera broke in the middle. To keep the lens on we used rubber bands. Another difficult part was getting the scenes in on time. We got behind when mike was sick for a few days, so it was hard to catch up. But we got the last few scenes in on time. Mike could be a little hyper and hard to work with at times but he was also what kept it fun.

I learned a lot of things in this project. One of the things I learned was using the computer and iMovie. We had some troubles with the iMovie but mike was really good at using the computer and worked them out. Mike taught me a lot about iMovie like how to change the duration, how to change the ken burns affect...etc. Another thing I learned was how to work with a partner. Me and mike had some disagreements but we usually worked them out. One more thing I learned was about Hernan Cortes. Although I didn't do Cortes for my movies I still learned a lot about him. Well doing the project I also learned a lot about Columbus. I also learned that patients pays off.

This has been my favorite project so far this year. I learned a lot doing this project. Mike was a good partner to have because he knew so much about computers.

Road Trip

My road trip to California was very fun. We spent a lot of time in Yosemite National Park. On the trip we rented a Volkswagen bus. The bus had a pop top, me and my little brother slept in the pop top most of the nights. On the trip we did a lot of hiking. The scenery was very pretty. We went to the pool for a couple of the days. We also rented bikes and rode all around the park. The park had a couple of bmx tracks and trails all over the park. We had a lot of fires on the trip.

Fishing

When I was in New Zealand we went fishing. My uncle has a 16' small metal boat. The boat had a 250hp Suzuki outboard engine. We drove from Auckland to a small town on the coast where he kept his boat. It was a pretty windy day but we went out anyway. We motored out of the Marina into the ocean. There were some pretty big waves but we were heading to an island to fish so the island would provide shelter from the waves. When we got to near the island and out of the waves we dropped the anchor. Me my brother, dad, and uncle started to fish. There were not very many boats out because of the weather and all the boats that were out were a lot bigger then 16'. We caught some small fish but none of them were big enough to keep. We were not catching to many fish so we decided to head back in. We started to motor back to the Marina. When we got into the open water the waves had gotten a lot bigger. some of the swells were at least 9-10' tall. It was a pretty scary boat ride. When we were almost to the Marina this huge wave hit us from the side and came close to tipping the boat over. My little brother was in the cabin and a pan fell and hit him in the head. Luckily we made it back to the Marina safely.

My Trip To New Zealand

We started the trip with a 15 hour plane ride. On the plane we each had a little TV on the head rest in front of us. The console had video games, music, TV shows and movies. When we got to the airport I was exhausted. My aunt who lives in Auckland new Zealand picked us up and took us to her house. I went straight to bed when there. The next day when I woke up my grandma and grandpa were there. For the next few days we toured Auckland. The next day we took a plane to Christ church where we stayed in a hotel and looked around the town. The next day we went bungee jumping. My dad went first, when I got to the edge of the bridge I was looking 200ft down, at that point I was pretty scared but I just went for it and jumped. It was a huge rush, after it was all over I was really happy I did it. The next day we went jet boating where they filmed Lord Of The Rings. It was really fun and pretty. The next day we drove to another town where I saw the actual Lord Of The Rings ring. We spent a couple days there. After that we flew back to Auckland to visit some more with my aunt, grandma and grandpa. Then we flew back home.

My Life Graph

"When i met Magic Johnson" I was in Hawaii, I got up to go to breakfast. When we got to the restaurant there was a little wait and the restaurant was in the mall so me my brother and grandma walked around and looked at the shops. In one of the shops my grandma came over to me and said I think i saw Magic Johnson over there. So i went over to where my grandma pointed and there he was. He was very tall i only came up to his elbow. Me and by brother ran back to the restaurant to get a business card for Magic Johnson to sign. my brother got the last business card so I did not get his autograph. The next day my grandma went back to the restaurant and saw him again. It was really cool to meet him.

Notre Dame Football Game

Last year my Grandpa picked me and my family up in his airplane. He flew us to Indiana to watch the Notre Dame vs. Navy football game.

For the Two days before the game we toured the Campos with my grandpa who's a professor there. We watched a Notre dame volley ball game, hockey game and we went to the pep rally. Both my mom and dad went to collage there so they showed me some of their old class rooms and dorm rooms. On the game day we went to a couple tail gating party's where there were some X Notre Dame football players there. We also watched the marching band. The game was a blast to watch although Notre Dame lost to Navy for the first time since 1963 it was still a fun trip.

My Interests

My name is Ben. My interests are dirt biking, snowboarding, music, soccer, football, and go karting. I have a Honda crf 150 dirt bike which i ride at my house and some times up in the mountains with my Dad. Myself and a couple other friends built a jump in a dried up pond in my back yard. I like to dirt biking because I like to go fast, catch air, and have fun.
Last year i did the ski bus it was a lot of fun snowboarding with my friends. We discovered this spot where there was always good powder. We spent most of our time in the terrain park, by the end of the season i got a lot better in the park. We also would go to the backside on good powder days and build some pretty cool powder jumps. It was a lot of fun and i'm planning on doing it again.
I really enjoy listening to music i like most kinds but my favorites are alternative, hip hop/rap, reggae, rock and some metal.
Ive played soccer for a long time. Last year in the fall i had to play up a year in division 1. i was playing with 14 and 15 when i was 13. We lost every game except for two. I improved that year a lot and it was a good experience. Ive also been to Fort Casey soccer camp twice with a couple of friends it was really fun the first time cause we had awesome counslers. It was not as fun the second time but it was still ok.
I played cougar football last year and it was a blast i played a little defensive end, but I mostly played on the offensive line. Our team went undefeated and scored over a 180 points and let in 6.
Ive only been go karting 3 times at traxx but every time has been a blast.

First blog ever

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