Wednesday, December 2, 2009

A Space Odyssey Evaluation Works Cited

"2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)." The Internet Movie Database (IMDb). Web. 03 Dec. 2009. .


"2001: A Space Odyssey (film) -." Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Web. 03 Dec. 2009. .

"History of Space Exploration." Views of the Solar System. Web. 02 Dec. 2009. .

"Space Exploration." Astronomical Data Center Home page. Web. 03 Dec. 2009. .

A Space Odyssey Evaluation

Stanley Kubrick’s A Space Odyssey is based on the future, focusing on 2001. This movie was made in 1968. Keir Dullea portrays Dr. Dave Bowman, Gary Lockwood is Dr. Frank Poole and William Sylvester plays Dr. Heywood R. Floyd. Stanley Kubrick and Arthur Clarke wrote the screenplay for this video. A Space Odyssey won an Oscar Award in 1969 for Best Effects, Special Visual Effects. In 1969 the movie also won the BAFTA Film Award for Best Art Direction, Best Cinematography, and Best Sound Track.




This movie had many confusing things about it. The first was the monkeys in the beginning because it showed them for like the first fifteen minutes but it seemed as if they had no point. It never showed you what the big thing was that the monkeys discovered either. That big thing came up later in the movie but you never found out what it was. Another thing was that the movie went too slow. I felt as though it just kept dragging on and on. Several parts could have been sped up or taken out to make the movie go by faster. Also, the ending was confusing because it showed him getting older and eventually turning back into a fetus. This is not possible for someone to just turn back into a fetus instead of dying.


The camera view was not too bad though. It showed interesting angles. The background music helped to keep things going. Sometimes though, it seemed to make the movie go slower because the song would play for so long and there would be a long stretch without anyone talking it would just play the song. The background music did help keep it interesting for the most part though.


It really freaked me out how they had a computer so smart it could do almost anything. That part is true in a way. Recently people rely on technology to get through everyday life. People used to coexist without technology but these day’s people can’t make it through everyday routines without using some sort of modern day technology. HAL could actually exist one day and it is scary to know lives would be in the hands of a computer. I thought it was really awful how HAL killed those astronauts. It is not a good feeling to know that one day, possibly soon, technology could become smarter than humans.


A Space Odyssey was right in another aspect as well; humans have been traveling through space since this movie. On July 20, 1969, Neil A. Armstrong took the first step onto the moon. Astronauts have made it as far as Mars, which was on May 25, 2008. New Horizons launched on January 19, 2006. New Horizons is a mission designed to fly by Pluto, its moon Charon, Kuiper Belt, and Jupiter and transmit images back to Earth. Overall this movie was pretty approximate on the space travel because we have traveled a lot since this movie was made.


Overall I would have to say I did not like A Space Odyssey. I did think it was interesting when HAL was trying to take over the mission, although it was terrible when she killed the three astronauts. After that the movie did get interesting for awhile. I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone though. I thought it was way too long and very boring. I did not understand half of the movie and what I did understand was to drug out. If this movie would have had not so many slow moving shots of the space exploration and would have sped up the monkey part I probably would have gotten more out of it.

Monday, November 23, 2009

Cell Phone Evaluation

Cell phones have many great things other functions than just making a phone call. You can now take pictures, play games, get online, make videos, and some have walkie talkies in them. Flip phones are important designs becuase the compact size when closed and when opened the microphone to talk into is close to your mouth. You can set your price for phones because of all the different contracts and phones to choose from. Phones can be plain and simple or complex. Some have different sized buttons that are in different patterns.

Tips for writing an evaluation

When writing an evaluation there are some key ideas that you should follow. Make sure you give the reader enough information that they would know what you are talking about without them having to be familiar with the subject you are evaluating. Make sure you know what you are talking about because otherwise the reader will not think the evaluetion is credible or trustworthy. Don't take sides when writing either. Be fair to both sides of the arguement. Also, give reasons for your judgement.

Thursday, November 12, 2009

Group Presentation

I feel like our group presentation went very well. All of us pulled together and helped out to make the video possible. We put our differences aside and I feel like we accomplished a lot. I feel like our video turned out really good. It is very informative and tells step by step exactly how to use the printers in the Bracken Library. Fayann did a great job on the introduction of our video. I feel like I did a good job telling about our obstacles although I got nervous and fumbled around on some of my part. Amanda did a great job on editing the video and describing every step again during the presentation. Alex concluded our presentation perfectly.

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

How to use the Bracken Library Printers video

Our group taped our video today. I feel like it went really well. Were going to meet tm to go over our presentations for Thursday. We seperated the presentation into four parts, one for each member. FayAnn is doing the introduction, I am doing the obstacles, Amanda is doing the details on our project, and Alex is doing the conclusion. We are writing our parts individually and tm talking about our parts and practicing our presentation.

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Group Work

In our group we are basically just waiting to video tape our presentation. We are still working on the script but other than that we just need to film it and edit the film. We decided on Tuesday that we will put some still pictures in with the video. I am researching how to videos so we will make sure our video is similar to the others. SO far our project is running smoothly.