During the process of creating this documentary, I learned an over abundance of new things.  I learned the most about technology and how to film a movie.  In order to get what is needed there needs to be more rather then less film on the topic that is wanted.  Such as when a visual metaphor is being created when things disappear, appear, or even reappear.  It becomes much easier if there is too much film rather than too little.  I also learned how to use movie editing software, such as Movie Maker and Adobe Premiere.  It is amazing how that information comes into use later on in your life, during the making of Global Warming: Cold Facts for a Hot Issue my sister needed something done on one of those programs and I was able to help her.  I am positive that everything I and the entire class learned will be of some use to us in the future.  As for researching I quickly discovered that often times the titles of articles tell all.  If the title is boring or generic then do not read it and is not worth the time.  Also if you know exactly what you want to find then search engines are a great tool.  Blogs are also great tools for receiving feedback about your research or ideas.  I know that the feedback that I received greatly benefited me and my group and I am sure that goes for every one else in the class as well.  For example the otherwise tedious task of searching for songs that have lyrics about global warming was greatly sped up by suggestions which were posted on my blog.  I did not notice any change in my writing process from the experience I received during this documentary but that does not mean nothing will show up later.  My organization was greatly improved just through the blog alone.  I found it was much easier to complete the many blogs that were needed if I created a list of what needed to be done and prioritize them on the list.  I realized very quickly that when you are working in groups that not everything you want to do will be done and that you must take into account the ideas of the other people in your group.  Also, it seemed to me that whenever people work in a group it is natural for them to select a kind of leader and want to verify everything they do with that person.  It could just be to avoid starting an argument with that person but anything is possible.

            I learned much about the topic of global warming and the work that I put into this project may have been enough to convince me that global warming might exist.  I am now of the mind that it exists but that it is a natural cycle that is being put to extremes by the impact of people and that when it starts to cool off again then it will cool off more then ever before, just like it has heated up more than ever before.  Through research I learned that even a minor increase in temperature will kill off many of the Earth’s species and throw the entire planet out of alignment, not literally.  The project was a great experience for me and may have opened my eyes a little bit and I believe it was definitely worth the time.  I do believe that given more time with the editing and filming that the documentary would have been perfect.  Especially if it was done over a better topic such as the lack of Patriotism in the country or Religious Intolerance.

First, I would like to thank you for all of your suggestions and for bearing with me when I was not posting.  You greatly contributed to our efforts and the documentary as a whole, and for that I am, along with everyone else, eternally thankful.  Now that we are finished, I would like to invite you to come watch our documentary on this Thursday at 10:00 (when we are supposed to be taking our final ).  I would be glad to see you there.  If you could either let me or Mrs. Pomerantz know if you are attending, we would be immensly grateful.

I have been looking for as many songs with lyrics about environmental topics or anything that takes an assertive tone to play during the documentary.  I am hoping that I have found enough to cover a good portion of our section using only 10% (or whatever the number that Mrs. Pomerantz found was, to make it legal).  So far I want to use “They’ve paved Paradise” for sure and I have many others but unfortunately they are all kind of spoofs off of other songs and are more comedic then I would have liked and may draw too much attention from the documentary itself, but I think we can use them anyway.

She managed to keep putting it off for quite a while, and then I would forget about it for a little while, so it took a while but I went in during lab and just told her we were doing it then.  So after worrying who was going to see the documentary and what she was going to say for a couple of minutes we got down to it.  She was able to reinforce some of the things we already had in our documentary, such as the cloth bags for groceries instead of plastic, and she was also able to put a world perspective on preventing or coping with global warming.  I think we got some very good footage from it and thank you Jason for being my camera man :).

TS: Global Warming affects us all and therefore each individual must become active in order for a global change to occur.

Thesis: Global Warming is a current issue which encompasses the entire world, thus the entire world should know the facts.

I started by asking my neighbors if I could borrow their recycling cans to line them up on the street but the few that said yes were too far apart and too few so it would not have had the right effect even if I put the ones I got on other people’s driveways.  So I went with my first choice but not necesarrily my groups first choice, the lightbulbs.  At first the light fixture was fighting me but once I managed to get that undercontrol it was smooth sailing.  I loosened all the normal bulbs enough so that they would not light up and only the energy efficient ones would.  While the first energy efficient bulb was hard to see it was clearer that they were the efficient ones later, lukily.  I also got footage of all the energy efficient ones in but off, just in case we would need that to say that even though they are energy efficient you still need to turn them off when you leave the room.

First off our group is meeting tomorow in lab to finalize the editing, even though Andrew did a lot of it at home and we have nothing left to do in lab :(. I am sure we will find something to do though and Andrew probably saved us a good 15 minutes of work even though I know it took him much longer. So many thanks Andrew :). We will probably figure out how we want to present the questions to the audience and how we want to fit my interview with Frau and Andrew’s footage from Earth day in.  I am going to push to meet on Thursday in lab and, depending on what we get done in class and lab tomorow, after school too because I really do not want to get up earlier than I have too :P.

This guy, George Monbiot, promises (like a ton of other people) to cut the world’s greenhouse gas emissions by 90% if his plan is put into action.  He proposes a rationing situation in which people would have to choose what they would want to use their energy on and either buy or sell excess energy.  He believes that to do this first nations need to be given rations and then they can ration their population accordingly.  Unfortuntley this seems to be an idealistic approach and I do not think it will be successful, for if it would work we would be following this plan, or one like it, already.

Good for us. Activism Heats Up: A Proposed Solution to Global Warming

This article says that scientists have a plan to inject sulfur compounds into the air to thicken the air with sun reflecting gases.  Their thinking is based on the cooling period that usually follows a volcanic eruption.  However other scientists warn that this may damage the actual ozone layer and delay the repairing of the hole in the antartic by up to 70 years.  It may also increase precipitation rates as it did in an eastern country during a massive volcanic explosion.  They also fear that it will drastically change the climate patterns and even though it was not stated in the article I fear that there would be some health hazards to having so much sulfur in the air, no matter how high up it may be.

I fear that the risks far outweigh the benifits and that this plan would cause more problems than it would solve. This is a good article for my group, prevention.  Using Chemicals to Cut Global Warming May Damage Ozone Layer

This article talkes about how GW has hastened the biological clocks of many species and, as a result, made spring come earlier.  It talks about how plants start budding to early and then die from a last minute cold snap like we experienced last year.  The changing of a plants habits also greatly affect the well being of the animals that depend on it.  If the plant buds earlier than the animal coming back from their winter get away then the animals will starve.  The butterfly was noticed first and the cause of this was that the plants dried out too quick and killed off the catepillars.  Not only this but the pollen count is extremely high for a “normal” spring and allergies get bad too early for it to be spring.

 Article is good for Affects on the World.  Global Warming Rushes Timing of Spring