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Footsteps

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  Footsteps I went on a long walk while visiting my family over reading period. As I walked across the snow, I couldn't help but notice the sound that the snow made with every step I took. It felt peaceful, so I thought it would be fun to focus my soundscape on that. I decided to walk through the snow at different paces, recording each sound that was made. I then walked across concrete, dirt, and rocks to gain various sounds of footsteps that way. Because each recording sounded so peaceful on its own, I thought it would be interesting to layer all of the recordings on top of one another. I started off by having one recording play, then slowly adding each recording, then letting all of them play at the same time, and then slowly fading each sound out to eventually end with the same recording that it started with. To me, it felt like going from a peaceful walk to a much more chaotic scene, almost like I was walking through a busy sidewalk with various people traveling to different pl...
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The Dead of Winter Layout

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 For my book layout, I placed one image taken of indoor plants and placed it next to an image of outdoor plants. I wanted the difference between the two to be very clear, so by placing them next to one another, it is easy to see the difference in color and tone between the two. The indoor plants are green, and in many of the images you cannot tell what season it is. In the outdoor photos, however, the ground is covered in snow, the plants are missing leaves, and the grass is brown. I thought that this was an interesting contrast that I wanted to be seen throughout the book.  When thinking about my book layout, I thought about McLuhan's quote "environments are invisible." I definitely saw this with the photos of indoor plants where the environment is less important since it remains the same all year. This felt different when thinking about the plants immersed in winter, however.    Here are some screenshots from my book layout!
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The Dead of Winter

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Flickr One of the many dreary winter photos Every time I have walked outside recently, it feels dreary because there are no leaves on the trees and all of nature seems to be colorless. When I walked into the greenhouse for my botany class, however, I noticed how vibrant the plants looked even in the middle of winter. It felt like two completely contrasting things, where the greenhouse plants have no idea about the environment around them. It made me think about Bob Dylan's quote within McLuhan's book, "Something is happening, but you don't know what is it, do you Mister Jones?" There is so much change happening around the world in terms of technology that if you aren't immersed in it, you won't know what is happening and will be stuck in the past, similarly to the indoor plants not knowing what is happening outside. I realized what I wanted to do for this project when I walked into the greenhouse and saw all of the plants baking in the sun because it remin...
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And the Cycle Continues...

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And the Cycle Continues...      When I think about media, I immediately think about how much of my time I spend consuming it, especially on social media platforms. I think about how many people quote TikTok sounds or talk about the latest trend. This reminded me of McLuhans ideas of space and time, in which he said, "we now live in a global village...a simultaneous happening" (p 63). Everyone is interconnected in what they consume on a day-to-day basis, whether they pay attention to it or not.     I often think about deleting all social media platforms, but then I think about how behind I would be if I did so. As McLuhan stated, "as soon as information is acquired, it is very rapidly replaced by still newer information" (p 63). I often fall into a cycle of  consumption because I feel like I need to know the newest trends even though this information is constantly changing.      While making this video, I knew I wanted to involve footage from ...
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About Janna B.

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  I  am  a senior  E nvironmental  S cience major , and I spend most of my time playing softball  or being in the  outdoors.  I grew up in   a very small  town in   N orthern Minnesota , which  I loved because it  held such a large community, but a McLuhan quote reminded me of the downsides of growing up where I did. It  said, “ Too many people know too  much  about each other. Our  new en vironment  compels commitment and  participation . We have become  irrevo cably  involved with, and responsible  for,  each other” (p 24).  As  media  expands, it does not take long for information to spread across town, and  everyone definitely knows everything.    My classes tend to be biology  focused,  however I spent fall term abroad in London taking classes completely different from what I am used to. I took an  art history class and...
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