My group and I have completed the script and have already started recording for our presentation. The way that we're going to be presenting it is through a podcast. We all have designated people we must reenact for this project. I am doing Desdemona and Cassio, Michael is doing Othello and Roderigo, Dakota is doing Barbantio, and Jacob is doing Iago. My job is also to edit everyones parts to make the podcast ready for the presentation.

    The good things about working in this group is that everyone knows their assignments. We all know what we must do to get our portion done and we know how to use our time effectively. But the bad things about working in a group is that some people didn't have computers to use the program we needed to record the lines. So we had to designate times in which we were going to be able to get them to do their part.

    For the editing part we had to choose which parts of the script sounded good together, as well as what would get straight to the point without losing story plot. It was hard to analyze all of the text and edit it, but we found out how to do it effectively and correct.

    My understanding for the plot and characters, as well as the theme are deepening through this benchmark process because I'm starting to see how things are tying together due to what has happened. I'm also seeing how somethings need to be mentioned in the beginning to make sense of what has happened at the end.

    We edited our script and found out that we had way too many lines so we had to edit it down a lot. Our script is organized but we still haven’t figured out who is saying what and we haven’t really decided on how were presenting. We don’t want out presentation to be boring but we don’t want to have to do too much because we have a very short time to finish this.

    We said we were going to read the lines but I think that wouldn’t be enough. Then we said we were going to use cards to help with the transition between acts and scenes. I want to make the cards that we use interesting. I want to put pictures of who’s talking on each card and what their actions are.

    So far my group is working extremely well. We all have lots of ideas that we want to put into this project, it’s just a matter of putting it together though. The first thing that we were discussing was finding the lines. We all wanted to find as many lines as possible so we could edit the script any way we wanted. We divided the acts amongst us and everyone looked for lines that dealt with jealousy. At first it was hard to find any lines that actually saying that someone was jealousy but when I looked deeper into it I found a lot.

  Another issue we were talking about was how we were going to edit the script. We didn’t say who would say what yet     because we want to know how much we were going to need first. After we edit our script things will become clearer.

6/8/08

    To continue on from my last post, my group's main accomplishment has been completing the script. After editing down to just enough lines, I feel as if we successfully are portraying the plot and illustrating our theme in a 10-page script. It’s funny that it’s possible to edit down that entire play and manage to get everything that matters into 10 pages. Shakespeare apparently liked to drag things out a lot.
    I also feel like my group managed to work efficiently together. I think we all did a really good job of staying on task during our work times and each putting forth our best effort. Hopefully, our presentation comes out just as well. Our puppets have not been created yet, but our background for the show is looking good.
    The most frustrating part of the script’s composition was copying and pasting the lines into the right places. Certain parts got mixed up and I ended up putting a line into our script in two different locations. Luckily, editing helped remove that.
    Our presentation date is Tuesday, so we have one more day to practice. Hopefully, all goes well.

This is a bit late, but better late than never. Anyway, the entire English Othello script writing is a lot more difficult than I thought it would be. I mean, the breaking down of scenes to strictly show the plot line, and your chosen theme was fairly easy and not very complicated to do, but after your entire group is done doing that, and being the person to read the entire script and edit it down to about 10 to 15 pages is extremely difficult. If there wasn't so much content, or if Google docs didn't run as slow as it does, a lot less stress would be present. Just today, in class, which was our last work period to finish the script, I was reading through the script, and editing down soliloquies, and removing un-needed dialogue. I was doing my job. But while I was, Google docs was running tolerably slow at first, and I didn't mind, but eventually it got to a point where I couldn't work with it. It was unbearable, and so frustrating at times. The only reason it was slow was probably because some of my group members were still adding text to the script that should have already been done on Tuesday. And yes, that is another frustrating part of the group. Deadlines were missed, so that kind of put me back on the editing part of the script. Deadlines are pretty much over now though, so editing should be a little bit faster and easier to do.

As I was editing the script, I realized that this is an extraordinary task that I had to do. It was difficult, and took a lot of patience to do. I paused for a second, and thought to myself what I had to do. I had to edit down this--currently 25+-page-- script down to a ten to fifteen page script. Not only that, but it has to make sense, and the basic plot line has to be able to be easily identified, along with your chosen theme. Yeah, sounds repetitive since it was explained before in the same blog post and probably the first one, but it has to be repeated, to show the difficulty of this fourth quarter English creative benchmark project. Even though the project is kind of like a ball on a chain that's bound to you--it isn't that bad-- it really gets you to think, and analyze text in Othello. Without this project I wouldn't have read through Othello again, unless a project had to do with it. Overall though, the project is a mind bender, and requires a lot of work.

It tests you, in a way.

Process: So far we are done with our Initial script. We started out with finding important line that sets our plot and then supports our theme. Since we were assigned on specific acts and scenes we found the lines, wrote a brief description of what happened and put it on google doc. So far everyone found their part and put it on google doc.

Group Dynamics: At this point everyone’s parts are done. No one was assigned to write the lines out on google doc. Since the two scenes I was assigned were pointless and did not have anything important on it so I was done first. I went online and found The Othello book and then read through google doc to see which lines we needed and then started pasting everyone’s lines. Since Guess was also done with me he also found the lines he needed for his section. As we finished coping and pasting our script I worked on my section where I cut out all the lines from the original text that we did not need. Because Sarah was not there I tired doing her line too. My other team members are working on theirs right now.

Editing: For the editing part it’s very confusing for me. Well not exactly, I was confused at first of what I should be doing so yeah. So far I have cut down my lines to where a character says something and it basically states what my one line summary says about that event. I did not go over where I have to link the scenes, but that will be done soon and we should be working on that the next class.

Evolving Understanding: I choose each line by looking at what that line leads to. For example I wrote the line where Iago tells Cassio to drink with him, this is important because that leads to Cassio to get drunk, get in a fight with Rodrigo and then get fired by Othello. So things like that, which basically changes or go along with Iago’s plan in the play are what I usually pick out.

Blog 1.

So far, my group has assigned each other with which scenes they are going to do. And we have  talked about how we are going to perform our play. I would say the hard thing about working in a group is having to depend on other people. For example, if someone doesn’t do their part, your all looking at a not so great grade. And like that saying “if you want something done, do it yourself” that doesn’t apply when your working in groups. That’s what I hate. But we did get our scenes done real fast. Editing the text wasn’t too hard. I thought that if I just took the text straight from the text, and then edit it later, that would be easier. I soon found out that I shouldn’t have done that. Now I have to go back and edit everything. I’m becoming used to the language more. It doesn’t look like complete and total gibberish anymore. I actually didn’t realize how much I enjoyed this book until this project. It’s an interesting story. And the ending just… sucks. There’s not much more you can say about that. Everyone just dies.

Nicholas Herrera

Othello blog one

This is my second blog as shown above. I am suppose to report various things such as the work ny groupo abnd i have produced, how the project is coming along, and explaining the different themes and how i am able to get in depth wiht them.

 TO start off i am holding my group behind, but they are not letting me fall to far behind and are making sure i catch up. I dont have a computer so i cannot fufill all of the requirements but they are helping me out. I think that today we will make great use of the Workshop period of our class, this way i will be able to catch up, even get ahead of shedule. Today ihope to post all my lines on gogole documents and begin filming or continue making the script.

THe group is doing well. Ofcourse we are goofing off a little bit but we are getting our work done at a steady pace. We have great chemistry all around. I have gotten to leanr more about khari shawn and lewam. I am also able to consentraite very well in this group, despite the hilarious jokes that are told.

 It is a little bit harder for me to understand the loyalty theme we are explaining. THe only thing i have noticed is that people can have three faces. One with their own intents, A face of appearence shown to others, and a face of sleflessness. Some peope have all these faces, some only have one. TO me it seems that Iago is coniving, yet clever, and knowing this can help me minupulate or understand how some people whom do such acts apear. This book is helping me understand more baout certain human natures.

My group and I are just about finished our script. Myself and I think another of my team members have found lines from all the acts and scenes we were assigned. We have them up on the Google Docs, and the rest of my group is just about finished with their acts and scenes as well.

There have been no additional difficulties so far relating to my group and their ability to work together. Our situation has been pretty much a complete success. No one wastes time or gets off task. We talk about what needs to be discussed, then we get done what needs to be done. Everyone is working effectively and efficiently, so there are no problems with my group, as far as I can see.

When adding lines to the Google Docs, my group searches for the quotes that can show off our theme without actually saying it, as well as give hints to the storyline and move it forward. We try to get the juicy quotes that let you easily know what's going on at whatever point of the story the quote is from. For editing, we try to pick out what is unnecessary in the quotes/lines we find and try to get to the point without too much extra information. My group picks tha lines apart and then puts them back together in a way that can be more understandable to the audience and not bore them or leave them stumped.

Now, after finding my lines and looking at those that my partners found, I do understand some of the secret jealousy and character edvelopment to a greater degree. I realized that Brabantio was jealous of Othello almost from the start, seeing as how his daughter was tempted by a "Moor" and not a noble man of Venice. He thinks just about anyone else would be a better choice for Desdemona, but that doesn't seem likely. Also, I've seen how Othello's jealousy was sparked little by little over the course of the story. Throughout Acts 1-3, he gets little nudges down the path to jealousy, but in Acts 4 and 5, he really starts to get "heated" and reveal the jealousy that was created in him by Iago's plan. He goes off on Desdemona about her being a whore with Cassio and giving away his blessed handkerchief, and even questions Emilia's motives. His judgement starts to become clouded near the ending and when the story does come to a close, he ends up dead.