Richmond's Own (but unowned) Website

 
 
As the school year draws closer to its end, it becomes time yet again for English video projects.  The project that everyone most looks forward to - a showcase of writing, understanding, acting, editing, and creativity.  And thus came this year's AP/IB English video project, with the usual scramble for groups, ideas, etc. 

This year, we elected to go in a supergroup.  Instead of the six person group, we ended up with eleven.  Myself, Trevor Graham, Victor Guzman, Priscilla Yun, Kelly Chan, Jessica Wang, Tesia Au, Yongjin Jin, Daniel Lei, Eric Whang, and Kevin Tian.  Before we were going to do two groups - but one group wouldn't have any girls - and that's no fun! (For obvious reasons and otherwise).  But besides that, we had all sat together in a mass 4x3 block of desks for the whole school year.  (Except for the days where we all switched seats and confused Ms. Chu) Anyways, I think it'd be accurate to say that we really bonded over the school year, and had a lot of fun teasing each other and what not for the first 160 days or so of the school year.  All of us were either in Band or IB...so does that make us an iBand group? (Note: I wrote this blog before Apple trademarked that...because they will someday!)

Though eleven people gives you plenty of resources, getting everyone to talk together at once can be pretty darn difficult as well.    So there were many ideas thrown around at the beginning - a multi story epic that was interconnected in strange ways.  A Comedy-Musical Murder Mystery.  Or Glee.  Ultimately, the male bloc vote was compromised and we were stuck with Glee.  Which is how I felt at the time - I wasn't all that thrilled about it.  But we went ahead, with myself blindly moving forward, not knowing anything about the original show.  My only experience with Glee was the Jimmy Fallon parody of the show, called 6-Bee, based on his studio name.

Soon AP/IB testing time came - and so did my time on Hulu watching the past episodes of Glee.  And I found a new show to add to my list of must watch TV.  I wouldn't say I'm as far as a Gleek - but very much a casual viewer of the show - maybe more.  Perhaps quite a bit more.  And I began warming up to the idea.  I enjoyed the show, and soon I found that I couldn't wait to make our own version.  So I must thank the four girls, and Kevin for switching his vote, to force us all to do this video.  In the end, it was an enjoyable experience, and perhaps one of the most fun I've had on a video project in my four years at Rowland - definitely the one with the most laughter and strange, awkward, hilarious moments.  I got my chance to "sing" - which is something I've wanted to do for years.  Well, not quite - I've always imagined a singing/dancing flash mob at school.  But random singing within the video works just as well!  And I got my favorites - a Jimmy Fallon version of Livin' on a Prayer, and Don't Stop Believin' - in the video!

Anyways, I'm glad I was able to work with the people in the group - especially the four girls.  Being in band with them meant I knew them and I was friends with them, but I had never really worked on big projects like this with them (well except Tesia, but that was a spanish video in sophomore year - a lot more low key than a 12th grade english video!).  It was nice being able to get out of the IB bubble.  Granted, five in our group were IB kids, but I enjoyed working with different people than in from the rest of my classes in the year.  That's one of the reasons I really enjoyed my english class this year - as an AP/IB combined class, I got to study with and interact with other friends as classmates who were not in IB.  And now with one week of school left, I'm beginning to realize how much I'm going to miss all these people.  But more on that later!

Here's our finished product:

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