Carrie Cook's Field Reports

Field report, yay!

Carrie Cook — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 16:32:21 -0600

Laura has inspired me, and it's a slow day in the office, so it's field report time!

Last night I was tapped (by process of elimination) to give a presentation on Digital Storytelling to the East Bay Mac Users Group at Ex'Pressions in Emeryville. I spoke for an hour, running through the history of CDS, an overview of the workshop process (including a writing exercise) and of course I showed some digital stories. All in all, I think it went really well, and we might even get a few volunteers out of it!

Next week starts the onslaught of workshops: a 3 day general at the end of next week, a 5 Day TTT the week after that, then hopefully Chicago for the open workshop in mid-November, then my and Laura's KPFA workshop the first week of December. I'm excited about it, but also nervous. We did a tutorial run-through with Andrea a week or two ago, and that combined with my presentation last night has made me feel better about doing a workshop, but there's still so much to learn.

Laura and I are also working on the CDS archive, which you can read about in her blog here. Also, I got the intern, Zoe, to fall for the updog AGAIN. Exciting stuff!

Also, on a more personal note, I bought a TiVo. If you've been thinking about it, do it, friends. It will change your life.

Have a fantastic weekend!

Updawg

Carrie Cook — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 13:27:58 -0600

Scene: Center for Digital Storytelling office, 12 PM

Intern Zoe: I'm really hungry, do you guys have plans for lunch?
Me: No, not really, but I'm ready to make some. Laura?

(Laura, realizing she is being addressed, takes off her headphones)

Intern Zoe: (to Laura) What are your lunch plans?
Laura: Umm, well, they would be to acquire sustenance, ingest said sustenance, and uh...to feel satisfied.

(all laugh)

Intern Zoe: I think some udon sounds good. Are you guys up for that?
Me: Udon? Do I know what that is?
Intern Zoe: It's like a noodle soup, I think you had it at that Japanese restaurant we went to with Joe.
Me: Oh, at first I thought you said updawg, like (sniffs), "Man, it smells like updawg in here"!
Intern Zoe: What's updawg?

(I am shocked that this has worked, but also overjoyed)

Me: (head swivel) NOT MUCH, WHAT'S UP WITH YOU?

(explosion of laughter)

END SCENE

I'm a slacker...

Carrie Cook — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 16:21:38 -0600

So this is my first field report, how lazy of me.

I'm working at the Center for Digital Storytelling, and thusfar a lot of my work has been tech-related, since that niche wasn't really being filled by anyone on staff. Basically, it's entailed a lot of time prepping computers for workshops by installing software, removing files/software that isn't needed, and troubleshooting technical issues. I also made a master table of our computers and all of the software that we have, so that teachers could clearly see what software was installed on which computers. It's something that I enjoy, but that can definitely get tedious, so I'm pleased that I'm going in a different direction for a little while at least.

That direction is working on the Berkeley event for the International Day for Sharing Life Stories. So far, we've secured a space at the Berkeley Public Library, pinned down some great artists to perform/exhibit their work, and I just finished what I hope is the final incarnation of the flyer for the event. Soon, we should receive a media mailing list which will enable us to notify various bay area media outlets about the event. I'm also working on editing together a mini-commercial of sorts for the day itself, which will probably go on the International Day website (www.ausculti.org). I really enjoy editing, so I'm excited about working on that.

Next week, I'll get to work my first digital storytelling workshop since participating in one in my second week of work here. That should be great, seeing what working a workshop is like will be really exciting, plus we have Daniel, who runs our Colorado office, coming in to help teach.

I also worked on compiling a list of high school teachers in the bay area who would potentially be interested in digital storytelling (mostly English, photography, and computer science teachers) so that we could send them some info. It was tedious (I basically went to each school's website and looked at their directory and found all of the English/photography/technology teachers and copy and pasted their info into an Excel spreadsheet), but it's done, and hopefully will go out soon.

I guess that's it from me. I swear I will be better about doing this.

Oh! I'll attach that contact list, just in case anyone else's organization may find it useful.