Midterm Crit Video Response

I started off pretty shaky right off the bat, scratching my neck and shifting positions too often. I also think I could have planned out my words much better; I winged it a little too much and sort of talked myself in circles conceptually, periodically pausing to think. I should have jumped into the slideshow right after introducing my new concept, but instead I ended up rambling on for another 30 -45 seconds about nothing that was particularly beneficial to the crit.

The first slide went badly. I did a poor job of explaining how that first image related to what I had just introduced as my concept, and as I struggled explaining it I kept stopping with "um...," which broke up my sentences and probably confused people even more. Once I got into the actual photos of mountaintop removal sites I did better though, and the fact that the lights were shut off and the attention of the class was away from me towards the projected images definitely helped. This topic is what I had been researching for the week or so prior to that, so that along with the fact that conceptually it's a lot more straightforward and concrete made it much easier to explain. While the small room was good for speaking, I kept turning toward the computer screen to change slides allowing my voice to fade, losing some key words. These explanations, like the early ones, could definitely have used some more planning as well. While the concept was still very new even to me, I think I could have come up with a better adjective than "pretty crazy" to describe the atrocities I had observed and researched.

The lights came back on for the class' comments, which went on much longer than I remembered. Once again I looked too uncomfortable and did a bad job of explaining why the mountaintop removal sites are more of a problem than the commercial expansions. I had my hands on my hips or in my pockets for much of this, as well as the rest of the crit, and it would have been much better to keep my hands formally folded when I didn't need them to help visualize what I was saying.

So all in all it was below average, even to my low public speaking standards.



Tom's face says it all...








I had a chuckle at the last frame too..