Regent Park Focus

It was about mid-November when I sat down to plan out a one-hour program for Radio Regent, the topic of which was to involve religion in some capacity. With the sensory rush of the holidays just gearing up and the airwaves (and internet) beginning to buzz with the annual "war on Christmas" debate, it seemed appropriate to consider just what "Christmas" means in today's Canada.   Although North American Christmas has been an ostensibly Christian holiday, many Canadians - even those who have been in Canada for generations - are not devout Christians, or Christians at all. So what do we do with a holiday that has "Christ" in its very name, and supposedly celebrates the birth of Jesus? Specifically, what do young Canadians who don't identify as Christians do when Christmas rolls around?        I sent out a couple of feelers to religious leaders in the local community, hoping for a response. Only two peop...

Today at Regent Park Focus we shot another episode of Interfaith Dialogue with special guest Patricia, a representative and healer from the Toronto Counsel Fire Native Cultural Centre in Regent Park. On the show, we discussed issues of residential schools, how it has affected the Native community and how they are currently healing. Patricia works at the Native Culture Centre as a counselor/healer to help Natives who were pulled into residential school reconnect and learn about their culture and traditions, she often helps rebuilds relationships between them and families. We had a full crew for production –  it was a good learning and informative experience for everyone. -Vina

Thursday December 16 th our animation programming has continued into the New Year and continues to bring the high level of creativity we have come to expect from this program. Today youths were given the freedom to create their own animation in addition with their own story to go with it. One youth created a futuristic aircraft/ship that was both innovative and artistically inclined. Many of the youths that are involved in this program have expressed an interest in going into the animation field. The youths wish to be the future of cartoons, movies and gaming, and with companies such as Pixar, Ubisoft, and Cartoon Network Studios there are many viable options in this job field. We also engaged in conversation about jobs in the field and ideas of future games that the youths have. This was a fun and enlightening session allowing the youths to show the skills they have developed in this program. By Corrina Richard

This Tuesday Regent Park Focus Youth Media Arts Centre was very busy producing three TV shows for our Interfaith Dialogues series, and producing a radio show for Radio Regent. Originally, Tuesday’s radio show was going to be about current news and events in Toronto. However due to the sad passing of Nelson Mandela, Regent Park Focus decided to focus on the life and legacy of Mandela. The show was co-hosted by Omar and Oscar, with special guests Murphy Browne, Karen, and Adaku. We started the show off with an audio clip of how student’s from Nelson Mandela school felt about his passing. We then talked about Mandela’s life and the incredible legacy of fighting for justice that he leaves behind. The show also included music that reminded us of Mandela and ended with the reading of a quote by him. This Tuesday we were also in the process of planning and shooting three shows that will be part of the Interfaith Dialogues series on Regent Park TV. This series focuses on various religi...

Ever wanted to learn how to produce a radio show? Well that’s exactly what happened at this week’s Regent Park Focus TV and Radio Broadcasting meeting. The participants, made up of both volunteers and staff, got together to talk about producing a Catch da Flava Youth radio show on Radio Regent. The participants were lead into Regent Park Focus’s very own radio studio to learn the elements that go into creating and producing a radio show. Participants hosted a mock radio show, taking turns being the radio technician, which involves controlling the sound of the mics and music, and being the host of the show. Participants then held a discussion about what topics they wanted to talk about on the upcoming radio broadcast. The topics ranged from local issues, such as Rob Ford and upcoming Toronto music festivals, to national issues like the senate scandal, to international issues, such as the protests happening in Thailand and the Ukraine, homophobia at the Sochi Olympic Games, and the imp...

There are many misconceptions about what happens in our country and h ow we relate to other countries. In Canada we frown on countries such as Japan, the Philippines and Thailand for their high involvement with human trafficking and sex trafficking. Canadians are one of the world’s highest sponsors to the prevention of child abuse and human trafficking worldwide but many Canadians fail to see that Canada also has high human trafficking rates including human sex trafficking, human slavery and human selling.   On Friday 22 nd 2013 the Diva Girls talked about the serious topic of human trafficking in Canada and the recent discovery in London England of the three women trapped into slavery by an English couple.   But incidents like these do not just happen across the ocean, it happens in Canada everyday. Organizations such as the Canadian Women’s Foundation work to help young girls and Trafficking survivors back to their normal lives and families. According to the CWF some of ...

We are excited to announce that we have completed our second week of our 4 week computer workshop. This is scheduled to happen every Tuesday, in the media lab from 4:30- 6pm. The first week began with an introduction to building your own website.The kids each designed and customized their personal pages on Tumblr, adding images and videos along with other decorative creations. They then ended the workshop by posting instructions as to what they had learned and steps for others to make their own Tumblr pages. I must say, each participant did a great job having their page reflect who they are and interests they have. Last week marked the second lesson in our computer workshop. We were able to build upon our lesson last week and add to it this week with a look at coding. The participants were given the opportunity to look at websites in a more technical manner. Coding involves giving the computer basic commands or codes that allows you to edit the webpage in detail. At first glance, ...

Regent Park Focus is partnering with a group of University of Toronto students to produce a media series exploring multiple faiths and religions. Over the course of 10 weeks youth will interview religious leaders in the community and get an understanding of the different cultures, values and lifestyles that make Regent Park and Canada so spiritually diverse. The interviews will be documented in the form of two radio shows and eight television programs, which will be available at RPTV.  At this weeks’ meeting, the Inter-Faith program team prepared for an upcoming interview with a member of an LGBTQQ (Lesbian, Gay, Transgender, Queer, Questioning) Islamic community. The youth divided up the various roles required for production, reviewed how to conduct a good interview, and learned how to produce, direct, and film a TV show. The youth also took a vote to choose which religion to focus on for the next episode, deciding on the Unitarian Church. By: Adaku

The Regent Park Focus facility welcomed animation designer Jude to our family. Jude will be coming in on Thursdays to teach kids about different animation programs and how to use them to creatively send a message about social issues and other topics in their society and lives. The 14 th however was an introduction into the future programming which included looking at finished products, and how they were designed. Youth can be signed up for this program which will be held every Thursday from 4pm-5:30pm, snacks will be provided as well as rewards for those who attend. Space is limited and is offered on a first come first served bases.    This program will be offered at the regent park focus in the media lab and include programs like After Effects, 3D sculpting, etc. The kids today got a first hand view on what it is like to be an animator and the kind of work and dedication that goes into producing even a short film. The youth seemed most excited about the creative fr...

Five youths came together to talk about the production of   two ten minute television shows, one about an LGBT accepting mosque and   another about the Chinese Christian Softball League. First we talked   about the potential for faith based sports such as the softball league,   and their possible capability for fostering community. We then talked   about some of the gender dynamics within Islam concerning leading and   taking part in prayer. This led to the discussion of the therefore   inherent difficulties incorporating people identifying as neither male   nor female into prayer. By: Milo Golub

The Diva Girls did the Dove workshop, which focused on issues such as body confidence, self-esteem and inaccuracies in the media. Each member of the Diva Girls filled out work sheets that required critical thinking about how they feel about their body images and how they cope with self-esteem issues. Exploring these issues help boost confidence mentally and generally giving them the ability to public speak, try out for teams and make new friends. These also help with metal hurdles the Diva Girls may face in day-to-day life whether that is bullying, stress or just in general sadness, remembering that they are beautiful and have self worth helps give them the tools to overcome every obstacle. The first work sheet asked the Diva Girls what gave them confidence, many answering that a combination of family and friends helped them through times of doubt or low self-esteem. This was a great way to remind the girls that many people find them beautiful even when they may not feel beautif...

 Friday, November 1 st 2013 the Diva Girls meeting started with conversation around how their Halloween went and their plans for November. May of the girls, sporting bags of candy, expressed they had fun Halloween celebrations even if they hadn’t been out and about with the ghouls and ghosts. The girls also talked about how their day had been at school and recent books they read. The conversation took a serious turn when the youths got into their “what happen in the week” topic which was gun violence. Less then a year after the Sandy Hook Middle School and several years after Columbine High School another middle school shooting occurred in Nevada, USA. The shooting left one teacher and the shooter dead, and rocked risky debate over a controversial bill passed in Texas, Oklahoma, and soon Indiana that allows and expects teachers to carry guns in class in case of an active attack. The Diva Girls listen to each of the events in which and active gunman entered each school...

On Thursday October 31, 2013 the media lab became a Pre-Halloween hangout for kids waiting for darkness to proceed with the always-fun trick or treating. In the Media lab, a new chance at learning was made by having the youth make a blog and a Gmail, if they did not have one. As a new initiative youths that come to the media center on Thursday will be encouraged to post a new editorial in their blog before they are allowed to go on social media websites. This will serve as both a learning media experience and an outlet for stress and the daily troubles of being a youth. The youth were quite receptive to the blog and many wrote of their Halloween experience at their schools. The youth also talked about the history of Halloween as originally a Pagan tradition having changed over hundreds of years. We also talked about Halloween plans including haunted houses and the export of candy from the neighboring house to their pillowcases and shopping bags. The excitement could hardly be co...

Friday October 25 th 2013 the Diva Girls had a guest speaker come in to talk about resiliency, ability to recover readily from illness, depression, adversity, or the like; buoyancy, and stresses the youth face everyday. The guest speaker, Christine, asked girls to choose their top three stressors and it seemed as though the girls unanimously decided that the top three stressors were, drum roll; School, Parents and Drama. We explored these topics deeper to get a better sense of why these things stress the youth, for example, many of the youth felt that school held all the stressors in their life such as friend drama and the stress of failing/not doing well and having their parents be disappointed. Although some of the youth put on a tough face many of the other youths talked openly about daily stressors like not fitting in and even violence.    The Diva Girls kept an open mind and everyone participated as they learned about ways to deal with daily st...

The group reviewed two videos that dealt with stereotypes. The first video was specifically stereotypical behavior from Toronto Youth. In this video we saw three males in different scenarios, at the mall, the barbershop, to name a few places. We heard phrases like, “I’m out here bro,” “beef ting,” and one that seemed most comical, “ yo boom!” The group discussed how the video made them feel and shared past experiences that related to other more serious stereotypes they had faced. This then sparked conversation about social norms and the struggle to fit in vs. the struggle to disassociate from them.   The last video was a segment from the show: The talk. They did a spoof on stereotypes, playing upon stereotypes used against African Americans, Lesbians, Asians, and The British. This was in response to Sophia Vergara an actress on the television show Modern family, who plays the character “Gloria.” Many have complained that her character is a stereotype of a “hot fiery La...

Last week the youth of the Diva Girls program worked together to create a presentation on a culture that is different from their own. On Friday October 11th 2013 the Diva Girls explored many topics some of which we touched upon last week but didn’t quite understand, these topics included, an article on assisted suicide (which can be found below), the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, and experiencing and appreciating others culture. With new girls arriving review an old topic gave the youths a chance to see what has been talked about before and expand the understanding of the girls who were left a little confused. When the youth came in we did a check in on how everyone was doing with their reading reward system and almost every youth in attendance had read a book/finished a book in that week. The group was also rewarded for filling out a important survey on where Regent Park community funding should go. If your child has not completed this survey and would like to they are availa...

On Friday October the 4 th the Diva Girls talked about many topics such as the Quebec Charter of Values and Teamwork. Two need segments were introduced the “What is happening this week?” and the reading initiative which rewards Diva Girl members when a book has been read. The youth were asked the question “how do they feel about Quebec’s Charter of Values?” after reading an article as linked below. The Charter of Values is a new decree from the Bloc Quebecois that restricts all religious symbols on public sector employees, such as hijabs, large crosses, etc. The group, although young, spoke volumes touching on subjects like human rights, the charter of rights and freedoms and law making in Canada. The youth came to an agreement that not only was the Charter of Values un-Canadian but also against human rights. The Diva Girls also had time to think about teamwork and what it meant to be a team both in the community, at home and in the world. Split into two groups the youth ...

Today was an exciting day at the centre. We had an amazing special guest by the name of Manal Azar visit Regent Park Focus Youth Media Arts Centre. She’s a media professional with over 15 years of experience in the media industry. Even her father worked in media. She spoke with us about her experiences working as a news reporter for an international news organization called Al Jazeera. She seemed to really enjoy her experience working with Al Jazeera, and praised them for their efforts to keep their news coverage neutral in opinion, even though many of the issues that the Arab news station covers are quite controversial In fact, the issues were so controversial sometimes that the U.S. government had refused to allow Al Jazeera to open a headquarters in the United States. They eventually did though. One of the most controversial news stories offered by Al Jazeera was an interview done with the late Osama bin Laden. Manal remarked how strange it was that the news organization wa...

Today we had a really interactive workshop/ discussion regarding sexual harassment, otherwise known as rape. Erin, producer of The Youth and the Law Show, led the discussion. Everyone at Focus provided great input and asked excellent questions that further improved the discussion content. Erin taught us what is considered rape and what isn't as well as methods to defend yourself legally and the actions you can take if the act has been committed against you. One thing that made the discussion really interesting was the use of real examples that happened of different types of sexual harassment cases. Overall, today was a great discussion and there was great input from everyone about their positions and perspective on this subject.   - Nedda

My name is Alice Yan, and I am a volunteer at Regent Park Focus Youth Media Arts Centre. Today, I assisted in filming a documentary about what goes on behind the scenes at Regent Park Focus. It was a unique experience for me, as I had never been on camera interviewing people before. Not only did I improve my communication skills, but I also realized how fortunate I was to have come across such a worthwhile volunteer opportunity. Filming the documentary was a lot of fun and I really enjoyed it - experiencing new things is one reason why I love coming to Regent Park Focus Youth Media Arts Centre. - Alice Yan

Today we filmed the second episode of The-She-World and it was a lot of fun. I was director and co-producer so I was in charge of assigning roles to crew members such as cameramen, audio crew and a switcher. We had an awesome guest on the show who had just as much fun as us on set. Everything went pretty smoothly. I love being director because I feel in charge of everything going on within the studio and I get to make the calls on different types of angles and more. I'm excited to film The-She-World again next week. - Nedda

Today, the second of August was my second day here at the Regent Park Youth Focus Media Arts Centre. One word to sum the day up? Hmmm... Unfortunately, one word will not do. After all, the day was an exciting one - full of wonderful opportunities. I began the day with great excitement as I was to go on a tour of the CBC. The group that went on this tour, was a fairly small but enthusiastic group which consisted of Katherine, Pierce, Alice and myself along with our wonderful supervisor Ehsan, without whom this trip would not have been possible. We were a very enthusiastic group who got a tour of the CBC by an editor of the CBC himself. He took us to various places inside the building. It was an amazing experience as all of us got to learn a lot from this trip. The trip began at around 12:00 and it lasted till around 2:00. When the tour was over, we headed back to Regent Park Youth Media Arts Center. Other volunteers/ workers who were not with us on the CBC tour...

Today, we basically had to edit our radio shows so that they are prepared to be heard over the radio. Most of the recording editing wasn't as hard as it was repetitive. Cutting parts out and making some parts louder than others, that was pretty much radio editing in a gist. I make it sound boring but it's quite fun especially if you can play around with the effects.  The most exciting part of the day was doing a media campaign proportional photo shoot for The She World show that will be coming up soon. I got to take pics of Clara who is the host of the show and she even let me take pics with her which I have to edit soon and then they will go up on the show website, twitter page and facebook. I'm seriously excited to be a part of the up-coming show!  - Nedda

Today we were joined by 2 new youth participants and they seem to be enjoying the program so far which is great. Over the weekend the summer crew had a little bit of homework to do and that was to research and familiarize ourselves with the Trayvon Martin case as well as look at other examples of self defense cases that have taken place in Ontario. We're going to be producing a show meant to educate youth on law. Erin came back in for another visit today and we all discussed more on the topic as well as some cases that a few of us found in our research. Everybody discussed different examples of when self defense is no longer defense and the different between abuse and when the claim if applicable. It was a very good discussion but we're going to be saving the real passion for the production of the show, which will be a good one. All in all today was another good day at Regent Park Focus. Tresvonne Rose-Wilson

The day started off for me by editing the news cast on Nelson Mandela Day which took place at Nelson Mandela Park Public School and on the African Women Acting. Then I worked with Alice and Jeff to help me write my environmental PSA script. Then the group came together and we did a workshop in which we had to look for a book, TV show, Movie and CD album in the top 5 released by First Nations or racialised people.Tomorrow we are going to visit CBC, looking forward to that.

Today I had the opportunity to host my first hour long radio show on Radio Regent. I had prepped, researched and rehearsed for this day for two weeks! I was very excited as the topic was something I am passionate about - health and fitness. My show consisted of tackling health myths, discussing my journey with eating right and exercise - how it changed my life and we even had a special guest Angela Olah who is a hardcore bootcamp coach!  I was nervous about the execution but I had a ton of support from co-workers and everything went great! What I learned from hosting a radio show is to not laugh a lot because when I started editing the content my laugh was pretty annoying. Just kidding, what I actually learned was time management is very important in radio. I did mess up a few times but I was fortunate enough to edit it before it went on air.  This experience has motivated me to do another radio show and hopefully another one on health and fitness! ...

So today we basically had to edit our radio shows so that they are prepared to be heard over radio. Most of the recording editing wasn't as hard as it was repetative. Cutting parts out and making some parts louder than others, that was pretty much radio editing in a gist. I make it sound boring but it's quite fun especially if you can play around with the effects.  The most exciting part of the day was doing a media campaign proportional photo shoot for The She World show that will be coming up soon. I got to take pics of Clara who is the host of the show and she even let me take pics with her which I have to edit soon and then they will go up on the show website, twitter page and facebook. I'm seriously excited to be a part of the up-coming show!!!

Today I had a wonderful experience reporting at the Nelson Mandela Park Public school celebrating the icon's 95th birthday. The event was filled with local celebrities like former Toronto's Argonauts quarterback Damen Allen, broadcast journalist Indira Naidoo-Harris (CBC, CTV, TVO, OMNI, NBC, and PBS) and internationally known jazz singer Amanda Martinez - who performed at the 2010 World Cup series in South Africa. The experience was one of a kind as this was my first official newscast for RPTV. A thank you shout out to my mentor Clint, who gave me the opportunity and had faith in me for doing this project. It was a three "man" team with Clint, Issac and I and we did a wonderful job interviewing all the local celebrities under extreme heat. Yay to us!

Today this morning started off with an independent work period. Working on either editing video, radio shows, or PSA. In the afternoon Joanne, Clint, Nedda, and I went to do an interview at a BBQ held by the Aboriginal Women's Resource Centre. The person I interview gave us info on how the centre came to formation, it"s purpose and the impact it has make on the people that go there. Then we came back to Regent Park Focus to help Vena with her PSA along with Trevonne and Katelyn. After that the whole group gathered together for a workshop on culture, what it is, what it does and if Canada has a culture. We ended off planning for our TV shows in August. Looking forward for whatever else we got in store for the future.

The day started off with us doing research on the subject of our radio project and start planning on what were going to talk about for our assigned newscast. After that we got to try out all of the "behind the scenes" stuff like director, camera operators, sound tech people, and even got to be on set! It was really cool but I thought that the directing part was really confusing because you, as the director, are controlling everything that goes down behind the scenes and even in front of the cameras! So you have to pay attention to  every one of those things and make sure it is as presentable as possible. So because of that I thought it was challenging but a very interesting experience.   - Pierce

Today was a day buzzing with excitement at Regent Park Focus Youth Media Arts Centre (RPFYMAC). The youth started off the day by planning out their radio shows coming up in the next week. They were especially focused on researching information for their PSAs (Public Service Announcements) in the works. The PSAs are about harmful household chemicals found in everyday products, such as hand sanitizers, hand soap, deodorant, hair products, and many others. They researched information on the harmful effects of the chemicals, which products they could be found in, and product alternatives free of the harmful substances. They really showed an interest in wanting to provide people with the best information possible on the subject, and leave people feeling empowered about how to protect themselves. Later on, after the lunch break, we moved onto the fun experience of being media executives at RPFYMAC, where we listened to 3 different TV show pitches for RPTV. Each of the pitches ...

So today we had a task were we had went out in to the community to interview people about anything of our choice. We were split in to two groups of four. My group choice to go to Yonge Street Mission to interview them about the summer programs that are going on. During that adventure on going to the Christian community center we had to make a detour and speak to the communications person to get the approval to start filming. Then when we began the filming we started to notice the fact that we never have a battery pack. so then in the middle of the interview the camera died, but we continued. - Cassandra  

The first day of the summer program at Regent Park Focus was a good start to the summer. There are a few new faces which is always good. We started off with an orientation of what this years summer program is all about and we began training right away. I've been part of focus for a while but it was refreshing to be given a "how to" camera tutorial again by Eman. Ehsan gave everybody a run down of how to use the soundboard for  Radio Regents internet radio program and I think the new staff enjoyed what bit the best. I can tell this summer is going to be a fun one with Focus and I'm excited to start new video projects and produce my own News Segments and Radio Shows. The day was a good day and it's only getting started. Tresvonne Rose-Wilson

Today Isaac, Pierce, Ree and myself went out to Daniel's Spectrum to interview a few people there about what the venue had to offer to the community and why it's such a special place. We spoke with Elwood, the Regent Park Film Festival coordinator, along with Christie the Regent Park School of Music director and Timothy the Art Heart Media Center coordinator and director. These people spoke to us about why the building and the programs that it offers are great. We personally got the opportunity to become comfortable speaking with strangers and organizing meaningful interview sessions along with camera and mic setup and the execution of the entire interview. It was an amazing experience that I learned a lot from in terms of equipment setup, proper interview etiquette along with useable footage. I would have preferred a longer session to complete this filming task for next time, but overall it was incredibly fun! - Nedda

Today we did a workshop on how to use Adobe Premiere Software to edit the footage of the interviews we did yesterday. We learned how to use all sorts of tools on the software to adjust the footage to flow better and to make a story out of the random footage we shot. It was incredibly informative and by the end of the workshop i felt very comfortable being able to teach this software to others. Both Tyrone and Emmanuel were supportive during the process and the learning experience was a lot of fun. I like the time length of this workshop and would love for other workshops to be just as long in order to be more effective. All in all this workshop was the most fun and informative.    - Nedda

Today we had the opportunity to participate in a 101 TV/Video workshop with Emmanuel K. Regent Park Focus' TV Coordinator. Throughout the session, Emmanuel showed us the different cameras and microphones the program uses to record and broadcast its' shows. He taught us the crucial basics such as putting in the proper battery, which microphone line to use and the importance of audio - no matter how bad the video is. He was very knowledgeable and funny - something instructors must have to keep their group learning and in focus. The 101 workshop was a great learning experience for first timers as they got hands on experience and a good reminders to those that already had experience in the field. -Vina

Today the summer staff team re-watched footage that we had all shot on Wednesday and Thursday and we learned about video logging. Unfortunately there was a technical difficulty with the camera that my team had been using so we just got a lot of blank space on our tape. It's all good though, mistakes happen. Later in the afternoon, Tyrone taught us how to use Premiere Pro, a video editing program. After that the rest of the afternoon was pretty much dedicated towards editing practice and adding little touches to our videos. Over all this has been a productive week. Tresvonne Rose-Wilson

Today Emanuel led an incredibly useful workshop regarding the proper way to interview people in terms of questions, media release forms, and the type of camera angles taken for the interview. He mentioned the importance of interviewing people who are important in events as well as having different roles in the event as opposed to interviewing everyone who have a similar role in an event. For example, if a news story is covering the Regent Park Soccer League it would be better to interview soccer layers, and their parents as well as referees and coaches as opposed to just all soccer players. This allows for a broader perspective and better coverage of the story as well as making it more interesting. Another important point Emanuel brought up was to cover the 5 W's and H. This answers all the questions that viewers could have about the news story and makes the story more informative. I thought the workshop was incredibly informative and a good review since I have...

Pierce, Issac and I had an opportunity to film Regent Park's first Farmers Market located beside the Daniel Spectrum building. We were fortunate enough to make it on time for the official ribbon cutting and caught an interview with Daneil Spectrum's Vice President Martin Blake. The turnout to the event was beyond expectation and it was really nice to see Regent Park supporting local, organic food vendors. Coming from a health perspective, I was really glad to see that the people of Regent Park made smarter choices when it comes down to produce - that they are supporting local produce and making healthier dietary choices. It was a very fun experience to be at Regent Park's first Farmers Market! - Vina

This morning I started off editing the PSA on The Daniel Spectrum with Needa, Shaun and Pierce. I then went with Pierce to get cut away shots for PSA with Pierce at the Spectrum, Nelson Mandela Park and Lord Duffrin. In the afternoon we started our first workshop with the youth that come in the afternoon. we started things off with an ice breaker game, gave them a tour around Focus then started our the first camera workshop with them. We showed them how to set up a camera and tripod, put the battery and tape in and different types of angles. The youth got to participate by focusing the shot in the camera to what they wanted and telling everyone what the shot was.  - Summer Volunteer

Blog: Today Emmanuel taught me and a bunch o other staff how to work the cameras and do stuff like add effects. Some new things I learned is that you can only control the cameras from inside the studio and not from the camera itself. He showed us all the basics of how to operate the camera. (Zooming, fade effects, removing from tripod etc...) Another thing he showed us is how to enable/disable the microphones and that while you're operating the cameras, the director gives you specific directions through a microphone. So I thought it was an over all cool experience and am looking forward to the up coming weeks.  - Pierce

Tuesday July 2, 2013 on Cath da Flava Radio we started off with a moment of silence for the 19 firefighters that died in the wild fire in Arizona. Then we kicked off the show talking about the 16 year old boy who got stabbed on Ashbridges Bay during Canada Day. We (Tyrone, Emmanuel, and Clint) all came to agreement that youth in Toronto are getting more out of control. The next topic was on how since this years Superbowl 27 football players have been arrested, we touch on Aaron Hernandez case how he could face 25 to life if found guilty. We talked about how youth are idolized by these athletes and how those same athletes get into trouble with the law. On a high note our last topic was on Anthony Bennett, how he's from Toronto and being the first draft pick for the NBA.  - Isaac

For the last five weeks the Diva’s at Regent Park Focus Arts Media Center have been working on “Creating a Digital (Self) Portrait” using Internet and Photoshop in a creative way, building some artistic and technical skills, learning about artists, photography and digital art. Some faces … The creation of a digital (Self) portrait consisted of taking digital portrait photographs, manipulating them in Photoshop, researching artist they like and choose a “face frame” for their portrait inspired by a painting, photograph or illustration that communicated in a unique way their personal idea of (future) self. The final digital composition was to express in a symbolic and/or more representational way their individual story or vision. The choice of images, colours, shapes, arrangement, manipulation, etc. had to be unique expression of how they see themselves, or tell a (personal) story that is meaningful to them, and/or anything else they would like to represent. The Process Exa...

This week, the boyz2men met up again on Wednesday. The boys continued to be working on their ‘ photo shopped ’ self portraits. Some of the boys learned to shade using oil pastels, and made excellent colored drawings of outfits and mystical creatures, such as a fire face dragon. As usual we took a break for some delicious sandwiches and snacks as treats for the boys' participation. After that we then sat around the table as a whole to do some quick exercises in which we did mark-making drawings to how we feel with certain music. We then collaged the mark-making drawings to make a background for the self portrait. -Hareem Qureshy