I’ve been evaluating Photo to Moviefrom LQ Graphics as a tool for digital storytelling. My favourite application is iMovie HD. It’s not perfect but better the devil you know – and I know iMovie pretty well now and still discover tricks that make me think “how clever”.
When Apple rewrote iMovie for iLife 08 it presented a host of problems for digital storytellers. The most obvious one is the total lack of a timeline in the conventional video editing style. It can be pressed into use for digital storytelling but for a new user there is a serious lack mouse functions for stills. Almost all of the digital stories told in my workshops are told by beginners using still images. Things improved in iLife 09 but not enough for me to start using it over the HD version.
Building Affected for Life? in Photo to Movie
Last month someone alerted me to Photo to Movie. A package written specifically for still images. It has a timeline and is capable of creating something more sophisticated than a simple slideshow by the use of highly configurable zoom and pan functions. It integrates quite well with iTunes and iPhoto, and so things looked hopeful as I read the help files and absorbed the basic functions. There are also Mac and Windows versions. But would it live up to my hopes? (more…)
I’m working with East Dorset Arts again this week training trainers in Verwood. Excellent facilities at The Verwood Hub make working working there a pleasure. Great people too. So if you live in the East Dorset area look out for opportunities to join a digital storytelling workshop there soon.
…but do you have the communication skills?
One of the most powerful ways of delivering a message is to tell a story. Being able to create a logical and captivating narrative is essential to this, and these same skills apply equally to writing a grant application or speaking clearly at conferences.
We are offering free digistories workshops run by someone who originally developed the concept for the BBC. These are based around creating short video, telling a personal engineering-related story, from photographs and a recorded script.
The films you create will be used to promote public awareness of engineering, influencing potential engineers of the future and showing them what we really do.
The next digistories workshop in the North of England is in Salford on three Thursdays: April 30th, May 7th & 14th. It’s for graduate engineers – part of the Engenious Stories programme.
The plan for Southampton is being updated. I will be in Building 27, Room 3059 on Highfield Campus at Southampton University next Tuesday giving two taster presentations.
If you want to know more then come along at either 11am or 1pm when I will be expalining how it all works, how much you will get out of it, how it will help aspiring engineers and to answer your questions. No need to book for tasters – just turn up. Enquiries to Dr Steve Dorney
Click to view/download map
The workshop will now run on the following Tuesdays – April 21st 28th and May 5th. You need to attend all three days to complete your story. Otherwise the details already published still apply.
The next Engenious Stories workshop is in Southampton. If you are interested you have only a short time to register, but it’s free and you will find the experience very rewarding. More about the project here. Click on the flyer below to download it.
To register contact Dr Steve Dorney today if possible.
I’ve just finished uploading more stories to the digistoriesuk YouTube channel. This latest batch is from two workshops which were run for faith communities. A church called Harrogate New Life and the summer school of Riding Lights Theatre Company. There are some quite remarkable stories here as well as others that are gentle and reassuring in the sense that not every story has to be defined a crisis or disaster. This one is from Ann Bentley – a school teacher in Harrogate.
There are also a couple of my stories in there. “Sleeping Under Cover” is the first digital story I made whilst training at the BBC. It, too, is about faith.
The second digital storytelling workshop for engineers to tell their own stories has been scheduled for the National Media Museum in Bradford. It is essentially for Broadcast Engineers to talk about the events and inspiration that led them into their career. The workshop takes place on three consecutive Mondays. February 9th, 16th and 23rd 2009. Participants need to be able to attend all three days.
The aim is to raise public awareness of what engineers do and what motivates them and to insprie young people to consider the profession.
The workshops are funded by an award from the Royal Academy of Engineering to the Universities of Salford and Southampton. Places on the workshop are free but must be booked in advance. You can download a flyer here and find more information on the digistories website
You can watch stories told by acoustics engineers in a pilot workshop to give you an idea of the style of these digital stories.
The second digital storytelling workshop for engineers to tell their own stories has been scheduled for the National Media Museum in Bradford. It is essentially for Broadcast Engineers to talk about the events and inspiration that led them into their career. The workshop takes place on three consecutive Mondays. February 9th, 16th and 23rd 2009. Participants need to be able to attend all three days.
