21 Settings

Here's another great article from Digital Photography School: 21 Settings, techniques and rules all new Camera owners should know. Take a look and make it a resolution to try these.

Screen Casts

Remember awhile back I used screencast-o-matic to make a screen cast but it didn't load in the lab due to a conflict with java.  Here is another on line screen cast editor that will work on an earlier version of java and does much the same thing but with fewer bells and whistles. I will give you the username and password if you promise to share and play nicely.  If you want your own account, I can fix you up with that too but it takes time to activate.  This application is still in beta but will work in the lab, if you are doing screen casting at home you can use jing which is a downloadable program, or you can use screencast-0-matic too.

Here is a screencast video of our MultimediaII ning main page

Record your screencast online

back from walk, found neat rocks, rodent skiulls, and ta daa 3 partial arrowheads and 1 partial spearpoint in the road!

Ok this has to be filed under doh! But for my beginning photo and video students this is mechanical DOF at its best.http://twitter.com/
http://ping.fm/LItVV

Happy Holidays!

group 2 video

Thanks to Ali and McKenzie for getting the dance video edited.


Multimedia Group 2 Video Project from ann darling on Vimeo.

Social Bookmarking

Yesterday in class you wondered where I find things like bomomo, well part of my luck was finding out about social bookmarking. Watch this entertaining and informative video to find out about social bookmarking and how it can help you research interesting things on the web.
To visit my bookmarks
http://delicious.com/darling.aw

Thanksgiving Video Project

Sam's video was a good example of the thanksgiving interview assignment. For more you can go to our shs multimedia group at vimeo to see everyone's.


My Thanksiving Interview-by Sam A from ann darling on Vimeo.

Why Blog?

We have done some work on blogging etiquette and writing techniques so now its time to show them off. I would like you to write a short post(you may post to your own blog or multimedia) on how blogging can be used to improve student writing. Reread the post about good blogging techniques with an eye for some of the skills required for a good post. Are there some skills used here that would be good for writing in other content areas? Give one example.
10 tips for a good blog

Good Blogging Opens Doors

DUE JANUARY 6

The Weird and Wonderful for this Week(3w)

Check out this crazy free graphics program called "bomomo"! You cant probably save work here at school since it requires a download but try it and see. This would be a great idea for title slides, backgrounds etc.

If you want to keep bomomo projects, choose to open in the save dialog rather than save and the project will open in an image editor such as photoshop or ms paint. then you can save normally. This seems to bypass the problem of downloading from the web which we cannot do in the lab.

Illustrating Poetry and Lyrics

Try this fun assignment in photoshop, movie maker, photostory or powerpoint.



OBJECTIVES: You will choose an original poem or song lyrics to illustrate. You may illustrate this poem with text and images in a Photoshop collage (no larger than 8x10 @ 72 dpi), Powerpoint slide show, photostory 3, or MovieMaker format. Since this is multimedia, music may be added. Stock photos are allowed however you are encouraged to take pictures!
GRADING CRITERIA: The poem must appear in its entirety without edits. Legibility of text. Overall concept & Creative relationships, Images support concept, Technical mastery ( like selections, scale &appearance).

Want to add a Graph to Your Blog

Just for fun I found crappy graph! Its kinda wonky but easy to do.
here is the url http://crappygraphs.com/ . Have Fun

What Makes You Happy?

Over at Digital Photography School they run contests every two weeks, what a great idea to keep you all taking photos! This is an example of the contest: http://digital-photography-school.com/forum/showthread.php?t=37646

This month since we are in a Christmas Mood lets try a contest. The theme just like at digital photography school should be "Happiness" and more specifically what makes you Happy!

• Your entry should be posted to the class blog over at http://wpmu.esu13.org/adarling.
• Size your photo as a jpeg at no larger than 450x450 at 72 ppi. and upload to the class blog.
• Entries should be in by Dec 17 and winner will be announced and connected with their prize on Dec 19 during our movie and Christmas Party.

Bembos Zoo

here is a fun project done with just one type font Bembos! Check it out at bemboszoo.com

Thanksgiving Interviews

The Next assignment for our class is an interview to be completed over Thanksgiving break. The assignment is to interview an older person and ask them 3 questions about the past.
For example; Interview the oldest person in attendance at your thanksgiving dinner, ask them the following.
What was the funniest thing that happened at a Thanksgiving or other holiday event?
What was a typical Holiday gathering like when they were a child? Who was there, what was on the menu? Where did the kids eat? What did the adults do?
What are they thankful for today?

Ask your qestions in advance to allow people to think about it before you start the interview.

Record the interview using a video camera, the movie setting on your camera, or just take still pictues and record the responses using g-cast.

Bring in your clips edit and drop them into movie maker, post to the class account on vimeo.

Good luck, hopefully you will learn some really interesting things about your parents, grandparents, older siblings and you!

If you are interested in creating this assignment as a podcast here is the how to link for gcast http://www.gcast.com/htdb/services/track1.html

Filming Calendar

Here is the handy dandy calendar for filming

Calling all student Photographers

At last a ning for you.

Find more photos like this on T H E . L E N S



If you don't know a ning is a type of social network for people that have similar interests. This one is for student photographers, gee I wonder if there are any students in multimedia that have photos? dOH! Get to it! here is a place to put up your stuff and learn new things too. So if you are passionate about photography or even if you just like it a lot, this will help you improve.
The Lens - A network for student photographers.

Fun for This Week

Well theres a few fun things for this week first its BeFunky a cartoonizer for any of your photos. Check out this tutorial.

Cartoonizer in Action from BeFunky on Vimeo.

Also there is Layers Magazine and most importatntly, Photoshop Killer Tips. I apologize in advance for what you will find because many of you would have found the fade to white technique most helpful in the layers collage.

Story Boards Due Nov 18

Storyboards are required for your movie project. They do not have to be perfect drawings but they should explain the number and nature of the shots you propose to shoot. They are due November 18th (thats next week) they are worth 50 points.

Screencast Tutorials

Heres what I'd like to do with our photostory project. Divide into groups and create about 4 screencasts that will document what to do with the photostory files we created for the 4th graders. Since all of the editing work has to happen on one computer now it makes sense to give a step by step how to for them so that they can do their own story editing. What topics i would propose is

• importing video files to moviemaker (the photostories).
• importing pictures
• creating titles over the pictures and animations for the titles
• adding transitions
• adding a music file, finding music for presentations

Each group would make up a quick story board and do one of these screencasts, we can save them as quicktime movies and up load straight to our class blog. If you want to upload to vimeo that would be cool too.

Here is a video I made with jing

Screencast-O-Matic

Here is a screencast I created on screencast-o-matic hopefully it will work for our photostory projects

I uploaded this file to vimeo as well and you can see it on our multimedia group file in vimeo.


screencast from ann darling on Vimeo.

Have You Tried Voki?

Hey guys this is a really cool web 2.0. product. You do have to verify your're human through an email activation but its free and way cool. Listen to Mrs. Darling below!

Get a Voki now!

Another photo class' blog

I ran across this class and their blog through digital photography school they also published the top ten tips that they learned on DPS. Check em out

Toondoo

Hi
If you and your partner have everything done for the photostory, you can check out toondoo which is a really cool comic generator. If you have an email account you can register and work right away! Enjoy
http://www.toondoo.com/Home.do?param=log&msg=1

try editing this cartoon

Time to do Movie Maker

If you haven't done so you need to practice with movie maker. The kindly folks at vimeo have produced this tutorial. You might want to checkout vimeo for their video sharing accounts @ www.vimeo.com

Windows Movie Maker Basics from Vimeo Staff on Vimeo.

Do You Know 2.0

I think that this video would be a good example for some of your semester projects in terms of format, text, images, music, and movement although simple are very powerful in getting the message across.

Now for the great part, what did you think of the content. Does this make you feel good about what we are learning in class? Are there things we should be doing that we havent done yet? Add your comments.

Multimedia and More

So far I have posted Brooke, J.C.'s and Daneca's creature feature here. http://wpmu.esu13.org/adarling/ If you tried to get an account from word press but received no confirmation email, try a different email address besides hotmail if you have one.

Blogging Safety

Heres an article about recent legislation that affects every school that uses federal e-rate funds(and this is almost everybody).
http://people.uis.edu/rschr1/et/2008/10/schools-soon-required-to-teach-web.html
What I would like to know from all of you is:

1. Do you think teaching internet safety is a good idea, bad idea, or it doesn't really make any difference?
   
2. Do you think internet safety is important for elementary students to learn?
   
3. What kinds of things do you know about that you would tell a young student to do, to avoid dangerous internet behaviors?
   
4. What things do you worry about as far as internet safety?
   

Here is an article on blogging safety that will help with some of the questions you might have. http://www.blogsafety.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1200000051
Please add your comments. If you cannot yet log in do so in a written word document uploaded to lanschool files on your computer. I would like to hear from all of you by Friday (halloween) boowaahhahahaha!

Here is a great idea for a student video. "How technology helps me learn." http://ping.fm/EcEGy

Fuel Fossils

I had an interesting photo experience this September. A local car collector and well known "saver" had passed on and his collection was offered at auction. There were hundreds of automobiles from the early part of the century up to the late 60's. Oh and there were parts, lots and lots of parts. I crawled in, out and over to try for interesting angles to the point my legs were sore for a week from all the bending and kneeling down. The music is by John Walker and Dan Newton.

student photo essays

Here are the links to student photo essays in multimedia I
Sam Aurich
Brandon Segelke
Chelsea Barton
Daneca Romick
Brooke Lechman
J.C. Lancriet

Abby Rosenbaum





Ali Miller
Courtney Fletcher

Jordan Schilreff




McKenzie O'Connell

Kayla Mattson

How to give credit for Creative Commons Licenses

We have talked about giving credit before but it doesn't hurt to remind. Some of you may have noticed that Animoto uses creative commons licensed work in their mashups and they have posted the attributes in their music listings so permissions were taken care of by Animoto. However, here is a good link on how to attribute (read to the end for examples) Creative Commons licensed work which you can usually use without asking for permission as long as you give credit, unless otherwise specified.

Also remember for assignments for Multimedia I USE YOUR OWN PICTURES! I will be checking.

Here is the link
http://www.wikihow.com/Attribute-a-Creative-Commons-Licensed-Work

Autumn Leaves

I follow Beyond Megapixels blog. Today they had a great post on tips for shooting Autumn Leaves, so get out there and take advantage of the good weather, keep shooting! Here is the link
http://www.beyondmegapixels.com/2008/10/5-ways-to-capture-autumn-leaves.html

At Last!!!

Hey kids looks like blogger is up! YAY

Leaf Peeper

One of my favorite things to do is walk in the fall. Last weekend I traveled to a spot called Vedavoo in the Medicine Bow National Forest north of Cheyenne, Wy. Here are some of my photos from that walk. Enjoy the aspen.

Are You Interested in Black and White?

Some of the greatest photographs taken were in black and white. Lately there are more of us trying black and white in class so I thought this post would provide some info that you might find helpful. First, check out this website about The History of Photography and the Masters of Photography found on our Moodle in topic #10. You will see some great images. I have also found some good tutorials and blogs from the good folks at Digital Photography School that would be worth your time to read.

Start with "Do you see in Black and White?" http://digital-photography-school.com/blog/do-you-see-in-black-and-white/ and also Key Ingredients for Black and White http://digital-photography-school.com/blog/key-ingredients-for-black-and-white-images/

And the following article covers the channel mixer, gradient map, desaturation and color lab ways you can process in Photoshop. This is a must see!
http://digital-photography-school.com/blog/digital-black-and-white/

Some of you have been working with layer masks and painting through a desaturated layer to create a black and white photo with a splash of color. Here is another way using the "history brush" that will be new to you.
http://digital-photography-school.com/blog/mono-with-a-dash-of-colour-photoshop-cs2-tutorial/

Another website Inside Graphics has some short tutorials on even more ways to make your black and whites snappy.

http://www.insidegraphics.com/black_white/default.asp

Five Tips for Black and White Photography
http://digital-photography-school.com/blog/5-black-and-white-photography-tips/

So read up and try some of these, you have lots of good possiblities from our photowalk and dont forget to go out on you own with the intent of looking for the elements like texture, contrast, shapes, pattern and light that will play well in a black and white format.

Image Bookmark Site

I just found this neat little website that allows you to bookmark and catalog images you really like on the web, since we will be dealing with images when we start using the more creative tools of Photoshop this would be a good resource, remember however images you want to edit should be not copyrighted, you can use creative commons images if you provide acknowledgement. Here is the url. http://vi.sualize.us/

If you cant say something nice...

Remember your mother and teachers telling you if you cant "say something nice, don't say anything"? While most people try to follow such advice, it shouldn't include constructive criticism. A good blogger not only has a responsibility to produce interesting content. Its important to try for a dialog or conversation with your readers.

If you are trying to engage someone in a conversation, commenting on or responding to their posts is important. It is considered good blogging etiquette. Offering constructive criticsm goes a long way toward winning readers not to mention respect.

5 questions for user friendly critiques

• What is the most successful/least successful part of the photo and why?


• Does the image trigger an emotional response in you? Anger, calm, envy?


• Are you passionate about the content of the image? Does it invoke happy or sad memories?
  
• Did the photo remind you of someone elses work or something awesome that you have seen?


• Does the photo touch a nerve, stir up a controversy, take a stand that you agree with or disagree with?

Learn from each other

Some people like to include the details about how they took a shot, set it up or processed it in photoshop. Other times they just put up the pic. It is perfectly ok to ask politely, "how did you get that!" More specifically ask:

• about the photographer's creative vision, settings they used and why they used them.
• about an expressive portrait or more specifically how the look came to be on the model's face.
• what decisions did you make and what ones were dictated by the conditions
• choice of subject or location and time of day
• What would you do differently next time

Make a suggestion:

Suggestions put politely are not offensive to most people especially if they are honest. Things you might consider as a suggestion include:

• cropping to highlight or center a main point in the frame or using the rule of 1/3.
• an idea for images in a series.
• suggest a different color sepia, black & white or high contrast and saturation.
• suggest a tutorial if you've seen one on the subject

Keep up the good work on your blogs I really like them and would enjoy them more if we did some better writing and comments!

"Urban Photowalk"

WE'RE GOING ON A PHOTOWALK! YAY!

Time for another photowalk. Meet at the parking lot on 10th and Hickory Wednesday Sept. 24.

Do your homework by looking at other posts on flickr. Here are some.

http://www.flickr.com/groups/greatcityscapes/ http://www.flickr.com/groups/topcityscapes-citylife/ find more by typing in cityscapes in the search box. Also you might like to see groups about small town life http://www.flickr.com/groups/livinginasmalltown/ since this is probably more of what we will see.

Dress Up Your Photos.

If you want your photos to look really professional check out this photoshop tutorial.

http://digital-photography-school.com/blog/look-the-part-how-to-show-off-your-photos-like-the-professionals-photoshop-tutorial/


This is my stab at it

PhotoStory 3

On Tuesday we took a look at PhotoStory 3. I used some of my memorial gardens pictures and the canned music that the photostory program creates. I did not do any titles or voiceovers.

Time for Photo Essays

Try Animoto
There are so many ways you can organize your photos into a photo essay. Remember a photo essay is a group of photos organized in order to tell a story or follow a theme. One web 2.0 application that looks like fun is animoto. Here is a demo i did of students' art.

Courthouse and Jail Rock

We followed this rainbow along the Pumpkin Creek valley on Saturday September 6, 2008.

Buffalo Creek Photowalk

Liatris
goldenrod
milkweed
juniper berries

I took these macro photos at Buffalo Creek Wildlife Management Area, south of Melbeta, Nebraska. There were also some landscapes that I can post later. I really enjoy getting out and walking, sometimes we see lots of wildflowers like today, other times its wildlife or neat weather conditions. Usually at this wildlife area there aren't very many people but this day we saw some horseback riders.

Black and White with a layer mask

Here is an example of a layer mask using the oval marquee tool to select an area from the layer mask and cut it away leaving the color from the layer below to show.

Picasa3 movie.

Easy editing.
Here is a movie made from the unedited images I took during our photowalk, of course you will want to edit before you render into a movie. Picasa makes it really easy.

Note it is a good idea to figure 4 seconds per photo and multiply this out, you will then know how many photos you need to put into the movie generator to make the pacing work out better than mine which I think is too long!

Picasa 3 test

Here are some photos from my picasa3 application, when I click on blog this 4 of the photos showed up in the blogger window.

Picasa 3

Just when you thought you were getting a handle on things something new comes along that will blow you away. Because some of the software we use in class is sooo expensive I feel like I should present you with some alternatives. We have already mentioned Gimp which is the open source counterpart to Photoshop. Now Google has updated their photo editor and sharing software Picasa. Its free and does many of the things that Bridge does so check it out! I uploaded some of my pictures to an album on Picasa's public site. Now I'm trying to see if I can embed a slideshow!
So after reading the directions I can blog directly from Picasa, Lets see!

Searching for the right place!

Ok students here is a new step in our quest to put our photos up quickly while we are all in the lab. In trying the wiki, it seems that most of us cannot post if someone is editing the class page. Boo! What I'd like us to try next is for you to set up your own blog. Since we have conveniently all gotten google accounts you can set this one up in seconds. Now lets see if we can upload photos! Wow that was really easy.!!














I think you can continue to write about your pictures and move them around I think I will see if we can leave comments. The only down side seems to be that everyone will have their own blog address but we should be able to bookmark links unless I can find a group blog!

Actually on the dashboard when you log in there is a place to post all of the blogs you follow. So we can link to each others photo blogs. Next I see that we can also embed video! yay! we can also keep our blogs from being listed on search engines so someone would have to know our addresses to see the photos.

What do you think?