CUIN 7358 Linked with CUIN 7336

Hands-On Assignment:
For this week's hands-on assignment, you should create a personal digital story without narration using Photo Story 3, or another program of your choice. This initial photo story should contain a minimum of 10 images and no audio. Here are the steps you should follow if you are just starting out using Photo Story software:

* Select the images you would like to use for your digital story. Place them all in a folder on your computer.

* Launch the Photo Story 3 software and select Begin a new story.

* Next, import the images you want to use into Photo Story.

* Modify the image order, if necessary, by clicking and dragging the image thumbnails in the timeline.

* Use the Edit feature to modify images and/or add any visual effects.

* When you click Next, you may see a message that states that some or all of your images have black borders. Determine whether the black borders should be removed or left the way they are.

* Decide if text should be used over an image (such as for a title slide), or if text slides should be created separately and imported into the timeline.

* For this exercise, adding audio is optional, meaning you may add and/or record audio if you want to, or leave it out for the time being. We will cover adding audio in next week's class.

* Determine what type of motion (panning and zooming) you want for each image and how how long each image should stay on the screen. Make adjustments to the motion and duration of your images by selecting Customize Motion.

* You should also decide whether or not you want to modify the transitions that occur between images.

* For this exercise, you do not need to add any music to your story and we will explore this feature in more detail in next week's class. However, you may add music if you like.

* Remember to save your project file often. This file will have the file extension: .wp3.

* You should use the default settings to finalize your digital story, and this will save it as a Windows Media Video (.wmv) file.

When you have created the .wmv file, you should upload it to any online site where it will be accessible. If you don't already have an online location, you can upload your file to YouTube or Google's free Picasa Web Albums (where you get 1 GB of space).

Blog Assignment:

For this assignment, go to the course discussion blog at: http://cuin7358-pop.blogspot.com/ and post a message in which you first include the URL of the video file you created for this week's hands-on assignment, and then post any questions or comments you have about the process you went through in completing this work.

More with Photo Story: Transitions, Effects, & Customizing Motion, plus Adding Text Slides

Working with Transitions

When you click on the Customize Motion tab, you will see the Transition tab at the top of the window. Here you will see 48 transitions that can be used when one image changes to the next. You can also set the number of seconds it will take for the transition to occur, with 1 second being the default length.

The CrossFade transition is used on all images by default, but you can change the transition on any images in your story. However, be careful that you don't overdo this as too many transitions can be overwhelming and detract from your story's message.

Adding Special Effects to your Images

Special effects may be added to your images in Photo Story 3, but like transitions, you should be careful that you don't add so many effects that they detract from the story itself.

1. Click on the Edit button below the Image Viewer in the main Import and Arrange window.
2. Click on the Add Effect tab.
3. Select an effect to apply from the Effect pull-down menu.
4. To apply the change to all of the pictures in your story, click the checkbox next to the Apply the selected effect to all of the pictures option.
5. Click the Save button to keep the changes.
6. Click the Close button to return to the Import and Arrange screen.

Creating and Importing Separate Text Slides

In class, we discussed the use of Title Slides and Text Slides and even though they're related, they are in fact two different things. But different people (and different software programs) use the terms to mean different things, which is why there can be some confusion. For our course, it will probably help if everyone reads and remembers the following:

The Title Slide is usually the first slide in a digital story. It may be a slide with just text on a blank background, or it can be text that appears on a background that contains some stylistic elements or even a photograph.

The Photo Story 3 software has a screen called "Add a Title to Your Pictures" and this is often used to create a slide that has text appearing over an image, and have it serve as the first slide in your story. Take a look at the story on the use of Pinhole Cameras to see an example of this.

1. Select the image you want to add text to in the timeline.
2. Type the text you want to add into the box provided.
3. Click the buttons above the textbox to arrange the text on the image.
4. Click the Select Font button to make changes to the font face, size, color, and style of your text.

We also have explored the use of creating a black slide in PowerPoint and adding text to it.

Here are the steps for adding a black slide:

1) Launch PowerPoint;

2) From the Insert Menu, choose New Slide;

3) From the Format menu, choose Background;

4) Use the pull-down option at the bottom of the Background box and click on the black color;

5) Click the Apply button;

6) The entire slide should now be black. From the File menu, choose Save As;

7) And from the Save as type pull-down menu, scroll down to GIF or JPG to save the slide as a graphic, rather than as a .ppt file.

8) And then just import the slide into Photo Story like you would any other graphic.

Take a look at Van Gogh's Letters to Theo to see how black text slides are used throughout a digital story.

You can add a text slide at the end of your story and use the customized motion to create a rolling credits slide like you see at the end of a movie. You can see an example of this by going to the end of the digital story: Almost Paradise.

And if you want your text slides to have a little more pizzazz than just white text on a black background, you might think about creating text slides in PowerPoint's and adding different slide design layouts. Take a look at Picasso in His Own Words to see examples of this.

Another Option: Add a Blank Slide or Credits slide created in an Image Editing Program

You might try downloading any of the following slides to add to your story or you may create similar slides in PowerPoint or and image editing program like Photoshop Elements.

black slide

white slide

gradient slide 1

gradient slide 2

When you are at a point where you are satisfied with your progress, you should save the project file. This will produce a .wp3 file, which can only be opened with Microsoft Photo Story 3. It is important to save this project file so that you can come back to the project later and continue working on it.

Click on the Save Project button from any of the screens in Photo Story and you will be prompted to save the project file. As we discussed in class, be sure to pick a descriptive file name, rather than the default file name the program offers, and choose a location where the file will be easy for you to find.

The saved .wp3 file is the actual work that you have put into the digital story (picture editing, customized motion, transitions, narration, music, etc). Remember that you should save this file as a working copy so that you can open it again later and continue working on it.

Saving your Completed Story (.wmv)
When you are finished working on the story, you will need to perform a final save that puts all of the elements of the story together and allows you to view the finished piece. This type of save will create a .wmv file (Windows Media Video) that will be playable with Microsoft's Windows Media Player.

In order to perform this final save, you must click the next button until you reach the final screen--it will say Save your story at the top left. At this point, you are able to make some choices about how to save the complete story from a series of options presented in a pull-down menu. Most of the time, you will want to use the default setting: Save your story for playback on a computer, as this will give you the best quality.

One More Thing...
At the bottom left of the Save your story screen, you should see a Settings button.

When you click on this button, another screen pops up with several choices for the size (in pixels) that you want your final story to be. I suggest that you try either the 640x480 setting or the 800x600 setting when you save your story. You may want to experiment with other settings to see which setting works best with your particular story.

Reading Assignments

Review:

The Copyright and Digital Storytelling Page on the EUoDS Website
http://digitalstorytelling.coe.uh.edu/copyright.html

Hands-On Assignment 5:

For this week's hands-on assignment, you should add narration and either computer-generated music or real music to the digital story you created last week.

When you have created the .wmv file, go to your personal blog and make a new post and add the video by clicking on Blogger's Add Video button as shown below.

This will bring up a dialogue box where you should click on Choose file button to select the video file you want to upload.

You will then need to give the video a title (please include your name and some descriptive information, such as "BRobin-Assignment4.wmv" and not simply leave the video named "PhotoStory1.wmv") and agree to the upload conditions.

When the upload begins, a video player with the orange and white Blogger log in the middle will appear in your blog window and you will notice the words "Processing Video" at the bottom of the window. It may take several minutes for the video to upload completely, depending on how large the file is.

After the video has successfully been uploaded, the video player should have a play button (a white arrow) in the middle, indicating that the video can be played. You can click this button to make sure the video plays properly, and if it does, you should click the Publish Post button to complete the process.

Your video should then be viewable in your blog, as shown in the example below.

For more information about uploading video with Blogger, go to:

How do I post a video to my blog?
http://help.blogger.com/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=67428

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If you want to, you may also upload your video to any online site where it will be accessible electronically. If you don't already have an online location, you can upload your file to YouTube or Google's free Picasa Web Albums (where you get 1 GB of space).

A tutorial on uploading your video to YouTube and embedding the link in your blog is located at:
http://courses.coe.uh.edu/brobin/resources/upload-videos/upload-videos.htm

Go to your personal blog and post a message in which you first include the new URL of the video file you created for this week's hands-on assignment, and then post any questions or comments you have about the process you went through in completing this work.