#4Life

Creations not speciic to a ds106 theme session.
Writing, reflections, how ds106 creations fit into my life.

Giffing it….

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The GIFitUP2015 event has started and many in #4life and #ds106 folks are working on GIFs for submission.

WOW! the submissions are fantastic and very intimidating. But at the same time, it does promote creations. I am not even in the farm league in this thing. I started to work on some things but gave up. But true to the ds106 world others were having ups and downs and the connections allowed for feeling good and being inspired – to sweat through the frustrations and finish something. The power of community and peer pressure to try your best. Shows what being connected can do for someone – keeps you going when the going gets tough.

@mdvfunes shared her ups and downs – but also support. By responding to her trials – she found a way to suggest to me – a true give and take and give. Mariana finished a wonderful GIF. RonaldL and JohnJohnston have been active and by sharing their work they opened the doors and windows to continue. The power of just a short comment is so powerful. It really shows the wonderfulness of simple courtesy and good will can move mountains.

By sharing my drafts suggestions made that took away the heavy frustration of not being able to make my visions reality. But the cool part is sharing the visions -others got it and saw it too and then offered some tangents to follow.

The result was I got to a point of finishing a submission  – although very rudimentary – and a good baseline for improving over the year and doing better next year.

My attempts were to create the hats in a ferris wheel motion – have not accomplished yet. This one is just in the files as practice.

The second was to have the icons play with a balloon. First attempt ….

and the result after being introduced to Puppet Warp and attempting FireWorks…. the submission:

http://gifitup2015.tumblr.com/post/132355357358/gif-it-up-2015-entry-from

I also did a couple of birthday GIFS on the fly this week….short and not polished – but to celebrate.

So a GIFFY week of practice!

and I still have a vision of a Toulouse Lautrec poster floating in glitter….it may happen. :-

Processes:

Did not do well at tracking development. Lots of erasing, cutting merging layers at first. Then Puppet warp to make the hands move in the balloon gif –  I used this tutorial.

I used the grid lines in the Hats to keep the images in the same place in each frame.

For the most part – the standard steps that suggested tutorials cover until I got to puppet warp.

Fireworks – all by the seat of my pants. States are a math problem for me and the preview frames seemed to go slower than they really came out when exported. But I did like how FW smooths things out. Too bad it is a historical app now.

An additional attempt with a Toulouse LaTrec poster….

http://gifitup2015.tumblr.com/post/132382388773/gif-it-up-2015-entry-by-kathy-onarheim-of

Organizing for Video and Good Sound

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Well creations are happening which means I usually find needs, desires, or ways to use stuff to make content creation and assembly at a next step.

I  watched a video cast – Audio Master Class by Leon Cych on organizing your equipment for video shoots and how to get the best sound etc. with minimal and inexpensive equipment recommended by @johnjohnston. Many of the tips are things I have done before – but like everyone I forget my organization and just dump stuff together. Which then means I go into org-mode.  (BTW – I can’t wait to go to the new Container Store in town – but waiting as long as I can- could be huge budget damage!)

Also looking at how an educator or student is ready for digital capture and creations to practice and apply learning. As I create my own stories, there is always a part of me that thinks thru how students can use as well as how educators could apply in their own learning and in the learning environments of their students. Organization can save a lot of time and headaches. It also lets one focus on the activity. I am one for learning by futzing – but good futzing means you do learn to manage as much as you can so that you can futz on higher level things. Organize to futz at higher order skills seems like a good goal.

Getting the stuff manageable:

Video Set Up Pack

I have each piece in a ziploc bag-wouldn’t cool nylon bags be snazzy! – but hey zip bags are easy, see thru and replaceable) I have 10 bags now. Each has labeled what is in it and a number. I know I have 10 bags. Why? because when you are out somewhere the last thing you want to lose is that one little do-hickey thing-a-ma-bob. This way I find my stuff, but when packing up I know I don’t leave anything behind. If you are fortunate enough to have more than one set up for class us – label with a letter and a number. Bag A – Bag B etc. With a quick glance you can make sure and remind students to match all their items for an equipment check. When you really want to get fancy – metal rings work great for attaching cheat sheets and directions. Remember to include photos for clarity in directions and fewer words. No one reads when they are in an active situation, but they will look at pictures.

Video Set Up Pack

Repurposed a former laptop tote. Has a place to put my iPad as well. Backpacks work great for class set ups – everyone has old ones somewhere.

The only thing missing is the tri-pod. Right now I use a great tripod – it is actually an antique. Way cool – but heavy and not as portable as I would like. So for my Christmas list – a flexible, lightweight and hopefully colorful tripod. 🙂

Can’t wait to go out and begin a shoot. Watch out family – the story interviews are about to begin.

Contents of my Video Pack:

  1. iPad Mount with lens adapter and boom mic mount capacity
  2. wide-angle and zoom lens for iPad – attaches to mount
  3. boom mic – with stand, cables, filter
  4. Lapel Mic
  5. Green Screen hanging clips (shower hooks and command strips)
  6. Green Screen cloth
  7. phone and iPad mounts
  8. 2 grips/table clamp tripod
  9. misc. audio cable, mount instructions, micro fiber cloth for cleaning
  10. extra batteries for boom mic

Still need to add a tripod…..

I am using TouchCast app on my iPad for capture as well as the standard Camera/Video app.

Another app I us is Fuse by TechSmith when working with others who use a video server such as Eduvision by JDL Horizons.. This equation allows for immediate upload to a server – great for student assignments or professional development, coaching and mentoring of educators who want to capture their practice.

Next will be doing a similar clean up of my DSLR camera bag for lenses and external flash with remote.

What do you do to organize or make sure you get the best when out capturing content?

#4life Skills applied

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Direct Link to Flip Book creation.bookcover

Seems  I have been absent in some ways in posting and updating. But I have been busy creating and #4Life. My intent was to create along #ds106tales this fall but seems they are now in week 7 already!

I look back at the last 8 months and how much the DS106 community has accelerated my skill building and made a difference in my creations. Adopting the “Make Art Damn it!” frame of mind has been awesome. Learning from others, expanding possibilities. I started this journey to learn things so I could use the stacks of family content now in my possession and under my care due to the loss of parents and parents-in-law over the last years. The loss along with my own children now adults and starting their own life paths of careers, love, and family, I wanted to be able to start creating in ways that would be special for them and the future through digital storytelling of family.

My brother-in-law by alignment of the stars has a milestone birthday of 70 years in October. My husband and sister-in-law wanted to do something to remember and celebrate their big brother’s milestone. Deadlines and specific targets always seem to keep me focused and this seemed a good kick-start to now applying some of my learned ds106 skills to something personal.

I have created GIFs of family and events. Scanning photos, capturing audio and whatever I can. Rochelle Lockridge introduced me to Flipbuilder via the Noir106 radio programs in spring 2015. The many assignments of the ds106 assignment bank in audio, design, video,  have given me lots of practice of which most is posted in this blog. The daily create has been a great source as well! Sandy Brown-Jensen has been a muse and inspiration as she shares her family storytelling creations. Thanks Sandy!

And thanks to all my #DS106 friends for your support and sharing (Twitter): @mdvfunes, @johnjohnston, @ronald_2008, and so many others – too many to list, but so important! Follow the #ds106 tag in Twitter and you will see them.

DESIGN: Created some designs to use as chapter start pages and book cover

I used Canava for these design posters. A handy tool for good graphic plates when you need several instead of one intense grand creation.

Book cover

POWER & STYLE

Chapter cover for Flip Book

I practiced my audio and video skills and learned lots! So much it is hard to share. I used Wondershare Filmora and iMovie as video editors and expanded on tools within each. I used the iMovie map animation in a video about the places he has lived over the years – so cool! The feature was there right in front of me all the time, but I discovered it thru this tutorial.

7 videos created for the Flip book: the YouTube Playlist starts with this video.

 

Each one improved IMHO. I used Audacity for audio and created audio scripts and clips first. Then imported into the video editors. For some of the videos I used features in one and then imported into the other video editor to gain the best features of each. I also used some of the iMovie templates, but to escape from the constraints, built a foundation and then changed the movie to a new project. This kept the theme transitions in place and available, but then allowed me to add and change to meet my needs.

I also was able to use family video from years past. Boy – a lot of footage and not much captured! LOL. I used a downloader to convert the DVD footage to usable digital pieces and edited in the video editors. A few I used FinalCut Pro for editing, to create content pieces much as I did with Audacity for sound. Without all the fancy interface it was powerful, but less cluttered and assisted in sticking to creating content pieces instead of production.

I also used my JibJab account and captured some video card creations to manipulate and build upon.

The Flip Book Creation:

The Flip book itself was a learning experience. Creating the WP plugin version and getting it to be accessible via a web page on a sub-domain I created for family stories.

The sub domain will give the opportunity to create something more static and approaches content differently than a straight up blog. I am going to try different versions of the theme with the sub domain over the next few months.

Flip Book Builder worked well. Things I know I will do differently are in customizing presentation and making sure the table of content links actually become links. I included the thumbnails open in the link to help family see the navigation. In the future, I would present with the option closed as the default.

The biggest AHA was that I now want to improve an develop more skill in using a page layout tool. I have access to inDesign – but will also look for some other open source options. The first flip book is okay-  but being able to make the pages look more art like and not document layout will be more pleasing for reading. It is not just about the content. Content is first and critical – but presentation makes the content shine.

As I move on to the next family project – I will reflect and try to post some process and development posts.

To see the Flip book check out my Family Stories site (still working on a better title for the site – suggestions welcomed!)

Direct Link to Flip Book.

 YouTube Playlist 

 

Tales of DS106 – Fall 2015 Coming Soon!

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Tales of DS106 Tales of DS106 Fall 2015

Looking ahead. A little over saturated with No. 6 after the last few creations and fairy tales needing a little kick in my mind to focus. I should be working on radio show things – but sort of lost in figuring out exactly what to do or work on yet. More than anything I was realizing I need to make a new banner for the blog as the season changes and haven’t decided what it is going to be yet. So shiny object chasing for a few days!

My first direction was to start working on family stories. One of my own goals with ds106 was to improve skills so I could use the tons of photos, video, sound, and stories of family and begin threading it together for those around now and in the future. Real stories seem far more complex than creative stories. After a day of organizing files I realized I have a TON of prep work and need to figure out a strand to start creating the pieces first.

The comic book covers for Tales of DS106 for the fall UMW cohort looked interesting. As a quick practice I decided to create one for the upcoming session. I will probably follow along as I love seeing the work the students create and the twists and turns. I am not holding myself to a schedule of trying to keep up with them this round at least that is my thought at this time – but definitely follow and support them in their work. I am moving into #4life and will continue TDC and work on projects but not within the Friday to Friday schedule and maybe not even on the same areas of focus. I will let it up to serendipity as they create and find new ways to do things that look interesting to do as well.

Process:

  • Inspiration and style guide from: https://www.mycomicshop.com/search?TID=13291551
  • Paul Bond graphic from: http://ds106tal.es header
  • Jim Groom Graphic from his avatars
  • Bitmoji avatar graphic from my account
  • Created rectangle for upper third and filled with color
  • Added two vertical rectangles for side and filled with color
  • Downloaded and Installed PostCrypt Font from http://www.2200freefonts.com/
  • Added Filter>Noise to lessen the abruptness of color of the coverTales2015cover
  • Added a rectangle as a horizontal divider to separate sections. I wanted to have a drop shadow – but moved on instead of trying at this point.
  • Figured out how to change the line spacing by using the properties menu when in Text mode – helps a lot!!! Before I would create each line and try and place them!
  • Would like to have the title outlined text instead of all one color – another thing to discover and master.
  • I did use Photoshop – as before mentioned – I have it so use it.
  • And of course – had to GIF it. 🙂 did this by creating two single graphics and set them at .1 sec in timeline.

From here  I may begin to create a cover for each family member for their story. I plan to use many media and assemble in a flipbook format so that each story can have all of its pieces and tangents instead of a summary like overview. Still thinking it out.Getting family to collaborate is harder than opening up to the ds106 community. 🙂

Update: My sister-in-law has been awesome at providing new content and will be visiting this month – so her help will probably be just in time to kick off something with her portion of the family story. Once that is in place I think my girls will get the idea and other family so then it will be up to me to keep up with things!

Sometimes you go back to things…Fairytale to Video

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Sometimes you go back to things you started but never finished.

I had left this just sitting on my hard drive from a few weeks ago. It seems this summer I am doing assignments, but ones I create myself instead of straight from the assignment bank. This started as Writing during the Bugeron106 Fairy Tale Festival. After going through writing – I pushed and did an audio reading of it so that I used my voice – something I was hesitant in doing. I moved on somewhat and created a PDF file of the writing with some pics to include in a FlipBook tool exploration. I still was trying to figure out how to used it in video and not just a slide show and had started playing around in iMovie with it. The drawback was not enough created art pieces to go with the story to hold it together so it was mostly an audio book. I left it and went on to new things.

Then I get mentioned in a tweet by @mdvfunes to @cogdog if my soundcloud version would help him in his K12 Keynote information collection. I had pondered how to help him out – but haven’t been able to condense my thoughts into something understandable and video.

The fairy tale is 11 minutes – longer than the 3 minutes that was requested, being another reason. I still have to think about if I can pull it off and if it would be helpful. Still pondering.

So as I was having my morning caffeine – I pulled up the video I started on the fairy tale. I am not sure if it is just time passing or because it is too dang hot outside today to want to do anything but sit still and keep cool – but I started to watch it and it didn’t seem as awful as I remembered leaving it.

So I looked at  a few options, added some titles and cleaned up some bumps. I used some Bitmoji avatar pics to stay with the storybook feel. I was surprised at how many can fit.

It is still 11 minutes plus and I don’t have all my attributions added yet. There are only a few – but they need to be added. Not sure it is anything Alan can use either, but will pass it on. It did feel good to take something that was left in the dust and at least polish it up a bit and have it in a form to share whether it is as something to learn from. The previous state was just a mess of files  – at least now it is connected.

I am getting to like iMovie a bit more. I can use it on my laptop or desktop so it allows me to be near family or in different rooms which is a perk. FinalCutPro means I am held in the office room. With this I found I could use some of the trailer templates and convert to a movie. The trailer templates are more polished and featured than the movie themes and it is nice to start with a base to edit from and not totally from scratch.

One thing which would be really nice is if iMovie Storyboard was somehow usable and a tool in iMoive for any movie. How great to improve planning and writing skills if it was possible to lay it out in a storyboard that converted it to the video like the trailer templates – but allowed you to be the director and decide what features and how long and what order. Is there such an option? Still looking – let me know if there is!

and here it is – A Story of Connections: DS106 and the Ed Administrator. Thanks to the Fairy Godfather – Alan Levine and the ds106 Guardian Angel – Mariana Funes, along with all the people and characters who are #4Life and continue to support and create.

Open sharing and connections are the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. They are the everyday simple acts of kindness and reaching out that together make wealth in life. Sometimes they become the awesome out of this world-never thought it could happen events, but mostly it is the true enrichment of the small touches that together add up. 

Give one – get many.
Open and share – you will never regret that you did.
🙂

and how appropriate – with auto upload from iMovie you can’t define your thumbnail cover – it automatically chose @NanaLou-  perfect!

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