I just finished my first commissioned video project. The “commissioned” aspect brought a whole perspective.
It’s not that the expectations were high. The professional association to which I have belonged since I became a teacher decades ago is doing a website makeover and wanted a video to promote the annual conference coming up in March 2013. Specifications were that I use the Ken Burns effect to bump up the visual interest from a plain slide show.
So bump it up, I did. The conference theme, “Investigate That Story,” was inspired by a quote by David Coleman, one of the authors for the Common Core State Standards:
Read like a detective and write like an investigative reporter.
And the conference logo has a bit of film noir going for it. At least that’s what I see with the kid in the trench coat and fedora.
So I enlisted the help of a dashing young friend from my teen book and writers’ club who fancies himself an actor and taped a simple opening and close that I made black and white, found some film noir-like music, and then simply added some author promo shots and book covers.
Biggest lesson was creating a lead-in to my actor’s “hot tip” line. I’m sure public library patrons thought I was “casing the joint” as I attempted pan after pan on different library shelves trying to find the perfect or at least less Blair Witch-like move. I wanted to set the mood with music before I came to the actor so I needed a rather long visual sequence. Adding the Coleman quote gave me a chance to lengthen the lead-in purposely.
So here’s my completed video:
I’m not sure my educator-friends know quite what to make of this but they seem okay with it as long as I got the Ken Burns moves on the images going. What if they had hated the film noir effect? Glad I didn’t have to face that because, though I believe that constraints inspire creativity; I also know that all the joy of creativity can be sucked out if you don’t have some freedom and space to realize your vision.
I’m definitely not ready technologically or emotionally for commissioned work.
Got a question for you iMovie fans. Can I insert an image and add text? I resorted to PowerPoint to create the brief bio slides for each author but, surely, I can accomplish this in iMovie.
Congratulations on your first commissioned project! You definitely can insert an image and add text. I whipped up a short Youtube video explaining the way I usually do it:
http://youtu.be/b_MGR75q5D4
I’m using iMovie ’11 (version 9.0.4). Hopefully that’s the same or similar to what you have.
Simply drag and drop on top of the image! I did everything but that, Melanie. Can’t thank you enough for taking the time to share your knowledge.
Nicely done! I like the feel to your video.
In addition to Melanie’s tips (nice tutorial, by the way), one thing my students and I often forget (and that Melanie showed) is that you don’t have to stick with the iMovie text defaults. When you have the iMovie list of fonts, colours and sizes open, you can also open the System Font Panel (in the bottom left – http://bit.ly/N2gw8Y) to pick any font you like! You don’t have to stick with their defaults.
“though I believe that constraints inspire creativity; I also know that all the joy of creativity can be sucked out if you don’t have some freedom and space to realize your vision.”
This is a money quote for me, and I need to think about how this plays out in a class like DS106.
I love the video, too!!
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