Welcome to the University of Delaware Library's Student Multimedia Design Center blog, sharing tips and links for multimedia creators and users. Come visit us in person on the lower level of the Morris Library or online at www.lib.udel.edu/multimedia.
iMovie 09 is one of our most popular video editing software programs, and we often get questions at the desk related to it. It's a good program to start with if you've never edited a video before; the platform is easy to use and intuitive for the most part. Although we've just finished with our iMovie 09 workshops at the Student Multimedia Design Center, you can still learn how to use iMovie by looking through Apple's iMovie tutorials online. The tutorials are short and focused, with clips on how to import, organize, and edit your videos, how to enhance your videos, and how to publish and share your videos. They are well worth a look if you're interested in video editing and learning how to use iMovie.
If you have a multimedia project that you're working on and you're a bit stuck on how to approach it or what to do next, I always find it helpful to look at other similar multimedia projects to get inspiration. If you're doing ethnographic research and need to put together a multimedia presentation of some sort, two sites (among many) come to mind.
The first is One in Eight Million, which are multimedia narratives put together by the New York Times. In a city as large as New York, it can seem easy to get lost in the crowd. One in Eight Million gives a snapshot into the lives of individual New Yorkers-- in images and narration that are simple yet powerful at the same time.
The Places We Live also takes an ethnographic approach in looking at how people in various locations around the world live. There is an interactive multimedia element to the digital narratives that is memorable and unique-- the use of ambient sound and photographs feels quite intimate and authentic.
If you come across any other multimedia based sites that would be good sources of inspiration, let us know!
Timberland, the boots, shoes, clothes and gear company has recently updated its presence on the Internet. The company has employed some interesting multimedia elements to create a very active and interactive website. Check it out: http://www.timberland.com/
Consider submitting a video to the second annual Career Services Center Video contest. This year’s theme is What Can Blue Hen Jobs do for U.The deadline for submission is Friday, November 5, 2010, and there are prizes for the first, second, and third place winners ($600, $300, and $100 cash cards, respectively). The top three videos will be posted on YouTube and the Career Services website. For more information about the contest, including instructions on how to enter, go to: http://www.udel.edu/CSC/videocontest.html.
If you don't have video equipment or editing software, no worries-- just come to the Student Multimedia Design Center and we'll help you with every stage of the video editing process. Check out a video camera, tripod, microphone, and external hard drive, and use one of the studios or computer labs to edit your video in iMovie, Final Cut Pro, or Windows MovieMaker. If you have questions, come to the service desk and we'd be happy to help.
For the curious, here are the winning videos from last year's contest...
A Fair(y) Use Tale, a very short film by Professor Eric Faden of Bucknell University, takes an informative and humorous look at fair use and copyright using clips from Disney movies.
