Computers are just tools. With their help, you can create fancy images, videos, audio and animations. Teaching and learning is hard as well. How about combining the two? YouTube tutorials have become incredibly popular over the last few years and are the first port of call when you are using a new piece of software. In this unit, you will learn how to create your own, professional screen cast video tutorial to help teach people how to use Microsoft Publisher. We are learning ...
So that we can ...
You betcha!
Before we start to record our tutorial videos, we need to learn how to use Microsoft Publisher! Task 1.1 Creating documents using Publisher Where we learn how to use features of Microsoft Publisher There are a few video tutorials to watch to teach you how to create simple documents using Microsoft Publisher. Obviously, you might not have the text you need to create the publication, so instead, designers usually use Lorem Ipsum text to help them. This is 'nonsense' text generated from a 1st-century BC Latin text by Cicero (!) which is used to allow fast generation of the visual form of a document without relying on using meaningful content. You can generate your own Lorem Ipsum text from the Lipsum website or click on the image below to download a text document containing some which you can use in the next step. Lorem ipsum text - click me to get some! Remember to use Lorem Ipsum text to fill the text boxes if you need to rather than agonising over what to type!
Extra Videos for Mr Mills to Record ... Using Guides, Upside Down Template, splitting images across pages. How rude! You should have learnt quite a lot of skills from the videos. Make sure you write down what you have learnt and provide evidence of the documents you have created. Remember, the more creative you try to be, the more you will learn.
Task 1.2 Leaflet / flyer design Where we learn how to create a design for a leaflet or a flyer Use your favourite search engine (it's going to be Google, isn't it?) to decide on a subject and a design style for your leaflet that you are going to make in Publisher. Remember the standard leaflet types are (click to see images) ... You can design your leaflet about anything - just make sure it's appropriate! Grab yourself a piece of A4 paper (or A3 if you really want) and produce a hand drawn design for your leaflet. Try not to make it too complicated - you are going to have to produce this in Microsoft Publisher! You could design your leaflet about ... ... or anything else as long as you know lots about it! Task 1.3 Practice making your leaflet Where you practice making your leaflet in Publisher before you record yourself Hopefully, you will be ready to create your publication! Choose a suitable blank document and design your template using the guides to help you to layout the content so that it will fold up correctly - remember to use the videos to help you if necessary. Create your leaflet using as many of the Publisher tools as possible. You need to make it look professional and high quality and ensure that there is as little white space as possible in the document. If you get any images from the web, make sure that you use images from ...
... because they are (mostly) free, though some require attribution to the author. You would normally put this on the back of the leaflet (and it's a good idea to do that anyway!) If you've made a folded leaflet, you should print it and check that it folds up OK. Remember to print the leaflet double sided and flip it on the correct edge (ask your teacher if you are not sure which edge to flip the page) depending on whether your document is landscape or portrait. It really doesn't matter if it's different as long as you can explain why you've changed it! You could see this as a first draft and then make some changes. It's always good to show a range of development ideas when you are creating artefacts like this.
I know it might seem a little odd to the graphic designers amongst you, but Microsoft PowerPoint is a really great vector graphics tool. But before we start, how about this little quiz? Task 2.1 Creating your vector logo Where we use Microsoft Powerpoint to create a vector graphics logo Investigate some more clever logos - click on the link for a Google Image Search but be careful - there are some pretty rude ones (Internet Safety and all that). You'll notice that a lot of logos make use of negative space - tricking your eye into seeing things that aren't there. Clever use of negative space in logo design There is a reason for that ... Now open up PowerPoint and investigate some of the drawing tools. One of the best ways to do this is to try to create a simple picture like a house or an aeroplane. You could even make a copy of one of the clever logos that you found in Step 1. Tools you should be taught to use ...
You can create some really professional looking vector based by tracing bitmap images in PowerPoint, although you have to work within the limitations of the tools you have available - after all, it's not really designed for this :) Before you can attempt this, you need to be comfortable with all the skills above plus ...
Now with the skills you have learnt, design and create your own logo for your screencast channel! You can use these ideas to help you with your design but *don't* just copy them! Notice how most of the logos you find online are vector based which is why we've learnt to use PowerPoint to draw vector images! Consider my poor attempts ... You can do a miles better job than me!
Task 2.2 Rendering as a bitmap Where we render the vector image as a bitmap and inspect the difference Most video software struggles to handle vector images - we can save our creation as a vector or as a bitmap. So, you've spent a couple of hours on PowerPoint creating a superb logo and now you are like 'what next?' You *could* copy and paste it into most applications but you might not get the result you expected. In this step, you learn how to save your logo as a bitmap and then a vector ... Click and follow the instructions It's an interesting thing to reflect on If you find the image files and double click each one in turn, you *should* find that the bitmap file (logo.png) opens up in some application (paint, Photoshop, GIMP, image viewer) quite easily. However, if you double click the logo.wmf file, you *should* find it more difficult to open - it might actually open in a bitmap viewer! Finally, import both copies of your logo back into a new PowerPoint presentation ...
You *should* notice that the WMF file looks a lot worse than the original image file, especially if you've used shading effects in your logo. This is partly why it is important to save the original work in case you need to change it! Another interesting thing to reflect on!
In this section, you will be creating your own animation for use in your video tutorial. Task 3.1 Storyboarding Where we plan a simple animation First, either download or grab a copy of the storyboard template from your teacher. There are only three panels on the template on purpose because it is only used for designing a simple animation.
Now, make sure that you describe your animation to your shoulder partner and get them to do the same!
Task 3.2 Creating your animation Where we follow our storyboard and make a simple animation
Time to practice your hex / binary / denary conversions! For each of the following hexadecimal colour codes, convert it to an RGB value. You night need to use this slide on the topic presentation to help you. I've done the first one for you so you can see the method. Q1 : Calculate the RGB values which are represented by #45B9F4 Click to view a video (with no sound - shhhh!) Works better in Google Chrome As of 2019, Google has a nice colo(u)r picker that you can use to check whether your answer is correct. Just type the hex colo(u)r code in the top field on the left and the RGB colo(u)r code will appear underneath together with the actual colo(u)r that it looks like. Because, like most things computery, color is spelt the American way but I like to spell it properly :) Now try these yourself on your whiteboards ... Q3 : Calculate the RGB values which are represented by #D2D829 Q4 : Calculate the RGB values which are represented by #C65CED Q5 : Calculate the RGB values which are represented by #FFFFFF Q6 : Calculate the RGB values which are represented by #000000 Are you sure?
Before you move on, make sure that you can use the following tools in Krita ...
Well, you might need to try again! Getting a well ordered workspace is really important when you are working with applications like this. The image below shows the way that I've organised my Krita workspace ... Click to engage Right click on the "Brushes and stuff" toolbar and make sure you only have the following 'dockers' showing ...
... and arrange them like I have by clicking on the docker title (*not* the tab) and dragging them to the correct place. Depending on your screen size and how beefy your computer is, you might have to choose a smaller screen size for your video. To play it safe, Choose an 800x600 "Custom Document" at 300ppi (Pixels Per Inch) - that way, it will fit nicely on most screens and the animations will run smoothly. The following steps are only suggestions on how to create an introductory animation. Each instruction has a screenshot available for you to view. Make sure you stay focused - this is bloomin' 'ard! See how you find this!
Hello Jupiter, fancy seeing you here! MPEG stands for Moving Picture Experts Group and isn't strictly a file format; it's the name of the organisation who came up with and maintains the file specification. However, MP4 (MPEG Layer 4) has been the chosen standard for video format since 1999 and continues to this day. In order to convert your animation to an MP4 file, you need a tool called FFMPEG which you may or may not be able to download in school because it's a binary file and they are normally blocked. Nevertheless ... Click to visit the FFmpeg website and try to download the 'build' suitable for your platform. ... or your teacher will show you where the ffmpeg.exe file is which might be easier. In Krita ...
Which one was your favourite? Record yourself using Audacity saying 'Thanks for watching' and then animate a face speaking (there was an example in one of the videos in Step 1) - remember to nudge the frames forward by one to make it slightly more realistic. Model the image of the mouth with your own mouth in front of a mirror to see what shapes it makes.
Practice screen recording using OBS - different sound tracks for sounds and commentary Scenes - VIDEO tutorials
Record introduction using audacity Choose free sound from bensound or other free / cc source Simple sound editing Sound file types (MP3 / OGG / WAV / FLAC) Recording and simple sound manipulation with Audacity (playing, recording, importing, simple editing) - VIDEOS Selecting suitable components : images, stock images, sound, images from the Internet Record sound track whilst watching video Add music track in background?
Video production Video as a container format / sequences of still images (heliotrope) Create video with avidemux - You can append video tracks but they have to be exactly the same dimensions; Creating simple video - importing clips / images Frame rate / limits of human perception Video file formats (MP4 / MPEG / AVI)
Choice of compression technology - human vs machine perception Lossy / lossless and application to sound, video, data Compression techniques Compression and streaming. |
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