Focus on the storytelling aspect of your video making- -do not get caught up in the technical points or making the video just for the assignment stars…  Be very sure that your videos tell a story, that it surprises us, that it perhaps jars us, and that when you write up your blog post you are providing full details and context for your videos. Think about the shape of stories we studied in unit 3.

All of your video assignments should include:

• An opening title sequence and/or closing credits – make sure your video gives credit to all media sources.
• Make good use of audio– keep in mind the lessons from your audio storytelling work– use of background music, sound effects, and/or foley.
• Your blog writeup includes the key elements— narrative describing the ideas/inspiration behind the video you created and also details on how it was made (including credits/links to media sources and at least one screen shot of your video editing screen). Think of it as the “extras” on a DVD or a “making of” article about a movie.

We recommend using video editing software that allows you to cut and re-arrange clips on a timeline, and to add, and layer audio tracks. Most typically this is the software that came with your operating system- iMovie on Macs and MovieMaker on Windows PCs (but feel free to look at some of the other options in the ds106 Handbook).

Many of the assignments will require downloading of clips form YouTube (we have a tutorial if you need it). PC users may have challenges in importing the downloaded mp4 video files into MovieMaker (We have been told that the Windows Movie Maker Live can import MP4)- you will either have to install codecs to read mp4 videos, or use a converter to change mp4 into AVI or WMV file formats. See the ds106 Handbook for some video converter options.

Other resources that may help include:

• UMW Digital Video developed by Andy Rush in DTLT, a local video guru
• Vimeo Video School
• The Basics of Video Editing: The Complete Guide

Do you remember your work in putting together the 30 seconds of foley sounds for the Charlie Chaplin Lion’s cage clip? If you skipped that assignment, take some time to review it. Now you get to re-assemble it back into a new video, and try to make a story out of it.

Your new story can be an explanation of what The Tramp is doing in the cage, why he went in there, the story from the Lion’s point of view, or any other creative interpretation of this sequence. Break out of literal interpretations, bring in unexpected elements. Maybe he is a time traveler or an alien from another planet. Maybe the Lion is an all powerful wise being. Or a monster. Or just a bored cat.

You will first need to download the clip and remove the original audio sound track (Look for a editing feature for the clip to either “Mute” the audio or separate the audio from the video, and then remove the audio track).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79i84xYelZI

Add an original title sequence that sets up the scene and launches the story- include a new music sound track, it can be modern or old fashioned, but it should match the theme for your story (we suggest exploring the royalty free collection from incompetech). Add any other media that you think might help complete the story. The idea is to re-imagine this scene using your video editing chops.

Now download from SoundCloud the segments of audio that other ds106 participants have created, re-assemble them to line up with the action in the video. It can get tricky if the segments are not exactly 30 seconds long, so you get some practice trimming audio or inserting filler audio (sound effects?).

• Sounds from 00:00 to 00:30 (tag chaplin-lion-01)
• Sounds from 00:31 to 01:00 (tag chaplin-lion-02)
• Sounds from 01:01 to 01:30 (tag chaplin-lion-03)
• Sounds from 01:31 to 02:00 (tag chaplin-lion-04)
• Sounds from 02:01 to 02:30 (tag chaplin-lion-05)
• Sounds from 02:31 to 02:55 (tag chaplin-lion-06)

Add a closing credits sequence and anything else to make the story complete. Publish it to YouTube. In your blog post for this assignment, use the tags for the video assignment based on this clip — VideoAssignments, VideoAssignments655

Are you able to make a different and new story out of this material? Try to do more than just stitch media together, give The Tramp’s adventure with the Lion a new meaning.

Your other task for this unit is completion of 16 stars of assignments from the Video Assignments. If you don’t like these, feel free to create your own and add them to the Assignment Bank.

All your video work should be uploaded to YouTube and you ought to write a post for each completed assignment in which you embed your YouTube video. We’d like to know the why’s and how’s of your productions. We’d like to know what larger story it might connect to or other existing genre of story. What might you do differently if you did it again? What did you learn, both technically and in creating your story, that you might take to the next project?

Your unit summary should not take much effort. Besides linking to the work you did for the last two weeks, make room to write some reflection on what you learned about creating stories in video — and not just the technical aspects, but what did you find were the compelling elements of story in the work you did in these two weeks.

And if you did any Daily Creates, add them as well (We like to see if people continue doing these when they are not assigned… aren’t we clever?)