Just tinkering

I wanted to keep a record about some projects I started for the #etmooc digital storytelling session and the tools that I experimented with. I’ve given a brief description of how I created each of these images. If you do want any more information please let me know, I’d be more than happy to share what I’ve learnt on this digital media learning journey.

Clipping an image outline – Gimp

Gimp is a free image manipulation program. It is very similar to Adobe Photoshop which I have used before albeit quite a few years ago.

I had taken a photo of this man (1st image) and wanted to cut out his outline to put him into a digital story (2nd image). The full(ish) story is in this post

To cut him out I used the paths tool in Gimp. This video gives quite a good explanation of how to use the paths tool. I then put the man into different scenes using layers.

To use any image manipulation programmes it is important that you have an understanding of how layers work. Benjamin Bailey tells all about layers here

Animated gif – Gimp

Having got to grips with the basics of Gimp, I now wanted to try it out to create an animated gif.  Refresh the screen (F5) to see the animation. I used the image in this blog post

Even though I had an idea about layers, knew I needed to use them, and had watched this video  it took me ages to find the Layers toolbar.(At that point I was trying to do all this without reading the instruction leaflet!) I finally found the toolbox under the Windows option as ‘Dockable Dialogs’.

The only other problem I had was working out the order of the animation until I realised that in the layers toolbar the order is sorted from the bottom upwards.

Looped video – Gimp + iLivid + MPEG Streamclip

Having mastered a simple animation, I then wanted to create a more complicated one – a looped video of Marshall McLuhan ‘inside a television set. I used it in this post.

First, I needed to find a video  of Marshall McLuhan which I downloaded using iLivid.

I then used MPEG Streamclip to clip a short section. According to the blurb the beta version allows direct Youtube downloads but it didn’t work for me which is why I used iLivid first. I used Alan Levine’s tutorial to work out how to export the video in frames

Finally, I imported the set of images together with an image of an old fashioned TV set as layers. I had to resize each of the image layers to fit the TV which was a bit time consuming. Otherwise, it was quite straightforward.

I celebrated all this by creating an animated video using Videoscribe. This is a great, very easy tool to use. I have used images from the Videoscribe library but you can upload your own images as well.

Remixed video – Mozilla Popcorn Maker

Another project I tried out during this session was to use a ‘one I made earlier’ video and add images, video and text using Popcorn Maker. I did create one, however I had problems displaying the right video when playing back using the iPad. In the process of trying to sort it out I deleted the whole project, so watch this space……..

Finally, my favourite line from my favourite movie says it all.   I need to loop this!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVh2M3NiYxw&sns=em