My New Playground

We have a student who needs their own, individual project. So I'm building a series of exercises that will allow him to explore some of the issues going on in his life - inspired by the film Tarnation. Part of the plan is to have him use the built-in camera on one of our iMacs to make a self-portrait using stop motion. So I went hunting to find an example and found this instead...Boinx Software - iStopMotion 2 - Examples

Fun stuff. Now I have lots of ideas for projects for all ages!

Making a craZy 3d animated video in less than 2 weeks

M dot Strange takes us through his process in a wonderful little post on The Workbook Project.

"I thought I would out together a little thang documenting my work on the Mindless Self Indulgence music video “Animal” There’s a ton of music video making-of’s out there but since I’m bored waiting for 3d renders to finish I’ll add one more to the mix.

So this is my process…."

How to: Making a craZy 3d animated video in less than 2 weeks

Special Effects on the Cheap

A great DIY how to Make (and Use) Your Own Green Screen
over at MacLife. Not only do they give a step by step for planning and building the background, but they also go through the post-production.

Looks like a great classroom project...

Don't Just Use What's In the iBox...

As tempting as it may be, I would encourage all iTeachers to not stay inside the iBox. In other words, search out and BUY plug ins and other useful tools for iMovie, Final Cut, and all of your digital applications.

Today I stumbled across this gem called Magnet. They've just released a new version and MacInTouch made mention of it.

"eX-cinder's Magnet 1.5 provides advanced motion tracking for video compositing and special effects. With it, you can attach tracking probes to moving elements, create compositions linked to the probes, and then preview and render the result. It includes direct access to iPhoto and iMovie media, iSight support, and other features. This release includes many new compositions, better integration with Quartz Compositions, preview mode, improved mouse tools, faster incremental tracking, and motion smoothing. Magnet is $39.99 for Mac OS X 10.4 and up (Universal Binary)."

Yes, for the price of 10 fancy coffees, you can have some really cool effects. Be sure to check out the demo movie on the Magnet site.

Techlearning > > Comic Strips with Flickr > May 25, 2007

A quick and dirty tutorial on how to make Comic Strips with Flickr. You could also make storyboards this way - with digital photos.

Pixar: 20 Years of Animation

It's a little old by blog standards, but I just found a cool behind the scenes look at Pixar, courtesy of the Museum of Modern Art. MoMA.org
Probably more appropriate for the younger set, but still quite good. Give your students a sense of the math and art that go into creating some of their favorite films (The Incredibles, Finding Nemo, etc.)