It's That Time of Year Again

Time's running out to register for MacWorld Expo, this January in San Francisco. As always, there will be many phenomenal products and ideas exchanged, especially at the Macworld Educator Academy Be sure to sign up by December 14th for the best discounts.

Fun Contest for Students - Flip Video Cameras

MySpace.com/flipvideo
Myspace is hosting a cool little contest called "What I'd Flip for this Holiday Season". The prize is one of these great little hard drive cameras. I had a chance to use one earlier this year - they take pretty good shots that are low rez. They're super easy to use and perfect for uploading to YouTube or Facebook or your school's site. I also like that you can give the cameras to your students to take home - and that they could shoot with them in many places a bigger camera wouldn't be welcome.

(Just make sure that the usb actually fits into your computer's slots before you toss the receipt. It's not that flexible.)

What if you only had 1 day to make a movie?

By the way, the gallery for the Insomnia Film Festival is up. The top 9 films are currently being viewed and scored by celebrity judges. Winners to be announced shortly.

When Planning Your Shoot...

Don't forget to check the Weather : "Google Earth Forecasts and Displays Current Weather The recent Google Earth update introduced lots of new layers, but one extremely useful layer that passed under our radar (as it were) at first glance was the addition of a new weather layer. The layer includes radar information, current conditions, and forecasts pulled every 15 minutes from Weather.com and a cloud layer that updates hourly from the Naval Research Laboratory. So if you're already obsessed with Google Earth for its stargazing and live flight tracking features, now you've got one more use for the freeware, cross-platform atlas."

Tips and Tricks for the new iMovie

MacLife's Better Your iLife (Part 3)- iMovie '08: "iMovie is all about easy editing, but it’s still got some hidden tricks aimed at more advanced editors. This collection of three video tips and four audio tips will help you go past the more obvious basics and squeeze a little more professionalism out of your iMovie projects. Try them out, and maybe you won’t want to upgrade to a more difficult (and more expensive) editor like Final Cut Express."

If you are in LA...

2007-2008 Contemporary Documentaries Calendar
Courtesy of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (the Oscar People)

The 26th annual Contemporary Documentaries series is a showcase for feature-length and short documentaries drawn from the 2006 Academy Award® nominations, including the winners, as well as other important and innovative films considered by the Academy that year.

All films in the series, except for the November 28 titles, screen at the Linwood Dunn Theater at the Academy’s Pickford Center for Motion Picture Study on Wednesdays at 7 p.m. The filmmakers will be present at screenings whenever possible. Admission for all screenings is free. Tickets are not required for entry.

Is Text Only Enough for Today's Students?

An interesting Blog from Techlearning
with some great examples of how images, video, phototagging, and other medium can tell the story better than text alone.

Just in Time for Halloween

How-To Create a Cheap and Cheesy Horror Movie- MacLife: "This Halloween you could throw a boring old party or hand out the same old candy. Or you could gather your friends and family and create a cinematic masterpiece. Follow us as we lead you to the summer camp that is The Mac|Life Guide to Creating a Cheap and Cheesy Horror Film. "

Pre-Production Means Research

In my classroom, video pre-production includes research. Back in the day, this meant hitting the pavement and heading down to the library. Now, students have so much at their fingertips - but I find many of them don't know more than the basics. Here's an article with some tips for taking your google searches to the next level. I pasted the article into Word and made it into a handout that I give to the kids - and keep one at my desk too.

12 Quick Tips To Search Google Like An Expert