For my third Emerging Technologies post, I decided to explore Digital Storytelling. I used the service called Animoto. Animoto allows you to upload pictures from your computer or from other popular sites like Facebook and Photobucket and add music to create a video presentation.
I returned on Sunday night from a trip to the Chicago area where I was on staff at the largest Magic the Gathering (a collectible card game popular with people worldwide) tournament ever held in North America. Naturally, I had a few pictures of the event that I wanted to share with my friends and this was a neat way to showcase them.
The process for creating a video on Animoto was a tad bit tedious. There were a number of things that had to be done to create a polished looking piece. Arranging the photos, finding the right music with a long enough track, and tweaking the speed of the show took a little doing and after reviewing each draft, the edits had to be recompiled. That took some time. I probably spent 2 hours playing with it. In the end, the time spent was worth it, because I really like how it turned out.
The free show that Animoto offers is only 30 seconds long. That wasn’t long enough to display all the images I wanted to use, so I went ahead and paid three dollars via Paypal. This allowed me to create a full length video.
After I had it finished, I uploaded it to my Facebook account using the interface offered at the end of the video creation. I also wanted to post it to my blogs, so I choose the upload option that said, “other sites” next. This gave me the java script code that I copied and pasted straight into \ this blog and into my edublog account.
If you’re not a big ole game nerd, like I am, you’ll likely wonder what all those geeks were doing. They were having a blast, that’s what.
Tip: When choosing music, you will have the option to use something from Animoto’s collection or upload your own music. Keep in mind that using music from your I tunes account is illegal unless it is music you created yourself or have the artist’s permission to distribute.
