creating video from jpeg's and audio narration files

[Phil Shapiro]

>  This month's Youth Today features a great story on youth media
>including commentary from Street-Level and other leaders in the field.
You
>can find in on the Youth Today website at:
>
>http://www.youthtoday.org/youthtoday/index.html

<p>tony, thanks for the pointer to this informative article.

     here's an idea that might prove helpful to expand multimedia reporting
opportunities for "youth reporters."

      most video editing software can import jpeg photos and mp3 audio
files. an opportunity exists for youth reporters to "deliver" news stories
to public access television stations by submitting jpeg photos and an
accompanying mp3 audio-narration file.  these can be submitted as file
attachments, so long as the audio file is not
larger than 2 megabytes. (most email programs cannot handle file
attachments larger than 2 megs.)

       to give you an idea of what these types of news stories might look
like, i've assembled in imovie some jpeg photos from an event i attended.
(the event was documented in photos only at
http://storymakers.net/rosebud2000/)

          i then wrote a short news script and recorded an audio-narration
to accompany the photos.  then i exported the video from imovie into
quicktime format. you can view the resulting quicktime at
http://storymakers.net/rosebudact.mov  (4.9 megabytes in size. 1.5 minutes
in duration. requires quicktime 6 to view, a free download from
http://www.apple.com/quicktime/)

        most public access television stations would not have the staff to
assemble video from such submissions, but some volunteer video producers
connected with the public access station might well be inclined to accept
submissions of this kind via file attachments.

         youth would gain experience in writing "tight" news stories -- and
in narrating those news stories in a lively and engaging way.  since the
writing-skill and narrating-skill might not reside in the same person,
teams of 2 or 3 youth could be sent to cover events, with the strongest
writers and strongest narrators working together to produce the finished
news stories.

          interestingly, today's low-end digital cameras would work fairly
well for taking photos for video.  as best as i understand it, a
1.3-megapixel digital camera would produce as clear a jpeg photo for video
as a 4-megapixel camera. (imovie would resize jpegs larger than 640 x 480
down to a 640 x 480 size.)

          a useful web site for tracking the best prices in digital cameras
is http://dealcam.com

          in terms of audio recording software, i use a shareware program,
"sound effects," for the mac. http://www.pure-mac.com/audio.html#sndeff
for windows, i've heard that http://www.cooledit.com is an excellent,
affordably-priced commercial audio recording program.

            hope this helps,

                  - phil shapiro
                    arlington, virginia

btw, a teen interested in pursuing a career in journalism could impress a
college they were applying to if they explained how they had produced more
than 20 community news stories for public access television. the teen could
have all their news stories archived on the web in quicktime format.

teens could learn news production techniques by viewing each other
quicktimes on the web. the youthlearn list might be a good place for
sharing the web site addresses of quicktimes that have been produced by
teens.

<p>
--
Phil Shapiro  pshapiro at his.com
http://www.his.com/pshapiro/ (personal)
http://www.mp3.com/philshapiro/ (guitar fingerpicking)
http://storymakers.net (multimedia explorations)

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