All of these sites for making video tutorials present very necessary resources. It only makes sense to capture "how-tos" and save them for others to use. I am trying really hard to get over the feelings I get when I have to listen to my own voice. I am just going to do what I need to do an let it go!
I looked at Screencastle, but could never really get it to start. It might have been the fact I was working on my MAC. I ended up making a sample using Screen-o-matic. Seemed pretty simple although I did "lose" the toolbar and could not end it exactly where I wanted. But I know with practice it will come easier. I also hope to talk to other Beachcombers and see how they handled the details with these things!
So here is my creation.
It is a very small version because of the limitations of the Blog.
I did upload the mp4 file to the Curriculum Wiki sidebar so you could see it in a larger form if you want. Scroll way down the sidebar to How to Grab a picture on the Mac.
This beach blog is truly an exercise in learning and sharing...I am all over the place working on this and that and getting information and ideas from various places and people, and trying to answer questions posed in comments or asked thru emails. My head is spinning, but I LOVE it....there are so many good ideas flying around about how to use all of these image generators!
I have seen two Voice Thread examples...one I could comment on because I was invited to do so and one that was embedded and I wanted to comment, but couldn't...but neither one mentioned being asked for $60 so I am ready to go after that resource again.
The Glogster folks have been monitoring my struggles (without me asking) and sent me a help line and even congratulated me upon my successful piece! A little bit Big Brother-ish, but I am so impressed they want their Thing to be successful that they want to help! Have you seen all these school examples?
I was contacted by one beachcomber who was having trouble emailing a bookr...so I went into the archives and emailed one from there to myself with no problems. I am hoping the email issue was temporary. Has anyone else had email issues with bookr? Were you finally successful?
Also, the issue of using flickr pix based on tags...if you uploaded your own photos and used a unique tag, could you make a personlized bookr that way? Has anyone thought about this or better, tried it?
I am including the archived bookr sample here just because the photography is so beautiful and the message a good example of some nice writing I think...
YES, it is a beach theme. Yes, I'm a little obsessed with the theme....and all the rest...does that make me a Blog Bum?
P.S. An issue that we have been working thru over at the 23 Things playground is the hiding avatars! If you have noticed, your Yahoo avatar is not showing. There is an issue with the html code. The work around is to go back to the avatar site and save your avatar as a picture (jpg file) then go to your blog layout screen and save it using a picture gadget, not html!
Glogster update...I said I was not giving up and I haven't...although this morning I came VERY close again when my password would not work. Big Red will tell you that!
Of course, it works much better when you finally realize that you NEVER created a password, you never registered for an account, and that is the reason I kept having to start over the other day!
So...be SURE you create your account before starting! You glog will disappear after a very few minutes if you step away...yes, I had that happen to me today!
With an account, you CAN stop working before you are finished, but you will want to save you glog as private...means no one can see it until you are ready for all of it to be seen!
o and btw, a Glogster person read my frustration from my previous post and gave me a help number. So if you need help, 888-GLOGS4U.
So I feel much better about the whole Glogster thing. I am going to shelve my serious project for a bit and play with one not so important...and therefore, needing less attention. I want to get one posted!
I REALLY want to learn about Glogster and Voice Thread and I just can't seem to string enough uninterrupted time together to get far enough in either one to get the job done.
I want to create a Glogster to overlay our Curriculum wiki opening screen and jazz it up a bit. It is not the concept of what to do that is getting in my way. I really do understand how to do it, but between the zillion choices that I HAD to go thru and all the color changes I insisted needed to occur, I kept forgetting there is no way to save a partially made Glogster...it is either all or nothing!! Grrr.
Tonight I decided to move onto Voice Thread. I created an account and then carefully re-registered for an educational account because I thought I saw where a basic k-12 account was free. However, after filing out several information sheets and getting the email that signified I was accepted, every time I tried to move forward to actually creating something, I kept getting a pop up asking for $60 dollars!!
So I quit that also...for now! I will try again to see exactly how I went from free to 60 in less than 6 minutes! A challenge for another day. I am only temporarily defeated.
This is just a quickly thrown together sample of a Bookr possibility. I knew one of my favorite beaches in the world would be available in the picture file...not the best photos I know could be available but enough to get the job done.
The question that has come up and I have it too. How can you use "better" pictures be they yours or someone else's? I think it may be the search term you select. I am pretty sure you have to open an account and upload your personal pictures and add a tag that you can later use to have them come up as bookr choices. I will see if I can find out any information to make these even more personal. Maybe someone who has used it longer can help with this question.
It's no secret that I love Animoto. And I am so impressed how they continue to add more excitement to the site. You can go here to see all kinds of samples that librarians and teachers have shared. Some of them were created way back before some of the features were available, but still serve a purpose. Would you like to add one to the collection? Share the link and I will add it!
