Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Presentation Self-Evaluation

When I first read about this project, I literally seized in fear. I've never made a video presentation before, and I certainly didn't even know how to start. After hours and hours of searching different video editing tools, I settles on a free trial of Camtasia. I also played around with Toufee and the Youtube Editor. My first instinct was to choose Toufee, but it froze on me constantly and the interface wasn't as logical as the one offered by Camtasia.

One thing I will take away from this class is the importance of copyright and Creative Commons. To search for video clips, I used the YouTube editor and searched for videos licensed under Creative Commons. Surprisingly, there are actual commercials that are allowed for reuse, and are of much better quality than home videos. After collecting all usable clips, I paired the videos with PowerPoint slides to combine everything into one presentation. 

Critiquing another presentation made me more aware of some key factors in an effective presentation--no clutter, good points, clear and concise. I also enjoyed watching just how many different topics there were, and the different styles students used as far as editing and graphics. 

I do believe I avoided clutter very well, keep to the time minimum and provided great media. However, I feel like my main points became confusing and often veered in different directions. 

A frustration of mine with this project was the constraint of using different media. I was limited to the video clips I used, which 90% of the time didn't flow with my concept. Because I was trying to make such a media-rich presentation, I ended up having to sacrifice my concepts in order to accommodate the available videos and the emotions they conveyed. In the end, I learned that even though I did find some amazing clips in terms of quality and copyright-free terms, I created a downside for myself by not having a clear and concise point. I felt like I tried to go in too many directions and confused the viewer. But all in all, I happy with the fact that I now have some knowledge in video editing, which can certainly be applied to future projects. I also amassed a new collection of tools and useful websites, like dig.ccmixter.com for Creative Commons licensed music; saveyoutube.com, which allows the user to save YouTube videos; and of course, Camtasia, which I found was very easy to use. 

Here is the final project: SR Diamonds

Music by cdk, "Baby", found on dig.ccmixter.com

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