Day Two at the Seminar

Yesterday at the multimedia seminar was all about learning how to use the technology.

One session focused on audio and a tutorial on using a mini disc recorder. There was some discussion about moving to using flash recorders. One advantage being the ease of just taking the flash card and inserting it into the reader on a computer. There's no conversion or capture. Berkeley will be converting to this in the future.

Still photography was also covered. One of the challenges was the variation in how individual camera models describe and locate functions.

We also went out in the field to shoot video and audio for our podcasting story. We had two on-camera interviews, one with Andrew Keating, the grad assistant for a history professor who's course was podcast, and the other with Mara Hancock, the associate director of educational technology at Berkeley.

Some of the concepts discussed on Monday came up. For example, the placement of the camera for the first interview was a bit above the subject. This was done to move some distracting horizontal lines into a better position in the background. Then when we set up for Mara, the background led to the placing of the camera very low to the subject. Fortunately, Joel questioned the angle early in the recording, so he and I decided to stop the interview and reposition. We then raised the camera to a level that matched better with the first interview.

Having taught video for several years, it was interesting to be reminded of the various constraints that arise in the field. Despite knowing principles and techniques, you still have compromises due to lack of time, equipment, and location issues. You have to decide which to deal with and which to let go. In our case, the psychological impression of the subject was deemed more important, rightfully so than background imperfections.