Of course, due to filtering issues, we can’t access YouTube here on campus.  But there’s a perfect clip of “The Colbert Report” you want to show in your Current Events class.  What oh what to do?

There are a lot of ways to handle this – plugins for Firefox, downloadable programs, scripts you can run in browers, etc etc.  The process I’m about to outline is a little slower than some other methods, but it is the easiest in terms of steps.

First off, you’re going to need a home computer and Net access – broadband recommended, the faster the better. 

Find the video you want on YouTube – or Google Video, or almost any other Flash-based video site.  Go to the page with the actual video.  A quick word about YouTube – say you’re looking for a clip from “The Colbert Report”, and you find five samples of the same clips.  You’ll want to take a quick look at the first few seconds of each clip to determine which ones are the best looking.  Some people upload files with terrible encoding, others upload pristine copies.  Go with the best-looking one, it’ll result in a better end-product. 

You’ll then want to open a new window, and in that new window head over to http://www.all2convert.com/index.html. This is an online converter / downloader for Flash Videos.  Look on the left-hand side of this new page.  There is a field marked “URL Video”.  Copy and paste the URL of the video you want (from your original window) into this field.  Below that is a drop-down menu.  Choose the last option: “WMV Windows Video” (it is not the best choice, but it’s the only choice that is guaranteed to work with our Windows Media Player here on campus due to codec issues).   In a few moments, your file will start downloading.   Your mileage may vary in terms of time, subject to the speed of your home connection.

Then all you need is a school computer and LCD projector to show the clip in class.  I highly recommend putting Windows Media Player in “Full Screen Mode” when doing so.  In terms of actually getting the videos to school – they’re going to be too large to email to yourself through the school’s email system, so you can either use an external email (Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo) or you can put them on USB keys and bring them in.

You can obviously convert multiple clips at a time, and when you bring them to school set them up as a playlist on Windows Media Player.

These clips will be of decent-but-not-spectacular quality – but keep in mind that Flash videos are half the resolution and half the frame rate of “normal” video, which is how the files are kept at a reasonable size.

Next time – how to rip DVD’s for more efficient classroom use.

My history of tech – well, let me put it this way – I remember using Yahoo when it was a Stanford University project, using a Windows 3.1 program called “Pine” to check email, and my first PC was a Packard Bell. Fortunatley, it’s all been uphill from there. My A/V stuff has been learned by hook and by crook through my years at the Academy as well as spending half my life in the theatre.

I’m here primarily on the media side of things – looking at piggybacking on existing infrastructure to better integrate media and media creation as part of curriculum. The day of the TV cart and the tape you have to check out are over – as are the days of plopping a class in front of a movie for a block and a half and giving them a writing prompt afterwards.

Hmm, a dream project . . . a current project I’m working on is the creation of a school-wide Video Lab – something separate from my Videography equipment that would allow any student to come in, check out equipment, and make movies for any class for a project. Another would be the Safari Montage project, which takes all our video and turns it into a locally-hosted server. I’m also interested in a school-wide videocast system, with “announcement TV’s” at key traffic points in the school. If you’ve been to LSC recently, you know what I’m talking about.

Current tech use – I split my time pretty evenly between Macs (for video, graphics and audio) and my PC (word crunching, email, etc). Tech is, of course, fundamental to my Video classes – digital shooting, editing and publication.

That’s about it for me. See you around!