Digital Story Telling with Windows Movie Maker Step by step

Transcription

1 . PAGE 1 Superhighways 2013

2 CONTENTS Before you open Windows Movie Maker (WMM)... 3 Organising your digital assets... 3 Windows Live Photo Gallery... 3 Your First Project in WMM... 4 Adding Audio... 6 Overview... 6 Different ways to capture audio... 6 Tools for editing audio... 6 Insert an audio file into your movie:... 7 Edit an audio file in WMM to fit your images... 8 Simple sound editing option More complex editing Option Editing Images and Video in WMM Overview How to refine the display of photos and video Animations and Visual Effects don t overdo it Overview Visual Effects About Animations How to Apply Transitions How to Apply Pan & Zoom Titles, Captions & Credits Overview Step by Step Titles Step by Step Captions Step by Step Credits PAGE 2 Superhighways 2013

3 BEFORE YOU OPEN WINDOWS MOVIE MAKER (WMM) ORGANISING YOUR DIGITAL ASSETS This is a very important stage if you have collected a group of digital assets (video, photos, sound) from a number of different places on memory sticks etc., you need to save them on your PC in the relevant music, photos and video folders. Until you have published your video, Windows Movie Maker (WMM) needs to keep track of each of these digital assets from their respective folders, in order to play your movie as you create it. If you don t have your USB plugged in at all times it will just show a file missing icon. FIGURE 1: WMM FILE WHERE THE IMAGES HAVE NOT BEEN CORRECTLY SAVED THROWS UP THIS ERROR WINDOWS LIVE PHOTO GALLERY Begin your video by importing all your assets into Windows Live Photo Gallery 1. Open Windows Live Photo Gallery 2. Select Import 3. Browse to your USB and select the folder where you have your assets stored 4. WLPG will analyse the different types of files 5. Follow prompts, including adding Tags (TAGS enable the search engine on your PC to locate quickly all the files you have tagged in a certain category. PAGE 3 Superhighways 2013

4 FIGURE 2: IMPORT VIDEOS AND PHOTOS INTO WINDOWS LIVE PHOTO GALLERY ADD TAGS (BEST PRACTICE TIP) YOUR FIRST PROJECT IN WMM 1. Select WMM from the start button (choose All Programmes if you can t see it on the list) 2. Choose New project from the drop down menu 3. Your new project window invites you to browse for photos and videos 4. Click on the words Browse and by default you will be taken to the libraries section of your PC where you will see Music, Picture and Video folders where you have saved already saved your digital assets. 5. You can select individual or multiple files of the same type i.e. all images PAGE 4 Superhighways 2013

5 Image file Timeline this image appears 0.07 seconds into the video which is now 4:16 minutes long Preview Window Video file Main Stage 1. The individual files appear on the main stage. Files can be dragged and dropped with the main stage area 2. When you select a file/asset it is highlighted in the Preview Window 3. A video file has a film strip graphic border 4. The Timeline is important later on when you start editing the individual assets PAGE 5 Superhighways 2013

6 ADDING AUDIO OVERVIEW Adding sound to a video is what turns your video from a glorified PowerPoint into a digital story. You can use sound to: Set the mood of your story upbeat, jazzy ditties or somber and reflective you decide Tell the story through the eyes of your service users by capturing their words and thoughts Move the story on through a narrative voice-over to pass on key messages DIFFERENT WAYS TO CAPTURE AUDIO As already mentioned in the presentation you can: Capture sound with Dictaphone / smart phones which you can download to PC via cable Or use the online tool Audio boo. This involves downloading the App to your smart phone / tablet, set up an Audio boo account, recording your audio files, which the app will automatically publish {upload} via a wireless network to your online library. Once the Audio is online you can perform basic editing on it. When you are finished right click on the title of your audio and save file to your PC Download royalty free music clips from the net Use WMM to record your narrative directly into the video (You will need a headset with a built in microphone for this and somewhere quiet) TOOLS FOR EDITING AUDIO WMM offers a reasonable editing tool which allows you to control the length of the sound file, whether the sound fades in at the start of the track. It also allows you to split the sound file which is useful if you want to reuse a section somewhere else or remove it from the video by deleting. Alternatively, you can edit your sound file in a separate editing programme. We used the open source application Audacity which can be downloaded free from the internet, for the Year in the Life of Community Connected video. Ease of Use: Medium [ which has a free creative commons licence] PAGE 6 Superhighways 2013

7 INSERT AN AUDIO FILE INTO YOUR MOVIE: 1. Click on the Home Menu Tab 2. Position your cursor before the photo where you want your audio 3. Select Add Music 4. In the Add Music dialogue box, browse to your audio file, if you cannot see it in the My Music Folder 5. Select your sound file and click Open 6. Note if your file is on a USB, WMM will automatically ask if you want to import it to the Sound Library which it uses to keep track of all the sound assets FIGURE 3: INSERTING AN AUDIO FILE FIGURE 4: SCREENSHOT OF RECENTLY ADDED AUDIO FILE TITLE WHY AM I HERE... PAGE 7 Superhighways 2013

8 The audio file shows up as a green bar with its file name on top of the image assets (Video and/or photos). TIP 1: captions are displayed at the bottom of the image assets in pink bar TIP 2: Your sound file is imported in its entirety unless you have squeezed it in between two other audio files. It is then a case of shunting all the other audio files along to create room for them. Try to avoid this at all costs EDIT AN AUDIO FILE IN WMM TO FIT YOUR IMAGES To get the fine grain editing you need for your files you will be using the Narration or Music Tools Options Tab. From these menus you can set a start point; set an end point (same way as demonstrated in Audio Boo) and you can use the Split tool to edit cut your audio into two halves. Splitting gives you the option of deleting the unwanted half or reusing it somewhere else. You can also adjust the volume for your track and determine whether it fades in or out. SIMPLE SOUND EDITING OPTION 1. Edit the image to fit the sound. This is the quickest way to add sound to an image or a piece of video without any sound pre-recorded on it. Import your sound file and then adjust the duration (play length) of your images to match the length of the audio file. The music/sound will only play when there is an image attached to it. So if you track stops mid-way through, you need to select the Project Tab and click on the Fit to music button. Consideration: You will see from the screen shot that you need to select standard or widescreen viewing for this fit to music option. MORE COMPLEX EDITING OPTION 2 Option 2 is where you add your sound file and edit its duration to fit your images. The screen capture (below) is taken from A year in the life of Community Connected and the file we are adding is a recording we made of Janet at St. Peter s church called lunchboo. 1. Insert the audio file - lunchboo 2. Click on the green bar with the title lunchboo to select the file 3. The Music Tools opens at the top of your window, with the format options available to you PAGE 8 Superhighways 2013

9 4. You have the options to set the volume of the entire track at this point by clicking the Music Volume Icon. You can set also set Janet s audio sound to fade in and to fade out. 5. The Set start time function shows you where in the timeline of the video your sound file is going to start playing in this instance it is going to play on seconds into the video. You could alter this to play the entire track x seconds earlier or later in the video 6. Set start point allows you to set the point at which your audio begins to play which means you can mute the first part of the audio in the track 7. Set end point allows you to set the point at which your audio stops playing which means you can mute remaining audio in the track 8. Note both set start point and set end point affect the length of the audio file, which has an impact on any audio and/or images/video that come after it. If you are working by adding your assets chronologically, it is not a problem. It is only an issue if you are tweaking your video as everything else from this point will be out of synch. 9. Split Audio (see screen capture below) enables you to cut your audio into two parts. To do this you need to select the audio track and drag the Timeline to the point where you want to split the audio. You can then click on the split icon which will no longer be greyed out Timeline FIGURE 5: MUSIC TOOLS FORMAT TOOL BAR HIGHLIGHTING THE POSITION OF THE TIMELINE AND SPLIT TOOL PAGE 9 Superhighways 2013

10 EDITING IMAGES AND VIDEO IN WMM OVERVIEW Once you are happy with the order of your visual assets (video and photos), you can next step is to refine how long the assets are displayed for in the video. WMM has a default display of 7 seconds. FIGURE 6: YOU CAN EXTEND THE DISPLAY FROM THE DURATION DROP DOWN MENU HOW TO REFINE THE DISPLAY OF PHOTOS AND VIDEO 1. Select video/image and click on the Video tools tab at the top 2. Using the Edit tab you can extend the length of time you display a photo 3. When you have a video file selected, you can also adjust the volume, control fading in and out and speed of the video PAGE 10 Superhighways 2013

11 To split your video you need to move the Timeline an exact location. Do not use this when your video has a voiceover! FIGURE 7 USING THE VIDEO TOOLS OPTIONS TO EDIT IMAGES AND VIDEO ANIMATIONS AND VISUAL EFFECTS DON T OVERDO IT OVERVIEW There are a range of visual effects and animations you can apply to both video and individual images. But as the title suggests it is very easy to get carried away less is more. VISUAL EFFECTS 1. Select the file you want to change 2. Click the Visual Effects Tab 3. Choose your effect 4. Notice the effect does not affect your original file PAGE 11 Superhighways 2013

12 5. To apply to all visual assets select the apply to all tick FIGURE 8: VISUAL EFFECTS CAN BE APPLIED TO ANY FILE AND DO NOT AFFECT THE SOURCE FILE ONLY THE WAY IT DISPLAYS ABOUT ANIMATIONS Animations have two functions 1. To control how the video moves from one slide to the next TRANSITION 2. To control how each image is viewed on screen - PAN & ZOOM HOW TO APPLY TRANSITIONS 1. To apply a transition between image 1 and image 2, click on image 2 to select it 2. Select the transition from the menu on the left 3. On the screenshot below there are only 9 transitions listed, click the arrow to reveal more 4. The transition between slide 7 and 8 is Contemporary - wide 2 HOW TO APPLY PAN AND ZOOM 1. To apply a pan & zoom on image 3, click on the image to select it 2. Select the pan & zoom style from the menu on the right 3. On the screenshot below there are only 6 styles shown, click the arrow to reveal more 4. Slide 4 has a Pan & Zoom to the right PAGE 12 Superhighways 2013

13 FIGURE 9: SCREEN CAPTURE TO DEMOSNTRATE PAN & ZOOM AND TRANSITION OPTIOSN TITLES, CAPTIONS & CREDITS OVERVIEW Titles and captions provide a valuable anchor point in the visual multimedia fest you have prepared. They give the brain another practical activity aside from processing audio and imagery reading. This gives you the opportunity you structure your theme and highlight the key points of your message. STEP BY STEP TITLES 1. Place your cursor in front of the slide where you want a tile slide to structure the following section. 2. Click the Home Tab and select Title from the Format menu 3. Type your title into the Preview Window. 4. Apply an animation style 5. Set the duration on the slide STEP BY STEP CAPTIONS 1. Select the image or video what you require a caption 2. Click the Home Tab and select Title from the Format menu 3. Type your text into the Preview Window. PAGE 13 Superhighways 2013

14 4. Apply a pan and zoom style 5. Set the duration on the slide STEP BY STEP CREDITS The final slide of the video gives you the opportunity to thank everyone who contributed to your project. This is a great opportunity to thank your funders. The step by step is similar to Captioning a slide. You have a special set of animation styles to choose from Our video A Year in the life of Community Connected uses PowerPoint slides, converted to images for its Title and Caption Slides. DON T FORGET TO SAVE! As you go along keep saving your movie as a Movie Maker Projects file. Save the final version as a movie - the Recommended for this project option. This is likely to take some time and you may need to go back and make some final edits. You might also want to save a number of versions (always keep the MMP file in case) e.g. different lengths and files sizes. You can also share directly with social media & other apps / tools if you have a Windows Live ID. PAGE 14 Superhighways 2013