Tools for developing mutlmedia applications: audio, video and images

I was wondering if anyone has really good sites for students to use for an audio program, a video program and an image program in developing lessons in a class or for a digital story.
Thanks!

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Permalink Reply by Elona Hartjes on July 24, 2008 at 8:10pm

I use http://animoto.com/ for slides and audio and http://www.slideshare.net/ for changing my ppt into video. There are how to videos on line for these programs as well. I've found this site helpful http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/ Larry lists his best choices. Hope this helps.

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Permalink Reply by Gary Blair on July 24, 2008 at 8:22pm

Thanks for the information.
I truly appreciate it and will look at it now.

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Permalink Reply by Elona Hartjes on July 24, 2008 at 8:26pm

Larry's site is really super. You can subscribe to it by email to stay up on the latest new technology. He will also answer email questions. I love it.

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Permalink Reply by Anne Mirtschin on July 25, 2008 at 3:41pm

We use MS Photostory for the quickest way to get our digital stories completed. It is a free download if you have the MS Office suite. Also use MS Powerpoint and convert to slideshare for online use or embedding in blogs. For more sophisticated outcomes, we use MS Moviemaker, or Sony Vegas Movie Studio and convert them all to mpg and email version if it is for online use.
For audio, you cant beat audacity for the fact that is is free, but we also use Sony Acid and it has more advanced features, sound loops and is easier to use.
For images, we manipulate them with irfanview as it is a free download as well. Students have fun with www.befunky.com to cartoonize photos etc.

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Permalink Reply by Gary Blair on July 26, 2008 at 4:10am

Thanks so much for the information.
I am going to check these sites out.
I have used photostory and audacity and am looking forward to investigating befunky.
thanks,
Gary

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Permalink Reply by Gary Blair on July 28, 2008 at 3:12am

thanks, Anne!
The befunky site is really fun!

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Permalink Reply by Karen Fasimpaur on July 26, 2008 at 7:45am

For audio, Audacity is great (free, open source, cross-platform and full-featured). For video, Windows Movie Makers is a good free program (similar to Photostory but does more; I like Photostory for very young elementary kids and WMM for everyone else).

For digital story telling, you might also look at VoiceThread.

Have fun!

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Permalink Reply by Ann E Darling on July 27, 2008 at 1:50pm

I have used movie maker, audacity, and Photostory 3 all are good. A few issues might be
what kind of images you will be working with. Microsoft likes jpeg, mpeg and .avi files so if your cameras use those file extensions(for video clips) you are good to go. We did have a problem with Kodak and JVC cameras in that they used the newer .mov format and this is an added step you will have to look out for if you don't have access to imove(apple) or quicktime pro. We had to convert our .mov files to something microsoft liked and it was doable but you'll get to do it! If you are just adding still images jpegs are fine.

A really good set of tutorials on movie maker and photostory 3 can be found at http://www.papajohn.org/Newsletters/162-PS3-Basics.html

These programs are all housed on your machines another neat way to do digital storytelling is on VoiceThread. It is very easy to use, students can access files at school or at home. Here is a link
http://voicethread.com/

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Permalink Reply by Gary Blair on July 28, 2008 at 3:11am

Ann:
Thanks for the information. I have seen audacity and really like it as well as voicethread.
I will be looking into Photostory.
Thanks for taking your time to reply.
Gary