Video killed the podcast star

So, podcasting was fun. The GarageBand software was easy to use, and the plethora of free sound effects would allow anyone to make a pretty professional-sounding podcast with very little practice. Video required a bit more skill and, since my group was using software on my Mac instead of the PC-based software, it also required a lot of Googling to answer questions. But answers were easily found, and, again, the software made it easy to add effects, transition, title slides, etc., that resulted in a well-edited end result. Of course, that was just the practice public service announcement (we got permission to be a little bit irreverent in our promotion of the ITS graduate program at George Mason University.)

The creation of our advocacy wiki PSA went well, to a point. One of my group members had a great idea that was pretty easy to put into a script and a "treatment." We uploaded our video, changed out some sounds, learned how to put certain audio over other. When we wanted to do a picture-in-picture effect, I found instructions on doing it online, and another group member created the "thought bubble" images. The thought bubbles went in easily, and then it all fell apart. The still images were making the video freeze, and then the iMovie program crash. When I reached the point I was ready to throw the computer out the window, we called it quits for the night, and I promised my group I would figure it out and put the finishing touches on the video.

Which brings us to today. Specifically, about four-and-a-half hours ago. After lots of online research, lots of failed attempts, then basically recreating the whole 30-second movie, I got it all to work (though not exactly the way we wanted) and to export into a .mov file. You can see the source of my frustration here:

I think there is great potential for using video in the classroom. It's fun. It gives students exposure to media literacy concepts like camera angle, sound, etc., and another form of literacy to practice encoding and decoding. But it also has its drawbacks, like technical errors. It just reinforces the idea that teachers MUST be prepared for just about everything, and must know the programs they're using inside and out. And, though we had the opportunity to practice with the tool a week earlier, still learning the tool while completing the final objective is a bit too much of a challenge for my students.  If I'm going to use this tool with my students, I need a great deal more practice and lots of backup plans for overcoming roadblocks that may get thrown in our paths.