iStruggle and iLearn iMovie

Buckling down and getting your hands dirty is really the only way to learn.  I have always wanted to learn iMovie because it's a tool on iPad that can be used with students easily.  But only easy if you know how to use it!  This is one reason I really wanted to incorporate iMovie into my capstone video.

So I did!  The funny thing is that I had reached a comfort level with Adobe Spark Video that made me want to keep a death grip on it.  Once I started playing with iMovie, I realized that I had so much more control over my video, that I decided to ditch Adobe altogether.

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​Here are a few perks of iMovie that helped me make that decision:

• I was sick of the song selections on Adobe!  I know that's a lame first reason, but there you go.
• With iMovie, you can record as long as you want, and include as many images that you want for the duration of the recording.   You can even set an image to appear at the exact moment you talk about it on your recording.
• You can use several transition effects from image to image.
• You can use sound effects!  I had a really cute section that included a school bell, but I had to cut it for the sake of time.  Curse you ninety second limit!
• You can control exactly how long an image appears by dragging on it's box and watching the seconds adjust as you do it.

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Those are just a few reasons I like iMovie.  Here are a few things I struggled with as I taught myself how to use it:

• There's a lot of movement in images that you have to keep control of.  There's this thing called the "Ken Burns Effect."  It causes the images to scroll on the screen from point to point.  You can't use it too much, or it's just overwhelming movement. Plus, if you're using transitions, it can get to be too much.
• The photos and images appear super zoomed in when you import them.  I decided to use the "Pic EDU" app (collages) to control this.  I imported an image into Pic EDU and made it smaller, and then imported that into iMovie.  This meant I had to do TONS of downloading of screenshots and images.  Kind of tedious, but worth the control.
• Since I recorded much longer pieces of script, if I made a mistake, I'd have to start all over. (However, recording longer pieces of script ended up saving me time overall, though)

​Now that I'm nearly done, I only have to do the Stop Motion section I've planned, and voila!  I did the majority of my video yesterday and today, because once I got into it, I couldn't stop!  One last thing I want to say, is that I'm really grateful to NVUSD for the opportunity to receive 5 iPads for my classroom this summer!  I attended a training at the beginning of the month where I learned about these great apps that were paid for and installed on our iPads that made this all so much easier: iMovie, Pic EDU, Felt Board, and Stop Motion!