Preamble+Video+Assignment

The Preamble We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity,

do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

The Assignment You, in a team, will produce a video that presents the preamble to your audience in a unique and creative way. This requires that you plan, communicate, and collaborate as a group in order to record and edit according to the team goal for this produced video. As you brainstorm, consider viewing Vines and YouTube videos to gather creative ideas - but be realistic with your level of video production abilities.

Considerations Be mindful of what it means to do quality work. Video clips that are quality have both good audio and good video. Do you know what it takes to record a clip that is quality? Re-record clips that do not meet the standards of quality.

Also, be mindful of the devices used and the owners of these devices. Sometimes, because smartphones are all around, we forget that these are actually powerful and expensive pieces of equipment. Handle them with care and show others how much you respect them by how you care for their possessions.

Lastly, have fun with this assignment. Make something you can be proud of and that you want as a lasting memory of the time spent.

Rules //**First**// and most obviously, your video must appropriately achieve the goal of the assignment (present the Preamble to your audience in a unique and creative way). //**Second**//, your video must include all 52 words of the Preamble in some way.

=Production Process = 1. Write a Screenplay While everything starts with an idea or concept, the process begins with the screenplay. This is a fancy and technical way that your idea can be visualized and understood by everyone involved in the process with you. Without a screenplay, ideas are ideas, and nothing coherent can be captured on camera, much less put into a story. Below is the video I showed in class that includes the five basic elements of a screenplay:
 * 1) Slugline (where and when)
 * 2) Action (What is going on and always written in present tense)
 * 3) Character Name (Capitals)
 * 4) Dialogue (keep this centered on the page)
 * 5) Parentheticals (actions during speaking)

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2. Create a Storyboard The storyboard follows the screenplay in the process and it is more visual in nature. As we consider using a camera to produce our screenplay, we must take into consideration the frame of the camera. What is going in in each shot? What exactly is the camera seeing? How do we make sure all people involved in the shot (cameraman and talent) know exactly what is expected. For more on storyboarding view Storyboarding 101 as well as the video below.

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3. Shoot When I first started teaching, the only way a project like this could be done was by checking out a video camera from the library; yes, one camera for the whole school. Sometimes, a group of students would have a parent who allowed them to borrow the family camera. Now, almost all of you have a camera that is 10X the quality that we used back then with editing abilities built into the OS. Moreover, these devices can send video directly to a cloud-based service like YouTube for sharing or to edit. iPhones and Android based smartphones, as well as iPods and iPads all have a great camera. Use it carefully and respectfully.

Record your clips according to your storyboard. The storyboard you created is your guide to exactly what shots accomplish your screenplay. The only rule with shooting video is to NEVER DEVIATE FROM YOUR PLAN. If you have a moment of creative clarity while shooting, save it for the next project. Changes in the plan in this phase lead to problems and extra headaches when editing. Why do you think professional film crews use this process? Do you think you're somehow above George Lucas or Stephen Spielberg? Didn't think so...

Here's a hint or suggestion between shooting and editing: You know those clapperboards that you see sometimes? Those are for the editors later who need to make sense of the film they have. The information on that board tells them exactly what that clip is. You can emulate this by recording a two second shot of the storyboard frame you are shooting at the beginning of your clip that can be trimmed off later. That way when you edit, your clips are easily identified.

4. Edit The following information is based on some assumptions. First, it assumes that not all members of a group are involved in the video editing process - really at most only one person can actively edit video. Second, it also assumes whoever takes the responsibility to edit has access to YouTube outside school (as YouTube is presently inaccessible). No other video service compares to YouTube.

Once you've recorded all your clips, it is time to edit them to bring them all together according to your screenplay and storyboard. There are a number of ways to do this based on what you used to record your video:
 * If you desire to edit directly on your device:
 * If you recorded video on an Android (Samsung or LG) device, the Google Play store has a number of free video editors: play.google.com/store
 * If you recorded on an iOS device (iPad, iPod, or iPhone), you can combine clips and edit them into a project using the iMovie app, which can be installed from the app store.
 * If you want to edit on a computer:
 * First, you must know how to access the video files on your device and load them onto your computer
 * Once you've done that, you can use tools such as YouTube's video editor (more on this below), or iMovie on a Mac. Newer PCs do not have a native (built-in) video editor. However, if you have a PC that has Windows 7 or earlier, then you can use MovieMaker to edit video.

Using Windows MovieMaker is the most readily available editor for most users. It is often pre-installed on most PCs (but can be downloaded for free if not). It is also quite user friendly. View the video below created by Vimeo Video School to get an overview of how to use it. It is #1 in a series of 10 videos on using MovieMaker. media type="custom" key="28235615"

Below is a video of how to edit using iMovie on iOS devices.

What are other members of the team doing during this process? One will write the video description for their video page. This will appear below the video in YouTube. It must include:
 * 1) First names of all involved (ONLY first names)
 * 2) A two paragraph explanation about the video and the process used to create it
 * 3) A paragraph explaining what was learned by the process
 * 4) Links to any resources used that were not created by you (images/audio)

6. Upload and Share Once your finished product is complete, you have two options for submitting it to me. 1. You can upload it to your own YouTube channel using a Google account of your own and then email me with the link to your video (preferred) 2. You can give the exported video to me on a flash drive and I will upload it to the classroom YouTube channel (Mr. Bruce's History)

Upload to YouTube: http://goo.gl/fONl5S

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