I just finished creating my sixth elementary school art lesson video. My first video was 21 minutes long. It's filled with great information about Dr. Seuss, but it took a long time to create. I'm finding that a seven-minute(ish) art lesson video is the sweet spot. It's just enough information to keep kids engaged while still getting the most important content to them. It's also faster for me to produce as I work full-time and I'm in graduate school, plus family, etc.
Over the past year, I've been experimenting; looking for video production best practices. In the last video, "Growing Veggies," I recorded audio files and timed PowerPoint slides in Camtasia to match. I videoed myself doing an introduction, a few stopping points, and a close, and wove those into the video.
My most recent art video, "Reflection," (click on the picture below) was shot entirely with my iPhone. I timed the slides to the video and honestly feel like the production time was much faster. The file size is larger in the end, but YouTube doesn't seem to mind. Don't mind my hair in the video, I have a horrible cat scratch on my forehead that I'm doing my best to keep covered, although it drove me crazy when my bangs were in my eyes.
Something else I've begun to explore when designing learning experiences, and producing art learning videos is cognitive load, but that's for another blog entry.
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