Digital Video Project Guidelines - Digital Media B

Please use Windows Movie Maker 2 to create an informational video pertaining to your life as a student at Price College of Business. View sample video.

Final length of this video should be between 30 - 60 seconds. If you want to create a longer video, please get approval from the instructor first.

Please display a title on a black background at the beginning of your video. The wording of the title is your choosing.

Please import at least two video clips into your project, as we did in our class tutorial.

You may record your own original video footage. If you need a video camera and tripod, you may check them out from the Business Communication Center (2-hour limit please).

If you would like to use clips from movies, TV shows or commercials stored on DVD or VHS videotapes, the Business Communication Center's lab assistants will show you how to capture and digitize video from those tapes.

You may use two different scenes from the same movie, TV show or commercial. But you may not use two consecutive scenes.

Use video clips that are at least 320 pixels x 240 pixels.

Avoid pixelation (do not import smaller clips into your project).

Avoid distorting clip aspect ratios (import clips larger than 320 x 240 only if they are exact multiples of 320 x 240).

You may use clips downloaded from the Internet if they are at least 320 pixels wide.

Possible sources for additional movie clips and trailers (advertisements) include:

Classfiles\Classfiles NP\BCC Media Files\Videos

Atom Films

Google's list of movie sites

Whenever you are given a choice of formats to view, choose:

Quicktime (.MOV)
Video for Windows (.AVI)
Windows Media (.WMV)
or MPEG (.MPG)

because movie clips with these formats get temporarily stored in the

C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Local Settings \Temporary Internet Files

folder and you can copy them to your My Documents folder from there.

Once saved to the hard drive, .AVI and MPEG movies can be imported directly into Movie Maker. QuickTime files (.MOV) must be converted to .AVI before they can be imported into Movie Maker. Go to the Business Communication Center for help converting QuickTime files to .AVI format.

Windows Media videos (.WMV) also can be imported directly into Movie Maker. The best way to save them from the Internet to your disk is to right-click the link to them in your browser and select SAVE TARGET AS.

Real Player videos (.RM) generally don't get saved on your hard drive and therefore can't be used in your projects.

Please mix your own voice narration with music or with the soundtrack of your clips for at least 5 seconds of your project. Be sure to synchronize your narration with what is being displayed on the screen. Normalize all sound clips to -3 db prior to importing them into your project. Avoid distortion and microphone puff effects. Adjust the levels on the AUDIO and AUDIO/MUSIC tracks so that your narration can be heard over any music or dialog that plays in the background. Never make the listener strain to understand your narration.

Configure your video to fade out at the end.

After your video fades out, please display rolling credits with your name, the course name & number, and the date, as we did in our class tutorial. You may display these credits over a still photo of yourself, a video clip of yourself, or over a colored background. These credits must scroll slowly enough to be easily read by the viewer.

Please submit the following files on ONE disk:

1.	Your Movie Maker project file saved with the filename "MyVideo" and the appropriate file extension. Please include all source files. I must be able to open your project and view your work with no error messages and without having to search for your source files.
2.	Windows Media Video file using the settings profile for Video for Pocket PC (Full screen 218 Kbps). The filename should be "MyVideo" plus the bit rate, width, and frames per second, followed by the appropriate file extension. Example: MyVideo_218Kbps_208_20fps.wmv
3.	Windows Media Video file using the settings profile for Video For Broadband (150 Kbps). The filename should be "MyVideo" plus the bit rate, width, and frames per second, followed by the appropriate file extension.
4.	Windows Media Video file using the settings profile for Video For Broadband (512 Kbps). The filename should be "MyVideo" plus the bit rate, width, and frames per second, followed by the appropriate file extension.
5.	Windows Media Video file using the settings profile for High Quality Video (Small). The filename should be "MyVideo" plus the bit rate, width, and frames per second, followed by the appropriate file extension. In this file's fileneme, indicate bit rate via the industry-standard abbreviation, as we discussed in class.

Please submit your files on one disk. If you have other files stored on that disk, then please place your Digital Video project files into a folder named Digital Video Project.

Do not delete your Photoshop, SoundForge or PowerPoint projects to free up disk space. You will need them for your FrontPage project.