Digital Storytelling In-Class Support for PJHC 470

Ahead of the Spring 2025 semester, Dr. Kerry Ward reached out to the DMC inquiring about collaborating on the capstone course for the Poverty, Justice, and Human Capabilities minor, PJHC 470: PJHC & Digital Storytelling. The objective of the class was to create an effective digital storytelling project based on their own internship experiences as part of the minor, which necessitated guidance on every aspect of the process: ideation, script writing, recording and filming, and editing. Based on the level of involvement expected, it was decided that Ian Mellor-Crummey, DMC Supervisor, would co-teach the course, offering 4 in-class sessions spread out across the semester.

The first in-class session, during week 2, functioned as an introduction to digital storytelling and demonstrated examples of effective practices. The second session, during week 6, focused on the technical aspect of equipment use for recording, covering the equipment and studio resources available to them through the DMC and how best to use them for their projects. The third session, during week 11, covered video editing using DaVinci Resolve. The final session, during week 13, functioned as an open workshop time for students to work on their projects and ask any lingering questions as they polished them for presentation the following week.

The resulting projects were an impressive collection of short documentaries and one GIS project, synthesizing their own experiences from working through the Poverty, Justice, and Human Capabilities minor with the principles and techniques of effective digital storytelling laid out over the course of the class.

FOTO 205/210 Use of the Photography/Video Studio

Images courtesy of Zeisha Bennett

Photography Lecturer Angela Chen brought her FOTO 205 and FOTO 210 classes to the DMC for a demonstration on use of the lights and backdrops in the Photography/Video Studio. The new seamless paper backdrops and high output lights give a lot of flexibility and allow for creativity in lighting schemes, which a number of the students made use of for their projects.

Photo/Video Studio as a Resource for Department Headshots

Student being photographed in a lighting studio

Student portrait with a blue background

As of Summer 2022, the DMC’s Photo/Video Studio has undergone a drastic transformation. We have acquired 6 high output LED lights with large soft boxes and white, black, and dark blue seamless paper backdrops which make the studio ideal for professional quality headshots. Using a simple 3 point lighting setup, the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department took headshots for the incoming graduate students for their department website. The studio can be reserved up to one month in advance just as you would a piece of DMC equipment using the self-booking feature in Primo. Photo/Video Studio Reservation Page

If you have any questions about how to use the equipment in the studio, ask DMC staff or refer to our Photo/Video Studio written guides

BIOS 201 Podcasting Project

In lieu of a traditional final, BIOS 201 students now have the option of recording a podcast as a small group project discussing some recent advance in stem cell, organoid or genome editing research focusing on a few of a curated list of original research papers in the field. As BIOS 201 is a very large class, the equipment demand is sizable. As such, the DMC assisted the class with equipment rentals, providing a list of recommended podcasting equipment and how to set up the different styles of microphones to record. As the DMC has limited copies of audio recorders or specific mics, in all likelihood there will be some variance in which each student group uses to record their podcast. The DMC Audio Studio was also proposed as an option for those interested. As for editing the podcasts, the class was directed to the DMC’s written guides and recorded short courses on Garageband and Audacity.

SOCI 389: Race, Gender, and Class on Film

SOCI 389 seeks to investigate the representation of race, gender, and class in film, how it may change over time, and what the cultural and sociological implications of that representation are. The class focuses on critical analysis of representation in cinematic media and the interplay of it with prevailing public perception of specific groups. The culmination of this course is a group project consisting of a roughly 12 minute short video focused on analysis of representation of a particular group in film. In support of this final project, the DMC provided an in-class session on editing video in Adobe Premiere Pro.

MUSI 762: Artist Diploma Seminar

MUSI 762 is a class aimed at introducing a wide range of practical techniques and knowledge for the working musician in the modern age. As part of this, the DMC offered a two part crash course in various essential aspects of digital media literacy for the practicing musician. The students learned how to create a WordPress website, create a basic promotional flyer in Powerpoint, basic video and audio editing techniques with Adobe Premiere, and the basics of portrait photography. DMC staff demonstrated these various techniques primarily via in-class sessions (in this case, via Zoom), with an optional out of class in-person (socially distanced) session for demonstrating portrait photography, in which DMC staff took headshots for those who participated. Additionally, students checked out video cameras and audio recorders from the DMC to self-record their performances.

HIST 238: The Body in Global Histories of Medicine

HIST 238 introduces how people in different parts of the world have understood why we get sick and how we get better. As part of students’ exploration of different frameworks for dealing with disease and the body, they are asked to conduct original research and produce a podcast to effectively communicate their findings in an engaging way. To that end, the class made use of our in-class workshops to learn audio editing techniques with Audacity and Garageband, which they were then able to employ in our audio studio to record their final projects. Additionally, they made use of our digital lab’s scanning resources to scan tracings they made of various medical images from cultures around the world, which they then were able to print at large scale using the DMC’s high resolution inkjet plotter.

The class website with the completed projects can be viewed here.

 

 

ENG 308: Introduction to Radio Storytelling

ENG 308 leads students through an introduction to the ever-expanding medium of podcasting, specifically radio storytelling. In the process of exploring the various techniques and trends in a wide variety of audio media, students are expected to develop both an understanding of and proficiency with the basics of audio media creation. In support of this goal, the DMC provided in-class tutorials to learn audio editing techniques with Garageband and Audacity, as well as proper use of the Zoom H4N audio recorders that they rented from the DMC for their projects. Additionally, some students used the DMC’s audio studio for their projects to record high-quality narration. With the aid of these tutorials and the borrowed resources, students created podcasts, developing a storytelling style and identity of their own in the process.

The class website with the final projects can be viewed here.