Mike Simpson » Multimedia

The Power of Online Video and Presentations – Chris Anderson from TED Talks creates a Prezi

Mike — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 17:09:01 +0000

Prezi is a cloud-based presentation software that opens up a new world between whiteboards and slides. The zoomable canvas makes it fun to explore ideas…

TED is a cutting-edge conference featuring “ideas worth spreading”

It goes without saying that people want to be entertained, and video may be the ultimate entertainment. The use of video in marketing, and education is also becoming more prevalent. In my workshop, a student recently declared that most of her listening exercises were conducted with video. I feel mostly the same way, and maybe that has to do with the fact that we often source our media from the Internet. The Internet, with its steady increase in content and bandwidth is an ideal platform for video.

When I conduct my “CALL workshop” – on Educational Technology – I have found that if I ask for “interesting sites” that I get a few predictable responses. In no means do I mean “predictable” as “dull.” But the two sites that are recurring with some frequency as possible teacher/student tools are TED Talks and Prezi. They are both very worthy of your time.

Presentation has come to mean two things: one a series of text and images, presented using tech like PowerPoint, and two, the actual process and art of giving a talk, with the slideshow of images and information playing a major role. the conventional knock against PowerPoint is that it is dull. In my opinion, it is not the technology at fault, but the skills and imagination of those who create them (to be simple we see too many bullets, too much text).

I happened upon some links I can share that bring it all together, and show the synergy between presentations and online video. First off TED Talks which is an amazing wealth of ideas and eloquent people speaking – and a worthy mention as great resource online. And the second, Prezi, has crept up in frequency and my be on the cusp of great things. It just so happens that I found a “talk” and a “Prezi” by TED head Chris Anderson, and it’s a cool reference from Prezi’s own blog to share with you.

Chris Anderson, not to be confused with Wired editor of the same name, is both the TED head, and one of a number of respected presenters who has shared a presentation using a web-based tool. Slideshare is a well known site, and experts such as Garr Reynolds, author of the amazing book “Presentation Zen,” has posted numerous presentations there (Check Presentation Design 411, which starts to really break the fundamentals down around slide 11). You can view Chris Anderson’s Prezi to see some of the format’s potential to be engaging and truly interactive. Watching his Prezi presentation I was reminded of the power of motion graphics tools like Adobe’s After Effects – it’s truly a visually dynamic format – the “camera” perspective pulls away, rotates and zooms in on featured content areas (which would represent slides in a tradtional Powerpoint format). Chris samples some “baby break-dancing” videos and other eclectic international footage to complement the message he has to share, which is that Internet video is changing the way we communicate in an increasingly globalized world.

If you are keen to create a whole new kind of animated Powerpoint, with highly visual transitions and different kinds of embedded media, you should check out Prezi, and Chris Anderson’s Prezi is indeed a true inspiration (see first link below).

Links:

There’s only one link you need that connects you with both Chris Anderson’s Prezi presentation and one of his TED talks:
http://blog.prezi.com/2010/09/16/watch-ted-head-chris-andersons-prezi/

Prezi – “Create game-changingpresentations online.”
http://prezi.com/

A blog article on the features of Prezi – “Finding an alternative to PPT”

http://www.k-international.com/blog/finding-an-alternative-to-powerpoint/

Presentation guru Garr Reynolds wrote about this same topic here
Garr Reynolds’ blog entry on Chris Anderson’s Ted Talk and Prezi

Alternative Online Presentation Tool – Slideshare -” Offers users the ability to upload and share publicly or privately PowerPoint presentations, Word documents and Adobe PDF Portfolios”
http://www.slideshare.net/

Alternative Online Presentation Tool - Google Docs (also create text docs, spreadsheets and more)
https://docs.google.com

Do we get the General Idea? Art Exhibit arrives at AGO

Mike — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 13:38:26 +0000

There is a quite a buzz surrounding the arrival of a large exhibition of work by General Idea at the Art Gallery of Ontario. GI were a Toronto-based art collective, founded in 1969 and comprised of: AA Bronson, Felix Partz and Jorge Zontal. They were renowned for their irreverance and satirical wit – playful yet antagonistic in their sometimes harsh critiques of beauty, sexuality, the art establishment and the media.

The exhibit occupies most ofthe top two floors in the general collection, which means there is no additional charge. We arrived on a rainy Wednesday evening at 6 o’clock – coincidentally the night that the gallery is free for a couple hours, and made our way straight to floor 5, with the plan to work our way down to 4. We bypassed the classics on floor 1 and headed straight to the elevator. The scale of the work exhibited is impressive. It basically occupies two entire floors (there are only 5 in the general gallery) and features impressively large works (some of which though may fatigue the eyes with their incredible saturated color schemes).

The work itself is interesting but grows a tad tiresome – there are a handful of major works involved, motifs, that are worked again and again. The AIDS logo, if we can call it that, is a fabulous reworking of the classic LOVE sculpture created by Robert Indiana. It appears in various guises, and is an incredible example of the modern art of sampling, recycling and reworking earlier design for a modern purpose. When displayed across a 5 metre by 10 metre wall though, the motif loses something and truthfully is a little disorienting and painful to look at (there is actually a physically uncomfortable component that both me and my companion noticed – was that part of the intent? I’ll guess the answer is no and that the curators are simply milking the themes for all they are worth).

I was very intrigued by “Miss General Idea” – a paraody beauty contest that was a major early work. It is genius – they created this contest, publicized it and playfully attacked the institution of the beauty contest. It’s too bad the displays consist mostly of blown-up images from their pamphlets, or a few simple props (though the props are sometimes outstanding – the venetian blind dress comes to mind!).

There are motifs that entertain and bring true giggles – the Poodles orgy images are omnipresent but beautifully designed (and the babies illustration is wickedly brilliant!). The Poodles are a welcome image that recurs throughout the exhibit and somehow have true staying power never losing steam and are ingrained in my mind.

General Idea is arguably, one of the most important artistic groups to have been generated in Toronto, and , not being an art expert, I won’t judge their significance in that way. I will give them a nod and say that I greatly admire their pioneering DIY spirit, the verve with which they threw themselves into areas like publishing (FILE magazine), and their masterly manipulations of the establishment (“Miss General Idea”) and the art industry. A great sense of humour is readily apparent, though truthfully many pieces have a dark, serious quality. The aesthetic is very punk – which is always good. Even if you don’t “get it” necessarily, you will feel the visceral quality and never ever be bored. That said, I have been lucky enough to visit a few exhibits in the last year, including “Rear View Mirror” at Power Plant, Tim Burton at TIFF, and Marian Bantjes at OCAD, and I can definitely say there is room for improvement in the layout and presentation of the General Idea group’s art.

This exhibit relies too much on the AIDS imagery, tries to blow things up to a scale which doesn’t necessarily serve the message in the medium, and unfortunately lacks proper vehicles for two important elements. The first is a proper history of the group, something to give the average gallery-goer some context, and secondly, a proper venue for the multimedia aspect. Power Plant had small mini rooms that are dark and allowed one to sit and immerse onself in a movie for a few minutes. The AGO has monitors with either shabby speakers or headphones – which is not even close to good enough. Is the multimedia worth displaying? Then put it in a dedicated room!

General Idea were a compelling group of artists with some amazing ideas. This exhibit is probably your best opportunity to engage with those ideas. I just recommend going on Wednesday when it’s rainy and there is no line-up for the AGO’s free-admission night.

“Haute Culture – General Idea” runs from July 30, 2011 to January 1, 2012 at the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto.

Links:

Toronto Star article – provides an introduction and overview
http://www.thestar.com/article/1032194–general-idea-haute-culture-at-the-ago

Art Gallery of Ontario website

http://www.ago.net/haute-culture-general-idea

Cinemagraphs – Magic animated GIFs bridge photography and film

Mike — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 20:37:13 +0000

Cinemagraph by Jamie Beck and Kevin Burg - http://cinemagraphs.com

I found an absolutely stunning bit of photography and animation on the web today. I went to google and searched for “sophisticated GIF” and found some work that blew me away. Each shot is like a time capsule, a magical micro-moment – and they’re animated GIFS!

There’s a good chance you associate the concept of an animated GIF with something like a garish early nineties website along the lines of a Geocities homepage. Remember Borat? His original tongue in cheek website is no longer online but has been preserved by the good folks at the Internet Archive, and you should read my post on his insane animated GIF strewn website here: http://iam.strongandfree.ca/blog/the-internet-is-forever-wayback-machine-retrieves-borat

Above you’ll see an example of this amazing visual art. It’s like a throwback to the original days of cinema, when even the most primitive frames could spark delight and capture the imagination. Mind you, the duo of Jamie Beck and Kevin Burg are operating in modern NYC and their spin on the “cinemagraph” is very sophisticated in its execution. I going to encourage you to check out two websites for dozens of examples of the incredible imagery, before I ask you to analyze the image at the top of this post (you’ll see some teensy tiny flaws in the crosswalk area at right).

So be sure to spend a few minutes at the main page, and the blog by Jamie Beck (each site has different content)

Cinemagraph site: http://cinemagraphs.com/

Blog by Jamie: http://fromme-toyou.tumblr.com/tagged/cinemagraph

50th Anniversary of Yuri Gagarin’s Historic First Orbit in Space

Mike — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 15:30:06 +0000

10 Ruble Russian Coin featuring cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin (Photo by Mike)

Today is “Day of the Soviet Space Program (Cosmonautics)” for Russians – a day to remember the cosmonaut and national hero Yuri Gagarin, who on April 12, fifty years ago, was blasted into orbit from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

His famous quote, and a good one to say when you are toasting your Russian friends over some vodkas is “Поехали!” (Paya hellei – Let’s go!).

I would encourage you to check out some video and articles that explore the first orbit by Gagarin and the Soviet/Russian space program – some recommendations follow.

Watch:

“First Orbit” real-time video recreation (uses HD international space station footage and original audio)

http://youtu.be/RKs6ikmrLgg

Read:

Article on Star City (Soviet / Russian Space Program Headquarters) at Russia! Magazine. First link is to web site, second is to actual magazine spreads using the Issue viewer (worthwhile to see some Laika – the space dog – cartoons).

http://readrussia.com/magazine/winter-2008/00044/
http://issuu.com/russiamagazine/docs/russia__magazine

Article on Star City at Wired Magazine

http://www.wired.com/techbiz/people/magazine/16-09/ff_starcity

“Waterlife” Documentary – Free Screening at NFB on June 1st

Mike — Tue, 25 May 2010 15:09:23 +0000

This movie looks like a “must see.” The director, Kevin McMahon has directed some amazing documentaries, including one of my favorites, “McLuhan’s Wake” – a doc on the Canadian media communications theorist Marshall McLuhan.

Green Screens presents WATERLIFE

Directed by Kevin McMahon, 2009, 109 minutes.

Tuesday June 1 at 7pm

FREE

NFB Cinema – 150 John St (at Richmond St W), Toronto

Waterlife follows the epic cascade of the Great Lakes from Lake Superior to the Atlantic Ocean, telling the story of the last huge supply of fresh water on Earth. Filled with fascinating characters and stunning imagery, Waterlife is a cinematic poem about the beauty of water and the dangers of taking it for granted.

The screening will be followed by a panel discussion with Tony Maas, Director of the Freshwater Program at WWF-Canada; Dr. Romila Verma, CIELAP Research Associate, Watershed Management and Climate Change; and Hilary Van Welter, Director of Social Innovation, Windfall Ecology Centre.

Green Screens partners films from the NFB with experts and panellists selected by the Canadian Institute for Environmental Law and Policy. If you are interested in the environment, Green Screens will entertain and inform you.

For more information, please call 416-973-3012 or visit:

http://www.NFB.ca/mediatheque

http://www.onf-nfb.gc.ca/eng/mediatheque/?lg=eng

Mediatheque and NFB – Great Toronto Film and Documentary Resource!

Mike — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 19:36:26 +0000

Located at John and Richmond St. in downtown Toronto, the National Film Board’s Mediatheque centre is an inspiring place. You can check out all kinds of short films, animations and documentaries. Once I took a group of students there for a field trip. The presenter was amazing – it was one of my favorite all-time field trips. The staff are always friendly and helpful.

One of the main reasons to go to the NFB Mediatheque site is to check out the viewing stations. I have taken my students there just for that purpose on a number of occasions. Recently I watched an animated short, “The Necktie,” that’s also available online. In fact, the NFB are digitizing most of their catalogue and making it available via their website. Another favorite is called “Film Club,” by Cyrus Sundar Singh. It’s about a 20-year reunion of former childhood friends who were immigrants and in grade 8 banded together in an after-school film club. So far this title is NOT online – so get thee down to the Mediatheque and watch it!

Check out:

Mediatheque
http://www.onf-nfb.gc.ca/eng/mediatheque/

The Necktie – animated short – 12 mins.
http://www.nfb.ca/film/necktie/

Flemingdon Park – Global Village – documentary – 47 mins
http://www.nfb.ca/film/flemingdon_park_the_global_village

“Across Cultures” – NFB clips from 60 different films!
http://www3.nfb.ca/acrosscultures/toutvoir.php?print

Mediatheque
150 John Street
Toronto, Ontario, M5V 3C3
416-973-3012

Book Review – Presentation Zen

Mike — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 16:41:39 +0000

4 famous books on Presentations

I have just finished a book review on Garr Reynold’s inspirational Presentation Zen. I summarize a few of the key ideas in the book and offer some links to online presentations at Slideshare and Ted Talks.

Presentations have fascinated me for the last year, coinciding with my early video experiments, one of the first of which was a video resume based on a PowerPoint presentation I uploaded to LinkedIn. Presentations, when combined with an interesting speaker and interesting topic, are a great learning experience. Too often though, we associate presentations with some dull training or business information session. It shouldn’t have to be this way.

In the world of education, the concept of “digital storytelling” has been a buzz concept for the last few years. More than ever, regular people have access to tools for telling their stories and sharing their ideas digitally. One of the problems with this of course, is the great output of mediocre or uninspiring video and other multimedia. I think a crash course is necessary, to teach a few design basics to anyone thinking about putting together a presentation or video.

In my expansive book review of Presentation Zen you’ll find some design principles I followed when creating presentations and a number of examples I borrowed from Reynold’s book. These days with tools like Photoshop Elements (a light version) being affordable and accessible, there is really no excuse for anyone to churn out a template-based “presentation by numbers” production. Interesting photos can be found at stock photo sites or through creative commons licensing. A world of resources is available to give your presentations some graphical pizazz.

Read the review of Presentation Zen and check out some links to amazing presentations
http://iam.strongandfree.ca/book-reviews/presentation-zen

Celebrating 50 Posts! And an Emerging Mastery of Web Design, Multimedia and WordPress

Mike — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 16:16:00 +0000

I have been doing this blog quite a while – I just reached the amazing mark of 50 posts! Some blog nearly everyday but I tend to post about twice a month so it’s taken about two years to get to this point. I’ve learned quite a bit along the way and I’d like to share some of those accomplishments with you and offer some quick tips and advice. I still consider myself primarily a writer and graphic designer, but I’ve become highly capable and familiar with websites, blogs, multimedia and social media / social networking sites. Let me share some insights!

First of all, it is possible for nearly anyone to build and maintain a website or blog. Content Management Systems (CMS) like WordPress are pretty darn easy to manage. Graphics are more of a challenge but changing templates by designing a custom header are within the grasp of anyone who can use Photoshop and has a little design sense.

Second, there is no doubt that the world is moving toward the rule of information. Text, in a word, reigns supreme in the web 2.0 era. I shake my head mutiple times a week at the people, some of them accomplished designers/business people, who have flash-based or graphics-based sites. Take my advice: build a blog! Your flash-based site with no meta information (description, keywords, alt tags) is INVISIBLE to Google.

On that same tip, create a video to promote yourself or your business. There are three things driving Google rankings: relevance by way of the text /multimedia content on your site, external links reinforcing your site’s relevance, and the relation your site has to social networking and video sites. In other words, you need external sites linking to your site and content such as video.

Are you a musician with no budget? Put your songs up on YouTube and just use your album graphic! You will at minimum, double or triple your hits and Google ranking. Run a business? Convert a PowerPoint presentation to flash video (flv) and post on your site (along with YouTube). Google rewards rich multimedia content and outside links from social media sites (especially user-created business directory sites like “Yelp” or “Ourfaves.”)

As part of the strategy to build a clients’s search rankings I posted a review on Ourfaves Toronto with a few pictures, links to his site and MySpace page, and the caveat that I was both a fan and friend (and designer of his website). It was an essential part of our marketing strategy. You can learn more about this case study at the “Internet Marketing” page at my design site, strongandfree.ca.

I would encourage everyone to start expanding your skill base and create a list of new things you want to learn more about. The world is changing at lightning speed and it will pay dividends to those with some broader abilities.

I’m curious now about podcasts, rss feeds and web video. I’m also interested in the convergence of media and the need for designers to have familiarity with wide ranging devices from tiny pixel cellphone screens to flash vector graphics on 24 inch widescreen monitors. Your next promotion should seek to create a buzz on both. But don’t forget the text! Build that blog, hire a competent writer, and GET THE WORD OUT! Text rules. It could be the most important aspect of any of your marketing efforts in the near future.

Greatest Indie Canadians

Mike — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 00:28:06 +0000

Recently I got to playing around with a graphic of the 2010 Vancouver Winter Games and a picture of artist/writer Douglas Coupland. I was compositing the two and came up with the image at left, which I really quite like. I started thinking about what makes Doug Coupland one of my favourite Canadians, and who else would make that list.

In 2004, as you may remember, the CBC commissioned a survey asking Canadians to nominate their own “Top 10 Greatest Canadians.” It was quite a challenge but the people were up to the task. I still remember that program. there were media/sport celebrities like Don Cherry and the environmentalist David Suzuki. There were pioneers in politics and science/medicine like Tommy Douglas and Frederick Banting. It was quite an impressive list. Perhaps the only person I thought was ”sure thing” was Pierre Trudeau. For any of his faults, he was a thinker and an enigmatic leader who came to power at the same time that Canada was blossoming on the world stage.

If we think of the dramatic decade that was the 1960s, and the amazing moments like a man on the moon and the Vietnam war, Trudeau was a leader for amazing times. He was, as the expression goes (especially for new young alpha male leaders in areas like extreme sport), a “Rock Star.” He also championed, along with the Liberal party, the rights of minorities and helped usher in the modern age of Canada as global human-rights benefactor and multicultural country (particularly through UN peacekeeping missions and landmark moments like the acceptance of the “boat people” – the tide of hundreds of thousands of refugees who fled Southeast Asia during the Vietnam war, rejected elsewhere but accepted first by Canada).

This stuff is really important, especially as we regard cities as the future habitat of most of humanity, and we begin to understand how things like climate change will play a role in forcing large groups of people to seek new lands in the 21st century. Canada can lead in progressive humanitarian areas, even as we fail or struggle to lead on the global environmental stage. But back to my list of “Great Indie Canadians.”

I thought up that title because I don’t feel the need to challenge the present CBC list which is found at http://www.cbc.ca/greatest/top_ten/. My “Indie” group, as you might have guessed, are not heroes of the nation in science or politics, and might be recognizable more to those who grew up in the 1970s and 80s, the children of the Baby boomers, and as Douglas Coupland calls them, “Generation X.”

My heroes include Doug Coupland, who has written books like “Generation X”, “Micro Serfs,” and “Shampoo Planet,” and authored a couple of photo-based books called “Souvenir of Canada” (Parts 1 and 2). I suggest you check out the books, but also rent or buy the DVD version. Watching Coupland mount his art exhibit of Canadian “souvenirs” in a condemned suburban family house in Vancouver he calls “Canada House” is remarkable. Included are dramatizations of Coupland’s youth: first jobs, traveling across Canada by car and other coming of age anecdotes, a terrific narration of his travails through university and his twenties, and an in-depth look at the identity of one of Canada’s most interesting and self-deprecating author/celebrities.

As a teacher and an artist, I feel great pride and admiration for this example of new-school multimedia work and encourage any and all to seek it out. If you like the old National film Board “educational” films you’ll enjoy some of the archival footage that is also used throughout the DVD. Doug is very Canadian and sits somewhere right at the top of my list. Who else makes my list? Well, in no particular order, here are a loose group of my Canadian heroes.

(My) Greatest (Indie) Canadians:

Douglas Coupland (writer), Marshall McLuhan (thinker/writer), Sloan (the rock group), Wendel Clark (vs. Marty McSorely), Atom Egoyan and Bruce McDonald (film directors), The Tragically Hip, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell and Rush (Musicians), Maestro (Fresh Wes, the rapper) and Frank Arthur Calder (First Aboriginal Canadian elected to a Legislature in Canada).

Please feel free to contribute your own list! Looking forward to your comments!

(Related) From the Toronto Star:
“Designed by Canadian artist/author Douglas Coupland and landscape architects Phillips Farevaag Smallenberg, an 8-acre park in downtown Toronto was unveiled today, featuring unique public art, water features and a jogging track dedicated to Terry Fox. Narration by Christopher Hume. Video by Bernard Weil. (September 9, 2009)” – This video shows some iconic images/people from “Douglas Coupland’s Canada”
http://www.thestar.com/videozone/693351

Painters Eleven "in Motion" at Christopher Cutts Gallery

Mike — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 14:54:41 +0000

For those of you interested in drawing/painting and animation I thought you might want to check out a week-long exhibition called “Eleven in Motion” at Christopher Cutts Gallery. Some of you may know “Painters Eleven” as Canada’s own version of the New York School (Abstract Expressionism). Well, the Toronto Animated Image Society (TAIS) has put together a project to get animators to do animations based on the work of these artists. The show is November 18 – Nov 25.

Peter Goddard wrote an interesting article in the TO Star. Below are the relevant links and article.

Peter Goddard article (also on new NFB DVD/Blu Ray release) http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/article/725074–new-exhibit-dvd-put-art-in-motion

Toronto Animated Image Society http://www.tais.ca/eleveninmotion.html

Christopher Cutts Gallery http://www.cuttsgallery.com