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Council for Basic Education: Project for Teachers Network

Duane Neil
Chapin School
100 East End Avenue
New York, NY 110028
(212)570-4962
neil@chapin.edu

I.  Project Description

I spent the summer and fall of 1997 gatheringvideo and audio footage and learning how to edit them together on acomputer.  My subject was my father.  The final product of my study was atwenty minute, edited video portrait of him.  It incorporated a variety of video and audio resources including videointerviews, old 8mm film clips, still images,  sound over narrative,recorded music from a CD and original music.  It was woven together usingMedia100 and took approximately two and one-half months to produce.  

There were essentially three major aspects ofmy project;  first of all was  my obvious personal interest in creatingthis video portrait, exploring old memories of my father with my family andgoing back over family pictures and film.  Old stories were retold and many new ones, never before shared, emergedthrough this initial gathering process.

The second part was the technical task ofassembling all this information.  My goal was to learn how to do it  on acomputer.  The challenge was not only learning the technology but creatingan aesthetically coherent piece that would reflect a personal feeling as well as be of interest to a generalaudience.

The last aspect was the process of applyingmy new knowledge and skill in the classroom and teaching, as well aslearning along with my students, in how to use video as an excitinglearning tool.

II.  Opening Remarks

1.  Purpose

My objective was to develop proficiencyediting video and creating multimedia on the computer in order to use videoin the classroom as a learning tool.  Incorporating valid media educationprinciples, students would be able create a video on any subject.  Tapping into their natural enthusiasm for videoproduction and applying it to the documentary style seemed a logicalconnection.

2.  Value to Teachers and Students 

Young people today are visually oriented and fluent in the vernacular of images.  They are excited by using their vast knowledge and understanding to create video.  The video image has a great deal of authority for them and they strive to create something they will be proud of.  A student once told me, "I would never ask my parents or friends to read a paper I wrote but I would ask them to watch a video I made."  Video production will never replace verbal literacy but, in conjunction with sound research, organization and writing skills, not to mention working in a team and group decision making, video production has an exciting place within the learning environment.

3.  Process 

The experience of creating a video portrait of my late father was probably the richest creative and technical experience of my life.  It became much more than looking at old pictures and home movies;   I did not anticipate learning so many new things about my dad and my family through their stories, many of which I had never heard before.  Stories of my parents courtship told by my mother were vivid and present, almost as if they had happened yesterday.  Learned that all six of the children had very different stories to tell and added  a unique color to the finished portrait.

The first week of my project was spent on the farm in northern Minnesota where I grew up and where my younger brother still lives.  Staying on the farm, which is also the farm that my father grew up on, I felt surrounded by the atmosphere of feelings that I hoped would ultimately come through in the finished product.  I'm happy to say, I feel they do. 

With part of the grant I purchased a good quality Sony Hi8 camera and tripod, which made all the difference.  I had only a few days to do five interviews including my mother, one sister and three brothers, so I was quite goal directed .  My family was terrific  and seemed to enjoy the process, particularly my mother, who is a wonderful story teller and contributed a feeling of local color and warmth to her narration.  She has always been a person who feels deeply and can also express herself well, confronting feelings in a forthright and pragmatic way.  As my younger sister was living in Germany at the time, I had to count on another sister to do the interview for me when she was in the U.S. in late June and send me the tape for later insertion.

Editing of old 8mm family films

When I returned to New York after doing the video interviews in Minnesota, I began the task of reviewing and editing the 8mm home movies from the 60Õs and 70Õs that the family has not seen since then.  Quite a trip down memory lane.  Of course, looking at something so familiar was fascinating to me and Knew my family would enjoy it.  However, from the beginning, I knew Wanted to create a video document that would be of interest to a wider audience, a sort of documentary of that generation of upper Midwest farmer which is dying out.  As I reviewed the films, I was also thinking about how to tie in the stories of my family I had just taped.  The video began to take shape, rather vaguely at first, but images and narrative definitely started to coalesce.  Much to my delight I noticed something quite interesting;  when I was home I did a slow pan of the farm, and when I looked at the films that my father had shot, I noticed he had done the same slow pan of the farm after the great blizzard of Ô76 and also of the lake where we went on vacation.  I was able to blend his pans with mine in the video.

I had to learn how to edit film, also a new experience for me.  The edited film was then transferred to video tape making it possible to import it into the computer program.

On thing I noticed about the difference between film, especially 8mm, and tape, is that the scratchy quality and the jumpy hand held camera look made for a dramatic contrast to the smooth, stationary video interview footage.  I was able to inter cut 8mm footage into interviews so as my brothers and sisters were talking, I tried to incorporate a shot of them as children.  I also incorporated still images and spent a lot of time collecting old photos and going through them, again searching for a narrative thread without being strictly chronological.

Structure of the Finished Video

Putting all the pieces together was without doubt the most fascinating and time consuming aspect of the project.  I spent four weeks in June editing and after a break, I returned to it for two weeks in August.  I also worked on it after the school year began and  completed the final version in late September.  I had to learn the software while I was making editorial decisions so as I progressed into the project, I learned how to do things which I then had to go back and apply to  earlier portions of the program.  It made for a constant review process and forced me to see the piece as a whole.  As I did not begin with a storyboard, I made editorial decision spontaneously, changing things around and constantly revising.  The software, Media 100, allows for this working method and was so fluid and easy to work with, it seemed to almost anticipate my thoughts. 

A major structural task was creating connections between clips.  I didn't want it to be simply a rambling collection of images, like a family scrap book, generally arranged in haphazard chronological order.   I allowed connections to emerge.  For example, when my younger brother talks about my dad smoking his cigar, I super imposed a photo of my dad smoking in a lawn chair which then leads into a clip of dad entering the shed smoking and saying, Holy smoke! as he sees me and my brothers doing scrap iron sculpture one day.

For sound, I opened the piece with my sister humming a little ditty that my dad had always hummed.  She did it spontaneously during the interview as she recalled particular memories of him.  I was able to use it as a voice over during the opening title.  I found a Tommy Dorsey CD which had one of  my dad's favorite tunes, "Marie", and used it for the more upbeat portion of the tape.  I also was happy to be able to use something that I composed on my electronic piano which seemed to go nicely with the long, lyrical pan shots.

As it stands, there are three basic units in the piece:  the first is a short memory quoted by each of the children and my mother as a voice over  old 8mm footage and  stills.  Then, it goes into a series of longer interview narratives and footage of my father telling stories.  I had interviewed him shortly before he died a number of years ago and when I was home my younger brother gave me a tape of my dad I had not known about, making for a delightful addition to my project..  The final section is upbeat as I wanted to emphasize  my dad's playful and childlike qualities.   For the beginning title, I scanned in my dad's signature which I took from one of his letters to me and the last title is my signature.  Another framing device I used was my sister at the beginning and then at the end where she talks about the day he died.

Dialect, syntax and colloquialisms  came through.  So much so that a friend in New York who viewed the tape had difficulty understanding the northern Minnesota, Scandinavian accent and suggested I use subtitles.  I decided against that step.

I sent a copy of the final video to the programming manager at the local TV station in Grand Forks, North Dakota, with the hopes that it might be considered for airing on public access as my intention was for the piece to be of general interest as well as personal.

Uncle Louie's Input

On a personal note, I want to mention that in my original application for the CBE grant, I stated my intention to do a video interview of my Uncle Louie, who was 90 years old and the last surviving sibling of my father.  I had developed a special friendship with him over the years and I felt he would be happy to cooperate and I was looking forward to incorporating him in the final project.  Sadly, I failed to act soon enough as he passed away in April, before I had a chance to interview him.  However, while the family was going through his personal effects, we discovered a large number of old family photographs which he had shown me on previous visits but the rest of the family had not seen.  I was able to incorporate them into the final video and thus, in a way, my Uncle Louie was able to participate in the project after all.

Input from Friends and Colleagues

Once I had a rough cut on tape, I invited a friend and colleague of mine, Pam Sporn, who teachers documentary video in high school and has made many documentary tapes herself to look at my tape for content and any advice.  Pam is not only a video maker but an excellent teacher and her input was invaluable. Pam helped me see things in the piece that I didn't notice or think about.  She watched my tape through and began by asking me a very simple question: "Why are you making this tape?"  It had not occurred to me but the answer was not clear.  She pointed out that I had created this idyllicvision ofthe rural setting I grew up on, yet I had chosen to leave it and move to New York.  Why?  Pam explained that the narrator (me) was not obvious.  It needed to be clear who was talking or in control of the sequence of images we were looking at.   Interesting things that only I knew needed to be made explicit; i.e., that my father and I both had done slow pans of landscape, where the farm is located in the country.  My father has a heavy Midwestern accent and Pam had difficulty understanding him when he spoke. She even asked me if he was speaking a foreign language.

I showed the rough cut to another friend and he suggested things like showing a picture of northern lights when my sister refers to it at the end since growing up in California, he had never seen them.

I called on my mentor, Mary Beth Burns, who teaches computer in Lower School at my school, to assist me with technical problems.  She was available to come in and also by phone at all times, giving me tips and suggestions throughout the process.  I also worked with Matt Cohen, a computer technician and Media 100 expert who has a computer business.

My friends and colleagues were always generous and extremely helpful in advising me.  Without their assistance, I could not have completed the project and am eternally indebted to them.

What I learned about Media 100

My goal of becoming proficient with the Media100 software in order to apply it in my classes was achieved.  The process of working on a creative project was extremely motivating in terms of learning the software.  I would think of something I wanted to do or some effect I wanted to achieve and I would have to teach myself how to do it by following the directions in the manual.  I learned the software as I developed the project and as I learned how to do something I would go back to a previous section and redo it.  It became a constant process of learning something new and reviewing the entire project with the "upgraded" skill.

In the winter of 1997 I used Media 100 with my students  in a course called "Point of View:  Constructing History".  My students  created short documentary videos using videotaped interviews of  older family members talking about their experiences during a specific historical period or event.  They researched the period and collected information, still images and historical and popular film footage,  and wove together all the elements to create an historical document which had a personal point of view.  In this way, they came to understand how history is constructed through the editorial decision making process and were better able to analyze and evaluate other historical texts.

The school  undertook a major building campaign in 1996 and a video editing studio was built in to the new library.  I, along with Mary Beth Burns,  are in the process of developing multi-media production and using computer technology across the curriculum, and all divisions and departments of the school. We foresee teachers and students coming to the multi-media lab to do video reports, create an inter-active CD rom, assemble an instructional tape, etc.  We  look forward to working with teachers in using multi-media as an alternative source of assessment in alleviating the pressure of  final exams.  

This may be a good place to insert a word regarding the place of media education and multi-media in the curriculum, particularly a traditional curriculum such as ours, which is primarily based on verbal skills.

Young people today are much more visual and it is partly in response to that reality that I have undertaken a crusade to develop media education at our school.  However, I feel strongly that visual literacy cannot replace verbal literacy as they are two very different skills.  Language requires a different way of processing information and my approach to visual literacy is to develop visual literacy along with language skills to augment and motivate the process of inquiry and learning.  Theory is the foundation of media literacy which is what my media course, "Art, Media and Propaganda" is all about.   Using video and multi-media extends and applies that knowledge to enhance the learning experience.

4.  Student Samples 

Since the fall of 1997, I have taught several courses on multimedia production, including team teaching the course mentioned above,  "Point of View: Constructing History" with a history teacher.  Students were required to produce a 10 minute documentary on an historical period or event using an oral interview with a family member or older friend who can speak from direct experience.  They  also used video footage from other sources, documentaries, popular movies, old family films, etc., as well as a voice over narration and music in order to construct a video which expressed their own point of view.  They learned  how editorial choices effect content and what you don't say can be as significant as what you do say.  They also learned about how much time and thought go into producing a documentary.  Their videos became very personal as family records as well.  For example, one student interviewed her grandmother who was a  Holocaust survivor and intercut documentary footage and  family photos.  Another student interviewed her father who was a television producer during the Nixon resignation and incorporated an interview with him along with documentary footage as well as clips from feature films.   One student discovered, while interviewing her father about his experience as a doctor in the Vietnam War, that her had pioneered a heart transplant procedure.

Another student did her video  on the effect of the Cuban embargo and its history dating back to Castro's take over. She interviewed her sister, a reporter in Cuba at the time, recounting her experience with local people and the effect of the embargo on their lives.  She incorporated historical footage, taped Cuban music and audio clips, as well as still images and voice over to create a powerful video denouncing the efficacy of the on-going embargo as a  power game by politicians who had little concern for its impact on the lives of ordinary people .  She had created her own piece of propaganda.

One student interviewed her mother who was in high school, living on a Naval base with her family in Hawaii during the Vietnam War and talked to her about what life was like without men.  she also discussed her experiences having male friends who were drafted and never returned.  The student's video included family pictures and historical footage, popular music and voiceover narration to create a very personal and unique aspect of life forwomen during the Vietnam War, quite distinct from the experience of high school aged women on the mainland.

Another student became interested in the historical accuracy of the Steven Spielberg film, "Amistad", and she did research of her own.  She interviewed people in the film industry in which she had a connection through her mother. She also interviewed an historian and intercut their versions of the incidents and events with Speilberg's film in creating her own analysis of the way the film maker  portrayed or altered events for dramatic effect.

The assignment for the above examples was to create a teacher's resource guide to go along with the video, with accompanying quiz and answer key, as well as an assessment of the historical and media education aspects of the document.  In this way teachers in the future can use them in their own classes.  For example, the Spanish teacher is using the video about the Cuban Embargo in her course.

The images shown here were done as video case cover designs by the students on Photoshop. 

The history teacher evaluated the historical content and I did the media and technical aspects.  I've also worked with a physics teacher and his class in producing short videos as final projects on physics topics.  Currently a small group of students  are working on a documentary about the founder of the school to be shown at our centenary celebration next year.

I also give video editing workshops for faculty members and offer Photoshop as a course for parents.

With my new camcorder I am exploring video as an art form and have already made several short tapes, editing them on Media 100 and incorporating music I composed on my electronic keyboard.  I have been able to explore a whole new way of expressing myself through video images.  I have always enjoyed drawing and I've develop what I call "Video Drawing", by recording a drawing as I do it and processing it either in the camera or on the computer.  My camera is hooked up to a monitor so I watch the monitor rather than the drawing surface as I work, similar to the eye-hand coordination skills needed to draw with a mouse.  I'm very excited about the prospects for creative expression that have opened up through video and computer editing.  A final process paper completed the portfolio.

5.  Resources-

Many, many  people acted as resources throughout my project, from my family who gave of their time to be interviewed to colleagues who provided technical advice to friends who were willing to watch my piece as it took shape and offer me suggestions and constructive advice.  I will always be indebted to them and the final product could not have been realized without their help.  Of course without the grant  from the Council for Basic Education , itself serving as encouragement , the entire project may never have happened and the benefits to my students, delayed at least.

Some texts provided advice and helped provide guidance.  the following is a list of some of them:

Recording Your Family History by William Fletcher.  Ten Speed Press, Berkeley,1989.

          --a guide to preserving oral history with videotape and audiotape, including suggested topics and questions swell as interview techniques.

Time Passages:  Collective Memory and American popular Culture by George Lipsitz. University of Minnesota Press,1990.

          --explores the complicated[ relationship in postwar America between historical memory and commercial culture, the texts of popular culture and their contexts of creation and reception.

Constructing Reality : Exploring Media Issues in Documentary by Arlene Mascovitch. The National Film Board of Canada, 1993

          --explores critical concepts of the documentary including the relationship between fact and fiction, objectivity, truth, point of view, voice and the construction of reality.

Mediating History: The May Guide to Independent Video by and about African America, Asian American, Latino, and Native American People  edited by Barbara Abrash and Catherine Egan.  New York University Press, 1992.

          --includes essays by film scholars, overviews by media critics and annotated listings of independently; produced videos.

Photoshop for Macintosh: Visual Quickstart Guide by Elaine Weinmann and Peter Lourekas. PeachpitPress, Berkeley, 1995/

          --an invaluable and comprehensive usersguide to Adobe Photoshop.

Premiere with a Passion by Michael Feere.  Peachpit Press, Berkeley, 1994.

          --dido for Adobe Premier.

The majority of my editing was done onMedia100 (le version).  Their User Guide and Reference are excellent forthe self-learner.

6.  Tips   Allow a great deal more time then you think it will take.  I didn't clock my hours (days and weeks, really) but I would have to say ending up with a twenty minute video, I put in at least 3-4 days per minute.  As a rule of thumb with my students, I tell them to allow at least one hour of editing time per minute of video.  That does NOT include story boarding, shooting and logging time.  Just the leg work involved in gathering footage, video and audio can take days, if not weeks. 

Early on in my crusade to develop media education at my school I realized I would need to put in the extra time and legwork such a task would entail.  The workshops I give for faculty and parents are outside my regular teaching schedule and I make myself available to teachers to work on special projects regularly.  Advocating video production in the classroom seems to work best with teachers who are most responsive.  I've found that forging alliances helps build a supportive and responsive group.  Since technology assistance is vital, those are the people that you'll need on your side.  I've also found that parents arequite responsive to technology and have been overwhelmingly supportive.

I'm happy to talk with any interested teacher.  Please don't hesitate to call or e-mail me.

Good luck!