E.g. it’s tempting to tell the story of a trip chronologically thus
weaker: “We started in Rome, took the train to Florence where we saw Ponte Vecchio, then we headed to the coast towards Pisa….”
stronger: look at how well Simon Griffiths uses the device of how he funded his south American trip to make a great story even better.
Popularity: 1% [?]
→ No CommentsTags: tips · story · digital storytelling
Joe Lambert of the Center for Digital Storytelling has written with news of workshops he’s holding in Copenhagen this summer and of exciting plans to establish a European Center for Digital in conjunction with Copehagen Business School.
Joe’s team will be joined for the workshops by guest trainers Lisa Heledd Jones (BBC Wales and George Ewart Evans Centre for Storytelling) and Barrie Stephenson of digistories.co.uk. There are details of the workshops here.
Next: knife crime is a problem in some British cities. I think community leaders may take inspiration from Mervin Jarman’s story. He’s just been awarded the Stockholm Challenge Trophy. He’s set up a digilab where people can come to make digital stories inside a 40-foot converted shipping container in Palmers Cross, Jamaica.
“The primary target group is what I refer to now as the hardest to reach. This is what we call the bad boys. Di ones who nuh have no value; the ones dem that fit for dumping. And that’s probably because that’s what I was characterised as,” Jarman says. Story from the Jamaica Gleaner.
Finally, I was delighted to hear that the Yale Centre for Digital Storytelling in Wrexham, north-east Wales is one of the 28 beneficiaries of a grant totalling £5.2million for rural development. The Yale team will work with people to reflect rural stories. Congratulations to the team at Yale; it’s great to hear such good news. Story from the Daily Post.
Popularity: 4% [?]
→ No CommentsTags: media literacy · Wales · instruction · digital storytelling
Which personal storytelling forms work well with the volume turned down?
This question’s inspired by opportunities presented by ‘A Wall is a Screen‘, kiosks in public places and public shopping-street screens like the one in Cardiff city centre, pictured by Mooganic.
If you know of ’silent’ short-form’ visual personal storytelling forms that passers-by find engaging enough to stop and watch, please let me know in the comments or by emailing melynmelyn at gmail dot com. I’ll share them in a future post. Thanks.
By the way, using the RSS button, you can subscribe to the posts in this blog and read them in your newsreader/feedreader.
Popularity: 7% [?]
→ No CommentsTags: story · digital storytelling
Hyperaction launches Storywalks tomorrow morning with a walk and picnic in Torfaen, south Wales. On their website you can download a printable PDF routemap (here’s an example) and free mp3 podcasts of the stories to listen to along your way.
Loading up your portable device with stories and heading off to the countryside clutching a map is a great idea and Hyperaction’s experience in such community-led projects shines through and is sure to contribute to the success and hopefully the future expansion of the network of Storywalks around Wales.
Popularity: 12% [?]
→ No CommentsTags: Wales · story · mobile · digital storytelling
I’ve always been puzzled this paradox: people get so many new skills by making their first digital story …. yet most people only ever produce one digital story. It was Jenny Kidd, whose PhD subject was Digital Storytelling at the BBC, who drew my attention to this.
The team at University of Glamorgan has been exploring lowering some of the barriers to continuation by devising forms that use widely-available online
production tools and social media tools.
Carwyn Evans, Lisa Heledd Jones and Susie Pratt of BBC Wales and University of Glamorgan held a workshop in Aberystwyth just before DS3 where they led a group of people through how to upload photos to Flickr.com e.g:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/making_space/2507528951
and how to add comments to photos. They also incorporated some ‘old
media’ like the PostIt and pen, thus:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/making_space/2510751989/in/photostream/
At DS3, I saw a dozen people all huddled around a massive poster print of Aberystwyth prom, scribbling on PostIts. The mix of the photo and different people’s reactions to it is really nice.
Some audio comments were also recorded:
http://www.makingspace.org.uk/ventures/picturepost/listening_circle.html
Tools like voicethread, photobucket remix, flickr, etc. are great levellers because all you
need is access to a broadband-connected web browser and a simple capture device. Of course, there are factors other than technology influencing continued media expression, but I believe using re-accessible technology will reduce one of the barriers to continued authorship. Also, the social networking capacity surrounding these Web 2.0 tools can engender a continued sense of community beyond the kick-off face-to-face workshop(s).
I think Making Space is a fascinating project and, already, the participants’ testimony at DS3 convinced me it’s a worthwhile direction in which to head.
By the way, the team is also exploring other areas via ventures such as:
http://www.makingspace.org.uk/ventures/digitaldresser.html
and
http://www.makingspace.org.uk/ventures/desertislandpics.html
Popularity: 13% [?]
→ No CommentsTags: media literacy · Wales · empowerment · digital storytelling
Dear friend of [murmur],
Shawn Micallef sent me an email this morning saying that [murmur] is looking to hire an executive director to help move the project forward. He asked recipients of the mail to pass it on, so here it is:
“[murmur] is looking for an inspirational leader. We’re seeking someone passionate about community, cities, and storytelling to guide and grow [murmur]’s collaborations and projects.
The director will be responsible for managing and producing [murmur], and leading its expansion through writing grant applications, securing commissions, and cultivating relationships with potential funders.
On the “producing” side, this means taking care of stuff like:
- Recording & editing stories
- Installing signs
- Giving workshops
- Managing volunteers and interns
- Responding to lots of email inquiries
- Coordinating with suppliers
- Writing & sending out occasional newsletters
- Attending conferences and festivals; sometimes presenting
- Organizing events
- Writing grant applications and project proposals
- Managing budgets and books
On the “cultivating relationships” side, this means (among other things):
- Establish new contacts and projects in Toronto, nationally and internationally;
- Develop strategies to raise funds to expand the project;
- Seek out potential sponsors and donors, and tapping into networks;
- Conduct ongoing research for new fiscal strategies and opportunities.
QUALIFICATIONS:
Please get in touch if you:
- Know the project, like it, and (personally) are excited to help in its expansion;
- Have experience being in charge of stuff;
- Are personable and a great writer;
- Are motivated and self-directed, a decision-maker and problem-solver;
- Want a flexible schedule (meaning generally you can decide your own hours, but sometimes there’s stuff that needs doing on weekends);
- Are organized and good with deadlines;
- Are very comfortable with the web, and technology in general;
- Are in Toronto but available for occasional travel;
- Are okay with the idea that your salary is dependent on your fundraising abilities.
The ideal candidate probably also reads a bunch of blogs, lives downtown, rides a bike and/or TTC, and has a cellphone.
ENVIRONMENT:
Our director will be working from the Centre for Social Innovation, on Spadina Avenue near Queen Street.
COMPENSATION:
This is a part-time contract position for now, probably 3-4 days/week and $18-20/hour to start depending on your experience, increasing with your fundraising success.
HOW TO APPLY:
Please email a CV and references to gabe at murmurtoronto.ca
We are looking for someone who can start as soon as possible, June 30th at the latest. Please contact us by June 16th.”
Popularity: 16% [?]
→ No CommentsTags: links · digital storytelling
I’ve just returned from the DS3 Festival of Digital Storytelling at Aberystwyth Arts Centre. It was another successful festival, following on from and expanding on last year’s DS2. People had travelled from all over Wales and Britain. I met delegates from Belfast, USA and there was someone who’d come from New Zealand too.
Day1 - Thursday 5 June 2008
A Public Voice - Digital storytelling, narrative and pedagogy. By Prof. Hamish Fyfe & Susie Pratt, University of Glamorgan; Karen Lewis, Lisa Heledd, BBC Cymru Wales
Karen Lewis set the context of the research that’s being done with AHRC support. Hamish Fyfe gave a description of storytelling across the ages and said Digital Storytelling lets people explore their “possible self”. Doing this and learning new skills means “the process of DS making often leaves people feeling more positive” and he argued in favour of a link between DS + community regeneration. Suzy Pratt shared research she’s conducting and showed the importance of “connecting” in ensuring sustainability of Digital Storytelling. She’s working with Lisa Heledd and Carwyn Evans on storytelling linked with social media via an exciting new website called Making Space. The Aberystwyth pilot is worth looking at.
Because of a meeting I needed to go to with the National Screen and Sound Archvie, I unfortunately missed some of ‘The Play Ethic - Pat Kane’ and ‘Narrative Forms - Case studies with Steve Bellis & Tony Pugh, Yale College Wrexham’.
There was a great Open Mic and Mac cabaret session at the bar that night. The mix of personal storytelling and watching Digital Stories worked really well. It was a kind of ‘Frey Cafe with films’ evening.
Day 2 - Friday 6 June 2008
Gilly Adams (freelance Story Circle specialist) - Telling Stories.
I enjoyed Gilly’s presentation more than any other in DS3. She spoke of the Gift Culture of Digital Storytelling where no money changes hands but the currency is the generosity of grace in sharing stories. The person who hears the story gains two benefits:
1. they get a unique glimpse into the heart of the teller
2. they can often say: “hey, that’s about me!” and they get to reflect on that revelation.
An example of generosity Gilly gave was that of someone who comes to a DS workshop with a story in mind but, having heard the stores other people tell, they sometimes change their mind and say: “Actually, I want to tell you this….”
Jason Ohler (University of Alaska) - Digital Storytelling in the classroom.
I’d been particularly eager for DS Cymru to invite Jason Ohler to speak at this year’s Festival and, having heard him speak, I was glad he’d come. He shared his experiences of working in classrooms throughout Alaska and his insistence that _story_ be at the heart of everything that’s done. A digital storytelling friend of mine, Barrie Stephenson, says he’s been using Story Maps - one of Jason’s story-generating systems - after hearing him speak at Sedona some years ago. That’s something about Jason’s style: he shares all kinds of practical tips that can be re-used in workshops.
Hanne Jones & Christer Fasmer (Digitale Fortellinger project, Norway) - Digital Storytelling In Norway. These were some of the most powerful digital stories I’ve ever seen. Hanne, Chris and Eli have worked with over 200 people in Norway. Their work is screened on TV, in museums and in cinemas. Two stories they showed made a deep impression: one by a young woman with Downs Syndrome talking about her life and plans with her boyfriend and another by a 101 year old woman remembering hiding because she was afraid of reading in front of a group of people when she was six years old (in 1913).
Popularity: 19% [?]
→ No CommentsTags: DS Cymru · Wales · digital storytelling
I met Culturenet Cymru’s Sioned Rhys Jones and Hawys Tomos at Eisteddfod yr Urdd, Conwy, last week. As part of the National Library of Wales and funded by Heritage Lottery and Welsh Assembly Government, Culturenet Cymru is working on a project based in Aberystwyth called ‘From Warfare to Welfare’. There’re doing three things:
1. helping people to make digital stories. Young people work with older people to make a digital story of 1939-1959 recollections
2. staging multimedia conferences
3. digitising photos by Geoff Charles
I nearly fell off my chair when they told me about the Geoff Charles element. Geoff was a prolific Welsh documentary photographer. He took a photo of my brother and I around 38 years ago. There are more than 20,000 of Geoff’s photos held for safe-keeping at the National Library of Wales. You can see some of these at http://geoffcharles.llgc.org.uk/
Here’s the digital storytelling connection…
When the Nokia N93 first came out around two years ago, BBC Wales was interested in its potential as a tool for people to tell broadcastable personal stories. All the members of the Capture Wales team experimented with many forms. Some of these forms went on to be adapted for public workshops. One of the experimental digital stories I made wasn’t made for publication; it was intended to explore the phone’s still image and voice recording capacity in a digital storytelling context. The voice recording quality was OK but, as you can see, there’s some distortion of the images because I needed to take photos up-close. I haven’t made the story public until now. But because of this bit of Geoff Charles Culturenet Cymru synchronicity, I wanted to share this mobile phone story with you now:
Popularity: 21% [?]
→ No CommentsTags: Wales · mobile · digital storytelling
I’ve been corresponding recently with Wim Kievits who’s had an interest in Digital Storytelling for some time. He recently contacted me regarding a presentation he’s making in the Netherlands later this week. He asked what triggered BBC Wales’s interest in starting Capture Wales and asked: “Can you tell me or point out to me how the whole initiative started? What were the initial challenges (or signals from society) you encountered that made you decide to start this initiative?”
Well I can’t speak on behalf of BBC Wales but I can remember a time when it used to cost £30,000 to buy a machine to edit video. So it was expensive/exclusive to access the tool to tell stories via video. 2001 was about the time when it became affordable to edit your own video on home computers. This opened up the door to enabling anyone to be able to tell their own story using video. For publicly-funded organisations like ours, this was an important moment. Digital Storytelling is a form that lends itself to personal storytelling because:
1. everyone has a photo archive
2. everyone has a story/stories to tell
But this isn’t a case of pure technical determinism. Because, in addition to new technology, some other elements were needed. E.g.
1. an attainable ‘form’. I.e. Digital Storytelling
2. careful facilitation so that the skills of constructing such a story can be shared with groups of people.
3. mass media willing to give completed stories a platform so the stories can be enjoyed by everyone who sees them
And those are some of the magic ingredients that led to the BBC Capture Wales project.
There’s one other catalyst I mustn’t forget: someone persuasive, a convincer and an evangelist. In our case, that was Daniel Meadows, from Cardiff University.
Popularity: 21% [?]
→ No CommentsTags: media literacy · Wales · digital storytelling
Registration is now open for Wales’s third annual Festival of Digital Storytelling at Aberystwyth Arts Centre on Thursday 5th and Friday 6 June 2008. And - wearing my DS Cymru member hat - I’d like to invite you to come 
Yes, DS3 has expanded to two days this year and, as it says on the website: “Whether you work in education, the community or as an artist, it is your opportunity to share experiences, explore new creative ideas, see the latest technological developments, look at examples of best practise in the U.K. and worldwide and celebrate the growing significance of Digital Storytelling”
I’m really looking forward to this year’s Festival, not least because the speakers who’ve agreed to take part are so good.
Jason Ohler, from Alaska, will be a familiar name to anyone who’s interested in Digital Storytelling in schools. He’ the author of ‘Digital Storytelling in the Classroom’. It should be interesting to see what the educationalists in the audience make of his evangelism for Digital Storytelling in the classroom, especially as Wales has the power to determine its own curriculum for schools. Might we see schools in Wales allocating sufficient resources and embedding the activity of Digital Storytelling in our classrooms in a revolutionary way? I personally hope so. Just imagine how that would impact on young Welsh people’s digital expression and storytelling skills and how much fun that would make school!
Gilly Adams is one of the most magnetic characters I’ve ever met. I sat in awe listening to her talk about how to help someone with their story as she addressed a group of 40 in Merthyr Tydfil in March. She was sharing decades of experience garnered from not only dozens of Digital Storytelling workshops but also her background in theatre, community radio plays and celebratory ritual performance. I guarantee that, if you want to learn something new about storytelling, you will if you come to listen to Gilly.
Two Digital Storytellers who have an historic connection with BBC Capture Wales are making the trip from Norway to Aberystwyth to share their experiences of setting up Digitale Fortellinger. Eli Lea and Hanne Jones set up their project with the aim of helping individuals to share their personal story on TV in Nordic countries. They’ve also done some interesting, pioneering work with museums. By the way, Hanne’s own Digital Story is one of my all-time favourites.
Pat Kane - half of Hue and Cry - wrote ‘The Play Ethic: A Manifesto for a Different Way of Living’ which “proposes the ‘player’ as a new identity for a productive, creative and meaningful life”. He’s coming from Scotland to Aberystwyth.
Also speaking or holding workshops or breakout sessions are Breaking Barriers; Canllaw Online; Cardiff University; Coleg Sir Gar, Llanelli; Culturenet Cymru; DS Cymru; Huw Davies; Monmouthshire County Council; University of Glamorgan George Ewart Evans Centre for Storytelling; Yale College, Wrexham; etc. as well as BBC Cymru Wales.
Between the keynotes there are sessions about where to go to get money to fund your grassroots project from people who’ve been very succesful in doing just that, creating ‘a digital story in ten clicks’, being young and telling stories, pedagogy, sustainability, new forms and social software, best ways of facilitating stories, an open mic story session, building digital communities, etc
So it’s a fantastic line-up and I hope you can come. You’ll be most welcome.
Popularity: 36% [?]
→ No CommentsTags: DS Cymru · Wales · digital storytelling
I watched a recording of On Top of the World this lunchtime. This is the half-hour programme by Tori James, the first Welsh woman and youngest British woman ever to climb Everest. It was shot almost entirely using the kinds of devices anyone can buy in the High St. It’s a gripping, endearing piece of TV. Goes to show what can be done in the longer form, using attainable technology, when the storytelling’s done well. Full credit to producer Melanie Lindsell who worked closely with Tori on the storytelling, editing and post production.
If you live in the UK, for the next six days you can watch this programme on BBC iPlayer here:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/page/item/b00b6×2v.shtml
Popularity: 38% [?]
→ No CommentsTags: story · mobile · digital storytelling
I’ve observed that working on stories in a group usually helps individuals to improve their story and I love watching how stories are improved, thanks to the group dynamics. That’s one of the reasons digital storytelling works so well as a group workshop activity.
One University of Tokyo project, called Unknown Shonan, is the first I’ve heard of that compares narratives arrived at individually with those arrived at by working in a group.
Shonan is Japan’s Brighton. It’s a bohemian seaside city about an hour by train from Tokyo. Universtiy of Tokyo researchers worked with participants, mixing historic photos with participant-taken ones where individuals are asked to make five-photo captioned narratives first individually and then in groups. They’ve already reached Phase II of the project and they’re comparing outputs at the moment. It’ll be interesting to hear the outcome and perhaps to start understanding what really improves stories when we share and discuss our stories collaboratively.
Popularity: 34% [?]
→ No CommentsTags: japan · story
Tokyo and Mell Expo 2008 were absolutely mindblowing. A more considered summary of Mell Expo 2008 will follow. For now, with music by B’z, is a montage of (Ricoh) images and (Nokia N93) video clips that capture the flavour of the event and the trip. Hope you enjoy it:
Popularity: 36% [?]
→ No CommentsTags: japan · media literacy
There’s an enigma around technology, isn’t there? Take the mobile phone for example. We used to use just it to make phonecalls; now phones have near-broadcast-quality video cameras on board too. If only there was a way of releasing some more of the potential of technology for the benefit of society…
Let me start with some questions about this:
1. What motivation and opportunities could be given to people in Japan to make more use of the creative capacity of their mobile devices and computers? 2. Which ‘forms’ of Digital Storytelling would be most attractive in this country to both author & audience of the content?3. And how could this content be shared with mass audiences?
My name is Gareth Morlais and I work for BBC Wales in the UK as a producer.
Everyone has a story to tell - that’s been central to our ethos at the BBC Capture Wales Digital Storytelling project and that’s what’s led to hundreds of people in Wales learning the skills they need to make their own Digital Story which is shown on BBC platforms - web, radio, TV and interactive.
A digital story is a two-minute broadcast-quality personal story made by the storyteller themself, using their own photos, words and voice.
E.g. Richard Pugh - A Quest for Understanding
Making a Digital Story for the first time often means learning at least two kinds of skills that may be new to the individual:
1. Technical - this is the new skill which is most often cited in connection with media literacy, digital exclusion and skilling for the knowledge economy in Wales.
2. Narrative - this is usually sadly underrated.
I feel that the skills of organising and relating experience in the form of a story can be as important in the knowledge economy as the technical skills. These skills of storytelling are harder to learn than technical. Learning in a group - workshop of ten people - is what we’ve found works best.
Here’s why I feel this is important, from the point of view of the individual citizen, the audience and the mass media, especially a public service broadcaster like the BBC. This is based on our experience in Wales, but I hope some of this may resonate with the experience you have in Japan.
BENEFITS
1. To the mass audience.
- A feeling of being reflected on the mass media.
- Fresh, surprising, diverse content.
2. To the broadcaster / publisher.
- Promotes media literacy in Wales.
- It’s a self-authored voice for all kinds of people on BBC Wales’s web, radio and TV platforms.
- Helps to spread the skills of storytelling.
- A good way of getting to know the audience and to work alongside them and with grass-roots organisations in the community. These partnerships can lead to other things too…
3. To the individual author.
- New skills.
- People report a feeling of having exceeded expectations and surprising themselves.
- A truer voice on the mass media, compared with other content made by publisher.
Here’s an example of what I mean by ‘truer voice’. Compare two approaches to a news story to show how much more empowering Digital Storytelling is, because of where the ownership of the story rests:
Case 1 - A traditional TV news story about cancer. Scientists in white coats, mother of a boy who died of cancer being filmed on the family sofa, reacting tointerview questions, leafing through family photograph album …
Case 2 - Gaynor Clifford - Castle on a Cloud - a 2002 Digital Story by the mother of a boy who died of cancer. She based her story on questions her son asked her when he was thinking about his future.
STEP-BY-STEP
Here’s the process we’ve used to help a group of ten people to make their stories over three or four days. Finished stories are 250 words, around 12 images, two minutes long. This model has come to be know as the ‘classic Digital Story’.
1. Recruitment. Always the most difficult part. Showing existing Digital Stories in a community setting is most effective. We apply principles of diversity in selecting Digital Storytelling workshop participants.
2. Briefing. Letting storytellers know what to expect in a reassuring way.
3. Storycircle. A whole day in a group working on and offering help with everyone’s story. No computers today.
4. Everyone records their story.
5. Introduction to the computers and equipment.
6. Taking digital photos and scanning images from own personal collection.
7. Editing. Learning to use video editing software to synchronise images with the audio recording of their story.
8. Sharing the stories at an end-of-workshop group screening, via a personal DVD copy and by publishing on web and TV.
OTHER FORMS
‘Classic Digital Storytelling’ is evolving and new forms have emerged from it. We still consider them to be Digital Stories if they meet these criteria by Lisa Heledd and Mandy Rose:
1. A strong story; a clear narrative the audience will engage with.
2. Transferral of skills.
3. Ownership rests with author.
(source)
Here are some examples:
FORM 1 - Shoebox story
Can be made in one or two days. Shorter, based on objects brought to the workshop in a shoebox.
E.g. Alan Jeffreys - A Dog’s Life
FORM 2 - In the Frame
Images from disposable film cameras. Storytellers react (unscripted) to photos they took. A powerful tool for citizenship.
E.g. Mel’s campaigning piece about her school
Selma Chalabi facilitated this story as part of ‘If I Were and AM’ - an AM is a Welsh politician.
FORM 3 - Archive
In the Rhondda Lives! project, BBC Wales partnered with Valleys Kids charity and National Screen and Sound Archive to mix personal storytelling with archive film of the Rhondda Valley. This is an attractive way of releasing new value and exposing archive footage, artifacts, etc. Attractive to museums as well as TV companies.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/rhonddalives/
E.g. Gillian Thomas - Hiraeth
FORM 4 - Mobile Story
Outline history of and show examples of experiments with mobile phone forms. These Welsh-language ones are from a February 2008 workshop for a youth programme called Mosgito:
Abi - Bywyd ar y fferm
http://www.bbc.co.uk/cymru/cipolwgargymru/stori/abi.shtml - about living on a farm
and
RhysW - Grefi yn y Coffi
http://www.bbc.co.uk/cymru/cipolwgargymru/stori/rhys-w.shtml - about someone who plays jokes on people
FORM 5 - Sensecam
BBC Wales worked with Microsoft Research Centre to test how a wearable camera might be used. Here’s a film called Day2 I made about my own experience of wearing the Sensecam. It’s intended as a reflective film rather than a narrative story.
We can speculate about some features of future forms. I think we’re likely to see device shrinkage, with better on-board editing functionality and more explicit linkage to location and the continuing shift to online editing and storage. The real challenges though are around motivating people to unleash the potential of what they hold in their hand and ensuring that access to the skills needed to do this are as universally available as possible.
I’d like to share some observations distilled from the last seven years…
LOOKING IN MY REAR-VIEW MIRROR
1. Build in sustainability.
- Court and involve prospects in workshops.
- Run training the trainers sessions.
- Urge new trainers to make another story alone before beginning to train others.
- Form partnerships and offer to publish their work non-exclusively.
- Capitalise on the snowflake-effect of building partnerships.
2. Agree on your ethos, as a team.
- Ways of working with people.
- Ownership of content.
- Etc.
3. Choose performance indicators wisely.
- Acknowledge value issues around working face-to-face.
- Compare ‘cost per story’ with ‘cost per hour of TV’.
- Case studies can be powerful justifiers of spending.
- Emphasise what you do which YouTube doesn’t.
4. Recruiting participants is the hardest part.
- Showing stories in the community is the best way to recruit.
5. Story is key.
- It’s the specific, sensory-driven stuff that we connect with.
- Even if you teach the technology one-to-one, the storytelling bits work best in a group.
- You know it’s a good story if you can enjoy it with your eyes closed.
6. There needs to be a skills exchange (media literacy), so try to teach people to use something they’ll be able to go home and use again later.
- Their own mobile phone as a capture device.
- Web-based tools to edit, store and publish.
7. Have a clear plan and stick to it.
- Let participants know which media form you’re asking them to make.
- Know and state your editorial proposition E.g personal, 1st person (I, my, we…), fact not fiction, etc.
- Work as a group where possible, ensuring everyone’s devices are set up to look and perform exactly the same, as far as possible.
8. Lower barriers to entry by adapting your plan to offer a choice of forms.
- Have a toolkit of forms. E.g. story in one weekend, story in an hour a week over six weeks, etc.
9. Ask people to use their own stuff in their story.
- This makes it personal and avoids rights problems.
10. Diversity really works.
- In the make-up of the people in the group (age, background, etc.)
- In the range of story subjects
- Avoid themed workshops, e.g. for ‘people with depression’.
11. Document, refine and share your ways of working.
- E.g. http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/audiovideo/sites/yourvideo/pdf/aguidetodigitalstorytelling-bbc.pdf
12. Finally, once again, story is key.
WHAT ALL THIS COULD MEAN IN JAPAN
When technology meets storytelling via skillful facilitation in a group setting with mass media hungry to show the results - heaven!
I’ll end by addressing the three challenges I set out at the beginning of my presentation:1. What motivation and opportunities could be given to people in Japan to make more use of the creative capacity of their mobile devices and computers? This is an appeal to the representatives of grass-roots community organisations of Japan who are in the audience today. I’ve shown examples of Digital Stories and how making one can have a powerful effect on the individual author. Can you see ways in which Digital Storytelling might be able to help you achieve your organisation’s aims? Can you find ways of linking up with other organisations, trainers and broadcasters to set up a project of your own?2. Which ‘forms’ of Digital Storytelling would be most attractive in this country to both author & audience? Well I’m not the best person to answer to this question, because Japanese culture and values are new to me. But what I’ve just done is to show you examples that have worked in Wales and on BBC Wales. And I hope that’s triggered some new ideas of what might work here in Japan and other Asian countries.3. How could this content be shared with mass audiences? This is a challenge to the broadcasters and mass media companies in the audience. One thing I can say about Digital Stories is that showing them to your audiences is a great way of demonstrating greater relevance in this fast-changing landscape.Whether or not you decide to get involved in this, these are exciting times. The fact that organisations like Media Exprimo, Mell Expo, MoDe, Japanese Universities and grass-roots organisations and broadcasters have come here to Mell Expo 2008 to investigate how the technology of Japan can be harnessed for the good of the people is a great thing. And I wish you every good wish on this exciting journey.
———————————————————————
BACKGROUND
My background is in radio social action broadcasting, in public service broadcasting at the BBC and with commercial broadcasters in Wales (Coast FM) and in Sri Lanka (TNL Radio)
Before Digital Stories, there was BBC Video Nation (1993) which pioneered self-authored, personal storytelling in the form of video diaries. I didn’t work on this but I remember the good impression this made on me at the time.
In 2001, I heard Daniel Meadows of Cardiff University speak at the BBC. He showed his digital story Polyphoto. This is the point at which I decided I wanted to be part of this project because it was the first time I’d seen a format for personal storytelling where the author chose the story, visuals and actually edited it themself.
Daniel Meadows had made Polyphoto at the Center for Digital Storytelling in California, in a workshop run by Joe Lambert. This was at a time one of the pioneers and founders of digital stories passed away: Dana Atchley. Dana’s digital story Home Movies is one of my favourites.
Daniel came on secondment to the BBC as part of a partnership between BBC Wales and Cardiff University. BBC Capture Wales was born, edited by Mandy Rose - one of BBC Video Nation’s founders. Joe Lambert and Nina Mullen were invited to come to Wales to run training the trainers sessions. That’s when I made my first story and joined the new Capture Wales team as a trainer and as producer of the website bbc.co.uk/capturewales. In 2005, I became the project producer and started a personal blog called Aberth Digital Storytelling - www.aberth.com/blog.
Our strategy has always been to try make Digital Storytelling a sustainable proposition in Wales. We always planned to run fewer and fewer workshops ourselves as more and more community organisations began offering Digital Storytelling opportunities. Examples of Digital Storytelling projects in Wales include Breaking Barriers, Yale Centre for Digital Storytelling, Coleg Sir Gar and Canllaw Online.
BBC Wales planned to stop running monthly workshops one day and that day came at the beginnin of April 2008. Two of our team have moved on assignment to the George Ewart Evans Centre for Storytelling at the University of Glamorgan, where the production activity and innovation continues with the aim of setting up a Centre for Excellence in Digital Storytelling there. Back at the BBC, the focus will be on offering to publish the stories that are being produced around Wales.
In 2001, only Capture Wales was helping people to make Digital Stories in Wales; now, there are over 70 organisations in Wales that are doing it or have been funded for a project that involves an element of Digital Storytelling. Almost 700 people have made their Digital Story with BBC Wales and, if you look at all projects around Wales, the figure’s well over 2,000. I think this kind of planned sustainability with inbuilt self-redundancy is a remarkable model for a broadcaster, and I’d personally like to see more of it.
Gareth Morlais, Cardiff, Wales, April 2008
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ANECDOTES
“0.16% of YouTube users upload to YouTube” (Heard in a presentation about media literacy by Ewan McIntosh. From the Guardian, May 2007)
“Watching a digital story is a little like taking a walk on a dark night past a house where the owner has left the curtains open and the lights on - you get a special glimpse of life inside.” - Gilly Adams, Capture Wales, at a meeting with Digital Storytellers in Cardiff, March 2008
“Right now there are more than 300 million people around the world watching video content online. It’s a fundamental shift that completely democratises our business.” Peter Chernin, News Corp. (Heard in a presentation by Jon Gisby. From http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2007/sep/15/citynews.musicnews )
UK media regulator OFCOM defines media literacy as: “the ability to access, understand and CREATE communications in a variety of contexts”. I think it’s great that the word ‘create’ appears.
University of Tokyo’s Shin Mizukoshi’s definition is even better, because it speaks of individual authors, and is explicit about the fact that one needs both the equipment and the skills to create: “Activities for independent communication via media in an information society, and the technologies and knowledge that support these activities” - http://www.mode-prj.org/document/HongKong2005_1ppt.pdf .
Significant developments since 2000 - broadcasters welcoming content from audiences, social media like YouTube, online applications, increase of capture resolution of small devices (Nokia N93, Zoom H2, etc.), embedding content in many places, etc.
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→ No CommentsTags: japan · media literacy · digital storytelling
When you’re working on storytelling with a group of people in a situation like the Digital Storytelling Storycircle, there’s one game that often really helps people to come up with ‘their story’. It’s the Match Game and it’s Gilly Adams who pioneered its use in Digital Storytelling. Gilly wrote instructions for this game to be inserted into give-away boxes of the long-handled cooks matches you need to play this game when we went on the Digital Storytelling Gathering tour around Wales last month. In the interests of sharing these instructions with people I’ll meet in Japan, I’m reproducing Gilly’s instructions here:
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Alan Thomas plays the match game at BBC Capture Wales Haverfordwest workshop. Photo: Huw Davies.
THE MATCH GAME
1. Ask everyone to think of something about which they feel passionate.
2. The first person strikes a match and talks for as long as the match burns.
3. If the flame goes out, even in the middle of a sentence, the speaker has to stop and passs the box to someone else.
4. The game goes on until everyone has had a turn.
5. Notice how much can be said in a very short time and what stays in your mind afterwards.
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Gilly’s an inspiring expert in personal storytelling and you can hear her speak by attending this year’s DS3 Digital Storytelling conference at Aberystwyth Arts Centre on 5 & 6 June 2008.
DS3 is a must-attend for anyone interested in Digital Storytelling. It’s in its third year now and has now grown to two days. It’s a truly international event with people attending from around the world and Alan Hewson and his team do a fantastic job of organising this.
Jason Ohler is coming from Alaska this year to talk about Digital Storytelling in the Classroom. Because Wales -as a country - sets its own educational agenda, I’m really hope Welsh educationalists join us to hear how Wales could really set itself apart as a nation where all children get a chance to learn by making their own Digital Story at school.
P.S. There’s a bit of a flurry of posts this week as this is all info I want to make accessible before heading to Japan tomorrow.
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→ No CommentsTags: story · instruction · digital storytelling
That’s the title for a 30-minute documentary TV programme my colleague Melanie Lindsell has made with young Welsh climber Tori James about her attempt to climb Everest. The programme goes out on BBC Wales on 6 May (see below)
Melanie’s an experienced Video Nation producer and she’s also had success with longer-form documentaries using the self-authored ethos of Video Nation. Because I knew the kit would need to be lightweight, durable and able to work under harsh conditions, I asked Mel about the cameras and batteries she gave Tori. Here’s Mel’s reply:
BBC Mini DV Camera: Panasonic NV-GS150
· Weighs 400grams – they were able to hang it on a karabiner on a rucksack strap for easy access when climbing
· Lithium batteries – lasted 2-3 days in sub zero conditions. They kept spare batteries next to their skin to keep them warm and maintain charge
· Recharged batteries using solar panels
BBC Nokia N93
· Weight: 180 grams. attached another, smaller karabiner so that she could attach to a rucksack strap
· Battery lasted 1-2days, had to recharge using normal phone charge connected to the solar panels
Had access to car batteries at base camp from which to charge all electrical equipment. If away for 2 or 3 weeks without any charging facilities recommend taking something that uses Lithium batteries. Lithium retains its charge the longest in cold conditions.
Also took a modified mountain helmet cam.
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Transmission details : You can watch Tori’s expedition in ‘On Top of the World’, Tuesday, May 6, BBC 2W at 7pm. Or on Friday, May 9, BBC2W at 10pm. The programme will also be available on BBC iPlayer in the UK for seven days from May 6 BBC iPlayer website. BBC 2W is on digital satellite channel 991 outside Wales and 102 within Wales.
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→ 1 CommentTags: technology · mobile · digital storytelling
Back in 2003, BBC Wales organised an International Digital Storytelling Conference. Two of the many attendees travelled to Cardiff all the way from Japan to be with us:
1. Akiko Ogawa, Associate Professor at the Faculty of Studies on Contemporary Society at Aichi Shukutoko University and
2. Aske Dam a Norwegian participatory media specialist who has worked extensively in the Far East on developments in mobile technology.
This wasn’t the last time I met Akiko and Aske. They’ve both maintained a lively interest in Digital Storytelling developments in Wales. In fact, Akiko has returned to Wales twice: she came to a Digital Storytelling workshop we ran in Cardiff and she returned last year with a group of six or more other Japanese academics, engineers and broadcasters who are part of a group called Media Exprimo (http://www.mediaexprimo.jp/english/).
The members of Media Exprimo who came to the BBC with Akiko were:
As well as Capture Wales, the group also visited Cardiff University, Breaking Barriers and projects in Denmark.
In a few days time, I’m making a trip to Tokyo to take part in Mell Expo 2008 (http://www.mellplatz.com/info/info2008.html) and it’ll be great to meet these people once again.
Another member of Media Exprimo I’m very much looking forward to meeting for the first time is Shin Mizukoshi. He’s written some insightful pieces about populating the space between personal and commercial uses of communicative media with a new lively public space. In 2005, he defined media literacy thus:
“Activities for independent communication via media in an information society, and the technologies and knowledge that support these activities” - http://www.mode-prj.org/document/HongKong2005_1ppt.pdf .
Some of his work has been written jointly with Aske Dam as part of the MoDe project.
I love it when senior academics ask the kind of ‘what if’ questions about the significance of the fact that we can now carry around a really powerful all-in one broadcasting device in our hands. And not just the ‘what can we do with this?’ questions, but also the ‘what could we do to extend the device?’ and ‘what kinds of motivations might persuade individuals to exploit the full power of what they hold in their hand?’ kinds of questions.
At Mell Expo 2008 next weekend, I’m looking forward to showing the work the BBC Capture Wales did using computers, mobile phones and other devices. Most of all, I’m looking forward to finding out from Akiko, Media Exprimo, MoDe, etc. about the exciting work that’s going on in Japan in the field of media literacy, digital storytelling and ensuring people have access to a voice on the mass media.
I’ll post updates on this blog over the coming days.
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It’s by the BBC Capture Wales team and we wrote it to coincide with the Digital Storytelling Gathering tour around Wales last month. It’s on the BBC Wales Digital Storytelling website. Hope you find it useful.
Here’s a link to the html menu page on the BBC website. And here’s a link to the pdf download which has a bonus section by Lisa Heledd outlining various new forms of digital storytelling, together with instructions - DS Recipe Cards, kind of. The pdf currently lacks Simon Turner’s fantastic article about recording people’s voices.
Table of Contents:
Introduction
The ideal venue
Briefing participants
Find the story
Getting the story down on paper
Refining the story
Things to look out for when making a story
Equipment checklist
Computer basics
Taking digital photos
Voice recording
Editing your Digital Story
Sharing your Digital Story
(Bonus section in PDF download only)
Digital Storytelling forms with introduction
1. Four-day Digital Storytelling workshop
2. Shoebox Stories workshop
3. In the Frame
4. In a Flash
5. This is Where
6. Story Walks
Useful Links
Written by:
Gilly Adams: storycircle director Capture Wales.
Huw Davies: trainer and post producer Capture Wales.
Carwyn Evans: assistant producer Capture Wales.
Lisa Heledd: assistant producer Capture Wales.
Lisa Jones: project co-ordinator Capture Wales.
Karen Lewis, partnerships manager BBC Wales, former project
producer Capture Wales.
Daniel Meadows: Cardiff University, former creative director of BBC Capture Wales.
Gareth Morlais: project producer Capture Wales.
Simon Turner: Gloucester University, freelance sound recordist
with Capture Wales.
Photos by Carwyn Evans and Lisa Heledd.
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The Capture Wales team has been holding a series of five Digital Storytelling Gatherings around Wales. We’ve held them in Caernarfon, Aberystwyth, Swansea, Merthyr Tydfil and Cardiff. The final one - in Cardiff - was held today and it was fantastic!
More than 100 individuals who are actively involved in or interested in facilitating digital storytelling activities in Wales have attended these days. Each day has been a chance for people who are involved in this work to meet others in their area, to enjoy watching stories together, learn a little about the history of digital storytelling, hear about recruiting participants (by Carwyn Evans), thinking about issues around ownership of story constituents (by Lisa Jones), technical challenges, sharing completed stories (me:), etc.
Daniel Meadows joined us at lunchtime. Daniel conducted the research into the proliferation of digital storytelling projects in Wales and it’s thanks to him that we had a starting point when inviting people to attend these events. Earlier in the day we’d watched Daniel’s digital story Polyphoto - one of the first digital stories I ever saw and one that left a lasting impression on me.
Something Capture Wales team member Gilly Adams said today in her story section really caught my attention. She said that watching a digital story is a little like taking a walk on a dark night past a house where the owner has left the curtains open and the lights on - you get a special glimpse of life inside. Gilly also used a stepping-stones analogy, saying that telling a story like this is like crossing a river using stepping stones. You take a series of steps and yet when you reach the other side, you can still see the riverbank you set out from.
Capture Wales team member Lisa Heledd has been studying digital storytelling forms in detail for the past two years. This afternoon, she outlined several different forms of digital storytelling, saying that different forms unlock different types of story. As well as showing examples of stories she, Carwyn Evans and Huw Davies of the Capture Wales team have helped people to make using disposable cameras (In the Frame) and mobile phones, she showed examples of digital stories from Murmur Toronto, Postcard Secrets, Story Corps, etc. I’m looking forward to a presentation Lisa’s making tomorrow jointly with Susy Pratt at University of Glamorgan’s George Ewart Evans Centre for Storytelling Annual Lecture and Symposium 2008 - Storytelling and Authenticity.
At the end of the afternoon, we gave attendees two things to take home with them:
1. a box of long-handled cooks matches with instructions for the storycircle ‘match game’.
2. a booklet called ‘A Guide to Digital Storytelling by the Capture Wales team’. We’ll be publishing this guide on the Capture Wales website soon.
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→ No CommentsTags: Wales · story · instruction · digital storytelling
Happy St David’s Day
Here’s a short clip of a song sung by children at a school in south Wales to celebrate the national day of the patron saint of Wales, sung at Cardiff Castle on 1 March 2008. I’ve obscured the images of the children on purpose. Diolch i chi blant am godi calonnau pawb a gwneud i ni deimlo’n falch i fod yn Gymry.
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In the summer of 2007, my BBC Wales colleagues Carwyn Evans, Lisa Heledd, Robin Moore and I worked with Microsoft Research Centre via Participate in the testing of a prototype wearable camera called Sensecam.
Carwyn and Lisa gave Sensecam cameras and laptops to six people from south Wales from different backgrounds and with varying experience of digital media. They worked with Dave Randall and the teams at Microsoft Research, Participate and BBC Research & Innovation on a series of suggested tasks to test what it feels like to walk around all day with a device around your neck that captures automatic pictures every minute or less - and more often when you move or the light changes.
Before devising tasks we needed to work out for ourselves what the camera could do. Here’s a piece of reflective video I made myself using the Sensecam and the supplied software to make the visuals. I recorded the audio using a Nokia N93, edited the Sensecam image sequences into an .avi file using the supplied software and then edited the whole thing in iMovie.
I’m publishing this clip now that the findings of the experiment have been written up and published in the form of Harper, R., Randall, D., Smyth, N., Evans, C., Heledd. L. and Moore. R. Thanks for the Memory. HCI 2007. (Best paper award.)
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→ 1 CommentTags: capturing assets · digital storytelling
Between Christmas and New Year, we stayed with my brother in law Dylan’s family. Dylan’s wife had given him a camcorder for Christmas and he’d filmed his family opening and playing with their presents on Christmas morning. He played the disk back and it was interesting to watch how people construct home videos. What Dylan had shot was a documentary-style piece showing other people - but not Dylan himself - opening their presents. We did hear Dylan’s disconnected voice from behind the lens, giving a running commentary and asking questions to his subjects.
Watching this home video set me wondering about what Dylan might need to do to get what he’d shot at home out on TV.
Our team here at BBC Wales is part of the Video Nation project. Under Melanie Lindsell’s leadership we’ve helped around 80 people to get video they’ve shot themselves onto the web and/or BBC TV. One of the defining features of Video Nation shorts is that there’s a strong authorial voice. These are personal stories; you know whose story it is and you know they are holding the camera and - if they’re not holding it themself for a shot or two - you know who they’ve given it to hold or that they’ve propped it up to record a piece-to-camera.
Going back to Dylan’s video, all he’d need to do to have all the shots he needs to edit a Video Nation-style short is to stand his camcorder on a bookshelf, look into the lens and say something that sums up what he feels about what’s been unfolding in front of his camera. This will give meaning to the footage, will make this a truly personal story and turn his home video into a more engaging piece of viewing.
Yes, if that’s what he wants, by taking on the look and feel of the Video Nation genre Dylan has the potential to get his home video broadcast on TV. All we need now is a TV climate where such content is made more welcome. And I’m hoping that moment is just around the corner…
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I’m hoping this is useful to people working in museums or with film archives….
I’ve written about Rhondda Lives! here before. This is a Valleys Kids Project, supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund, BBC Wales and the National Sound and Screen Archive of Wales.
I led a workshop held at Valleys Kids’ Soar Chapel at the end of November. This was a novel kind of digital storytelling experience because it fits edited, considered but unscripted personal reminiscence with existing archive footage shot in the Rhondda Valley between 1926-1986 or so. I’ll post a link to the stories from Aberth when they’re live.
Step 1 - attend public screening at Valley’s Kids (2hours)
Step 2 - Katrina Kirkwood of Valley’s Kids followed leads - people who wanted to tell a story in the workshop by visiting them in their home for research and to take a photo (1 hour)
Step 3 - morning storycircle led by BBC’s Lisa Heledd; afternoon story audio recording (unscripted) by BBC’s Carwyn Evans I (8 hours). The storycircle came about from a suggestion by Carwyn Evans who’d seen an early pilot I’d made where people spontaneously reacted to particular clips. Carwyn felt the reflection time of both the visits made by Katrina and the time together in the storycircle would not only result in more engaging stories but would also help to build a sense of community, comeradeship and fun between the participants. He was right on all counts.
Step 4 - directing BBC video editor Carwyn Jones as he fits archive footage to edited story audio recording (2 hours)
Step 5 - public end-of-workshop screening (1 hour)
The total time commitment we ended up asking the storytellers to make was around 14 hours, over five different days, across two months.
I’m publishing this workshop model in case it’s of interest to others in the digital storytelling community.
Special thanks to the storytellers; to Carwyn Evans, Lisa Heledd, Carwyn Jones, Katrina Kirkwood and Lona Wharton who made up the workshop week team; and to others involved in the project, including: Leighton Andrews, Cath Allen, Aled Eurig, Liz Girling, Edith Hughes, Margaret Jervis, Lisa Jones, Karen Lewis, Denise Lord, Robin Moore, Richard Morgan, Gareth Morris, Tim Neale, Dewi Vaughan Owen, Dafydd Pritchard, Gwenda Richards, Andy Roberts and Iain Tweedale.
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→ 2 CommentsTags: Wales · story · instruction · empowerment · digital storytelling
Step 1: make your own a 60-second movie, based on the theme ‘unite’.
Step2: register and enter.
Step 3: there’s no Step 3.
P.S. here’s the film that won last year’s BAFTA. There’s a Wales category and winner too.
Popularity: 68% [?]
→ No CommentsTags: digital storytelling
The end-of-workshops screening - along with the storycircle - is everyone’s favourite part of the workshop. This afternoon at two at Valleys Kids, Soar Chapel, Penygraig, Rhondda, we’re holding the Rhondda Lives! screening and I’m really looking forward to it.
This week has been a fantastic one with ten people making a personal film with Valleys Kids using archive footage from BBC Wales and the National Screen and Sound Archive in a project funded by Heritage Lottery money. This project has been a lot of hard work for a lot of people and - seeing the stories that people have made - makes me realise it’s worth all the hard work. The stories they’ve told are fantastic!
I’ll reflect more about Rhondda Lives! in a future post and about different ways of facilitating storytelling using archive footage. For now, I just want to enjoy the anticipation of that final screening today.
Early on Monday morning, I’m taking a trip to Scotland organised by Susie Pratt of the George Ewart Evans Storytelling Centre at the University of Glamorgan. I’m looking forward to this, not least because it’ll be the first time I’ve ever been to Scotland. I’ll write about this trip next week.
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Hamish Fyfe: ‘I remember being in a classroom in Northern Ireland where the children were drawing. I noticed one little girl of about seven and asked her what she was drawing. “I’m doing a drawing of God” she said. I said I thought that was interesting since a lot of people didn’t really know what God looked like. “Oh”, she said, “that’s alright, they will in a minute”.’
That’s a story Prof. Fyfe told at University of Glamorgan last night as he set out his vision for society where there are exciting new spaces set out for the arts. He show digital stories and compared today’s You Tube age with the moment when Eastman invented the one dollar box Brownie Camera and vernacular photography was invented. He warned that changes need to be made in the way arts are integrated into society. Here’s a summary of my understanding of his manifesto for new social and creative literacies:
We need to find better ways to communicate with each other and to engage with artists and a range of forms. The creative needs of those who work in the socially engaged arts need to be met and there needs to be space for children and young people to more freely explore creativity for themselves, instead of those opportunities always being so highly structured. People who care about this need to speak out as advocates for the arts as a cultural right for everyone and there needs to be a climate in which people can interact both locally and internationally, take risks and experience creative transformations for themselves. (A summary of key points by Hamish Fyfe in his ‘Cycles of Affirmation - Art and Community in the New Century lecture. Look out for the full text of his lecture which, based on past experience, will probably be posted here.)
I don’t know about you, but that I think that sounds like an improvement on the society in which we currently live and, unlike many utopian visions, this one sounds deliverable.
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→ No CommentsTags: media literacy · empowerment · digital storytelling
When I lived in Ardfert, County Kerry, in the Republic of Ireland in the mid 90s, I remember a radio programme called ‘Queueing For A Living’ in which the presenter Paddy O’Gorman sought out queues of all kinds and recorded conversations he had with those waiting. From laundrettes to prison waiting rooms, there was something about the stories that came out of those everyday situations and people spoke of things I hadn’t heard many people speak of on radio before.
I think Professor Hamish Fyfe of University of Glamorgan would have enjoyed that programme too. I’m looking forward to attending his inaugural professorial lecture this evening at the Glamorgan Business Centre, University of Glamorgan, Trefforest CF37 1DL.
Hamish is a fellow member of DS Cymru and the University of Glamorgan and BBC Wales are collaborating in research into forms of digital storytelling and participative media. I last heard Hamish speak formally at the University at the conclusion of The George Ewart Evans Centre for Storytelling 2007 Research Seminar series on 14th June 2007. In that seminar, “Habits of the Heart” Storytelling and Everyday Life, he compared digital storytelling with the Mass Observation movement. He showed half a dozen digital stories and a 1930s Humphrey Jennings film. You can read the text of that lecture here (pdf file).
It’s fascinating to have the bloodline of what we’re doing in digital storytelling today traced by Hamish from Surrealism, though Mass Observation, via the radio ballards to a new book by Joe Moran called ‘Queuing for Beginners’. Moran (as does O’Gorman) revels in the everyday, routine and the ordinary - but not in the negative sense of these words.
And Hamish (as does Moran) wants the everyday and the ordinary to be taken more seriously by academics and by the mainstream. Because I think we can learn a lot by paying greater attention to the stories people tell in their digital stories.
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→ No CommentsTags: story · digital storytelling
University of Leeds is advertising two fully-paid PhD scholarships, one of which will be about “Digital storytelling and political engagement”. I studied media management with this university’s Institute of Communications Studies and it’s a great department and a fabulous place to study and live. (Link to application from on ri
