iPod Nano video camera in professional development...who knew?

This iPod Nano Video workshop has just been named Best of CUE, as evaluated by the attendees and participants of the CUE 2010 Conference in Palm Springs.

It's pretty easy to be a snob about video cameras if you went to film school. It's a Hi-Def, progressive-scanned, 1080i pixel resolutioned, cine-geek's wonderland! I have learned since then, most often by necessity, that good work can be done with the simplest tools at hand.  
So when I was challenged by my friends at the recent Computer Using Educators Conference to present a Lights, Camera, Learn! workshop featuring the video camera on the new iPod nano , I was intrigued.

This new 5g iPod Nano is certainly cool, it boasts a video camera, FM radio, pedometer among its extra features and absent a world with flying cars, the new nano is strong proof that the future is here! It captures certainly 'good enough', cell-phone quality video and sound, but it's so light and small you wonder if a strong gust of wind might blow it away let alone allow you to shoot steady enough video to be useful for anything beyond goofing around at a birthday party.

If The Professor could take a couple of coconuts and make a nuclear reactor or McGyver disable a spy satellite with a shoelace and pack of gum then I can teach the Door Scene to a conference audience with an iPod!


Hold your camera with both hands, rehearse your shots & have fun with some of the effects was all this group really needed to team up and run with our 3 hour mini-film school in Palm Springs. A few basic moves and the iPod's easy download to a recently refreshed iMovie made for a surprisingly productive and downright fun workshop for everyone. This one project in particular I think made excellent narrative use of the Nano's on-board effects suite. Have a look, I hope you ordered your Door Scene 'extra creepy'!


Moral of the story is a parable for teaching and learning in the digital age. It's not the size of your mega-pixels that matter, it's what you download with them that counts!