In one of the TEL workshops entitled: the pedagogy and production for video I wanted academic to to learn and understand the key concepts of using video as part of their teaching/courses. For this we did not want the complexities of video production to get in the way of creating a video. In this workshop we wanted the academics to create something and learn through their experiences but not get bogged down with issues such as file formats, importing video, aspect ratios, and the list goes on.
This is where iMovie for iPad comes in. This is a cut down video editing app that allows users to film, edit, and publish all from the iPad.
What I like about the app is its simplicity, as this has been redesigned for use on a tablet. The Application does a lot of the heaving lifting; automatically putting in animations when adding text and and providing a range of creative transitions between scenes. This said the simplicity of the app means that is is rather limited in functionality.
the positives:
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Essentially this is a one stop shop for creating video all the steps can be done within the app.
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The interface is simple to use, accompanied with a convenient help button that will highlight how to interact with the clips and options.
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import and export of video has been significantly simplified
The Negatives:
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If the photos and video are not on the iPad it is quite difficult to get them into iMovie.
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Recording on the iPad mean being limited to the iPad lens: no optical zoom.
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Limited editing features in comparison to desktop equivalents.
I think that an ap like this is truly simple enough for anyone to use, and this app can be used to teach the fundamentals of video production without the technology getting in the way that can otherwise make it a timely and complicated endeavor. I do think that as people get proficient at this app they might find the choice of themes limiting and may want to migrate to a desktop video editing system. This is not a bad thing as having learned the fundamentals of video editing will make more complicated software much less intimidating.
iMovie logo: Copyright Apple, sourced wikipedia
