The Wrath of Khan: 21st Century Education Genesis

Sal Khan has been getting quite a bit of attention lately. He’s been featured on Jon Udell’s blog, described by Bill Gates as his, “favorite teacher,” and awarded a $2 million grant by Google. He makes mathematics screencasts, thousands of them, inside a closet, in his house. His math videos have had over twenty-five million views and his YouTube channel has over seventy-five thousand subscribers. Let’s repeat that again – he’s one person teaching thousands of students math from a closet inside of his house using YouTube and screencasting software. That’s education, 21st century style, my friends.

Imagine the potential of our cognitive surplus. It’s not a pipe dream, it’s happening today. And Kahn isn’t alone. YouTube is rife with people teaching each other how to do things, whether it’s using software, changing the oil in their lawn mower, or the typical middle / high school curriculum fare. Where we learn and how we teach has been and continues to change rapidly. It’s up to us to recognize and grasp the tremendous opportunity that we have. Carpe diem. Seize the day, people of the world. Let’s make the educational opportunities of the 21st century extraordinary.

Check out the Khan Academy in action:

3d Screencasting: Episode IV – The Magic of Inverted Masks

If we’re going to pull off this 3d screencasting gig we’ll need to clean up our screen recording footage and make our 3d window disappear. It’s going to be animating and exploding after all, which means we can’t have a copy of it just hanging around on the desktop all the time. That calls for some magic. The kind that would make Harry Potter proud.

Now, I know what you’re thinking–this cat’s gone off the deep end. He’s read too many fantasy adventure novels and has swallowed the whole magical powers bit hook, line and sinker. You’re right about that last part, but in reality working with After Effects is akin to being handed Harry Potter’s wand, and the rotoscoping / masking techniques you’re learning in this series are a Defence Against the Dark Arts crash course. In 3d Screencasting Episode IV we’re going to be dashing around our screen footage, inverting masks and disappearing windows. It’s not learning. It’s magic! ;-)

Without further ado, it’s time to climb aboard my little screencasting wizards, we’re going for a magic carpet ride!

If you’d like to use the assets in this tutorial and view a completed After Effects sample project you can download the files here.

3d Screencasting Episodes

1. Episode I – It Ain’t Your Daddy’s Screencasting
2. Episode II – Rotoscope Our Problems Away
3. Episode III – Building a Screenshot / Screen Video Sandwich
4. Episode IV – The Magic of Inverted Masks
5. Episode V – Killer Animated Windows
6. Episode VI – Ultra Cool Shadows & Motion Blur

3d Screencasting: Episode III – Building a Screenshot / Screen Video Sandwich

Hungry for killer screencasting chops? You’ve come to the right place. In 3d Screencasting: Episode III we’re going to combine our transparent Snagit 10 screenshots and Camtasia Studio video footage to create an independent window that can be animated in 3d space. I like to to think of it as making an open face sandwich–the Snagit screenshots are the bread and the screen video is the yummy content that sits on top.

To build this sandwich, we’ll use the rotoscoping skills we acquired in Episode II to trim away screen video footage that we don’t want and expose our transparent window frame. Once we’re done editing we’ll pre-compose our layers together into a single composition (layer) that can be easily repositioned, scaled, or exploded (hells to the yah, as the kids in here in the States say). Whet your appetite and dig in!

If you’d like to use the assets in this tutorial and view a completed After Effects sample project you can download the files here.

3d Screencasting Episodes

1. Episode I – It Ain’t Your Daddy’s Screencasting
2. Episode II – Rotoscope Our Problems Away
3. Episode III – Building a Screenshot / Screen Video Sandwich
4. Episode IV – The Magic of Inverted Masks
5. Episode V – Killer Animated Windows
6. Episode VI – Ultra Cool Shadows & Motion Blur

Canadian Invasion Brings Michigan to a Standstill

Here in Michigan we spend our summers battling Canadian tourists:

The Bacon Chronicles: Drawing A Crowd With Bacon Lollipops

I don’t get the bacon craze, but its descended to new lows. From the TechSmith tent at the local carnival we offer up maple-bacon lollipops for your viewing (and eating) pleasure:

If you’re feeling your inner freak coming on stop by the 360Flex TechSmith booth for some organic, cured pork embedded in a salty maple hard candy; on a stick.