Indiana University: IT Training Tips Blog

One of the effects used infrequently back in the day was the split screen.  Using the split screen, filmmakers could make it appear as if the same actor was on screen twice (see "The Parent Trap"). This required the camera to stay perfectly stationary and the lighting to be identical. Most of the time, this effect was used as a gimmick, and as time has gone on, filmmakers have gotten a lot more sophisticated effects, including computer controlled cameras that can be used to make much more complex effects that accomplish the same goal(the same actor on screen multiple times), but also allows the camera to move, and actors to move in front of each other and even interact with each other.

But since I don't have a fancy computer controlled camera, I decided to do this old school.  It's actually pretty simple in After Effects.  Check out the final result:

See how to do it yourself after the break.

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As a web designer, developer, or administrator, are you constantly managing simple requests to change page content for nontechnical team members ? If so, you may find Adobe InContext Editing useful. InContext Editing gives clients and nontechnical team members the ability to update website content without having to learn any HTML. Potentially, this could save you a lot of time in updating web pages, providing time-consuming training, or recovering from user mistakes.

InContext Editing is an online service that designers may use to  allow content editors and publishers to update website content directly through their browsers — without compromising design integrity. Your team members won't need to learn HTML, nor even install extra software. And for now, it is free.

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After all the great feedback we received from the IU community, the decision was made to extend the Lynda.com pilot to June 30th of 2010.  That means that the IU community gets an extra 6 months of free Lynda.com access.

So please keep using the service and let us know how it works for you!

Check out http://ittraining.iu.edu/lynda for more information and to log in.

How do I love thee, Google? Let me count the ways...

• Search engine is extremely effective
• Couldn't have made it through grad school without Google Scholar
• Gmail provides a massive amount of storage space and unlimited number of free accounts
• Google Earth is awesome
• Picasa is the best free photo editing application available
• Google's translate tool makes it possible for me to send messages to my Spanish-speaking friends, even though I know very little Spanish
• The company is creative and not afraid of looking silly (the constantly changing image on the search page proves this)

...and if that isn't enough, a few days ago Google announced that they would provide free Wi-Fi in airports around the country through January 15, 2010.  That confirms it. My heart now officially belongs to Google!

To see a list of the 47 participating airports, or to read more about this recent announcement, click on the image below:

If you have been using Twitter for a while, your Twitter Home page is probably becoming a blinding  jumble of unrelated messages. Because all your feeds pour into the same space, you need to do a lot of weeding to find what you want--that is, if you have the patience. Now, with the new Lists feature, Twitter allows you to categorize and filter tweets in any way you like. Just create and name one or more Lists and then assign people you are following to your various Lists.

Here's how:

In your Twitter space, click the Profile link at the top of the page. Under your username, click the Lists   button and choose New List. You can name your list anything, and make it Public or Private.

Once you have one or more lists, in the "Following" section on the right of your Profile, click the View All link. To the right of each of your followed usernames is a List button:   Click this button to see your lists, and then assign the selected username to a list.

Your Lists appear in the right section of your Home or Profile. Click a list to see only tweets that have been assigned to that list.

It seems like every device these days includes a video camera.  Cell phones, music players, laptops and more all include easy to use video cameras.  Along with this, consumer level cameras are becoming cheaper and more powerful all the time.  But what to do with all of that video?  Well IT Training is here to help.  Starting next week, we'll begin teaching on video topics with the following workshops on 11/4 and 11/5:

Video Basics - An Overview of Tools and Resources - In this workshop, Donna Jones will discuss the basics of video, starting with a discussion of cameras, and what features to look for, and then using Windows Movie Maker to edit a short video.  While working on editing the video, the process of shooting a movie will be discussed, including setting up lighting, getting good quality audio, and setting up good shots.  Donna will also discuss some simple ways to make your production look more professional.

After Effects: Text Animation and Video Basics - Adobe After Effects is an animation program focused on video production which allows you to combine video and animations into a single project and then export it into many common video formats. In this workshop, Andy Hunsucker will guide you through the creation of a short movie trailer that combines text animation, video, and background music, along with some animations created entirely within After Effects.  Participants will get a chance to spend time working in the interface, and learn the basics of the animation system and the effects system.

See the workshop descriptions to sign up.  If you can't make it next week, we're doing a rerun on 11/17 and 11/18.  And don't forget about the same workshops being held at IUPUI.

You can learn to use IU’s Oncourse Reorder Tools feature, or get training on how to conduct a Tandberg videoconference, by watching IU IT Training and Education’s award-winning tutorials.

In October IT Training & Education from Indiana University received awards for two training videos at the Fall ACM-SIGUCCS Conference in St. Louis, MO. ACM-SIGUCCS stands for The Association Computing Machinery Special Interest Group on University and College Computing Services; it is an international group of professionals involved in the support of information technology at institutions of higher education.

The communication awards were given in Category 3b: Electronic How-to Guides: http://www.siguccs.org/Conference/Fall2009/award_winners.html . Click "Read the rest of this entry," below, to see the tutorials.

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A flu epidemic or service outage due to weather can cause serious disruption of classes. IU has designed a new instructional resource to help instructors match their preferred teaching techniques with IU-supported technologies. The web site, structured around best practices of teaching, provides instructors with information about remote teaching and collaboration technologies, and supplies directions on where to get help from a consultant.
Check out the resources at: http://keepteaching.iu.edu/

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On October 29th, IT Training & Education and Adobe will be offering three special Acrobat hands-on workshops taught by Steve Adler, an Acrobat Field Specialist from Adobe. These special workshops are being offered at no cost to IU students, faculty and staff, and are intended to complement our regular Acrobat workshop offerings and take you deeper into key features.

This is a rare opportunity to get in-depth hands-on Acrobat training direct from the source, on topics that aren't normally covered in our IT Training & Education workshops. The workshops (with brief description and schedule information) are:

Enhanced ePortfolios Using Adobe Acrobat 9 - October 29th, 9-11am in Wells Library, rm. W302

Teaches how to organize and gather information from a variety of sources, collaborate and share documents in real-time, and collect and manage feedback in a single PDF document. Also shows how to include video, audio, interactivity and assessment in a single PDF wrapper.

Creating and Distributing Forms with Adobe Acrobat 9 - October 29th, 12:30-2:30pm in Kelly School of Business, rm. CG0030

Teaches how to use Acrobat 9 (and the included Adobe LiveCycle Designer) to convert existing forms into intelligent, interactive documents that reduce re-keying and errors; also shows how Acrobat's workflows can improve distribution, data collection, and analysis.

Achieving Efficiencies in collaboration and instruction with Acrobat 9 - October 29th, 3-5pm in Kelly School of Business, rm. CG0030

Participants will learn how to use Acrobat as a collaboration tool. Acrobat allows users to both view a document remotely and comment on it at the same time. This workshop will focus on how to these features can be used by faculty and students in the classroom.

You can find full descriptions and register for each workshop by clicking the title of the workshop above, or you can visit http://ittraining.iu.edu/Acrobat to see all IT Training STEPS workshops in Acrobat and register for the ones of your choice. Please contact us with any questions, and we hope to see you there.

What is videoconferencing?

Videoconferencing enables groups of people at different locations to see and hear each other at the same time. This technology allows users to conduct meetings, teach courses, and collaborate in real time at any distance. To participate in a group videoconference, you must be using videoconferencing hardware and software.

What videoconferencing resources are available at IU?

Indiana University faculty and staff can schedule any of the 228 videoconferencing systems located across IU campuses. Video calls from IU are not limited to IU campuses, however; calls can be made to locations around the world that have compatible videoconferencing systems.

IU maintains special pricing on the Tandberg MXP-series high-definition videoconferencing system. Therefore, this is the recommended and supported group videoconferencing system.

Where can I get training on the Tandberg videoconferencing system?

You can watch a video tutorial on the Tandberg videoconferencing system at IU, at:
http://ittraining.iu.edu/online/tutorials/tandbergFinal/index.htm

Where can I get more information?

The IU Knowledge Base has information about videoconferencing at IU at: http://kb.iu.edu/data/ajtt.html.