ANIMOTO

This week you are in for a treat! May I introduce to you the first Animoto slideshow, produced by none other than RBug Productions......

Animoto is an awesome tool used to create slideshows. All of the images in the video have been given permission by the author to use or modify. I found all the images using the handy dandy Google images search tool. I had no idea you could narrow the search to find only images that were free to use! That is so cool! Google never ceases to amaze me. Animoto is so simple to use. I didn't subscribe to the full version, so I am sure there are a lot of other features to it. The ease of use, straight forward layout and production quality were enough to earn it a branch on my PLE for sure. I have used Prezi in the past, but I found Animoto to be much easier to navigate. I even had the opportunity to work with another tool this week to create my logo (as seen at the beginning and end of the video). I used Sketchpad 3.7 to create the image.

This tool takes a little bit of time to figure out, but there are so many options and fun thing to try, you really can get caught up in all of the creative avenues it has to explore. I especially like the spray paint feature! This exercise furthers my explorations into becoming a full functioning digital citizen. The process of searching through copyright images and free use images really made me aware of the importance of researching every aspect of what you are including in your work. Creating work of my own and posting it to my blog also creates a feeling of ownership. I am really starting to understand how people must feel when creating work for the world to see and not wanting it to be taken and passed off as work they did. There is a certain pride attached to your work, and being recognized for it is like receiving a pat on the back for a job well done!