Tamaki Today - 2008 the Technical.

Everything on Tamaki Today that was featured as a video was recorded the same way. We had a single Sony Camera that recorded everything onto tape. Using a standard Firewire Cable the material was then transferred onto Laptop and the footage was edited using Microsoft Movie Maker. Moviemaker was great - one we were a PC school and two the students pretty quickly were able to edit and put together the movies themselves!

From the outset an attempt to 'Brand' the material was created by using Photostory to create a five second introduction. This animation was of a still picture that I took in 2003 of the 'Settlers' statue in Victoria Street, Hamilton, with a Tamaki School Uniform draped over the dog. The music that went with it was a five second burst of the official 'Mooloo Song' introduction from the Waikato Rugby Union (its a Cowbell Ringing). The closing credit is just a repeat of the banner from the Blog, with a five second burst of the intro to "Can't stand me now" off The Libertines second album. This proved to be useful as once I began uploading the material it was taken down and then spread elsewhere. I've since seen it taken/re cut/passed on to three separate locations, with the credits intact which has been great for continual traffic for the site.

I know there's much better software out there for production, Moviemaker never being anyone's favorite really, but it suited me, and I also wanted to guarantee access to the software, with the students eventually taking ownership for the editing (which they were able to do). It was not my intention to start churning out so much material but once it caught on with the students I was really happy for them to run with it. We also gained a way in which we could share events with our school and students, such as having an event broadcast and saved online.


The video above gives you a pretty good idea of how the 'Learn to Speak Samoan' Series was developing. I'd need to brainstorm with the students a rough idea (or more often that not they'd come with the idea) we'd view the script and then make sure the translation was correct (it did concern me that we'd have a problem with a word and teach something incorrectly I had a teacher aide who was fluent in Samoan check all the spelling before we put the credits on and published any material) and then film it. Something like this video, and in fact nearly every video in the series (which ended up being over 25) was recorded in one take. Occasionally we'd have a retake shot, but then it would be of the whole video rather than one particular scene. The idea was to get the video out and produce it quickly. Not for me endless retakes and re shooting to make sure there was a high degree of professionalism (resulting in telephones ringing, people walking onto shot, people in the background, noise etc) I felt much better to get it out quickly and get it out in short. Three minutes was the absolute maximum for a video too. Never produced a video longer in the past two years I don't think (we'll maybe four tops!)

The rest of the material that was online was effectively slide shows and the like that were primarily through Bubbleshare (before it went offline, which was a shame) which the students seemed to enjoy. That and the small matter of some language videos, which the site is probably best remembered for.