Resources

I use Pinboard to bookmark interesting websites related to ENGL 3844, but I will try to add the most important resources to this page. If you’d like me to add a link to this page, just let me know.

Virginia Tech Resources

• Lynda.com (Free software tutorials)
• InnovationSpace
• Student Software Distribution
• VT Google Apps Portal

Image Editing Software

• Pixlr (free web-based image editor)
• GIMP (free multiplatform image editing software)

Public Domain and Creative Commons Images

• Wikipedia’s list of public domain image resources
• Creative Commons image search
• stock.xchng
• Library of Congress American Memory project
• Wikimedia Commons
• Google Advanced Image Search

Video

• Turn a PowerPoint Presentation into a Video (Windows)
• Turn a PowerPoint Presentation into a Video (Mac)
• Windows Movie Maker (relatively easy to use, but it can be buggy; several different versions available)
• iMovie (relatively easy to use, but I recommend keeping your project on a single computer the whole time; to move your project, follow these instructions)
• Stupeflix (web-based editor; easy to use, but not very powerful)
• Mozilla PopcornMaker (web-based editor; OK for very basic videos, but limited in what it can do)
• Prelinger Archive of public domain video clips
• Creative Commons’ wiki-based list of video resources
• Suggested resolutions and bitrates for uploading to YouTube

Audio

• Audacity
• Creative Commons’ featured list of sites that offer “legal music for videos”
• Free Music Archive
• Freesound
• Sound Cloud’s archive of tracks with Creative Commons licenses
• 7 Sources of Creative Commons Audio For Podcasts
• Creative Commons’ wiki-based list of audio resources

Sample Video Narratives

• “What You Wanted,” by Genevieve Critel
• “Memory Test,” by Leasa Burton
• “Persistence of Vision,” by Tim Lockridge
• “Ironing,” by Ryan Trauman
• “Rhetoric, Christmas Cards, and Infertility: A Season of Silence,” by Kristin L. Arola
• “High Voltage Cable Inspection,” by simonjz05
• “Holy Cow Lisa,” by Bianca Giaever
• “Home Movies,” by Dana Atchley
• A collection of video narratives on Vimeo.
• YouTube channel for The Center for Digital Storytelling

Tap Essays

• Tapestry (the software we’ll use for our tap essays)
• Tips and Tricks for Better Stories: Working with Text
• Tips and Tricks for Better Stories: Using Color
• Tips and Tricks for Better Stories: Pacing Stories

Sample Tap Essays

• “Fish,” by Robin Sloan (the one that started it all)
• “Passion,” by Gary Vaynerchuk
• “The Jump,” by Dominic Basulto
• “Don Saltero’s Coffeehouse: Or a Secret History of the Museum,” by Brooke S. Palmieri
• “The Italics,” by Robin Sloan
• “Subcompact Publishing,” by Craig Mod
• “Why Ernest Hemingway Once Told John Updike Literary New York Is a Bottle Full of Tapeworms Trying to Feed on Each Other,” by Lauren Leto
• “Don’t Chase the Ball,” by Ryan Skinner
• “Cricket & Mud Brick,” by Senongo
• “Why Nikola Tesla Was the Greatest Geek Who Ever Lived,” by The Oatmeal
• “What We Don’t Know,” by anonymous
• “Lessons from a Dog,” by Patrick Moberg
• “Graduation,” by anonymous
• “Anaheim, CA,” by Nicole Robichaux

Cascading Style Sheets

• CodePen
• Kuler (for generating color schemes)
• A Beginner’s Guide to HTML and CSS
• CSS Basics
• CSS Font Stack Generator
• CSS Text Shadow Generator