I have been working on OpenSourceCPD a bit recently. Mostly working on the On-site Cpd Opportunities. Nearly everything is labelled first draft being work in progress but I guess that is the beauty of a wiki.

Yesterday I knocked out a rough version of the first of some guides to Online Tools. This covers the basic use of Picnik the online image editor. I used Picnik a couple of times with my class last session and was please with how easy it was for children to use. The course (or cpd opportunity) at OpenSourceCPD just goes over the basic use of Picnik and has a few ideas about using it in school. Very much a first draft at the moment, feedback is welcome in the comments or via email.

For the first time on the OpenSourceCPD site I’ve made use of a screencast. I’ve made a few of these before elsewhere and used the smartnote book recorder to make instructional videos for the children at school but this time I used an application new to me ScreenFlow.

ScreenFlow is a mac application that allows you to record your screen, audio from the mac and a mic (you can also record from an isight). It then allows you to edit the video and export to quicktime. The editing is very slick, you can auto highlight the main window, the mouse or zoom and pan the video. You can add other images, video and audio. I had a bit of trouble with my mic and recorded the audio over the original footage without too much bother. I am not completely happy with the result (and may redo it ) but that is more to do with me than screenflow, my previous efforts were much shorter, smaller and without a voice over. I think I was trying to go a little too quickly to make for good instruction.

As ever I’d be interested in feedback about OpensourceCPD and the screencast not only the content but the playback as it is a H.264 movie and nearly 30mb.

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