Florida State College Students Use iPad 2 to Create Multimedia Masterpieces

Students in Marc Boese’s spring Fundamentals of Digital Video class are going to be going where no man has ever gone before. Well ok, where no student has ever gone before, at least here at Florida State College at Jacksonville. They’re going to take a video class without cameras! Not standard video cameras anyway.

This term, the students will do all of their work on iPad2s. Unlike most classes that use the iPads only during class times, though, these students will check theirs out like library books, and keep them for the entire semester. Then they’ll use them for everything from screen writing and pre-production, to shooting their films (with a special app to enhance the iPad’s camera) and editing them. They’ll even use GarageBand to create their own original soundtracks.

This project is a new way to learn says Boese, who’s working on his PhD in Educational Technology. The all-in-one approach allows students to take advantage of new technologies, while keeping their own costs under control, since they won’t have to supply their own cameras and editing equipment.

As for the students themselves, they’re not exactly whom Boese expected. “Some of our other majors are taking this as an elective and going ‘Hey – this would be a really good elective,’” he says. “So it’s going to be a really interesting combination of Digital Media Arts students and a nursing student or someone else who doesn’t have much experience in digital media.” A new frontier for all!

Robin Herriff, Digital Media Productions

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While students in the Digital Media program will learn how to shoot and edit on high-end industry standard equipment, Professor Boese says this is an intro course. This course focuses on the creative storytelling and process using video to tell a story. Additionally, for communication students, Boese says this is a great way to introduce the means for "one-man banding".  Not a believer?  We'll feature student iPad 2 projects on The Network this spring and let you decide.  

Click here to read USA Today's story: iPad 2 Offers Aspiring Movie Makers the Whole Package