PLA MULTIMEDIA PROJECT SELIA KARSTEN JANUARY, FEBRUARY 1994 1. DEVELOPMENT OF CD ROM AND WORKBOOK A production meeting was held to establish the roles and responsibilities regarding the project. Carol, Marilyn, Allan and Lynda joined me for this meeting. We first went over a preproduction check list to see what was needed to be ready for the students. (attached) Lynda Jones agreed to do the authoring and Allan will lend technical support. Carol Henry continues to administer the budget and Marilyn Welsh is the consultant to the CD ROM and workbook. In January interviews were held for students interested in a field placement on the project. These are third year School of Communication Arts students. The placements are for two six-week periods, creating original computer graphics to illustrate the text. Lynda Jones and Allan Booth took part in the interview and portfolio viewing process. Each candidate was assigned 16 thumbnail sketches for a Storytime component of their choice. Selections were made based on their response to the assignment. Team One - January 17 - February 25 Nelson Caetano was assigned the Storytime components. His illustrations of the animals will be drawn first then scanned in and coloured, and backgrounds will be added. Robert Lyons was assigned the Activity components. He will assemble photocollage, combining it with computer graphics for these screens. Team Two - February 28 - April 15 Stavroula Laloudakis is to be assigned the Theory component - illustrations that enhance the text but limit any use of the human figure in order to keep pictures non-sex, race or age specific. Dan Barbosa is to be assigned the Role Model components - He will use photos of the leading characters taken by me on the TVO Live and Learn shoot. He will create backgrounds for these pictures to illustrate the text. PLA-MM Jan/Feb 94 -page 2 Initially, a volunteer student was brought in to do the workbook layout. Her skills were not advanced enough to handle the assignment and there was no other available work at her skills level. She received some career counselling and was offered aptitude testing in future. The search continues for an additional student to do the workbook layout. I met with Roberta Burke for revision of the workbook, part two. Subsequent to our session, she typed the revision and sent the disk and hard copy to Seneca. Team One came in for orientation and an overview of the creative concepts. They were given text scripts and storyboards to work from. Allan supplied a guide to file formatting. Students were given the freedom to set up their own schedules for working on the Mac in the project office. Assignments were given on a weekly basis with regular due dates for both roughs and completed screen graphics. During the two weeks of the TVO shoot, I kept in contact with the two students to check on their progress with graphics for the CD ROM. Each week they were assigned one component of 17 screens and the roughs for another component. In the final weeks of the first placement, the work was reviewed and revisions were made. Also during this time, Lynda worked with Marilyn on the navigation of the screens. It was suggested that the linkages be rewritten and immediately following the work with TVO I did a major revision following their suggestions. I found however, that this revision distorted the overall concept of the program as originally designed. After further consultation, it was agreed that I would do another complete revision of the text for the program. Colleen Curruthers, Portfolio Development instructor at Seneca, agreed to meet with me to go over these revisions so that the instructional material was consistent with Portfolio Development course content. Following the TVO shoot, my time was divided between monitoring student work and revising text for the program. PLA-MM Jan/Feb -page 3 2. TVO SERIES During the month of January I met with producer, Fraser Steele, and director, Les Nirenberg, to audition talent for the four half-hour docudramas. Fraser had held preliminary auditions so that we sat only at callbacks for three to five of the top candidates for each part. The leading characters are as follows: Leslie Yeo plays George, Sandi Ross plays Beverley, Beatriz Pizano plays Elena, Simon Sinn plays Simon. Principles include Linda Gorenson as Shaaron, David Chant as Mr. Chung, Carol Greyeyes as Terri Redbird, Jacqueline McCleod as Century College administrator, Vicki Papavs as clerk, Ron Nigrini as instructor, Discente Diaz and Nelson Furtado play Elena's husband and son, Walter Boone plays Tony - a friend of Beverley's and Joe Sealy plays Alvin Reynolds, a friend of Simon's. There were a number of extras selected as well by Fraser's assistant Gordon and myself. I went on a number of location scouts with Les Nirenberg. A Chinese herb shop on Dundas West near Kensington was chosen as Simon's store, Kinko's on Bloor West near Spadina was selected as well as the coffee shop located at 606 King West. When nothing else suitable could be located, my own apartment became the location for Elena's house. Sheppard campus was chosen for two days of shooting of Century College interiors. Exteriors were at George Brown College. Two days of rehearsals with the leading characters were held at my home. Lynn Harrison, the writer, and I took part in any revisions necessary and Lynn wrote a shooting script based on these. Preliminary blocking was done for scenes that would be located in George's apartment or Elena's apartment. The location shooting began January 31 for five days. Wallace Studios was used for the second week of shooting. I attended the entire shoot, acting as both location manager and as script consultant. There was a large crew of twenty plus. The crew consisted of director, production manager, assistant director, two production assistants, a production secretary, director of photography, cameramen, technical director, sound man, boom man, electricians, grips, labourers, drivers, costume crew, makeup and hair crew, art director, props, and caterers. Two large trucks brought in the lighting and sound equipment, props and costumes. The call each day was 8 am and work frequently went until mid-evening. PLA-MM Jan/Feb -page 4 The producer, Fraser Steele, visited the set and on one occasion brought in the head of distance learning at TVO, Rita Caracas and her assistant. Long days resulted in overtime, and costs went well over budget. The amount of script shot each day exceeded the usual amount for such a series. I was consulted about changes the affected the educational content. During location shooting, especially at Seneca - I was very active in assisting the production while facilitating on-going work for the Seneca staff and students. Of course I was the key resource when the shooting took place in my own home. At the studio, I sat with the director and took part in decision-making regarding the look of the shots as they were set up and rehearsed. I also was taking pictures throughout the shoot. I concentrated on pictures of the four leading characters, taking approximately 150 pictures during the two week period. From these, 68 have been selected for use in the CD ROM. It was ascertained that as these pictures were being used for educational support materials that ACTRA's agreement with TVO would support this use of the actor's images. TVO's own photographer took pictures as well for use in TVO's promotion of the series. PLA-MM Jan/Feb 94 -page 5 SUMMARY This two month period has been a very intense and busy time. I found it quite challenging to launch the CD ROM production and monitor it's progress while at the same time, taking a very active role in the production of the TVO series. By the end of February, the CD ROM had a template, designed by Lynda and a first version of a tutorial on the use of the buttons and windows. Lynda's first navigational version was put aside pending the final revision of text. This revision makes the initial concept for navigation perfectly clear. She is now working on the model for the introduction and first module. Once a model is in place for one module, the other modules will follow this same format. The first series of graphics produced by Team One are all on file. An evaluation of this work was done with the students, John Choate of SCA, and myself. I have written evaluation letters to the field placement coordinator, Johanne Daoust, and the students received copies of these letters wich commend them for their excellent contribution to the CD ROM. The Ministry of Education and Training has agreed to make extra funds available so that there are two hard drives available for storing the files of the two versions of the CD ROM. Allen continues to give technical support to the project, assisting the students when needed and backing up all files. Preparations have been made for Allan and myself to present a paper on multiplatform multimedia development, using this project to demonstrate that concept. The presentation will be made in Jacksonville, Florida at the Fifth National Conference on College Teaching and Learning - the the theme is "Teaching, Learning and Technology : The 21st Century". I have been granted financial assistance from the Centre for Teaching and Learning and from PLA to attend this conference. Louis Lizotte, Ministry of Education and Training is also setting up a presentation of the work to date on the CD ROM at the Council of Regents in mid-March. At this meeting, I have been asked to discuss multimedia proposals with other colleges involved in PLA pilot projects. PLA-MM Jan/Feb 94 page 6 I have established a Production Book which includes all versions of text, the storyboard, copies of student graphics, and hard copy of the workbook. This book serves as a resource and chronicle for the project. A copy of the script for the TVO series is also available to the students as they prepare their work. I continue to do my work on the Amiga 4000, the students use the Mac for graphics and the PC will be used for the workbook. I attend IMDA and ABUG meetings and access the ABUG BBS for support on the Amiga platform. I have had several tutorials with computer instructor, Tom Metcalfe regarding the Amiga. Attached: Preproduction Notes Production Schedule