My college (UC Berkeley) has a really cool program called deCal where basically any students can set up a course on almost any topic and people can take it for general education credits.
I've been wanting to start a Practical DV Filmmaking deCal for a while now and only recently did I managed to solve the logistic problems (I think). Now I'm putting together a detailed proposal so that I can start looking for a faculty sponsor and get the ball rolling. If all goes as plan the course will open in the spring.
What I liked to do is get your inputs on the kind of things that I should include in the 8-9 weeks curriculum (once a week for 2 hours). Keep in mind that the people who will signed up aren't likely to be film fanatics; most of them will only have a passing interests and others are likely to just be onboard to fill up their credit requirement. I'm aiming to keep the topics very entry level with a mixture of lectures/demonstrations and hand-on short film exercise. But right now I'm rather unsure as to how detailed I should go. The ideal curriculum would be something deep enough to pique their interests but not so technical as to bored them. Some of the more advanced concepts such as lighting we can't cover at all since there's no equipment for the class and others like DOF I'll only be able to covered the theory since their equipments are likely to be 1-chip cameras. Here's the basis of the class so far:
1) All students are required to have access to a mini-DV camera with firewire port. They provide their own tape.
2) All editing will be done on Avid Free DV software. I still have to download this and give it a try but this has the advantage of being free (duh) and still offer the interface of a professional NLE. It's also compatible with both PC and Mac which is a bonus. If anyone know of another NLE I should look at, feel free to chip in.
I would love to hear any suggestions and I'm very excited about this. Hopefully it'll turn out well!
I've been wanting to start a Practical DV Filmmaking deCal for a while now and only recently did I managed to solve the logistic problems (I think). Now I'm putting together a detailed proposal so that I can start looking for a faculty sponsor and get the ball rolling. If all goes as plan the course will open in the spring.
What I liked to do is get your inputs on the kind of things that I should include in the 8-9 weeks curriculum (once a week for 2 hours). Keep in mind that the people who will signed up aren't likely to be film fanatics; most of them will only have a passing interests and others are likely to just be onboard to fill up their credit requirement. I'm aiming to keep the topics very entry level with a mixture of lectures/demonstrations and hand-on short film exercise. But right now I'm rather unsure as to how detailed I should go. The ideal curriculum would be something deep enough to pique their interests but not so technical as to bored them. Some of the more advanced concepts such as lighting we can't cover at all since there's no equipment for the class and others like DOF I'll only be able to covered the theory since their equipments are likely to be 1-chip cameras. Here's the basis of the class so far:
1) All students are required to have access to a mini-DV camera with firewire port. They provide their own tape.
2) All editing will be done on Avid Free DV software. I still have to download this and give it a try but this has the advantage of being free (duh) and still offer the interface of a professional NLE. It's also compatible with both PC and Mac which is a bonus. If anyone know of another NLE I should look at, feel free to chip in.
I would love to hear any suggestions and I'm very excited about this. Hopefully it'll turn out well!
