The document discusses digital storytelling, which involves enriching traditional narratives with various types of digital media like photos, audio, video and graphics. It provides details on the hardware and software needed, examples of tools used to create digital stories like Animoto and VoiceThread, different formats that can be used like video and audio, and various types of stories that can be told like personal stories, informational stories and stories based on interviews. It also outlines a 6 step process for creating digital stories, including choosing a topic, collecting artifacts, storyboarding, revising, constructing the story using software, and screening the finished product.

1. Digital Storytelling
M.A Reilly

2. What is Digital Storytelling?
Digital storytelling is the enrichment of a
traditional narrative with photographs, audio,
video, graphics, animation and other media by
means of computer or internet-based
applications.

3. Hardware and Software
Requirements
Digital camera/video player
Scanner to scan non-digital images
Computer
External or built in microphone
Movie Creation Software such as:
Windows Movie Maker and/or Photo Story for PCs
iMovie for Macs
Online applications such as VoiceThread and Animoto

4. VoiceThread
A collaborative multimedia slide show with
images, videos, and documents and oral and
written comments
Easy to use
http://voicethread.com

5. Animoto
http://animoto.com/
“Animoto automatically produces beautifully
orchestrated, completely unique video pieces
from your photos, video clips and music. Fast,
free and shockingly easy.” (from website)

6. Media Formats Used to Tell
Stories
graphic,
motion graphic (ex. A flip book),
video,
animation,
text,
photo,
audio

7. Stories: A STORY NARRATED
WITH YOUR VOICE
Stories created in a narrative style are the most
personal in topic and tone. Written in first person,
narrative stories are narrated with your own
voice. Narrative digital stories are often the
source of personal discovery and introspection,
where we generally find out something personal
about the author. The story “drives”—or takes
precedence over—the images; the meaning is
expressed through the narrative and supported
visually by the images.

8. Digital Essay

9. Stories: A
STORY WITH
MUSIC
Most commonly recognized
as music videos, this type of
production is a story without
words, although captions,
titles and the blending of
lyrics and visual imagery can
personalize the piece.

10. Stories: A STORY WITH
INTERVIEWS
Different people (including yourself) tell a story
with interviews and the author provides
supplemental images to support what is being
spoken about. A common technique is to weave
an entire story through the voice and reflections
of others; this method is enhanced through
multimedia technology, which allows voices to be
heard while different images are seen. A story
using interviews can also be mixed with a story
including narrative.

11. Digital Story Based on
Interview
“Tocayo” (Student production
SFETT)

12. Personal Story Themes
REMEMBRANCE OR MEMORIAL STORIES
Stories that acknowledge, honor or reflect on the life of one
who has died.
RELATIONSHIP STORIES
Stories of significant relationships in your life. Common
subjects are immediate relations, including parents,
grandparents, siblings, spouse or partner. Other meaningful
relationships may include a business or creative partner, a
teacher or mentor, childhood or lifelong friends, even pets.
Who are these subjects and what impact have they made on
your life? Consider including stories of love, admiration,
longing or loss, disappointment or a poignant reflection of a
person.

13. Personal Story Themes
THE GENESIS STORY
Almost all people can point to a significant moment or event in the past that was a
determining factor in how things are today, e.g., “If my mother had not taken a ceramics
class, she would not have met my father....” The genesis story is an essential part of
almost all family histories, examining the question, “Where do we come from?”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/audiovideo/sites/yourvideo/pages/raphael_schutzerweissmann
_01.shtml
STORIES OF CHALLENGE
Stories in which you have experienced challenge and how (or whether) you overcame it.
They can be physical as well as mental challenges, i.e., the challenge of climbing a
15,000-foot mountain, conquering the fear of changing careers or returning to school after
an extended absence.
Example: http://www.storycenter.org/stories/ SOFAS by Wayne Richard

14. Personal Story Themes
OBJECTS AND ARTIFACTS
All of us have owned or known of a possession that held tremendous value in
our lives and the compelling stories that accompany them. Objects or artifacts
can be as varied as a lucky charm, a rock found on a memorable hike or a
precious family heirloom handed down through many generations. What are
these objects, how do they exist in your life and what value do you place on
them?
HURT AND HEALING
Sadly, it is guaranteed that human beings will experience at least some
element of emotional suffering. Stories about pain and the healing process are
ultimately about resurrection and finding a way to continue. These types of
stories can be about hurt and how that changed you.
SFETT: “the system”

15. Informational Stories
http://www.nytimes.com/packages/khtml/2006/02
/18/national/20060219_SMUGGLE_AUDIOSS.ht
ml

16. Sample Digital Stories from
Wales
http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/audiovideo/sites/galle
ries/pages/capturewales.shtml
Jason Ohler’s site:
http://www.jasonohler.com/storytelling/index.cfm

17. 6 Steps to a Digital Story
Step One: What To Say?
Step Two: Artifact Search: images, music, voice
Step Three: Story Board
Step Four: Revision
Step Five: Construction
Step Six: Screening

18. Digital Story that Began with
Images

19. Story Sources
Our identities are filled with stories, which
provide insight into who we are. Stories mined
from our lives are a direct connection to what our
experience on the human journey is. Stories can
explain and illuminate:
Who we are
Where we came from
Where we are going
What we care about
What is important to us

20. That’s Who I Am
http://www.bbc.co.uk/w
ales/audiovideo/sites/y
ourvideo/pages/raphae
l_schutzerweissmann_
01.shtml
That's Who I Am
By Raphael Schutzer
Weissmann
September 2004,
A digital story from
Who Do You Think You
Are?

21. Getting Started: What To
Say?
1. Draw a detailed map of your neighborhood.
Include the layout of the streets, homes of
friends and strange neighbors, schools, local
hangouts, and so forth
2. In a journal exercise, respond to the following:
“Think of your favorite childhood coat. What is in
your pockets?”
3. Respond to the following: “Write about a decisive
moment (one where you ended up heading in an
unanticipated direction) in your life.”

22. Step Two: Artifact Search
Use a digital camera to capture images related to
your story.
Photograph artifacts that relate to the words you
use in your story.

23. Step 3: Storyboarding
Map on paper each image, technique, and
element of their story by constructing a
storyboard.
This visual story had two dimensions:
chronology—what happens and when—and
interaction—how audio information interacts with
the images.

24. Step 4: Revision
Techniques
Option 1: Highlighting
Students marked up their scripts, highlighting all of the action in
green and all of the reflection in pink. Too much pink indicated too
much preaching. Too much green indicated that the writer was telling
an anecdote with no implications.
Option 2: Timeline
Students rearranged the order of events, making them either more or
less chronological (Heard 99).
Option 3: Exploding Sentences
There were two possible plans of attack here. First, writers worked to
explode the sentence into a slow- motion retelling (helpful to the text
that will be read aloud). Or, writers thought of the explosion as more
of a magnifying glass, focusing on pinpointed, targeted specifics
(Heard 32–38).

25. Step 5: Construction
To build your digital stories, you will need to: to
import or digitize their photos, add transitions and
special effects to how they played, record
narration, add sound tracking, and burn their
finished work on a CD.

26. Step 6: Screen
Celebrate the finished stories.
Show digital stories. Have popcorn, etc.

27. Digital Stories in Spanish
http://www.umbc.edu/oit/newmedia/studio/digitals
tories/projects.php?movie=SPAN305_Relato_dig
tal_Elver.flv
Please go to the following site and view two
stories told by Heritage Spanish speakers.
Could your students collect heritage Spanish
speakers’ stories? How might that help them to
deepen their language?
From UMBC Digital Stories