Recently, I presented (from the studio where I regularly  record Digital Beards) on assigning video activities to students over Hangouts on Air, with the assistance of Rob Prince, Dan LaSota and Owen Guthrie. Dan and Owen are fellow designers, whom I’ve spoken to before, who have really spearheaded our Teaching Tips Live effort at UAF. Rob is an Assistant Professor of Journalism at UAF who is far more experienced than myself (I have to admit) at assigning video projects–although in his instance he is working with professional equipment and students who more or less  expect  video assignments. In my case, and in the cases of my target audience of teachers, our subjects may seemingly lie outside the concerns of proper visual composition. I teach writing, after all.

But as more and more petabytes of visual data are generated and shared ever more quickly than text (the average wpm typing speed hasn’t increased parallel to the efficiency with which a single person can make and edit a video, that’s  for sure), it becomes increasingly clear that visual communication is the future no matter the subject, if the subject intends to remain  relevant  to the general population.

Brooke Sheridan recorded what was to be the next Digital Beards that would go up, with UAF’s English Department’s Director of Composition and the genius behind Write Alaska as her guest. However, Brooke had to (was forced against her will!) leave last week for vacation before she finished editing the interview, so that will be going up next week or the week after. Early next week, I hope to squeeze an interview in with the infamous Alex St. John, one of the fathers of Direct X at Microsoft, among many other things. Whichever is finished first will be the first to go up. In the meantime I find myself discussing a medium I have less experience with, at least insofar as Digital Beards is concerned, using the medium as my medium of delivery:

Video.

Enjoy.

Chris Malmberg

Former Member of the UAF Instructional Design Team