Session 15 - Pixlr Templates

Templates

There are a number of sites that provide templates for use in Pixlr, with many choices for creating cover pages for Facebook or YouTube or your other social media tools.

Facebook

Group 801 X 250 pixels

Page 851 X 315 pixels

Upload your picture when completed. If you like, you may also share in our Facebook Group. I completed one just to show you how bad my design skills are. Don't laugh........

Setting your Dimensions in Pixlr

https://www.facebook.com/help/125379114252045?helpref=faq_content

Pixlr Information/Tutorials for cover pages

https://support.pixlr.com/hc/en-us/articles/209349878-Customize-your-Facebook-profile-timeline-with-a-Pixlr-Editor-template

http://pixlr.com/blog/?s=facebook+template

Examples

Here are some clever examples of Facebook cover pages

https://blog.bufferapp.com/facebook-cover-photo

http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/creative-facebook-timeline-covers/

http://www.awwwards.com/45-funny-and-creative-facebook-profile-covers.html

Pixlrtemplates.com

This is a site that has lots of free templates for use with Pixlr.

http://pixlrtemplates.com/


http://pixlrtemplates.com/#facebook

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etUCon5By4A

Activity

Find out dimensions for other Social Media sites:

• YouTube
• Twitter
• Google+

Create a cover page for Facebook (or other preferred Social Media tool) and share on our Facebook group.

Marketing Session 5

Review Our Marketing Plan

We will spend some time discussing and reviewing our marketing Plan

We will also spend some time considering our marketing items

• Appropriate Print Items
• Possible Content/Text for items
• How to distribute

Aside from our print items, what other marketing items could we use?

Other marketing Items

As well as paper based marketing materials, novelty items are often used as marketing tools. Some are very cheap, and some are more upmarket and can be expensive. When you run an event, there is an expectation that you might get some free stuff if you attend - and everyone loves free stuff.


https://www.promotionsonly.com.au/

https://www.brandconnect.com.au/

Activity

1. Find 3 websites (not the 2 above) that you could use to order promotional material that is not paper based.

2. For each of the scenarios below, select 3 marketing items that may be suitable. Justify your response. Think about the target market when selecting the items. What slogan/logo/printing would you put on the items?




a. To try and get some of the resources that are about to be written off back into the library, South East TAFE will be having an amnesty on fines during November.

b. Mysty River Regional Library services will be running special school holiday events

c. The grand opening of the new branch of Mysty River Regional Library services will be on Saturday the 25th October. There will be activities for young children such as a petting farm and the multimedia games section will be open for teenagers with a singstar sing-off.

d. In November, the library will be running some classes on using iPads, Android tablets and e-readers with a focus on senior members (over 60). A government grant has been provided as part of an Accessibility program rather than stocking the limited number of large print books.

Marketing session 6 - Finalising our plan and getting on with it

Our Marketing Plan is almost complete and we now know what marketing material we need to create.

Your job is to create that material!

FINAL ASSESSMENT

Create 4 pieces of print material as per your marketing plan

See assessment sheet for full details

Publisher

Microsoft Publisher is Microsoft's Desktop Publishing tool. It is part of the Professional or Enterprise version of Microsoft Office. It has a similar look and feel to Word and the other Office 2010 or 2013 applications.

There are many templates available in Publisher, but as creating a document using a template is easy, we will concentrate on the features of Publisher and where it differs from Word.

Start by creating a blank document.

One of the main differences is that Publisher has lots of features that are purely there to help you lay out your document. The first of these are the rulers (yes there are also rulers in Word). You will see the ruler across the top and down the left hand side.

You also have Guides that you can use to help lay out your document. You can place guides anywhere on your page - they are there to help you line items up and are not visible on your final product.

There are also preset Guides that you can use. You can find these under Page Layout.

Once you have guides on your page, you can tick the option to align objects to the guides.

As you move objects around the page, you will see that the guides will highlight so that you can easily align to them.

The grey areas to the sides of your publication is called the scratch area. You can place objects here so that they are available easily when you need them.

The above shows multiple images selected when using the Insert Picture option. When I click Insert, all of these images will be placed into the scratch area.

They can then be dragged onto the pages when needed. You can also do a "swap" by using the icon in the middle of the picture and dragging the image on top of any image on your page.

Building Blocks can also be used to add items to your publication. Building Blocks are under the Insert Ribbon.

http://office.microsoft.com/en-au/publisher-help/use-building-blocks-to-quickly-create-a-publication-HA101823829.aspx

By using right-click on an object, the context sensitive menu includes the ability to use the object as a background or to add it to the building blocks.

Once you have lots of images with your publication, you can use the Graphics Manager to keep track of where they all are.

As well as full page brochures, there are many other page layout options that you can use to create different types of publications.

The following is an example of using publisher to create business cards. Create a new publication and choose More Blank Sizes to select from the many preformatted paper sizes available.

Choose the card size and design your business card

When you go to print, it will print however many it needs to on the one page.

 

One of the activities is to create a bookmark. I like to have something inspiring written on them, Here are a few sites to help with that.

http://ebookfriendly.com/best-quotes-books-reading/
http://bilingualmonkeys.com/43-great-quotes-on-the-power-and-importance-of-reading/
https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/reading

 

ACTIVITY

Create your own business cards for Mysty River Regional Library Service - be imaginative.

Create a bookmark suitable for primary school children

Create a bookmark suitable for teenagers

For more publisher information:

Here are a couple of links to get you started using Publisher

http://www.gcflearnfree.org/publisher2010

http://office.microsoft.com/en-au/publisher-help/training-courses-for-publisher-2013-HA104032122.aspx


You can also access a range of videos on Publisher from Linda.com - access via the library page.

Words Words Words

What words do we put on our materials? Here are some links that will help with good marketing copy.

https://www.quicksprout.com/2013/08/19/how-to-write-marketing-copy-without-actually-writing/

https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/278767

http://www.enchantingmarketing.com/sales-copy/

Things to NOTE when creating your print materials

Spelling and Grammar

Please make sure that you proof read your content to make sure that all spelling is correct (unless purposely wrong for effect) and your grammar and punctuation is used correctly and matches the tone and target audience of your publication.

https://cybertext.wordpress.com/2012/11/22/a-light-hearted-look-at-how-punctuation-can-change-meaning/

http://www.future-perfect.co.uk/grammar-tip/fun-with-punctuation/

Fonts and Kerning

http://www.boredpanda.com/funny-letter-spacing-fails/

Colours

http://www.sitepoint.com/10-troublesome-colors-to-avoid-in-your-advertising/

FINAL ASSESSMENT

Create 4 pieces of print material as per your marketing plan

See assessment sheet for full details

Session 12 - Online Photo/Video sequencing and sharing

This week, we will look at a couple of online video/photo sequencing tools. Most of these online tools have a free option that gives you some basic functionality as well as the ability to share your creations.

If you have a facebook account (and you ALL should have), most will allow you to log in using this.

Social Media

In our social media class last term, we discovered a range of photo/video sharing tools that were available. The difference between social media photo/video tools is the amount of "interaction" that both the sharers and the viewers have with each other. Social Media tools allow you to "follow" or "like" posters and to comment on items shared.

Some of the tools that we will look at today do have some social media / networking built in, but are not strictly social media tools.

Online photo/video tools

There are heaps of tools out there that allow you to create slideshows and/or videos out of your images, without necessarily sharing via social media.

Photo sharing

Photobucket http://photobucket.com/

500px https://500px.com/

Flicker https://www.flickr.com/

Cluster https://cluster.co/

Slideshow/video creation

Stupeflix https://studio.stupeflix.com/en/

Roxio Photoshow http://www.photoshow.com/home/start

Kizoa http://www.kizoa.com/

Slidely http://slidely.com/

Animoto https://animoto.com/

Video

YouTube   http://www.youtube.com/editor

Activity 2

Find some online Photo sharing, video/slideshow creation or video editing tools.

What do you get for free?
What plans are there for paid services?
Try one out - create a short photo/video clip and share on our Facebook group

ASSESSMENT TASK

Using any tool that you like, create a photo/video story. A video photo story is a sequence of photos and/or videos that have a common theme and/or tell a story. It should be around 3 minutes long.
 

Here are some samples:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YnbVB6tx_4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QELya-LnTj4

Session 11 - Creating your marketing plan

In our first session, we had a look at the definition of marketing and read a few articles on why we should create a marketing plan. The reason we create a marketing plan is to get clear objectives as to what we want  to achieve with a particular marketing campaign and be able to measure our success.

Today we are going to create our marketing plan with the second stage being to create the marketing material defined in our plan.

You may use a template to create your marketing plan (see link from week 1) or you use the headings in the Our Community website link.

Week 1 link - Australian Government Business.gov.au
http://www.business.gov.au/business-topics/templates-and-downloads/Pages/marketing-plan-template-and-guide.aspx

Our Community - Not for profit organisations
http://www.ourcommunity.com.au/marketing/marketing_article.jsp?articleId=1510

Assessment Task 1 - GROUP TASK

Your Assessment Task is to create a Marketing Plan and then produce marketing materials for a particular scenario. Your marketing plan should include details of at least 4 print based materials, which you will each have to create for Assessment Task 2, plus 2 other items of promotional material, which we will look at next week. You are to choose from one of the scenarios below.

Decide as a group which scenario you would like to do and work on creating the marketing plan in SMALL GROUPS using a shared document on Google Drive, or any other approved sharing tool. 

DO NOT DELETE ANOTHER PERSONS WORK - Just add your ideas underneath. Once everyone in the group has contributed, you can decide on what needs to stay to finalise your marketing plan.

1.     You work in a primary school library. The State Government has allocated funds and built the school a new resource centre. In typical Government style, they built the centre, but did not provide sufficient funds to adequately resource the new centre. You need to create a marketing plan and promotional material that will allow you to raise funds for the resource centre. You initial aim is to raise $20,000. You may make any reasonable assumptions about the organisation and goals.

2.    You work for a public library located in a growth corridor of Melbourne. Although the library is quite successful, you have noticed that there has been a drop in the number of young people who have been using the library. You need to create a marketing plan and promotional materials to promote the library as a fun place to visit.

3.    You work for a public library located in a growth corridor of Melbourne. Although the library is quite successful, you have noticed that there has been a drop in the number of older people who have been using the library (60+). You need to create a marketing plan and promotional materials to promote the library as a place where older community members are welcome and catered for.

4.    You work in a Secondary College library in what would be considered a disadvantaged area. The problem is that the culture of the demographic is that it is extremely “uncool” to visit the library, and students who regularly stay to study there have been the victims of some bullying and name calling. You need to create a marketing plan and promotional material to change this attitude and increase the popularity of the library.

5.    You work in the library of a well-known and respected University that has a large number of International students. Your job is to create a marketing plan and promotional material that can be included in a “welcome pack” for new students. It needs to have a focus on International students, but should also be suitable for all new students.

To start with, you will need to come up with a name for your organisation and some fictional background information (fictional, but must sound real).

Session 10 - Introduction to Video Editing

Taking video

Taking video is simple and you can use a dedicated video camera, or the video/movie mode on a digital still camera or your smartphone. Video from a smartphone or still camera will not be as good as that taken with a video camera as a video camera will usually have a much better optical zoom and you will not need to rely on digital zoom to take closeups. Digital zoom is like cropping a picture - your video will be of a lower quality.

When using movie mode, the stop and record button acts as a toggle. You press it once and it starts to record your video. Press it again, and the video will be paused. In most cameras, this will create a separate "clip".

Read the following article for more details as well as tips for using video.

http://www.dpreview.com/articles/3438174465/digital-cameras-video-a-beginners-guide

A video camera will also take still shots, although not usually with the same quality as a still camera. Some video cameras will also allow you to take stills at the same time as you are recording video.

Different video cameras, still cameras, and smartphones may use different formats for saving video.

The following specifications are from a cheap digital still camera with a cost of $129.

with the technical specifications as:

This camera saves video as AVI (MJPEG). The Canon IXUS 150 saves video in MOV (H264).

Video Resolution

https://vimeo.com/videoschool/lesson/186/the-basics-of-image-resolution

Windows Essentials

Windows Live Essentials is a free package from Microsoft and includes Movie Maker and Photo Gallery. If it is not installed on your computer, you can download it from Microsoft,

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-live/download-windows-essentials#wetabs=we2012

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/music-video-photo-download

Video Editing Terminology

Using Movie Maker to edit video is very simple. The concept of video editing is to watch your clip in the preview window, use the split tool to break the video into smaller chunks, and delete the bits you don't want.

Split

 

The concept of splitting a video is the same as good old fashioned video editing. You "cut" out the bits that you don't want and stick it back together.

Trim

When you split a video clip, you can "cut" out the bits that you don't want anywhere within the clip as as many times in the clip. Trimming allows you to only cut out video at the beginning or end of the clip.

Movie Maker Basics

If you want to play along, there is a folder with the videos and images from this example. These were all taken with my iPhone, so nothing special used and limited zoom.

 

This shows where Movie Maker is installed in my Windows 8. If you can't find it, use the search bar.

The main parts of Movie Maker are the preview screen and your "timeline". You view the timeline in the preview screen. The timeline represents your end movie.

Use the add Videos/Photos to add selected items to your timeline.

You can apply a theme, animations/transitions, and special effects to any or all of your clips.

To change the order of the assets, you can just drag and drop them into whatever order you want.

Adding Text

A title creates a blank image that you can put text on, whereas captions appear over the current photo or video clip

Other Audio

When you import any video clips into Movie Maker, you automatically get any audio that was recorded at the same time. If you don't want to play the original audio, you can mute it using the editing tools.

To add a soundtrack to your video, it is as simple as clicking on the button and selecting your music.

If you had a microphone, you can also add a voiceover or Narration to your movie.

Saving and Publishing your Movie

This is important!!! Movie Maker, like most other video editing tools is Non-destructive. When you split, delete, or trim a video clip, you do not actually change the original clip. Movie Maker essentially makes a list of all of your edits and within Movie Maker, what you preview has all of your edits that are in the list. When you click Save in Movie Maker, what you are saving is JUST THE LIST OF EDITS, and not your end movie.  Movie Maker calls this your Project file. Save this if you think you might want to change anything in your movie at a later date.

To Save your Movie (actual video file complete with all of the edits), you either Publish Movie, which will save your completed video to your preferred social media platform, or you can save it on your computer for playback using Save Movie.

For More Tutorials on using Movie Maker 2012

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GREeD2icUo

http://www.digitalcitizen.life/editing-video-windows-live-movie-maker-2011

Class Activity

Using my video clips and images or your own, create a short movie to practice using Movie Maker. If you want, share your creation on our Facebook group.

Mac Users

Those using an Apple can use iMovie, which is also a free movie creation tool.

Session 9 - Understanding paper

Paper Sizes

A Series

In the print industry, there are a range of paper and card stock sizes that are available. Some you will have already come across such as A4 paper and DL envelopes.

The A series paper sizes are defined in ISO 216 (International Organisation for Standardization www.iso.org ).

A0 is the largest and has an area of one square metre, A1 is half the size of A0, A2 is half the size of A1 and so on.

Paper also comes in the B series and C series, but the A series is the most common in Australia.

http://www.kalamazoo.com.au/paper-sizes/

DL

Envelope Sizes

Paper Weight

When we talk about paper weight, we are referring to the thickness of the paper or card. ISO 536 outlines the standards for paper weights.

Paper weights are measured as grams per square metre g/m2 or gsm. Because the A0 size is defined as being 1 square metre, the weight of this defines the other sizes of the same paper type. If the paper is 80gsm, which is the standard weight of photocopy paper, then a sheet of A0 will weigh 80 grams.

Once paper becomes more than 120gsm, then it gets classified as a cardstock!!

More information can be found at http://www.papersizes.org

Paper Types

http://www.kalamazoo.com.au/paper-types

Paper Finishes

http://www.kalamazoo.com.au/paper-finishes/

Paper Folds

http://www.kalamazoo.com.au/paper-folds/

Pantone Colours

http://www.kalamazoo.com.au/pms-colour-guide/

http://au.pantone.com/pages/pantone/index.aspx
 

Pantone Vs RGB

http://www.kalamazoo.com.au/colours-printing/

Printing Methods

http://www.kalamazoo.com.au/printing-methods/

Class Activity 1

Get 3 online quotes for:

• A4 Letterhead 
• A1 Poster
• DL Full Colour Postcard
• Business Cards
• Fridge Calendar (or other print based marketing material)

Include the company name, order process, timing, quantities required.

Preparation for Printing

Images

If you have included images such as photos, make sure that they are of a suitable quality for printing. Most printers will print at 300dpi (dots per inch) and your screen is usually 72dpi.

Different printers and printer drivers such as PDF writers may compress images which may reduce the quality.

Proof

Make sure that you request a proof when you upload your file - a proof is essentially a sample of what your final product will look like when it is printed.

Distribution

Once you have your documents printed, you will need to consider how you will be distributing them. Posters are easy - they are stuck up on walls and noticeboards, but event flyers and postcards may need to be distributed.

Read the following article on distribution ideas.

http://www.marketingcommunicationsblog.com/brochure-distribution-ideas/

Class Activity 2

Think about the print materials required and how they might be distributed in the following scenarios:

1. To try and get some of the resources that are about to be written off back into the library, Chisholm TAFE will be having an amnesty on fines during November.

2. Mysty River Regional Library services will be running special school holiday events

3. The grand opening of the new branch of Mysty River Regional Library services will be on Saturday the 25th October. There will be activities for young children such as a petting farm and the multimedia games section will be open for teenagers with a singstar sing-off.

4. In November, the library will be running some classes on using iPads, Android tablets and e-readers with a focus on senior members (over 60). A government grant has been provided as part of an Accessibility program rather than stocking the limited number of large print books.

Class Activity 3

Find 3 companies that provide letterbox distribution


Discuss your findings and solutions with the class.

Session 8 - Making a Calendar

Today's session is mostly about how to make a calendar in Publisher as well as some other ideas on how you can present your photos.

Assessment Task

You might think it strange to start with an assessment task - this is not to put you off, but so that you can do today's activity taking into account that it will be assessed. Our first photo editing assessment task is to create a calendar or Photo Book.

See separate assessment cover sheet with details

Creating a Calendar with Microsoft Publisher

Using a Template

When you open Publisher, or when clicking the file tab > new, you are shown a catalog of templates to choose from to create a new publication. The catalog is divided by categories; one of theses categories is calendars. Choose a calendar from the list of installed templates.

These templates can be easily configured for the desired year or specific months within the year. It is important to choose the correct year and the correct months when choosing your template.

Click on Set Calendar Dates.

When you have set your dates and other details, click on the Create Button.

Editing Your Calendar

After choosing your preferred dates, you can replace the image for each month with one of your own.

Things to consider:

    A theme that compliments your imagery
    Fonts that compliment your theme/imagery
    Titles and/or descriptions that will assist the reader in understanding your calendar

Creating a calendar from a blank page

Personally, when creating a Calendar, I prefer to start from scratch!! I like the idea of a traditional calendar like you might buy from a newsagent - a full size picture and a full size calendar.

Use the following steps to create your own Calendar.


Start with a Blank page - I used A4 Landscape.

File / New

Make this first page your cover page - I placed an image and a title on mine as well as a background colour.

Next step is to add your new page. I set mine up as a 2 page spread and so when I insert a page, it adds a double.

This is what mine looks like

I gave mine new page the same background as the front cover - just for consistency!

Add your images to the left hand side and your "calendar" to the right hand side.

To add an image, use Insert / Picture and select the image that you want on the page. Add any other enhancements such as frame or shadow if you want.

To add the Calendar part, use Insert / Calendar and Browse for more calendars so that you get more choices.

 Move the calendar onto the right hand page and increase the size so it takes up the full page to the margins.

This is what mine looks like:

You can now create the rest of your calendar. You can insert Blank Pages and add the elements - i.e. Image on left and calendar on right, or you can add Duplicate Pages and delete/edit the elements.

When you have added all of the months, add a single page at the end. This page will contain thumbnails of your original photos/images.

Creating your Image Page

Create your thumbnail page by adding each image, resize as appropriate, and move into position. For 12 months, a 4 X 3 grid would work well. You could also create a collage in Pixlr and add your grid as 1 image.

Printing your Calendar

Finish off by printing your calendar in colour. Print it double sided as you want the picture and calendar to be displayed when you open it up. Think about the flip - do you flip it on the long side or the short side?

You can staple it or be fancy and buy a set of covers and coil binder from the library.

ENJOY!!

Other Publications for Photos

In Publisher 2016, there are heaps of different layouts to suit lots of projects. There are a couple of templates that can be used for Photo Books.

Links for some other Ideas

http://mashable.com/2016/04/23/smartphone-photos-products/#_

https://www.buzzfeed.com/mikespohr/33-incredible-things-you-can-do-with-your-family-photos?utm_term=.fxbWveopY#.uuZ5gW6dm

http://www.momento.com.au/

http://www.photobookaustralia.com.au/