There used to be a tree, next to my kitchen door, blocking the light and the doorway. When it was chopped, I decided to use the remaining bit for a platformed mini-garden. In The Netherlands, we have a famous invention called ‘de makkelijke moestuin‘ – and that inspired me to use an old table blade and create a spot for planting lettuce.
Phew! Pretty, though. It is going to be a lovely summer, with lots of strawberries, tomatoes, mint-tea and lettice!
With all the wood and branches in my garden, there must be lots of projects to go for. This summer is going to be a very exciting and productive one!
The CatART tree was the first, and next will be this:
Let me share a nice list with freeware – testing them to see if we can use them for machinima. Your thoughts/reviews are welcome, of course!
I tested Apowersoft Screen Capture, which was a free offer for a day – but found it had low framerate and no audio. see TEST
However, there is a free web based Apowersoft online screen recorder too.
freeware VIDEO CAPTURE :
Icecream Screen Recorder –
CamStudio Portable –
ActivePresenter Free Edition – (Record full motion video)
Fast & Easy Screen Recorder –
SMRecorder –
Screen2Avi –
TMUnderground contributes: check out screencastomatic.
All public events are fair game.
This means photos made of you visiting concerts (singing out loud, so flattering), of your family at the beach (yeah think of you wearing that bikini – or worse your kid pulling it down ..), visits to restaurants (nothing as becoming as a close-up of you eating in public), or any other public gathering can be used without a worry in the world. Most of us knew that, right? We never expect these photographs appearing on a billboard or bus, at least never without granting permission.
How about the content and media you share on Facebook?
Here is what they state in their new 2015 TOS – which by the way backdates ( !!! ):
You grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to use any IP content that you post on or in connection with Facebook (IP License). This IP License ends when you delete your IP content or your account unless your content has been shared with others, and they have not deleted it.
So, post a photograph on FB and it is free to use, from there on.
Do you really want certain pictures you posted on FB 4 years ago to appear on billboards/buses? Most of us think that this wont happen anyway; why would anybody want to post my ugly selfie in public space? You could be so wrong (and sorry), and worse; there is nothing you can do about it. No consent needed, no copyright protection, no informing you about any use whats so ever. Picture a personal photograph of your kid, used to advertise dipers – and you were never told about it.
Well, it is too late anyway, even if you delete your FB account right now – and how many of us would do that? Anything shared, ever, is out there and now belongs to Facebook. — [[chatdislike]] [[iidislyk]]
I wonder how professional photographers handle this, for example there is a store around the corner where I live, they post their photo-shoots on a Facebook fanpage. This was always considered good marketing, you need social media to promote and sell your product, right? Well, if they do not delete their page before January 1 2015, they are handing out freebies. Oh and reach all their customers, who have proudly shared the photographs on their Facebook pages already, for sure… yep, too late.
Fun and fabulous gadget for Oculus Rift users. Seeing yourself in third-person perspective (TPP) in the real world, is a cool piece of virtual tech! It’s a virtual whirl. This home made Wall-E style add on for Rift looks like a lot of fun to build and could be a novel way to experience the world.… and you can make it out of bits and bolts lying around your home and in your computer.
Panelists at CynKids tablet webinar shared some terrific insights on best practices to expand brands into the tablet realm.
Some highlights:
– Kids are finding their way to brand websites through tablet apps. As of March, PBS Kids is getting 13 million unique visitors a month, many directly from apps, said Abby Jenkins, director of content for PBS Kids Digital.
“We like to show variety in our apps, different characters, different aspects of the curriculum” to attract a variety of kids and parents, she said.
– Discover-ability remains a challenge. “This is the biggest issue when developing apps for tablets,” said Caroline Fraser, VP, digital products and production, at Scholastic Media. Scholastic releases apps around big programming events and anniversaries, “so we have increased marketing muscle around them.”
– When developing an app, don’t overlook the unique ergonomics of a 3-year old. “It’s very difficult for kids to move around with a heavy tablet,” said Mindy Brooks, Sesame Workshop director of research and education. “We don’t allow for tilting and moving the tablet within apps.” The other reason Sesame says no to tilting: “We don’t want the kids dropping and shattering mom’s iPad.” Fair enough.
– Kids are interacting with content across multiple, emerging platforms. Keep up. “Technology is anything that was developed after you were born,” said Graham Farrar, president of Cupcake Digital’s iStoryTime. “You ignore a platform at your peril.”
Source: Cynopsis media.
Are you a R2-D2 fan? Would you like to work as volunteer agent for Tony Dyson, the man that built R2D2.
Tony would like to visit more conventions (Cons) worldwide.
If you think this would be fun, please contact Chantal Harvey on facebook.
On January 24, an American survey of 1,500 parents of kids 2-10 by The Joan Ganz Cooney Center, founded by Sesame Workshop, tells us that 57% of these parents believes their children learn significantly from educational media. The parents also state that learning from mobile devices falls short when compared to other platforms.
The study, Learning at Home: Families’ Educational Media Use in America, speaks of a drop in educational media use after the earliest years.
As screen media use goes up, the proportion devoted to educational content goes down, from 78% of all screen media among 2-4-year-olds to 39% among 5-7-year-olds to 27% among 8-10-year-olds.
Remember; at a young age the parents provide the choice of media, but as soon as the child gets to choose, things change dramatically. Key is creating and providing higher quality and more fun media, as it tells us that non educational content is more fun. I wonder why there has been so little improvement in for example e-books for children, there are of course exceptions, but mostly they still show pretty primitive animations. Kids will not settle for that, not anymore.
I agree with Dr. Michael H. Levine, the Center’s exec director. “As we work to raise education standards and improve students’ success, we must provide higher quality media options-especially on mobile-that will help engage and educate today’s older children.”
Among other key findings:
– 2-4-year olds spend more time per day on educational media than any other age group – 1 hr, 16 mins compared with 50 minutes for 5-7-yr-olds and 42 minutes for 8-10-yr-olds.
– Television continues to dominate, with children spending an average 42 minutes a day with educational TV compared to 5 minutes with educational content on mobile devices and computers and 3 minutes with educational video games.
– 39% of parents say their child has learned “a lot” about any subject from mobile compared to 52% for TV.
– Children are reading an average 40 minutes per day, including 29 minutes with print, 8 minutes on computers, and 5 minutes using e-platforms.
– There are significant differences among racial groups. Both African-American (60%) and Hispanic-Latino (52%) parents are more likely than White (37%) parents to consider interactive media a very or somewhat important source for the lessons their children most need to learn.
Tony Dyson, the man behind R2-D2, the most lovable little robot in the world, is now casting his magical spell on the world of children’s e-Books by adding advanced animation on every page. Welcome to the world of Bobbekins.
One of the most innovative ideas for children’s e-Books this year, the magical world of Bobbekins is true to the style of storytelling of old, but designed for children of today.
It speaks from the heart and minds of its authors of magical worlds and dreams that can come true, but it never speaks down to your child in any way.
The man behind Star Wars R2-D2. The versatile Emmy nominated Film SFX supervisor is the creative genius at the helm of many of the biggest SCI-FI movies to date. Among them are Superman 2, Moon Raker, Dragon Slayer, and of course, The Empire Strikes Back. “Professor Anthony John Dyson obss”
When it comes to Robot technicians Tony is quite unique, as well as building one of the most famous Robots ever, R2-D2 he has also designed and built Robots for some of the largest electronic companies in the world, for example Sony, Philips and Toshiba.
You can also find examples of his creations on permanent display in one of the most prestige’s museums in the world ‘Smithsonian Institution’ and R2-D2 was one of the very first Robots to be honored in the ‘Carnegie Mellon University’ Robot Hall of Fame and Tony was also Nominated for an ‘Emmy’ for the Sony television commercial.
On January 24, an American survey of 1,500 parents of kids 2-10 by The Joan Ganz Cooney Center, founded by Sesame Workshop, tells us that 57% of these parents believes their children learn significantly from educational media. The parents also state that learning from mobile devices falls short when compared to other platforms.
The study, Learning at Home: Families’ Educational Media Use in America, speaks of a drop in educational media use after the earliest years.
As screen media use goes up, the proportion devoted to educational content goes down, from 78% of all screen media among 2-4-year-olds to 39% among 5-7-year-olds to 27% among 8-10-year-olds.
Remember; at a young age the parents provide the choice of media, but as soon as the child gets to choose, things change dramatically. Key is creating and providing higher quality and more fun media, as it tells us that non educational content is more fun. I wonder why there has been so little improvement in for example e-books for children, there are of course exceptions, but mostly they still show pretty primitive animations. Kids will not settle for that, not anymore.
I agree with Dr. Michael H. Levine, the Center’s exec director. “As we work to raise education standards and improve students’ success, we must provide higher quality media options-especially on mobile-that will help engage and educate today’s older children.”
Among other key findings:
– 2-4-year olds spend more time per day on educational media than any other age group – 1 hr, 16 mins compared with 50 minutes for 5-7-yr-olds and 42 minutes for 8-10-yr-olds.
– Television continues to dominate, with children spending an average 42 minutes a day with educational TV compared to 5 minutes with educational content on mobile devices and computers and 3 minutes with educational video games.
– 39% of parents say their child has learned “a lot” about any subject from mobile compared to 52% for TV.
– Children are reading an average 40 minutes per day, including 29 minutes with print, 8 minutes on computers, and 5 minutes using e-platforms.
Chantal Harvey 