Understanding computer-based digital video

Abstract

E ducators and instructional design ers are interested in creating effective learning environments. Often this involves the use of various media to implement instructional strategies. The rapid growth of the Intemet, and specifically the World Wide Web as a delivery medium has led to an explosion of Web-supported and Web-based courses and instructional materials. In the mid 1990s these Web materials were generally limited to text and static images. But with the increase in network bandwidth, user connection speeds, and hardware processing speed, audio and video have become viable media for instructional environments. These trends have been coupled with growth in the installed base of CDROM (and now DVD-ROM) drives and "multimedia equipped" personal computers. So if you are interested in including video as a component of your instruction, how do you go about producing video for digital distribution via Internet or CD/DVD? My goal with this article is to help you understand the terminology, requirements (costs, equipment, etc.), and procedures for producing and delivering computerbased video. Before we proceed, you must ask yourself "Why do I want to use video?" Video is certainly a powerful medium and there are many instructional situations in which it is both appropriate and effective. These situations might include: 1. Demonstrating a procedure or sequence of steps 2. Documenting a performance or event d video and audio quality) and displayed in a small window. This precludes the showing of most motion sequences and anything but medium shots and close-ups. Also it is not uncommon to find Web sites incorporating video for the sake of technical capability, not value to the viewer. Photographs, animations, audio recordings, and text descriptions can be very effective in many situations, and require fewer computing resources and less production time than video. While acknowledging the constraints of digital video, the following sections describe the effective use of this powerful medium.