Project Summary
The University of California Santa Cruz, Silicon Valley Extension produced an e-Learning program - UC Scout - with the goal of delivering AP-Level courses and education for disadvantaged high school students who would otherwise not have access to advanced course material. Ultimately, the program would go on to reach over 10 million students worldwide.
The material is presented to students via distinct courses - in line with AP guidelines - as video lessons. Each course covers an entire semester, typically consisting of 30-40 videos, each approximately 15 minutes long.
Each video is led by an on-screen presenter, with strategic cuts to supplemental visual content such as imagery and animation.
Program Breakdown
Over 2 years, I worked to produce 10 courses, for which I produced a total of 97 video lessons and 143 additional animations. I also produced a number of miscellaneous animations, graphics, and titles that supplemented these and other videos.
I worked as part of a 5 member team to assemble the videos together. Each member was responsible for their own distinct videos, however, certain subtasks were relegated to various members for efficiency and consistency across the whole course. My primary subtask was creating animations that were then laid into the videos as well as creating animation tools and templates through the use of MOGRTs and Adobe Essential Graphics packages.
From start to finish, a course generally took 2-3 months - dependent upon overall size - to complete. This accounts for shooting film, layout, assembly, animation, and final output.
Video Production
Actors were brought onto a green screen sound stage to film lessons. In the case of foreign language classes, actual teachers were used. Actors would read a script from a teleprompter. My role here was the operation of the teleprompter. The talent was shot with the assumption that any and all footage would be visually seen, so there was a high priority on getting a good performance both visually and auditorily. Once filming was completed, the footage was then brought into Premiere where color keys were applied for green screen editing.
Animation
Most lessons incorporated animation of some form in their design. The scope of these animations ranged widely. There were many notable types of animation that were produced across the courses.
The history courses routinely incorporated maps. For these animations, I made a hand-drawn world map (created in Photoshop). I built a map template in After Effects, with modifiable territory areas, arrows, map pins, and other features.
The art history courses allowed for a wide variety of styles - and were great opportunities to create 3D animations to demonstrate historical monuments. For these animations, I built them in Maya and added finishing animations in After Effects.
Tool Development
The creation of editing tools through the Adobe Essential Graphics feature was essential for maintaining consistency across the many videos and multiple editors. It was also a matter of efficiency. Custom lower 3rds with auto-resizing text boxes and timing and color controls, along with resizeable highlight boxes and arrows were the most common items that I created. Tools were designed to be as automated as possible while keeping customization simple and intuitive.
Assembly
Each video was built in Adobe Premiere, with a distinct file structure that allowed for easy iteration. These files were generally visual graphics such as .jpg and .png, rendered animations, text panels, and raw video.
Each video course utilized a standard graphics template contained in a dedicated sequence. This method allowed for a quick drag-and-drop approach to build out each video which helped to maintain consistency.
Final Thoughts
The overall size and complexity of the UC Scout project was instrumental in my development of effective and efficient techniques in video editing and animation. Many techniques that I now consider a standard in my approach to all projects emerged as a result of the technical needs and limitations imposed by these projects. This project further emphasized the importance of robust - yet nimble - custom templates to improve efficacy and efficiency in projects both large and small.