Un-anonymize the heckler

Posted on January 14, 2009 by Alvin Trusty

High school sports fans can be brutal.  The bleachers can be inches from the field of play and some fans do not know when to stop.  Coming from a family of teachers, most of us have coached at one time or another.

The latest incident involved a fan sitting right behind the coach, about four rows up (just out of reach).  This guy was screaming at the top of his lungs at the coach.  He was not about to stop until someone on the bench took out a camera.

One of the assistants simply turned around and started snapping pictures.  When you do something like this, you want to make sure the flash is working.  It won’t make the picture better, but it will telegraph the fact that you are taking pictures.  After you have the heckler’s attention, pull out a video camera and tripod.  Point it right at the guy.  No one wants to be the next YouTube doofus feature.

People act differently when they know a camera is pointed at them.  Shots are more candid when the subject doesn’t know the camera is pointed in his/her direction.  Check out the “super-secret spy lens” for your SLR.  This could be just as much fun as filming the heckler.
 

 

 

Posted in leisure | Tagged | Comments Off on Un-anonymize the heckler

Get to know your class

Posted on January 9, 2009 by Alvin Trusty

On the first day of class I take a picture of every student.  I don’t have a nice plain wall to use as a background.  I pull the projector screen down in the front of the room and have each student stand in front of it.  It works well.

As I take each picture, I have the students write their names on a sheet of paper.  The camera saves the pictures as files with consecutive numbers at the end of the file names.   After class I rename each picture using the student’s name from the gradebook.  I use Irfanview‘s Thumbnail tool to create a contact sheet for each class (insert is pixelated to protect the identities of my students).  I use this to learn the names of the students.

After making the contact sheet, I resize all the pictures to 1024×768 and store them in the document area of Blackboard.  We use the pictures in several assignments during the semester.  We make several PowerPoint presentations using the pictures.  When we format Word documents, I have them place their own picture at the top of the document (makes it easy to know who the paper belongs to) and format text around it.  I use them in another lesson that requires the student to demonstrate knowledge of cropping.  In one assignment I have each student select a graphics program and add text over the picture.

The only thing I do not have them do is place the pictures on a public network, which is why I have pixelated the contact sheet in this post.  That leads to discussions on privacy and copyright.

Posted in edtech | Tagged | 2 Comments

Taking Attendance

Posted on January 8, 2009 by Alvin Trusty

Normally it takes me about two minutes to take attendance in class.  I’m trying something different this semester.  Using my point-and-shoot I can snap four pictures covering everyone in class in about ten seconds.

Every day I post these pictures in Blackboard.  If someone misses class, he/she can easily see who was there and pick up the notes.  The pictures I post in Blackboard are full size (8 megapixel).  The resolution is high enough that it is easy to identify everyone.

Posted in edtech | Tagged | 4 Comments

Un-Jailbroken iPod Touch

Posted on January 7, 2009 by Alvin Trusty

My wife wanted a small portable computer for Christmas.  She didn’t want something as big as a laptop.  We looked at the netbooks, but none were small enough to fit in her purse.  I thought the iPod Touch would be the perfect gift.

There was only one problem.  My iPod Touch was hacked a year ago.  Since then, the App Store came online and thousands of cool programs are available for everyone without the nerdiness required to jailbreak the device.  After I played around with the new Touch, I decided to reset mine and purchase the $9.95 upgrade to get all the new stuff.  What could I miss from the outdated jailbreak version I was using?

For the most part, it was a great choice.  I have scores of apps that were not available before and I have only downloaded the freebies.  Truth be told, most of the apps I have downloaded are games that I played a couple of times.  There are some nice productivity tools.  I have Evernote so I can type myself a message that updates a document on the web.  I have Facebook, Tritter, Google Apps (read only mode), a Bible with dozens of translations, VNC, wireless network file sharing and more.

I did lose a few things and two of them I really miss.  First and foremost (and almost a deal breaker) is Nemus Sync.  This app sync’ed my Google Calendar with the iPod Calendar.  It is bi-directional and there is nothing (not even a pay app) like it in the Apps Store.  The second app is the full version of Wikipedia.  You can buy a version for $8.00 but some of the reviews say the two gigabyte download doesn’t play well with iTunes or the synchronization process.

I also lost my Apache web server and wireless SSH server.  Those had a certain coolness factor, but were handy at times. I also can’t get into the OS like I could before.  I can’t find a screen capture utility which is why I had to use a picture from Flickr in this post.

Overall I’m glad I have the apps store.  I really miss my Google Calendar sync, but maybe Nemus will add it to the Apps Store.  They have other applications in there.  I would certainly pay a few bucks for it.

Posted in edtech | Tagged | 9 Comments

Ways To Use A Digital Camera

Posted on January 6, 2009 by Alvin Trusty

I am not going to call it a “series” yet, but I have the first post.  I have a new point-and-shoot that I plan to have with me all the time.  I was having lunch with Buzz, and he was diagramming some things he was trying to do on his home network.

We were at Panera.  Buzz drew this diagram on the back of a piece of paper he had.  I wanted to take the paper, but he needed it because of the contents on the other side.  Ten seconds later I had a perfect copy in the memory of my camera.  For all intents and purposes, my digital camera is a photo copier.

Digital camera aside, I wanted this picture for a different reason.  Buzz is a retired public school superintendent.  I think he retired ten or fifteen years ago.  If you have a problem reading between those lines, let me make it very simple.  Most of the people his age from his profession don’t know the difference between a patch cord and a patch of strawberries.

But Buzz is different.  He has taken upon himself the pursuit of greater technical understanding.  Take a look at this drawing.  He wants to configure a second access point on his home network.  He already has DSL connected to a router.  The second access point requires an Internet connection for configuration.  He did not want to interrupt his network connectivity to add the second router.  He drew this picture and asked me if everything would work if he set it up this way.

I applaud his effort to stay on top of all things technical!  We need more school administrators willing to learn the basic principals of the technology surrounding them in school.

Posted in edtech | Tagged | 1 Comment