Topeka and Shawnee County Public Library | dewey ~ broadcast_yourself_using_youtube_videos_to_promote_your_library

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Broadcast Yourself: Using YouTube videos to promote your library collections and programs

Abstract

Three librarians share their experience in the past year creating and uploading a variety of amateur-style library-related videos to youtube.com. The 27 videos posted so far have been viewed over 20,000 times in the first year of this project. Each video was made with available equipment and software, with an emphasis on completing and posting short videos quickly and creatively. Experiences and the technical aspects of using different video and still cameras, microphones, lighting and sound equipment, and editing software will vary widely based on available resources. Most interesting are the new ways that information about the library, books and reading can be shared through existing and developing technology. Our experiments thus far include “60 second book review” videos and footage from major library events, including author visits. Our newest videos include children’s book reviews recorded on location at local schools, a book review acted out by Barbie dolls that was featured in the January 2008 Library Journal and our most popular video to date - a commercial parody featuring machinima captured from World of Warcraft intercut with librarian-in-action footage. Learn how your library can begin or expand a video pilot project and check out our videos at http://www.youtube.com/TopekaLibrary.

Poster Session Organizer
Lissa Staley
estaley@tscpl.org
Adult Services Librarian
Topeka and Shawnee County Public Library

Additional Contributors
Daniel Fogt, Public Services Specialist
Carrie Cummings, Public Services Specialist
Topeka and Shawnee County Public Library

Early videos

It all started in the Spring of 2007 when Katie Dunneback posted to FICTION-L about her YouTube video experiments. She was booktalking 5 book in 5 minutes and asking other librarians to do the same.

My co-worker Carrie Cummings had a Sony Handycam video camera, and on my living room couch we tried our first booktalk. We did very little planning or rehearsing and worked without a script. Carrie edited the footage in Windows Movie Maker (a basic video editing program that comes standard on many newer computers running Windows) and created our library's YouTube account. We shot our second video on location at a local bookstore, hoping for ambience but finding sound-quality issues instead. By trying to keep the video book reviews informal and chatty, we hope we kept them interesting for the viewer. (There is a certain appeal in watching to see what ridiculous thing I will say next.) By focusing on getting the videos finished and uploaded rather than getting them perfect, we were able to work quickly and then move on to our next experiments. Watch our first and second booktalking efforts.

While our library encourages us to experiment with different technologies to connect people and books, many of these videos were made outside of the library and on our own time. As our videos have found more success, our library has devoted more resources to providing staff time and equipment to support these and similar efforts.

What if Barbie had a book group?

About this Video: Filmed in March 2007. Barbie and her friends talk about the fun and flirty teen novel I was a Non-Blonde Cheerleader by Kieran Scott. The inspiration behind having the Barbie dolls star in this video was simply that I was home with a head cold and Carrie wasn't available to run the camera. Once I was behind the camera, I filmed some footage of the dolls, then edited the video together, adding narration using the microphone that came with my computer. Since I could record the narration to fit the images, and read from a short script, the words are more polished than our previous efforts. I moved every directional lamp in my house into the room where I was filming to add more light and improve the picture quality.
Technical Details: Fujifilm FinePix 3800 Digital Camera 3.2 megapixels (.avi file output at 320x240 resolution), low quality "freebie" microphone, Windows Movie Maker.

60 second book review: Confessions of a Jane Austen addict

About this Video: Filmed in August, 2007. This video takes a first-person perspective to act out the novel, which itself is written in the first person. Obviously, this would have been difficult to film at the library. This new novel by author Laurie Viera Rigler takes a heartbroken thirty year old Los Angeles woman and sends her back in time to the early 1800's, specifically to the world inhabited by her beloved Jane Austen characters. A fun chick-lit read for those who enjoy escaping - literally - into a good Regency-era novel. I received an e-mail from the author, who was thrilled to have spotted the video on YouTube. She featured it on her website.

Technical Details: Olympus FE-190 6.0 megapixel digital camera (.mov file output at 320x240 resolution), USB microphone headset intended for gaming, edited with iMovie (a video editing program that comes standard on Apple computers)

90 second book review: Austenland

About this Video: Filmed in December 2007. The Barbies are back, this time to act out scenes from the novel Austenland by Shannon Hale. The inspiration came from both the previous success of the Barbie-themed book review videos, combined with the perfect tuxedo for Ken. When Jane Hayes' inherits a three-week vacation from her eccentric aunt, she heads to England to try to get over the overwhelming obsession that is preventing her from finding romance in New York. The publicist for the novel brought this video to the attention of the editors at Library Journal and the video was featured in the January 2008 issue of Library Journal.
Technical Details: Olympus FE-190 6.0 megapixel digital camera (.mov file output at 320x240 resolution), USB microphone headset intended for gaming, edited with iMovie (a video editing program that comes standard on Apple computers)

60 second book review: THE DEAD BEAT

About this Video: In July 2007, author Marilyn Johnson visited our library, and I obtained her permission to record brief video clips of her talk. This video book review combines the author's own words with a review of her non-fiction book, all in only 60 seconds. The Dead Beat will gratify the reader with a survey both humorous and poignant of the wonders enfolded in the pages of an ordinary newspaper, and including many marvelous tales relating to lost souls, lucky stiffs and the perverse pleasures of obituaries as witnessed and faithfully recorded by Marilyn Johnson.

Technical Details: Olympus FE-190 6.0 megapixel digital camera (.mov file output at 320x240 resolution), USB microphone headset intended for gaming, edited with iMovie (a video editing program that comes standard on Apple computers)

William Allen White Award Book Review: The Dr. Dyl Show 2

About this Video: Outreach librarians Sandy Lane and Robin Clark experimented with equipment from our library's "Technology Toolbox" to film children talking about books in order to advertise the books to other readers. Watch local middle school students review Kansas William Allen White Award nominees. The Dr. Dyl Show includes interviews for Defiance by Valerie Hobbs, and A Dog's Life; the autobiography of a stray by Ann Martin

Mysteries of the Book Depository REVEALED

About this video: Have you ever returned a library book and wondered what happens next? This is a very common question at our library. Honestly, even I did not know exactly what happened after I put my book onto the conveyor belt, until I rubber-banded my camera onto the front of a thick book and sent it through the machine. Making this video seemed to be a unique and creative way to help answer it. At the Topeka and Shawnee County Public Library, the Book Depository leads down a conveyor belt to the basement where the Techlogic AMH machine sorts materials after checking them in. Affectionately called "the machine", this is a cool example of a library technology that still focuses on books. This video is also our first foray into using (free and legal) music licensed under Creative Commons.
Technical Details: Olympus FE-190 6.0 megapixel digital camera (.mov file output at 320x240 resolution), edited with iMovie (a video editing program that comes standard on Apple computers)

World of Warcraft commercial parody - Belf Librarian

About this Video: Lysistrata is a Blood Elf Hunter. She is also a librarian. This video is a parody of the popular Mr T. and Shatner commercials, made by a Warcraft Blood Elf about her alternate life in the library... This video was inspired by a conversation with other World of Warcraft players about the appeal of the new television commercials for the popular MMORPG. In discussing real life versus avatars, and how a player and his/her game character can be interchanged in casual conversation, we stumbled upon the idea of the avatars making commercials for their counterparts in "real life." This is our library's most popular video to date, mainly because it was uploaded to YouTube a few weeks after other commercial parodies for these advertisements began appearing. The large number of polarized and diverse comments also reflect a greater YouTube viewership. (I have resisted deleting negative comments.)
Technical Details: Blood Elf footage recorded on an iMac using World of Warcraft's built-in video capture software for Apple computers. Similar screen capture software (like Fraps) for PCs is available for free download. Librarian footage filmed with Olympus FE-190 6.0 megapixel digital camera (.mov file output), Blue Snowball USB microphone borrowed from my library's "Technology Toolbox", edited with iMovie (a video editing program that comes standard on Apple computers)

Making your own videos for your library

It doesn't take much to get started - almost any digital camera or video camera will take video or still photos of a quality that can be uploaded to YouTube. Video editing software now comes standard on most new computers, whether you have Windows Movie Maker on a PC or iMovie on an Apple. A headset microphone is sufficient for recording voiceovers, especially when you are just experimenting, and any available lighting will help improve your picture quality.

I have been amazed at the positive response from our patrons, from our staff and from other viewers online. As interest in sharing amateur videos online increases, libraries and librarians can find a place to continue the conversations about books and reading in this new environment.

Our best advice is to get started and upload your experiments to share them with other people in your library, in your community, and with viewers online around the world. Encourage your patrons and your coworkers to experiment as well. Have fun, upload often and don't get hung up in the details!