Cambridge Digital Humanities course timetable
September 2019
| Wed 18 |
The Letters Connection: Social Network Analysis in the Scientific Correspondence Collection
Finished
Letters have been for centuries the main form of communication between scientists. Correspondence collections are a unique window into the social networks of prominent historical figures. What can digital social sciences and humanities reveal about the correspondence networks of 19th century scientists? This two-session intensive workshop will give participants the opportunity to explore possible answers to this question. With the digitisation and encoding of personal letters, researchers have at their disposal a wealth of relational data, which we propose to study through social network analysis (SNA). The workshop will be divided in two sessions during which participants will “learn by doing” how to apply SNA to personal correspondence datasets. Following a guided project framework, participants will work on the correspondence collections of John Herschel and Charles Darwin. After a contextual introduction to the datasets, the sessions will focus on the basic concepts of SNA, data transformation and preparation, data visualisation and data analysis, with particular emphasis on “ego network” measures. The two demonstration datasets used during the workshop will be provided by the Epsilon project, a research consortium between Cambridge Digital Library, The Royal Institution and The Royal Society of London aimed at building a collaborative digital framework for 19th century letters of science. The first dataset, the “Calendar of the Correspondence of Sir John Hershel Database at the Adler Planetarium”, is a collection of the personal correspondence of John Frederick William Herschel (1792-1871), a polymath celebrated for his contributions to the field of astronomy. Its curation process started in the 50s at the Royal Society and currently comprises 14.815 digitised letters encoded in extensible markup language (.xml) format. The second dataset, the “Darwin Correspondence Project” has been locating, researching, editing and publishing Charles Darwin’s letters since 1974. In addition to a 30-volume print edition, the project has also made letters available in .xml format. The workshop will provide a step-by-step guide to analysing correspondence networks from these collections, which will cover: - Explanation of the encoding procedures and rationale following the Text Encoding Initiative guidelines; - Preparation and transformation of .xml files for analysis with an open source data wrangler; - Rendering of network visualisations using an open source SNA tool; - Analysis of the Ego Networks of John Herschel and Charles Darwin (requires UCINET)About the speakers and course facilitators: Anne Alexander is Director of Learning at Cambridge Digital Humanities Hugo Leal is Methods Fellow at Cambridge Digital Humanities and Co-ordinator of the Cambridge Data School Louisiane Ferlier is Digital Resources Manager at the Centre for the History of Science at the Royal Society. In her current role she facilitates research collaborations with the Royal Society collections, curates digital and physical exhibitions, as well as augmenting its portfolio of digital assets. A historian of ideas by training, her research investigates the material and intellectual circulation of ideas in the 17th and 18th centuries. Elizabeth Smith is the Associate Editor for Digital Development at the Darwin Correspondence Project, where she contributed to the conversion of the Project’s work into TEI several years ago, and has since been collaborating with the technical director in enhancing the Darwin Project’s data. She is one of the co-ordinators of Epsilon, a TEI-based portal for nineteenth-century science letters. No knowledge of prior knowledge of programming is required, instructions on software to install will be sent out before the workshop. Some exercises and preparation for the second session will be set during the first and participants should allow 2-3 hours for this. Please note, priority will be given to staff and students at the University of Cambridge for booking onto this workshop. CDH Learning gratefully acknowledges the support of the Isaac Newton Trust and the Faculty of History for this workshop. |
| Wed 25 |
The Letters Connection: Social Network Analysis in the Scientific Correspondence Collection
Finished
Letters have been for centuries the main form of communication between scientists. Correspondence collections are a unique window into the social networks of prominent historical figures. What can digital social sciences and humanities reveal about the correspondence networks of 19th century scientists? This two-session intensive workshop will give participants the opportunity to explore possible answers to this question. With the digitisation and encoding of personal letters, researchers have at their disposal a wealth of relational data, which we propose to study through social network analysis (SNA). The workshop will be divided in two sessions during which participants will “learn by doing” how to apply SNA to personal correspondence datasets. Following a guided project framework, participants will work on the correspondence collections of John Herschel and Charles Darwin. After a contextual introduction to the datasets, the sessions will focus on the basic concepts of SNA, data transformation and preparation, data visualisation and data analysis, with particular emphasis on “ego network” measures. The two demonstration datasets used during the workshop will be provided by the Epsilon project, a research consortium between Cambridge Digital Library, The Royal Institution and The Royal Society of London aimed at building a collaborative digital framework for 19th century letters of science. The first dataset, the “Calendar of the Correspondence of Sir John Hershel Database at the Adler Planetarium”, is a collection of the personal correspondence of John Frederick William Herschel (1792-1871), a polymath celebrated for his contributions to the field of astronomy. Its curation process started in the 50s at the Royal Society and currently comprises 14.815 digitised letters encoded in extensible markup language (.xml) format. The second dataset, the “Darwin Correspondence Project” has been locating, researching, editing and publishing Charles Darwin’s letters since 1974. In addition to a 30-volume print edition, the project has also made letters available in .xml format. The workshop will provide a step-by-step guide to analysing correspondence networks from these collections, which will cover: - Explanation of the encoding procedures and rationale following the Text Encoding Initiative guidelines; - Preparation and transformation of .xml files for analysis with an open source data wrangler; - Rendering of network visualisations using an open source SNA tool; - Analysis of the Ego Networks of John Herschel and Charles Darwin (requires UCINET)About the speakers and course facilitators: Anne Alexander is Director of Learning at Cambridge Digital Humanities Hugo Leal is Methods Fellow at Cambridge Digital Humanities and Co-ordinator of the Cambridge Data School Louisiane Ferlier is Digital Resources Manager at the Centre for the History of Science at the Royal Society. In her current role she facilitates research collaborations with the Royal Society collections, curates digital and physical exhibitions, as well as augmenting its portfolio of digital assets. A historian of ideas by training, her research investigates the material and intellectual circulation of ideas in the 17th and 18th centuries. Elizabeth Smith is the Associate Editor for Digital Development at the Darwin Correspondence Project, where she contributed to the conversion of the Project’s work into TEI several years ago, and has since been collaborating with the technical director in enhancing the Darwin Project’s data. She is one of the co-ordinators of Epsilon, a TEI-based portal for nineteenth-century science letters. No knowledge of prior knowledge of programming is required, instructions on software to install will be sent out before the workshop. Some exercises and preparation for the second session will be set during the first and participants should allow 2-3 hours for this. Please note, priority will be given to staff and students at the University of Cambridge for booking onto this workshop. CDH Learning gratefully acknowledges the support of the Isaac Newton Trust and the Faculty of History for this workshop. |
October 2019
| Thu 10 |
From Blog to Book
Finished
Blogging as a digital means of research communication seems so simple: with free, easy-to-use platforms we’re all just a few clicks away from setting one up. But having set a blog up, the difficult work begins. Who are you talking to? What are you trying to achieve? How will you generate your content? How will the people you want to talk to find it? How are you going to keep it going alongside your research and teaching commitments? Will it make any difference to anything? And will you ever be able to transform any of this work into a scholarly publication that ‘counts’? This session will be an interactive conversation between Julie Blake, Cambridge Digital Humanities Methods Fellow and Connie Ruzich, University Professor of English at Robert Morris University, Pittsburgh, USA. Connie’s Behind Their Lines blog started in 2014 during a Fulbright Scholarship at Exeter University to research First World War poetry in the context of the Centenary Commemorations. She became interested in the lost and neglected poetry of the First World War and began blogging about her ‘finds’. Five years later, she has had almost 400,000 visits to her blog, she maintains a lively dialogue with public and academic audiences including via Twitter and she is in the final stages of completing a monograph about this material with Bloomsbury Academic. We’ll discuss the highs and lows of Connie’s research blogging experience, the surprises, the pitfalls and the lessons learned by hard won experience. We’ll try to answer all the questions listed above, and participants will be invited to join in with their own questions. |
| Wed 16 |
The Library as Data: An overview
Finished
Is the "digital library" more than a virtual rendering of the bookshelf or filing cabinet? Does the transformation of books into bytes and manuscripts into pixels change the way we create and share knowledge? This session introduces a conceptual toolkit for understanding the library collection in the digital age, and provides a guide to key methods for accessing, transforming and analysing the contents as data. Using the rich collections of Cambridge University Library as a starting point, we will explore:
The session will also provide an overview of the content in the rest of the term’s Library as Data programme, and introduce our annual call for applications to the Machine Reading the Archive Projects mentoring scheme. |
| Wed 23 |
Text encoding, or the addition of semantic meaning to text, is a core activity in digital humanities, covering everything from linguistic analysis of novels to quantitative research on manuscript collections. In this session we will take a look at the fundamentals of text encoding – why we might want to do it, and why we need to think carefully about our approaches. We will also introduce the TEI (Text Encoding Initiative), the most commonly used standard for markup in the digital humanities, and look at some common research applications through examples. |
| Wed 30 |
Correspondence collections are a unique window into the social networks of prominent historical figures. With the digitisation and encoding of personal letters, researchers have at their disposal a wealth of relational data, which can be studied using social network analysis. This session will introduce and demonstrate foundational concepts, methods and tools in social network analysis using datasets prepared from the Darwin Correspondence collection. Topics covered will include
No knowledge of prior knowledge of programming is required, instructions on software to install will be sent out before the session |
November 2019
| Wed 6 |
This session focusses on providing photography skills for those undertaking archival research. Dr Oliver Dunn has experience spanning a decade filming documents for major academic research projects. He will go over practical approaches to finding and ordering materials in the archive, methods of handling and filming them, digital file storage, and transcription strategies. The focus is very much on low-tech approaches and small budgets. We’ll consider best uses of smartphones, digital cameras and tripods. The session is held in the IT training room at the University Library. |
| Wed 13 |
Recent advances in machine learning are allowing computer vision and humanities researchers to develop new tools and methods for exploring digital image collections. Neural network models are now able to match, differentiate and classify images at scale in ways which would have been impossible a few years ago. This session introduces the IIIF image data framework, which has been developed by a consortium of the world’s leading research libraries and image repositories, and demonstrates a range of different machine learning- based methods for exploring digital image collections. We will also discuss some of the ethical challenges of applying computer vision algorithms to cultural and historical image collections. Topics covered will include:
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December 2019
| Mon 2 |
This two-day intensive workshop will introduce participants to the practice of game design. It will explore the different ways that digital and analogue games are designed, particularly how you can design with intent to communicate a mood, theme or message. Participants will learn game design skills - such as boxing-in, design documents and prototyping – alongside opportunities to test them out by creating their own short games. The sessions focus on game design, how to shape mechanics and play experiences, so no technical skills are needed. Participants will create their short games using both non-digital tools and simple, free software that will be taught in the session. The course participants will be selected via an application process, once a provisional place is booked a call for application form will be issued for completion and return by 1 November 2019. Once the applications are reviewed, places will be confirmed directly in the week beginning 18 November 2019. |
| Tue 3 |
This two-day intensive workshop will introduce participants to the practice of game design. It will explore the different ways that digital and analogue games are designed, particularly how you can design with intent to communicate a mood, theme or message. Participants will learn game design skills - such as boxing-in, design documents and prototyping – alongside opportunities to test them out by creating their own short games. The sessions focus on game design, how to shape mechanics and play experiences, so no technical skills are needed. Participants will create their short games using both non-digital tools and simple, free software that will be taught in the session. The course participants will be selected via an application process, once a provisional place is booked a call for application form will be issued for completion and return by 1 November 2019. Once the applications are reviewed, places will be confirmed directly in the week beginning 18 November 2019. |
January 2020
| Tue 7 |
This session explores the lifecycle of a digital research project, across the stages of design, data capture, transformation, analysis, presentation and preservation, and introduces tactics for embedding ethical research principles and practices at each stage of the research process. We discuss how to assess the impact of relevant legal frameworks, including data protection, intellectual property and media law, on your digital research project and consider what approach researchers should take to the terms of service of third-party digital platforms. Please note: this session covers the same content as The Ethics of Data Collection and Use in the Social Sciences Research Methods Programme. Students eligible to attend SSRMP are therefore requested not to book this session (though they are welcome to attend other sessions in this course), and instead to book here https://www.training.cam.ac.uk/jsss/course/ssrmc-ethicdaus |
| Tue 14 |
This session addresses the technical and ethical aspects of digital data collection and wrangling – two fundamental stages in the lifecycle of a digital research project. Participants will be introduced to online data sources and practices of internet-mediated data collection, including retrieving data from social media platforms. As data collected from online sources is often dirty and messy, we will also provide a short practical introduction to the process of transforming raw data into a clean and structured dataset using free and open-source software. |
| Tue 21 |
What happens to the practice of qualitative research when interactions between researcher and research subject are largely mediated. This session will explore a wide range of topics including the challenge of consent, researcher presence and ‘lurking’ in mediated settings, how to engage with digital gatekeepers, information security for researchers, and understanding the impact of digital platform architecture on qualitative research design. |
| Mon 27 |
This workshop is a very basic introduction to network analysis for humanities scholars. It will introduce the concepts of networks, nodes, edges, directed and weighted networks, bi- and multi-partite networks. It will give an overview of the kinds of things that can be thought about through a network framework, as well as some things that can’t. And it will introduce key theories, including weak ties, and small worlds. There will be an activity where participants will build their own test data set that they can then visualise. In the second half of the workshop we will cover some networks metrics including various centrality measures, clustering coefficient, community detection algorithms. It will include an activity introducing one basic web-based tool that allows you to run some of these algorithms and will provide suggestions for routes forward with other tools and coding libraries that allows quantitative analysis. Attendees should bring their own laptops. Ruth Ahnert is Professor of Literary History & Digital Humanities at Queen Mary University of London, and is currently leading two large AHRC-funded projects: Living with Machines, and Networking Archives. She is author of The Rise of Prison Literature in the Sixteenth Century (2013), and co-author of Tudor Networks of Power, and The Network Turn (both forthcoming). |
| Tue 28 |
Data Presentation and Preservation
Finished
The afterlife of your research data forms a vitally important part of your research project. Research funders and academic journal publishers are often strongly committed to the re-use of data and are reluctant to fund or publish research where datasets are not accessible for the purposes of peer review or further use. Yet the push for open data exists in tension with the expectations of data protection law which requires transparency from researchers about how long they will retain personal data. This session will explore good practice in data sharing and archiving as well as introducing sources of further information and advice within the University on this topic. |
February 2020
| Tue 4 |
This course will provide a hands-on introduction to the field of Social Network Analysis, giving participants the opportunity to “learn by doing” the process of network data collection and analysis. After being introduced to the basic concepts, the participants will have the opportunity to explore all stages of a social network analysis project, including research design, essential measures, data collection and data analysis. The focus will be on the retrieval of electronic archival data (e.g. websites, digital archives and social media platforms) for non-programmers and on the production of network analysis with specialised software (e.g. Gephi). At the end, the participants will be equipped with the basic tools to perform meaningful visualisations and analyses of network data. |
| Tue 11 |
This course will provide a hands-on introduction to the field of Social Network Analysis, giving participants the opportunity to “learn by doing” the process of network data collection and analysis. After being introduced to the basic concepts, the participants will have the opportunity to explore all stages of a social network analysis project, including research design, essential measures, data collection and data analysis. The focus will be on the retrieval of electronic archival data (e.g. websites, digital archives and social media platforms) for non-programmers and on the production of network analysis with specialised software (e.g. Gephi). At the end, the participants will be equipped with the basic tools to perform meaningful visualisations and analyses of network data. |
| Wed 12 |
We are running a focus group to try out Gale Digital Scholar Lab, an online platform of Digital Humanities tools for organising and analysing the historical texts in their archive. Gale representatives will demo the capabilities of the Lab and give you a practical opportunity to build your own corpus and do some analysis and visualisation (without writing a line of code). You will have a chance to feedback your opinions and research needs, and discuss broader issues of how these sorts of tools might fit in with your Digital Humanities research, and the role of private sector providers in the provision of tools and resources to researchers. Gale Digital Scholar Lab will be available to participants in advance of the focus group. A link will be sent to participants by email. Refreshments and light lunch will be provided. Please bring your own laptop. |
| Mon 17 |
Beginner's Filmmaking Workshop
Finished
Tutors: Sarah McEvoy / Kostas Chondros Are you curious about making a short documentary film? This beginner’s filmmaking workshop will help you to start thinking visually and communicate using sound and film. Over two days you will be introduced to different camera shot types, how to construct a basic story, use digital video cameras and sound recorders to shoot your own footage, and then edit a short sequence for export. The workshop assumes no or very little prior knowledge of filmmaking and no prior preparation is required for the workshop. This is a hands-on practical workshop, working in small teams of two or three people. We expect a willingness to be open to ideas and work in a team to jointly create a short film clip. The workshop will give you the foundational skills to incorporate film and sound in your own future projects, for example short clips for social media, publicity about research projects as a way to engage wider audiences etc. During the workshop you will work with dedicated video equipment, but the techniques you will learn can be adapted to film making with smartphones, tablets and other readily available personal electronic devices. COURSE PROGRAMME Day 1 – Monday 17th February
Day 2 – Tuesday 18th February We will be working on apple macs and Final Cut X; however we do not expect any prior knowledge of working with either computer or software
Handouts will be emailed after the workshop, and include: Presentation – shot types, how to construct a sequence Editing on Final Cut x Camera functions, audio recording, info about equipment and editing software and model release forms What you need to take with you Headphones – preferably the kind you can plug in rather than Bluetooth headphones Storage device – if you want to take footage you shoot with you after the workshop, you will need a hard drive, USB or SD card that can hold at least 8GB. Video files are large. Please make sure that the device is formatted to FAT32 if you use it on a PC, as we will be using macs. You can check this by right clicking the device and checking the properties. If you prefer, you don’t need to save the footage that you film and can also upload the exported film to Dropbox. Upon booking this workshop a questionnaire will be issued to participants which must be completed in order to satisfy the booking. The workshop is led by: Sarah McEvoy holds BA Hons Fine Art and an MA in Visual Anthropology from Goldsmiths University of London and has most recently completed an MA in Art and Design in Education at UCL Institute of Education. Sarah has worked with arts organisations and charities creating short documentaries and has most recently filmed and edited a film working with a socially engaged artist in the community of South East London. As an artist-educator, Sarah works with youth groups and adults with learning disabilities in the community and museums and galleries. Kostas Chondros holds an MA in Visual Anthropology from Goldsmiths College, University of London. He also holds an MA in Social Exclusion, Minorities & Gender from Panteion University and a BA in Social Anthropology & History from the University of the Aegean, Greece. Since joining the Personal Histories film production team in 2011, Kostas has filmed several events and taught camera & film production skills. Additionally, as a freelance filmmaker, Kostas documents improvised music performances and collaborates on film projects with other artists and performers. He is also a musician, poet and translator. |
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Beginner's Filmmaking Workshop
Finished
Tutors: Sarah McEvoy / Kostas Chondros Are you curious about making a short documentary film? This beginner’s filmmaking workshop will help you to start thinking visually and communicate using sound and film. Over two days you will be introduced to different camera shot types, how to construct a basic story, use digital video cameras and sound recorders to shoot your own footage, and then edit a short sequence for export. The workshop assumes no or very little prior knowledge of filmmaking and no prior preparation is required for the workshop. This is a hands-on practical workshop, working in small teams of two or three people. We expect a willingness to be open to ideas and work in a team to jointly create a short film clip. The workshop will give you the foundational skills to incorporate film and sound in your own future projects, for example short clips for social media, publicity about research projects as a way to engage wider audiences etc. During the workshop you will work with dedicated video equipment, but the techniques you will learn can be adapted to film making with smartphones, tablets and other readily available personal electronic devices. COURSE PROGRAMME Day 1 – Monday 17th February
Day 2 – Tuesday 18th February We will be working on apple macs and Final Cut X; however we do not expect any prior knowledge of working with either computer or software
Handouts will be emailed after the workshop, and include: Presentation – shot types, how to construct a sequence Editing on Final Cut x Camera functions, audio recording, info about equipment and editing software and model release forms What you need to take with you Headphones – preferably the kind you can plug in rather than Bluetooth headphones Storage device – if you want to take footage you shoot with you after the workshop, you will need a hard drive, USB or SD card that can hold at least 8GB. Video files are large. Please make sure that the device is formatted to FAT32 if you use it on a PC, as we will be using macs. You can check this by right clicking the device and checking the properties. If you prefer, you don’t need to save the footage that you film and can also upload the exported film to Dropbox. Upon booking this workshop a questionnaire will be issued to participants which must be completed in order to satisfy the booking. The workshop is led by: Sarah McEvoy holds BA Hons Fine Art and an MA in Visual Anthropology from Goldsmiths University of London and has most recently completed an MA in Art and Design in Education at UCL Institute of Education. Sarah has worked with arts organisations and charities creating short documentaries and has most recently filmed and edited a film working with a socially engaged artist in the community of South East London. As an artist-educator, Sarah works with youth groups and adults with learning disabilities in the community and museums and galleries. Kostas Chondros holds an MA in Visual Anthropology from Goldsmiths College, University of London. He also holds an MA in Social Exclusion, Minorities & Gender from Panteion University and a BA in Social Anthropology & History from the University of the Aegean, Greece. Since joining the Personal Histories film production team in 2011, Kostas has filmed several events and taught camera & film production skills. Additionally, as a freelance filmmaker, Kostas documents improvised music performances and collaborates on film projects with other artists and performers. He is also a musician, poet and translator. |
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| Tue 18 |
Beginner's Filmmaking Workshop
Finished
Tutors: Sarah McEvoy / Kostas Chondros Are you curious about making a short documentary film? This beginner’s filmmaking workshop will help you to start thinking visually and communicate using sound and film. Over two days you will be introduced to different camera shot types, how to construct a basic story, use digital video cameras and sound recorders to shoot your own footage, and then edit a short sequence for export. The workshop assumes no or very little prior knowledge of filmmaking and no prior preparation is required for the workshop. This is a hands-on practical workshop, working in small teams of two or three people. We expect a willingness to be open to ideas and work in a team to jointly create a short film clip. The workshop will give you the foundational skills to incorporate film and sound in your own future projects, for example short clips for social media, publicity about research projects as a way to engage wider audiences etc. During the workshop you will work with dedicated video equipment, but the techniques you will learn can be adapted to film making with smartphones, tablets and other readily available personal electronic devices. COURSE PROGRAMME Day 1 – Monday 17th February
Day 2 – Tuesday 18th February We will be working on apple macs and Final Cut X; however we do not expect any prior knowledge of working with either computer or software
Handouts will be emailed after the workshop, and include: Presentation – shot types, how to construct a sequence Editing on Final Cut x Camera functions, audio recording, info about equipment and editing software and model release forms What you need to take with you Headphones – preferably the kind you can plug in rather than Bluetooth headphones Storage device – if you want to take footage you shoot with you after the workshop, you will need a hard drive, USB or SD card that can hold at least 8GB. Video files are large. Please make sure that the device is formatted to FAT32 if you use it on a PC, as we will be using macs. You can check this by right clicking the device and checking the properties. If you prefer, you don’t need to save the footage that you film and can also upload the exported film to Dropbox. Upon booking this workshop a questionnaire will be issued to participants which must be completed in order to satisfy the booking. The workshop is led by: Sarah McEvoy holds BA Hons Fine Art and an MA in Visual Anthropology from Goldsmiths University of London and has most recently completed an MA in Art and Design in Education at UCL Institute of Education. Sarah has worked with arts organisations and charities creating short documentaries and has most recently filmed and edited a film working with a socially engaged artist in the community of South East London. As an artist-educator, Sarah works with youth groups and adults with learning disabilities in the community and museums and galleries. Kostas Chondros holds an MA in Visual Anthropology from Goldsmiths College, University of London. He also holds an MA in Social Exclusion, Minorities & Gender from Panteion University and a BA in Social Anthropology & History from the University of the Aegean, Greece. Since joining the Personal Histories film production team in 2011, Kostas has filmed several events and taught camera & film production skills. Additionally, as a freelance filmmaker, Kostas documents improvised music performances and collaborates on film projects with other artists and performers. He is also a musician, poet and translator. |
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This course will provide a hands-on introduction to the field of Social Network Analysis, giving participants the opportunity to “learn by doing” the process of network data collection and analysis. After being introduced to the basic concepts, the participants will have the opportunity to explore all stages of a social network analysis project, including research design, essential measures, data collection and data analysis. The focus will be on the retrieval of electronic archival data (e.g. websites, digital archives and social media platforms) for non-programmers and on the production of network analysis with specialised software (e.g. Gephi). At the end, the participants will be equipped with the basic tools to perform meaningful visualisations and analyses of network data. |
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Beginner's Filmmaking Workshop
Finished
Tutors: Sarah McEvoy / Kostas Chondros Are you curious about making a short documentary film? This beginner’s filmmaking workshop will help you to start thinking visually and communicate using sound and film. Over two days you will be introduced to different camera shot types, how to construct a basic story, use digital video cameras and sound recorders to shoot your own footage, and then edit a short sequence for export. The workshop assumes no or very little prior knowledge of filmmaking and no prior preparation is required for the workshop. This is a hands-on practical workshop, working in small teams of two or three people. We expect a willingness to be open to ideas and work in a team to jointly create a short film clip. The workshop will give you the foundational skills to incorporate film and sound in your own future projects, for example short clips for social media, publicity about research projects as a way to engage wider audiences etc. During the workshop you will work with dedicated video equipment, but the techniques you will learn can be adapted to film making with smartphones, tablets and other readily available personal electronic devices. COURSE PROGRAMME Day 1 – Monday 17th February
Day 2 – Tuesday 18th February We will be working on apple macs and Final Cut X; however we do not expect any prior knowledge of working with either computer or software
Handouts will be emailed after the workshop, and include: Presentation – shot types, how to construct a sequence Editing on Final Cut x Camera functions, audio recording, info about equipment and editing software and model release forms What you need to take with you Headphones – preferably the kind you can plug in rather than Bluetooth headphones Storage device – if you want to take footage you shoot with you after the workshop, you will need a hard drive, USB or SD card that can hold at least 8GB. Video files are large. Please make sure that the device is formatted to FAT32 if you use it on a PC, as we will be using macs. You can check this by right clicking the device and checking the properties. If you prefer, you don’t need to save the footage that you film and can also upload the exported film to Dropbox. Upon booking this workshop a questionnaire will be issued to participants which must be completed in order to satisfy the booking. The workshop is led by: Sarah McEvoy holds BA Hons Fine Art and an MA in Visual Anthropology from Goldsmiths University of London and has most recently completed an MA in Art and Design in Education at UCL Institute of Education. Sarah has worked with arts organisations and charities creating short documentaries and has most recently filmed and edited a film working with a socially engaged artist in the community of South East London. As an artist-educator, Sarah works with youth groups and adults with learning disabilities in the community and museums and galleries. Kostas Chondros holds an MA in Visual Anthropology from Goldsmiths College, University of London. He also holds an MA in Social Exclusion, Minorities & Gender from Panteion University and a BA in Social Anthropology & History from the University of the Aegean, Greece. Since joining the Personal Histories film production team in 2011, Kostas has filmed several events and taught camera & film production skills. Additionally, as a freelance filmmaker, Kostas documents improvised music performances and collaborates on film projects with other artists and performers. He is also a musician, poet and translator. |
April 2020
| Tue 21 |
Bug Hunt 2020 [cancelled - Covid 19]
CANCELLED
This programme is an opportunity to learn, through practical experience and shared investigation, how to apply digital methods for exploring and analysing a body of archival texts. The core of the programme will be 5 x 2 hour classroom based sessions supplemented by group and individual work on tasks related to the project design, delivery and documentation in between sessions. In addition to attending all five face-to-face sessions, participants should set aside an additional 8-10 hours over the duration of the course for work on project-related tasks. During the programme we’ll work together on a particular topic: how insects were represented in books created for children in the 19th century. This question will help us to think about how children’s encounters with the natural world might have been framed and shaped by their reading. We’ll work on digital collections of 19th century children’s books exploring how such collections are built and how they can be used for machine reading. We’ll develop specific research questions and you’ll learn how to explore them using different tools for textual stylistic analysis. At the end, we’ll present findings and consider the implications of what we’ve discovered. Topics covered include; • The development of methods for machine reading the archive – ideas, motivations and ethics • Children’s books of the long 19th century – a beginner’s guide • Designing a small-scale investigation • Building a collection of digital texts • Transforming texts into searchable data • Analysing stylistic patterns in the data |
| Thu 30 |
This online session will introduce basic methods for reading and processing text files in Python with Jupyter Notebooks. We'll discuss why you might wish to do text-mining, and whether coding with Python is the right choice for you. We'll run through the 5 steps of text-mining, and start to walk through an example that reads in a text corpus, splits it into words and sentences (tokens), removes unwanted words (stopwords), counts the tokens (frequency analysis), and visualises results. This initial session is one hour long and will be delivered remotely by video conferencing. During the session we will cover the essentials of working with the Jupyter Notebooks provided so that you can carry on working through the materials in your own time. The first session will be followed by a second, optional Q&A session for troubleshooting issues and recapping essentials. Required preparation: A short internet-based exercise in working with variables and text in Python will be sent out one week prior to the session. You will also get instructions on how to find the materials we will be using and how to log onto the video conferencing platform. Please make sure you have some time to prepare properly so that we can concentrate on teaching during the remote session. |