Free Access to Lynda.com via Libraries

What is Lynda.com?
Lynda.com offers well organized tutorials on all kinds of software such as the Microsoft Office Suite, Adobe Suite, various other multimedia programs, professional development topics, project management, programing languages, and more. To be clear, I don’t work for Lynda.com nor do I get a kickback for endorsing them here. It’s just a really great product, and I’ve gained a lot of advanced expertise all on my own using the tutorials available. You can see all the topics and courses available without logging in, so take a look to see what I mean. You can even watch some of the videos, just not entire courses.

Inside of Thompson Library at OSU. Photo features a staircase overlooking a main floor and several stories of the building with glass walls.

Thompson Library

First, get your library card:
You’ll need a free Columbus Metropolitan Library (CML) membership to get free access to Lynda.com. Bring your BuckID to Thompson Library to sign up for a CML membership. Fill out the form listing an Ohio address, which should ideally be your home, but could also be your office, dorm or department. After completing the form, you’ll receive your CML card and PIN. Alternatively, you can sign up for a membership at one of the many CML branch locations around Columbus or online. If you choose the online option, you may have to wait up to 10 days for your library card to arrive in the mail.

Then, log in for free:
Don’t go to Lynda.com and click on the Sign In button like a normal paying user. Instead, visit go.osu.edu/lyndacml, to be prompted Continue reading

Easy Screen Recording on Mac

Screen recording window w/ red record buttonDespite the misnomer, Quicktime Player actually does a lot more than play videos. You can use it to make screen recordings, and it’s oh so easy! Here’s the method I recommend, which involves recording and saving your video using Quicktime, then compressing to an mp4 of reasonable file size using MPEG Streamclip.

Install this software to record from your computer OR reserve time to use the Digital Union recording studio, where we have all the software, hardware, and staff assistance to help you get the job done. Either way, here’s what you’ll need to do. Continue reading

Beyond H.264

Banner with the initials HEVC, under which it reads High Efficiency Video CodingToday the most commonly consumed media format is MP4 files using the H.264 (Advanced Video Coding) compression scheme for video and AAC (Advanced Audio Coding) for audio. These provide the best, easily consumable, compression ratios and as such became the format of choice for mobile device designers and manufacturers. While H.264 does a very efficient job of compressing video, making larger sizes and higher quality possible at lower bit rates than previous formats, there’s always room for improvement. That’s where H.265, or HEVC (High Efficiency Video Coding), comes in. Continue reading

Why Use U.OSU?

closely cropped Image of OSU seal with the words "What is U.osu?" superimposed over imageFor me, U.osu has been nothing short of empowering. Whatever your job is, I’d be willing to bet it probably involves organizing information in some way. Do you have to evaluate proposals? Collaboratively review information and provide feedback? Provide your team with updates? Have a central repository for documents, photos, information, or links? Outline processes, policies, procedures, or instructions? Delegate tasks to a team? Share updates and provide access to departmental forms? Continue reading

Learn Photoshop Fast

Image open in Photoshop window. Image is of a mature couple laughing and holding each other at a beach with white sands fading into green water and sunny blue sky.Photoshop CS6 Essential Training is one of many complete video tutorial courses offered on Lynda.com. Need Photoshop Creative Cloud training? That’s offered now too! You can access the tutorials for free one of three ways, then choose to watch only the videos that apply to you. No more hunting around on Youtube to find out exactly how to do what you need. All the Continue reading

Free OSU Stock Photos

Orton Hall tower against a dramatic, purple twilight sky. Crescent moon in the background.OSU Communications’ website provides a great selection of photos we can download and use for free for our daily work. I use a lot of the images to breath life into my presentations, flyers, videos, and internal staff site. Click through the gallery to see if you can find what you need, or even submit your own photos! Tip: Once you click on a gallery, scroll down; the images load underneath the list of galleries.

University Communications’ signature gallery offers Ohio State photos for university use. Continue reading

Record Your Lecture with Mediasite

Video camera set up in the back of a lecture hall, recording the lecture.Mediasite is OSU’s free, supported lecture capture solution. It allows you to easily make a video of your lecture, including the content on your computer screen, as well as video of yourself lecturing. There are two flavors of Mediasite: the Desktop Recorder is free software you can download to use from your computer. The Hardware Recorder, installed in large classrooms around campus, will automatically record your lecture by request. Here are three ways Continue reading

Easy Forms in U.osu

I use a U.osu site to organize tools, information, and training materials for the Digital Union student staff. Recently, I implemented a form in the site for staff to submit documentation to me in the event that we encounter a particularly unruly guest.

What I’m emphasizing in this post however, is not the topic of the form, but how to make a form, and a few of the really nice features of Formidable, the pre-installed WordPress plugin for building forms in a U.osu site. Continue reading

Map Your Mind With SimpleMind

I just downloaded SimpleMind, a free mind mapping tool for quickly creating branched diagrams useful for laying out your thoughts in a more dynamic way than the traditional tabbed outline allows.

Screenshot of mind map of dad's wifi project

Use it to easily create a diagram of anything with multiple levels of association, such as jotting down and organizing the points to hit when writing about a complex topic, laying out the structure of a website, or in my case, mapping out the “project” of setting up wifi for my dad. He lives a couple hours away, so unless I want to be stuck giving tech support on the phone across English and Cantonese, I better get it right the first time!  Continue reading

Image Sizing Explained

Small image of a cowboy next to a larger, blurry version of the same image.

This image demonstrates what happens when you upsample an image.

At some point, you’ve probably tried to make a Twitter icon, a handout, a web banner, or image for your presentation, and just got frustrated with all the weird image sizes and how things just don’t quite size up. This pic looks great on my phone but it prints blurry, or tiny! I want to make this image my twitter icon but it’s huge! How do I find the right size image for my Powerpoint slide? What’s all this business about pixels, resolution, dpi, and ppi anyway? What does it all mean, and how does it translate between cameras and web and print? Well good news; today is the day you understand all that Continue reading