Archive for the ‘Saturna Project’ Category
Blocks that appear based on taxonomy in Drupal 6
Posted by: mark in Saturna Project on April 20th, 2009
Discovering the power of the Views and Taxonomy modules solved a huge number of frustrations I had when I was designing our site. But to get the subsequent Blocks to appear on the correct pages with the correct content is tricky.
This problem is easily solved with some PHP cut and paste magic that gets inserted in the configure section of the specific Block you want to control (See image for the exact location of where the code goes). This page in the Drupal forums has a list of great snippets that can help with organizing Blocks with PHP. I was stuck two of them together to get the following code, that makes a specific block appear on certain pages, and also a certain page type if the taxonomy term is correct.
To find out the number corresponding to any of your Taxonomy terms, go to the Taxonomy section in your admin menu and in "list terms", hover the mouse over any given term and the term's number will appear at the bottom of your browser.
To use this code, just replace the term number and the Drupal paths with your own and change the FALSE / TRUE variables as you like.
<?php
$match = FALSE;
$url = request_uri();
if (strpos($url, "fogalarmbuilding")) {
$match = FALSE;
}
if (strpos($url, "community_stories")) {
$match = FALSE;
}
if (strpos($url, "saturnina_stories")) {
$match = TRUE;
}
$desired_term = 4;
if ( arg(0) == 'node' and is_numeric(arg(1)) and arg(2) == FALSE ) {
$node = node_load(arg(1));
if (is_array($node->taxonomy)) {
foreach ($node->taxonomy as $term) {
if ($term->tid == $desired_term) {
$match= TRUE;
}
}
}
}
return $match;
?>
Su Yon’s Post Mortem #4 – truly multimedia-based videos
Posted by: suyon in Saturna Project on April 11th, 2009
Having come from a traditional filmmaking background and currently working as a multimedia designer, one of my goals during my education at Masters of Digital Media is to learn how to incorporate ever-changing digital media tools into my multimedia storytelling methods.Santa Saturnina on the ocean in Unity
The videos on exploresaturna.com are composed of “conventionally” shot interview footage, archival footage, photography, digital motion graphics in After Effects, and video capture of a 3D model in the game engine Unity. Personally, it was an extremely valuable experience to produce the multimedia-based videos. The present and future of the digital media realm has (and will have) so much to offer in terms of diversity of its formats. My objective is to learn how to tell a story using these tools in the most compelling, effective, and convincing way.
Su Yon’s Post Mortem #3 – exporting as a .flv file from Final Cut Pro
Posted by: suyon in Saturna Project on April 11th, 2009
To upload the videos onto exploresaturna.com, the videos had to be exported as .flv files. Final Cut Pro does have an option for .flv under “export”. However, FCP would freeze every time I attempted to export my “sequence” as a .flv file.make sure you select "Make Movie Self-Contained"
The first solution I looked into was to export the “sequence” as a .mov file by “Using QuickTime Conversion" under “export” then use SUPER (Simplified Universal Player Encoder & Renderer) to convert from .mov to .flv. However, the picture quality of the .mov file was unbelievably terrible. After editing the videos for weeks, compromising the picture quality was the last thing I wanted to see. I was hoping that SUPER would enhance the picture quality while converting from .mov to .flv but it wasn’t helping as much as I had hoped.
In the end, this was how I successfully exported as .flv files. In Final Cut Pro, I went to File > Export > QuickTime Movie. I had to make sure that I selected “Make Movie Self-Contained”. This will make a .mov file as a Final Cut Pro movie file as opposed to a QuickTime movie file. Then I brought the .mov file into Adobe Media Encoder where I could convert the .mov file to a .flv file.
Su Yon’s Post Mortem #2 – rich storytelling resources from the community of Saturna Island
Posted by: suyon in Saturna Project on April 11th, 2009
Initially, Aerlyn and I planned to create three short videos for exploresaturna.com under the themes of 1) general introduction to the early Spanish exploration, 2) the East Point Fog Alarm Building, and 3) the Santa Saturnina.feral goats on Saturna Island
The core concept of our storytelling was to tell the stories from the past by relating them to the current community members’ perspectives and passions. We wanted to convey the message that “history does not have to live in the past” throughout our videos. This was why it was crucial to interview the residents of Saturna Island for the videos.
During our visit to Saturna Island, we filmed a Saturna Heritage Committee meeting, the tour of the East Point Fog Alarm Building led by the last East Point Lighthouse keeper Ian McNeil, and several actively-involved community members.
Once we returned to Vancouver with the precious footage from Saturna Island, we realized that there were too many interesting stories and we shouldn’t make just three videos. That was how seven, instead of three, videos came about exploring 1) vision of the Fog Alarm Building (FAB), 2) the Santa Saturnina and its on-going Spanish heritage on the Gulf Islands, 3) the FAB as an artistic inspiration, 4) renovating the FAB, 5) the East Point Lighthouse keepers, 6) early Spanish exploration on the Northwest Coast, and 7) Canadian-invented diaphone fog alarms. Not to mention that, if the time frame for our team was longer, we could’ve created more videos because of the abundance of stories from Saturna Island.
The community of Saturna Island is the owner of exploresaturna.com. I hope that the Saturna Islanders will continue to update the video storytelling contents and showcase their everyday “heritage-making” process to the rest of the world on a regular basis.
I dare to suggest that a video making class would be an exciting part of the curriculum for Saturna Ecological Education Centre (SEEC) where young students can learn about how to tell a story via video and produce videos about what is happening on Saturna Island.
Su Yon’s Post Mortem #1 - starting off with research
Posted by: suyon in Saturna Project on April 9th, 2009
Our video making team, Aerlyn Weissman and myself Su Yon Sohn, started off our Saturna Project by researching some unique characteristics of Saturna Island, British Columbia. As our team’s two main focuses were the stories of the East Point Fog Alarm Building and early Spanish exploration on the Northwest Coast, our research topics varied; 1) what different stories has the Fog Alarm Building (FAB) had? 2) what motivates the community of Saturna Island to rehabilitate the FAB? 3) what are the stories of the demolished East Point Lighthouse? 4) where did the name “Saturna” come from? 5) what kind of living conditions did the Spanish explorers have on the ship Santa Saturnina? 6) what was the route of the Santa Saturnina’s journey when she discovered the region around Saturna Island? 7) what was the Spanish interest in the Northwest Coast in the 1700s? 8) what sort of political tension did the Spanish, the British, and the Russians have on the Northwest Coast in the 1790s? 9) who are the current residents of Saturna Island? 10) what kind of vibrant culture have the Saturna Islanders created? 11) what has made Saturna today’s Saturna? 12) What makes the Saturna Islanders proud of themselves? 13) how did the Fog Alarm actually work back in the days when GPS didn’t exist?Team Saturna in our project room
The goals of our research were 1) to come up with compelling storytelling ideas for under 2 minute videos which the community of Saturna Island would recognize themselves in 2) to become as knowledgeable as possible before we meet the residents and interview those who have been actively involved in rehabilitating the FAB and who have a passion for tracking Saturna’s Spanish heritage.
How to get video into Drupal 6.
Posted by: mark in Saturna Project on April 9th, 2009
This might seem like an incredibly easy question to answer, but as a first-time Drupalist, with this being the first feature I tried to add to our site, I ended up experimenting with several different module combinations and ripped out all of the hair I had left before I finally got the videos playing.
To actually get the video files to play in Drupal, I followed this tutorial from Drupal Therapy: http://drupaltherapy.com/node/50, which uses the FileField and jQuery Media modules, running the videos in the free JW Mediaplayer http://www.longtailvideo.com/players/jw-flv-player/.
The JW Mediaplayer is probably the best bet in terms of a player, and its customizability was ideal for streaming video online as well as creating an off-line video gallery that could play in the Fog Alarm Building.
Once you have videos playing with jQuery Media and FileField, you'll probably want to get rid of the annoying FileField icon that appears just below the video. There are several posts in the Drupal forums about how to do this with PHP code, but it's simplest to just add the following code into your CSS file:.filefield-icon {display:none;}
Santa Saturnina 3D
Posted by: stephen in Saturna Project on March 29th, 2009
With the project deadline fast approaching everyone on the team has been working overtime on their areas of responsibility. Over the course of the past week I have been busy working on fine tuning the model of the Santa Saturnina (poly count is stressing my pc :) along with improving the texturing. With expert guidance from Gordon Miller, I believe we have created a good representation of what this old ship once looked like.
Here are a few renders...
Stephen
Santa Saturnina - model
Posted by: stephen in Saturna Project on March 5th, 2009
The first iteration of the Santa Saturnina model is getting close to being finished. While there is still more detail work to be done, the majority of the modeling is complete. Here are some recent renders of the model in a more "natural" environment.
Thanks to Saturna Island!
Posted by: mark in Saturna Project on March 4th, 2009
Team Saturna at the Fog Alarm Building on Saturna's East Point
The team just got back from Saturna Island and we are completely amazed at the warmth and hospitality of everyone we met, especially the people we stayed with, everyone who fed us, drove us and boated us around - we are so impressed with the Saturna community and all of the amazing projects they are working on. Thanks!
Saturna Expedition
Posted by: mark in Saturna Project on February 27th, 2009
Saturna Island's Fog Alarm Building (photo by Gerri Sinclair)
After many weeks of hearing about Saturna Island, reading about, looking at pictures of the FAB, charting courses on old maps, and new maps, we're finally visiting the island! All five members of the project team will be on Saturna Island from today until March 2nd. We can't wait to meet everyone and see all of the places we've heard so much about.
