About Digital Stories
Digital Stories are short, personal, multimedia scraps of TV that people can make for themselves.
They're 'mini-movies'. Desktop computers enabled with video editing software are used to synchronise recorded spoken narratives with scans of personal photographs.
This project requires commitment for, as well as all the technical stuff that must be learnt, script writing, picture editing and performance skills are also needed and these have to be worked on, which is why most Digital Stories are made by people attending workshops where participants can benefit from the help and advice of facilitators.
People of all ages and abilities make Digital Stories and many have testified how rewarding the experience is for, when their story is shared with friends and family or posted on the web, they find they have discovered a new voice.
There's a strictness to the construction of a Digital Story: 250 words, a dozen or so pictures, and two minutes is the right length. As with poetry these constraints define the form (e.g. a haiku is a poem written using 17 syllables, and the 14 lines of a sonnet are written in iambic pentameter) and it's the observation of that form which gives the thing its elegance.
Daniel Meadows, Lecturer in Participatory Media & Photography Cardiff University School of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies and former Creative Director of 麻豆社 Wales Digital Storytelling.