Throughout the second week of the summer break, the West Leeds City Learning Centre ran the Multimedia Madness summer school!

25 children aged between five and eleven took part in various media based activities over four day, with some great results. The young people had the opportunity to try out new techniques and new technologies; including Graphic Design, Comic Production, Animation, Music Production and Video Editing.

Over the course of the project the children used; iMac computers, Digital Still Cameras, Video Cameras, the Green Screen, Tricaster TV Studio, Plastercine for Model making and various bits of software including; Photoshop, Comic Life and I Can Animate.

Zombies taking over Leeds West CLC

Leeds West CLC completed their Zombie Mania summer school today with the premiere of ‘Zombie Mania 3D’. Young people from across the city worked throughout the week to produce the 3D film. They successfully undertook all aspects of film making, story-boarding, costume design, special effects, acting, editing, computer graphics and music composition.

All their hard work paid off when Zombie Mania was well received by the audience who were impressed with quality of the finished product.

The day of the shoot

Pre-production

Costume & Make-up

The fantastic final performance Summer School Musical 2010 took place last night at the Howard Assembly Rooms in the centre of Leeds. The project ran for a total of 8 days at Derek Fatchett City Learning Centre, the White Rose Learning Centre, and the BBC Media Centre at Primrose High School.

The students, aged 10-12 were given the challenge of creating, rehearsing, and performing a musical in a very limited timeframe, and exceeded everyone’s expectations. Thanks to the help of artists Danny, Claire, and Naomi, the staff at each of the centres, and a group of student mentors, the young people involved managed to write the dialog, learn their songs, make their costumes, props, and scenery, and deliver a fantastic performance to an invited audience.

Continuing on with the successes of last year, students on two of our courses have enjoyed some amazing success this year. Both courses had a 100% success rate, above our already high expectations.

Students from City of Leeds School came to the CLC for 3 hours a week for the whole year and completed a BTEC Level 2 Award in Interactive Media. This qualification is equivalent to a B grade GCSE (46 points) and covered such areas as game design, graphics, sound and advertising.

Another group of students from several schools: City of Leeds School, Primrose High School and Carr Manor High School, successfully completed a BTEC First Diploma in Media, worth 4 GCSEs grade A* to C. In this course, they developed a variety of media skills such as print production, video production, audio production and animation techniques as well as learning about research for media production, creating products for an audience and the media industry.

We fully expect our year 10 students to be as successful – the vast majority of them have already achieved a BTEC First Certificate in Media, worth 2 GCSEs grade A* to C.

Over the past few weeks, Leeds CLCs have been hosting a series of quizzes between primary schools from across the City. Starting out with heats, and then a semi final, year 6 quiz teams came to the City Learning Centres and competed with each other using the vide0-conferencing technology. With each team miles away from each other, it came down to a battle of wits as they took turns answering questions being fired from a quizmaster in a remote location. After some very close matches, Calverley Parkside Primary won the opportunity to compete against a primary school from the city of St. Helens.

With a score-difference of just 1 point, St. Helens won by a whisker, but a good time was had by all involved.

Leeds CLCs have enjoyed this project, and are looking for ways to improve it and possibly run it again in the future.

During the Summer holidays, the North East Leeds CLC is running multi media session called Scanning & Restoring Old Photographs from Monday 16/07/2010 to Friday 20/07/2010, 10.00 am- 3.00 pm. Students will be learning about manipulation of images in Adobe Photoshop, scanning and restoration of old photographs.

This course is open to pupils who live in the North East wedge of the city. The course is free and students will have to provide their own lunch. It’s aimed at students aged between 14 and 18 years old. There are limited places that will be given on a first come first bases. Students are expected to attend all of the sessions.

For more information contact Jelena at North East Leeds CLC on: 011302883500.

During the Summer holidays, the North East Leeds CLC is running multi media sessions called Introduction to Digital Photography & Digital Image Editing With Adobe Photoshop from Monday 09/08/2010 to Friday 13/08/2010, 10.00 am- 3.00 pm. Students will be learning how to use digital SLRs and to manipulate their photographs in Adobe Photoshop.

This course is open to pupils who live in the North East wedge of the city. The course is free and students will have to provide their own lunch. It’s aimed at students aged between 14 and 18 years old. There are limited places that will be given on a first come first bases. Students are expected to attend all of the sessions.

For more information contact Jelena at North East Leeds CLC on: 011302883500.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO A TRACK

Creative and Media Diploma students from South Leeds CLC used the portable iPod kit whilst on a research trip to Bradford Media Museum. The iPods were loaded with a video of what they had to achieve on each floor of the museum, students then used the iPods, microphones and digital cameras to record their notes and work for the day. Back at South CLC, they then gathered all of their research and turned it into a Website with blog to summaries what they had learnt. This all formed part of their Diploma coursework.

Not only did students comment on how much quicker and enjoyable ‘digital note taking’ was but several schools who were also in the museum commented positively.

“it meant I was able to spend more time looking at the exhibits instead of completing work sheets”, “Because I was recording my notes I had to actually read the signs and text so I think I learnt more than I would have done normally”, “I really enjoyed using all of the IT kit, it made the day feel much more special”

Even the minibus driver commented on how quiet and hard-working the group were, it is amazing how quiet a group goes when given iPods on a minibus!

To discuss using the portable kit, contact your wedge CLC.