The NSW Institute of Technology Education (ITE) held it’s annual conference this week and one of the industry workshop options was a day at the Adobe Sydney office on Wednesday 27th November.

This event was run by myself and Adobe Education Leader Jason Carthew (IT Manager, Technology teacher at Korowal School, NSW.

Following a brief welcome and demo of the new Adobe Aero app, the educators were divided into two rotated workshops. Jason’s was focused on Animation with After Effects, Photoshop and Adobe Animate. My workshop was based on video editing with Spark Video, Character Animator, Premiere Rush and Premiere Pro.

Feedback comments from this event included:

• A highlight was Adobe Spark for its applications for all school subjects
• Learning about powerful programs that I never knew existed. Exciting stuff!
• A highlight was sharing ideas that are able to be used immediately in the classroom.
• Professional, relevant, inspiring.
• A highlight was animation in Photoshop
• Excellent presenters, relaxed and experienced.
• As always enhancing my knowledge working with experts
• A highlight was extra Photoshop and After effect tools learnt
• Character Animator wow
• Learning how to develop my own Character in Character Animator.
• Being shown advanced features of an adobe programs
• Getting hands on with new software

The resources for this event can be found on the Adobe Education Exchange via – http://bit.ly/adobe27Nov19

On Tuesday 26th November, the Year 9 Media class from Davidson High School visited the Adobe Sydney Office for an Adobe Day.

The focus of this day was video literacy. We started by creating video with simple tools like Spark Video, Character Animator and the new augmented reality experience app, Adobe Aero.

Then we moved to the next level with Premiere Rush and Premiere Pro.

One of the usual highlights of an Adobe Day at the Sydney office is a tour of the office to see how a number of the Adobe employees do their work.

Special thank you to Adobe Campus Leader Jessica Peade for organising this event.

On Monday 25th November, a group of teachers from rural NSW travelled to Sydney for a special Adobe in Education training day. These educators help run the NSW Rural STEM Industry School Partnerships (SISP) program.

SISP is an education model that partners with industry with an aim of inspiring students to study STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering &  Mathematics). It focusses on growing students’ job readiness skills and contributing to the international competitiveness of regional NSW.

The aim of this event was to train these trainers and enhance their skills and confidence with a range of Adobe’s industry standard creativity applications.

Having the whole day together enabled us to work through a number of Adobe tools with a focus on how they can be used in the classroom to enhance the creativity and productivity of students and teachers. Examples of applications that were workshopped and demonstrated included:

• Character Animator
• Aero
• Rush
• Dimension
• Photoshop
• Experience Design
• Substance
• Spark Page
• Spark Video
• Premiere Pro

Feedback comments from the event included:

• I really liked being encouraged to take notes on Adobe Spark – it kept me engaged with the workshop and I got experience using the platform.
• Getting turned into the cartoon skeleton, brainstorming ideas of how to use in our schools/lessons.
• Experimenting with the software and discussing all the ways that I can incorporate these ideas in the classroom.
• It’s so rare to have professional learning where everything you are shown can be so easily applied in a real-world setting!
• I was really excited to play with Character animation and XD as i could see lots of really amazing applications for my classroom. I’m really keen to sign up for the education exchange and see some great ideas and resources.
• Amazing day
• A highlight was the connection between creative theory and practice
• I loved this – it will be so meaningful to the classroom and to extend talented students interested in the industry
• A highlight was interacting with other teachers, hands on learning and learning about the New Adobe Mobile apps.
• Fantastic workshop that can be used in the classroom.
• A highlight was understanding the purpose and tools in each Adobe product and being able to experiment.
• Exceeded my expectations. It was fantastic and inspiring. I’m ready to give the Adobe creative cloud a go and see what I can create!

A special thank you to Dr Scott Sleap (Project Leader SISPProgram, Secondary Education, Learning and Teaching Directorate, NSW Department of Education) and his team for helping to fund and organise this event.

The resources shared for this event can be found on the Adobe Education Exchange via http://bit.ly/adobe25Nov19

On Friday 22nd November, I had the pleasure of working with about 50 media students at St Helena Secondary College to help them develop their video editing skills with Adobe Premiere Pro.

Before we got stuck into tips & tricks with Premiere Pro, some of the students helped me demonstrate the value of Adobe Character Animator and the new Adobe Aero as additional video tools. Character Animator is a quick way to create animated puppets for a video story and Aero is a great was to create 3D augmented realty video experiences.

It was a great pleasure to work with these talented students as they commence the VCE Media Year 12 subject for 2020.

On Friday 15th November, It was my great pleasure to again be invited to hand out some of the graduation awards for the Swinburne University Screen Production Course.

The highlight of this event is always viewing the best of the graduating short films.

As one of the most sort after media courses in  Australia, Adobe is very proud to support the Film and screen production at Swinburne University.

Special thanks to Adobe Education Leader Max Schleser for inviting me to this event.

Tips & Tricks on Adobe Character Animator was the topic for the first of a series of new Adobe in Education Vodcasts I am hosting that went to air as a pilot on Thursday 14th November with co-host Craig Daalmeijer-Power (Adobe Education Leader from TAFE NSW).

The next Vodcast is scheduled for Wednesday February 5, 2020 (7.30PM AEST). The topic will be Adobe Creative Cloud Overview and will be hosted by Ali Blackwell (Adobe Education Leader from Melville Senior High School, Perth).

Join us live if you can and share this with your colleagues & wider network of educators.

On Wednesday 13th November, I had the pleasure to present to the student finalists of the 2019 SAE ATOM awards.

The ATOM Awards have been celebrating the best of Australian and New Zealand screen content from the education sector since 1982. These awards feature over 30 different categories covering everything from feature-length films, television programs, animation, short fiction, educational resources, and new media including web series, apps and games.

It was great to see students from all over Australia and New Zealand involved in this event and present at this ceremony.

My  job was to announce the winners of the 2019 ATOM 1 Minute Film Competition.