Wow, What a Difference Training Makes!

The other day, I wrote a post about Twitter for Professional Development. Along with the post, I uploaded a screencast that I had made. Very shortly after I uploaded it, I took down the link. I decided that I wasn't satisfied with the final product, and I needed help quite desperately. 
I took matters into my own hands, and signed up for the free imovie and Garageband classes at the Apple store. (I blogged about that too). Well, here I am, three days after the training, and I feel like I have a totally different video. It is clean, fasted-paced, and fun. It is not necessarily a "training" video, but it is a good introduction for someone who is interested in getting a fast-paced overview of twitter. There are still some things I'd like to fix about it, but I think it might mean using a different screencasting tool. 
I'd say that training works, but you be the judge: 


And my original video below: 

Learning to Edit

Sometimes, I am my own worst critic. I just watched my last video tutorial and said, "The timing isn't quite right. I need to refine it."
I know in this day and age, perfect doesn't always matter, but with training, I think many videos are too long. My "Twitter for Professional Development" video fell into that category. 
Learning new technologies is sometimes about giving it a go, and deciding that you need a little more training. Screencasting and making video tutorials are like that for me. I started using them about two years ago, but had always worked in a team environment to produce the final content. This time, I am on my own. I have decided to take a class at the Apple store to learn how to better use imovie software. I thought I would have to pay for the workshop, but it turns out that the class is free. I don't mean to tout Apple products, but imovie lives on my computer already, so if I can learn a bit more, the quality of my videos will improve. Taking time to do it right is worth it--especially if it builds a stronger foundation for future projects.