Helen Keller said that the most pathetic person in the world is someone who has sight, but no vision. Our visions prompt us to see the beauty and uniqueness of things around. We also want to make things that move swiftly through the eyes of the viewers to their heart and make an appreciated mark on their intellects.
The animation is the key and the lock as well in this case. We lock our creativity and content in small Powtoon work and let it reach the learners. They use the same key and open it to unleash an abundance of interesting screening on the devices.
This blog post is a thanksgiving to Powtoon for their pleasant gesture of supporting the act of teaching. I wrote to them that their free account limitations are hampering the way we need to help the students stuck at home. Citing the Coronavirus and the subsequent lockdown, I asked for an increase in the time limit of videos we can make on their free account.
The insistence on their social media and later via e-mail to Support[@]powtoon.com was timely acknowledged and they sent me an activation link for a Trial for the Premium Services. For 90 Days (till 30 June) being a Teacher, I can use their full-featured platform. The watermark shall remain in the exported works though, I don’t mind that at all.
One of the first renders I did is of my profile as a Vlog Resume.
Powtoon also has a smartphone app. Which gives us the options to:
- Upload Media for Powtoon Development
- Record Voice Over
- Play and Share our Powtoons
The quality of the animations and templates is good to see on screen. When you select the option of making a presentation on Powtoon, do remember that you can even import a PowerPoint Presentation to Powtoon. That presentation is converted as an animated one. There are visible limitations and we cannot expect a divine transformation. But the options that we can apply after importing make it all the more significant.
The premium account gives you access to characters, music, animation and exclusive templates. This is not just for education but it is a multi-domain solution platform for video making. Rather than opting to shoot a video or start something from scratch, we can opt to use the pre-made designs – both free and paid ones. Powtoon also allows embedding of the created work. It is sad for teachers that only 03 minutes duration is possible under the free account and you cannot download the work in all formats. That’s the business world for Powtoon and we as teachers cannot fight much against it. However, we can request them to give us limited-time access to develop contents for learning not for money-making.
Powtoon has categories of templates like marketing, presentation, resume and a lot more. You can choose from any and then customise it according to the purpose in hand. Please do not forget that this multi-facet character gives it a weightage for your students as well. Our students, who are going to enter various domains of career can learn this smart skill of designing in a compact and creative way in the classrooms itself.
While you step ahead towards PowToon Creation, the following prerequisites are to be kept in mind:
- Powtoon can design your concept, you have to develop it yourself
- The free version certainly has the limitation but as a platform, it gives you a chance to develop something creative and impressive
- Keep stock of images that you want to use in the presentation/video
- Do not use images which are copyrighted
- Use Pixabay or Pexels for Free Stock Images
- Make a Story Board first and then design-develop your presentation
- Do not depend completely on the template designs, be the Champ and Design your own slides using the Powtoon offerings
For any assistant regarding the use of Powtoon, feel free to connect with us via twitter (@TeacherParv) or email us at TeacherParv[@]gmail.com
ImageSrc: Powtoon
