Links to Free, Cheap and Good Multimedia Resources

I thought that I should post the current & definitive list of where to get stuff here so it can be updated and 'always' available for those who, like me, keep forgetting where they put such a list. I will add categories as I find the time. If you find that any of these are duds, please let us know!

We take no responsibility for the actual content. If one of these sites posts something that you find offensive, take it up with them!

Images - Free
http://www.flickr.com and http://compfight.com/ - a Flickr search tool
http://commons.wikimedia.org/
http://www.archive.org
http://www.simplyyouthministry.com/freebies.html
http://all-free-download.com/hight-resolution-photo/
http://www.wga.hu/index.html- The Web Gallery of Art
http://www.freefoto.com
http://www.imageafter.com
http://www.freeimages.co.uk
http://www.sxc.hu
http://www.morguefile.com
http://openphoto.net
http://art.net/%7Ejeremy/photo/public_texture/index.html
http://www.picstyle.de/index_e.html
http://kepek.creart.hu
http://www.freemediagoo.com
http://stock.kriegsnet.com
http://geekphilosopher.com/MainPage/photos.htm
http://www.ppdigital.com
http://thefreesite.com/Free_Graphics/Free_photos/index.html
http://www.free-photographs.net/index.php
http://aarinfreephoto.com
http://www.bigfoto.com
http://www.picturestation.net
http://www.stock.b-man.dk
http://www.nationalgeographic.com

Images - Commercial
http://www.istockphoto.com - plus weekly free photo, monthly free illustration
http://www.shutterstock.com - weekly free photo & illustration

Video & Animation - Free
http://commons.wikimedia.org/ - free images, movies
http://www.archive.org - free images, movies
http://www.kore.uk.com/ - free video, animation
http://www.wingclips.com - video clips from feature tilms
http://www.cvli.com.au - church video licenses to screen feature films
http://www.textweek.com - video suggestions grouped by theme
http://www.simplyyouthministry.com/freebies.html - lots of free stuff, including graphics and clips
http://aso.gov.au/education/ - free video clips - Australian
http://www.churchmedia.net/ - online community sharing media resources
http://bibledex.com/ - Short film intros to Books of the Bible
http://www.pleix.net/films.html – short films
http://www.stockfootageforfree.com/ - requires free account

http://movietools.info/ - requires free account

http://royaltyfreestockvideofootage.com/videostore/category/free-stock-footage.html
http://www.motionelements.com/free/stock-footage

http://vimeo.com/groups/freehd/videos/
http://www.vjvault.com/

http://muvipix.com/products.php?subcat_id=40


Video & Animation - Commercial
http://www.istockphoto.com -plus monthly free video
http://www.shutterstock.com - commercial photos & video - weekly free photo
http://www.theworkofthepeople.com - video clips
http://highwayvideo.com/ - video clips
http://www.midnightoilproductions.com - video clips
http://www.proost.co.uk
http://www.worshiphousemedia.com/ - video clips for sale, some free

Advertising Videos
http://www.theinspirationroom.com

Audio - Free
http://www.jamendo.com/en/albums
http://www.soundsnap.com/

Audio - Commercial
http://www.istockphoto.com - plus monthly free audio
http://www.proost.co.uk

Media conversion sites
http://media-convert.com/
http://www.zamzar.com/

Presentations
http://www.presentationzen.com/presentationzen/ - design tips
http://prezi.com – presentation tool
http://www.opensong.org/ - free church presentation software
http://www.zionworx.org.uk/ - / - free church presentation software
http://www.indezine.com/ - Powerpoint & presentation resources
http://www.jumsoft.com – Apple Keynote and Pages templates & stuff

Online Journals & Associations
http://jcmc.indiana.edu/ - Journal of Computer-mediated Communication
http://www.usask.ca/relst/jrpc/ - Journal of Religion & Popular Culture
http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/HPPC – International Journal of Media & Culture
http://avalon.unomaha.edu/jrf/ - Journal of Religion & Film
http://popularculturecollective.com/ - the popular culture collective

Cool stuff
http://www.wordle.net – make art from text
http://visibletweets.com/ - visible tweets
http://kuler.adobe.com/ - colour charts for design

Ideas & connections
http://craigmitchell.typepad.com/ - craig mitchell, SA
http://holdthisspace.org.au/category/uncategorized/ - cheryl lawrie, VIC
http://jonnybaker.blogs.com/ - jonny baker, UK
http://www.postkiwi.com/ - duncan macleod, ACT
http://pumphouse.blogspot.com/ - rob hanks, NSW
http://digitalorthodoxy.com/ - darren wright, NSW

Templates - Apple Motion
http://www.motionelements.com

Templates - Apple Pages
http://www.jumsoft.com - commercial

Templates - Apple Keynote
http://www.jumsoft.com - commercial

Templates - Powerpoint

Google Earth Prayer

Hi All,
I know most of us are choosing to put stuff on our own websites/blogs and using the egroup to spread the word or ask/discuss questions but I thought it worth seeing if anyone might still be inspired to update our blog...

I'm adding here, the Google Earth Prayer we used at the biennial Uniting Church youth event NCYC09 CONVERGE!!

We basically used brown paper one day to collect prayers from over 150 punters and asked them to be specific.... you know, if praying for a friend or neighbour then include their address. It included Gaza, Fiji, Zimbabwe but also a handful of houses and water courses!!

We let the selections on the globe zoom in an out with a sung live soundtrack and it could have been a CD in any other setting!!

Powerful Persuasion

Tex Sample has a new book called Powerful Persuasion. After his other great offerings, "Ministry in an Oral Culture", and "The Spectacle of Worship in a Wired World", I expect this to be good.

Section One focuses on Story,
Section Two on Rhetoric in Image, Sound, Beat, Light, Move and Dance
Section Three on the Prophetic Church and Prophetic Use of Figure - in Hebrew Poetry and in Electronic Culture

Here's what the back cover says:

When it comes to communicating the gospel through new media and technologies, churches are often faced with one of two bad options. Either they can reject these new vehicles for sharing the faith as “not the way we’ve always done it”; or they can uncritically embrace them, failing to see that when not understood properly these media can obscure the gospel message just as much as they can communicate it. If they are going to reach the generations formed by electronic culture, churches must engage in a new evangelism, one that makes use of new technologies and cultural expressions. Sample explains how the electronic generations receive and process the information communicated by new media, and how the ways in which our consumerist culture makes use of those media are not good models for how the church can employ them to spread the message of Jesus Christ.

Tex (what is that short for?) was Professor of Church and Society at Saint Paul School of Theology in Kansas City - now he's a freelance author and lecturer.

Open Office 2.0

I've recently converted my father and his church's old computer network to Open Office, it wasn't hard to do, the words "free" and "legal" really help, and since it's a phenomenal piece of software in it's own right it's a good move for anyone who is sick of the microsoft "intuative" software. Software should never be intuative, it should do what I tell it to do and as fast as I want it to, not be wasting time thinking about how I may want it to work and then stuffing me around for hours on end...

Anyhow, rant over.

So imagine the joy and excitement when I realised that OO2.0 had been released in the last week and a bit...

Open Office does all that Msoft Office does, it's got a spreadsheet creator, presenter, word processor and a paint/draw program to boot. It's free, it's a 75MB download and it's not Microsoft...

OpenOffice.org 2.0 is the productivity suite that individuals, governments, and corporations around the world have been expecting for the last two years. Easy to use and fluidly interoperable with every major office suite, OpenOffice.org 2.0 realises the potential of open source.

With new features, advanced XML capabilities and native support for the OASIS Standard OpenDocument format, OpenOffice.org 2.0 gives users around the globe the tools to be engaged and productive members of their society.

I've been checking it out today, it's a sweet piece of software and should be enough to convince even the most microsoft friendly person to give it a go.

The layout and options have increased in quality and variety since the last release, to the point that one has to take a second look at the word processor in the suit to make sure that it's not msoft word. The presenter has increased in options, and now can open ppt and pps files as well as use a variety of newly created transitions and custom annimations, 300% on the last presenter release.

And the coolest thing about the presenter in open office is that it converts to flash with the click of one button, although it doesnt seem to like the cusom annimations in the flash file...

Go and download the setup file now and give this program a chance!

Read: OpenOffice 2.0: Exclusive Interview – OpenOffice Leaders McCreesh and Suarez-Potts

ABC radio podcasts

ABC radio in Australia is releasing a number of its shows as podcasts (ie. doownloadable mp3s)

Here are a few:

The Media Report
A critical look at the latest developments in the communications industry and how the media affects our lives.
podcast: Entire program, weekly, updating Thursdays at 10.30am.
Anticipated File size: 14MB
podcast url: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/podcast/feeds/mediarpt.xml

The Religion Report
Your guide to religious affairs: analysis of the events shaping the world of religion and the religious events that shape our world.
podcast: Entire program, weekly, updating Wednesdays at 10.30am.
Anticipated File size: 14MB
podcast url: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/podcast/feeds/relrpt.xml

The Spirit of Things
An adventure in religion and spirituality, exploring contemporary values and beliefs as expressed through ritual, art, music, and sacred texts.
podcast: Entire program, weekly, updating Sundays at 8.30pm.
Anticipated File size: 23MB
podcast url: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/podcast/feeds/spirit.xml

Street Stories
Ordinary people intrigue us just as much as celebrities do: everday life stories that connect you to the wider world.
podcast: once weekly updating Wednesdays at 1pm.
Anticipated File size: 13MB
podcast url: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/podcast/feeds/streets.xml

The entire list is here.

Jesus Vs. Christians

Highway Video have been producing Christian video material for quite a while, and their scope and range keeps expanding. They currently have a free video download called Jesus Vs. Christians where they ask people on the street what they think about Jesus and then what they think about Christians. Not surprisingly, there is a discrepancy!

You have to sign up to download and its 105 mb, 640 x 480 mpeg 1 file. 4 minutes. nicely done

these people have strong production. they are perhaps a tad conservative for my taste, but I still find a lot of their stuff good and usable. well worth a visit

craig

movie-related websites

I asked the youthmultimedia egroup about books and websites related to faith and film, and here's what they came back with:

Journal of Religion and Film
Journal of Religion and Popular Culture
Chris Curtis' weblog
Metaphilm
Hollywood Jesus
TextWeek
Damaris Culture Watch
Spirituality & Health DVD & Video Reviews
Spirituality & Health Cinema Reviews

Any more out there?

Craig