About the workshop

Introduction

We are living in a world dominated by images. For most of the time we are nothing else but viewers. A smart phone in our pocket however means that we can turn into a filmmaker by the press of a button. This is good news for scientists because today’s science sees a strong demand towards audiovisual content – a demand growing day by day. It’s only a question of time when the few minutes popular science videos, also known as “video abstracts”, will become an obligatory component of scientific publications. The objective of this workshop is to help scientists to be able to provide scientific journals what they need. A good scientific paper. And a good scientific video. The one-day workshop consist of four sessions, each 90 minutes long. You will have enough time to learn about writing a script for your video, and acquire all the basic skills you might need when recording audio and video and editing your footage into a complete programme. Make sure you have your smartphone and laptop ready.

20161017_155521 — Making video abstracts can be a great source of fun.

Structure

The first session is about WRITING. We start with good and even better examples. We discuss them and try to imitate them. Then we turn to our keyboards. The result is a textbook or script, that we can build our video upon.
The second session is called RECORDING. We get acquainted with basic recording techniques then we create all the graphics, audio and video content we will need for editing. The result is a lot of information (sound and video files, images) carefully organized into folders.
The third session is called EDITING. We structure the material we’ve got, and following our script, we make the first version of our video. The result is a rough director’s cut of the video abstract.
The fourth session is called SHARING. This part of the one-day basic course includes everything from discussions, last modifications, creating and sharing fine cuts with our colleagues, the publisher and finally, the world.

20161107_144559 — Simple tools can turn your office into a sound studio.

Short history

In 2014 Filmjungle co-founder and creative director Attila Dávid Molnár was assigned by Attila Andics from Eötvös University to create a video abstract for his publication in Current Biology within 3 short days. The video was received well, reaching over 20K viewers up to this day. The online video abstract‘s success inspired the team to develop a workshop. The idea of the intensive training was first embraced by Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research (IZW, Berlin) followed by the German National Library of Science and Technology (TIB, Hannover) and the Eötvös Loránd University of Sciences, Budapest. Our results show that actively publishing scientists and PhD students in Berlin, Hannover and Budapest were equally successful in producing a video abstract within a day. No background in filmmaking and no special equipment was needed, let alone the smartphones and laptops brought along by the participants. By 2016 we have PopSci People all around the world, continuously developing the idea further. To popularize the fairly new genre of video abstracts and to encourage scientists to jump into filming, Popular Science Video Workshop share its findings in scientific articles and the Wikipedia: attends conferences: makes more and more video abstracts: and organizes new workshops around the world.

Trainers

‘I have a degree in marine microbiology and in scientific filmmaking. With my award winning filmmaker fellow Zsolt Marcell Tóth I founded Filmjungle Production back in 1996 which is now the biggest natural history film production unit in my country. I worked for science news magazine DELTA for years, directed numerous award winning natural history films and edited thousands of hours of factual programming at the Hungarian-Czech popular scientific television channel called SPEKTRUM TELEVISION. My filmography includes Naturvision, IWFF, Matsalu, Greenscreen and Envirofilm winning titles such as The Invisible Wildlife Photographer, Sharks in my viewfinder, Vipera Life – a serpent’s tale, Wolfwatching, Rhinos on the Brink. My recent works include scientific video abstracts produced for universities and research institutes all across Europe.’

Attila Dávid Molnár, wildlife filmmaker, director, trainer

‘A trainer, a psychologist, a math teacher, a civil activist, a social neuroscientist I am. I held trainings on presentation skills and brain imaging to researchers, on intercultural competences to youth workers, on sexual education methods and cooperative learning techniques to teachers. I worked in formal education and for several NGOs. I’m interested in voice processing, and in social and affective aspects of learning and perception in general, and in the neural processes behind them. Using comparative brain imaging (fMRI) and behavioural methods with dogs and humans, I investigate the species-specificity of how we perceive individuals, how we learn about others, and how we process language, from an evolutionary perspective. During my PhD, I studied the neural mechanisms of voice recognition, and the interplay of speech and talker identity processing. For my full CV please click here.’

Attila Andics, Post-doc research fellow

Coordinators

‘I hold a 5-years degree (B.Sc. and M.Sc.) in Physics and a master’s degree in Scientific Information and Communication. Right after finishing my master’s degree, I started working at the German Nacional Library of Science and Technology in a scientific video platform. An issue I focused on was how to integrate videos and videos abstracts in a scientific publication so that scientist can make use of this resource. Currently, I continue researching ways to enhance publications. Researches might think that preparing a video is a waste of time, but it isn’t. I assure it is worth it! I also work as a scientific editor, check out my page here.’

Paloma Marín Arraiza, PopSci coordinator in South America

‘I am a conservation biologist interested in evolutionary genetics and tropical ecology. I gained my MSc degree in Applied Zoology from the University of Veterinary Sciences in Budapest, Hungary. Later I obtained extensive field experience on psittacines in many Latin-American countries in the Neotropics. During my PhD at the Australian National University I became an expert in modern molecular genetics. Before and during my PhD research George worked years in the Peruvian Amazon with local communities and the eco-tourism industry. I recently produced a conservation documentary with Filmjungle.eu about my work (www.macawmovie.com). My interest in genetic analyses and his endeavour to preserve biological diversity via well established conservation management found their common niche in conservation genetics and genomics. I currently work as a postdoctoral fellow at ANU, in charge of the genetic research of endangered bird species (http://georgeolah.weebly.com).’

George Olah, conservation biologist, PopSci coordinator in Australia

‘I am a conservationist and scientist, mainly focusing on great apes in Africa, and wildlife filmmaker. I completed my Masters of Science in Zoology in 2006 at Szent Istvan University, Faculty of Veterinary Science in Hungary; my thesis was about the environmental enrichment of captive great apes. Then I worked in the Democratic Republic of Congo with bonobos, and later for a Hungarian wildlife filmmaking group, Filmjungle.eu Productions for 5 years. That is when I got to work with David Attila Molnar. During this time I decided that I wanted to make films for conservation purposes, especially in remote areas. That is how I got to Tambopata, Peru, where with George Olah I filmed The Macaw Project, a half-an-hour documentary, along with many short films to raise awareness about the research and conservation efforts in the region. I realized that I wanted additional scientific background in order to combine filmmaking, research, and conservation and so in 2015, I gained a PhD degree in Primatology, at the Kyoto University in Japan, writing my fieldwork focused dissertation on the personality traits of wild-living bonobos. Since graduation I have worked in DR Congo, as a conservationist for an American NGO, and I continue filming and exploring the possibilities of using films in different ways to promote nature conservation.’