studiocoding technology white paper

Studiocode White Paper: A video coding and analysis tool with applications for education and research 10/23/06 Background Studiocode is based on a product called Sportscode. Sportscode was developed to allow someone to view a video of an athletic event and create a set of codes that can be applied to certain moments in the recording. These codes can be used later to create compilation videos based on a single code or Boolean combinations of codes. Compiled videos are automatically organized into chapters for easy organization and navigation. For example, you could watch a video of a football game and set up buttons to indicate the team that has possession of the ball, the types of plays, and sub-codes to indicate the success or failure of those plays. Later, you could search for all Penn State possessions AND pass attempts AND penalty flags. This would compile all clips in the video that matched all of those criteria. Realizing that their Sportscode product had applications beyond the athletic field, the developers created Studiocode, for more generalized video analysis use in business and education. Organization The Studiocode Business Group (http://www.studiocodegroup.com) is a commercial division of an Australian company called Sportstec Limited (http://www.sportstec.com). Sportstec Limited develops and sells a variety of software and products that track athletes and their performance. Studiocode takes Sportstec's Sportscode product and repurposes it for educational and business uses. Sportstec has seven employees working in North America to sell and support Sportscode and Studiocode. Sportstec has over 1,000 clients worldwide, with nearly 500 in the United States. Within the Big 10, intercollegiate athletic departments who are using Sportscode include Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Michigan State, Northwestern, and Penn State. U.S. universities using the Studiocode product include Arizona State, Brigham Young, Colorado State, Duke, Northeastern, Stanford, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, University of California Berkeley, University of California Santa Cruz, University of New Hampshire, University of Hawaii, and Western Oregon University. Overview Digital video is becoming more prominent in higher education, being used for a variety of purposes, such as data sources for research projects, real-world examples to enhance instruction, student self-analysis of performance, and supervision and feedback for students engaged in field experiences. However, using video for these purposes presents unique challenges in terms of coding and searching through collections of video data in ways that allow users to access what they need when they need it. Studiocode is a video editing and analysis tool that allows a user to annotate video and keep track of the frequency and times of specific events that occur in the video. For example, if you are researching student question-asking behavior in a classroom setting, you could record classroom sessions and import those videos into Studiocode. Once loaded, you can watch the video and mark occurrences of interest such as interruptions, hand-raising, and eye contact as well as note demographic information about the student making the action and the instructor's response. Later, you could use Studiocode to search through the video and pull up all instances of hand-raising or all cases where male students interrupted female students. These instances can be pulled together into a single compilation for qualitative exploration or studied in a more quantitative way (frequency, time to respond, etc.). Studiocode enables organizations to capture, compress, categorize, monitor, and search video and audio very easily. It is an end-to-end product that enables you to categorize data right from the camera or existing footage. It can also be used to manually add text transcripts to videos fairly easily. Technical Requirements Studiocode version 2.5.1 has an official release date of May 2006, but incremental patches and bug fixes are provided from time to time. Studiocode only runs on Macintosh OS X, 10.4 or higher. The product manual recommends a PowerPC G5 or Intel-based Apple computer with 1GB of RAM and any other hardware needed to capture video from a VCR, video camera, or other input device. (Note: Studiocode is a video editing program. It does not include a mechanism for distributing files after they are edited and/or coded.) Licensing Studiocode is a commercial product that is sold at different price points depending on the number of licenses purchased. A trial version of Studiocode is available for download as a universal binary installer that will run on an Apple computer (http://www.studiocodegroup.com/sbg/clients/ client-login-software-update-studiocode.html). The demo version of Studiocode is fully functional, but limited to 10 hours of use. The cost for the full version of Studiocode is based on the number of licenses purchased. Penn State’s College of Education and Children, Youth and Families Consortium have invested $50,000 for 20 licenses. Dr. Kyle Peck is also spending another $50,000 in March 2007 for use with the Regional Education Research Laboratory. A site license that would cover University-owned computers at the University Park campus would cost $150,000. (The Studiocode group has given Penn State a two-year option to apply the current $100,000 planned expenditure toward the cost of a site license.) Studiocode would charge a fee of approximately 10% ($15,000) per year for software updates, service, and one onsite visit per year to conduct training. For $50, students are able to purchase a one-year license for Studiocode for use on a personally-owned computer. transcript and create a custom movie based around the search results. With Studiocode, this can be accomplished in a few seconds. Rich and Efficient Communication: By using Studiocode, students and faculty can more effectively communicate with each other in a media-rich manner. Instead of spending time splicing together video clips or verbally recreating an incident from memory, using Studiocode, faculty and students can quickly pull together illustrative video-based examples, which can be used as the basis for a deeper, more meaningful discussion about those cases and their implications. Active Learning and Reflection: When students use Studiocode to code video clips of their own work, they may be forced to see themselves and their performance in a different light. They can also use coded clips of their performance over time to monitor their progress instead of having to rely solely on their own perceptions of their performance. Providing Best-Case Examples: After Studiocode has been used to code video recordings of student performance; the codes can be used to compile examples of outstanding student work. These examples can help an instructor clearly explain his or her performance criteria to a new class of students. Collaborative Understanding: Groups of students can use Studiocode to code the same video clips. Differences in the way that individual students have encoded a clip can be used as the basis for a group discussion and consensus-building activity that leads to a more complete understanding of the activity being studied. Strengths Capture: With Studiocode, you can capture observations live from a digital video camera during an event. You can also code videos after an event either from DV tape, VHS tape, or prerecorded MPEG4 video files. You can preset the capture time, so that capturing stops after a specified number of minutes. Video feeds may be saved using a range of resolutions, frame rates, and video/audio codecs. Coding: Studiocode lets you create codes in the video's timeline either during or after the event. These codes are created in a code window, where you create your own set of buttons and labels. To enable you to react quickly to an instance of an event, you can assign hot keys to codes. Other features associated with codes include the ability to develop relationships among codes via linking, 2 Assessment Implications for Teaching, Learning, and Research Unified Tool for Video Research: Studiocode enables faculty and students to engage in research based on video analysis using a single tool. Without Studiocode, researchers would have to use disconnected combinations of video players, word processing software, and qualitative analysis research packages. Studiocode brings the key features of these tools together in a unified application with crossover benefits such as the ability to search through key words in the the option of lead and lag times for code buttons, and color coding. Once your codes are set up, you can share your code template with other users. Code templates can be edited as often as necessary, and do not have predefined structures, making them very flexible. You can also code the same video multiple times or start with codes and then go back later to create a transcript. Search: Studiocode's search functionality allows you to quickly view portions of a video that meet complex search criteria. You can also search across multiple videos. Multilevel (up to 20) search categories can be used across thousands of files. Results are compiled into a stand-alone QuickTime movie with chapters. Sharing: After transcription and coding, the final movie can easily be compressed in multiple formats and then either burned to a CD or DVD or streamed (Penn State users can use the Information Technology Services Streaming Server.) Code Matrix Organizer: After a video is coded, a summary view of the number of occurrences of each code can be viewed in the Code Matrix. The Matrix can be used to quickly view all instances of a coded event. The matrix data can be exported into applications like Microsoft Excel or SPSS for further analysis. The code matrix is also interactive, allowing users to click on a cell (such as Female/Student Speaking in the example shown below) to bring up a movie of all those combined instances. In the example, the composite movie not only has all four instances, but also can include the codes or even the transcription as subtitles in the movie. The resulting movie is organized by chapters in a pulldown menu to allow for easy movement between instances. The composite movie can be saved as its own file to make it easier to share with others and include in presentations. Transcription: Transcripts, which can be added to the movie as a visible caption track, are integrated with the Studiocode search function and appear as part of the timeline. The search tool can access a video's codes and transcript text, so by using the search feature, you can find individual words, codes, or text threads. Transcripts can be created directly within Studiocode, or the data can be imported as tabdelimited files from other sources. Suggested Improvements Educational Examples: There are no examples of educational uses of Studiocode available on the Studiocode Web site. This makes it more difficult to understand the value that Studiocode adds to research and practice. Indexed Movie Problems: Studiocode has some problems with indexed movies (where the video file uses periodic keyframes as a way to make the file smaller). Studiocode can review and code these files correctly, but when the file is searched and the start of the video clip is in between two keyframes, Studiocode cannot display the clip properly. Manual/Tutorials: The current Studiocode manual is difficult to follow. A quick-start guide would be a nice addition. The Studiocode site would also benefit from having online video tutorials that would walk a user through the steps of coding and searching through a video file. Incomplete Toolset: The tools that are fully implemented in Studiocode lag behind the ones that are available in Sportscode. For example, there is a drawing tool that allows users to draw on a video clip to highlight part of the movie. Unfortunately, these drawings are not tied to start and end times, so anything drawn on one frame will appear on all frames of the movie. Learning Curve: Upon first opening Studiocode, it is not clear where to begin. Some of the steps are counterintuitive, such as creating a timeline first and then importing a movie clip to attach to the timeline. There are a few other interface issues, such as a box within the coding window that looks like you should be able to type text, but which is only intended to display information. However, after seeing how the software should be used, we were able to import and code our own videos with ease. For this reason, video clips showing how to use Studiocode would be beneficial to new users. 3 Stability: During our training session, we had several issues with Studiocode crashing on two laptop computers (one Intel-based, one a G4 laptop). The issues with the Intel crashing have supposedly been addressed, but it is wise to take precautions and save work frequently when working with any kind of video editing/analysis software, due to its heavy load on a hard drive, memory, and processor. Transcription: Transcripts are not saved as typical text tracks, but are rather embedded within the video track. There is no way to separate them after they are compressed. Current Adoption Research on Classroom Practice: Dr. Scott McDonald is using Studiocode to understand science classroom teaching. Science is particularly difficult, given the extensive use of graphs, diagrams, gesture, and technical language during teaching. Studiocode's multiple representations of classroom practice allow researchers unique analytical tools with which to understand the complexities of classroom discourse. Studiocode timelines are used to determine the development of science concepts (such as the mole in chemistry) over multiple lessons and diverse activity structures. The matrix reveals patterns in amount of emphasis different key concepts receive and what activity structures dominate in the classroom. The transcription window supports microanalysis of discourse interactions between teachers and students. Single frames and video clips can be used to focus on particular graphical or gestural contributions teachers use to support students' understandings. Using Studiocode, Dr. McDonald can move fluidly between these various representations to create detailed analytical portraits of science classrooms. Evaluation of Internship: Dr. Jamie Myers and Dr. Jim Nolan are in charge of students doing teaching internships. These students can use Studiocode as a means of editing and analyzing video recordings of their performance and activity in their classrooms. At the end of their internship, they are required to compose a video essay that summarizes their internship experience and development. In addition to using Studiocode for video editing, it can also be used to search through many hours of coded classroom video recordings and pull up clips that show improvements in teaching performance or specific incidents that have shaped the students' perspectives on K-12 teaching. Supervisors who oversee the internships would have access to the same video recordings and could use Studiocode to organize and edit their evaluations for feedback to students and their advisors. Analyzing and Reflecting on Teaching: As part of the process of learning to teach, Dr. Carla Zembal-Saul engages elementary education majors in video analysis. Initial experiences with video analysis focus on excerpts of science lessons taught by experienced classroom teachers who have been involved in extensive professional development. Reflections on these teaching episodes are scaffolded to focus attention on specific aspects of scientific inquiry and associated discourse. As the group learns more about teaching science to children, they co-construct 4 Penn State Integration Security There is no security built into Studiocode since it does not manage files in any way. If there are cases where a user needs access to shared files, they can be placed on a file server, which can be accessed so the files can be pulled into Studiocode for editing. If these files are shared as "read-only" files, then it would provide a mechanism for a group (for example, students in a class) to view the same video and create their own analyses and derivative movies. File Sharing In Studiocode’s current form, Studiocode files will not integrate with video streamed from the ITS streaming video server due to the streaming server's reliance on a database to manage files and file permissions. Studiocode does have a related product called Stream, which provides a Web interface for searching through coded videos and viewing movies composed of compiled clips. These movies are streamed to a user's computer (either a Windows or Macintosh computer will work). Through the Stream product, an organization with a large amount of coded videos could distribute them online. Another option for sharing coded video files is through a peer-to-peer file sharing product called LionShare (http://lionshare.its.psu.edu/). This option would enable someone to share a video, which can be received and coded by several people. Those people could then share their timeline files with the rest of the group for comparison. Note: Studiocode's timeline and coding files are stored independently from the original video file, which should make it possible for students to get a video from nearly any source (Web, file server, FTP, CD-ROM), code the videos, and submit only their completed analysis files. codes within Studiocode, allowing for rich discussion of course concepts and teaching practices. Eventually, students apply these codes to video of their own teaching experiences as a way to guide substantive reflection. Studiocode Assessment Team: Lead: Allan Gyorke, Education Technology Services asg102@psu.edu Contributors: Pat Besong, Education Technology Services Scott McDonald, College of Education John Messner, College of Engineering Jamie Meyers, College of Education Kim Winck, Education Technology Services Carla Zembal-Saul, College of Education Potential Uses Team Interaction Research: Dr. John Messner, a faculty member in the Department of Architectural Engineering, and members of the Computer Integrated Construction (CIC) Research Program are interested in researching the interactions among team members who are using a virtual reality representation of a construction project. Students and industry teams will be interacting inside the Immersive Construction Lab, which allows for the display of stereoscopic images of their construction project on three large screen displays. The CIC team members videotape team communication and record the computer images so they can analyze the types of communication used and the ways that teams use the interactive environment for reviewing project designs and construction plans. The CIC team will use Studiocode to analyze this video footage and mark the recordings to indicate the frequency and variety of interactions and communication types that occur. Speech Analysis: Currently, instructors are recording speeches in some sections of CAS 100 (a public speaking course taken by all students). Faculty can use Studiocode to go through these videos with an established coding rubric that helps faculty provide detailed feedback. For instance, an instructor can mark all cases where students were reading from their notes, fidgeting, or saying "um." On the positive side, an instructor can mark instances where a student made eye contact, used a good transition, used a helpful visual aid, built credibility, and used humor effectively. With students' permission, these videos can be used to illustrate both positive and negative aspects of public speaking to future classes in a very dynamic manner. For example, an instructor can search across several hundred videos and pull together all instances where students effectively established their authority. This publication is available in alternative media on request. Penn State is committed to affirmative action, equal opportunity, and the diversity of its workforce. U.Ed. ITS07-7020 © 2006 The Pennsylvania State University This publication may be used and distributed freely for nonprofit purposes. Permission must be obtained to use it for profit by contacting tlt@psu.edu. 5