SAM ANIMATION
Posted by Lois on August 11, 2009
SAM Animation is another fantastic piece of free, cross platform, software that is ideal for schools. SAM originally stood for “Stop Animation Movies” which indicates what it does. The software has been designed by the TUFTS Centre For Engineering, Education and Outreach, with the noble purpose of:
- increasing student and teacher excitement for learning STEM;
- improving student & teacher skills so learning is more enjoyable in all subjects;
- increasing the general public’s technological literacy, and
- increasing the awareness of the importance of STEM for society.
(STEM = Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics)
SAM Animation is easy enough for primary aged students to use, with impressive results, but would be equally suitable for older students or adults wanting an application to illustrate a concept or tell a story. It has a variety of sophisticated tools to capture, import and manipulate images and sound. It even has the ability to apply the chroma key effect.
Once you have finished your animation there are options to export it into various movie formats which means it is portable for home computers and easily published to a blog or wiki.
The SAM Animation site has a very thorough “help” section with easy to follow movies. It has links to “Latest Animations”, “Related Web Sites”, research, a forum and community. You can try the online version or download it for your personal use or for educational research. If you register as an educator your principal will need to verify the details that you have supplied but then you are able to use SAM in your school. All this and its free! Schools should definitely make the SAM investment - their students will love it.
August 11th, 2009 at 9:03 pm
Hello Loisath,
What a great find, cross platform too! Thanks for sharing, I can’t wait to give it a try. And congratulations on your new podcast.
Cheers
Darrel
[Reply]
Lois Reply:
August 11th, 2009 at 9:51 pm
Thanks Darrel. I’ve known about SAM for awhile (thanks to Twitter and LucyB.) but hadn’t had a chance to use it until now. It is fast becoming one of my favourites. I hope to publish some student examples soon.
PS Thanks for the plug for the RUConnected podcast on the Ed Tech Crew. It is much appreciated.
[Reply]
August 15th, 2009 at 1:24 am
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