Create Your Own Digital Story

Everyone has a story to tell. But not everyone feels confident with writing or illustrating. In fact, you might be a lot more comfortable playing with images, music, and video clips on the computer. If digital media is more your style, try experimenting with digital storytelling as a way to create and share your stories.

What exactly is a digital story?

According to the Center for Digital Storytelling, it’s “A short, first person video-narrative created by combining recorded voice, still and moving images, and music or other sounds.”

But really, a digital story is any story you tell using digital media. It could be a personal narrative, nonfiction, or fiction. You could use music, photos, drawings, video clips, sound effects, and narration.

Check out some of the teen-created stories posted at the Center for Digital Storytelling and some of the stories hosted at DigiTales.

Your story can be as simple or complex as you want to make it, and there are lots of tools that can help you along the way.

Websites like Storybird and Xtranormal provide some of the basics for you, like artwork and sounds, and all you have to do is add in your story.

Other websites allow you to add your own images, music, and narration, but help you put the whole package together in an easy-to-use format. Examples include VoiceThread and Animoto.

If you want to delve deeper into the creative aspects of media and technology, you can use software such as Windows Movie Maker (for PCs) or iMovie (for Macs) to build your digital stories. Sound editing tools (Audacity), photo editing tools (Photoshop, GIMP, Picnik, Pixlr, Splashup), and video editing tools (Final Cut Pro, Pinnacle Studio, VideoStudio) can all be used to put the elements of your story together.

Want to give it a try but not sure where to start? Come to the digital storytelling workshop on Saturday, July 23^rd from 2 to 4 pm at CLP – Main. Space is limited to 10 teens, so please register on the events page or email teensmain@carnegielibrary.org to reserve your spot!

~Amy, CLP Main Intern