It’s one in the morning and I probably shouldn’t be making a youth group announcement video right now in the first place, but despite my better judgment, not only did I make it, I’m even posting it here for you all to see. (I might regret this later when everyone makes fun of me and my lame tired performance. I just watched the video again and… wow… lol!) Here it is:
Here’s a quick tutorial on how I made it. Granted, these directions are for Mac since that’s what I use, but the same principle applies to Windows and can be done just as easily there, I’m sure.
Step One: Go to the free section of CrowdControlGames.com and download their free interactive host, LT. Unzip the package, open both Flash files and play around with him a little. It’s quite entertaining. He’s the high-tech puppet you always wanted.
Step Two: LT is intended to be used on two seperate monitors, but that’s too much work to set up when all I want to do is record LT on my screen. So I purchased a screencast program called iShowU (Mac only) for $20 and set it up to only record the section of my screen that contains LT, as in the image below.
Step Three: When you’re finished recording your announcement with LT using your screencast software, use your favorite video editing software to add music, text and whatever else is necessary. And wa-la! You have your video announcement! (Just please record a better accent than I did! lol)
About me: I am married to my beautiful wife, 
From Ministry Questions.com...
December 6th, 2007 at 3:24 am
Very funny. This would make a good music video I think. And yes unless you are getting paid to be awake (like me at work now) you should defiantly be sleeping!
December 6th, 2007 at 6:10 am
That is hilarious!! well done.
December 6th, 2007 at 8:42 am
My favorite part was the phrase “college high.” Not sure what you meant by that, but anyway…funny.
December 6th, 2007 at 8:43 am
oh…i forgot to mention that a free screen capture program for PC is camstudio and can be found at http://www.camstudio.org.
December 6th, 2007 at 9:50 am
Very cool that someone out there looks and sounds so much like you. I like it, but do they have different versions so I can get one to look like me?
October 8th, 2009 at 5:57 pm
Wow. I think the look is great, but the video is 2.5 minutes long, and you can get the point and all pertinent information across in less than 1 minute. Also, that B-roll of snowboarders in action can be used with a voiceover to make the visual more dynamic. Otherwise, it gets boring after more than 20 seconds.
There's also a tutorial on the web on how to create an animation like the kind used by JibJab, but you need to be able to use Adobe After Effects. The results are great, though. Check out this link if you want to see an example . . . http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XpKQkzCfghI