Creating Higher-Quality Educational Video

COLUMBUS—While teaching a ten-week course covering manufacturing process at The Ohio State University, I was forced to rely almost entirely on material from a book, supplemented with low-quality, low-resolution video found on the Internet. While many of these techniques are investigated in different class offerings at the university level, visiting these facilities was impossible due to the large number of students, scheduling conflicts, and safety concerns. Additionally, some of the covered topics required hours, days, or weeks to complete, while some facilities are simply off-limits to guests.

Across the United States, many institutions have adopted an approach where video is used as a tool for teaching. However, there is a lack of high quality, detailed materials covering manufacturing processes used in industrial design, interior design, and engineering. At The Ohio State University, there is an enormous wealth of facilities and well-educated experts working in their fields, but few ways of sharing this knowledge outside of direct classroom or laboratory visits.

Building the Apprentice Piece was created to communicate machining processes to Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering students at OSU. While not a substitute for hands-on learning, this video introduces core concepts, focusing on the basic operation of analog lathes and mills. The resolution of the video is high enough to allow careful, detailed inspection by viewers. It also also affords instructors the ability to freeze-frame or cue-and-review to highlight important information in ways less practical—or impossible—in the lab.

Unlike the majority of university-produced educational video, Building the Apprentice Piece was shot on-location using a Canon 5D (a top-quality DSLR), under controlled lighting, and with a variety of professional lenses. The final video was fully color-corrected and then annotated after editing.

The video was produced by Tim Jacoby and Ryan Hale for the Department of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering at The Ohio State University.