The Movie Game
The movie game is very simple. Download a bunch of famous movie DVD covers from the internet and put them together in a presentation.
Whatt you’ll need to do is remove the name of the movie (you can crop it out in Powerpoint / Keynote etc or Photoshop it out). Put up one slide at a time and people have to guess what the movie is from the front cover.
Download the movie quiz we put together in Powerpoint (downloads as a zip file)
Note the Powerpoint also opens up in Keynote.
Colour Game
This is the game where you have words flash up on a screen, one after another. All the words are names of colours. Each of the words is a different physical colour from the name of the colour.
So, for example, the words that flash up are: red, blue, green. However, the colour of each word is: white, red, yellow. The contestants have to say the colours that they see, not the words that they see. This makes it quite hard as the natural reaction is simply to read the word, not say the colour. Gradually, the speed of the words appearing on screen is increased.
You are able to do this in Powerpoint, with timed settings. However, you apparently cannot go faster than 1 word every 1 second (so I am told).
To download our game as an MPEG file, click here.. (This is a 5 player game. Downloads as a zip file, around 7.1MB in size. Includes music).
This game is also quite difficult to ‘mark’ – so click here to download our PDF of answers..
Quick Movie
The purpose of this is to prepare and then record a storyline, without the need to edit the camcorder video. What you need to do is get the group to prepare a script / storyline than can be easily acted out by them in the local area. The video shoot must include more than one scene and have a beginning and end. To have a good story, you need some dramatic tension in the storyline. Tension creates a plot. So, the tension may be an argument, it may be good vs evil etc.
The group must storyboard their storylin, very basically. This means they need to simply & quickly write down who does what, where it will take place and what will happen. Think about charcaters that can be easily acted and developed. Some basic dialogue (words between characters) should be created too. People can have different roles depending on your equipment. One person can video the action (make sure they know how to press record / pause. Make sure you have the batteries charged, and that you have a new DV tape. The camera person will also need to leave around 2 seconds before and after filming an individual scene, so scenes don’t get cut off by the camcorder). Someone else is the director (‘action’), someone else can be the producer (who does what, what goes where and when etc). Then the others can be the extras / actors.
The purpose of this is to be able to think up, then record a good storyline in a defined period of time. I would give the group 30 mins maximum, maybe only 20 mins. If anything goes wrong with the filming, if they have a record, they can act it out later instead! Then, get everyone back together. Hook the AV output of the camcorder up to a projector via the camcorder cable.
The best video wins!! (In fact, give everyone a prize)
Worship visuals
Thanks to Simon D and Joe P for this one. Get hold of a camcorder (with a firewire output, also called d-link) and a digital camera. You’ll also need your firewire cable from camcorder to laptop, and your digital camera’s cable to go from the camera into a laptop via USB. Arm yourself with an iBook or Powerbook (or the Windows equivalent equipped with a firewire / USB input – if it has it) and get iMovie and iPhoto ready to blaze (or Windows equivalent – movie editing programme and photo editing). If your digital camera has movie capture you can also use this and get it into the laptop according to your instructions.
This is the deal, you go out with students – with both the camcorder and digital camera. The aim is to get a whole bunch of creative / worshipful images.. so trees, the sky, urban environments, nature etc. Go out and get a bunch of photos and footage. Make sure you have enough memory / tape on your camera / camcorder. Go film / photo out and about for up to 30 mins.
Then you come back. Plug in the camcorder to the laptop via the firewire cable and to a Mac, iMovie will open up, create a new project. Capture (‘record’) the footage (iMovie will explain how, it’s incredibly easy and yet advanced where it needs to be). Do the same with the camera (plug it in via USB) and iPhoto will open up (or equivalent). Hit ‘import’ and the photos will import.
Using iMovie you can then drag clips into the ‘timeline’ (this is like creating a ‘storyboard’ to tell the story). You drag clips into this timeline (at the bottom of the screen) and you can add transitions (ways different clips merge) easily. You can also add music from your iTunes playlist or music on your Mac. (Windows Movie Player does similar things). You can playback the clips from within iMovie once you’ve finished, and ‘export’ (save) it as a Quicktime movie file.
Using iPhoto you can create a ‘slideshow’ (click on the ‘slideshow’ icon at the bottom of the screen) which means it will play back a sequence of your photos (they fade in and out with each other) over a tune you can choose. If you want. it will automatically fit the slideshow to the length of the tune or you can play back each photo for a specified length of time.
There’s much more you can do. But you can play back the clips during a service. We did this in a session on creative forms of expressing our worship to God and it worked very effectively.
Film your own..
TV advert (or take one off) – why not condense a movie (Matrix?) – or a TV programme. Get a camcorder, set a task and let it rip. Got a well known Bible scene, soap scene, comedy scene, Shakespeare (ughhh..) – you name it you can film it. Make sure it’s done in one take and watch back.
Big Brother
Have a camcorder set up and do interviews with young people during a youth work session (out of the room). Have a Big Brother chair and they have to come and sit down (those who want to) and answer a couple of questions which you tell them before. Ours were who do you want for youth pastor and why, and what are you most looking forward to in 2003 and why. Then later in the session plug the cam into the back of a TV and playback what everyone’s said. We did this and it was wicked. If young people want to say something but not be on film, you can film their shoes or an object nearby or something.
Animation
Fancy a creative project? Why not get young people to do some cartoons, to make it easy get some of those pads you can flick through to make a character ‘animated’. Or make some pads up yourself using paper and glue or staples. Get young people to draw cars, people, animals, use your imagination. For bigger projects get bigger bits of paper. You could even hang a camera overhead, photograph each shot and make an animation in photo or on computer if you have the time and technology! What programmes would you use on the computer? Well, video editing packages would work (or use QuickTime Pro from the www.apple.com website) and there are several 2D animation programmes that you could use – for example Toon Boom Studio (£310). Alternatively scan the images in or input them via your USB digital camera and then import the photos into something like Macromedia Flash (£440) and create a presentation
The puzzle
This copies a TV game programme from a few years back. You take some lego (or something similar) and, using around 3-10 pieces you construct a model. You can use different colour lego bits if you want to. Then, make an exact replica of the first model. Then take the pieces of the second model apart. Hide these bits and the constructed model.
Next, take 2 people (who have not seen the lego model). One sits on one side of a screen, the second person on the other side. It is important that they do not see each other or each other’s lego. Person 1 has the constructed lego model. Person 2 has the pieces of lego that exactly match the pieces of the constructed model. Person 1 then has to describe the model to Person 2 so that Person 2 replicates the original model as closely as possible. (see diagram). Obviously, the more complex you make the original model, the harder it will be to describe/reconstruct.
Bits’n’Pieces
Yes, it’s the same as the Radio 1 feature. This has been successfully used in countless schools, youth groups and more..
What you need is access to some of the latest chart tunes (get a ‘Now’ CD) if you need to. From the CD you record or sample 5-10 second clips of 5-10 tracks. Put a 5-10 second silence in between.
Give all the young people bits of paper numbered with the amount of music clips you have (plus pens). As you play through the music clips they have to identify the song title and artist. Alternatively, get three people up the front to do the same.
If you don’t have access to a tape player or mini disc player, simply use the original CD and let the track play for 5-10 seconds before pressing pause and moving on to another track.
What’s that advert?
Similar to Bits’n’Pieces except you use advert clips. What we did was record loads of adverts and then video edit them so that there were 5-10 second clips that didn’t mention the company/product being advertised by name or on-screen. The young people had to guess what the adverts were. Scary how many they know!
Who’s the celebrity?
Similar to ‘What’s that advert’ but you get celebrities from TV etc. You can get TV clips that don’t show their face and the young people have to guess who the celebs are. Or you can use video editing software like Adobe Premiere or Final Cut Pro etc to blur the faces
If you want a much simpler option then get some teen magazines, cut out some of the pictures and then either chop off the heads or scan them into a computer and manipulate the image, for example by blurring the face. Then scan and project them. The young people have to guess the celeb!
An alternative is to mix’n’match pictures cut out from a magazine and make them into a composite image. For example, Bill Clinton’s forehead and eyes, Madonna’s lower face, Robbie William’s torso and Britney Spears legs and feet. Then see if the young people can identify the various celebs making up the composite image
Got access to a laptop?
Many ideas – play music while using a graphics programme to run a series of images. We did this after September 11th with help from the excellent youthspecialties web site. A similar idea is to use a program like itunes2 (Apple Mac only) which plays full screen visuals with or without music. Or what about using a 3D animation package to animate youth leaders or young people from the group and people have to guess who they are. Animate famous buildings – or do a 2D drawing – and people have to guess where it is. Use your machine to run a playlist of your CD collection to ‘lead’ worship or do a bits and pieces quiz (above). The possibilities are endless..
Make a documentary
Choose a subject – a couple we thought of were selling the church to potential new members, doing a documentary about the local area in a cheesy, old fashioned way and so on. Whatever subject is current, funny or funky. Do that.
Make a Movie On The Subject Matter
Why not use a Parable from the New Testament or other Bible story. Read it from The Bible. Then get the young people into groups to script or improvise a modern-day take on the story. The story has to be no more than 2 minutes. Then they go off and film it. Each group has 5 minutes to film. The final ‘cut’ has to be done in one take.
Spy Search
We got some ‘spy’ related bits and bobs and put them in a garden. We then put these items around a piece of the garden and filmed them as it was getting dark with the 0-Lux night site turned on to give it effect! The young people then have to guess what the items are. Examples of items are a briefcase, a gun, a mobile phone, a torch, a CD, a disk etc.
You’ve Been Framed
Why not make your own video. Loads of videos on this programme are clearly made up. Why not do something amusing – you can show it to your group – or even send it in and get £200 or whatever the current amount is. We’re still trying to come up with some profitable ideas ourselves!
TV link-up
Go out and interview people in your local town or do something similar out and about with a camcorder. Arrange it so that you can show the video at an event after the filming and pretend it’s a ‘live satellite link-up’. It will probably need to be scripted. Have someone acting as a reporter ‘live’ at a scene. Set up questions and pauses so that when shown it seems it’s live.
For example have a script like ‘we’re going live to our reporter.. are you there Jon?’ ‘Yes, I’m here live at the scene.’ ‘I see it’s raining outside’ ‘Yes we’re going ahead anyway.’ etc. Add touches like ‘Jon how many people are there?’ ‘I’m sorry I didn’t get that, can you say that again..’ ‘Yes, Jon how many people are there?’ etc. etc.
Then have an event where you show the tape and pretend it’s live!
Show movie previews
Get hold of movie previews before anyone has seen them (the internet or contacts is the way to do this). Some previews are ’embedded’ into pages so you often won’t be able to just show the clip but will have to show the player as well – usually Quick Time or Real Player
Observation Quiz
Get a video clip of 2-3 minutes and prepare some questions about the clip. A great bit is the bit of Men In Black when Will Smith heads to the building to be tested by Tommy Lee Jones. End it after the bit where Will ‘wins’ after shooting the ‘little girl’ and heads off with Tommy Lee Jones. Ask questions like ‘how many candidates were there?’, ‘what colour top did Will have on’ etc. Ask around 10 questions – NB There is one swear word in this clip!
Pop Idol/Popstars I
Another idea taken from a TV series. Pop Idol/Popstars originated in the UK but the idea has gone to countries like Australia and Germany to name two countries. People become popstars and are whittled down by being voted off by a jury or by people in the country voting them off.
The first idea is to get a bunch of willing youth leaders, young people etc. to take part in a pop idol competition and have a panel – also fixed where people can make comments about the poor performances, dress code etc. It can be a right laugh!
Pop Idol/Popstars II
Instead of the above, video some TV performances from stars like Britney, N-Sync, Dr Dre or whatever. Then separately video some of the youth leaders pretending to watch the performance who then go on to make amusing comments about the artists ie. ‘So, Dr Dre, you’re a Doctor are you? Done any operations recently then..?’ (or make up something funny!).
Now put the two things together using video editing techniques (see below) or software and hey presto – your very own ‘Popstars’ finalists and jury.
Video Discussion
If your group is like our mob they’ll be into movies but what makes a good movie and why do your young people like certain movies and not others? Sounds like a cue for a discussion but try it this way..
Ask members of your group to find a 3-5 minute clip of their favourite film and bring it with them. Obviously 15s, 18s etc. and adult content etc. is not allowed. Watch the film clips they bring in and then talk about these factors..
1. Why do they like the film?
2. What makes a good film?
3. Why are the effects so good?
4. How did they film the shots?
5. If they wanted to bring an 18 video as some inevitably will, why?
Voice overs
We went to a local zoo and filmed animal chewing. We then did voice overs and showed it. This takes a camcorder and a video mixer or video editing software. This was to copy the ‘lizard’ Budweiser advert but we took it much further..