Thursday, March 16, 2006

Toastmasters Speech #2: On Videoblogging


Click here for the movie! (MPEG-4 format)




<a href="http://www.mortaine.com/Video/Toastmasters2.mov"><img src="http://www.mortaine.com/Video/Toastmasters2.jpeg" width=640 height=480></a>

This is my Speech #2 for Toastmasters. The goal of this speech is to improve and demonstrate organizational skills. The first speech was introductory; you can find it posted here.

Afterwards, one of the members of my local Toastmasters group asked a question (we don't usually Q&A our speeches), and I answered him.

The Handout mentioned in this speech is available here (PDF), and here (MS Word). Videobloggers are welcome to use and modify it for other presentations as needed.

And as with my first vlog on this subject, I videotaped myself rehearsing. However, because I rehearsed this speech so many times, I decided to spare you all of the attempts and refinements, and have mixed my practice sessions into this video. It's smaller and shorter, in part because I only mixed up the introduction, and left out all the flailing around to express the body of the speech adequately.

A technical note: I hope all the folks from the Videoblogging Yahoo! Group will take a moment to mock me soundly for ranting about filming a screen and then doing exactly that, in the same week! All I can say in my defense is that the camera was supposed to be zoomed in far enough to keep the TV screen out of the field of view. Boo.

A second technical note: The practice and speech videos were shot on my new Panasonic PV-GS65 camera, which I am now seriously in love with. My husband is lucky this thing doesn't have a butt as cute as his, or I'd leave him for it in a heartbeat!

And a personal note: We have an impromptu speaking session called "Table Topics," in which the best speaker wins a ribbon. I won this week for my 1-2 minute speech on why we do "spring cleaning" in the Spring (because it's easier to throw away 15 lbs. of stuff you got over the holidays than it is to lose the 15 lbs. you gained on your hips-- sadly, I didn't videotape it). Table Topics, being a popular vote competition, tend to be won by humor and rants, both of which I get a lot of practice with and exposure to in videoblogging.

Technorati tags: