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Video Storytelling
Compelling visual stories grab your attention, spark discussion and pull at your emotions. Great video storytelling takes both narrative skill and technical understanding. Learn how to engage your audience and craft video stories that hold on to the very end.
In this certificate-earning online video production course, you’ll learn the foundations of storytelling and filmmaking from professional filmmakers and multimedia journalists. Plan, write, interview, shoot and edit your own short video alongside a community of makers. In this course, you’ll gain the practical skills necessary to kick-start your journey in video storytelling.
Start building your professional portfolio in film; whether you’re looking for a career edge, side hustle, or weekend adventure, this course gives you the tools to hone your craft.
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Course Outcomes
An experiential online workshop in essential skills for producing video stories to a digital-first media environment.
- Learn the foundations of story form, and how to develop your own narrative.
- Gain experience in pre-production through practical planning and story craft.
- Practice on-camera interview techniques, including interviewing subjects remotely.
- Gain best practices for video production in cinematography and sound.
- Learn about equipment options including smartphones, microphones, headphones and tripods.
- Learn how to collect b-roll that supports your film’s narrative.
- Work hands-on in Adobe Premiere Pro to edit footage, b-roll, audio, sounds, and music together.
- Understand copyright, and learn how to find and use archival video, news clips, stills and music.
- Leave with a portfolio-ready video, produced by you.
- Certificate (PDF) upon completion of the course requirements.
- LinkedIn badge to add to your profile to signify accomplishment of the course.
Meet Your Instructors & Facilitators
Instructors subject to change.
Shaleece Haas

Shaleece Haas is an Emmy Award-winning documentary producer and a director based in Los Angeles. Her films, marked by a balance of poignancy and humor, invite audiences deep into the interior worlds of their protagonists. TEXAS STRONG, a film she produced in 2018, won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Short Documentary and premiered at SXSW. Her 2016 film REAL BOY screened in 23 countries, earned 20 festival awards, and was broadcast nationally on PBS’ Independent Lens. Shaleece also co-produced THE GENIUS OF MARIAN (2013; Tribeca Film Festival, POV) and the final episode of ASIAN AMERICANS, a landmark historical series for PBS (2020), and was a consulting producer on POV’s first limited series, AND SHE COULD BE NEXT (2020; Tribeca Film Festival, POV). She is currently producing Julie Wyman’s UNTITLED DWARFISM PROJECT, a film about the Little People community’s response to new drugs promising to make children born with dwarfism taller.
Her films have received support from IDA Enterprise Fund, ITVS, California Humanities, Berkeley Film Foundation, IFP, Film Independent, and Fledgling Fund, among others. Shaleece is an Impact Partners Documentary Producing Fellow, a Film Independent Documentary Lab Fellow, and a Working Films Fellow. She is an alumna of the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism and was a founding staff member of the national oral history project StoryCorps.
Charlise Holmes

Charlise Holmes is an LA-based producer with over 15 years of experience creating content for television and film. A skilled storyteller, she has contributed to the creative vision of a broad range of documentaries, including projects for Netflix, CNN, Amazon, A&E, Cinemax, and more. Charlise serves as an AP Council Delegate for the Producers Guild of America, and is a voting member of the Television Academy. She previously served on the selection committee for Dances With Films, and has been a guest speaker on a variety of educational panels.
Lauren Kawana

Lauren Kawana is a documentary filmmaker from Honolulu, HI and a graduate of the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism documentary film program. Her directorial debut was Live, Breathe, Hula, a documentary short about Native Hawaiian musician and kumu hula Mark Keali‘i Ho‘omalu. Since then she has worked on feature documentary films such as Mind/Game: The Unquiet Journey of Chamique Holdsclaw, Dogtown Redemption, FREE: The Power of Performance, Alternative Facts: The Lies of Executive Order 9066, and No Straight Lines: The Rise of Queer Comics. Most recently, Lauren served as field producer for Try Harder! directed by Debbie Lum, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2021. As a freelancer, Lauren has worked for KQED, National Geographic, Jigsaw Productions and Imagine Documentaries, among other outlets. Lauren is currently based in Oakland, CA, and a member of the Asian American Doc Network, Brown Girls Doc Mafia, and the Asian American Journalists Association.
Nicholas Parkin

Nicholas Parkin is an award-winning educational designer, teacher, and visual storytelling jack-of-all-trades. His global career highlights include: Journalism lecturer and education consultant at Monash University, Australia, television, radio and online news reporter and producer for ABC News (Australia), freelance video journalist for ABC News and Bloomberg Quicktake (Australia, Brazil, Japan, Nepal), freelance videographer and video editor for various international NGOs (Australia, Cambodia, Japan, Nepal, Thailand, Vietnam), university study tour coordinator (Cambodia, Hong Kong, Japan, India, Nepal, Singapore).
Chris Schodt

Chris Schodt is an Emmy-nominated visual and multimedia journalist. His current freelance work includes a range of corporate and journalistic clients. Previously, Chris was a video producer with the international technology news site Engadget, helping launch an innovative new web show that tripled the news site’s subscriber base. In addition to his photo and video work, Chris teaches multimedia communication at UC Santa Cruz’s Masters of Science Communication program, and Stanford’s Environmental Communication degree.
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Syllabus & Course Format
NEW Course Format
This online course includes hands-on, interactive learning activities designed to build your skills as you progress through each week. Lessons include videos, audio files, tutorials, case studies, discussions and assignments.
Weekly Live 90-Minute Sessions
Each week your cohort will interact with the instructor during a scheduled 90-minute Zoom live session. We encourage all course participants to attend. The instructor reinforces important concepts with relevant materials for the first 60 minutes; then you'll workshop an assignment, for the remaining 30 minutes, from the week, discussing and getting live feedback on your work from the instructor and cohort.
Weekly live sessions for the course are held on Tuesdays from 5:00 pm - 7:30pm PST. This information and links are provided in the LMS for registered participants.
All live sessions are recorded for future viewing.
Syllabus
Participant Experience
We’re With You All The Way

Work With Experienced Instructors & Mentors
Our instructors are industry leaders, with years of experience in their field. Every member of the team has the academic savvy and real-world practice to support you on your learning journey. Gain the full value of their expertise through in-depth discussions, thoughtful and critical feedback on assignments, and live sessions.

Make Connections With A Professional Network
You’ll gain access to an international network of professionals building skills similar to your own. We provide a range of opportunities to engage with your peers and instructors, share insights, and keep the conversation going long after you’ve completed the course.

Collaborate & Engage
We offer a supportive space for collaboration. We’ve designed the learner’s journey to help you fully engage with course content, guided by seasoned professionals and a community of peers and mentors. Engage in live group discussions, complete lessons, and share and offer feedback on assignments.

Practice & Apply New Skills
We believe the best way to learn new skills is by doing. Gain mastery of each new skill through creative activities designed to hone your learning, culminating in the final project. At the end of this course, you will have gained in-depth knowledge, a new skill set, and a portfolio to immediately apply to your job or new career.
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Who Should Attend?
Ideal for those new to video, content creators, journalists, editors, new media managers, media professionals, marketers, communications and PR, publishers, educators and web producers.
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Course Fee
Standard registration is $840 USD. Early registration is encouraged as courses fill up quickly. Discounts for early registrations are applied automatically at checkout.
Team Training: Teams of five or more may be eligible for a group discount. Contact us for details.
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Prerequisites
This is a beginners level workshop, no previous experience with storytelling, filming, or editing video is required.
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Requirements
- All participants must have a computer or laptop for use during this course. Your computer must meet the minimum technical specifications outlined on the Adobe Premiere Pro systems requirements page. If in doubt please reach out to Adobe directly. We recommend you verify your computer can run Premiere Pro before enrolling.
- A subscription to Adobe Creative Cloud for a period of 5-weeks is required to participate in this course. Information on how to purchase a subscription can be found on the Adobe Premiere Pro Editing Software page. You will begin using Premiere Pro during the second week of the six-week course. Keep this in mind when purchasing the license.
- An external hard drive for working with video files in Adobe Premier Pro.
- Headphones are required.
- A device for shooting video is required. This course references the smartphone (both iPhone & Android) with custom technical tutorials for shooting video. Smartphone accessories for video recording are available for purchase through MOVO photo.com Use code BerkeleyAMI for 10% off and free shipping within the USA at this link: BerkeleyAMI MOVOPhoto
- Download and review the Gear Guide before registering.
- Proficiency in English (instruction is delivered in English).
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Additional Information
Please review the Terms and Conditions for more information about our course policies.