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A New and Easy Way to Create Green Screen Videos

ByRichard Byrne

Roughly a dozen years ago I made my first attempts at creating green screen videos with my geography students. My students created “on location” video reports about places they researched.

Back in 2010 my students used iMovie because it was the only option available without buying expensive software. Today, there are many more options than ever before for making green screen videos. The latest option comes from Canva.

Just like you can use Canva to remove image backgrounds you can now use Canva to remove the background from your video clips.

By using Canva’s background remover and video editor you can now create green screen videos even if you don’t have an actual green screen to record in front of. Now you can simply record a video clip, upload it to your Canva account, and then use the built-in editor to remove the video’s background. Once you’ve replaced your video’s background you can replace it with any stock image available in Canva or any image that you own and upload to your Canva account.

Watch this brief video to see how you can quickly create green screen videos with Canva.

Three Ideas for green screen projects:

  • Student Newscasts

This might be the most common use of green screens. Students can create a newscast complete with a weather forecast set in front of a weather map.

  • Step Inside a Book

Take the concept of a book trailer video one step further by using green screen production tools. Have students place themselves in front of various backdrops that are representative for settings, scenes, and characters in a favorite book. This is a particularly good strategy for fiction/ fantasy books because students can draw their own backgrounds and characters to use on the green screen.

  • Guided Tours of the World

Have students research a collection of places around the world then gather pictures or video clips of those places. Students can then use those pictures and clips in the background as they highlight and narrate the tour.

50 Tech Tuesday Tips!

50 Tech Tuesday Tips is an eBook that I created with busy tech coaches, tech integrators, and media specialists in mind. In it you’ll find 50 ideas and tutorials that you can use as the basis of your own short PD sessions. Get a copy today! I’ll host a free webinar for any school that purchases ten or more copies of my eBook.