Tutorial: Making Multimedia Concept Maps - Paths, Pictures, Quicktime Movies, and a Splash of Color
This tutorial focusses on several features found under the "Special" menu. The "Special" menu is organized into seven sections. The first three sections are all multimedia related. The fourth section contains an analysis feature. The fifth and sixth sections contain features which are either usable but still in development (such as ConversationMaker and the NetData Utility), or older features which are still usable but have been deemphasized (such as ChainMaker and the Puzzler). The seventh section contains activities which are discussed in a different tutorial.
Figure 65: Special menu
Create a new concept map called "Multimedia Tutorial".
Choose "New LifeMap File" from the "File" menu. You will see the following dialog box.
Figure 66: Save LifeMap file dialog box
Now create the following little concept map about birds.
Figure 67: Multimedia starter concept map
The concept map, as it stands, is a perfectly clear little concept map about birds. It has nice clean lines. It doesn't need anything else. The features described in this tutorial will give you the power to take any simple, clear concept map and gunk it up with lots of flashy formatting that carries no meaning whatsoever. So don't say we didn't warn you.
The first multimedia element we are going to add to this map is a still picture. You can place a pict, a gif, or a jpeg file into any Fancy Border. We are going to add a fancy border to the concept "Birds".
Double click on "Birds". ConceptMaker will open and you will see something like the figure below.
Figure 68: ConceptMaker window
Click once on the "pict" button (the one with the little picture of the Earth on it). This will place a picture of sorts in the sample border graphic (the one diagonally down from the words "Border Size:". When you click "Redraw", a fancy border of a rectangular shape will be created (the size of this fancy border relative to the concept it is attached to is determined by the numbers in the "FB Margins:" field - which are x,y displacements from the topleft and bottomright corners of the concept). Alternatively, click the "Fancy Borders" button and then choose a shape for your fancy border. (If you want to get rid of the fancy border, click the "Fancy Borders" button or the pict button - maybe both - until you see the sample borders graphic as a rectangle with no picture in it.)
When you have gotten ConceptMaker to look like the figure below, click "Redraw".
Figure 69: Another view of ConceptMaker
Your map will now look like the following.
Figure 70: Concept Map with one fancy border
Now drag the box around "Birds" so that it is just above "Birds". After you have dragged the box, drag "Birds" a little. Your map will look like this.
Figure 71: Concept Map with fancy border moved a little
The above dragging was for the sole purpose of demonstrating that if you drag a fancy border, this changes the position of the fancy border relative to its concept. If you drag a concept that has a fancy border, LifeMap automatically repositions the fancy border so that it maintains the same relative position.
Okay, now we are ready to go bird watching. Select the fancy border. Choose "Place Picture in Fancy Border..." from the "Special" menu. Find the gif file called "pinesiskin.gif" and click "Open". The dialog box will look something like the one below.
Figure 72: Select a Picture dialog box
Now your map looks like this.
By the way, this drawing of a Pine Siskin is by Larry McQueen. We are using it courtesy of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, one of the premier avian research and education groups. You can find out more about birds from their web site at http://www.ornith.cornell.edu/ or you can call them at 607-254-BIRD.
Figure 73: Concept Map with picture of a bird
Adding still pictures to a concept can be useful, but sometimes only a moving picture tells the whole story. We are going to use a quicktime movie to help explain why Dinosaurs did not do the Waltz.
Select the concept "Waltz". Choose "Add a Movie to a Concept..." from the "Special" menu. Find the quicktime file called "Waltz4.mov". (It may have been sent to you stuffed, in which case you will have to unstuff it first.) Click "Open". The dialog box you will see is shown below.
Figure 74: Quicktime Movie selection dialog box
To play any movies you embedded in this concept map, choose "Play Movies" from the "Special" menu.
After you have chosen "Play Movies" your map will look like the figure below. Click on the buttons in the controller bar (at the bottom of the movie) to play the movie.
Figure 75: Concept Map with picture and movie of "Dancing Man"
Well, okay, you still don't know for certain whether Dinosaurs could Waltz, but you do have a sense of what the leader's part of the Progressive step in the American Waltz looks like.
When you are done looking at the movies, select "Remove Movies" from the "Special" menu. This option just removes the movies from the screen. It does not remove the movies from the concepts. If you want to remove the movies from the concepts, hold down the Option key while selecting "Remove Movies" from the "Special" menu. You will then get some dialog boxes asking you if you really want to disembed the movies.
The next multimedia feature this tutorial will cover is nested maps. First, select the concept "Waltz".
Figure 76: Concept Map with Waltz selected
Next, select "Open NestMaker..." from the "Special" menu. Set up the NestMaker window so that it looks like the example below.
Figure 77: NestMaker window
Click "Create Nested Map". Your map will now look something like this.
Figure 78: Concept Map after NestMaker has done its thing
Drag the "Waltz" concept that has appeared in the upper left corner to just below the original "Waltz".
For the purposes of this tutorial, delete the original "Waltz", and make a link from "probably didn't know how to" to the new "Waltz", so that your map looks like this.
Figure 79: Same as figure above, only rearranged a little
You can tell that there is a connection between the concept "Waltz" and a nested map becase "Waltz" has a drop shadow on the bottom and right sides of the concept. In the Lingo of LifeMap, you would say that there is a Pathway between "Waltz" and the nested map, and that a PathPointer is stored in the concept "Waltz".
To travel along the Pathway, you have two options. You can select "Waltz" and choose "Open PathMaker..." from the "Special" menu, and then double-click on the PathPointer that is shown. Alternatively, you can choose "Browse Tool" from the "Edit" Menu. The cursor will change to a pointing hand. Clicking and holding on a concept with a drop shadow, you will see a pop-up menu such as the one below. It will list all of the PathPointers stored in that concept. Choosing an item from the pop-up menu will take you to that card.
Figure 80: Pop-up PathWays menu in Browse mode
That card now looks like that shown below. It contains the concept (or concepts) you had selected from the original map, plus a new concept which is the title you had given to the original map. In this case, the title was called "Birds", and this concept contains a PathPointer back to the original map.
Figure 81: View of new concept map created by NestMaker
Now, suppose that you wanted to create a nested map in which you could see the original map in the background. This would be most effectively done in a true three dimensional concept mapping program. LifeMap can't do true 3D concept maps at the moment (although we are thinking about attempting it). However, it can do the next best thing.
The next best thing is a cluster icon.
First, select the entire original map, or the portion of the map you want included in the cluster icon. So, try selecting concepts such as shown below.
Figure 82: Concept Map with some concepts selected
Next, select "Create Cluster Icon..." from the "Special" menu.
You will see the dialog box shown below. Please note that if you enter a name of a concept that already exists, the cluster icon will be attached to that existing concept. If the existing concept already has a picture embedded in a fancy border, the cluster icon will replace the picture. If the concept does not already exist, a new concept will be created and the cluster icon will be attached to that new concept.
Figure 83: Cluster Icon dialog box
When you drag the concept "Characteristics of Birds" to the middle of the page, your map will look like this.
Figure 84: Concept map showing Cluster Icon
Now, select both the concept and the fancy border, and choose "Vanilla Cut" from the "Edit" menu. You can also choose "Cut" with the option key held down, but you can't use the key combination Command-Option-X. Alternatively, you can Copy the concept "Characteristics of Birds" and its cluster icon, go to the next card (you can use the arrow keys on your keyboard, or the arrow buttons in LifeMap's main control window, or the options under the "Go" menu.), and then choose "Paste" from the "Edit" menu. Then go back to the original card (the words card and page can be used interchangeably to refer to the multiple maps that can be stored in a single LifeMap concept map file), select "Characteristics of Birds" and its cluster icon there and delete them any way you please.
So, by now you are probably asking yourself, "Why are there two 'Cut' items in the 'Edit' menu?" This is a good question, and even I didn't realize that they were needed until I wrote this user manual. "Cut" does more than just cut whatever you have selected. "Cut" figures out what kind of objects you have selected, and then performs a number of operations depending upon the type of object. For instance, suppose that you select a single concept that is linked to some other concepts. However, you do not select the linklines and arrowheads that connect it to those other concepts. "Cut" looks at the object and says "Ah ha! My carbon based peripheral wants to cut a concept. Are there links drawn to or from this concept? Yes, there are. I will cut these graphic elements first, and then I will cut the concept. That way, the map stays clean (no dangling linklines). If the carbon based peripheral decides to paste the concept back, the important part, the concept, is intact. The other graphic elements will get redrawn based upon the information stored in the concept anyway." There's a lot more to it than that, and "Cut" doesn't really muse about what it is going to do, but you get the idea.
Sometimes, one feature can get in the way of another. Kind of like building an airport runway directly across an automobile highway. You could take a lot of effort and build a tunnel for the highway under the runway (perhaps only to find that you have just cut through a water main), or you can do the simple thing and build a separate feature.
That is what "Vanilla Cut" is. It just cuts whatever object is selected. It doesn't do anything but cut the object. For some things in LifeMap, this would produce ragged results, and possibly errors, but for some tasks, such as moving a concept and its cluster icon from one place to another, "Vanilla Cut" does the job perfectly.
Now we will add one final multimedia element, a splash of color. We will add the color to the concept "Waltz" for no good reason other than it doesn't really belong in a concept map about Birds. Making "Waltz" red will emphasize this.
Double click on "Waltz" to open it up in ConceptMaker.
Figure 85: ConceptMaker window
You will notice that there is a rather unassuming button directly to the right of the "Redraw" button. This button has a grey square with a white hole in the middle. Click the Grey Square button.
When the following dialog box comes up, click "Colors". (You can also try "Patterns" if you like since it works basically the same way.)
Figure 86: Colors or Patterns dialog box
Now click "Border".
Figure 87: Apply Colors dialog box
In the next window, click on any color tile. We suggest a nice bright red to make "Waltz" stand out. Make sure that "for Black pixels" is set since we are still using the all black pattern.
Figure 88: Color Selector Window
Finally just for fun, change the shape of the fancy border to a star, change both the horizontal and vertical border sizes to 5, and set the FB margins to 60,70. ConceptMaker should now look like this.
Figure 89: Concept Maker window showing star shaped fancy border
Click "Redraw".
Now, to see the full effect of your first totally bell-and-whistled, multimedia concept map, choose "Play Movies" from the "Special" menu. You may have to add the waltz movie back into the "Waltz" concept since the original "Waltz" concept with the movie in it probably got deleted back in the NestMaker step. In the figure below, we have copied the "Characteristics of Birds" cluster icon back into the map, just to show all of the features in one map.
Figure 90: Multimedia concept map in all its glory (or as much glory as is fit to print)