Youth Ministry Geek » Software

POLL: Publishing Software

Jon — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 20:30:06 +0000

At our church we create a load of custom publications. When I first started I used Microsoft Publisher. Over the past 2 years I began learning Adobe’s Creative Suite 5 so I have converted to an InDesign user. What kind of publishing software do you use, and why? Give 3 “likes” and 3 “dislikes”

What Publishing Software Do You Use?

10 Favorites from 2011

Chris — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 19:49:47 +0000

Here are some of my favorites from 2011:

1. Apple MacBook Air MC969LL/A 11.6-Inch Laptop (NEWEST VERSION)">MacBook Air - I love this little computer. Great for travel, and super fast.

2. Sticky Faith - These books have really made me think a lot about youth ministry and being a parent. I highly recommend them. Plus check out StickyFaith.org for more insights in their articles and blog.

3. Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson – I found this book to be a difficult read. He could be so harsh with people. It really made me think about leadership, success, and family from someone who did great things, but failed at so much too.

4. iPad 2 - This continues to be a device that changes the way I interact with content. I love it.

5. Kindle Fire - You probably didn’t expect to see this after I listed the iPad, but it’s a different device for me. It’s a great reader that also does some tablet functions. Plus, I love that there’s someone pushing the iPad to be better.

6. YSnetwork - This one is personal, but we launched it this fall at YS (where I work). It’s a great way to connect with other youth workers, join a network or build your own. It’s free to join, and if you sign up join the Youth Ministry Geek network to stay connected.

7. Flipboard - This is probably the app I use the most, and with the addition of the iPhone version a month ago, I just use it even more. It’s by far my favorite news reader.

8. GoPro - I got one of these cameras to take on our vacation to Hawaii this year, and it’s so much fun. We use it under water, on water slides, in the pool, the beach, on the trampoline. It’s a great camera to take when you don’t want to risk you full size, expensive one. Sure it has it’s limitations, but you get an amazing picture that can go anywhere. It’s my Flip Camera replacement.

9.Timbuk2 Control Laptop Case - After about 7 years, my old shoulder bag finally wore out. This was my replacement. Things I love about it: separate sleeves for laptop and ipad, TSA compliant so I don’t have to take my laptop out, not too big, but big enough.

10. Tech News Today - I love podcasts and increasingly over the last year, this has been my #1 to go to. It’s about 45 minutes every week day covering the lastest in the world of technology. Entertaining and informative, perfect for this geek.

What were you’re favorites from the last year?

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Best of 2011

Jon — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 10:00:55 +0000

2011 was a whirlwind year for me. While serving in our student ministry, I also spent half of the year revamping all of our discipleship courses, and the other half of the year directing our elementary ministry. We built a website to host all of our discipleship course registration and blog content, directed the largest children’s Christmas production our church has ever hosted, and are in the middle of planning a county wide student conference. At the same time I am pursuing an MDiv in Apologetics. I have relied heavily on technology this year but have also found some other non-techie favorites. Here they are in all of their glory:

Adobe Indesign CS5

Having done all of my publications in Microsoft Publisher over the years the switch to InDesign was fabulous! In an effort to keep users from messing up, Publisher limits the ability to manipulate the document however you want. While this is not a problem most of the time, there are moments when it becomes quite bothersome. Publisher often gives me grief when I have images layered one on top of the other. InDesign has been a breath of fresh air. The program offers so much control over the document. The learning curve is steep at first but you catch on. I highly recommend this software if you want to step up the quality of your publications

Color Scheme Designer (colorschemedesigner.com)

Creating a professional looking publication means you don’t need to guess about your color scheme. While most of us can “eye-ball” a good color, this web app takes all of the guess work out. Plus, the app allows you to choose between monochromatic, complementary, analogous, split complementary and every other scheme you can imagine! I found this one late in the year but it has quickly become a go-to app.Samsung PX2370 LED Monitor:

I purchased this monitor at the beginning of the year and I have enjoyed every minute in front of it (well, maybe not every minute). The LED backlighting and 5,000,000:1 contrast ratio makes for a crisp display. Once again, if you want a top notch publication you need to create it on a display you can trust.

Screencast-O-Matic

When we built our discipleship website for our church members to register an account on we created a screen cast video to walk them through the registration (basically a video that captures everything happening on your computer screen). The software we used cost a pretty penny. Well, just the other week I found Screencast-O-Matic! It has 95% of the features as the expensive program but only costs $12 a year to use. I am amazed at what we are doing with web apps now, and this one is one of the most impressive I have seen yet!

Ethics for a Brave New World:

I took an ethics course this semester and this was one of our main texts. The title plays off of the famous work by Aldous Huxley, Brave New World. It’s a massive work (close to 1000 pages), but boy does it cover a load of pertinent topics. The Feinberg’s set out to give evangelical views on issues ranging from abortion to just war theory. If you want to give yourself a kick in the pants, pick up a copy and begin working your way through it.

Well, it’s Christmas eve when I am writing this and I am wicked tired and ready for Santa to get here! Hope 2012 treat you all well, and I hope all your techie dreams come true.

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Sixth Grade iOS Developer Speaks at TED

Chris — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 23:17:39 +0000

This was super cool seeing this kid talk about what he loves. It was a great reminder to me to encourage kids in their interests, you’ll never know where it will take them.

Box.net: Free 50 GBs of Storage for Life

Brandon — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 04:24:08 +0000

I love “The Cloud.” Apps like Evernote, GoogleDocs, iCloud, and Flickr are great for share and freeing up space on your hard drive through free online storage. One of my favorite cloud apps is dropbox. Dropbox is a free app and online site that lets you store pics, docs, and videos and access them from any device. In addition to accessibility and its freeness I can easily share folders and files with other dropbox users or with a link from my dropbox “public” folder. If you want to check out dropbox click this link and install the app.

If you don’t think dropbox has enough storage space for you check out BOX.net. Right now iTunes has the BOX.net app (iPhone & iPad) for Free downloaded. You have today until December 2, 2011 to register or sign in to your account from the app to receive 50GB of lifetime storage on Box.net (usually $19.99).Check out both and see which you like more! Share in the comments some of your favorite cloud apps.

Want to Learn to Code?

Chris — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 04:50:17 +0000

I don’t know about you, but I’ve always wanted to really learn to code. I feel like I know just enough to know about programming that I don’t know what I’m doing. This weekend I stumbled upon Codecademy which is a free site that will teach you some basic coding / programming skills. The lessons start out really easy (can you type your name?), and then get a little more difficult as they teach you some of the fundamentals. You can also code along with your friends, and earn badges for the lessons you finish (Who doesn’t like badges?).

It might be a great thing for students that might be interested in coding but don’t know quite where to start.

Enjoy, who knows, maybe someday you’ll find yourself turning into a CodeMonkey.

Clips For iPhone — Movie Clip Teaching Ideas

Chris — Tue, 09 Aug 2011 13:00:33 +0000

Have you ever hunted for just the perfect movie clip to use as an illustration for your teaching? There’s brand new iPhone app to help with that: Clips ~ Teach the Bible; Use scenes from movies. I love that it’s made by a Youth Pastor that’s also a developer, RJ Grunewald.

Description from iTunes:

Have you ever noticed that a scene from a popular movie can often teach better than any great lesson from a pastor or small group leader? Clips is all about helping people engage with the Bible by using scenes from great films. Pastors, small group leaders, and youth ministers can all benefit with the tools provided. Clips tells you exactly what scenes to use, what topics to teach, the verses you could use, and even some possible discussion questions. It gives you everything you need to easily find the scene you are teaching from, even linking to it in iTunes.

Open the app and you are free to browse the movie library, look up topics you’d like to teach, or even search for a scene based on a particular verse. Once you’ve found the movie you want to use, Clips makes it easy for you to have exactly what you need to lead a discussion on that scene.

Features:
- Library of 50 movies (and growing…)
- Over 80 topics
- Search by title, topic, or verse
- Share scene details via email
- Save your favorite clips and add used clips to history
- Easily find movies in iTunes through download links

Looks like a great youth ministry resource, go grab it on the app store now!

Evernote…Again

Brandon — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 16:14:38 +0000

I may be late to the game but did you know you can email notes to Evernote? They have created a slick way to not only send your notes to your account but also to tag and place them in folders.

Here’s a clip from their site:

How it works
First, find your Evernote incoming email address. It’ll look something like [username].12345@m.evernote.com. The address is located under Account Info in the desktop versions of Evernote, under Settings in Evernote Web, and in the Sync tab of Evernote for iPhone. We recommend adding this email address to your address book or contact list.

Next, try emailing something into Evernote. In the subject line of your email, write the title of the note as you want it to appear in your account. In the same subject line, add one or both of the following:

Use @ for notebooks: Use an @ symbol followed by the name of your destination notebook

Use # for tags: Use a # symbol followed by the tag or tags you wish to assign. You can have multiple tags just make sure each one starts with an #

For example, Subject: Trip to Florida @travel #expense report

Would create a note titled Trip to Florida in my travel notebook, tagged with expense report.

This has been a useful new discovery for me, I hope it helps you in your note taking. To read more check out their blog at: blog.evernote.com/2010/03/16/emailing-into-evernote-just-got-better/

Favorite iPhone / iPad Apps Part 2

Chris — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 14:00:09 +0000

Here’s part 2 of my favorite iPhone / iPad apps for ministry and everyday life.

1. Bible – LifeChurch.tv - This is my go to Bible reader on the iOS platform. I’ve tried others, but I always come back to this one. The team at LifeChurch just keeps making it better and better.

2. AppShopper - As a app junkie, I’m always looking for new apps and AppShopper is a great way to find out what’s new. One of my favorite things about this app, is creating a wish list, and you’ll receive and email when the app is updated or on sale. I’ve saved a ton just waiting till the app I wanted was on sale or even free.

3. Kindle - This is my go to book reader. I think iBooks is prettier, but I love Amazon’s pricing and I love being able to access my books on all my devices. I always look to kindle first for ebooks.

4.GarageBand - This one is iPad only but if you are interested in making music, this is an amazing app. It’s the touch version of the popular app on OS X. You can play piano, drums, or guitar and record them. It’s also been so fun watching my kids make music of their own and get into it. I love this app.

5. iMovie - This is my favorite quick video editor for iOS. Again, the touch version of another of Apple’s desktop iLife apps, but it works so well on iOS. It’s great for simple videos on the go that you can upload directly to YouTube or Flickr. Easy to use and fast.

6. OmniOutliner for iPad - Another iPad app here, but it’s so useful. I often organize my thoughts in Outlines, and this is a great tool for that. I use it for projects, teaching, writing, and just organizing. It also works with the desktop version which I also really like. Like all Omni apps, it’s a little on the expensive side, but I always feel it’s worth it in the end.

7. Documents To Go® – Office Suite - I’m a big fan of Google Docs and do a lot of my writing there, and this is best Google docs editor I’ve used. I can access all my google docs there so I can edit or write on the go. It also can access microsoft office docs stored in dropbox so you can edit or access on the go.

Bonus Pick: Live Curriculum - OK this one is a little selfish, but I’m pretty proud of it. It’s the first app I helped design and produce. It’s the app to access Simply Youth Ministry’s LIVE Curriculum. Click here to learn more about it.

There are so many other apps I use all the time, but I’d love to hear about some of your favorites. What ones did I miss? Tell me in the comments.

Favorite iPhone / iPad Apps – Part 1

Chris — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 13:45:15 +0000

I often get asked what my favorite iPhone / iPads are, and I thought I would share my current list with you guys. I’m a total app junkie so it was difficult to narrow this down, I tried to make it a top ten, but there are a few more than that so I’m dividing it into a couple posts. Some are favorites because they help make work easier, some make everyday life more enjoyable and some are ministry focused. Also these are in no particular order.

1. Evernote – This is my go to note taker. I use it on my phone for quick photos or audio notes to myself. I also use the iPad version to take notes in meetings or at conferences. It also works great as a desktop app. There’s also the ability to email notes or do web clippings into your notebooks. The best part is they all stay in sync. I find new uses for this all the time.

2. Dropbox – We’ve talked about this before on this blog. This is another one of those services that I use all the time. The Dropbox service allows you keep files in the cloud and keep them in sync across your devices. This app is how you access your files from your iPhone or iPad. Having access to my files anywhere is a life saver. I also love that you can play media files from the app directly.

3. Flipboard – This is my favorite news reader, and sorry, but this is iPad only. I love the way it looks and the way it works. It turns my twitter, facebook, google reader into a dynamic digital magazine. Plus you can read from their curated topics or add your own RSS feeds.

4. TomTom U.S.A. – I have a horrible sense of direction and I do a fair amount of travel, so always being able to find directions to where i need to go is great. I find the built in Google Map to be difficult to use, that’s why I love TomTom. It has a great built in search for locations and then will give take you there. This is a lifesaver.

5. Angry Birds – I don’t feel like I need to explain this one. Love it or hate it, it keeps my kids (and maybe me) occupied.

6. Keynote – This is my go to presentation software on my desktop and the mobile version is a great way to review and make quick changes to a presentation. I actually like the iPad version so much I often start my presentations there.

7. Pages – If I need to do some writing with more formatting than Evernote will let me, I use pages. It’s the best word processor I’ve used on the iPad.

Stay tuned for more apps in part 2.