Thursday, November 25, 2010

Video Therapy

Happy Thanksgiving. My household has a Thanksgiving video-making tradition. We ask each other the same 5 questions on film and then review past years' responses to assess how we have changed or review what has happened in our lives previous years.

It got me thinking about ways to use video in therapy. I have used still frame animation in therapy. Here is a YouTube example of someone doing still frame with a white board. I totally want to try this!



You could also use clay, toys, furniture, yourself. Basically it involves moving or changing something in tiny increments, taking a whole lot of photos and putting them together with some basic video editing software. Seems like a good one for working on maintaining focus/attention. I think it could be a fun group project as well.

I also thought about video therapy as a possibility for someone who is physically ill and working on leaving a legacy.

I found video on you tube of a woman using it with patients with Alzheimer's disease. It's a little old, but still useful information.

I read a chapter in Materials & Media in Art Therapy about therapists using video with groups of people who are homeless and HIV positive. I also found this article in Time discussing the use of video to help people gain insight into what they say and how they say it.

Any other thoughts or ideas? Have you used video in your own work?

Sunday, November 21, 2010