Research Guides: Digital Scholarship Services: Digital Storytelling

Digital Storytelling Tools and Resources

There are a wide range of tools for digital storytelling available online.

Digital Scholarship Services are happy to consult on how to integrate these tools into your classroom or your scholarly communications strategy. Email us to schedule a consultation.

If you don't see your favorite tool here, let us know and we'll add it to the guide.

UMKC IS Software Policies

Before integrating any software or content management system into a course, including free software, faculty should complete an IS Software Purchase request to assess security and FERPA compliance. This is the responsibility of the instructor of record on the course. Libraries faculty and staff will not do this on behalf of teaching faculty.

Journalism

Knight Lab Storytelling Toolkit
Knight Lab develops prototypes, projects and services that help make information meaningful and promote quality journalism, storytelling and content on the internet.

Interactive Storytelling

Scalar
Scalar is a free, open source authoring and publishing platform that’s designed to make it easy for authors to write long-form, born-digital scholarship online.
Sutori
Sutori is a tool for creating collaborative presentations for the classroom
Twine
Twine is an open-source tool for telling interactive, nonlinear stories.

Design Tools

Canva
Canva is a free-to-use online graphic design tool. Use it to create social media posts, presentations, posters, videos, logos and more.
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Premium options available.

Spatial Storytelling

ArcGIS StoryMaps
Transform your maps and geographic information system (GIS) work into interactive content that informs, inspires, and engages stakeholders. For organizations and GIS professionals.
StoryMapJS
StoryMapJS is a free tool to help you tell stories on the web that highlight the locations of a series of events.
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Requires Google login.
StoryMaps
Create interactive digital maps.
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Premium options available.

Timelines

Timeline JS
TimelineJS is an open-source tool that enables anyone to build visually rich, interactive timelines.
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Uses Google Sheets.

Here's an example of a timeline created in TimelineJS

Citation:
Sewell, Claire and Spencer D. C. Keralis. “The History & Origin of Cat Memes: From the 18th Century to lolcats; Or, How Cats have Basically Changed the Internet and the World Furever.” Hyperrhiz: New Media Cultures, no. 21, 2019. doi:10.20415/hyp/021.m07

To learn more, contact Digital Scholarship Services to schedule a consultation, or attend a workshop.

Audio Storytelling & Podcasts

Audacity
Audio editing and recording app.
D-Script
Descript is a video editing app that’s also a social-media video maker.
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Basic plan is free. Premium services available.
Soundcite
SoundCite is a simple-to-use tool that lets you add inline audio to your story.

Data Storytelling

Piktochart
Import your data to create infographics, reports, videos, and more.
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Premium options available.
RAWGraphs
A free and open source tool for data visualization
Storyline JS
Storyline is an open-source tool that enables anyone to build an annotated, interactive line chart.

Visual Storytelling

Juxtapose JS
Juxtapose helps storytellers compare two pieces of similar media, including photos, and GIFs.
Scene VR
SceneVR is an engaging way to tell stories from an entirely new perspective. It turns your collection of panoramic and VR-ready photos into a slideshow of navigable scenes, allowing you to create unique 360° narratives.

Digital Scholarship Services