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CMSE495 Data Science Capstone

Project Video Assignment

Throughout the semester, your team will build a single project video that tells the story of your project.

Rather than creating the final video all at once, the video is developed through a series of milestones that include planning, recording, review, and revision. Each milestone contributes to the final product.

The goal is not simply to document what your team has built. The goal is to communicate your project to a general audience, your community partner, and future students.

Video Milestones

Why Videos?

A successful project is not only about technical work. It is also about communicating ideas clearly.

Video assignments help teams explain their project, demonstrate technical progress, reflect on project decisions, and build a professional artifact that can be shared outside the classroom. Many teams discover that preparing a video helps them identify gaps in their understanding, clarify project goals, and improve collaboration.

Iterative Development

The video assignment is intentionally structured as an iterative process.

Teams develop a storyboard early in the semester and continue refining it as the project evolves. Video milestones alternate between planning, recording, and revision. Each milestone should build on previous work.

By the end of the semester, the final video should feel like a single coherent story rather than a collection of disconnected clips.

Storyboarding

A storyboard is a plan for the video.

Good storyboards help teams organize ideas, estimate timing, divide responsibilities, and identify needed visuals before recording begins.

Most teams find presentation software such as PowerPoint useful for storyboarding. Slides can be used to outline visual content while speaker notes contain narration drafts, timing estimates, and production notes.

At a minimum, a storyboard should communicate:

Remember that videos are not limited to slides. Demonstrations, interviews, screen recordings, animations, photographs, and other visual elements may all be incorporated into the final production. The storyboard should describe how those elements will be used.

The First Storyboard

The first storyboard should communicate your planned project journey for the semester.

Most teams include project motivation, community partner needs, project goals, success criteria, planned technical approaches, major open loops, expected milestones, and desired project outcomes.

Your audience should be able to understand what the project is about, why it matters, and how the team plans to approach it.

For this first milestone, focus on clarity rather than production quality.

Video Milestones

The project video typically evolves through three major stages.

Introduction

The first video introduces the project and establishes the overall story. The audience should understand who the team is, why the project is important, and what the team plans to accomplish.

MVP Demo

The second video demonstrates the current state of the project. The focus shifts from planning to evidence by showing a working workflow, progress toward project goals, and the major challenges that remain.

Final Project Video

The final video integrates previous work into a complete project narrative. Teams should present results, interpret findings, discuss lessons learned, and communicate the overall impact of the project.

Reviewing Existing Versions

Revision is expected.

Each milestone should improve the project’s organization, clarity, visuals, pacing, and overall professionalism. Strong teams regularly revisit earlier video segments and storyboard sections rather than simply adding new material.

Quality Expectations

The strongest videos tell a clear story, focus on the audience rather than the team, demonstrate meaningful project progress, and use evidence to support conclusions.

A useful video is often more valuable than an impressive video. Prioritize clarity over special effects.

Using AI and Media Tools

Teams may use AI tools to assist with scripting, editing, image generation, transcription, captioning, and production.

However, the project’s story, technical content, conclusions, and decisions should reflect the team’s own understanding of the work. As with all course activities, AI should support communication rather than replace critical thinking.

Recording and Editing

Most professional videos are assembled from multiple recordings rather than produced in a single take.

Teams are encouraged to combine slides, demonstrations, screen recordings, interviews, photographs, animations, and narration to communicate their project effectively. Editing is an expected part of the process and is often what transforms a collection of recordings into a coherent story.

If you need help selecting tools or editing video, please contact the instructional team. We have a great deal of experience producing educational and technical content and are happy to help.

Sharing Your Video

Videos should be hosted somewhere accessible to instructors, classmates, and community partners.

Common hosting options include:

Regardless of the hosting platform, teams should make video links easy to find. Including the active video link in project documentation, repository README files, and team folders is strongly encouraged.

Specific submission instructions for each video milestone will be provided in the corresponding milestone assignment.

Teams are encouraged to choose tools that fit their workflow and experience level.

Common choices include Zoom, Snagit, Camtasia, OpenShot, FFmpeg, YouTube, and MSU MediaSpace. Most successful teams use a combination of tools rather than relying on a single platform.

Bottom Line

Build one story throughout the semester.

Plan early, record often, revise intentionally, and focus on communicating your project’s value to a general audience. A successful final video should clearly explain what your team attempted, what your team learned, what your team accomplished, and why the work matters.