I have moved my Blog to Squarespace.com.
WordPress was good for a while but it is really designed for the more Web intensive user.
SS give me the ability to modify my template to resemble main website and manage my website blog without having to keep up with web tech.
I was listening to a new podcast by the Globe and Mail. “The Download Decade” and this old music industry fossil who is now head of some international coalition to rally all countries to “stop piracy”. He said pirate, piracy & steal so many times that I didn’t start to feel guilty for downloading torrent files, I started to be insulted. I am not a Pirate.
I started to think about the what the people on the other side always call it, “file sharing”. Yeah that’s more like it. If I flashback 15 years, before the digital jungle we call the interweb was widespread. I use to own a double deck cassette player and when me and my buddies would buy a record or cassette we would share our purchase with each other. I also remember listening to the radio and recording off-air my favorite songs. Then when I had some disposal income I would lots of there overpriced cassettes, then CD, VHS and finally DVDs. I owned so much stuff that I filled many Ikea bookcases and bins with my various media. Sometimes a friends would want to borrow some media they were more than welcome that’s what friends do. I shared my media with them and occasionally they would even make a copy of it to play in there walkmans or Golf GTI, crazy concept.
In the last few years I have, with the encouragement of my wife, to discard some of the now obsolete media (cassettes, VHS and soon all my DVDs will be on the chopping block). So, lets get this straight I have pumped in lots of my money into the “Fat Cats” pockets. And let me write this in caps, I AM NOT GOING TO RE-PURCHASE ALL THE MEDIA THAT I PREVIOUSLY OWNED, again. I must admit that I have doubled and now with the advent of yet another device (Blu-ray) triple purchased some of my favorite media; guilty over consumer. I am a media lover but this is like one of those dysfunctional on-again-off again high school relationships, I am tired of breaking up with my media. So, please don’t call me a pirate.
Wait a minute! When I really think about it, I still buy music or give it as a gift (itune cards are very convenient and always appreciated) and I go to the movies and even buy an occasional Blu-ray DVD. I am still consuming there products. So, please don’t call me a Pirate.
Okay, one might say what about the new music, TV and Movies that are released every week? This is also really important (let me cap this) IF I AM DOWNLOADING IT, IT MEANS THAT I WOULD NOT BUY IT IN THE FIRST PLACE. If its TV I would not make room in my schedule to sit through your show and I would not spend money on a box set of a TV show that was on the tube for “free”. I hate downloading Movies because they are usually poor quality, but if I would, its because I WOULD NOT PAY MONEY FOR THE MOVIE. If your media is good I make a point to spread the word (aka free advertising)
So, for the love of Jeebus, DON’T CALL ME A PIRATE!
If you must label me call me a Digital Sharer or something.
LIST OF SHAME
(some of my double purchases or Triple purchases)
Aliens Trilogy
Stanley Kubrick Movies
Say Anything
Wu-Tang Clan
Nirvana
(I am going to stop this list is aggravating me)*
Copyright Shared Links
The Download Decade lots of great info about the history behind copyright and some better written articles about “Piracy” battle.
Search Engine (Jesse Brown Moved from CBC to TVO update your itune Podcasts subscriptions)
Michael Geist (keep up with the latest news on Copyright battle)
*Please feel free to add to this list of double purchase that you have made to the poor Music Mega Companies & film studios.
Kevin Deakon Baird
My son was recently born on March 31, 11.50pm. Thus the lack of time for serious blogging. Twitter has seemed a healthy alternative for me and I make less speeling and grammar mistakes in 140 characters. So, FOLLOW ME if you want to get Post Production & Film Tweets.
So, time is valuable and before my son was born, we bought a car after many years of using public transit and man powered vehicles (ie. my bikes)
I soon realized that my reading time was substantially cut since I was doing the commuting driving and keeping my eye on the road. This coupled with the fact that off air Radio (with the exception of the CBC) is pretty lame. I had this idea after I got tired of making playlist and listening to podcasts: audiobooks!
I know this is not a great appifanny but I like many people that I would share my “new discovery” with; I raised my nose at the “lazy-Read-me-A-Story” people that listened to audiobooks instead of using their reading skills. However, when I went to the itunes store and saw that the book that I was going to purchase was 10$ and read in 2.5 hours. It hit me. Me the slow reader who reads a book a month on a good month could crank out a book in 2-3 car rides or 3-4 house cleaning activities. Wow great deal and I am a little cheap with certain things, books being one of them. So, I bought “Tribes” and 2 days later I was done. Hummm. In another few days I could eclipse my book reading record. I am a slow reader. This was a good deal.
Like I said when I shared this with others I got either the disapproving look or “nose in the air” comments about the joys of curling up to a book on a bear skin rug and a log fire. But in reality, my reading time has been on crammed city bus, standing in a packed subway or sitting on a cold porcelain seat. Hummm or should I say Brrrrr.
I am not saying don’t read but listening to a book is better than not reading it at all. I still have a book that I read, slowly but since I have listened to 4 books now in 2 months, I am adding audiobooks to my life.
Note that I don’t really read Novels, I am more of a Non-Fiction fan which I find is better suited for the audiobook format.
Here is a list of what I have listened to:
(crazy convienient got all the information in a few hours, time was a factor)
I have been hearing about Twitter for months now and I finally opened and account. After a week of Tweeting, I see that this application is a scaled back version of Facebook’s status update line. So, what is the big deal. Well, If Facebook was a personal computer, it would be a PC and Twitter would be the MAC. It is just more efficient than Facebook.
I would not say that it is better than Facebook but I am not one to explore everyone’s personal pictures, office YouTube clips and wacky add-on applications that they seem to always want me to add to my already cluttered Facebook account. Facebook has its place, I found it very useful to announce to all my friends and acquaintances that we were having a baby and to spread some pictures around to my family. But overall and similar to a PC, sometimes it is a little much.
What Twitter brings to the social network scene from my perspective is a slick paired down version of some of your friends, acquaintances, corporations, website and even famous people’s daily discoveries and an occasional funny comment on a life experience. You can follow someone or be followed; my tendency is to follow my technologist friends since they are all early adopters and usually have interesting things that I would like to explore and/or similar interests. I also like to spread my techno-geeky links and daily discoveries from my office or the road via iphone apps like Tweeterific.
I am probably the last of the “early adopters” and it will probably grow as big or bigger than Facebook.I can definitely see the business and networking possibilities and I think that is why it is growing so fast.(recent podcast on TED, CBC Sparks, TWIT… all the tech-heads are on the “bus”) Similar to Google rise to power, I can see why Twitters simplicity will carve themselves a spot in the social network scene.
I even added the Widget to my site!
Gorilla Productions Tweets
Last week, I listened to a podcast as I was drinking my morning coffee and I could relate to these editors frustration. Check out “That Post Show Episode 7: A Market for Avid and Final Cut Pro” for a nice debate on the state of freelance editing today.
The Last few jobs that I have done are “save jobs”, I usually loath these jobs because they are usually old clients that have bypassed my services for a more affordable post guy aka the “hack”. Ironically they are double paying at this point because the client hired someone who didn’t know Final Cut Pro on a professional level, can’t edit in a Walter Murch sense, don’t manage media properly, can’t deliver on promises like graphic work or many other reasons; to put it simply the quality of the work was affected by their lack of mature work quality standards.
So, I decided to list out 5 thing that the Hack could do to save himself or at least help the people that pick up the pieces of there “work”.
(Feel like this post is going to have lots of “”)
1. Be consistently Hackfull.
Okay so you don’t know what your doing and you hack away a solution that is inefficient, tedious and mildly stupid. Please continue doing the same stupid technique throughout the project. The person who is going to fix your work will not have to decipher your mish mash of knowledge every time you decide that the last time built a lower 3rd, for example, was half -assed. Make his or her life easier and its a good practice.
2. Try not to work more outside your realm (Sound Editing, Color Correction, Graphics)
I know it is hard because your a hack, but try not to take on more than you can chew. Hopefully, you know you barely get by as an editor. Don’t promise Color Correction, Motion Graphics or Sound design. These are all different skills that have their own hacks that are hacking away in their own special way.
You also look really stupid when you can’t deliver these elements because more people can judge bad sound and color.
3. Seek help, the Inter-Web is your friend. (Size of Composition, Graphics, Audio formats, Compositing)
This might save you in the 11th hour. This might even get you out of the realm of hack. Please don’t jump to the conclusion that it is a flaw in the software it is Final Cut Pro that is technically inept its you, your a Hack. So, Google it and you might just fine the answers on a message board or even a poorly shot YouTube video screen capture.
4. Cover your Tracks. Clean up after yourself when it is passed on. Consolidate God Dammit!
Okay, your employer that you BS’d decides to got to, let’s just call him or her an non-Hack. When you hand over the project to the “Non-Hack”gather all your files and hand those to the Man or Woman who is going to fix your mess. Media Management is part of your job and you don’t want to constantly be contacted by your previous employer about where is this file or that. You can even try to “Media Manage” your Final Cut Pro Project and let the computer do the work!
5. Learn from your mistakes: a few keyboard shortcuts make you a better person, don’t say its impossible and be honest.
These tips might help you in the future from burning more bridges in the city you live in. If your working in house, you might want to learn some keyboard shortcuts so you are not spotted immediately as a hack. I am sure that your not stupid, learn from your mistakes. Don’t promise before you know that you can deliver, it makes it hard for the Non-Hack when he or she is trying to explain to your previous employer (who at this point is double paying for the job) to trust them, they know what they are doing.
Lastly, get back off the beaten track of Hackdome and be honest. It is so much easier and people usually understand it is a big technoworld out there and it take time to acquire all the knowledge. I know that I still learn everyday something new and it won’t stop but what make me a professional is these five things that I to make the clients feel like they are in good hands.
* Liked this post Hated this post, post a short comment to help others. Good Luck out there.
Cuppa Coffee recently posted up the pilot episode of Nerdland that I edited this past fall (in there Cuppa Shows section of there website they have the whole show available for viewing).
Coming from a live action background and film production workflows, my animation experience was very revealing.
I was able to use some of my compositing skills in a more intensive manner and familiarize myself with an animation production workflow.
Live action Film and Animation should cross paths, I learned some valuable workflow lessons.
However, the pace is something you have to get use to. It is definitely slower, which makes it very hard when you are trying to give the show a pace and rhythm.
I also, just saw Coraline in 3-D pretty amazing the amount of depth and excellent use of the Real3D technology, it makes the 3-D it less of a gimmick more of an enhancement of the movie experience and composition. A must see.
Just to follow up on one of my most read posts “Rogers High Speed Internet best of the worst and proud of it!“:
I did get a call from the Head Office of Rogers Cable in late August 2008.
The person who called and left a message about “returning the call if you had any more concerns” like she was checking me off her to call back list.
Now, i could not let them off the hook like that… I outlined all my concerns in my letter and that call back wasn’t satisfying. So, I called back (twice) leaving a message to call me back, so I can discuss further my “situation”.
When we spoke, the tone of the conversation was not like the monitored calls when you call tech support, not as guarded and Rogers Politically Correct. I explained to her why I wrote the letter and there was a small conversation where she told me that “the situation was now resolved in my area”. (I guess I would have to get there service again to confirm that claim) I don’t think that I believe her after my extended experience. I told her my new situation with YAK, one of there competitors, and she surprisingly said that she “was glad that I was happy with my service and that all had ended well.” I guess Rogers does want the best for me.
Oh yeah, I finally got an iphone. So, I decided to go with Fido. I know they are the same company but I thought I would not give Rogers my money directly this time and do it through a sister company; since they have the Canadian Monopoly on the Apple “Tricorder”. Let’s just say that the Dog is a good analogy for the company. They claim to offer similar services than Bell but in reality there packages fall short of Bell, they are extremely convoluted and they have the weirdest Long Distance Plans/network restrictions. Needless to say Fido looks a lot like its Master.
Make sure you know your getting the maxim out of your bandwith, TorrentFreak Blog posted up a link to Googles new pet project “Mlab” to monitor your bandwith providers and let the consumer know regain some control. I first heard about this through the CBC’s Search Engine which you should download everyweek to stay ontop of the latest Tech/Political/Copywright issues. It is one of the few major Podcast that tackle and monitor the issues of Copywrigth, Throddling and Cell phone propaganda…. Download a few and you get what this all means.
I was reading on the weekly tip newsletter from The DV show site (you can and should subscribe to it under the tip section) and they posted a very cool online version and a download-able PDF of all the major Final Cut Pro software packages shortcuts. (FCP, DVDSP, Color, Motion)
It still amazes me when I go in professional environments and I see other editors work. I see the struggling “Mouser’s”, the relatively fast “Pen Tableters” who don’t have carpel tunnel and then “default” keyboarders. But, I rarely see the “Customized Speed Demon” Keyboarder, which is the Church I am a loyal disciple.
Okay, all methods lead to the same result and I have been know to go on a rant about how editing is too fast since the advent of digital editing. That being said, “Mouser’s” are driving a Chevette with a
top speed that barely breaks the speed limit and sometimes you need to be able to “drop the hammer”. So, as a professional the ability to edit as fast as you are brainstorming is a tool that may come in handy in certain situations. Moreover, if your an older editor you should/must adapt and keep up with the upandcomers from the video game nation that move at a lightning speed when it comes down to button combos.
The first few versions of FCP didn’t have customizable keyboards and that was one of the main arguments from the Avid editors. My Avid Teacher Ethienne showed me how important it was to move the keys to your liking and how much more productive your are when you don’t travel the keyboard distance or do pretzels with your fingers to access a common key that you use 100 times a day. One of the only things that I retain from this class was to travel with your customizable shortcuts. *
Now, if your already a Keyboarder your half way there your driving the jaguar but the seats are adjusted for a taller person and the mirrors are out of wack and your listening to Zamphir. So, take a 
second, don’t be a sheep and let Apple dictate how you work and customize. Then, go to your Preferences folder on your home drive and copy the “Final Cut Pro User Data” folder to your ipod, memory stick or DVD media and bring it with you and drop them in the similar path folder before you work on a system that isn’t your own and then wow your new employer with your blazing speed!
Last thing, people are always amazed at how many shortcuts I use and how did I learn them all. I have a terrible short term memory and I am even amazed that I retain it; but it almost becomes reflex after a week of using the same shortcut. My advise is to learn 1 shortcut a week and move the tools that you use often to the main level of the keyboard, no “shift, command or control” button. Then don’t be scared to move the keys and try them in an new location, you will be surprised at the difference. (eg. the famous “J-K-L” keys are “S-D-F” for me, I find it opens up the keyboard and I move all my primary tools to my left hand.)
In a short amount of time you will speed up your work time.
Subscribe to Larry Jordan’s Blog tip of the day and then you don’t even have to open your FCP Manuals!
Okay, I do admit that you should not always the keyboard because you will develop carpel tunnel syndrome and it hurts. So, occasionally when nobody is looking pick up your mouse or use more “natural” Pen tablet with customized buttons in the Timeline window for added velocity.
*Travel with your creative tools: Very important because when you do get use to your custom keys and you will look like you are Newbie if you try to use the default settings and your physical memory of the keys may make you invoke FCP actions that will puzzle you.
I recently traded services with a talented designer/web designer friend Nick.
I did a added some motion to a TV spot with some sound design from some images and fonts that he provided to me.
In exchange he re-designed and revamped my website.
I am just re-compressing the Flash media to fit his functional and clean design.
He gave and captured a great feel for my type of work whilst featuring my reel footage.
I think I won in this trade, but I am sure I will get him back on another TV spot.
(Long descriptive non- creative more descriptive titles so you can find it on the inter-web)
Why isn’t there 3D text in After Effects yet?
I was watching a pretty cool tutorial from the GreyMan. He created a pretty cool old video effect look, which is sometimes the hardest thing to do. Then it had me thinking about the recent updates from Adobe. They seem really interested integrating 3D features into Photoshop and Illustrator but what about After Effects. For years there has been Plug-ins an workarounds and presets to make 3D text but why are they taking baby steps when this feature has come and gone in a sense. Time to give it up Adobe…
http://www.motionworks.com.au/index.php
BEND IT
Your key is perfect, it blends in with the background, you have adjusted all the color correction and everything but there is something still not just right.
Your Brain is telling you NO! I think the very generous Maltaannon has given in his tutorial LIGHTWRAP the “keys” to the keying problem for FREE.
Maybe it is my eye has been exposed to the evolution of green screen thought the years and I usually can pick off a greenscreen but in recent years some shots I just know are logistically greenscreen moments but I can’t see it and I think this is why. This little addition of the interaction of the light wrapping around the subject is what is tricking my brain into thinking that the Giant Monkey is stomping out the city.
This technique is a must in your keying arsenal!
(And Hey if your reading this and your at one of those Big Companies, make them buy the Man’s Preset because he is making you the Hero.)
