The good news is you have delirium

Last night I filmed a fashion show out in Amherstburg. It was a smaller show, so the models just were loose and just having fun. It was held outside on the riverfront, and it was a very warm and sunny day, so it worked out great. I met some nice people there, and hopefully there will be some more work for me in the ‘burg.

Unfortunately, because I was filming the show, I missed most of the Red Wings game. I did manage to catch most of the third period. I expected Pittsburgh to try and assert a more physical presence, but some of their tactics were pretty disgusting, mainly the actions of Gary Roberts. I’ve always liked him, and you know he’s going to play a hard game, but hitting Franzen in the head? That’s just wrong. We all know he’s had concussion problems recently, so show a little class. Hit him, even cross check him, but don’t give him shots to the head. Perhaps my favourite moment of the game was when Datsyuk started throwing some punches at Roberts. No one would have expected that. That was hilarious, and that just goes to show you what a hard worker and complete player Pavel Datsyuk is.

The new Indiana Jones movie (Kingdom of the Crystal Skull) is out, and I will eventually go see it, but first I have decided to go back and watch the first three. I haven’t seem them in so long, it’s almost be like seeing them for the first time. I started out with Raiders of the Lost Ark last night. I think my favourite part was when he was in Cairo and one of the bad guys pulls out a huge sword and starts wielding it all ninja-like. Rather than waste his time and energy, Indy simply pulls out his gun and shoots him. Classic!

Next up is The Temple of Doom!

I ran the Boot Camp Assistant and installed Windows Vista on my Mac Pro yesterday. Here’s a basic rundown of the process.

Before you install Windows, you need to print out the Boot Camp directions. I was expecting maybe 3-4 pages.

It was 25.

But you really only need the first half. The second half is a bunch of extra troubleshooting and keystroke commands, and so on. I suppose it’s worth keeping, but it certainly isn’t vital in actually installing Windows.

You will be asked to partition your hard drive, and decide how much of it you want allocated to Windows and how much should remain for Mac.

Insert your Windows disc and the computer will restart. The drive will need another quick format and then it should resume installation. This will take a while.

Next, you need to put in your Leopard disc so your Mac can pull off some drivers. I believe it restarts again, and that’s about it.

The process probably takes about an hour. That does not include backing up your hard drive, which you really should do before installing Windows.

Now I can produce an Oscar-winning movie in Mac, then reboot and do my taxes in Windows.

Hoorah!

Just got my 32GB P2 card and B+W UV filter from DV Shop in Toronto last week.

I’ve done business with them a few times now. Their staff is friendly, their prices are among the best in Canada, and they will return your call if you leave them a voice message.

I placed my order Thursday and the package was delivered the very next day. And as always, they also shipped me a tasty candy.

Mmm…quality service!

Whew!

The blog was down for about 14 hours but it’s back. It all happened last night when I tried upgrading to the latest version of WordPress. I didn’t have any trouble the first time I upgraded, but this time, it obviously didn’t go so well.

I’m still relatively new to the whole blog thing so I was worried I lost everything. Luckily it’s all still here. Not to brag, but I fixed this all on my own, and believe me, it’s not that easy.

Anyways, all is well. The sky is not falling.

I watched a very cool documentary on CBC the other night.

It was about the wonderful world of advertising, in particular, the way advertising is shifting from television to the Internet and mobile phones, and from big ad agencies to everyday people who create user generated content.

Did you know that in Japan, they actually swipe their cell phones like debit cards to make transactions? Wild!

You can learn more about “The Selling Game” by clicking here, or actually watch it by clicking here.

I’ve been in business for a few years now and have basically been a one-man-show. If a shoot calls for two (or more) cameras, I contract additional help, but generally, I do all the shooting, the editing, the marketing, the web design, and so on, however, it’s gotten to the point where I could really use some support.

I’ve known my friend Dan for about three years now. He was always pretty interested in films and video production, especially the editing. So I called him the other day to set up a meeting, which took place last night. It went very well. As I told him about all that I had achieved with Delirium Media, as well as some things I have planned, he became more and more engaged as the meeting went on.

I told him one of his duties will be to dump the P2 footage to my laptop and external drive during a shoot. I said “I’ll give you a cool title, like Media Offloading Engineer, but sometimes I might affectionately call you The Dumper.”

Dan’s on board and I think he’s just fine with either title.

Going to a tapeless workflow is great, but it does require some planning.

P2 media is very expensive, so many people opt for an external drive to give them the storage capacity they need. The Firestore drives from Focus Enhancements give you more bang for the buck than P2 cards, but they are cumbersome and do not hold a charge for much more than an hour. And while more cost-efficient than P2 media, they are still expensive compared to your everyday (Maxtor, Western Digital) external drive.

So after careful deliberation, here is the workflow I have decided to use.

Footage captured to my P2 cards will be offloaded to a Windows-based (ick, I know) laptop through the PCMCIA slot, and then from the laptop to an external Maxtor drive via USB or firewire. Due to the unpredictability of hard drives, I feel it is necessary to make an additional backup, at least in documentary-type shooting circumstances. If it’s something easy to re-shoot, than you can make the call whether one or two backups are required. Just remember, once you’ve deleted that data from the P2 card, it’s gone, so use extreme caution. (Looking to the future, when hard drives are replaced by flash drives, the need to make redundant backups will be a thing of the past and we’ll all be able to rest much easier knowing that our data is safe.)

Of course, you need to have power for the laptop and the drive, but I have thought of that too. At wedding receptions, this should not be a problem, as every hall I’ve ever been to has a sufficient number of outlets. When power is not available, I plan to use a portable, rechargeable power source, or even a cigarette lighter adapter in the car. Not to mention that there is also the laptop’s battery.

One other thing of note, if you offload from the camera directly to an external drive, you create a partition. You may only have a maximum of 16 partitions. So even though you may have a 500 GB drive, if you are offloading 8 GB cards, you’ll max out the drive at 128 GB (8GB x 16 offloads=128GB). But fear not, because if you use a larger card, like the 32 GB, you’ll be able to utilize the entire drive (32GB x 16 offloads=512GB). I will be offloading to the laptop first, then to the external drive. The data will just drag and drop over to the drive like any other data, so I won’t have to worry about partitions.

I have done mock tests dumping from the camera to the laptop and the drive, and, this is important, making sure the footage transfers properly into Final Cut Pro, and so far, no problems.

With all the time and money I just saved you, I think it would be real swell of you to buy me some extra P2 media. Or at least some ice cream.

So I bought a new high definition camera, I’ve seen how great the footage looks in the viewfinder and on my computer, and now I’m ready to see what a finished product would look like on an HD television.

This means I have to buy a Blu-ray burner for my Mac Pro and a Blu-ray player for my HD LCD. Sure, those upgrades will not come cheap, but pricing is not my gripe. The problem is Apple’s DVD Studio Pro 4 does not support Blu-ray (or HD DVD).

Say what?!

Yeah, it’s kind of strange considering Apple is usually on the cutting edge of, well, pretty much everything. Final Cut Pro was quick to support P2 media, but somehow Blu-ray has been lost in limbo, even after NAB 2008.

For video producers everywhere (who run Macs), the alternatives are not great.

Adobe’s DVD authoring software, Encore, does support Blu-ray, but is only sold as part of Premiere Pro, which is around $800. Roxio’s Toast 9 supports Blu-ray burning, but not authoring, so you’d have a plain, straight burn video.

Hopefully Apple addresses this issue shortly.

Of note, you can connect the HVX200A to an HD TV via the included component cable. This at least allows you to view your raw footage on a TV. From what my friend Mickey is telling me, the HVX200 did not offer that feature.

Now that Blu-ray has won the battle against HD DVD, I’m sure Blu-ray players are going to be one of the hotter items this year. And probably no Blu-ray player will be more popular than Sony’s Playstation 3 (PS3) gaming console.

The average Blu-ray player is around $400. For that very price, you can get a 40GB PS3 system, which of course, also plays Blu-ray media.

I’m not into video games as much as I used to be, but one thing I have heard is that the PS3 can receive Blu-ray firmware updates via the Internet. This is technology other Blu-ray players are currently lacking, so that seems reason enough to choose the PS3 over other regular set top units.