Slides from 18th Pro Video Show Seminars
March 10, 2008
Here are my presentation slides from the three seminars I gave this weekend at the 18th Pro Video Show.
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Kino Flo DIVA and Kobold 400W HMI PAR
September 8, 2007
Here’s a little video I made with Steve Garfield to demonstrate the use of daylight balanced lighting in an outdoor interview situation, using the lighting to help create a better balance between subject and background. The instruments used in the video are the Kobold 400W HMI PAR and the Kino Flo DIVA 400.
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Making Media Now (slides from Opening Remarks)
June 2, 2007
Here are my slides from the Opening Remarks I made at the Making Media Now: Filmmaking in Transition conference held yesterday at Boston University. A special thanks to Jennifer Kaplan, Bonnie Waltch, and all the people and sponsors who made this lively and engaging event possible.
Mac Coolant Leak (video)
April 7, 2007
A short while ago, one of the Power Mac G5 editing systems at work stopped working. My first response was to run the Apple Hardware Test, which revealed a problem with the video card. We called AppleCare, who dispatched a technician to take care of the problem. Much to our surprise, the cause of the graphic card failure turned out to be quite unexpected, as shown in this video. Who would have thought that the cooling technology uses in this digital age machne would be the cause its own near-death experience, a reminder of the value of AppleCare protection for your Macintosh, and that in rare cases Macs can eat themselves from the inside.
The video was shot casually in a matter of minutes with a Canon PowerShot S410 digital still camera in movie mode and edited using Final Cut Pro on the train ride from Boston to New York on the way to Podcamp NYC. Once I got to Podcamp, I uploaded the video to blip.tv thanks to the WiFi access provided by UrbanHotspots. Piano performed by Howard Apley.
New Technology Presentation at Rio International Film Festival
September 30, 2006
On Thursday, September 28th I moderated a Rioseminars Panel at Festival do Rio 2006 (Rio International Film Festival) titled “New Technologies / Digital Market” with Irina Neves (COO, Cine Mobile), Fabio Lima (COO, Rain Network), and Martha Cavalheiro (Marketing Vice President, Latin America, 20th Century Fox). We each gave a brief presentation and then engaged with the audience in a very lively question and answer session. My presentation provided the “big picture” context for the discussion, while Fabio, Martha, and Irina discussed their cutting edge work in mobile media and digital distribution.
I promised to make my slides available, here they are: Rio2006-NewTech-v2.pdf (PDF, 10.2 MB)
The presentation is based in part on a work-in-progress article: Macro-Trends-v2.pdf (PDF, 164 KB)
Ten Documentary Films
August 27, 2006
I was reading a post tonight on DVXuser that asked What’s the best documentary you’ve ever seen? and I was inspired by the challenge and made a list of 10 documentary films to watch that are worthy of both viewing and analysis. I can’t begin to rank what I would consider a top ten of documentaries, nor could I ever narrow things down to ten, but if I had to pick ten documentary films right this instant to program in a virtual documentary film festival, here are ten films I’d consider programming right at the moment.
One is a short to make up for the epic length of one of the selections.Ask me tomorrow and my answer will be a little different, ask me next year and it will be really different. So here’s the list in chronological order:
Film or video? It depends on what you mean.
August 2, 2006
The tools, techniques, grammar, and cultural practices surrounding the production, distribution, and viewing of “video” and “film” have been converging for a long time. Film has adopted much of the grammar of the “video” while video can now be used to shoot a film. Each term can be on the one hand used interchangeably, while each can also be used to describe a very specific set of tools, techniques, grammar, and cultural practices.
The Invaluable Guide to the AG-HVX200
May 29, 2006
I recently came across “The Invaluable Guide to the AG-HVX200,” a delightful document from Panasonic that provides a detailed description of the features and capabilities of the AG-HVX200 prosumer HD camcorder in a format that’s easy to read like a brochure, but with plenty of substance and details you’d expect from a well-written technical overview, it’s got lots of great illustrations. If you’re thinking about purchasing or renting this camera, you’ll want to download a copy from http://panasonic.biz/sav/p2/ (it’s a PDF document that comes in two versions, one for the AG-HVX200E European/PAL and the other for the AG-HVX200P US/NTSC versions of the camera (they are different in terms of the formats/frame rates they record).
To P2 or not P2, that is the question…
April 30, 2006
I discuss Panasonic’s P2 technology and workflow in Part 2 of my article about the Panasonic AG-HVX200 camera that appears in the most recent issue of New England Film. As part of my research for the article I put together a music video shoot using P2 workflow and spoke with several filmmakers about their experience including Barry Braverman. I spoke with him about his perspective on P2 technology and its implications on workflow.
A conversation with Red Digital Cinema’s Ted Schilowitz
April 27, 2006
At NAB this week there was a lot of buzz on the show floor about the Red camera currently in development. I had the opportunity to sit down and talk with Ted Schilowitz about Red. Before joining Red he was a Product Manger at AJA Video Systems and part of the team that created video capture cards for Apple’s OS X and the Io box that AJA co-developed with Apple. Ted is a recognized expert in the field of broadcast television and feature films as well as an award winning Director and Producer who has created projects for Discovery Channel, E! Entertainment, Fox, NBC, Nickelodeon, PBS, et al. I interviewed Ted as part of my research for an article I’m writing about NAB2006 for Imagine, however, it was such a fun conversation I decided to post the unabridged conversation here. Enjoy!
