[Bob Cole]

Sounds as if something is amiss here. If the client is questioning many of the edits, did you ever have a meeting of the minds? Was there a script that you and the client were both using? Or, do you and the client just not have the same sense of style/pace/structure? Maybe you aren’t meant for one another.

I usually get good ideas from my client reviews, but thankfully not a lot of them.

— Bob C.

[Bob Cole]

Thanks Tim. That’s great news.

I’m leaning toward the 17″, but if I decide on the 15″ with its single FW port, does anybody know something about the Express Card/34? Is there an adapter which provides FW through it?

— Bob

[Bob Cole]

[Steve Wargo] “Professional spots never show people eating.”

That’s very interesting. I thought I noticed a lot of commercial “rules,” but somehow I never spotted that one.

It does make you wonder, though. If you broke ALL the rules in one 30-second spot — show food not only going into the mouth, but coming out and going in again (“Pizza so good you’ll want to eat it twice”)… zits growing on eater’s face… grease dripping… pizza flipper blows his nose with his fingers and then catches the falling pie (“our secret recipe that nobody can duplicate”) ….

Well — it sure would get peoples’ attention anyway.

I need to see “Putney Swope” sometime again.

What are the other commercial rules? For some reason, years ago I noticed an awful lot of pure-white windows in the background — what’s that about?

— Bob C

[Bob Cole]

Well, naturally, I agree with you as to the “shoulds” of this. It’s the “how” that puzzles me.

Absent a legal approach…

It sounds as though the EP is responding to emotional blackmail from the prior editor. So tell the EP that you can’t afford (“emotionally and professionally”) to spend a half-year on a project without receiving the appropriate credit for your work on it. And find a way to let him deal with his emotional blackmail issues by coming up with a nice credit for the prior editor. Could she have been an assistant producer, in some remote sense?

Hey David, at least you were working on something that you WANTED credit for.

— Bob C

[Bob Cole]

Tim, were you using two FW ports at once? i.e. hook up the camera or source deck to one FW, while simultaneously digitizing to an external HD via the other FW.

[Bob Cole]

[WTS(JManz)] “I’m assuming you didn’t note the beginning of that paragraph?”

You are right. Thanks for the reply. I should have read your post more carefully.

— Bob

[Bob Cole]

[WTS(JManz)] “The (-) does not work well at all for dvd video.”

Jim, I’m told by duplicating houses to use DVD-R for my (single-layer) authored DVDs. What is it I am missing here?

[Bob Cole]

Find the best cinematographer you can, who will let you sweep the floor, carry the cases, etc., for no or low pay, just so you can hang out and see what he/she does. You learn from the people in your life, so put the right people there (would a bunch of fellow students be so much better?).

If you’re close to finishing at UNT, take some courses in areas that you’ll never have an opportunity to study again, in business, marketing, history of art.

[Bob Cole]

[Greg] “why bother?”

In this case, from their nonresponsiveness, it smells like the fix is in, so I agree with that statement.

But this is actually a fairly common problem, esp. with a potential client who hasn’t done any production. If you want to work with such a client, you have to do some education. Show some productions at various budget levels. But don’t overwhelm them with arcane and fairly irrelevant details like the chaptering on the DVD.

[Bob Cole]

— you may not have taken the best approach with the client. They may just be trying to get a general idea of the costs, or they may be playing games (e.g. “get three bids, show the commanding officer how outrageously expensive this is to do out of house, and then we can buy our own FCP system and do it ourselves.”).

The problem is, you don’t know whether this is a genuine request or not. In this case, I would have looked at my schedule, figured out how much I wanted the project, and then bid accordingly for either a bare-bones or lavish production.