Chris Blair
Forum Replies Created
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We deliver digitally to probably 75% of the stations we send spots. Most stations in our area will accept digital delivery directly on their own FTP. But, many of them then transcode the spot onto their playout servers, and often they get it wrong, flipping fields and screwing up colorspace.
There are a couple stations that accept digital files but they’ve screwed up our spots so many times we resorted back to delivering beta dubs.
On the HD issue, I certainly realize shooting in HD has advantages in quality, but if a client asks you to shoot in HD and that quality advantage is completely negated by the fact that no one will see it in HD, then I think it’s my responsibility to advise the client they really don’t need to spend the extra money to use higher-end cameras and edit in HD since nobody will actually see that quality as an end result. Of course there are probably those that don’t charge more for shooting in HD these days, but I believe you should, considering the post-production issues you face with HD to SD conversion, the increase in storage space needed if you’re editing at high HD data rates etc.
Of course this brings up a related issue. If everything else is equal, lighting, DP skill, etc., will an SD project shot with a high-end SD camera look better when it’s shot in HD using a comparable level camera (meaning broadcast camera to broacast camera)?? Uh oh, I’ve probably opened another can or worms.
Chris Blair
Magnetic Image, Inc.
Evansville, IN
http://www.videomi.com -
We’ve experienced a very similar problem using H264 using Apple’s codec and by using Daniel’s suggestion that solved the problem. We output them at 848×480, which keeps them at the same basic dimensions of what an MPG2 would look like played back on a computer.
What’s weird is we can setup a transcode from HD to SD 720×480 16×9 aspect to Quicktime DV, Quicktime JPEG2000 and H264 and the first two play back 16×9, but the H264 plays back full 4×3 and stretched.
So what exactly causes this? Is it the square pixel versus rectangular issue among the codecs?
Chris Blair
Magnetic Image, Inc.
Evansville, IN
http://www.videomi.com -
I don’t think it’s that much different today than 25 years ago. People have been doing low-budget video for a long-time, even before wide distribution of home-video cameras in the 1980s and 90s.
I’d estimate that 95% of our clients are overjoyed with projects that are “good enough.” We’re the ones constantly pushing them to do better graphics, to add light effects, to color correct, to use dolly and jib moves on shoots, to try new production equipment like 35mm DoF adaptors, to try new framing techniques etc. Most clients won’t consider any of that, a few will.
Like Ron is always preaching on here, if people bring you work that you can’t make money on, it’s really not in your interest to do it. You can certainly help the person by referring them to people who might be able to do the work for them, but there’s a point where “cheap” turns into unprofitable.
As for the Mac and Windows ads being simplistic or cheap. I doubt they’re either. I imagine the two main actors in the Mac ads are bringing home high six-figure, possibly even 7 figure incomes annually for their part in those spots.
The Windows spots may look “off the cuff,” but I guarantee you those are carefully choreographed, from searches for the people in them to shooting the entire thing. Visually they look amazing considering how they’re shot, and the audio is superb in them. That’s what talented and experienced DPs and directors do, make spots look like they just picked up the camera and said, “hey, let’s go shoot somebody ‘off the street’ buying a PC.”
There will always be people who understand the value of hiring pros to create videos and those who think the assistant to the marketing director can shoot and edit their promotional video.
A great analogy is if you’ve ever thought, “hey, I’ll save a ton of money laying my own ceramic tile” when you’re re-doing a 300 square foot kitchen floor from stripping 4 layers of linoleum and underlayment to laying and grouting the tile. It took me 4 full weekends (two of them just removing the old crap on the floor and leveling low spots.) The $1000 the tile company quoted me to strip the floor and lay/grout the tile sure looked like a bargain after more than 60 hours of work and a month of lost weekends. Not to mention their work probably would’ve looked better than mine (although mine looked pretty good if I say so myself.)
Chris Blair
Magnetic Image, Inc.
Evansville, IN
http://www.videomi.com -
Something that hasn’t been clarified is: “who designed these cards using whose artwork?”
If the client designed them, then in the absense of a contract stating otherwise, they likely own the rights to them.
If the poster designed them, he likely owns it.
So if he designed the cards and the artwork, or paid for the use of the artwork thru a stock company, and the client’s logo isn’t on them, then he could sell them to whoever he wants.
If the client designed them, then like everyone else says, the poster really shouldn’t sell them to someone else. Again, like most of these disputes, I can’t imagine we’re talking about very much money so I doubt the client would actually pay attorney’s fees to take any legal action no matter what anyone did or does.
But if the client won’t pay for them you you certainly have no obligation to turn them over to him regardless of who designed these things.
Chris Blair
Magnetic Image, Inc.
Evansville, IN
http://www.videomi.com -
Progressive shouldn’t matter. Bit-rate might be related but if that was the issue it should have similar problems on PCs.
One thing to try is if you’re burning the disc at the burner’s fastest speed, try a slower one, like 4x or 8x. Again I doubt that would solve it since the disc plays on PCs. But this been reported to help according to people on a few Mac forums.
Also, try different burning software, maybe something’s happening in Nero?
Chris Blair
Magnetic Image, Inc.
Evansville, IN
http://www.videomi.com -
Daniel Low: Not in all my years have I seen any issues like this. I would sincerely love to know what they updated or changed to get it working.
I called them and asked. They updated a very old graphic card driver and it fixed their issue.
A quick google search turned up this link to a similar fix for a DVD playback problem. It’s a two year old link but it was a driver update that fixed DVD playback functionality:
https://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=120319
There are also scores of posts like the one below on Mac related forums about users experiencing DVD playback problems with Macs using either burned or commercial DVD discs. The problems vary wildly, but there are many, many posts from users who can play some commercial discs fine, but not others, and users who can likewise play some burned discs but not others. We’ve had two different clients experience this issue on their G5 Macs with burned DVDs we’ve given them. In both cases, software updates of one type or the other fixed their problem.
https://forums.macresource.com/read.php?1,493086,493186
Chris Blair
Magnetic Image, Inc.
Evansville, IN
http://www.videomi.com -
Daniel Low: What on earth are you on about? A Computer running a piece of software to play back MPEG-2 content from a build in DVD player is 100x more of a powerful solution than a dedicated DVD player.
I never said it wasn’t a powerful solution. I said DVD’s were originally designed to be played back on hardware DVD players hooked to TVs. The colorspace issues in outputting a DVD for consistent playback and display across computer platforms and monitors is a testament to that. Those issues are non-existent when outputting for NTSC or PAL playback. Data rate issues also contribute to inconsistent performance on computers, Mac or PC. Just last month we had a client that had this exact same problem and it turned out to be some software issue (a setting or an update, can’t remember which) on their Mac.
And we’ve seen plenty of Mac computers that have playback issues with DVD Hollywood titles from the video rental store. That’s the first thing we asked the client to do, and their commercial DVD wouldn’t play properly in their Mac either. Once they updated or changed some setting, it worked fine.
I’m not sure what I did to you to prompt your negative responses to my posts, but I sure wish you’d stop. I don’t claim to know everything and never have claimed that. I’m just trying to help the folks that are posting solve their problems. If my suggestions are off-base, that’s fine. Correct the errors and move on. That’s what we’re all here for.
Chris Blair
Magnetic Image, Inc.
Evansville, IN
http://www.videomi.com -
Fernando,
Thought I’d update this thread. We ended up using a variation on your method rather than using the javascript code from JW Player.
We use Microsoft Expression and you can bascially do the same thing you mentioned in it as Dreamweaver. Works perfectly and a lot easier to code than trying to get JW Player to read the description from XML.
If we had 300 videos using XML would be better, but we don’t, so using this method works great. Thanks for the tip.
Chris Blair
Magnetic Image, Inc.
Evansville, IN
http://www.videomi.com -
Your issue is likely an incorrect setting on either you Mac’s DVD hardware or the software DVD player or a combination.
We run into this issue all the time (on both Macs and PCs) and 99 times out of 100 something isn’t optimized on the computer hardware or software.
Keep in my DVD-videos are designed to be played on hardware DVD players connected to televisions. The fact that you can play them on PCs is a bonus but it requires the DVD-Rom and software to do it.
Some possible causes:
-Outdated DVD software player
-You used an MPG2 codec that’s new and the Mac software doesn’t decode it well.
-Your Macs graphic card drivers are outdated.
-Your DVD software is up to date but using the wrong combination of MPG2 decoder and splitter.
There could be other issues I’m missing too, but I doubt there’s anything wrong with the DVD if it plays ok on the PC. Check it on other Macs (if possible) to see what happens before re-encoding.
On PCs you can download Zoom Player and it has a utility to let you switch between all the MPG2/splitter combos until you get optimum playback from your DVD software. I don’t know if there’s anything like that for the Mac but you could do a google search and see.
Chris Blair
Magnetic Image, Inc.
Evansville, IN
http://www.videomi.com -
While everyone brings up valid points, in the absence of an agreement stating otherwise, he likely owns the rights to the footage. But that’s an issue that’s been debated repeatedly on here and there’s not always a clear cut answer legally or ethically.
But I doubt those “big hits” from local football games is worth a huge sum of money, so if he discusses it with the coach and school, and they’re ok with it, he likely will have no issues with parents.
There are scores if not hundreds of sports team magazines produced weekly both in print and online that take snapshots and video of local sporting teams then resell those photos and videos to parents online. They recruit parents to shoot the photos and pay them a little something for shooting and a little portion of each photo or video sold. They don’t get permission from teams, coaches, parents or otherwise. Nobody complains. In fact, parents eat it up because they can go online and see pics and video of their little whipper snapper in action. Nobody complains although the whole enterprise is clearly done for profit. Again, I doubt anybody is getting rich on this venture.
The only time rights owwnership has ever been an issue in my 25 years is when there’s a substantial amount of money involved.
So as long as nothing unethical or inappropriate is being done with the images or video, there’s little to fear, especially if you discuss it with the school and coach.
One more thing, schools routinely take photos and videos of sporting events, graduations, recitals etc. and resell the photos and videos to parents under the guise of “fundraising.” When I was in school I played a lot of sports and every year we signed a waiver for a bunch of stuff, mainly injury related but there was also a release about photos and film (shows how old I am). That was 30 years ago so I bet most schools have kids sign waivers for stuff like that today as well. Almost all schools videotape games then share that video for teaching and scouting purposes, so that’s why (at least back then) they needed the releases.
You could also offer to kick back 10 or 15% of what you make from selling the footage to the shool. That should make everyone happy.
Chris Blair
Magnetic Image, Inc.
Evansville, IN
http://www.videomi.com