[Nick Griffin]

Light Panels makes smaller battery powered dim-able LEDs. We have one that’s about 3 x 6 inches and another that’s about 5 x5 inches. They probably make other sizes besides their 1 x 1 foot models of which we’re now using 3. Several of the small ones strategically placed would probably help you get even lighting. If the windows are tinted you REALLY need something dim-able to balance out.

[Nick Griffin]

Dawn-
If you want to teach more than just which buttons to push you should add the parallel element of story telling. It should be easy to find examples both good and bad of the editing creating versus harming the story which is being conveyed. It might also be useful to break apart a few written short stories and show how the elements are linked together to take you from point A to point B.

[Nick Griffin]

John-

[Todd Terry] ” your attorney can suggest the next-and-more-harsh step”

Which might just be formally asking for X sum of money as not paying it violates your copyright. Unless you believe that the usage is worth well into the 5 or 6 figures litigation is a wastesfull way to go. Your attorney may be able to arrange a “binding arbitration” in which a neutral arbiter, normally a retired or inactive judge, will help both parties come to a peaceful agreement.

But to answer your initial question, HELL YES you are owed if they used (or use) your footage without permission.

[Nick Griffin]

Not at all familiar with this brand, let alone model. If you do get it MAKE SURE that B&H will accept it back if you don’t like it. They’re usually very liberal on this but there are some products that they clearly state cannot be returned. The fact that they are saying 7 to 14 days means that its not in their stock and likely that it takes that long to have it air freighted from China.

As to it’s unbelievable low price, I’m reminded of the adage “You get what you pay for.”

My two cents.

[Nick Griffin]

WOW!!! I don’t think I’ve ever seen all parts of these two, just portions. As I recall this was done as a self-promotion piece by a production company that had in large hole in their schedule so they thought this would be a great way to get through to agencies. Sad to say that, without the lies, much of this is spot on for some ad agencies. Simply brilliant and hilarious.

[Nick Griffin]

[Mark Suszko] “Allan Smithee is the standard name you put in the credits for people who don’t want their real names used.”

Funny. We list Norm D. Plume as our Creative Director. (Distorted French for pen name.)

[Nick Griffin]

Hard to imagine that just going through and organizing the material would take less than 10 to 12 hours, probably more unless all you did was a cursory review of what you’d been given. As to hourly rate: pick a number. There are no doubt some on this site who will edit for $40 to $50 per hour and many others whose work is priced by the day, say $1,000 to (I dunno) $5,000 or more. As a beginner, who presumably doesn’t own the equipment you’re using, you’re probably closer to the $40 to $50/hour range. The key is to be honest with what your capabilities are versus the expectations of who you are doing the work for.

As to the
[Timothy Cervinsky] “piece of crap”:
As long as you are diplomatic and not at all confrontational it’s a good idea to point out the limitations of what you’ve been given. Better still if you can offer a solution like, “Let me help by re-shooting just the main speaker(s) and inter-mixing it with any existing wide shots to produce a better product.” Also consider re-creating their PowerPoint slides. It’s amazing what many people try to cram into a single slide and expect anyone to read it or have any impact. Rule of thumb is no more than 7 words per line and no more than 7 lines of text per slide.

[Nick Griffin]

Wow! If this is the FIRST effort of a print designer you may have a serious video career ahead of you. Not saying to give up your day job, because this can be a very fickle business. Do keep adding to your skill set in all media and you’ll be competitive in a brutal world.

[Nick Griffin]

There’s an old joke that I included in one of my business articles early on here on the COW.

How do you get new clients?
Get the existing ones to change jobs.

Not as dumb as it sounds. Often you get to keep the existing client because they’re happy with your work and, I can’t stress this enough, when more than one person in a company knows you and is happy, virtually no one has any interest in going through the hassle of finding a new supplier. More on this in a minute.

The contact who has recently changed jobs almost always wants to work with you because they KNOW you. They know you’ll do a good job and, in the process, make them look good. This is especially true if they are middle to upper management. Departmental directors (corporate, not the film/video kind) and VPs of sales and/or marketing have proven to be very good contacts to maintain for me in the past.

Earlier this year a friend mentioned to me, and now above Neil McClure in a post above, is bringing up how when those of us get to be a certain age we tend to lose our best contacts to retirement — and sometimes job loss. This is why it’s so important to become a part of your client’s company by knowing and being known by many contacts at many levels. Remember, virtually no one has any interest in going through the hassle of finding a new supplier.

Being plugged in at many levels and with multiple people can also be very useful if one of the people, for whatever reason, gets pissed at you. More often than not they can’t easily fire or replace you because they’ll have to explain it to the others.

When in a new business context it comes down to price, it’s essential that you put it in perspective. For example:

“So, Mr. Prospect there’s NOTHING more important to you than cost, is that what I’m hearing? Maybe we are not the right ones for you because there’s ALWAYS going to be someone cheaper. There are a lot of kids just starting out who will work for cheap even though they have no real experience and provide no real guarantee that you’ll be happy with the end product. In contrast, we’re known, and have built a 20+ year long business on providing the highest quality of messaging and production on time and within the agreed budget.”

This kind of pitch doesn’t always work but the point is to get the prospect to realize that, when they actually think about it, price is NOT their number one concern.

Helpful?

[Nick Griffin]

OK, so on 8.6 I can set the audio split to L-R but not only the music goes L-R… BUT the VO track, which was laid onto ONE track first has now gone 100 percent left track. The “hamburger” command “Remove Pan On Track From In” does nothing. Does this mean to get the (already heavily edited) VO track to the center I have to re-import it with the Audio Settings set to centered? Is there REALLY no way to pan this track? No pan knobs, no work-arounds?

My next step may be to have to export just the VO track and then re-import it into another track with the audio import set to centered. I seriously welcome any better ideas or anything I’m missing from the lack of pan knobs in both 8.5 and 8.6.

PLEASE tell me there is some switch or command somewhere to bring back the pan knobs.

Thanks, Gurus! This one has me stumped.