Timothy J. allen
Forum Replies Created
-
Don’t worry about missing NATPE too much, Michael. As much as some want you to think the deals are made there, you can think of selling the show like planting a garden. It’s not done in that one week.
…and what you reap from the garden isn’t a “sold show”, the “fruit” is new or better relationships that can help you get to your goal.
NATPE is really an event where you can either make initial contact and plant the seeds of a relationship, or simply get together and let the world know how your “crop” is coming in.
Most of the work on the garden is in-between the NAPTE shows.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that just about EVERYONE is selling something at NAPTE – so when you approach someone there about your content, they are quite often defensive – and they are not listening to what you are saying. Instead they are thinking of what it is they want to sell to you (That could be their distribution capability or something else.)
Luckily, since NASA doesn’t sell content (we give it away for free), I didn’t really have to “sell” – just inform. I was just there to let people know about some of the content we have to offer.
If you have a specific entity that you want to contact and need a name and number, contact me off list and I’ll see if I can help.
Also…don’t be concerned, Michael, that we hear more about your challenges than your successes. The very fact that you participate in this and other forums here at the COW demonstrates that you still care about getting better at what you do – no matter how much you’ve already done. That goes a long way in my book.
-TJA
-
Michael,
I’m at the NATPE convention in Las Vegas right now, where thousands of content producers are asking the same types of questions. Forgive me for the long post, but it’s been rare lately that I’ve had much to post, and I want to offer a few suggestions if I may…You said “research has shown that the likelihood of a program of this type would not be a high priority of a station without some form of groundswell or grassroots support dragging it through the red tape”. That’s exactly right! What you need is a structure to measure and quantify the amount of support that it has. Once you can quantify that a large amount of people want to see it, getting both advertisers and distributors is much easier.
I would suggest that you create a companion website for the show where a larger audience can view segments of the show in order to generate interest. Add a blog section where viewers can connect with the creators of the show (hosts, producers etc.) so they can actually be a part of the push that drives it to the next level.
If you can create a context for “social engineering”, where your audience is passionate about seeing more (for instance, using web blogs, discussions and other
-
Don’t take it. As the others said, the larger the market, the better for you in the long run. I’ve been tempted by the same thing in the past, but I took the job where I didn’t have as much creative freedom and I’m better for it.
Don’t get me wrong, I love creative freedom, but that freedom tastes best when it’s been given by a client whose trust you’ve earned.
Here’s why:
Even the greatest artists (i.e. DaVinci, Michelangelo) had to work within a budget and express themselves within their clients guidelines. If you can demonstrate a knack for doing that, you’ll have skills that are in more demand (…and the amount of freedom in a small market is often no different than a larger market. If someone else is paying for the project they usually have final say on how much “latitude” you will have for that product.)
Anyone can create when they are mostly pleasing themselves, but a truly gifted Producer/Director/Editor who can demonstrate creativity while pleasing their client and other
-
Do you have a lot of bins open when you are playing the sequence? If you have a bin with a lot of sequences in it open, it might be taxing the system beacuse it’s still making sure it’s ready to find and play all the elements from those sequences too. One trick that could help… Copy the sequence you are working with into a bin and close the bins that have the other sequences in them.
There could be other reasons the Avid is taking a while to buffer the media elements in the sequence you are playing… but the time it takes to build that buffer is probably the culprit.
-TJA
-
BrowncowTX,
I’ll bet that the -6 db audio guideline means that your digital peaks average at -6 db… So you can hit certainly hit levels above that, as long as you don’t go over the 0 db ceiling, which would cause digital distortion.
As far as colors go…if your warnings are set where you want them, and you are getting clips that are flagged, here
-
To all,
NASA imagery is free and clear for you to use, but there are a few stipulations.
You can find the guidelines at https://www.sti.nasa.gov/new/vidguide.htmlTimothy J. Allen,
Video Production Team Lead,
NASA Johnson Space Center
Houston, Texas, U.S.A. -
When we compress for the web, for our clients we give them quicktime and windows versions. The gamma is different between them so it’s nice for visitors to the web to have at least that much choice, so they don’t have to view video that was compressed for a Mac on a PC (which will show up dark) or vice versa.
Actually, we usually give them small medium and large sizes of each format.
What it really comes down to though is providing what they need… and they may not know exactly what that is in pure technical terms. It’s your job to translate their requests into what technically meets their desired results. So..first you should discuss the desired end-results with them…see what they intend to offer to visitors on the website. (Not only file size limits and formats, but also things like do they want it to be easily downloaded or will it be streamed etc.) Their needs will determine the way you create the movie files.
Ultimately, since “one size” does not usually fit all, this discussion translate into more opportunities for you.
Remember, your job isn’t so much providing a compressed movie, it’s providing help towards the goals they want accomplish. The first step in doing that is understanding what those goals are. Contrary to most common wisdom, sometimes it’s best to start from the end rather than the beginning.
-TJA
-
Grinner,
Sorry to hear about Ol’ Bessie. Maybe she’ll run across my old Media 100 (a.k.a. “Charlotte”) in her new travels.This past year, we also switched to Avid MC Adrenalines, and I have to tell you that after some time using other NLE systems (which I won’t name, but are also PC-based), I am very happy that we went with Avid.
We have five Adrenalines on Unity and all of them have the DNXHD board. I’m not complaining about speed or compressed codecs or any of that stuff one bit. All I know is that, due to us going with the Adrenaline NLEs, I’m finally back to being comfortable promising our clients specific completion dates for their shows.
As I type this, I’m in a hotel room in Tewksbury, MA, having just finished Advanced Editing (201) training this afternoon. I can’t wait to get back and try multicam editing along with the other things that were covered in the class.
Congratulations on your new speedster! May you take the (learning)curves slow enough to avoid crashes, but fast enough to get your “adrenaline” pumping. 😉
-TJA
-
I’m working on an Avid Media Composer Adrenaline these days, but I imagine (or hope) that my suggestion translates to Final Cut Pro…
If you have bins open with multiple sequences, the application has to poll the drives to make sure it knows where all the raw media files, and pointers (clips and sequences or timelines) are. Getting all that information ready for you to instantly access it takes a little preparation. That preparation is part of what the editing application is doing when it loads a project up for the editor to work on it. So the more complex the project, and the more media files associated with it – the longer it’s going to take to start the project (or launch the application).
When you launch a project in Media Composer, the NLE has to poll the computer and find out where all the data associated with each bin is. So… one “trick” is to keep only your most current sequence (or timeline) in an open bin and put all of the older versions you might still want access to in another bin that is always closed unless you are in the process of opening an older sequence to work on. When you start working on that older sequence, it’s no longer “older” – so you put it in the “Most current version bin”, and put any other versions into a bin that you close. That way, the application doesn’t have to spend its resources actively keeping track of the metadata in all of those older sequences. (At least not to the point where it’s instantly available for you to pull up.)
That technique would also let others who open your project quickly know that the one sequence that’s in the “Most Current Version” bin is the latest version that’s being actively worked on. It also keeps your interface less cluttered, which is good for you, and more
-
I tried using a PDA (Tungsten E actually). Then I tried using the replacement one I got after the first one failed on me during a production meeting. Never again. It’s just not resilient enough for me.
I have a production calendar made in Excel on my laptop and desktop, so others can reference it, but I print out the spreadsheets regularly and put them in my planner. That paper-based Franklin Planner is what I take with me and it’s what I ultimately rely on. It NEVER crashes.
(By the way, I have a Tungsten E PDA for sale cheap if anyone can figure out how to get it to take a charge and start working again.)
-TJA