No doubt the Obama campaign had aspirations of reaching a huge audience both at Mile High Stadium and on broadcast tv networks.
First, a critique of the staging.
Was this a U2 show or a political rally? It was difficult to tell the difference. That magically appearing hydraulic podium was like something out of a 1977 era KISS concert. Was Peter Criss waiting in the wings? For a candidate trying to be one of the common people, he sure looked like a rock star. That is not a political opinion, that is based upon the staging and fireworks.
Now on to the deplorable MSNBC tv broadcast. I should have set my TiVo to record the unfiltered C-SPAN feed, but in a last minute on the way out the door that morning decision, I hit the MSNBC broadcast. Having first watched a few Doctor Who episodes with my wife, I started watching the broadcast around 10pm Eastern Time. Thankfully I could easily fast forward through the commercials and most of the hateful political commentary from Olberman, Matthews, Brokaw and the rest of the biased NBC gang.
To paraphrase a famous quote from a political convention of the past:
It's 1am. There is a thin film of dried coffee on the bottom of your mug. If you tilt the mug way back you might get a drop or two, but there is no need. You have just uploaded your edit to the client review website (if you don't have one, it would be a good investment - simple ftp access if all you need).
You took the client's directions (make us a video, not exactly sure what we want, you're the experts) and put your heart into it. You shot the interviews and b-roll with the people and locations provided to you. You were told what locations you did not have access to.
A script draft was not returned to you by your direct contact, and the shoot had to happen to hit the deadlines.
You owned the project. You feel it is some of your best work, working with what you had available, that is. You view the video one more time before bed and you smile.
As you drift off to sleep, either in bed, on the production office sofa or in your car on the side of the road, you smile.
Ok, maybe that headline was a bit sarcastic, but I have just returned from a 20 mile bike ride (inspired by watching the Olympic bike event) so I am a bit oxygen deprived. Bear with me.
What I am getting at is a review of the NBC Olympic coverage.
Let's start with the opening ceremonies - China's so called coming out party. Whatever.
It was certainly spectacular with very nice tv coverage. But seriously, I could live without Matt Lauer's incessant political commentary. We know, Iraq, Iran, North Korea etc all have problems. We get enough of that from the regular news. Same goes for you Brokaw! Let Bob Costas talk about sports and shut your traps for once.
I'd like to say I have been so busy catching up on work that I have not had a chance to write new posts. This is partially true.
Partially, I took a week to visit my folks in insanely sunny Florida, helped my wife through some medical troubles (no, for the last time, I did not film it) and have in fact been pretty busy at work.
Oh, and I discovered I know a lot of people on Facebook.
But back to the important topic of workflow.
As described in excrutiating detail in previous posts, I make the most of to do lists, post-it notes, scraps of paper, e-mails to myself, Excel spreadsheets and various other attempts at self-organization.
I recently completed a project which was an excellent exercise in organization. I will describe it in generic terms, but give some specific example of learning points.
The Documentary/Promo/Movie Trailer to Promote OB/GYN Careers
Hold on George Lucas, don't get too excited. Let me explain.
Let's say I have a rough cut of a surgery (or any documented event for that matter).
I have cut this to the best of my ability, without any sort of Vulcan mind meld to know exactly what the client wants. Now that would be cool.
Next step is to have a meeting with the client, to review the video together. Let's say that the client has such limited time that the only time available to even review the edit is face to face for 1 hour a few days after the edit was completed.
Step 1
View edit on laptop - point video camera at laptop, lav on client, roll tape.
If you have been following my blog, you know that we use a Sony V1U primarily as another DVCAM camera, for most of our shoots. We actually shot a lot of interviews a few weeks ago with our V1 and a rental, in the hopes that matching the two cameras would be easier than trying to match the V1 with a Panasonic camera.
Here is the transcript of a conversation had this week while shooting a surgery:
Doc: So, is that an HD camera?
Me: It shoots HD, but not at the moment. Do you record HD?
Doc: No, the HD scope (medical video camera) doesn't let you record in HD.
Me: Figures. Although you are displaying it on those nice plasma screens in your OR.
Doc: It's nice isn't it.
Me: Not bad, although when you walk right up to the screen it looks kind of grainy.
Doc: What do you think looks better the plasma or the boom mounted LCD?
It's Saturday morning (at least it was when I started this post). Sleeping past 7am can be a real treat. Make a cup of coffee (as much as I like the convenience of highway gas station coffee, making it at home is so much nicer), eat breakfast whenever, and plan out my day.
Now certainly weekend time is valuable and precious, however it is also an opportunity to be productive without working too hard.
Here's my home office setup for the weekend. The morning sunlight casts a comforting glow on my workspace, normally provided by fluorescent lights:
This gives the phrase Capture Window new meaning - it is nice to be able to capture video while looking out the window, reading, eating or catching up on a week of TiVo recordings.
There have been numerous posts on the Business and Marketing forum about working with clients, especially those that demand a lot of attention.
So let's create a fictional video project. Company X wants a video touting their latest product, the Amazing Doohickie 5000. You agree upon a price and a timetable and present a statement of work, like the following:
Statement of Work
XYZ PDQ Productions will create a 10 minute video depicting the Amazing Doohickie 5000 (AD5K) in use and describing the features and benefits.
Milestones
Script - Due Jan 5
Video Shoot at client's headquarters - Jan 15
Video shoot at Bob's Doohickie Emporium - Jan 16
First edit - Feb 1 (up to 20 hours editing time)
Revisions from client - Feb 15
Final edit - March 1 (up to 20 hours editing time)
Additional hours of editing beyond estimate will be billed at $150/hour.
Upon approval of edit, client will receive DVD master, Betacam master and quote for duplication.
Not all travel is by aeroplane. No sometimes we need to drive. If you do mostly local production, you are always driving. If you are like me, your gigs are anywhere and everywhere, although we do have a lot of shoots in Boston, NY and Philadelphia.
A big concern at the moment of course is the high price of fuel. I can't take a long car trip without adequate fuel in my tank, and one must make this a priority, or you might not get to your destination. I am of course talking about coffee and the very best gas station sandwiches money can buy.
There is indeed a Food category here on the blog, so by golly I will make a food post.
If I am what I eat, then most days I consist of dark roast coffee, oat bran, a breaded turkey cutlet and not as much water as I should be having.
Indeed, the diet and exercise regimen of a video editor can be less than ideal.
Best case scenario:
Sunday evening I bread and cook enough turkey cutlets for the week, along with a pot of macaroni or multigrain rice with vegetable. This is then served to 4 or five plates, shrink wrapped, and stored in the fridge, so that I have lunch each day. This does not happen every week.
And so my Spring travel season comes to a close. Like the annual monsoons in India, my Spring travel takes me to conferences and various shooting locations, as recounted in previous posts. The only problem with so much travel, is one needs to get into the swing of things to actually cut the videos and move toward project milestones and eventual completion.
I have blogged before about project management, workflow and organization, but I feel it necessary, especially for independent contractors and some of the younger folks who read these blogs to reiterate the importance of being organized.
Getting organized can be easier than staying organized. I tend to change up my methods periodically. Whatever method I use, I follow one maxim: use paper.
Here you can see my current incarnation of brain management - the linear calendar.
So, day two of the shooting extravaganza went great. We started in the OR with about a dozen people and 4 cameras, shot some conflict scenes for the communication video, then broke into two crews for the rest of the day.
I hired two actors to role play about 15 different communication and conflict scenes. While we had about 25 pages of scripts, we improvised some new scenes and modified or deleted existing scenes. Overall it was loads of fun, single-camera film style setups. I even did a little acting.
As the day progressed from 7:30am call time to 4:30 wrap, people were getting a bit punchy and goofy, and there are some great outtakes and giggles, which keeps everyone engaged and working together.
I say this every time I participate in this type of shoot - it is some of the most fun one can have as a job.
I chose the famous Hannibal Smith line from the A-Team because that's what happened today. As related in my previous post, i have been planning a weekend bonanza of shooting, here in Sunny, altitudinal Denver, CO.
The three of us on this shoot woke around 3am Connecticut time, which is a few minutes earlier than Eastern Daylight time, and high-tailed it to the airport in the torrential rain. For those who have not been to Hartford's airport, it is a time warp. If you are flying Southwest, United, Northwest, Delta or Air Jamaica, you depart via the new glass and steel terminal 3, reminiscent of the Deep Space Nine space station, complete with MSNBC store, a Brooks Brothers store should you need a $75 dress shirt at 5:30am and numerous coffee bars. If you are flying American, aside from paying the new innovative $25 for the first checked bag plus $125 for each additional bag fees, you walk into terminal 1 and are instantly transported to 1985 - no Delorean time vehicle required.
Back from vacation. Spent Monday reviewing the e-mails, phone messages and packages that arrived during my absence, as well as ones from before I went away. As producer of various projects, one job has been planning some upcoming shoots.
Also spent some time Monday rebuilding a colleague's corrupt Encore DVD project (Encore CS3 has some sweet improvements over CS2, such as being stable, but still get some unknown errors.) Also made a cutdown DVD from alonger video for a client, put a time coded video online for another project and packed my gear for Tuesday's shoot.
Tuesday's shoot was to kickoff a new project about OB/GYN careers. The first shoot had us innterviewing several physicians, a medical student and shooting some clinical scenarios including an ultrasound exam on a mother expecting twins! The project is akin to a documentary, in that we are shooting as much as possible in several institutions, based upon our treatment, a predetermined list of questions, on the spot follow-up questions and brainstorming, then tying it all together with narration, still photos and music. Should be exciting and today was a great start.
Memorial Day weekend arrived in the US, indicating my 4th annual trip to Cape Cod for a much needed vacation. The weather was pleasant, the roads were relatively empty and my brain appreciated the chance to recharge.
I set out this year to take fewer pictures than usual, but make them more interesting as a result, and I left my video camera at home, forcing myself to relax a bit more. I also rented a bike and took some nice rides along the Cape Cod National Seashore.
Recently I experimented with different HD video editing options, to determine if I should shoot an upcoming project in HD or standard def. I concluded that i will stick with standard def for now.
I installed the Intensity Pro card. This allows for HDMI capture and monitoring of HDV. I do not have an HDMI (or any HD) monitor, so I could not test that part, and from what I observed, without HDMI monitoring, using the Intensity for HD editing is not so useful.
Capturing HDMI HDV to external SATA drive (350 gig 7200rpm seagate)
Always trying to come up with clever headlines for these blogs, today I settled upon Random Access Memory. We in the video business are always talking about RAM as it relates to using multiple programs at once, having enough juice to run your software. But in this case I am talking about the availability of information in a randomly accesible fashion.
Take a database, or a simple Excel speadsheet - randomly accessing desired information is as simple as a search or a query. However as we all know, the specificity of the search is limited by the details of the data stored.
For example, if I have a database of oh, I don't know, surgical videos. We store the name of the procedure, the author/s, the year produced, the running time, the available formats and a brief description of the video, either something written by the author or the first few lines of narration.
Thus, i can search for: Cholecystectomy AND Jones to find videos on Cholecystectomy by anyone named Jones.
Someone ought to write a book called "I'm a project manager, Now What?!"
Hey, not a bad idea for a book.
Back in 2003 I began the gradual transition from video editor/shooter to project manager. Mind you I do plenty of editing, but depending upon the project I am in fact managing, sometimes more sometimes less. But the particular responsibilities are no less important than the others.
At the time, we had about 3 times as many employees, so I was also a department manager. There was some resentment, such as "can you do my job as the web master? how can you possibly manage me or review my performance if you can't do my job yourself?"
I'm not making this up, but the same guy who said that, in the same conversation, said "you know, I turned down other jobs since I've been working here for more money because I thought I could make that money here, and I like the people I work with. Now you're telling me you're not happy with my performance? How could you judge my performance, you don't know what I do...yadda yadda yadda."
This can actually fall into many categories. Scope creep is when the initial project plan morphs into something you could not have anticipated, often thanks to last minute "emergencies" and clients changing their minds.
As a customer service oriented organization, it is easy to say "yes, no problem." A better response, based upon the estimated budget and a signed contract which explicitly discusses overages, is "yes, no problem. That will cost an additional $4,000. How would you like to proceed?"
See the difference?
Which response you give has to do with how you have structured your financial terms with the client.
Here are a few semi-autobiographical examples (the names have been changed to protect the guilty!):
Client XYZ
We shot a re-make of an older video, approx 90 minutes running time. The client provided little feedback on the transcript for the original video, aside from "yeah, let's shoot it." The agreed upon deliverable was a DVD, perhaps with chapters.
The first edit took a couple of weeks - we made it match the original video, except with more up to date graphics and narration.
Over the past two weeks I attended several medical conventions as an exhibitor.
First was the SAGES meeting, discussed in my previous post. Last week was a combined meeting of surgical program directors and coordinators, held in Toronto. The unique aspect of the exhibits at this meeting were the uses of multimedia technology aimed at surgical education.
First, of course, the Cine-Med display featured our latest books and our online video libraries, and a demo of our forthcoming Multimedia Atlas of Surgery. At this meeting, the most popular items were the books. Particularly a book about improving communication techniques for surgeons. The ACGME has mandated that surgical education serve one or more of six core competencies, including communication and professionalism. This book covers these two competencies. Click here if you want to see more:
This past week we attended one of two major surgical conventions, the Society of American Gastrointestinal and Endoscopic Surgeons, this year held in Philadelphia.
As usual, we setup our booth on the show floor, to advertise and sell our videos and books.
The most satisfying events during these 3 days are when our customers and business partners say hello, offer praise and extend invitations to explore new business endeavours.
Here are a few example:
Doctor A - wearing Naval uniform: I take your penetrating trauma textbook with me whenever I am deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan. It and the video CD are invaluable.
This is great to hear, that videos I shot and a book I helped to create are used to help save the lives of our brave soldiers and presumably the local citizens in war zones. Regardless of one's opinion about the war itself, soldiers who are volunteers do their assigned jobs and deserve the very best medical care.
Recently I was asked to make a video loop to play on the hotel television system during this week's convention. No problem, I had already begun receiving videos. The format requirements were simple: DV tape, DVCAM tape or authored DVD.
In reality, I received videos in the following formats: DV tape, Authored DVD, Windows Media, MPEG-1, MPEG-4, H.264, DIVX - all the usual suspects.
In most cases this is not a problem, Premiere Pro 2.0 will import just about every format. A few files had to be converted to another format due to the wrong audio frequency (32 vs 48k). Two videos came in without their audio, so i used Squueze to convert the original file to an MP3,import the MP3 and line it up on the timeline.
In the past, here and on the forums, I have discussed the merits of putting one's relatives on videotape. I can think of no greater use for video than in documenting those you wish never to forget.
This past week we buried my last grandparent, my dear Izzy.
While sometimes an annoyance, the video camera surgically attached to my hand at every family gathering, no matter how insignificant, has been my own conduit to the storehouse of precious memories. If I close my eyes, I can certainly envision favorite memories, places, fragments of conversations with people I have loved. But with my eyes open, I have a treasure trove of visions of the past which I shall cherish forever. And when my relatives are prepared, past the point of immediate mourning and sadness, they too can share the magic of visting their best friends who speak no more.
No, that's not the name of a new company - but it sounds good actually.
I actually was thinking of the term "go fast boats" as used in the Miami Vice movie. Basically fast racing boats used for smuggling.
This week was a go fast production week.
Monday - Pack my gear, print Google maps of two hospitals and a client's offices in Massachusetts. Fuel up the Wagon Queen Family Truckster (Saturn ION) for a mere $30, and hit the road. I also hit the library to stock up on Jackie Collins books for my wife and hit the supermarket to get her some provisions.
Lately my best friend has been a thermos bottle. I brew some coffee using a French Press, add a few spoonfulls of hot cocoa powder and little milk to the thermos bottle, then fill it up with the brew. This stays hot and comforting all day long. I pull over at every rest stop, or about every half hour, and have a small cup using the screw on lid from the bottle.
Once in a while, we get a post on the Business and Marketing forum here on the COW asking advice for education. For example, should I go to college, film school, Full Sail, or just buy some gear when I graduate high school and start working.
Each of these options has its merits and pitfalls, and everyone's experience is unique. And there have been successes and disappointments all around.
Here is a snippet of my experience.
In the Spring of my Sophomore year at the University of Hartford, a graduate student named Chuck called a meeting for interested students. He was proposing that for the first time, a weekly newscast be broadcast on campus. This was 1992. Prior to 1992, there was no cable tv on campus, but a system had just been installed and the campus tv studio received a modulator for campus channel 2.
We came up with the clever name STN - Student Television Network, producing the weekly Channel 2 News.
But this was April, so school would soon be out for the summer. My Summer internship in 1992, amazingly enough, was news intern for the Midday News at WCVB in Boston. Serendipity strikes again!
