A BLOG BY TODD

NO SLEEP FOR THE BUSY & I JUST GOT BACK FROM VENUS

2012-01-19T23:20:00.000-07:00

So here's a short photo story of what I've been up to the past month and a half... in no particular order.

Filming with Dick Marriott (an avid skier)

Drove a really fast 2012 Subaru STI & this picture is all I have to remember it by.

Filming with Orson Scott Card. Crazy love for this super down-to-earth, intelligent guy.

Filming and meetings at Ft. Carson (great book by Les Grau, a great guy)

Skiing in Jackson Hole

Late Night Alumni and Kaskade (amazing DJ, smart businessman, great guy) BUY ALL THEIR MUSIC!

Filming with Burke and Southern Virginia University (end of shoot, pulled extra wide on right camera)

Took a picture of Tayler's eyeball (Nate and Tay, thanks for the rad iPhone 4S camera attachment)

Got a girlfriend (I'm sure we're not the only ones surprised)

Breakfast at Grand America

Christmas with the family

Other things that didn't make it in the photo story; returned from Puerto Rico and Uruguay shoot. Finished two Toronto mormon.org portraits, submitted the first spanish one, getting really close to moving Sansom Media into a larger office (fingers crossed)... This list is too long.

The year has started really good, we are super blessed and we're excited for what's to come. We're in Virginia right now shooting on the AF100 kits (Nikon and Pentax glass) with the SmallHD DP6 monitors. Love them both! I've brought Tim with me for this shoot and we're finish filming with Burke and SVU early next week and then it's back to editing and storyboarding for a new commercial campaign for another client.

As Tim says, "Be good."

Salt Lake City - Puerto Rico - Uruguay - Salt Lake City

2011-12-03T19:44:00.001-07:00

Things have been extremely busy at Sansom Media as this year comes to an end. Nate is keeping the editing going, with sidekicks Lynden and Mike (our newest emoyees...welcome!). We've finished up some Rogue Fitness pieces (demos, sizzles and more), prepping a few other projects. I sent off the second cut of the Canadian mormon.org.

Right now I'm in Puerto Rico filming a few more portraits and then to Uruguay to pick up some broll for one of the Canadian portraits.

I've brought Tim with me with on a second AF100 kit. He's one of my favorite shooters of all time. The guy nails it every time. One of the few people I can feel comfortable bring with me or sending anywhere alone to film when I can't get there. Super stoked to have him along on this trip. Eric Morgan, the creative director, has been great to have along. He's helped a lot with the scheduling and his Spanish skills fill the large void mine leave behind, aside from doing a smashing job ensuring the proper direction and feel for the piece. A stellar team all around.

One great thing about this Mormon.org campaign that I absolutely love is how many amazing, talented people I've been able to work with. It's been rad 'cause of all the rad people. I look forward to more with them all.

In the meantime, we're writing new commercials with Rogue Fitness and I think it's safe to say viewers will be in for a treat. Not to mention the project we're just starting with Southern Virginia University. We just love, love, love working with them.

My good friends Dodge Billingsley and Scott Thornton with Combat Films and Research just went to Iraq for the rest of the year to film the withdraw of US troops. Should be a great film. We wish then the best with luck and safety. I wish I were with 'em.

And, thanks to all you kooks that actually read this blog. It's fun to write and rewarding to know it might help or entertain someone.

I'm going to get back to my dinner so until next time...

Hasta.

Back From Ohio But Not To Reality

2011-11-14T17:59:00.001-07:00

We were in Ohio last week filming with Rogue Fitness (subscribe to their YouTube) and it was a great shoot. Among things we shot were a how-to of sort on building a garage gym, some demos of new equipment and some random, goofy things with Mikko. Mikko is funny and just a great guy. Everyone else is terrific too. Rogue had Tony Blauer come in and give his seminar on how to Be Your Own Bodyguard. Some great stuff and helpful for real world applications. He teaches you how to harness your natural tendency to flinch as a fast and powerful defense tool. Cool stuff. Nice work Tony.

The footage is back in the office and we're processing it now and as we transcode it we're putting it on a new Promise Technology 12TB Pegasus Thunderbolt RAID. We picked it up to test out a basic network sharing solution. Several of our clients have several TBs (terabytes) of footage that we are always accessing from several drives. The RAID solution is a way to have all the footage online, with enterprise speeds and data protection. If this works well, we'll probably move to a larger 32TB RAID, depending on a few things, one being future Sonnet Thunderbolt peripherals, among other brands.

With a gigabit switch, we can hardwire each editing bay to each other and we can pull one or two streams of footage to each. This is perfect for assistant editors to pull clips, prep sequences, and process footy while the editor works on that, or a different project off of the same RAID. Not as robust as a Fiber or 10Gigabit Ethernet solution but certainly a stepping stone and great for trials. Once we move on from this to a larger, more robust system we can repurpose the Pegasus as a back up for RAW footage with its lightning fast (sorry for the lame pun) transfer speeds and larger capacity.

We're shooting with Southern Virginia University this week while we work through some edits for a few other clients. I'm bring Tim along to film with me while Nate manages the editors here at base camp.

As we part I wanted to leave you with something to make your day a little brighter, a remixed song from Coldplay's new album, Mylo Xyloto -- UFO.

Senators & Scholars

2011-11-08T11:53:00.000-07:00

We've been doing some stuff for the Hinckley Institute of Politics at the University of Utah and they're all super cool. It just so happens I graduated from the U of U in Mass Communications & Public Relations. We've shot Senator Joe Lieberman, Former Senator Bob Bennett, and Martin Tolchin

We've been doing mostly still work for them, photojournalistic style, and it's been a lot of fun. We also just finish number two of three Canada "I'm A Mormon" portriats. Well, first cut that is.

I'm leaving right now to jump on a plane bound for Ohio to film with Rogue Fitness for the week so I'll leave it at that for now. A side note... I'm noticing a trend with these photos I've thrown up here. Anyone else notice.

The Hustle & Bustle At Sansom Media

2011-10-21T18:50:00.001-06:00

Where has the time gone?!! (two exclamation points still doesn't suffice). Two weeks ago I was leaving Toronto, Canada heading back to Salt Lake City and my internal clock is so out of whack right now I can't tell if it feels like a day ago or 3 months ago.

The shoot in Toronto went really well. I was directing three portraits for Bonneville Communication on the I'm A Mormon campaign. I've just about got a good first cut done of one. It's turning out really nice. The other two will be great too.

All the while, Sansom Media has begun to grow quickly. It's fun, but a little scary too. My biggest focus on the growth is making sure that we grow responsibly. This means that we don't take on more work than we can handle (which feels like it's getting close), we spend time working on current projects and preparing for those upcoming. Using free-lancers when needed and growing into more employees. Upgrading equipment and office space appropriately (both of which are happening right now).

Nate is editing close to full-time as he finishes up his last semester. He's really killing it and keeps getting better and better. We recently brought on an intern, of sorts (not to be derogatory Lynden). He's be great. He has a lot of passion, creativity and talent. He's also a pretty good DJ. (And thanks to his mom for reading the blog regularly).

We still need one more solid editor. Easier said than done. It's really difficult to find someone that blends with the company's style. That has the same vision for work and is, as I have dubbed, sleuthy: a creative problem solver. Encounters unknowns and develops solutions. Overcomes obstacles. This is a really lame example but it works... I want to hire people that, when pressing the gas pedal and nothing happens, discover the car isn't running and take the necessary steps rather than coming to ask for help because the car won't go.

This week has been full bore. We're cutting a 25 minute show for Barrick with the media from our shoot last month, delivering tomorrow. We're also editing Day 2 and Day 3 of the Rogue Fitness at the 2011 Reebok CrossFit Games (here's Day 1), some Dew Tour footage, an I'm A Mormon ad and equipment sizzles for Rogue Fitness. Coming up in the ensuing weeks we have two more I'm A Mormon ads, a heaps of sizzles, demos, series episodes to edit. A few shoots in Denver, Ohio, Luisiana. Some super top secret stuff with Rogue. All while moving our offices, upgrading server equipment, editing bays and finding some time to sleep. All good problems to have. We're blessed and grateful.

PS. While in Toronto I got to grab some lunch with my pal Marty Cej from BNN. He took Tim and I to a great hole-in-the-wall Indian place. Tasty! Thanks Marty.

Apple Founder, Chairman and Former CEO Dies at 56

2011-10-05T19:28:00.000-06:00

A shadow has been cast on Apple today as its beloved genius and co-founder, Steve Jobs, has passed away today in Palo Alto, CA. In 10 years Steve took an ailing tech company to one of the most valuable companies in the world.

I have loved the tech and dream that Steve and Apple had created over the years. My first computer was a PowerBook G4 Aluminum in 2002 and have since found uses for so many of the technologies created. I am pretty bummed to hear and wish peace and blessings on he and his family.

I'm in Toronto, Canada filming all week and received the news as I was walking back to the hotel from dinner. It's sad it happened so quick. He was a unique individual and an inspiring visionary. A film worth watching and that really gives an insight into the history of a company that has matured faster than a teenage kid is Welcome To Macintosh - The Documentary Film For The Rest Of Us. Go buy it here. Watch it and you'll have a whole new appreciation for what Steve and his people have done. He really has, "Left a dent in the world" -- Chase Jarvis | Photographer, Creative Director

Thanks for the amazing ride, Steve. See you on The Other Side.

Thoughts While Filming/Producing Barrick's 2011 Global Mine Rescue Summit

2011-09-27T15:39:00.000-06:00

Two weeks ago, we started filming with Barrick Gold for their 2011 Global Mine Rescue Summit. We had myself, Nate and Tim on the filming crew and Alisia running photography. Everything went very smoothly, except for when Alisia missed the bus back to Salt Lake City and we had to buy her a flight last minute. We still love her. ;-) We shot with two Panasonic AG-AF100's (Tim and I) and Nate ran three GoPro's along with all media management.

The mining industry gets a lot of grief and a bad name from accidents that occur and I've gotta take the mining industry's side on this. I don't know of an industry that takes safety more seriously. Barrick Gold is, in my mind, the poster child for safety first. I don't know how many zeros come after the number they spend on safety but I'll bet they spend more and care more than a lot of other industries.

For example, Barrick invited 60 of its volunteer first responders from their mines throughout the world to the United States for a week of training and instruction. Two days were spent at the University of Nevada, Reno's Fire Science Academy where they attend an extensive aircraft rescue course and the rest of the time on burn props to help simulate situations and let them hone their skills. Barrick also split up the group into three for three community service projects in Elko, Nevada.

Another day was spent at the University of Utah's Medical Center getting hands on training and lectures from some of the best doctors, nurses and medical experts in the world. At one point, they interacted with 3G dummies that talk and give feedback. I got to be the speaker for a few of the Spanish crews that practiced. That was pretty fun, but I think I should stick to filmmaking.

My point here is that these are great people that make up great companies and they care a lot about their safety and the safety of others. They won't put the car in gear before you have your seatbelt on. They are serious about safety.

My great, great grandfather, James Gatherum, and two of his brothers Thomas, and William Gatherum died in the Scofield Mine, so mining accidents impacted my family a century ago. It's nice to know there are companies like Barrick that put safety at the front of the to do list. And they DO a very good job at it.

Stay tuned for a short sizzle of the Summit.

Casket of James Gatherum being loaded onto the Rio Grande Western Baggage car.

James Gatherum with family on a picnic

Scofield Mine Disaster Links
The George Edward Anderson Collection
James Gatherum Casket Image
James Gatherum baby portrait
History of the Scofield Mine Disaster
Names of Miners
Utah History To Go
University of Utah

Filming Some Dew Tour Wizardry With Sansom Media

2011-09-10T13:07:00.000-06:00

The ever amazing Dew Tour is in Salt Lake City this week and it has offered up some mega amazing stuff. Yesterday Sansom Media (Nate Gunn and I) was there filming semi-finals of street skate and Hart and Huntington Speed Style. There were some great moments and stellar tricks. We're heading back today for the finals, sadly we won't be able to film much because NBC owns rights to all finals events. So go watch it on LIVE on NBC. Here's a few freeze frames from some of the footage. Look for an edit soon. Big thanks to Alli Sports for great events like this!

Business Expansion and Server Solution // Dilemmas & Suggestions

2011-08-25T15:26:00.000-06:00

If you're not a business don't tune out just yet. There will be some valuable info for you too. Whether you're a blogging mom, music/movie junky, a small retail business or a larger production studio you've all probably felt the growing pains of digital storage. You're left with a few option, buy another external drive, try yourself or pay someone to install a larger internal drive, buy a new computer or maybe abandon technology and go back to sticks and stones.

Let's lay out a few numbers. Some basic math (if you can call it that) 1024 MB = 1 GB. And in kind, 1024 GB = 1 TB. A typical HD movie from iTunes will set you back 2-4 GB each. A song from iTunes about 9 MB. If you have a 250 GB hard drive once you subtract room taken up by your OS, applications and such, you'll probably have 180-200 GB. SO, you could put 67 HD movies, 22,200 songs or 9,090 RAW photos. Sounds like a lot, until you run out of space. You're not just going to have all of one and none of the others.

So at Sansom Media Inc. our dilemma is having footage spread over too many hard drives. Here's our workflow. Every project gets four hard drives, yup 4. Two Lacie Rugged (500 GB or 1 TB each, depending on the project), and two 3.5 inch bare drives, usually 1 TB each. I'll use our last commercial shoot for Rogue Fitness as an example. While in the field, we use the two Lacie Rugged drives along with ShotPut Pro. We'll either offload cards throughout the day or do them all at once, again depending on the project. ShotPut Pro transfers the data to each Rugged and verifies everything. This is a lot better than just copying them using Finder and dragging and dropping. Mac's will write invisible files when you do this and you don't want extra stuff like that with your footage.

Once we finish the shoot we put them in our Pelican 1050 case (it fits two perfectly) and we carry them with us in a silver briefcase handcuffed to our wrist (slight exaggeration). When we arrive to the studio we use Final Cut 7's Log and Transfer tool to transcode the footage to Apple ProRes 422. These are now the files we'll work with. And make sure you separate your raw footage drives to two different locations. The two bare drives are now clones of each other, one being a back up while editing.

We have so many drives now and we're constantly pulling clips from each to create content for clients. We need a solution that will store and distribute all the transcoded footage to multiple edit bays, be RAID 6 and not cost heaps of cash. Here are the options we've found:

DROBO S/FS/Pro/800i/1200i $400 for 4 TB or $4,000 for 16 TB (drives not included)

from USB 2.0 to iSCSI gigabit ethernet protocol but has a max of 125 Mb/s throughput, you can only 3-5 HD streams while editing.
so easy a caveman's dog can use it.
dual disk, RAID 6 style, back up
great for business that have a lot going on but files are not HD video. (ie. documents, point of sale, brochures, images, small videos for social media. general data storage and retrieval.
range of costs to buy and lower cost to expand

Promise Technology - Pegasus - $2,000 for 12 TB

uses Thunderbolt and has a max of 10 Gb/s throughput or 1,125Mb/s That's 1.25 GB/second. FAST!
Drives aren't able to provide this speed yet (still trying to figure this one out).
brand new and not industry tested
no network RAID capabilities
superb for high end editing and animation.
average cost to buy and expand

G|SPEED FC XL - $11,000 for 16 TB

4Gb/s fiber channel
all sorts of RAID configurations
network friendly editing
fast performance
high cost to buy and expand

It's important to remember that RAID 5 or 6 save the space of two drives for back up so 16 TB is more like 11 TB in a RAID 6.

Our final opinion at this point. If you're a music junkie or just have large amounts of file storage needs look at a Drobo or Drobo S. You can have all your music, videos, family photos, Office files and more and not worry about storage again for a long while. You can also use file sharing on the computers at home to access files on that drive. Wifi works, hard wired Gigabit ethernet is much better.

If you're a small retail business give the Drobo FS or 800i a try. For small production companies, do individual workstations dedicated to specific clients and maybe one bay for the smaller, less frequent group and when you need to access media from the other dives use file sharing on the computers. You can even write a simple apple script that will tell the computers to automatically connect to each other when turned on.

For the larger production studios that want to have multiple bays edit off of one server the G|SPEED FC XL (fiber channel, extra large) will probably be your best bet.

Hopefully this has been helpful and not confusing. If anything it's a good place to start as you search for increased storage solutions that suit your needs. We'd love to hear what you've found. Comment and share it with everyone.

Also, check out the workflow video Chase Jarvis Inc. did. It's another great resource.

Climbing the Grand Teton For My Birthday

2011-08-18T00:29:00.000-06:00

Photo: Ron Niebrugge / WildNatureImages.com

This one really isn't going to have anything to do with filming other than I'm glad the only camera I took was a GoPro. So I recently had a birthday, the number isn't as important as what I tried to do. My old friend, Taylor Morgan, challenged me to something rad for my birthday. I was thinking, go to Costa Rica and chilling he suggested to climb the Grand Teton. 13,770 feet of sheer rock faces, snow fields, large animal life and thin air.

We drove through the night from Salt Lake to get to Grand Teton Nation Park by 1am. Our goal was to get there by 9pm on Thursday but work keep us both later than expected. We arrived, started packing our gear and by 1:30am we were on our way with a 22 lb. pack on each of us.

The climb started nice. The gradual grade of the first four miles was pretty manageable, especially for a dude climbing a 13,770ft mountain cold turkey. Every mile I found my body complaining about something. It started with my calves and then my hamstrings, after that my gluteus awesomeness... You get the idea.

The higher we got the slower I went. As the sun rose and kissed the peaks of the Tetons at 6:40am we were reaching 10,500 ft. This was where slow became really slow. We were heading up a snow face, probably 500-600ft of vertical with crampons and an ice ax. After that, we stowed them and made our way up to the lower saddle, which sits at 11,200 ft.

This is where really slow ends up getting ridiculously slow. My heart began beating ridiculously fast with every 30 yards and by the time we were at 13,000 ft every vertical foot caused my heart to go into overdrive, taking minutes to calm before the next foot.

At 13,200 feet, just 570 feet from the peak I had to conceded to the mountain. The last 500 feet required technical climbing with ropes and all over 1,500 cliffs. I was in no capacity to even attempt such with any tide of safety. It was a very hard decision but one that had to be made nonetheless. I was actually very worried that I'd even be able to make it safely back the the lower saddle, let alone the 10 miles down the mountain and back to the car.

At 7:30pm and with a very sore knee and weary legs, we arrived back to the car, 18 hours after we set out. In all, we ascended 7,200ft, 20 miles round trip and a max altitude of 13,200ft. So aside from the surrendering short of the goal I did break any other record I had previously had, climbing more altitude, traveling more distance and maxing higher than I ever had, and I did it all in one day, with no prep.

I should give most of the credit to Taylor. He is a fantastic climber and he is what kept me on the path every mile that I wanted to turn around. He had a fantastic knowledge of things to eat, ways to handle situation and in the end he took me farther than I ever could have on my own. And all along the way was my Heavenly Father watching over me. He's the reason I got as far as I did and made it back safely too.

If you stuck with this and read the whole thing I'd like to offer you a reward so how about a pat on the back. I'll be returning to the Grand Teton to finish what I started and I hope you're with me Taylor.

Rogue Fitness Commercials Have Debuted...On ESPN3

2011-08-02T20:46:00.003-06:00

The 2011 Reebok CrossFit Games have come and gone and so has the debut of our 7 commercials we created for Rogue Fitness. They've been a great client and we absolutely love working with them. Above is a playlist for the 7 spots. I was surprised to hear they ended up airing on ESPN3 during the live broadcast of the games. There are a lot of different flavors so I'm curious which one you like best and why? They were a blast to do, from writing, filming/directing and editing.

For the techy people reading, we shot it with two Panasonic AG AF100 cameras. If you want to know more than that just ask. Tim was great to work with and I'm glad he wanted to be a part. I'm looking forward to some more.

It's been a few busy weeks and they've been a lot of fun. It started with Seattle, then Oregon, California and now in North Carolina.

Seattle - Just Serve - Episode 1
Oregon - NASCAR Doc - Chasing Spencer
California - 2011 Reebok CrossFit Games
North Carolina - Just Serve - Episode 2

The crew has changed on this second episode. Tim and Ethan are both doing other work. Rhett and Burke Lewis are on the crew in their stead. Early mornings, long days and short nights need to be offset by a long night. That's my cue to head to bed.

Wrapped Filming FIrst Episode Of A New TV Series: Just Serve

2011-07-22T23:53:00.000-06:00

FACT: Seattle, Washington Is One Of My New Favorite Places.

I've been in Seattle, Washington for the past week filming the first episode of a new tv show called Just Serve. The premiss is three strangers come together and provide random acts of service for more strangers. I'm not sure how much I can disclose of the episode at this point so I'll leave you wondering and wanting more. Stay tuned, expected air date is October.

I've been working with Tim Irwin, Ethan Vincent, Adam Able of GoFilms, Nathan Lee, Erich Cannon and Kristi Schimek. A super stellar crew and I love each of their faces with all my heart. Ethan, sadly, is moving his family to Vienna, Austria in August so this will be the last project with him for the next few months until he gets them all settled. I will most definitely be going to visit. That city enchants me.

We've been shooting on three AF100s with a mix of Nikon, Canon, Pentax, Lumix and ... what other lens do you have Tim? Ethan has been shooting on Extreme II (or something like that) SD cards with a bit rate of 48/sec - ish. Tim and I have Panasonic Gold at 22/sec. We've found out that the faster bit rate increases card format time by A LOT. We're talking 5 seconds vs. 50+ seconds. Even though the AF100 doesn't need that kind of speed when shooting, it sure pays off on the post side. I'll need to run tests and see if they faster bit rate cards actually offload footy faster too.

I'm now at the Sea Tac Airport waiting to fly to Portland, Oregon for some NASCAR filming with Patrick Wier until monday afternoon. Then fly home, wash clothes and fly to California wednesday for the 2011 Reebok CrossFit Games. I leave straight from there to North Carolina on a redeye to film the second episode of Just Serve. ...a little busy, but it's great.

Thanks for the awesome week everyone. See you all in NC.

Drop The Gun! Or I Shoot The Car.

2011-07-05T13:09:00.001-06:00

Didn't have anything to do with this one but a great commercial. Really funny. I was waiting for the thief to ditch his loot and pick up car and take the car but I was wrong.

Had I directed this one it would have been more...epic (for lack of a better word). Police cars of all makes, Dodge, Chrysler, Acura, BMW. arriving to a high value robbery, bank, fine art and when the cars arrive the drives all pull weapons as a girl rolls up, parks and gets out in the middle of the looming firefight. Then the phrase, "drop the guns! or i shoot the car." and give more emphasis on the respect for the superior car.

...but that's just me. Its still a fun little spot with a nice kicker at the end.

Panasonic AG-AF100 with Power Box and AJA Mini Ki Pro

2011-06-30T10:49:00.001-06:00

Beam Products posted this video on their YouTube page a few weeks back and it shows a Panasonic AG-AF100 with a Power Box, designed by BEAM teamed up with a full cine kit including a Mini Ki Pro.

What does this mean? This setup gives you the ability to bypass the AVCHD codec of the AF100 at 22Mb/s and capture direct to ProRes 422

There's a great discussion on it in the DVXUSER.com forum here.

Producut of THAILAND(Design by BEAM) Power box all in one and rig mini kipro

Europe Is Always So Cool

2011-06-29T11:22:00.004-06:00

I had a great time watching this piece. Very well done and a fantastic story. Wether you're in Utah, Ohio, New York or California we can all relate, "I have to pay you how much and I only get 7mbps speeds?"

Sansom Media pays $52/month for 20mbps down and 3mbps(ish) up, that's just for internet. With all the work we're doing sending and receiving rough cuts, footage and other large files, 1gbps would be smashing.

In the US you have to play the "we're breaking up" game. I told Comcast Sansom Media was leaving them since we was paying too much, service was spotty and we were generally disenchanted with them. On our last bill there are a total of $67 in service discounts. We're still paying double what UK-ers are paying but its a start.

The funny part of that story, the agent working with me said, "be sure to call back in one year when your discounts expire and threaten to leave us again." I thought only venture capitol groups and the mob used threaten in their business models.

The Peanut Gallery
7:30, check out the piece of art on the wall.
10;12, €17,000 for 3 houses to get fiber. that's roughly $24,533.54... wow, they really wanted that fiber.
12:40, microchip, amps techy, blah blah blah. I like this Tim guy. He's a jolly fellow.

You ask them how much they pay for broadband.

"Oh, forty Euros." That's about $56.

"A week?" you ask.

"No," they might say. "Per month. And that includes phone and TV."

It's really that bad. The nation that invented the internet ranks 16th in the world when it comes to the speed and cost of our broadband connections. That's according to a study released last year by Harvard'sBerkman Center for Internet & Society on behalf of the Federal Communications Commission.

Where's Al Gore now? The full Engadget article is here.

Apple's Final Cut Pro X - RELEASED TODAY

2011-06-21T08:56:00.006-06:00

Final Cut Pro X images courtesy Apple Inc.

Final Cut Pro X released this morning and it's so exciting and yet so never racking. I want to jump up and down for joy and stand on guard, nervous to let it into my life. So many confused feelings. Not everyone gets to be Larry Jordan and use if for two months before the rest of us coach class-less professionals. He says he loves it, wishes it had some features that are forthcoming, but loves it nonetheless.

"Finally! Apple released Final Cut Pro X (and new versions of Motion and Compressor) this morning at 5:30 AM. I've been working with the program for the last two months, and talking extensively with Apple about this new version since February.

Final Cut Pro X represents a complete rewrite of the entire application.

* Background processing of just about everything.

* 64-bit memory support so project size no longer crashes into RAM memory

*Multi-processor support so everything is a LOT!! faster

* A totally new interface

* Amazing new features like the magnetic timeline, connected clips, and built-in color correction."

You can buy Final Cut Pro X on Apple's App Store for $300. Motion 5 and Compressor are both available for $50 each. You're $400 all in.

So a few things to look for when moving over to the new Final Cut Pro X; given that this is a total rewrite of the software there is always the chance that something could go terribly wrong. I'd run a few test with the program and some FCP project files. Make back up copies of your projects in the FCP 7 friendly format because most likely once you convert them to FCPX you won't be able to revert back.

More useful links:

Final Cut Pro X, Motion 5, Compressor 4: Graphics card compatibility - LINK

Final Cut Pro X Supported Cameras - LINK

ProApps QuickTime Codecs - LINK

Gary Adcock - Ready Or Not, Here It Comes
Chicago Illinois USA

©2011 CreativeCOW.net. All rights reserved.

Gary's Review

Compressor and Motion 5 freeze frames below.

Compressor images courtesy Apple Inc.

Motion 5 images courtesy Apple Inc.

Final Day of 2011 Reebok CrossFit Games - South Central

2011-06-20T11:17:00.001-06:00

So it's just another day here in paradise, only I didn't know paradise got to 101 degrees with 40% humidity. It is quite unbearable. The venue is is on a ranch in Texas. There's a large concrete pad where the competition is set up and the athletes are sizzling. I think one or two turned to scrambled eggs during their event.

But all my griping aside this really is a rad venue. It has a old western film feel to it. There were a lot of good athletes here and a lot of emotion as the wide field competitors was slice from over 100 to just the top three teams, women and men. Those that won will be heading to the Home Depot Center in July to compete in the finals. Should be pretty cool.

As for the filming and editing, I'm surprised I didn't have any cameramen pass out from heat exhaustion and Marty was stellar. He has really started refining the style and we very receptive to my direction and vision.

The editors did a great job and I really like the multiple computer workflow with the Mirrored RAID. That sped up the process so much and made our life's so much easier. Awesomeness is what it was.

That said, we've packed everything up and are making our way to the airport and head to SLC. There for a fe days and then to California on Thursday to shoot some more for the NASCAR doc.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Chemawa TR,Tomball,United States

2011 Reebok CrossFit Games - SouthWest Regionals // Day 2

2011-06-11T21:28:00.001-06:00

The sun has set here in Aurora, a suburb of Denver, Colorado. It is the end of day two and we are cranking away at wrapping the highlight reel. It's been a really good region to produce. I added Tyson Maughan to my unit and it has been extremely helpful. He's a DP but has taken the reigns of processing all the footage from my cameramen, logging it and pulling selects to give to Kyle Kebert. They're really cranking through stuff and I couldn't be happier. Kyle is a great editor. He edits for ESPN and he's just a stallion. I'd take him on my unit any day of the week.

Yesterday's video was, I think, one of our best pieces so far. Check it out HERE. Today's will be even better. Great footage, lots of drama, rain and tears. I'll get you a link when they post it.

For the geeks reading, we've managed to land a fiber/Gigabit/blow your socks off Ethernet connection. We effectively download 70MB and upload at 30MB. It took us 8 minutes to upload a 2.5GB video file to the FTP site. Not bad and certainly much better than the .5MB speeds we had at the Maple Leafs Hockey rink last week in Toronto. Here's DAY 3 wrap up video. I may have been editing the last two (men's 5 and 6) at 6am after my editor fell asleep and I felt a little kooky at the end.

I should probably get back to producing or something more helpful to my editors, whom I love.

UPDATED: Multi-Machine - Infield Log, Transfer and Edit Network with One Mirrored RAID

2011-06-02T10:36:00.004-06:00

Today we're talking local server networking with computers using a Mirrored RAID set, Mac computers and Final Cut Pro. This will work with Final Cut Pro X when it comes out. In fact when you no longer have to transcode things your life will be much nicer. The big thing here is hardware and how its set up. Below I've included the copy for how to set up your server and best practices when using it. Can anyone draw? A diagram would be nice but not from my hand. I have no creative drawing abilities in my bones.

Let me know how this works for you and if you have any suggestions to improve it. I've used it and love it. It can be adapted and modified to meet your specific needs and workflow. I prefer to offload raw footage to the drives using ShotPut Pro and then work off a copy of the footage. I'll have myself or lead editor working while I have the assistant pulling broll and whatnots. When that isn't possible this workflow is exactly what you need.

There are images at the bottom of the post that you can download and use as a visual reference.

**** A somewhat important point not to forget with the Mirrored RAID work flow: when ingesting footage from the secondary (laptop), the editor on the primary (MacProo) needs to manually drag (import) the media that has been logged and transferred to the RAID into their FCP project. Even though they are working on a FCP files that is the exact same name, the files are stored on two different machines (each machine creates it's own autosave of it's project) meaning the footage doesn't automatically poputlate on the FCP project NOT ingesting the footage. Ideally with bins matching the file structure on the RAID. ie. Day 01 // 09_23 card 01_a // (media clips).****

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NETWORKING: EDIT WITH TWO COMPUTERS FROM ONE DRIVE

For best results use a MacPro with separate FW800 Busses, front and back

Set up two hard drives — one on the front FW800 buss and the other on the rear FW800 buss. Open disk utilities and select each new volume and partition to one volume. Do each one twice, for good measure calling one shoot_region_a and shoot_region_b (short names, lower case and no spaces is ideal).

NOW select shoot_region_a and select RAID (seen in blue above). From the left column select the two hard drives shoot_region_a & shoot_region_b and drag them into the white box to the right. Youʼll want to tell it to automatically rebuild -- this is found in options... Once it has completed this, there will be only one drive on the desktop of the MacPro.

NEXT plug an ethernet cable between the two machines -- the MacProʼs have two so you can still connect hardline to the internet to upload content to an FTP or whateve -- and open System Preferences on the MacPro and select sharing under the Internet & Wireless section. Tick the File Sharing box. When you have a green light youʼre done. You can, if youʼd like, to name the computer as per your needs. ie. MacPro or Main.

Repeat this File Sharing process on the MacBook Pro. Maybe label the computer name laptop or something. Again, when you have the green light youʼre good to go.

Okay, now in the Finder bar on the laptop (or secondary machine) select Go and then Network.

Youʼll select the MacPro or primary machine and Connect As a register user. Youʼll need to know the admin login name and password for your machines. When you are connected youʼll see a list of the volumes available. Select the Mirrored RAID you created and it will appear as that (unless youʼve change your icons.

You should now be networked to your Mirrored RAID, having access to both machines.

WORKFLOW
This is a setup for direct Log & Transfer and not to be used to copy raw digital files to drives. See Infield Workflow for example.

I suggest using your secondary machine to Log and Transfer your footage and pull broll selects for your editor.
Create a FCP project file and name it exactly what youʼve name it on the principle machine. This makes FCP not confused when it is looking for files as the secondary and primary will be saving and naming everything the exact same. When you ingest footage youʼll want to create a new folder in your scratch disk for each day, ie. Day 01. Then a new folder for each card you offload and I like to label it with the time (military), card number and camera. 08_21 card 01_b. This helps you know when the footage was shot and who shot it.

You can use this same principle in FCP as you ingest and create a bin for each card ingested. Thatʼs youʼre call.

So create new sequences and label them as per your needs and begin cutting selects to those sequences. Once youʼre done pulling the specific work. Create a new FCP Project and label it accordingly. ie. Awesometown Selects. Save it to the Mirrored RAID, close it on your machine and then the principle machine can open it, copy the sequences or whatever makes the editor happy.

• It is wise to change the FCP Autosave to 10 mins from 45.
** This will work with any two Macs -- laptop or desktop or iMac as long as ʻhostʼ is a MacPro with two separate FW800 ports on the front and rear AND you have two separate licenses of Final Cut Pro.
*** Any other questions please ask me.

CrossFit Games 2011 - NorthCentral Regionals - Day 1

2011-05-28T02:45:00.000-06:00

It has been a long two days here at the CrossFit Games 2011 - NorthCentral Regionals presented by Reebok and Rogue Fitness. Sorting out a lot of hick ups, missing packages, bad equipment and wrong equipment we've managed to shoot one successful day. It's been a lot of fun. We're on hour 22, yesterday was 19 hrs, and we're just wrapping up our edit for the Day 1 highlights. I'm tired, Kyle is tired and the rest of the unit is sleeping so no everyone is smashed tomorrow.

Two more days of this and I think we're going to be a lot more efficient. No more fighting with the facilities who wanted $10,000 for a 5MB internet connection over 3 days. YEAH! $10,000. Justin and I got them down to $1,000 for 7.5MB speeds.

It's been quite a bit different in the current roll; I'm a…field producer, or something. I'm supposed to run 3 cameramen, an announcer, an editor and several runners. Not my usual, one to three man -- I'm shooting and editing. No one has proposed anarchy yet so I must be doing okay. My unit is outstanding. Everyone is gelling very well and we are getting everything we need. It has been a little behind schedule but we're succeeding nevertheless. More to come.

A Little Trip Down Memory Lane

2011-05-27T08:06:00.002-06:00

Is it a little ridiculous that I have over 12,000 email dating back to the first weeks of 2006? It could be worse. I'm sure there are those of you out there that have me beat by half a decade or more.

While archiving -- deleting -- some of them, I came across a few emails from Apple and I was quite impressed with the change in their technology and junk they offer then and now. I've passed a few examples -- probably more than you'd ever like to see -- in here for your enjoyment. Newest to oldest

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What's on TV? Just about everything you've got in iTunes and your photos, too. With Apple TV, all your hit movies, TV shows, music, podcasts, and photos can be enjoyed in your living room on your big-screen TV, transferred wirelessly from any Mac or PC in your home. Apple TV—now any time is prime time. Learn more.


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As a .Mac member, you can now get a $20* instant rebate when you buy iLife '06 at the online Apple Store or Apple retail store (via mail-in rebate elsewhere). You'll get iWeb and the newest versions of iPhoto, iMovie, iDVD, and GarageBand, so you can do more than ever with photos, movies, blogs, websites, and more. And sharing it all with .Mac is a snap. Hurry, rebate offer ends December 13, 2006.

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Is Service More…?

2011-05-25T14:21:00.001-06:00

Image by Daryl - http://www.terriblypoetic.com/author/admin/

Last week while driving through Ohio with Tim we talked about a lot of things and one of them was war. Now I know everyone has their own opinion and next to religion and money this one hits high on the sensitive scale. These are my thoughts and opinions and as such, are subject to morph and grow. So take this for what it's worth.

Tim asked me, "How much have we spent on The War in Iraq?" We talked about it and then he said what would be different if all that was spent on service?

I wasn't too sure on numbers so I looked it up and as of this blog post: CostOfWar.com says $791,743,312,678.00. Weather it's $100 billion or $700 billion it's a lot of money so lets not get hung up on the details there. The point is that that's a lot of money to spend -- depending on how you look at it -- hating and killing people or saving and protecting people. I'm not getting into the whole we should or shouldn't, I'm merely asking the question and providing some recent thoughts.

So this is in no way the most brilliant foreign relations policy but more a very simple way to apply a seemingly simple idea. So let me precede it with the question: Does a $100 billion put toward service have more power than $100 billion put toward war? Can service be more powerful and more effective than "death and carnage via air and artillery?" -- a quote from Fog & Friction, a film I worked on -- directed by Dodge Billingsley. It's good, you should buy it.

Okay, getting back on track... I have two samples for you to think about and then send you on your way.

The First - Ammon the Missionary

This one comes from a religious account. If you're a Mormon you'll know the story, if you're not, you're in for a treat. It is the story of Ammon. Ammon wasn't always the nicest kid on the block. Origionally against the church, he and his brother Alma the Younger, contended with the church and those of the faith. BUT, after heavenly intervention and a personal conversion, Ammon, being a Nephite, served as a missionary to the Lamanites -- foes to the Nephites.

He was taken captive by the Lamenites and the king, Lamoni, asked him what his purpose was in their land. Ammon's resonse, he sought to serve them and nothing else. The king accepted his offer and sent him to serve and tend his flocks of sheep.

Despite his service Ammon did run into some conflict in which he had to fight and defend his life and the flocks of the king from robbers. Which, as I see it, is the same to day, but maybe business or family rather than sheep. Being impressed with his honesty and overall awesomeness, Lamoni offered him a daughter, which he politely declined and sough to continue serving the king and his people.

In the end the service was much more powerfull than the sword, yet the sword was still need to defend and protect.

For a full account go here: Ammon: Missionary to the Lamenites. Or watch the rad Lego reenactment at the bottom.

The Second - Burger and Fry

As best I can tell this is legit. Inmates at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base on Camp Delta have never been too fond of giving up things they know and as most stories about the place go, those wanting to know are never real nice about asking. Point being, some interrogators moved from using fear, pain, violence... the not nice stuff, to being nice and taking care of the inmates. One way in particular, giving an inmate what they really wanted…a Happy Meal®. In the end, terrorist plots were unthreaded without war.

So is it possible to use service as weapon of war? Can service be more powerful than fear and intimidation? There is, in my mind, most certainly a time to take up arms and defend one's self, family… liberty. Can we find a better way to use the things we have to educate, advance and serve those around us?

Just a longwinded thought. And thanks to Tim for getting me thinking about it and you're great insight on the Ammon Way, as you called it.

Quotes on Service
The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.

-- Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948) Preeminent leader of Indian nationalism.

Only a life lived in the service to others is worth living.

-- Albert Einstein (1879-1955) German-Swiss-U.S. scientist.

Give what you have to somebody, it may be better than you think.

-- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) U.S. poet.

The Greatest Blog Post Review of The Greatest Movie Ever Sold that was presented by POM Wonderful

2011-05-23T07:56:00.000-06:00

I tried to concoct the longest blog post title ever. So after a long week -- not implying that it was bad, just long days and lots of work -- Tim and I went to the local AMC theatre and watched the film, POM Wonderful presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold, directed by Morgan Spurlock. I really quite enjoyed it. There is a fair amount of humor throughout the show. If you're looking for a film to supplement your 4 year degree in marketing and advertising, this will leave you a little short of your goal. You're not going to come away a mastermind of the ad world but it is insightful and entertaining.

David Ferguson's review of the film is good. I interpret his writing style to say, "you start with an F! Now impress me and I might give you a B." Either way, its good to hear both sides. He said,

"I have spent some time thinking about this and I will stick to my conclusion. What the movie doesn't do is provide any insight or detail into what drives product placement in entertainment. However, the movie does a decent job showing us how presentations are made to advertising managers at companies, and it leans heavily on Mr. Spurlock's often-hilarious viewpoint of situations (Mane & Tail shampoo)."

I would have to disagree, though it's never said explicitly, the between the lines of this film is all about what drives product placement. A few times he did make reference to it, ie. TiVo and the World Wide Web. And lets be honest with ourselves, very, very rarely do you go to a national cinema to be educated. That's what NOVAs for.

As for me, I felt like I did learn something AND I was entertained. Morgan is a strange man. He's quite funny and very quick. I won't spoil the whole movie for you but at one point he's talking to the chief marketing officers of BAN and he asked them how they would describe their product and with blank stares they said nothing. After a few moments one of the said, "Superior technology. BAN is superior technology". Morgan replies something along the lies of, "Really? People don't want to put technology in their arm pit."

On a scale of 1-10 I'd give it a 7.5. Go see it. You'll laugh and hey, you may even learn something.

My Best Joke Yet... And Probably Ever

2011-05-20T16:38:00.004-06:00

Unintentionally, I came up with my best joke to date… Why did Apple Inc.'s name for Final Cut Pro 7 jump to Final Cut Po X (10)? Because 7, 8 9. Yes the punchline isn't original but neither is Jay-Z's song, Young Forever, and it's still good. If you're still saying I don't get it, I feel sorry for you.

Now that I'm done proving myself… We wrapped a little early today which was not a bad thing at all. Today detoured a little from the purpose of this shoot, film 3 commercials, as we ended up filming some great interviews and other footage. We also filmed a guy named Joe. He uses a multi-million dollar laser to do precision cutting of steel. Cool technology and a super cool dude. As Tim put it, "he resembles Willie Nelson."

We used two AF100 panasonic cameras on the interviews. One with a Nikon 50mm f/1.8 and the other, Tim's 50-135mm f/2.8 Pentax. Both work really good in interview situation. Attached to the two AF100s are SmallHD's DP6 monitors. Tim turned me onto them a while back and it's been one of the best additions to the AF100 kit. I've stuck a few pictures in this post so you can see them in action. …sorta. Tomorrow is a broll day of Columbus and the surrounding countryside. Clouds are finally breaking today after hard rain since Monday. It should be a stellar day for Columbus beauty shots.

Rogue Fitness Commercial Shoot - Columbus, Ohio

2011-05-17T22:02:00.002-06:00

I've brought Tim Irwin with me on a commercial shoot for Rogue Fitness this week and while making our way here we stopped off in an airport and while changing planes we encountered this. Pop quiz… What is this and where is it?

Day 2 here the beautiful capitol city of Ohio -- Columbus -- if you haven't freshened up on your geography lately. The last time I was here was during The Arnold Classic a few months back and the weather is pretty much the same, cold, windy and wet. Although it is now 40 degrees and not 19 so there is green on the trees.

We're shooting with two Panasonic AF100s and a mix of Lumix, Nikon, Sigma and Pentax lenses. We also have a small slider dolly that has been fun to use a bit too. Mostly, however, we're sticking to our guns -- handheld and sticks. Today consisted of welding, drilling, cutting, scraping, grinding, pressing...a lot of 'ings. The commercials are gonna be great and the concepts are pretty solid but quite simple, just the way we like it. I've been going overboard lately and complicating a lot of things when in the end we need a solid storyline and stellar footage. Luckily we have five more day of just that!

We have a 4 card SDHC offloading solution for now (this post talks about the problem). It works well -- we just offloaded 4 16GB shot cards to redundant drives at once (see the picture below) and had no problems. It just isn't as clean as the cube with four slots. It consists of a Belkin USB four port hub, two Lexar Professional compactflash/SD card readers, a SanDisk reader and the MacBook Pro SDXC card slot. To offload the footage we're using the trusty ShotPut Pro application. Love, love love it! And checking all offloaded footage in Final Cut Pro (soon to be Final Cut Pro X -- AND we'll be able to edit in the native codec rather than transcode everything)!