Catching Up

THIS POST FOUND IN DRAFTS-forgot to post…I’ve really missed blogging. I was sick with the blahs almost three weeks and after a long cold spring, I was anxious for spring to break, yet when it did I just sat inside and looked out the windows while spring sprung. It was miserable!!!

In between sneezes and headaches, it was time to prepare the garden, so Bill, with the help of his sons, tilled and Cain and I started some planted some Zinnia seeds for starters. There was planting the garden, weeding, Mother’s Day, weeding, then two days at The Heart Hospital when Bill unexpectedly needed a stint put in. Between Granma days, more weeding, a pre-school graduation, and now tending to the garden each morning. Thanks to my iPhone, I’m able to continue shooting even when life moves a bit fast, so now for a visual accounting of the month of May.

What to do?

I’ve been down with a cold for a few days and watched a lot of video content. Netflix, YouTube, cable television, movies on disc. When you’re passionate about creating your own video content, what is there left to create? So much of what I’ve seen is visually stunning. What seems to be missing is an interesting storyline; one that holds together to the end. These question constantly come to mind but answers never do:

-How to create something of your own while keeping it fresh and interesting?
-Does one create for others’ enjoyment? Or their own?
-Does it really matter if others enjoy what you create?

Since my passion goes to the technical side of a project, so far I am only creating for the sake of creating and would be grateful for feedback from storytellers. In the midst of a valley of endless entertainment, where do you find your inspiration and ideas?

Website

April 9-10 freshened the site with wordsmithing and new skin. Fresh ideas are coming.

DVD Burning

My attempt at DVD burning with Premiere Pro v6 was several days of failed DVD’s. 12 of them to be exact. The DVD burned alright but the resolution was so bad the faces were blurs and the text had jaggies from pixel edges. I worked on this for a total of about 4 days. While on the Adobe site looking for my issue, the chat screen appeared and the REAL troubleshooting began.

Adobe online chat took over 2.5 hours before we had a good DVD burn result.  I’m so happy I thought to set up my Canon Vixia camcorder and video the chat. The Adobe helper took control of my computer, and we communicated using Notepad from my computer. When I had a question, I had to type it and wait for him to notice since me (My taking control of the mouse lead to confusion). For me it wasn’t the best way to remember how to repeat if, but if I didn’t record his moves, I would just be chatting again the next day when my first attempt failed again.

To repeat the success on my own I opened the chat recording, found the successful burn procedure, copied the video to the clipboard…closed Premiere Pro, reopened it>navigated to the show I needed to burn>opened it. After it loaded completely I went to…edit>new>sequence, then pasted the clipboard contents which put my burn procedure on the new sequence. Then I followed the procedure, making notes as I followed. SUCCESS! Now I have a procedure written down, and partially committed to memory.

Premiere Pro 6 DVD burn

 

 

Still frame from 1080 Canon camcorder

DILEMMA:  I’m in a video class at IVY Tech community college. I thought I’d be set in equipment with the Nikon D3s 720 video capabilities. Looking at the video from the camera when making a PSA for project 2, I wasn’t happy with the movie playback. I turned to my point-n-shoot,  Nikon S8100. This little camera shoots a very good video but the exposure wasn’t controllable and I didn’t have a mic input.

RESEARCH: The instructor, Chris Campbell, ordered cameras for the class after he found DV import is not possible with Premiere CS6. The video cameras the class would use were DV cameras. He told us his shopping led him to the Canon M30 for our needs. IVY Tech purchased 6 of them.

I normally would go straight to Sony brand, but Chris’ talk to the class, and video camera forums claim Canon and Panasonic were the way to go, not Sony. Panasonic research uncovered nothing for me so the decisions was CANON! Now to psych myself up into letting go of the cash.

VIXIA HF R30 $366:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/search?Ntt=VIXIA+HF+R30&N=0&InitialSearch=yes&sts=ma&Top+Nav-Search=

Canon site stats R30:

http://www.usa.canon.com/cusa/consumer/products/camcorders/consumer_camcorders/vixia_hf_r30

VIXIA HF M50 $545:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/838768-REG/Canon_M50_HF_M50.html

Canon site stats M50:

http://www.usa.canon.com/cusa/consumer/products/camcorders/consumer_camcorders/vixia_hf_m50

SOLUTION: I purchased this camcorder model for these top reasons…The Canon M50 has a CMOS Pro chip for better image quality (So says Canon).built in 8GB storage, 64GB maximum capacity SD card, mic input, and what I perceived would be a better lens than the Sony G lens. The zoom is 10X so I sacrificed zoom range for lens quality. I can always add a lens to my constantly changing want list, and save for one or sell something to get a lens add-on from Canon.   I love the image quality of this little camera!

Enough for the lengthy set up story. This post was supposed to be showing a still shot from video.

I opened a :08 video clip (1080/60i) in Photoshop CS6.Click and sliding the play control to advance frames, I chose a frame>select all>copy>file>new>ok>paste. That was it. Saved for web and kept the image at maximum quality and 100% size.

Now to find out what 1080/60i means in the specifications.

(This photo from a video frame was a close-up of me holding Brad Paisley tickets, and one of his semi trailers in the background.)

Still from a video

First blog post

Digital photography vs. Film photography- who wins?

Digital-hands down, no question, no comparison, no contest-for me.

I experienced my first glimpse of digital photography in 1997 with the Sony Mavica. As a  salesperson for a camera store, it was wrong to refuse embracing digital as I did for the first few years, yet once I let go of my reservations and began learning this new lingo, I realized it was short sighted of me to hold out.

Now there’s no going back! That stinky darkroom, the unknown after my shutter fires, the ‘locked-in’ confinement of film capture…I don’t want any of it. I’m proud to say trading ISO limitations, grain, and sprockets for pixels, resolution, and megabytes is an excellent trade!