MediaCollege.com Blog http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php Tips & tricks, industry news and professional commentary. en Sat, 07 Nov 2009 13:14:24 GMT vBulletin 60 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/images/misc/rss.jpg MediaCollege.com Forum - Blogs - Official MediaCollege.com Blog by Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php Subscribe with My Yahoo!Subscribe with NewsGatorSubscribe with My AOLSubscribe with BloglinesSubscribe with NetvibesSubscribe with GoogleSubscribe with Pageflakes New Motion Stabilization Software http://feeds.mediacollege.com/~r/mc-blog/~3/Q3uxLPX_tsM/blog.php Mon, 27 Jul 2009 09:19:54 GMT First, the bad news: This is still in the research stage and won't be available for perhaps a couple of years.

The good news: A new approach to image stabilization appears to give dramatically improved results over current software. The new approach creates a 3-D model of a scene from shaky video footage, then recreates the camera movement to simulate a nice linear or parabolic track.

See the whitepaper and video here and story in New Scientist here. ]]> Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=49 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=49 Blog Back in Business http://feeds.mediacollege.com/~r/mc-blog/~3/1roSjU8UxQg/blog.php Mon, 13 Jul 2009 01:48:36 GMT It's been quite a long time since I posted anything in the MediaCollege.com blog. I won't bore you with excuses, I just want to let our subscribers know that I'm back and looking forward to posting again.

I'm hoping to do lots of work on the website this year and I have lots of ideas for new material. Unfortunately one of my biggest tasks is to update old material; for example, much of our web design tutorials need updating to include recent developments in the industry.

There are also many video and audio tutorials that are looking very old - I'll get to work on them ASAP.

Before too long I really want to introduce a new video sharing section. This is perhaps the most exciting new feature I have planned but I still need to tackle the issue of which software to use for it. That's a long story and I'll get back to it in another post. In the meantime please let me know if you'd be interested in uploading your (original) videos to MediaCollege.com. These can be anything from tutorials to short films. Perhaps a section for showreels and demos would also be good.

Anyway, enough talk... I've got work to do. ]]> Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=48 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=48 Youtube Goes Widescreen http://feeds.mediacollege.com/~r/mc-blog/~3/Aj0Mu68DcH4/blog.php Wed, 26 Nov 2008 09:42:04 GMT At last! I logged in today to see the long-awaited change. 16x9 videos (http://www.mediacollege.com/video/aspect-ratio/16x9.html) can now be seen as they were meant to. Older videos appear to either... At last! I logged in today to see the long-awaited change. 16x9 videos can now be seen as they were meant to. Older videos appear to either keep the 4x3 player or get pillared inside a 16x9 player. All good.

BTW, if you want to link directly to the high-quality version of a Youtube clip, add &fmt=18 to the end of the URL. For uber-quality add &fmt=22. ]]> Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=47 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=47 RED Announcement http://feeds.mediacollege.com/~r/mc-blog/~3/Qr4NMe_LoO0/blog.php Thu, 13 Nov 2008 21:39:49 GMT RED's DSMC (Digital Stills and Motion Camera) System is now official. In case you haven't heard, RED is probably the most talked-about and hyped new camera system in years. It's had rave reviews from such notables as Peter Jackson.

The main points are:
- It's an affordable system for those of us that don't have multi-million dollar budgets.
- The quality and specs are up there with the million-dollar versions.
- It's a truly modular system, allowing you to buy and replace parts of the camera as required. This begins with the "brain" at the center of the camera.

There's too much to talk about - you really have to see the website and browse the photos etc. Try not to drool on your keyboard.
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]]> Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=46 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=46 Adobe Customer Support http://feeds.mediacollege.com/~r/mc-blog/~3/x-35pQIm-uA/blog.php Wed, 12 Nov 2008 04:35:14 GMT Over the last few weeks I've had my first real experience with Adobe Customer Care/Support. Before I get to the rant I'll say that the person who dealt with my case tried her best to help me and ultimately she did - the issue is now resolved. However the experience was less than impressive and left me wondering "How could such a clever company have such an impotent customer support system?"

Here's the story...

Oct 16th: I purchased Adobe Master Collection from the Adobe Store (www.adobe.com). I opted for the download version which came to nearly 15GB - about half my total monthly data cap. Unfortunately one file became corrupt during the download and had to be downloaded again (5GB). Eventually I managed to get a working file and stay within my data allowance (just). The installation went well enough but I was a bit confused about the splash screen in Photoshop (see attached imaged below) - apparently this application was called "Stonehenge" instead of Photoshop.

Oct 18th: I received an email from the Adobe Online Store Team telling me that there had been a mistake at their end. The files they had provided for download were for a pre-release version instead of the final version (which explained Stonehenge - it was the beta codename). They apologized and told me I could either download the correct version or request a complimentary DVD box set from Adobe Customer Support. With no way to download the files again I decided to go with the box set.

Oct 20th: I contacted Adobe Customer Support as instructed but they knew nothing about this issue. Eventually the operator advised me to forward the original email to an email address she provided. I did so, and in the email I again explained the whole situation and my desire to take the box set offer. I included my customer ID and order number.

Oct 30th: I submitted a ticket to Adobe Support via my online account telling them that I hadn't received a reply to my email. I included previous details and case number.

Nov 2nd: I got a response to my ticket. They advised me to forward the original email to the same address I previously forwarded it to. The ticket was closed from their end and marked "resolved". I dutifully forwarded the email again.

Nov 4th: Adobe contacted me by phone to confirm my serial number. I was told that the issue would be escalated and resolved shortly. An hour or so later they called me back to inform me of the "solution" - all I needed to do was download the correct files and reinstall the software. I reminded them that I already knew this and I had previously explained why I could not do it (twice). I reminded them of their offer to send me a box set and my attempts to take them up on the offer. The operator appeared confused but told me she would forward the issue to the appropriate people.

Nov 6th: I got a phone call from Adobe Customer Care telling me that my case had been closed and I would receive the DVD box set in 5-7 working days.

Nov 10th: I got the DVD set. It took all day to remove the previous version and reinstall but at last I was happy.

All in all this was a very poor response by Adobe. My advice if you work for a company that cares about customer support:

(1) If you have a known issue that affects a lot of people, and you advise them to contact Customer Support for the solution, you should tell Customer Support about it first.
(2) Don't close a support ticket until it has been sorted out. There are few things more infuriating than being told your issue is resolved when it isn't. Adobe did this to me twice in one ticket.

It can't be that hard to get this right. Suggestion: A database of known issues where each issue gets a code number. Give that code number to affected users and say "Quote this issue number to your customer support representative". They then look it up on the database and dish out the appropriate solution.
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]]> Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=45 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=45 More holograms http://feeds.mediacollege.com/~r/mc-blog/~3/ZwH9BFjFWgY/blog.php Thu, 06 Nov 2008 21:19:00 GMT Back in September I blogged about a live hologram (http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=33) being broadcast from Australia to New Zealand. This week CNN introduced their own version which... Back in September I blogged about a live hologram being broadcast from Australia to New Zealand. This week CNN introduced their own version which also looked very impressive. Check out the story here, which includes a link to a behind-the-scenes video.

I think the CNN team might be a little carried away with their own success in using phrases like "never-before-seen image" and "you've never seen anything like this on television". Technically they may be right - I'd only previously seen this technology on the Internet, but I'd be surprised if this was really the first time it had been shown on TV.

I find myself wondering if the "wow factor" will continue to outweigh the production cost. That's a lot of expense for a shot that doesn't actually provide much more content than a traditional two-way setup with one camera at each end. I guess time will tell.

I'm also not convinced by the blue halo. Apparently it was put there intentionally to avoid confusion but it spoiled the effect for me, especially after seeing the one in New Zealand that had no such artifact. If it really was done intentionally I think they need to scale it down a lot.

One last thing - as far as I can tell the CNN hologram is only designed to show up on a television screen. It doesn't actually appear in the studio itself (which is why there's a red laminate on the floor - so the presenter knows where to look). The Australia/New Zealand version beamed a hologram right on stage in front of a live audience. That's an important difference.

Whichever way you look at it though, it's impressive technology. I'm looking forward to it maturing. ]]> Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=43 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=43 Extreme Visual Computing http://feeds.mediacollege.com/~r/mc-blog/~3/6lWwVhsNF94/blog.php Thu, 23 Oct 2008 07:54:12 GMT If you're into serious immersive AV displays, you have to have a look at the World's Most Technologically Advanced Planetarium. It's a stunning look at where computer displays are going. The whole article is five pages but there are plenty of pictures ;)

It's worth the read. I was practically foaming at the mouth. ]]> Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=42 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=42 Dreaming in Monochrome http://feeds.mediacollege.com/~r/mc-blog/~3/GnzknBWT6bc/blog.php Tue, 21 Oct 2008 10:01:33 GMT Among the many mysteries of dreaming is the fact that some people dream in colour and some people dream in monochrome (black and white). Why is this? It's often reported that there's a correlation between vibrant personalities and vibrant dream-colours although I'm skeptical about that claim. Some people don't believe we dream in black and white at all; rather, there is simply the absence of any colour information (i.e. the colour is "unspecified").

Maybe the real answer is simply that we watch too much TV. Researchers have concluded that monochrome dreamers are more likely to be over 55 years of age and brought up watching black and white TV. My first reaction is again skepticism but maybe there is something in it.

Do you dream in B&W? Did you have a B&W TV when you were young? ]]> Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=41 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=41 Adobe CS4 Reviews http://feeds.mediacollege.com/~r/mc-blog/~3/YvZ5Gq3XEAI/blog.php Sat, 18 Oct 2008 09:12:29 GMT Adobe CS4 is out! It caught me on the hop a bit, I wasn't expecting it until November. Anyway, I managed to download the Master Collection, play with it for a day and then scribble down my initial thoughts in this review. I've also done a slightly more in-depth review of Premiere Pro CS4. Hopefully I'll be able to expand and add more reviews over the next month or so. ]]> Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=38 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=38 TV station guilty of subliminal advertising http://feeds.mediacollege.com/~r/mc-blog/~3/SyXXlyz2O0E/blog.php Wed, 08 Oct 2008 22:32:46 GMT The Australian Communications and Media Authority (http://www.acma.gov.au) has found Network Ten (http://ten.com.au/) guilty of using subliminal advertising during the 2007 Aria Music Awards.... The Australian Communications and Media Authority has found Network Ten guilty of using subliminal advertising during the 2007 Aria Music Awards. Single-frame shots of sponsor logos were flashed during the broadcast in a technique thought to increase consumer brand awareness and action.

The network is only getting a slap on the hand. I think they should count themselves lucky - it is well known that subliminal advertising is illegal and trying this trick in the 21st Century is pretty stupid really.

Or is it? Not only do the sponsors get the initial round of advertising but their names are also rehashed every time the news story is quoted (except in this blog post where I'm purposely leaving them out). Maybe Network Ten is working on the premise that any publicity is good publicity.

As for whether this type of subliminal advertising actually works, that's open to debate. Wikipedia mentions several studies in which consumer choice is said to be affected by subliminal advertising. It does appear that in the right circumstances, subliminal advertising can have some effect on some people. However there isn't much evidence that it is any more effective than traditional advertising.

In the worst case, at least it gets your sponsors in the news. ]]> Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=37 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=37 Adobe CS4 Preview http://feeds.mediacollege.com/~r/mc-blog/~3/7c0xsOjetTM/blog.php Tue, 23 Sep 2008 23:38:55 GMT In a nutshell, CS4 highlights include:

Premiere Pro: Native AVCHD support! Woohoo! Also "speech search" which allows you to transcribe audio and search for words in the video. Reports on how well this works vary - don't expect too much.

After Effects: Photoshop 3D layer import. New "Mocha" tracking application.

Encore: Firewire output for monitoring. Pop-up menu for Blu-ray support. Enhanced Flash output (automatically make a Flash version of a DVD).

Soundbooth: Multi-track support!

Photoshop: 3D painting and compositing tools. Enhanced motion graphics editing. Rotate canvas to any angle. Content-Aware Scaling (automatically recompose an image as you resize it). Sync visual effects to an audio track.

On Location: New interface (in line with other Adobe apps). Mac support.

Flash: New motion editor, similar to After Effects. New 3D tool.

It all looks quite nice, with some great new features. However I'm not exactly blown away by the feature list. There's a lot of tweaking and "enhancements" and not so many completely new features. I've pre-ordered the complete version and I'll be back to post a review once I get my hands on it. ]]> Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=36 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=36 ExitReality Review http://feeds.mediacollege.com/~r/mc-blog/~3/KFKwK6Gd3Tw/blog.php Fri, 19 Sep 2008 01:16:02 GMT ExitReality (http://www.exitreality.com/) is a new browsing and social networking system that allows you to navigate any existing website in 3 dimensions. I watched the video and was impressed enough... ExitReality is a new browsing and social networking system that allows you to navigate any existing website in 3 dimensions. I watched the video and was impressed enough to download the required plugin (Windows-only, 3.5MB).

Getting started couldn't be easier. As soon as I'd found a suitably bald avatar I was wandering around my own websites in 3-D.

The possibilities looked amazing - for example, I could make a custom 3-D version of MediaCollege.com with big screen TVs showing videos in different rooms. I could make the website into an apartment, gallery, airplane or alien landscape.

Unfortunately things soon started going wrong. I was running Firefox 3 and IE7 on a pretty grunty quad-core PC with 4MB RAM, but after about 10 minutes the ExitReality application began faltering. At one stage my point of view fell upside down and I couldn't get the right way up again. Eventually it all fell over and a restart was required.

Still keen, I started trying to customize one of my websites. This wasn't as easy or as much fun as I'd hoped. The help files aren't very comprehensive and I found myself struggling to get anything interesting happening. About 1/3 of the themes I tried didn't work at all.

I started wondering about how committed I was to this experiment. I decided to have a bit more of a general surf using ExitReality and see what other sites were offering. The answer: Not much. There are two types of websites in ExitReality:
(1) Sites that have been customized to work with ExitReality. These look promising but of course there aren't many available yet.
(2) Sites that have not been customized and appear using the default 3-D layout. Frankly, although the first impression is good, all you get is a slower and more difficult way to navigate.

Of course there's the social aspect but I'm dubious. If I want to be social there are much better ways to do it.

ExitReality is brand new - I was trying it within a couple of hours of launch - so it would be unfair to expect a lot of content or socializing. However there's a real chicken-and-egg problem: As an end user there's nothing for me to see, and as a web publisher there's no incentive for me to make a big effort providing content when there's no audience.

And that's the central problem - if web designers don't get on board, the whole idea is a flop. There needs to be more incentive for website owners - perhaps some promotional opportunities or prizes.

As I often do, I'll sit back and wait for the market to pronounce judgment before I have another go at ExitReality. I think this service has an uphill battle ahead of it and I lack the motivation to help them fight it.
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]]> Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=34 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=34 Live Events via Hologram http://feeds.mediacollege.com/~r/mc-blog/~3/eLB2KM08Xao/blog.php Wed, 17 Sep 2008 00:13:58 GMT As reported at stuff.co.nz this morning, "a walking, talking image of Australian chat show host Rove McManus was beamed across the Tasman yesterday to appear live on stage at Auckland's Vector Arena." Telecommunications company TelstraClear is promoting the technology for both business and home use, although the latter is still several years way.

Is this also the future of larger-scale "live" appearances? With increasing concerns about the environmental impact of touring acts, might this be an attractive alternative? I can imagine a specialist venue, integrated with a standardized protocol for such events, used solely for the purpose of attending live gigs taking place on the other side of the world.

Pros: Cheap, efficient, green.
Cons: Not quite real (but still much better than current 2-D tele-gigs).

With two-way video-conferencing so the band can see and interact with the audience, I reckon this could become acceptably close to being "real".
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]]> Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=33 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=33 How to work with a click-track http://feeds.mediacollege.com/~r/mc-blog/~3/YDhwTE4VCnY/blog.php Sun, 14 Sep 2008 23:33:31 GMT Here's one for the musos out there. It's a subject that I recall well from my own days in the music industry - how to work with a metronome or "click track" when recording your material. It's not an easy thing to get used to but it's quite an important skill if you want a professional production (unless you're sure that your music doesn't need a consistent tempo).

Read the complete article here. ]]> Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=32 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=32 I want my own holodeck http://feeds.mediacollege.com/~r/mc-blog/~3/iauSSpn2VT8/blog.php Sat, 13 Sep 2008 01:42:53 GMT It's not quite Star Trek standard but this one might do for now... The Immersive Cocoon is an enclosed virtual-reality pod being developed by international design collective NAU.

Have a look at the Flash demo and tell me you're not drooling for one as well. ]]> Dave http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=31 http://www.mediacollege.com/forum/blog.php?b=31