From the Archives: Effective Sound Effects

A few years ago, I wrote an article for Virtual Instruments Magazine on how to use sound effects to help spice up sound tracks and underscores. These same techniques can be used to cover otherwise-awkward edits in soundtracks, and to help tie an otherwise generic piece of stock music more closely to the theme of your video. It has now been re-posted to the ProAudio Coalition channel; click here to view it.

The content contained in our books, videos, blogs, and articles for other sites are all copyright Crish Design, except where otherwise attributed.

TecnoTur episode 2 (English): Radio Lollipop + Matrox’s announcements at NAB 2010

TecnoTur episode 2 (English) is now available, and includes an interview with Radio Lollipop, and with Matrox regarding all pro video announcements at NAB 2010. Brittany Smith of Radio Lollipop —an international radio network based in the UK, with affiliate stations in children’s hospitals throughout the world— tells TecnoTur about her background in commercial radio, and her current position at Radio Lollipop. Then Rubén Abruña and Allan Tépper travel to NAB 2010 in Las Vegas and interview Wayne Andrews, a Matrox pro video product manager. Wayne tells us about ProRes422 encoding in Windows, compatibility with Avid MC5, and MAX 2.0 with scene analysis and VBR encoding.

MONOGRAM’s BCC is a portable studio that changes the rules of the game

When people first hear about MONOGRAM’s BCC (Broadcast Case) production TV studio in a box, some of them mistakenly assume that it is a copycat of existing portable TV studio systems that have been on the market for a while. However, as soon as they get closer or hear more about it, they realize that it is quite the contrary. I had never seen a touch-screen interface before on a vision mixer (“switcher”), let alone for an entire portable production studio with onboard audio mixer, character generator, 4:2:2 recorder, and H.264 video streamer. I had also never heard of one with an onboard intercom system, yet alone one that could even power the cameras over a unique combined camera cable, which unifies SDI (or HD-SDI), power, intercom, and even tally information in one very manageable enclosure. In this article, you’ll learn how unique and groundbreaking the BCC really is.

TecnoTur’s new English audio channel is live in iTunes

We are glad to announce that TecnoTur’s new English-language audio channel has joined the original Castilian-language one. Now, many other interested people —even those who don’t speak Castilian— are able to become TecnoTuristas too, as well as being guests on the TecnoTur program. The TecnoTur program will continue to invite industry professionals from throughout the planet to be interviewed. Now, with the English channel, TecnoTur will expand both its number of listeners as well as its scope of interviewees. As of today, TecnoTur’s new English channel is live on the iTunes store, and as with the original Castilian channel, listeners may subscribe —free of charge— to receive new episodes automatically in the iTunes application. It is also possible to listen to an individual episode without subscribing, or to subscribe to the RSS feed using other applications. The first English episode includes:

Look What I Found In The MGM Grand Monorail Station

I hear vending machines like this are everywhere in Japan, but are really rare here in the States.  So if you find yourself in Las Vegas with a sudden need for an iPod, some headphones or a USB memory key and all the other stores are closed, Best Buy Express to the rescue!  Amazing.

BCC/Broadcast Case portable video mixer to be shown at NAB 2010

It just came to my attention that the BCC/Broadcast Case will be shown at NAB 2010. BCC/Broadcast Case is the name of a portable audio/video mixer (aka “switcher” in the USA). According to the manufacturer, the device uses an intuitive touch-screen interface which helps to reduce the shlep factor in mobile production, and offers 12 inputs, 8 of which can be camera/video inputs. Supported cameras range from composite video to SD-SDI, HDMI, and HD-SDI. Also, the BCC/Broadcast Case boasts a unique integrated interconnection, which combines the video signal, power, and intercom signals.

Canon EOS 5D Mark II Software Update Announcement!

While I haven’t made the leap to SLR-video shooting, I know a lot of you have, and the Canon EOS 5D Mark II is the tool of choice for many.  However, I have read of complaints of 30FPS instead of 29.97and no 24P modes, among others.  Well, it looks like your wishes will be granted, with a FREE firmware upgrade (did I mention it’s FREE?)

I apologize for the size of the picture, but it has to be big to be readable.  Enjoy.

NewTek’s TriCaster TCXD300 ignites 3rd multicam revolution, now in HD

Any video professional with a couple of decades of experience under her/his belt will remember the original Video Toaster, which was a card that ran in a Commodore Amiga computer, and (among many others) included the infamous Kiki wipe. Despite very minor defects, the original Video Toaster —in its era— represented a revolution for multi-camera live (or live-on-tape) productions. Now NewTek has given birth to the HD-capable version of the 3rd-generation product. The TriCaster TCXD300 is an amazing standalone box that works in either SD or HD, and can record internally or externally, in addition to encoding live webcasts in HD. It has a high quality character generator and includes virtual sets. After attending an intense, multiple-hour demonstration in Miami, conducting a radio interview for both of TecnoTur’s audio channels (the current Castilian channel, and the upcoming English channel) with two TriCaster team members, and a followup e-mail interaction with NewTek’s executive VP of engineering, I now know that there is no exaggeration in stating that the TriCaster TCXD300 is indeed the 3rd multicam revolution for HD live-to-disk, HD live-to-air, or HD live-to-web production. Experience many of the details in this article.

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