The Quicktime Conundrum, Part 2: Solved by our Readers

A couple of great suggestions for creating flawless H.264 Quicktime—and Flash!—movies popped up in the comments section of my last article. They deserve their own article.

The Quicktime Conundrum

There’s nothing like waking up in the morning and realizing that your chief marketing tool is probably driving away more clients than it’s attracting.

Quicktip Day 26: Saving EDL Comments in Avid

Quicktip #26 (February 26, 2009) Making EDL comments in an Avid EDL

If you are sending an edit to online via an EDL you can add comments for the online editor that can appear in the EDL. First select a clip you want to add comments via Segment mode:

Then click on the edit sequence name above the record monitor and choose Add Comments…:

Type in your comments in the Comments window:

Those comments will show up in the EDL:

If you can’t see the comments make sure the Comment box is checked in the Comments tab under EDL Settings.

HPA Technology Retreat 2009

How is the Tech Retreat like (and unlike) a location shoot? Why does New York’s Metropolitan Opera put ten minutes of solid white at the tail end of each live HD cinemacast?

How to Avoid Common Freelancing Pitfalls

Just a quick blog entry to note a good article over at Freelance Folder on why Freelancing is hard, and what you can do to alleviate your pain as much as possible. Check out the article here.

Law, nonsense, and predatory dinosaurs

Sympathy for the typo

Pouncing on a typo may seem petty.  For one thing, everyone makes them, and they sometimes survive endless diligent re-readings.  But they can cost big time, and not only when the typo consists of a misplaced decimal point in a dollar amount.  In one famous dispute a telecommunications company risked losing millions because a single misplaced comma made the renewal term ambiguous.  The issue was resolved, but not until a decision, an appeal, and lots of expert testimony about what the placement of a comma signifies.

Sweetening the Depresso

Suddenly, Hollywood Seems a Conservative Investment, writes Brooks Barnes in The New York Times. His thesis? “Wall Street, real estate, the art market — all of those other supposedly stable investment areas — are now such a mess that Hollywood is one of the safer places you can park money.” But, he goes on to say, it’s not the established players as much as indies who can exploit these shifts in economic fortunes. “The big studios probably won’t be able to rely much on this pitch. Their upfront needs are too big ... and Wall Street and the real estate market may sort themselves out before their current slate deals expire. ... But for independent producers — especially ones that operate in a transparent manner — the strategy could offer a lifeline.” He does warn that it’s not the art-house pics that will get this funding; you still need to have a commercially viable pitch. Remember, there’s a reason it’s called “show business”, not “show art”.

NAB 2009: no RED tent

RED Digital Cinema’s Jim Jannard has announced that RED will skip NAB 2009. A delay by a supplier means “too many non-working prototypes at NAB” (no snide comments, please), so RED will skip the big industry confab in favor of their own “RED DAY” event(s).

Both Avid and Apple skipped NAB 2008, and Apple is dropping trade shows altogether in favor of other, more Apple-controlled marketing channels, like Apple Events and customer contact through Apple Stores and the Apple website. RED has often been compared to Apple (mercurial, visionary CEO; “thinking differently”; rabid fanboy community), and this only amplifies the parallels. It’ll be interesting to see if RED returns to IBC or to future NABs, or if they’ll depend on RED owners and third parties like accessory vendors to spread the word henceforth.

So if you want to see the 18-85mm in the flesh (in the glass?) this NAB, or any of the other RED bits that might help you decide on a purchasing plan, better hope that Element Technica, Redrock Micro, Air Sea Land Gear (a.k.a. Toys4RED), and/or View Factor have enough kit in their booths to feed your hunger.

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