Category: General

Categories
Random Thought Video Technology

What other editing interface(s) can we imagine?

During a conversation last night about a new type of touch-screen display that mounts on regular glass (don’t know any more about it than that – hope to get more information shortly and share).

During the discussion I was reminded that in the earliest days of using NLEs (a Media 100 for me at that time) I had fantasies about being able to edit using a 3D display environment, where in this virtual world the clips would be in space or grouped together in some logical order (these days I’d say that was based on metadata groupings) and the editor could simply move clips around, stack them and build the story along a virtual timeline. Even composite by stacking clips.

Not that I ever really developed the idea beyond that trip to my imagination, it does make me wonder if some sort of surface like that being proposed for regular glass, or even maybe a 30″ Cinema Display type screen, that was a full touch-screen surface that supported gestures, etc. Microsoft’s Surface would be close to the sort of experience I’m visualizing.

In thinking about it further I realized that the sort of work we’ve been doing with metadata would tie in nicely. The metadata would be used to group and regroup clips organizationally, but also to suggest story arcs or generally assist the editor.

It’s probably time for a new editing paradigm.

If not for a future version of FCP or Media Composer, perhaps, for iMovie?

Categories
General Presentations

Calendar and bio additions to the blog

It wasn’t until recently that I realized I had no “about Philip” or bio, whatever, on the site, so I’ve added a page so you can find out a little more about me, if you care.

Another addition is the calendar of upcoming presentations. Over then next couple of months I’ll be attending or speaking at the Orange county MCA-I Media Camp tomorrow (Saturday June 20). Media Camp is like a Bar camp, itself a reaction to the O’Reilly FOO (Friends of O’Rielly) exclusive, invite-only conference.  A Bar Camp (Foo Bar, get it?) is the opposite. Anyone is welcome, there’s no formal agenda so you make of it what the participants want to make it.

The Orange County Media Camp is like that – we’ll all be getting together and talking about/planning etc media production and distribution topics. I guess. I won’t know until I get there.

Then there’s DV Expo coming up In September, and the Professional Video Association’s Conference in January 2010 – more on that later but I’ll be presenting a full day on Final Cut Pro titling and a full day on growing your production or postproduction business.

In between I expect to be doing some presentations in Boston, Connecticut and New York and, depending on timing, other user groups or dealers. These will include a full day on New Media – where we’re going and how we’ll make money; and free sessions on how to benefit from First Cuts, Finisher, and Sync-N-Link. We may do the Growing your Business seminar there as well.

I hope to see you at one of the events. If you read the blog, come and say hello.

Categories
General

How has the Internet changed viewing windows for Programs?

I was reading and article on TorrentFreak discussing how the unaired (in the US) finale for Prison Break is already available via bittorrent sites. 

For those not following along, Prison Break wrapped up its run recently, without being renewed. Fortunately the producers and writers had enough notice that they were able to wrap up storylines for a neat ending. (I wish more shows would do that – even if it meant doing a special for the following season to wrap stuff up. But I digress.)

What’s different is that Fox didn’t really show the last two episodes on US television, withholding them for July 21st release on DVD. This is called artificial scarcity, or more accurately an attempt to create scarcity where it really does not exist, since these episodes were shown in non-US territories. The global nature of media consumption being what it is, there’s no way that program owners can artificially limit access, once it’s been broadcast or made available anywhere. 

In fact, it’s one of the things that will drive non-authorized viewing that does not accrue to the producer/copyright owner. 

Here’s the message if you’re a content owner: do not try and manipulate your audience, they’re smarter than you are. If you won’t provide your customers with:

  • the programs they want to watch
  • on the schedule they want to watch them
  • at a “price” they’re prepared to pay

then you don’t have a business any more.

The Internet was designed to route around “damage” (even survive nuclear war). Artificial limitations based on territory might have once worked, but the world has changed. When your environment changes there are two alternatives: adapt or die. Apparently big  media has chosen “die”.

It’s not just this isolated case. When the modern series of Dr Who was held back from US release, but broadcast in the UK, it was downloaded over 5 million times. (Didn’t hurt the ratings though.) Australia, where there are too few outlets for programming anyway, frequently doesn’t get new programming from the major studios until months, or even years, later. Not surprising, Australians download a lot of unauthorized content because the content owners will not provide a legitimate alternative.

What we’re seeing is a broken system where the content owners will not listen to their  customers, so the customers take things into their own hands, providing the product the content owners should have been providing all along.

The fact that content owners want to charge about 2-3 times for every viewing than what they ever got from advertising revenue just adds insult to the “injury” of not serving your customers’ needs.

Like I said, the two choices are adapt or die. The old status quo is not an option.

Categories
Metadata Random Thought

I think there’s a sixth type of metadata

When Dan Green interviewed me earlier in the week for Workflow Junkies, in part about the different types of metadata we’ve identified, Dan commented that he thought we’d get to “seven or eight” (from memory). I politely agreed but didn’t think there were going to be that many. I should have known better.

The “iPhoto disaster of May 09” is actually turning out to be good for my thinking! In earlier versions, iPhoto created a copy of the image whenever any adjustments were made. The original was stored, which explains why my iPhoto folder was almost twice the size of my actual library as reported in iPhoto. iPhoto 09 (and maybe 08, I skipped a version) does things a little differently.

When I changed images while the processor was under load, the image came up in its original form and then – a second or so later – all the corrections I’d made would be applied. It was obvious that the original image was never changed. All my color balance, brightness, contrast and even touch up settings were being stored as metadata, not “real changes”.

The original image (or “essence” in the AAF/MXF world) is untouched but there is metadata as to how it should be displayed. Including, as I said, metadata on correcting every image blemish. (The touch up tool must be a CoreImage filter as well, who knew?)

So, I’m thinking this is a different type of metadata than the five types of metadata previously identified. My first instinct was to call this Presentation Metadata – information on how to present the raw image. Greg (my partner) argued strongly that it should be Aesthetic Metadata because decisions on how to present an image or clip or scene, but I was uncomfortable with the term. I was uncomfortable because there are instances of this type of metadata that are compulsory, rather than aesthetic.

Specifically, I was thinking about Raw images (like those from most digital cameras, including RED). Raw images really need a Color Lookup Table (CLUT) before they’re viewable at all. A raw Raw file is very unappealing to view. Since not all of this type of metadata is aesthetic I didn’t feel the title was a good fit.

Ultimately, after some discussion – yes, we really spend our evenings discussing metadata while the TV program we were nominally watching was in pause – we thought that Transform Metadata was the right name.

Specifically not “Transformative” Metadata, which would appear to be more grammatically correct, because Transformative has, to me, a connotation of the transform being completed, like when a color look is “baked” into the files, say after processing in Apple’s Color or out of Avid Symphony. Transform Metadata does not change the essence or create new essence media: the original is untouched and Transfomed on presentation.

Right now we’re a long way from being able to do all color correction, reframing and digital processing in real time as metadata on moving images as iPhoto does for still images, but in a very real sense an editing Project file is really Transform Metadata to be applied to the source media (a.k.a essence).

This is very true in the case of Apple’s Motion. A Motion project is simply an XML file with the metadata as to how the images should be processed. But there’s something “magic” going on because, if you take that project file and change the suffix to .mov, it will open and play in any application that plays QuickTime movies. (This is how the Project file gets used in FCP as a Clip.) The QuickTime engine does its best to interpret the project file and render it on playback. A Motion Project file is Transform Metadata. (FWIW there is a Motion QuickTime Component installed that does the work of interpreting the Motion Project as a movie. Likewise a LiveType QuickTime Component does the same for that application’s Transform Metadata, a.k.a. project file!)

I think Dan might be right – there could well be seven or eight distinct types of metadata. It will be interesting to discover what they are.

Categories
New Media Random Thought

Why don’t I care if newspapers die?

I was once an avid reader of newspapers – a three-paper-a-day man: the local paper for local news; the capital city daily for national and international news and the national Financial Daily for business news. I now read none and think that the whole industry has the stench of death about it – not financially (although it certainly has) but the quality of work was what sent me away.

Newspapers (and television news) is notoriously inaccurate. There are exceptions. Occasionally a paper will do a great job of investigative reporting and team it with great writing, but this is not the “norm”. Most newspaper content is filled with slightly rewritten press releases, information easily found elsewhere (movie start time, tides, weather, TV program guides, etc) and copied from the real source to the newspaper) and some hastily written article about an event that is full of inaccuracies because the reporter hasn’t a clue about the content.

Do you think I’m judging too harshly? Consider this. Have you ever watched the TV news report, or read a newspaper article, of an event you were part of or participated in? Has that report been 100% accurate? I can honestly say that, of the dozen or so appearances I’ve made in newspaper or TV media, or those associated with other family business where I’ve been privy to the facts, not one report was 100% accurate. Not a single one.

So I have to assume that every article is written with the same sloppy adherence to the facts of the story.

The average newspaper adds very little value. Most of the content is not original reporting – between the previously-mentioned press releases and Associated Press and/or Reuters and fact-based content sourced from elsewhere there’s not much original, true news gathering.

The little there is is easily reproduced elsewhere. For example, local news site Pasadena News outsources the writing to Indian writers. If you’re only rewriting a press release, or reporting the outcome of local council meetings, which are placed online anyway, then the desk could be in Pasadena or Mumbai. Fact checking (if anyone actually does that) is an email or phone call away wherever you are in the world (as long as you’re prepared to deal with time zone issues).

Newspapers, in their current dying form, are not adding a whole lot of value. Instead it’s nostalgia that’s keeping them going – the nostalgia of lazy Sunday mornings with paper, family and coffee, not the delivery of well-researched original reporting.

If we have Associated Press – who have a very useful RSS feed to deliver relevant content directly to me – why do I need the LA Times to print it for me? If they added a local angle, maybe.

Journalism won’t die with newspapers. In fact, contrary to the opinion of some journalists, the blogosphere – the sheer number of people fact checking – has led to some real stories breaking. Remember the Dan Rather/George W Bush faked papers scandal? Or how the citizen reporter who videotaped (and shared) George Allen’s “macacca” moment that lost him re-election in 2006? It seems in many, many recent cases, citizen journalists have out-performed (in aggregate) the established media in uncovering stories.

So, I’ve gone from a three-a-day habit to a zero newspaper life and am better informed about news than ever. I keep track of Australian news and am better informed than my Australian-resident mother. I scored very highly ion the Pew Research Test Your News IQ with a better score than my newspaper-reading, TV news watching friends and associates.

I won’t be dancing on the graves of newspapers, but their failure to adapt and their high minded refusal to see the log in their own eye makes me indifferent to the failure of the whole industry. Let it be replaced with new forms of news-gathering where some accuracy might slip in.

See also: We need a Fifth Estate and Will “amateurs” save democracy from the “professionals”?

Categories
Metadata Random Thought

What is the fifth type of metadata?

Right now I’m in the middle of updating and adding to my digital photo library by scanning in old photos, negatives and (eventually) slides. Of course, the photos aren’t in albums (too heavy to ship from Australia to the US) and there are not extensive notes on any because “I’ll always remember these people and places!” Except I don’t remember a lot of the people and getting particular events in order is tricky when they’re more than “a few” years old, or those that were before my time because a lot have been scanned in for my mother’s blog/journal.

Last time I wrote about the different types of metadata we had identified four types of metadata:

  • Source Metadata is stored in the file from the outset by the camera or capture software, such as in EXIF format. It is usually immutable.
  • Added Metadata is beyond the scope of the camera or capture software and has to come from a human. This is generally what we think about when we add log notes – people, place, etc.
  • Derived Metadata is calculated using a non-human external information source and includes location from GPS, facial recognition, or automatic transcription.
  • Inferred Metadata is metadata that can be assumed from other metadata without an external information source. It may be used to help obtain Added metadata.

See the original post for clearer distinction between the four types of metadata. Last night I realized there is at least one additional form of metadata, which I’ll call Analytical Metadata. The other choice was Visually Obvious Invisible Metadata, but I thought that was confusing!

Analytical metadata is encoded information in the picture about the picture, probably mostly related to people, places and context. The most obvious example is a series of photos without any event information. By analyzing who was wearing what clothes and correlating between shots, the images related to an event can be grouped together even without an overall group shot. Or there is only one shot that clearly identifies location but can be cross-correlated to the other pictures in the group by clothing.

Similarly a painting, picture, decoration or architectural element that appears in more than one shot can be used to identify the location for all the shots at that event. I’ve even used hair styles as a general time-period indicator, but that’s not a very fine-grained tool!  Heck, even the presence or absence of someone in a picture can identify a time period: that partner is in the picture so it must be between 1982 and 1987.

I also discovered two more sources of metadata. Another source of Source Metadata is found on negatives, which are numbered, giving a clear indication of time sequence. (Of course Digital Cameras have this and more.) The other important source of metadata for this exercise has been a form of Added Metadata: notes on the back of the image! Fortunately Kodak Australia for long periods of time printed the month and year of processing on the back. Rest assured that has been most helpful for trying to put my lifetime of photos into some sort of order. The rate I’m going it will take me the last third of my life to organize the images from the first two thirds.

Another discovery: facial recognition in iPhoto ’09 is nowhere near as good as it seems in the demonstration. Not surprising because most facial recognition technology is still in its infancy. I also think it prefers the sharpness of digital images rather than scans of prints, but even with digital source, it seem to attempt a guess at one in five faces, and be accurate about 30% of the time. It will get better, and it’s worth naming the identified faces and adding ones that were missed to gain the ability to sort by person. It’s also worthwhile going through and deleting the false positives – faces recognized in the dots of newspapers or the patterns in wallpaper, etc. so they don’t show up when it’s attempting to match faces.

Added June 2: Apparently we won’t be getting this type of metadata from computers any time soon!

Categories
General

Why are people so stupid?

Well, I haven’t had a real good rant for a while – in fact haven’t written much lately – but I’m finally drive to a good old-fashioned rant against stupidity. There seems to be a lot of it going around right now!

Politicians are an easy target, particularly when they get into any sort of tech areas, where they only open their mouth to demonstrate how stupid they are. For example, Missouri passed a law that text messaging is fine if you’re over 21 if you’re over 21! Stupid! Texting while driving is dangerous, period. Not only is it stupid to have a specific law against it (it’s always distracted driving, which has been illegal for years) but it’s a stupid law. What magically happens on the anniversary of 21 years alive that gives the driver super-powers to focus on two things at once? Stupid!

Then there’s stupid California, who are insisting on taking their (obviously illegal) video-game sales law to the US Supreme Court. They’ve “only” wasted $1 million of tax payers’ money on a law that’s been struck down in 12 rulings in the last eight years as State by State have tried to bring in similar legislation that has always been struck down. Stupid waste of tax payers’ money in a State that’s just about bankrupt. Stupid!

And there’s STUPID, stupid, stupid South Carolina Attorney General Henry McMaster, who tried to go after the principals of Craigslist despite the very, very clear provisions of the DMCA Safe Harbor provisions. (Section 230 of the DMCA if he’d like to look it up.)  Pure political grandstanding from a stupid man who, rightly, now has an injunction against him and his office preventing them from acting. Craigslist quite rightly pointed out they are doing nothing illegal, that there is no legal way to go after the principals of the company and that there are wider and greater “illegal” actions by newspapers and magazines in South Carolina. A stupid man who should be drummed out of office for stupidity alone.

Then there’s the stupid TV broadcasters who’s business model is changing, so they too want a bailout form the Federal Government. Stupid.

But my greatest act of stupidity for the week comes from Podcasting news. In an article “Online Video Advertising…Is Horrible” James Lewin made the strangest comment:

“We already know that ad-supported Internet video is the future.”

Now you can imagine that caught my eye, because I have a pretty much 100% contrary opinion – new media (Internet Video) is very unlikely to be advertising supported. So, I was interested in what was behind the assertion as this forgone conclusion had gone by without me noticing!

Turns out, if you follow the link in the quote, that no such thing was proven. Stupid!

The report they are actually commenting on (through very biased and uninformed eyes imnsho) did state that people “were willing” to put up with advertising to watch free video on the net. Not that people wanted to; where happy to; or other qualitative information, just that they would watch advertising to get free video. Woopee. Like that’s news. 

But there isn’t enough advertising to fund new media; advertisers generally are not transferring substantial parts of their budgets to new media and that advertising support is the old media model and failing pretty much at every turn.

And yet, this is the “future”? The only future we’re considering? Even when their own report on the survey concludes with:

“The research suggests that people trying to make money with video podcasts and short-form Internet video may need to look for options other than traditional intrusive ads.”

How stupid is that? And yet, these type of stupid people have jobs! They have employers who obviously know less than they do and won’t call someone to task for drawing a clearly bogus conclusion (is the future) in one article that is not supported by the referenced article. Now that’s clearly stupid.

It’s particularly stupid when the New York Times is reporting in an article titled Ad Revenue on the Web? No Sure Bet that web startups are looking beyond advertising as a business model. (Well, d’oh, what have I been saying for the last two years?)

It’s also stupid when better thinkers in the space, like Chris Brogan, in an excellent post on The Next Media Company says as it’s fifth point:

“Advertising cannot be the primary method of revenue.” 

Anyone who’s not stupid has realized by now that advertising is not going to be the predominant means of supporting new media. It’s not even desirable because as soon as you take in advertising you’re beholden to the advertiser not your audience.

And that’s stupid.

But not as stupid as Sony Pictures CEO Michael Lynton who thinks nothing good can come of the Internet, when the problem is that the company (and it’s CEO) are simply too stupid to adapt to changing business circumstances. That’s another whole level of stupid.

Stupid people. Do not want!

Oh wait, there’s another level of stupid! Commercials between web pages. Just when I hope we’ve reached the ultimate level of stupidity it turns out there’s another stupid person just waiting to be less thoughtful, with less consideration for the real world, than everyone else.

Categories
Item of Interest New Media

What is the future of Internet TV?

In his latest column, The Future of Internet TV (in America) Robert Cringely talks about the success of Hulu and the two dominant modes of distribution: streaming (RTSP) or download (HTTP). Hulu is firmly in the streaming camp while Apple and iTunes are in the download camp. (YouTube acts like streaming in that no download is left that’s easily accessible, but in fact it’s a download mechanism, not streaming.)

Now, I’ve been a long term fan of the download model, being very taken by the efficacy of RSS for this type of distribution. So much so that I helped invent a technology for doing commercial distribution through RSS feeds. Cringely tells of the unsatisfactory experience attempting to stream from Hulu – with rebuffering needed several time, even after they dropped the quality of the stream. RTSP is hard to do well because so much of the delivery channel is beyond the control of the “broadcaster”. But like established business models, they try and shovel their old model into the new channel. Rarely works like that.

By the way, Chris Albrecht has a column on the topic over at NewTeeVee.com with the clever name, Hiccups in the Stream, That Is What They Are.

We love the idea of streaming video over the Internet directly on our television sets. The issue is, when you stream video to your house, you open yourself up to problems you don’t get with progressive download. With streaming you need to get a continuous bandwidth to cover the signal or there are hiccups or temporary freezes in the stream. This can happen on cable systems during peak periods when more people are sharing the neighborhood bandwidth.

Hulu is undoubtedly getting very popular, and will become more so now that Disney are joining the group (with Fox and NBC-U). However Cringely looks at what is a viable business and Hulu, YouTube et al fail. RTSP is expensive, but more importantly, advertising supported media on the Internet has no possibility in covering the cost of production any time soon.

In other words, the model that has sustained television for its life is probably not going to sustain whatever we’re going to call the same thing delivered via the Internet. Funding will have to change. Personally I’d prefer to pay the equivalent to advertising-revenue-per-viewer for a show (because it’s a relatively low 25-75c per viewer per show) and skip the advertising.

Cringely’s suggestion is that Apple, or Google, could easily chip in say $3 billion or so a year for programming production and commission the same shows as are broadcast now (or, in Fox tradition, the same shows with different names) from the same producers that produce the best entertainment now.

This is something I’ve hypothesized on myself so when Cringely is on the same page, I have to go re-examine my thinking. It worries me to agree when so often I don’t.  

Let’s say a 13 episode half season costs from  $32.5 milliion (Friday Night Lights or Mad Men) to say$ 60 million per 12 episodes. There can be some substantial saving if these series were made outside the Hollywood Studio system – probably halving the real cost, but let’s not go there right now.  After all Cringely’s problem is that we can’t pay all those folk in the value chain from non-existent advertising revenue, while they do all get a small, slice of an iTunes Store sale. 

For easy math, let’s say the average hour of “television” is going to cost 50 million per 13 week season, or 200 million for a year’s programming. As we saw in my earlier post about how the numbers stack up for new media, programming in that price range rates 4-5 million viewers (or it’s produced more cheaply or cancelled). Some programming, like the Daily Show, is very viable at 10c per viewer per show.

There is cheaper television. The Daily Show’s $5 million a year deal with Comedy Central buys about 80 TV hours a year. (161 half-hour shows in 2008) so Apple or Google  pick up for $5.5 million or so per year. But the Daily Show is not Prime Time.

$200 million per Prime Time hour per year. $3 billion buys you 15 hours a day or Prime Time Television, with Network standard production and the expectation of Network size audiences. Keep in mind that Prime Time for the networks has been considered 22 hours a week, or an average of around 3 hours a day, not 15 hours a day.

Scale those numbers to Cable size budgets and audiences and an Apple or Google, putting in just 10% of their available cash-on-hand could create the equivalent of a five new Prime Time channels each.

It still seems that NBC-U, ABC-Disney, Fox and CBS need downloadable sales and rental channels more than ever. Clearly they don’t have the power in the argument.

Do I think Apple would ever go directly into the production business? Probably not “willingly” – as a first preference path – but as a bargaining ship against any network that wanted to withhold content….? It’s a very interesting thought. If Apple felt that commissioning the content themselves was in their best interest, they’d do it in a heartbeat. They have the money, it’s only a matter of a decision.

OTOH, I don’t think that will qualify for being ‘new media’ any more than I think Hulu does. My definition, What is New Media anyway?, came to the conclusion that new media is where there is a direct connection between the viewer and the producer. Having Apple commissioning shows would have Apple as the gatekeeper, rather than the network and their advertisers. I suppose getting the prissy advertisers out of the loop might improve the programming by allowing to be more real.  

 

Categories
General Interesting Technology Video Technology

What we learnt from the editor/software face-off at NAB

Let’s start by saying we’re working with a very specific type of video production: trade-show style video where there is an A-roll interview and limited b-roll that goes specifically with the A-roll. These are generally shot on a trade-show booth with shots of product from the booth.

Finisher was originally conceived as the book-end to First Cuts. First Cuts will save documentarians many weeks of work getting to first cuts, with the ability to create first cuts almost instantly while you explore the stories in the footage you have. These cuts are complete with story arc and b-roll. We worked on the assumption that an editor would probably delete the b-roll while they worked on cutting the a-roll into the finished form. (Although not necessarily: I cut one piece while keeping the b-roll around to save me having to go find it again.)

Finisher was suggested by Loren Miller of Keyguides fame who wanted an “editing valet” that would take his a-roll and add b-roll and lower third back in. That suggestion became Finisher.

However, I’ve been long interested in the application to these trade-show type edits that had never been near First Cuts and had to use much simplified metadata. My gut told me that an experienced editor would be faster but the cost effectiveness of a novice with Finisher would be compelling.

I was wrong. As it turned out, I ended up being the editing contender. I was happy about that because I trust my abilities – I’m fast and effective at this type of video. Up against me was the software’s co-developer, Greg Clarke. Greg’s first FCP lessons (other than import XML, export XML, open a Sequence) were on Sunday afternoon ahead of a Tuesday afternoon shootout. To say his editing skills and FCP skills were rudimentary is a huge understatement!

Greg had his edit complete in 27 minutes from being presented with raw footage. (Both competitors saw the footage together in raw form in a new project.) This video shows the Greg + Finisher cut. It’s acceptable but could definitely use an experienced eye.

My cut took 40 minutes to add in lower third and all the b-roll. There is a third cut, which is where I took the Greg + Finisher cut and added my editorial experience to that, which took an additional 11 minutes, for a total of 38 minutes. Yep, almost exactly the same time to get to a finished result.

Until you work on the cost side of the equation. Let’s assume that an experienced editor is going to work for $45 an hour for this type of work. (That’s approximately the Editor’s Guild rate for an assistant on a low budget documentary.) Let’s also assume that we’re paying Interns $15 an hour.

Rounding to nearest quarter hours for easy math, my cut was $33.75 to the producer; the basic Finisher cut would be $7.50 and the Finisher plus novice with editor tidy-up (however you would write that elegantly) would add another $7.50 of craft editor on top of the cost of the Intern cut.

Under half price.

Scaling production

Here’s where it gets exciting (for me anyway – I am easily excited). The Digital Cinema Society and Studio Daily produced some forty videos during NAB 2009 with the talented Chris Knell editing. Let’s assume that Chris got paid the hourly rate he should have and worked 10 hour days (with breaks) to get forty videos done within the week. By rights he should have been paid in the order of $1800 for that time.

One craft editor can tidy and clean four videos an hour (five based on my numbers, but let’s say four). Each video will take an Intern about 30 minutes to prepare a video for the craft editor. We need two Interns to feed the skilled craft editor four videos an hour. (2 Interns producing two cuts with Finisher per hour). Now 10 videos can be produced in 2.5 hours instead of 10 (getting them to the audience faster).

Faster and cheaper: Cost per day is 2.5 x 45 = $112.50 plus 2 x 2.5 x 15 = $75 for a daily total of $187.50. For the four days the editor also gets to enjoy NAB – show or hospitality – and the total cost to the producer is $750, not $1800. The massive reduction in time means that one crew could shoot and edit without damaging their personal health.

So, what I learnt at the Face-off is that Finisher is a tool I can use as an editor (more on that shortly); it helps scale large volume production to get results out faster; and it can substantially reduce the cost of the mass production of these types of video. It was not only Studio Daily producing forty videos but FreshDV, Mac Video and  MacBreak were also producing video and could have achieved similar savings.

Analysis

Both approaches required logging the material. During the Face-off we both trimmed or subclipped our b-roll to individual shots. (Here’s a tip we both used: drop the b-roll clip or clips in a Sequence and add edits, deleting bad sections of b-roll as you go, then convert to independent clips and name something appropriate. Finisher will use the name as metadata).

We also trimmed up our A-roll adding Markers as we went. For Finisher the Markers were added to Sequence Markers and given a duration that the novice wanted to cover with b-roll. I was placing Markers into the A-roll clip – so they would move when I cut the clip – so I could locate where b-roll shots would go based on topic.

What I learnt was that, if I adopted the convention from Finisher and basically added comments to my Markers that matched clip names, I could automate the process of laying in clips to the Timeline – 2 minutes for the Finisher round trip vs 10 or so to do it manually. It’s basically an automation tool.

Plus, as an editor I’d be closer to being finished as I’d place my Markers a heck of a lot better than a novice does/did.

But it’s really in the scaling and cost reduction for mass production that came as a surprise – a pleasant one.

Categories
General

Mik Vitti – Lost in Las Vegas

There have bene many tributes to Mik Vitti but I thought I’d add my thoughts.

When I heard the news Monday morning I went into a mild shock. Mik was a lot younger than I am, and that’s always scary. He also seemed the picture of health. If he knew of the condition that killed him, he never let on.

Mik was a friend both online and in person when I’ve travelled to New York and, of course, at NAB time. So many people have attested to his generosity of spirit, good humor and generally gentle nature.

Appropriately the 2009 NAB Supermeet was dedicated to Mik’s memory with tribute paid by Carey Dissmore and Rob Birnholz and a slideshow of Mik – mostly at user group functions – was presented by Dan Berube.

The International Media Users Group has posted a tribute page.

God speed Mik, you will be missed.