04.24.07
Apple’s dirty little secret…
There’s not one Apple product or service that ‘just works.’ Not one.
04.16.07
Moving right along…
Hey, I’m getting my act together here.
Just landed a job as more or less an online editor, for a project shot in DV. The catch is that it was shot in a 24fps simulating camera mode, but isn’t really 24fps footage, and any other final cut pro settings you can think of were probably also adjusted into wrongness. Then there’ll be color correcting and some light VFX.
Also interviewed today for another post, as an on-set editor. That’d mean dumping P2 cards and assembling footage, while everyone else runs around making a movie. And because I’m tied up with one and then maybe the other of these things, I got to turn down some grip work for the week. Even with a current job, I find myself applying and checking the ads as much as ever, since I’m getting the best rate-of-reply to craigslist ads I’ve ever gotten…which is probably still less than 50%. I could almost start to fret about not getting the thing that comes next before remembering that I’ve actually got a decent gig at the moment.
And even though it’s probably paying what really ought to be the bare minimum acceptable amount for the kind of work being done, everything else thus far has paid so much worse that it seems like a ton of money. It’s got me thinking of all the fantastic things I can purchase now! I mean, I’m not trying to brag or anything, but I’m thinking of purchasing a bed pretty soon.
I’ve also made some things for people looking for someone to do motion graphics and titling. They’re not great, but it’s a little AEX practice here and there.
I also seem to be running around more, maintaining a steady diet of one episode of Homicide: Life on the Streets per night, and sorting through a lot of on-set photos and such. Those’ll find their way over to flickr soon enough.
04.11.07
1,112: Foreign Correspondent
Yeah, I know how to strike up and operate a carbon arclight. You don’t? Should’ve had the inventor of banded cable and dozens of everyday, household professional film lighting instruments show you….
I’m getting faintly more post-oriented. The PC is up and running, if not with full accoutrements. What a mess! Losing that editing drive, then mostly recovering that editing drive, it’s left fragments of work all the hell over the place. I used to have a system for keeping things findable across my many hard drives. Complex, but a system. Now it’s everything everywhere. Without adding drives, I don’t really have the space to put everything right. The obvious solution is to finally (as in ultimately) complete and put to rest various old things, and burn off backups of whatever is going to need it.
Also considering making one of those “Hey, here’s a lot of stuff I’ve worked on all chopped up into one big music video that doesn’t really show you anything at all about the original work itself” things that people like to see. Of course, a lot of work is in Premiere’s DV codecs, and Final Cut refuses to play nice. I’m excited for Premiere CS3, especially since I could run it on a mac if I had to. I want to see it suck up market share, but I suspect I won’t get to use it for money any time soon. Shame.
Another post I wrote most of and then abandoned for days. It started strong, like Foreign Correspondent, which was great for at least an hour or so, and then gets muddied, slightly confusing and less interesting, and lands in the sea.
04.01.07
Updates, in brief
So…Zombies Ate My Prom Date wrapped its principal photography a week ago. I was kind of sorry to see it go, but I’ll be glad to see it come back, in the form of a finished and hopefully fun to watch flick with monsters and such.
I put in a couple days on a short about what can happen when you’re drinking but can’t use your hands for anything except more drinking. It’s primary social circle was the Tonight Show.
Then there was another Cougars taping. They sort of paid me to sit and enjoy an hour or two of sketch comedy. One sketch, over and over, but still. (Karmically, this balances out sitting in a tiny apartment for two days under 4k watts of light for free).
After both of those AND the zombie movie, there was a short called ‘paranormalists.’ The PSCs of which include a school in Ohio and New Line Cinema. I don’t know if it was/will be any good, but I sure learned a lot. I learned about picking up a grip package from a rental house. I learned about the thorough use of flags and nets when presented with only three lamps, all of which are too strong for the small location. I learned that even google maps doesn’t get it right everytime. I learned how to build and strike down a PortaJib in 15 minutes or less. I learned that it can be important to make sure the co-workers one refers to the production will be reliable, and as a corollary to that, who will be the first to get axed by a production that suddenly needs to decrease its expenses.
Oh, and there’re the fortnightly question testing sessions for ODVD.
All of that is what I’ve been up to. Along with attempts to get to the Tomorrow Show (saw Scott Thompson last time I went) and ASSSSCAT at UCB on weekends when work doesn’t preempt ‘em. And yourself?