Aug. 24, 2015
News. Training. Insight. 

WELCOME BACK!

It's the middle of the last month of summer. It seems that everyone in the industry is either taking  time off or prepping for IBC in Amsterdam in September.

Me? I found myself waxing philosophical. So, this week, I have two blogs AND a product review of a new RAID from HighPoint Technologies; along with a favorite article from the archives.

In the meantime, our Creative Truths contest continues to generate some great entries. Take a few minutes and share your "Truths" with us.

Our web team has been working on our website. We made several performance improvements over the weekend that more than double the speed of page loading. We are continuing to work on this, as we think we can make our site even faster; which helps you, too.

Teaching starts this week for me, just as our Summer School program winds down. Summer School was a fun exercise for me - teaching both editing craft and technology. I'll have more on this education series in future weeks. You can still register for the nine-session class here.

Enjoy the last remaining days of summer. We'll chat again next week.
 
Larry Jordan
Larry Jordan & Associates


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In This Issue
ShortNotes
RANKED A TOP 5 PODCAST!  
Digital Production Buzz
Our podcast - DigitalProductionBuzz.com - was ranked one of the Top 5 video editing podcasts by Motion Array.  As Tyler Williams wrote:

"Welcome to our ongoing series on great podcasts for creatives. In each post in our series, we'll highlight several podcasts in a topic related to production, creativity, or design. We're going to kick it off with podcasts for video editors.

"Whether you are a professional film editor or you just have to edit together a presentation from time to time, there is something here for everyone. Today we are highlighting 4 general editing podcasts..."

We are in great company. Join us for a new show every week.  Here's the link to the list.
2015 CREATIVE TRUTHS CONTEST
The 2015 Edition of our Creative Truths Contest continues to generate great quotes - and smiles!

Share your aphorisms with the world - win prizes - become wickedly famous! Or, at least have a lot of fun reading the entries!

Enter here -- it's FREE!

THIS WEEK'S WINNERS - AUG. 24

We picked 3 winners this week. Jerry Thompson  is one of them:

Actual comment from an actual client.
Client: "Just use that Michael Jackson song. Nobody will ever know."

See all our winners here.
currentwebinars

Webinars
LAST WEEK'S WEBINAR
Conversations on Craft - Acting

We continue our "Conversations on Craft" by looking at acting.  This week, instead of interviewing one guest, we showcase three wide-ranging interviews on acting from recent episodes of the Digital Production Buzz:
  • James Castle Stevens spent 16 years in Los Angeles as a professional actor. Now he's a director and shares his thoughts on how to succeed as an actor.
  • Suzanne LaChasse is a Los Angeles-based producer and actor. She and her husband, Ryan Williams, own and operate Screen Actors System. 
  • Oliver Hollis-Leick is a trained actor specializing in motion capture. He co-founded "The Mocap Vaults" to train a new generation of motion capture performers and filmmakers.
 All three in one program - tell your acting friends this is a session they don't want to miss.

This title is already in our Video Training Library. Non-members can download a copy here.
THIS WEEK'S WEBINAR
Conversations on Craft - Cinematography

We continue our "Conversations on Craft" by looking at cinematography. This week, we showcase three interviews from recent episodes of the Digital Production Buzz:
  • William LaChasse has been creating unique photographic images since he was six years old. His ad agency work has broken boundaries and created amazing ad campaigns. He is an expert at digital imagery and, in this discussion, explains how he sees a scene.
  • Mark August is a veteran camera operator and filmmaker with 25 years in US Navy as a combat photographer and a veteran of the Desert Storm War in 1991 and Global War on Terrorism in Afghanistan. He is a current member of the Camera Guild local 600, founding member of the Digital Cinema Society,  Veterans in Film and Television (VFT), and currently president of the Society of Camera Operators.
  • Art Adams is a cinematographer with 28 years industry experience. Between shoots he works as a consultant for a number of industry companies including Sony, Sound Devices and DSC Labs, and writes technical and educational articles at ProVideo Coalition and DVInfo.
Registration is FREE - register here!


Buzz
Digital Production Buzz
THE BUZZ - VOTED ONE OF THE TOP FIVE VIDEO EDITING PODCASTS!!

In Tech Talk this week, learn how to use keywords to find and organize clips in Final Cut Pro X.

Our guests this week started with Philip Hodgetts, CEO of Intelligent Assistance, presenting his "Haiku of Production;" how to do more with less and still have it look great. Then, Sean Mullen, CEO of Rampant Design Tools, explains why he's released more than 2,000 effects for 4K video. Finally, Douglas Sheer, CEO and Chief Analyst for DIS Consulting, explains what he's learned over 30 years of researching the media hardware industry and trends we need to watch for the future.
  • Watch the entire show here.
  • Listen to the entire show here.
  • Read the show transcript here.
By the way, the Buzz website is evolving. Come visit and check out our new look!


artvids
New Articles & Videos
Two blogs, a product review and an "oldie-but-a-goodie."  As always, I updated our Top 3 Lists. Stay cool -- I'll see you next week!


Article01

The Future of Post:
More of Everything
BLOG

I had the pleasure of hosting a panel discussion, sponsored by KeyCode Media and Sony, on future trends in post; specifically, 4K, HDR and Wide Color Gamut media.

In this blog, I explain what each of these are and how they are likely to affect each of us.

The real credit for these ideas, however, comes from the experts on the panel itself: Michael Cioni, Michael Whipple and Bryan McMahan.

Read my blog here. 
An Untenable Situation
BLOG

Our industry is close to a major transition,  whether good or bad I'm not sure, but it will surely affect each one of us.

This is a blog on the expectations disconnect between buyers waiting for new products at lower prices and sellers needing revenue today to fund the development of tomorrow.

It grew out of my interview with Doug Sheer, discussing his research on the media hardware industry.

Read my blog here.



Article02
Product Review: HighPoint Technologies RocketStor 3614A RAID
PRODUCT REVIEW

This is a detailed review of an interesting product from a company that is not yet ready for prime-time in the creative community.

If you are a hardware manufacturer, you can learn from the mistakes HighPoint makes here.
 
FCP X: Create a Picture-in-Picture Effect
TUTORIAL
 
A picture-in-picture effect is a very popular effect in that it allows us to see two images at once. For example, to see both the presenter and their slides, or an interview with yourself.

This effect is easy to create and this popular tutorial from our archives shows you how to create this.

Read my tutorial here.



Articles03


Training
 
Larry's Best Training: 
Final Cut Pro X: Complete
NEW for version 10.2!
We've updated our training to include all the new features in the 10.2 release of Final Cut Pro X.

Plus, we added new or revised chapters covering:
  • An Editing Quick Start
  • Learning the Interface
  • Media Management
  • Media Import
  • Keywords
  • 3D Text and Titles
  • Inspector Effects
  • Masking
  • Color Correction
  • Video Effects Cookbook
  • And more

More than 200 movies, more than 20 hours of training - all guaranteed to get you up-and-running quickly and turn you into a Final Cut Pro X expert.

 

There's nothing better on the market. 

 

  

 NEW & IMPROVED!
Video Compression:
 
Master Apple Compressor 4.2
This Master Collection includes everything you need to know to learn Apple Compressor from the ground up.

This bundle includes our comprehensive Compressor 4.1 training, then updates it with all the new features in Compressor 4.2.

Then, we put the software to the test to see if it was any faster than previous versions - and discovered is is more than THREE TIMES faster than Compressor 4.1!

NEW TRAINING NOW SUPPORTS
COMPRESSOR 4.2

These days, everything we do ends up on the web. Which means that if we don't know how to compress our video to make it look good, all our work during production and post is wasted.

Everything you need - all in one place. 51 movies, more than six hours of training!

popular
Top Three + 1 Lists