Compressor (and multiple cores) is your friend

This is a big deal. In addition to what this note says note says, you can use other computers to render your files. It has taken me a little while to figure this out. This tutorial describes just using one computer but you can do the same for multiple computers. I did try this on a Dual 1GHz G4 and it slowed things down, so make sure that the additional computers have sufficient power. ...

May 5, 2009 · 1 min · lkoepsel

This is getting more interesting!

Lifehacker - Wider-Screen Kindle Coming Wednesday - Kindle A couple of stories are out stating that a new e-book reader is coming, either from Amazon or from Apple. I’m interested in the technology because many technical books are available in electronic format and it seems like a shame to burn a lot of paper on a book that will be outdated in 12-18 months. I also like to convert lengthy reviews (I’m looking at you Ken Stone) to pdf’s and read them offline. ...

May 4, 2009 · 1 min · lkoepsel

FCP's DV Compatibility issues

While creating the previous post on iMovie 09, I ran across a very interesting post by David Pogue, related to his desire to combine Flip footage with footage from a high end Canon HD camera. He was attempting to combine two vastly different video file types; Flip’s H.264 and Canon’s AIC. Final Cut Pro was re-rendering every time he did an edit, causing his workflow to slow dramatically. His solution was to ensure that both files were rendered to the same format before continuing to edit. ...

May 4, 2009 · 1 min · lkoepsel

iMovie 09 and Ken Stone

iMovie 08 was a bit controversial on introduction last year. It was substantially different than the previous versions of iMovie, so much so it angered most heavy users. It was clearly a version 1.0 release and Apple was atleast kind enough to keep the old version iMovie HD around so we could still use it. This January, iMovie 09 was released and this new version has made all the difference in the world. Many of the missing or incomplete features were fixed and some significant additions were made, most notably “precision editing”. ...

May 4, 2009 · 2 min · lkoepsel

Dropshadow, dropshadow

(think Moon shadow, moon shadow) I wanted to make the site look just a weeeeee bit better. And a dropshadow on the images seemed to be the way to go. Search the web… uhhhh, that isn’t easy. Let’s see what Pixelmator can do… uhhhh, that isn’t any easier! Sigh, let’s fire up Photoshop and flail away. D’oh! My image is locked, why oh why! More searching… one of two solutions, double click on the layer then click OK or make sure the image is RGB not Indexed. Sigh. That was 30 minutes. ...

May 3, 2009 · 2 min · lkoepsel

It's the little things

Whew! Made some changes to the site in an effort to bring it into the 21st Century. First, I added a drop shadow to all of the images. What a difference it makes! Details on how in my next post. Second, I wanted to make sure the tooltip for each image would say “Click on image to play film.” and each image would have a alt tag so it would validate correctly AND when the film played, I wanted to ensure the title in the shadowbox did NOT say “Click on image to play film!” Details on this one; so Shadowbox has a title attribute; use it to show the title when it is being played. Use the href attribute title for the tooltip AND ensure you have an alt attribute for the img tag. ...

May 3, 2009 · 1 min · lkoepsel

CrumplePop

CrumplePop: Hand-drawn Master Templates for Final Cut Pro. Saw the demos, had to have’em. Can’t wait to use this in a project. High quality labels to put into your FCP video. They also have a Polaroid film template that is free but I’m waiting to get the link….hurumph.

May 2, 2009 · 1 min · lkoepsel

TextMate — The Missing Editor for Mac OS X

TextMate — The Missing Editor for Mac OS X. Oh, Textmate, how do I live without you? I’ve tried, oh, I’ve been tempted by the others; Espresso, Coda. You’ve been a mainstay for many years after convincing me that BBEdit had lost its way. And every time a new combo editor/FTP client/fry pan comes along, I try it. I’ve always come back… Highly recommended, one of my favorite tools.

May 2, 2009 · 1 min · lkoepsel

I love it!

So I wanted to add a picture to my header… not a problem. BUT! Now the picture and my blog title were in conflict. Because the header photo was half dark and half light, any title color would look great on one side but not the other. Sigh. Here’s where it got fun! Using Safari 4’s Develop menu (enable using the Advanced Tab in Preferences), I used the Web Inspector to see if I could drop the title to just under the photo, oops, move it to the right, and make sure the Search widget lines up at the bottom, change the color, FINIS! ...

May 2, 2009 · 1 min · lkoepsel

Hello world!

To begin… again. Probably my 4th or 5th attempt at blogging. This time I want to take a different approach. I want to use this blog as a way of understanding video and OS X/Macs. Let’s see what happens!

May 2, 2009 · 1 min · lkoepsel