Okay, I’m officially converted to iMovie 09. Able to do everything I needed to or wanted to with this little project. And I love the themes. A fun touch. The trick is lots of brief shots.
Inauguration video
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Tag Archives: YouTube (Mine)
Tweakers pretty good speakers
Re-evaluating Flip HD
My initial impression of the Flip HD video camera was pretty positive. But the more I use it “in the field,” the more things I find that bother me. The audio is very poor when compared to my Casio EX-Z300 (a small still camera that also takes video). And in low light situations, the Flip really sucks, while the Casio is very forgiving. And if you don’t hold the Flip dead still, your video shakes like pup passing peach pits. Not so the Casio.
These cameras are comparable in price. I think you can get either for around $200. And I’m open to the possibility I’m not doing something right but these are pretty much idiot-proof cameras, so…
The 4 minute video above was shot on my Casio (by my friend Greg Perry) and edited in iMovie 09 (which I like much better than 08). He was also using the Flip. The difference was night and day. Couldn’t use the Flip stuff and the Casio came out okay. There’s some artifacts in the video above but I think that’s mostly YouTube compression. I’ll post the .mov file later if you want to download and take a look.
I still have the inauguration video I shot on the Flip HD so maybe I’ll see better results but I’m skeptical. If you I had to choose between the two cameras, it’s no contest: Casio wins hands down. And it records nice stills and audio. If you bought a Flip on my recommendation and aren’t happy with it, my apologies.
YouTube switches to 16:9 player
I’ll have to play with this some more but, at first look, here are my options: If I want the ease and quality of the YouTube capture mode on the Casio, I have to go with 4:3 and get the vertical black panels in the new, wider YouTube player. The Casio has an HD/wide-screen setting, but it’s not YouTube ready. I’ll have to jump through all of the encoding hoops to get anything like the same quality. Easy choice.
Demolition of state lab in Jefferson City
Demolition of the State Lab in Jefferson City. I should point out I was there during the noon hour a couple of Saturday’s ago. The guy resting his eyes had probably worked all morning and was catching a few winks before going back to work.
Voter Number One
Original plan was to roll out at 4 a.m. and get to the polling place by 4:30. Couldn’t sleep so wound up getting a good spot by arriving at 2:30 a.m. Didn’t see a soul for a couple of hours, but by 5:30 a.m. a line had formed. I am proud to say I was voter #1 at my place. Whatever happens, I’m glad there was an election and I got to take part.
Update: Very short video of the line as I left at 6:08 a.m.
WWII veterans
While waiting for my flight from St. Louis to Tulsa last Friday, I captured a little video of some WW II vets heading out on a little trip. A year ago in Las Vegas, I witnessed a hauntingly similar scene featuring Marines returning from Iraq.
Tree House Magic
A tree house is a frivolous thing. No practical value (unless you’re living in the African bush). But if you can recall that childhood rush of climbing to the top of a tree for absolutely no reason other than the joy of doing it, you can appreciate what brings four good friends (and friends of) together every year to re-experience that feeling.
Tree House III (this is the third year of the project) is in the middle of the Prairie GardenTrust, which is managed by my friend Henry. He invited me to to come and be part of TH3 this weekend, which was perfect in every way. We finished the day yesterday by climbing up to the third level (about 30 feet up) to enjoy the view and reflect on project.
Box Turtle
We see lots of adult Box Turtles in our neighborhood but rarely (never?) see the babies. Rick Thom –long time employee of the Missouri Department of Natural Resources– lives just down the hill from us and called a couple of days ago to report finding one of the little guys. Video runs 3 1/2 min.
Sand Castle Lesson
Barb hired a professional sand castle artist Mark Flynn to give the family a lesson. Not too bad for a first try. And lots of fun. Here’s the flickr set and slide show.