REACTION426

while we in the West sit idly by....

2009-01-23T08:28:00.001+11:00

....our poor Zimbabwean brothers and sisters suffer under hyperinflation attributed to Mr Mugabe's reign of terror.

A South African friend of mine at work (Lemac Films) just returned from a Christmas/New Years holiday back in his home country and had this to share about his poor Zimbabwean neighbours.

At the end of 2008:

One 200 000 Zim dollar note (ZWD$) equaled less than USD$0.10 cents

Then, on 22 December 2007, a new note of 500 000 dollars is introduced to the market

Soon, a 750 000 dollar note

By January 2008 - new 10 million dollar notes...

...which at the time of print was worth 10 times less than this USD$10 dollar note

happily on his way to buy a handful of lollies at the corner shop

A case worth 65 billion Zimbabwe dollars equaled about USD$2,000

Off to the supermarket. The exchange rate at the time was 25 million Zimbabwe dollars for USD$1 dollar

This mountain of cash is worth as much as the USD$100 sitting on top of it

The ZWD$50 Million note is then introduced

why stop there tho?? Next up is the 250 million dollar note

"Sorry, how much was this t-shirt again?" "Oh, it's heaps cheap, only about 3 billion dollars"
(notice the sign - "...prices are now shown in millions and billions)

May 2008 - a note of 500 million dollar is introduced

June - notes worth 25 and 50 billion are printed (and the fantastic Mr. Mugabe)

and finally, a 100 billion dollar note

which at the time of printing could buy you these 3 fine eggs

yes, this is indeed how much people have to bring to a restaurant if they're to pay in cash

the bill

On 1 August 2008, the government devalued the Zimbabwe dollar by removing 10 zeros from notes

However, inflation kept going up, and by September for this amount of cash you could only buy around 4 tomatoes

and still a handful of cash for a simple loaf of bread

and then it started again, the 20 000 dollars note in September 2008

and a new 50 000 note newly printed just a few weeks back in the end of 2008

The country's currency plunged to a new record low just this last Monday, trading at an average ZWD$250,599,608,000,000,000.00 to the USD$ (I pulled that figure off xe.com's Universal Currency Converter which we always used at National Geographic Films when I worked there - remember you have to add 10 zeros to the end of the figures given) and triggering massive price increases.

The hyperinflation is now estimated at over 231,000,000%...although no one really knows.

All of which explains the picture of this toilet…

close up:

(if you doubt any of the above, have a read on the following link, and do your own currency conversion from USD$ to ZWD$ on any online currency trading site (ie www.xe.com, www.oanda.com, etc)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zim_dollar

Obsolescence Obsolete. [UPDATED]

2008-11-13T20:04:00.000+11:00

The future of digital still and motion picture capture is being completely rewritten. As I type this at 11:01pm (Australian ET), Jim Jannard, billionaire ex-Oakley sunglasses founder/owner and now CEO of RED Digital Cinema is posting information on the specifications of the new RED Epic and Scarlet cameras. No words can truly define how breathtaking this is for professional photographers and filmmakers the world over.

We're talking about an entry level camera that your grandma can shoot on (and purchase, because the price point is incredibly low for what you're getting) that could stand up against any film projected in a cinema (resolution-wise...remember, it still takes some great lighting skills and a good eye to make pretty pictures at the end of the day).

Scarlet can shoot nearly 5MP at 120 frames per second (thats MEGA PIXELS)! Thats more than 4-5 times 1080P HDTV resolution. 120fps is essentially 4 times slow motion...Think NFL Films or some really nice, smooth slow mo (Napoleon Dynamite shot of him walking in the suit type stuff)

In a variant, Scarlet can shoot at up to 24MP at 30 frames per second. Insane.

Epic can shoot, get this, up to a 291MP image at 25fps...yes, thats over two hundred mega pixels, on a large format size sensor, for ONLY $55,000!! You may think thats a ton of money, but for pro photogs, magazines or billboard ads, not really.

You thought the hit BBC doco, Planet Earth was "earth" shattering??? Think of what kind of quality can be shot with these.

Here's just a taste of one of the more than a trillion possible configurations with the two new "brains" they're releasing (in a DSLR-like mode):

Probably won't be getting much sleep tonight...and it looks like Jim probably won't have slept in 48hrs after this is all said and done (he was more giddy than a school boy. Read his forum posts for proof! Billionaires. Sheesh.)

(for an unfinished (I'll get around to it eventually :) history of my [Brad's] experience with RED Digital Cinema, meeting Jim Jannard at two NAB's, and getting RED's Ted Schilowitz out to NatGeo in D.C., and taking him around town here in Sydney, Australia, go to my old blog here)

"Raising the Bar"...for the investigators

2008-11-11T19:25:00.005+11:00

It was October 2002. I had been married to Kimberly for 6 months, and been off my LDS mission (Australia Sydney South) for nearly a year and a half when in the priesthood session of the LDS General Conference, Elder M. Russell Ballard spoke his everlasting sermon about "raising the bar" for missionaries - in essence, raising the minimum standard, that not any kid who committed wrongful acts could go on a mission. I hadn't committed any grievous acts prior to my mission and this isn't a coming out confession regarding my worthiness pre-mish...rather, perhaps, a confession looking back that I fell trap to the most heinous "crime" a missionary can commit - baptizing people who hadn't been adequately prepared for the long haul.

Why am I thinking about this now, more than 7 years since my "return[ing] with honour"? I finally tracked down a Chinese lady my companion and I taught and baptised in the Hurstville Ward back in 2000. How? Google. (I know, why'd it take so long!) She's now a concert violinist who's been painted by a Nobel Peace prize winner and International Olympic Committee artist. I just got off the phone with her about 5 minutes ago after having had no communication for ages. At the end of the conversation I asked about her church attendance. In broken English (too bad I couldn't have conversed in her native Mandarin like I should have been able to, having dropped out of Chinese after 3 semesters at BYU), she mentioned her music keeps her too busy and she hasn't attended in a very long time, but if they [the Ward] would like her to perform in Church, that she would oblige for a small donation.

How is it the dogma of mission zone conferences (at least in my mission, and from what I've heard, every mission any of my friends have served in) has ended up so focused on the numbers? "How many people are you going to baptize this month, Elder/Sister?" Looking back at my mission, if I were to have done it right, I don't think I would have had any baptisms from my own finding. They would (should) have been baptised long after I had left. Why? For that very reason seen exemplified by this sweet Chinese lady. She wasn't ready at the time, but she showed signs of progress, met the minimum requirements for baptism, and sadly, you feel a sense of relief knowing that your next accountability, or interview with president, wouldn't be so harsh.

If I could redo it all over again (or if for some random reason someone is reading this who is planning on serving a mission), I would raise the bar so the minimum requirements for baptism were the following (after the already minimum requirements of showing some signs of a testimony and committing to live covenants - that they probably don't understand anyway):

Individuals must be better friends with at least one (preferably two or more) "permanent" families (meaning, they own their home or aren't going anywhere anytime soon), than they are with the missionaries teaching them
After the initial discussion, no lessons are taught without a ward member present (if at all possible), and preferably in one of their homes (this is of course recommended, but I think it should be a rule)
Read at least 1 Nephi through Alma in the Book of Mormon, showing signs they plan on finishing the entire book in a reasonable time frame
Fully understand the law of tithing and live it for a month (or two)
attend Church for at least two months
participate in fasting for two fast Sundays
If at all possible, taken to tour the closest temple grounds or visitors center with a family (not the missionaries)
attend family home evenings with a couple different families

That really doesn't seem like very much, now does it? Its apparent that the majority of those include befriending by other members, because the missionaries come and go. Thats the key! (oh wait, I that we already knew that?) I'm not in any position to institute this (certainly), but I can sure do my part as a family or "ward member" as noted above.

I really think if people who were investigating the Church were to accomplish the above, they would prove to be in it for the long haul, and not just passively accepting and being baptised within a week of meeting the missionaries (which, I hate to say, honestly seems like a complete joke, unless they were SERIOUSLY converted from the start).

I would love to hear what you think, or your experience on this matter. Please sound off in the comments! (please...please?)

Ron Howard & Andy Griffith share all

2008-10-29T19:26:00.003+11:00

Its great to see good ol' Ronny using an Arricam with an Arri FF-4, what looks like a huge Primo lens (or is that an Angenieux?), all resting nice and neat on an O'Connor 2575 head...why is he lensing the "B" camera tho??? Oh, I mean, its funny to see him reenact two of his most beloved screen characters, whether you like Obama or not. Enjoy!

See more Ron Howard videos at Funny or Die

Why is the USA being so stupid?

2008-10-28T10:15:00.000+11:00

As many are aware, on Sunday last (26th Oct) the USA committed an "unjustified act of aggression" against the country of Syria, killing 8 Syrian civilians in al-Sukkariah village in Abu Kamal near the border with Iraq…all of this without permission from the Syrian government.

"Syria condemns this act of aggression perpetrated by the U.S. occupation forces," stated a letter sent Tuesday from Syria to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and the Security Council.

"This act of aggression represents a dangerous violation of the Syrian sovereignty and the UN principles and conventions," it added.

"Syria, at the same time, calls on the Iraqi government to investigate into the backgrounds and reasons of this aggression and assume its responsibilities to prevent the use of its lands as a launch-pad in violation of the Arab League convention," said the letter.

I personally don’t think the US has any right to go traipsing around the world knocking off targets without the blessing of the country we’re attacking within. These acts are seen as acts of terror against these poor civilians, and thus makes the United States “terrorists”, and at this point I think I might have to agree with any UN sanctions placed on the US as punishment for such ignorance and callousness.

A plethora of news on the subject can be currently found here

Sound off in the comments about your take on the matter!

View Larger Map

Countries without an LDS presence, or not dedicated to the preaching of the gospel

2008-10-08T21:57:00.000+11:00

AFGHANISTAN
ALGERIA
AZERBAIJAN
BHUTAN
BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA
BRUNEI
BURKINA FASO
BURUNDI
CHAD
CHINA (we just had a Sister Guo serve in our area of Woy Woy who was called from Qingdao, quite north of Shanghai on the mainland, and she said the Church was growing in China, but obviously the Church can't openly proselyte there....yet)
COMOROS
CUBA
DJIBOUTI
EAST TIMOR
EQUATORIAL GUINEA
ERETRIA
GABON
GAMBIA
GUINEA
GUINEA-BISSAU
IRAN
IRAQ
KOSOVO
KYRGYZSTAN
LIBYA
MACEDONIA
MALDIVES
MALI
MAURITANIA
MONTENEGRO
MYANMAR
NIGER
NORTH KOREA
SAOTOME AND PRINCIPE
SENEGAL
SEYCHELLES
SOMALIA
SUDAN
TUNISIA
TURKMENISTAN
UZBEKISTAN
WESTERN SAHARA
YEMEN

My WEB footprint...or “Ever Google'd yourself?”

2008-08-24T21:37:00.002+10:00

C’mon, everyone that has access to the internet has probably “Googled” themselves at least once.

My “short” name (Brad Wilson), unfortunately, is extremely common, and I’m not going to peruse all 500k+ entries Google found to see where I fall in.

Googling “Bradley Wilson”, however, brings up a reference to my Devhood Public Page (click here) in 15th place.  Haven’t touched it since 2002, but I’m sure if I could remember my username and password to go in and update it, I’d get my page rank back up there (doubt to #1 tho, but maybe to the top 10 on the first page?).

“Bradley Everett Wilson” (in quotes) wins the lot, bringing “about 90” entries, all of which are of me, or pages that sourced info from other pages, my imdb.com profile being the main one.  It is quite funny to see I’m listed on the “Who’s Dated Who” celebrity listings as having dated the uber famous and beautiful Kimberly Blunck (now Wilson :) in 2002.

So, here are some major sites that have info on me (click ‘em to go to my info):

Devhood

Internet Movie Database

Mission.net

Facebook Public Search Listing

One reason why I’m doing this is so I can update all the info on me found on the web, in case any long lost friend tries to get in contact with me (although Facebook has already reconnected me with quite a few already).

The main reason, however, is to follow the counsel from Elder Ballard about using New Media and putting references to the Gospel and our affiliation with the Church on our blogs and websites, so someone would convict me of being LDS if they Googled me.

If I had endless amounts of time, I’d try to scour the entire web and bring back any reference to me, or info about me, or published by me.  People are into figuring out their carbon footprint these days...well, I want to figure out my “WorldWideWeb footprint” (yes, I just coined that, but it wouldn’t surprise me if someone already has before me...better Google it to make sure :)

Brad & Kim....manga style

2008-08-23T21:34:00.002+10:00

Okay, so I was inspired by a good friend of mine, Todd Hamilton (congrats on the upcoming wedding, by the way!) who had some FaceYourManga avatars up on his Facebook profile of him and his fiance, and a good friend of Jeremiah Udy's (Kevin Rose, founder of digg.com) who had one he did on his pownce.com profile.

Here's what I came up with (I'm hiding my "baldy-locks" - as Olenslager coined it - behind the orange "Wheaties" hat I always wear:)...and thats Bronte Beach in the background (except its winter, hence my blue Sydney Uni jacket). Kim just always looks amazing!

Whaddya think? Sound off in the comments.

RED Digital Cinema - WIRED Mag writeup & [my] mundane history

2008-08-20T21:19:00.003+10:00

If you’ve been to my “About Me” page on this site, you’ll notice I have down as my favourite camera the RED One from RED Digital Cinema.  For those that aren’t familiar with this camera, Wired magazine wrote a brief background for the average joe non-filmmaker (its not entirely accurate, but worth a read anyway) which I have linked here:

“Analog Film Meets Its Match in RED Digital Cinema's Ultrahigh-Res Camera”

Now, I’m not writing the following to “big note” myself in any way, more putting the words to page recounting for myself (and hopefully one day, my posterity), my chance encounters with RED (as they have been so varied and random), as I consider it extremely revolutionary, and a company that is completely changing the landscape of motion picture capture.

When I worked in the Latter-day Saint Motion Picture Studio’s (LDS MPS, located in Provo, Utah, USA, tucked away semi-secretly behind Movies 8 and the Shopko there) camera department with Brian Wilcox, back in 2005, it seemed like the Church’s AudioVisual department was at a crossroads.  Brian was in one camp, the stalwart who stood behind all the 16/35mm film cameras and gear (and all the history that went with it),  with, what it seemed like at the time, the rest of the entire AV department firmly backed into the video camp (one dude up in the Conference Centre Studio even had a “Film is Dead” poster on his office door), having all come from broadcast backgrounds.

I was intrigued by what I was reading in the industry mags of the day about the new Arri D-20 digital cinema camera (that was to eventually come out at the end of 2005), and what Dalsa had in store with their 4k Origin camera, and how these new digital “video” cameras could take all the film accessories and lenses we already had, and captured RAW images (as close as yer gonna get to capturing film in an electronic environment right now), which allowed you to capture a lot of information initially, and decide on a look in post (similar to grading and post colour correction).  Right before the big National Association of Broadcastors (NAB) exhibit in Las Vegas in April 2005, I started compiling all the information I could about the specs of these new digital cinema cameras into an Excel spreadsheet that I passed onto Glen Willardson (the guy we reported to in the camera department...maybe he was head of production??), detailing the pros and cons of each one, mainly so I knew what to look for when I dragged Kimbo down to Vegas that year :)

One of the most technically amazing of all these (I think at the time there was the Origin, Viper, D-20, Genesis maybe??, Panavised F900, and...) was an old, crazy looking guy named Jeff Kreines’ Kinetta Camera (seen here).

His concept was to create a sensor agnostic camera that would be in every way conceivable as close to a film-like experience as possible. The original heart of it was an approx 2K+ sensor that could be hand cranked (awesome!) up to like 60fps.

Kim and I (and Dustin Olenslager, a missionary companion of mine who lives in Vegas, and who comes to NAB with me every time I go) passed him on the showroom floor, but I honestly can’t recall if I said anything to him (should have tho!).

At that particular NAB we were swept up in Panasonic P2 fever (I had scored some Panny party invites somehow on online that got us into the P2 launch event one of the nights; we also met up with an old workmate of mine, Todd Hamilton, who used to work at BYU’s Technology Assisted Language Learning Group [TALL] with me) and fell in love with the HVX200 (we owned a Panasonic DVX100 at the time, which we ended up selling to help purchase our tickets to Sydney), and digital cinema cameras suddenly took a backseat.

In July 2005, Kim and I were off to Sydney for a masters degree in film at the University of Sydney, and we missed NAB 2006, wherein the Oakley founder and billionaire (and, I’m assuming ex-, Latter-day Saint), Jim Jannard, showed off a prototype RED One camera, which at the time was “not much more than an aluminum box about the size of a loaf of bread” (as the Wired article put it), and spec sheet. At the time, apparently 500 people put down the US$1,000 deposit and secured their place in line. John Bowring, managing director of Lemac Films, my current employer, was one of the first....well, that is until he got distracted, and lost his place in line to the likes of Mike Seymour of FX PHD...and ended up with serial numbers 64 & 65 (still, not too bad).

Kim and I returned to the USA in 2006 and went off to Washington, D.C., to work at National Geographic Television. While there, I befriended the VP over my department (Production Operations), Mike Castro, and went out of my way to create maps of the exhibit halls, lined up booth tours and invite only VIP party registrations, and eventually weaseled my way into a trip to 2007’s NAB on NatGeo’s dime. My initial American Airlines flight never left the tarmac (engine malfunction), so I missed the opening day on Monday (and the schnazzy Apple booth tour I lined up), and didn’t arrive until late Tuesday (when all the awesome SWAG has been depleted around the entire showroom floor - no free t-shirts to increase the size of my wardrobe...to the disdain of Kimberly, who hates when I get free shirts :). The weeks prior to NAB I had been reading the forums and industry sites about the RED and that it was surely to be the must see booth at NAB.

I lined up with Dustin (yup, he was there at NAB 07 with me as well) in the endlessly long line that wrapped around the RED tent (this was on the third day and there was still this much pent up demand), and finally got in to see the short film Peter Jackson (yes, of LOTR trilogy fame) shot on two alpha-prototypes (Boris and Natasha - seen in my Moto RAZR crapcam pix below), called “Crossing the Line”. Completely stunned after seeing the film projected in glorious 4k via the Sony SXRD projector they had, I wandered up to Jim Jannard and handed him my card and said National Geographic would be interested in finding out more. He said “Great, why don’t you speak with Ted...” and pointed me in Ted Schilowitz’ (RED’s Leader of the Rebellion, essentially Jim’s right hand man, and maybe even the technical and marketing brains behind the whole operation) general direction. We exchanged business cards and I told him I would get in contact with him to see what we could set up in our neck of the woods (D.C.).

RED’s logo outside the tent camera setup with video out

"Boris" & "Natasha" alpha prototypes Close-up of "Boris"

RED's Spider...just looks cool RED’s “Fire Chief”, Jarred Land scratching

(or picking?:) his nose, behind a

prototype RED

MORE SOON....

Eye popping research out of Siggrraph ‘08

2008-08-19T21:16:00.000+10:00

My older brother, Ben, sent this research done by a group from the University of Washington, and I found it quite intriguing (some of the researchers work for Microsoft, but we won’t hold that against them this time:), so I thought I’d share it with everyone:

“Using Photographs to Enhance Videos of a Static Scene”

Essentially, they have a technique of enhancing video with high res digital still images to enhance sharpness, increase the dynamic range (the range of information from the darkest blacks to the brightest whites in an image), fix problems in a frame, or completely remove objects.

You just need to watch the embedded demo video to “be blown away” (as Ben put it)...and I think you will.

bringin’ the Clearplay action to Oz

2008-08-18T21:10:00.000+10:00

A couple years back, during a double date with my bro, Ben, at the fantastic Thai Ruby (in Provo, UT, USA - highly recommend it if yer in the area!), we wandered next door into the CleanFlicks store and rented our first edited film (can’t remember the title...). At that point, we were hooked, as we loved film, but didn’t want all the unnecessary language, violence, nudity, sex, etc in our home.

Unfortunately, a couple years later in July 2006, Cleanflicks (and all the various derivations) faced an untimely demise due to a lawsuit signed by some Hollywood heavy weights (but hey, who can say they were sued by the likes of Steven Spielberg and Norman Jewison - of “Fiddler on the Roof” fame??!)

However, the lawsuit didn’t afflict a relatively new upstart company showcased on the Today Show with Matt Lauer (in the USA) called Clearplay, which eventually was protected under the US Congress’ Family Movie Act.

Fast forward to Kim and I living in Washington, DC, and we saw Clearplay on sale in the local Target store. We snatched it up, and fell instantly in love.

Now, Clearplay’s distinguishing feature is that the original DVD is unaltered...its edited on the fly almost instantaneously - as the DVD spins so rapidly, its easy to fast forward thru the naughty bits without so much as a hiccup...really hard to notice most of the time - and the audio can cut out for the foul language just like pressing your mute button on the telly.

Kim and I had to part ways with our beloved Clearplay right before we hopped the plane to Sydney, because at the time, it was an American only operation. Seeing a definite need here in Australia, a quick look at the current specs of the player showed it could handle the 240V/50hz Aussie power, and the PAL television system, so there shouldn’t be too much involved to get it on our shores.

A barrage of emails to every email address I could find for anyone who did anything with Clearplay finally got me in contact with the Clearplay International operation, who, are bringing the goodness of Clearplay to the rest of us.

I quickly got to the point that I wanted to help spearhead the import of this wonderful product to Australia and got a nice response:

Many thanks for your e-mail enquiring about ClearPlay, our colleagues in the US have asked me to respond to you.

ClearPlay International NV is responsible for building the ClearPlay business outside the US and we are interested in working with distribution and marketing partners.

Today, we are focusing expansion planning on those countries where evidence exists that consumers and opinion leaders are actively concerned about ‘objectionable’ content in the entertainment programming that they and their families receive, and where those consumers would be interested in more choice and control. If you have such information, it will help us to evaluate/determine if Australia should be among our first expansion markets.

For your information, we are developing a BluRay version and attached is an overview of ClearPlay Connect, the new application for BluRay players.

Many thanks once again for your interest.

Yours sincerely,

(name removed by me for obvious reasons)

So, I’m gonna give it my all and see what I can do to help clean up living rooms Australia-wide.

Will keep you posted...

Pancakes

2008-08-16T21:08:00.001+10:00

Right before we married, Kim and I set a goal that we would have some sort of special Sunday night dinner, as a tradition with our kids as they grew up.  I figured pancakes were always a hit, and you can have enough variety with various toppings each week that it shouldn’t get too boring.  So the past 6 years I’ve been perfecting this recipe, and now I share it with the world:

1.25   cups flour (whole-meal or bleached, doesn’t matter)
1/8   cup caster/powdered sugar
1/8   cup brown sugar
1 tsp   baking powder
1 tsp   baking soda
1 Tsp   cinnamon
1   pinch of salt
1   egg
1.25   cups buttermilk (alt. mix fresh cream and regular milk)
1/4   cup oil (or melted butter if your into that kind o’ stuff)
1 tsp   vanilla extract

Not in any particular order, throw all that in and whisk it like crazy till its nice ‘n smooth (the batter should run off the whisk like a thick velvety ribbon.

Cover it and toss it in the fridge for two hours (so the baking soda and powder can do their fancy work).

Heat the pan and spray it down with oil of your choosing.  Cook ‘em till they start to get bubbly...c’mon who hasn’t cooked pancakes before.  You know the rest.

(If you’re living in Australia we highly recommend Coles Maple flavoured syrup as the best cheap alternative to the real deal.  In the USA I love Mrs. Butterworths - but the same stuff did drive my little bro over the edge once, so use sparingly)

pet peeves

2008-08-15T21:06:00.000+10:00

Some people really don’t like it when the person next to them on the train is hacking up a lung the entire way home. If you’re Kimberly, you really hate it when Amelia’s down for a nap and the kookaburra’s start cackling like crazy right outside her window (and then Amelia’s up for the rest of the day).

If you’re like me, you can’t stand it when people have big high definition television screens connected to their DVD players and digital/HD tuners via ultra thin, el cheap-o analog RCA cables (you know the kind, Yellow for video, Red and White as the stereo pair - the absolute worst is when they only have mono/White connected...but I won’t go there today).

A good friend of mine had a fairly new 65” HD plasma screen, which I felt just wasn’t cutting it as far as picture quality when he was showing it off to me. A bit of investigation and I find the exact scenario laid out above. He had his up-converting, progressive scan capable DVD player AND his HD Comcast cable box connected to two analog RCA ports round the back. Get this tho...he was paying for premium HD cable, and didn’t even know that he had HD channels!!!

A quick trip to Walmart and some HDMI cables later and he was in business. I left the Yellow RCA cable connected and did a little demonstration with his HD comcast box. Tuned into the standard def Fox channel with American Idle (Idol) on via the RCA cable. 4:3 aspect ratio, 480i picture. Not too bad. Jumped up to the HD channel via the digital HDMI connection (it was hidden in the 900s - maybe he didn’t have the patience to go through all the thousand channels he was paying for?) and it completely blew him away. 16:9 and 1080i. You see the audience cheering in the wings (you don’t see that on the SD broadcast because of the 4:3 framing), and on close ups you could see the veins in the contestant’s eyes, and the make-up lines on the host’s face. Flipping back and forth had him sold.

Now this has been a very long winded morality tale, and the moral of the story is: utilize the screen you paid big bucks for with the proper connection! Esp if you paid more than a thousand dollars, a $20 cable from Walmart is nothing (obviously more expensive cables would be best, but at least you have the proper connection that can drive the resolution your new telly is drooling for).

Remember, Yellow/RCA is worst, S-Video is a tad bit better, Component (RGB coloured) RCA is probably the best yer gonna get as far as analog (enables progressive scan), then comes DVI-D, which is great for digital, but I reckon HDMI is best (carries high def picture and digital surround audio down one nice cable).

My write up in the ACS Magazine

2008-08-14T21:03:00.000+10:00

In trying to become more involved in the Australian film industry, I volunteered to write articles in the Australian Cinematographer Society’s (ACS) magazine, Australian Cinematographer.

Anyway, I wrote some items about new gear and it’s appeared in the 50th Anniversary issue.  I’ve got myself a proper printed issue for posterity, but if you’d like to read the bits, you can find the PDF here (probably a snoozer for non-filmies...maybe even a snoozer for, you tell me :):

ACS 50th Mag (PDF #3)

Its found on pages 52 & 53.  I wrote the bits about the wireless system, the new Aaton Penelope (which Lemac should have the first in Australia - whenever Aaton works all the kinks out), the Sony PDW700, and the new Sony F35.

So there you go.  I’ve been published in print.

Cane Toads - coming soon in stereoscopic 3D

2008-08-13T20:53:00.007+10:00

If you’ve never seen the Mark Lewis’ classic 1998 documentary film, “Cane Toads: An Unnatural History”, you’re definitely missing out (its absolutely hilarious!), and need to run to your local library or check Netflix and get a copy to watch ASAP.

At Lemac over the past couple months, I’ve had quite a few phone conversations with Mark, and have been working with his camera crew in-house as they gear up for production for his follow-up film, twenty years later, and this time they’re shooting in stereoscopic 3D on two Silicon Imaging SI-2K cameras, and for tight close-ups, shooting on two Iconix 2K POV cameras.

(for the uninitiated, the “2k” in SI-2K represents 2048x1152 resolution - currently televisions that you can buy in a local electronics store mostly top out at 1920x1080.  The DCI spec, or the resolution most digital cinemas will be projecting initially is 2048x1080 - but they do have a 4k version for the future - 4096x2160 - a resolution the RED One captures without problem)

I personally don’t like the SI-2K...I mean, the SI-2K Mini by itself attached via GigE to a Macbook Pro running XP via Parallels, maybe...but the body they’ve designed for this camera is complete rubbish.  Embedded Windows XP running on some cheap Intel mobo with an HDMI port that maxes out at, like, 640x480 for monitoring???  Bogus in my book.  SiliconDVR (the software interface) leaves too much to be desired.

However, the head block is pretty small and offers a nice means of 3D rigging (the Iconix is even easier, obviously because of its size).  It also offers an interchangeable optical assembly which supports PL or F- or C-mount lenses.  At this point in time it looks like the Cane Toads guys are thinking of sticking with C-mount (since they can share lenses between the SI and the Iconix), but they have two sets of Zeiss MK2 16mm superspeeds on hold just in case.

BOOK OF MORMON GEOGRAPHY??

2008-08-12T20:17:00.002+10:00

I was bored today, and perusing Google, stumbled upon this website that had an intriguing theory to present, and some “facts” to back it up. Anyway, I thought I’d post a weblink and let you decide for yourselves what to make of it:

Click Here

If for nothing else, it was cool to read the links to my old stomping grounds (National Geographic) and the BBC about sunken cities, etc.

Feel free to post comments about this. Would love to know what people think about it (if anyone other than Kim and I actually read this....:)

Sherlock Holmes...in HD?

2008-08-11T20:46:00.001+10:00

Since Paul Smith got Kim and I hooked on the 1984-94 Granada television production of Sherlock Holmes, starring the fantastic Jeremy Brett, I’ve always had a desire to do a proper film restoration of it (the DVD transfer they’ve done is horrible at best).

Anyway, I’ve sent a letter (via a third party) to one of the producers of the series, June Wyndham-Davies, to see if I can get her on board before I start trying to raise capital. Anyway, here’s the body of the letter I wrote to give you an idea of what I’m trying to accomplish:

A good friend of mine and I are looking into the feasibility of raising the capital necessary (in the multi-millions we can only assume) to do a complete restoration, proper ultra high resolution re-transfer, and color correction of the original camera negatives (if they hopefully still exist and have been stored properly) with the aid of the original cinematographers (if they can be tracked down, and/or are alive).

Those original camera negs/prints would be scanned in at a minimum of 4k resolution (4096x2160, essentially 4 times that of full HDTV 1920x1080 lines of resolution), for eventual international re-distribution via HD television/cable and BluRay disc (assuming Granada would be interested in distributing HD versions of the show, which I have no doubt they would), for not only the countless fans already extant, but for a whole new generation of viewers.

During this complete restoration process (of not only picture, but sound as well, enhancing the original mix for possible surround sound capabilities), we would also try to restore out-takes, bloopers, and track down as much ‘behind the scenes’ information (pictures, interviews, sound bites, scripts, drawings, etc) and interview as many people involved with the original series to round out a definitive collector’s edition box set of all the original television episodes as well as the feature length episodes in full high definition and surround sound, with extra discs chock full of hours of bonus material to finally complete any fans collection.

I’m sure Granada have considered (or will soon consider seeing the open marketability of renewing an old asset like Holmes) doing an HD run of the series, we just want to make sure they’re not going to go the cheap route and just transfer it to HD tape, but do it the justice it deserves (ie a complete restoration going back to the original negatives and prints, as you would any old classic film).

I would love to know if you’d like to be a part of this effort. Thank you for any and all help you may offer. I look forward to hearing from you soon.