Crash Test Trailer wins a Gold Empixx Award

I’m happy to announce that the book trailer I made for “The Outsider’s Guide to the CrashTest Nation” by Rho Mack has won a Gold Empixx award.

The Empixx Awards may not be the Emmys, but I’m still proud to be recognized by other professionals.

Book Trailer for “Crash Test”

“The Outsider’s Guide to the CrashTest Nation” is a young adult book for non-readers, by Rho Mack.

I worked with the author to capture the playfulness, mystery, and suspense of the novel in a book trailer she could use to market the book, including a Kickstarter campaign to fund the book’s art.

I made heavy use of Motion’s emitters for the clouds and various rains.

This was done on a tight budget, so I did things like use my iPhone as the mic, and used my laptop as a green screen.

Shoots that require taking bites of donuts are fine by me.

Quicktip on ProVideoCoalition

Scott Simmons is doing his 28 Days of Quicktips over at the ProVideoCoalition site. This year, he accepted reader submissions, and mine got in!

I export a ton of video to XDCAM Professional Discs at work (I think I’ve averaged 2 or 3 per day for the last year), and like any repetitive task, have tried to make it as quick as possible. One part of that I’ve covered here is exporting to XDCAM with correct timecode and audio channels.

This Quicktip covers another area of exporting, that can mean the difference between making your deadline and missing it.

Read the Quicktip here.

One note- this is on FCP 6, and I haven’t had a chance to see how it works on FCP 7.

601/709 to RGB Filter

A common problem taking a video from Avid to Final Cut is color space- Avid works in 601/709, and Final Cut works in RGB. This leads to low contrast video when using a video exported with Avid in FCP. Luckily, Avid can export as RGB as well.

Take for instance, this still from a video of quaking aspens shot with an iPhone. The one on the top was exported from Avid as 601/709, and the one on the bottom was exported as RGB.

The difference is slight, but the darks aren’t as dark, and the lights aren’t are light in the one exported as 601/709. Putting the 601/709 version on top of the RGB version in the FCP timeline and changing composite mode to difference on the 601/709 version shows where there are differences. It’s hard to see (try staring at it for several seconds, or adjusting your viewing angle of the screen), but the waveform shows there is up to 10% difference in the colors.

A quick overview of the difference between RGB and 601/709- a digital color is made up of a Red, Green, and Blue value. Each can have a value of 0 to 255.

In 601/709, black has a value of 16,16,16, and white has a value of 235,235,235. Here’s the waveform for the aspens shot which was exported in 601/709-

In RGB, black has a value of 0,0,0, and white has a value of 255,255,255. Here’s the waveform of the aspens shot, exported as RGB-

Notice the differences between the two waveforms- the RGB one stretches further into black, and further into white (to the point of clipping – thanks, iPhone).

Both color spaces their perks- 601/709 can handle values blacker than black, and whiter than white, but RGB has more information (256 steps between white and black, versus 220 for 601/709).

To handle this difference, I wrote a filter, that basically takes each value from a 601/709 file, and “stretches” it out to RGB space.

Here’s what the filter does with the aspen shot- the top is the original exported as 601/709, the middle is exported as 601/709, with the filter, and the bottom is the original exported as RGB.

The filter has brought the 601/709 footage much closer to the RGB, how it should be in Final Cut. How close? Using the same difference composite mode technique, I can see it’s much closer, in fact within 3%.

As you can see, it will not match exactly, but it will work in a pinch. If you can reexport the file as RGB, that is preferable, but there are many instances (lost master, time constraints) where that isn’t possible.

Download the filter by right clicking and saving- 601-709RGB.fcfcc.

To install, unzip the file, and place the filter into /Library/Application Support/Final Cut Pro System Support/Plugins/ and relaunch Final Cut Pro. It will be in the Image Control folder in the Video Filters section. Apply it to a 601/709 clip, and it should be fine. If it’s a bit off, try messing with the “Adjust” Parameter until it’s correct.

Let me know how the filter works for you!

Carnival of Errors

Carnival of Errors from Alan Dague-Greene on Vimeo.

Synopsis: The fight for control of carnival land will pit clowns against mimes in a musical standoff that will tickle the funny bone and excite the senses. The Ben-Hur of single shot musicals.

A couple weekends back, I helped out on a film shoot as part of the International 48 Hour ShootOut. I had worked with the same group of people in November on Quillions, and had a blast again. During production, I was a Production Assistant, helping by controlling music for lipsyncing (I used Remote on my iPod Touch), burning CD’s for practice, taping a mock up of the set on the floor as we only had access to the space for 4 hours, and whatever else needed it. I also worked on Visual Effects, making the mime disappear at the very end. A good, yet busy weekend.
On a different note, I will be starting full time as assistant editor at Idea Spring Editing tomorrow. More on that later.

Quillions-Panasonic HD Filmmaker Showdown

Quillions from Alan Dague-Greene on Vimeo.

This last weekend, I worked with a great group of people to create this entry into the Panasonic HD Filmmaker Showdown, a 48 Hour Film Fest. 5 groups across the US received a phrase, character, and item to be included, as well as a HPX500 camera. I joined late in the game, and worked as a P.A. It’s an amazing feat- 5 minutes, 1 shot that moves from stairs to courtyard, across a street, into a train station. The guy controlling the iris had a big job, and pulled it off well.

Socially Aware Media and Poverty

In honor of Blog Action Day, I thought I’d write a bit about Socially Aware Media and how poverty comes into that.

I’ve found that many people get into media because they want to make the world a better place. And the media does have that power. We can create change, and do on a daily basis. Yet creating change and making the world a better place can be two completely different things. Yes, you have the power to change things for the worse. And it’s happened. I think I can safely say that media around the world has encouraged – both implicitly and explicitly – racial and gender injustice, for instance. Yet in those same areas, there has been a lot of positive change brought about by media.

An example: Today I met with a woman who I first met July 2007, at a conference in California where we showed “Fuerza”. Ben (the director) and I had a Q&A session afterwards. This woman asked what she could do about immigration. We gave some generic answers, as well as an idea to work with the Mexican economy to decrease the “push” factor of immigration.

Fast forward a year: this woman has led a discussion group on immigration at her church, traveled to the border to explore sustainable economics with Mexicans, visits undocumented immigrants at the local detention center weekly, meets with an immigrant rights group weekly, and more. And she still isn’t satisfied.

Okay, at this point, I think I must change my mind on an earlier point. The media has little to no power to make actual change. It does, however, have the power to encourage others to work for change. “Fuerza” will not change policy, comfort a mother torn from her family, or create a sustainable local economy. But its viewers can.

Now, media has a strange relationship with poverty, one unlike other genres of social injustice. Making media takes money. In general, creating media is getting cheaper, but it’s still expensive to make a movie, publish a newsletter, or even a blog.

Now, it is wrong to jump in and say, “Oh! I have a voice! I will speak for the poor!” The impoverished have a voice. They know how to speak. They simply don’t have access to the same equipment, connections, etc., that we have due to our privileges. They’re not being heard.

So you’re not a “voice for the voiceless.” Your job as a socially aware media creator is to allow the people who aren’t being heard or are being silenced to speak to those who weren’t listening. These people may be inspired by the new voice to make change.

When dealing with poverty, or any other issue of injustice, you must take into consideration the imbalance. You must realize that perhaps your video has only men, because you only interviewed politicians and other people in positions of power. Recognize the systems at work, and always look on the low side of the power totem pole for your best stories, the other side, and potential to make the world a better place.