HD slow mo uploads

Uploaded these videos to Vimeo. It seems, however, that YouTube's HQ setting renders better than Vimeo... hmm..

http://www.vimeo.com/4930832

http://www.vimeo.com/4930857

They are clips from the 'savasana' portion of Abby Lentz's new "HeavyWeight Yoga" DVD. The second in the award-winning series that we're producing (!).

Acai juice

Spent the day yesterday staring at a green screen; we were making a promotional video for a client who makes healthy fruit drinks from acai, noni, goji and mangosteen juices. All very fun - background will be Brazilian scenes etc etc...

Tramps and champers

Had two great meetings today.

One was at Red River Cafe (mm) with a fitness instructor about making a proper trampoline video.

The other was at Jo's on South Congress with Mandy Lauderdale. We're planning a new music video for her single, "Champagne."

Of course, they were sandwiched by 

 - exporting video - HD takes forever to export!

 - uploading to YouTube

 - creating DVDs for two clients

 - continuing design of our new company website

 and

 - learning more than I'd care to about RSS and pixels.

Fiore De Henriquez

I'm happy to say that the documentary about the sculptress Fiore De Henriquez is coming together nicely. The executors of her estate have been very kind and are helping every step of the way. We are heading out to Peralta in June to interview some people involved in her life and see the foundry where she worked.

From this footage, we shall cut together a promo piece to raise funds to make the full-length feature about this fascinating lady.

slacker

I've been slack in posting. Mainly because I've - thankfully - been silly busy...
Quick shopping list of video projects at the moment:

- SPRING CONDOMINIUM
Edited more interviews with tenants saying how much they like it etc and putting together a marketing DVD and series of web videos for their soon-to-be re-vamped website

- HEAVYWEIGHT YOGA part II
Directed a 4-camera HD shoot of a one-hour class with interviews with the stars of the show.
Edited with FCP's multi-cam feature.
Went to the Crossings spa/retreat and filmed some beautiful slow motion on the EX-1 for the Savasana section.
Prepping the DVD design
Getting a Spanish translation recorded and dubbed for Special Features.

 - CENTRE FOR CHILD PROTECTION

Filming and editing marketing and promotional material for this, sadly, much-needed organisation.

- CulinART
Directed and edited a multi-camera shoot of a charity dinner & art event.

The charity was The Wright House - they help people living with HIV/AIDS, Cancer and Hepatitis C.

- Legal Seminar
Filming a chap give lawyers their 'furthering education' seminar .He used a lot of movie clips, including My Cousin Vinny, Forrest Gump (ugh) and A Few Good Men...

- Al Jazeera
Filmed a TV show for Al Jazeera's English station during South By South West.
There's a clip of one of the episodes here:



- South By South West
Coordinated the multi-cam shoot and stage screen for the outdoor stage at South By South West.
Headliners Explosions in the Sky were amazing!

WW2 P.O.W. video

Well, I've been away for a bit getting married and stuff. My family have been visiting, including my grandad on my mum's side.

In the Second World War, he was a sent to the Pacific (before Pearl Harbour happened) and was subsequently captured by the Japanese. He spent the rest of the war in a Japanese P.O.W camp being starved and sent down the coal mines to help the Japanese war effort.

A few days ago, we drove out to Fredericksburg (in Texas) to the Nimitz Museum, run by the family of Admiral Nimitz. It's a museum dedicated to the Pacific Theatre during World War 2 and has some very extensive displays. And it's still expanding!

About 8 years ago, he told his story on camera and I cut it together with scraps of pictures and videos found online. Here are the opening and closing graphics sequences. The full story is on YouTube.

time lapse

For Mardi Gras, I spent the evening up one of the condominium towers that are being built here in Austin. Spring Condo was celebrating with a 'topping off' party. I think this means that they've put the roof on, but I'm not sure. 

We were at this party because a few months ago, Spring Condos asked us to film views from their 32nd floor. We decided to shoot High Def time lapse of sunrise, sunset, clouds racing past etc. and cut it all together rather nicely (we think!).

Here it is:

For the tecchies, it was shot with two Sony EX-1 cameras in 720p mode. We shot between 1 and 5 frames per second for the time lapse stuff and edited on Final Cut Pro.