Videocracy Blog

Has anyone noticed anything new, and or different about YouTube today?

YouTube is now showing there movies in a 16:9 (Widescreen) format…

I read an article about this on /Film and thought it might just be on SOME videos… or videos that were originally recorded and uploaded in widescreen to begin with…

But upon going to YouTube, I find that it is not the videos that are being displayed in widescreen, but it’s the player itself… meaning that content shot and uploaded in 4:3 (Most of the video creators in this world) it will have the black backs on the left and right within the video player.

I think it sounds great, it’s a good idea… but I dont’ like the black bars on the left or right… hopefully in the future you will have the option of specifying whether you are displaying your video in 16:9 or 4:3…

The benefit for this, is that it now allows people shooting in HD Widescreen aspect ratios to display their video as they are, and not have to chop off the left and the right, or even worse squeeze the video into a 4:3 format…

SO I can see where this has it’s advantages, but I can see where it will fall short…

For more info, just go to YouTube, you’ll see what I’m talking about…

Google and Life Magazine have created a search-able database filled with millions of photos from the Life Magazine archives… it’s a great reference tool, and the photos go all the way back to the 1860s… so essentially about 20 years after Photography was “developed”

It’s a great looking database, with so many cool photos… and it’s worth checking out.  I’m a big fan of flipping through photo collections bound in a book… and this is essentially the same thing.

http://images.google.com/hosted/life

I wrote previously about the holographic effect that CNN used on election night…

I just read a pretty interesting article that talked more about how much that effect may have cost, and gave a greater explination of how it worked… better then I gave, or even understood previously.

So here’s the article, it’s pretty neat

http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/tv/chi-election-question-cnn-1106nov06,0,900553.story

Well, Canon and Nikon have now both released DSLR cameras that shoot HD Video… according to DV Magazine, the Nikon D90 has the capability to shoot 1280×720 in their “D-Movie” mode… and the Canon 5D Mark II has the ability to shoot 1920 x 1080 at 30 fps second…

Using this camera with a good lens will surly get some good results if you want to go that route for shooting video…

I also listened to a recent episode of the Digital Production Buzz, where they talked to Red Rock Micro, who has come up with a device that they are calling the DSLR wrapper, I believe… and by putting it on your DSLR… you are now shooting digital still images, in the same way that 35mm is shooting film… giving you that cinema look…

Just take a look at the images on their site… this frankensten looking thing is pretty neat, and it’s gonna change the world of cinema…

http://www.redrockmicro.com/redrock_dslr.html

This was Canon and Nikon’s way of adapting to the boom that was created by the Red One when it came out… showing us where the future is headed…

i recent re-did our Music on Hold… Music and Announcement here at OnYourMark, LLC…
I want to share the original Music On Hold, as well as our new Music on Hold.

Original Music on Hold…

New On Hold Music…

So in the past I have written about Netflix, and also about Blu-ray…

In reference to Blu-ray, I have written about the results of the Blu-ray/HDDVD war… and in reference to Netflix, I have written about this revolutionary service, as well as the Roku box that will allow you to watch movies on demand on your TV…

Well Samsung announced that the two will be joining forces… On a select number of the new Samsung Blu-ray player, you will be able to connect to the internet and watch your Netflix on Demand movies, through your Samsung player.

Seems like a logical move on Samsungs part, as from my viewpoint, more people are subscribing to Netflix then buying Blu-Ray players… And I know that Netflix has recently started shipping Blu-Ray discs to users who are interested in them, for an additional fee…

I know that I would still have to do some careful thinking as to whether or not I want to buy a Blu-Ray player… I mean at this point I still have no interest in them… but I do want the Roku box. So would it make more sense to just buy a Blu-Ray player so that when I do feel the need to or the desire to buy Blu-Ray DVDs, I’ll have the box to do it? I don’t know…

I think I’d get more use out of the Netflix on Demand feature, then I would from the Blu-Ray feature…

Well, learn more for yourself, here’s the link to the article I found…

http://www.slashfilm.com/2008/10/22/samsung-announces-netflix-streaming-on-select-blu-ray-players/

A few years ago I discovered a great program called iSquint, for converting movies to iPod format… the company, Techspansion also has a program called Visual Hub, and another called Audio Hub…
Well it was recently told to me that Techspansion is closing its doors, and Visual Hub and all the other programs associated with it will no longer be available…

See more at Techspansion’s website… www.Techspansion.com

Visual Hub’s main purpose was to convert any file from one video format to another… in the easiest way possible, just drag the file in, and click start…

It’s a great program, so much so that when I bought my iMac, I made sure it was part of my arsenal of programs…

In this article…
http://apcmag.com/visualhub_gets_reborn_as_filmredux_goes_open_source.htm
Visual Hub will be re-released soon in an open source format called FilmRedux, but it won’t be out for awhile…

So for those of you who don’t have Visual Hub already and are looking for a program that will do simple conversions…. well there are a lot out there that will do it, but if you are willing to pay for it… I recommend using Quicktime Pro, it’s $30 to upgrade to the Pro version, and it will do what Visual Hub will do, not necessarily with the same ease… but with a program like Quicktime, at least you know it will do a sufficient job…

For PC I’ve experimented with various ways of doing this conversion… but in the end I would settle for Quicktime Pro, it just works the best…

That is until this FilmRedux comes out…

This is upsetting news… but it’s worth sharing for other video people out there…

I was watching CNN on election night this week, and they were trying something new that I thought was interesting…

They were able to bring in a reporter from Chicago, into the studio in what they were calling a “Hologram” think Star Wars, when there are communications where the person is seen in a translucent 3 Dimensional image of the person communicating…

And what CNN was doing was that they were filming the reporter in Chicago, all the way around… 360 degrees.  And in the main CNN studios the cameras were recieving a signal to indicate which camera was live… so initially we could move around the figure and they looked flawlessly like they were in the studio…

The image was not really a hologram, the CNN reporter couldn’t see the Chicago reporter… who in fact was just super imposed onto the screen for the TV viewers to see…

it was a neat idea, a neat concept… I think to truly impliment it properly in the future, we will ahve to actually have a hologram system… one in which the CNN studio reporter could see….

Here’s an interesting article that pretty much restates exactly what I just said, but in better detail.
http://www.news.com.au/technology/story/0,25642,24616216-5014239,00.html