In my previous “On working abroad” post, I talked about communicating in far-flung places. This time, I’m going to talk about currency and getting the stuff you need on a day-to-day basis.
I made one big mistake in preparing for my Sierra Leone trip last year: I assumed $1 was $1.
Wait, what?
Video compression is something of a black art. I’ve become something of a compression nerd over the past few months, partly because I was helping to plan the 2010 NPPA Multimedia Immersion, and partly because I’m a giant geek. I’m going to concentrate on editing codecs today. I don’t want to get into final output and compression.
I recently went back and re-editing the very first Final Cut piece I ever did. It was funny to go back and see how far I’ve come. It wasn’t a bad first attempt, but the edits weren’t very precise, I used way too many transitions, and it was a little too long. I did my copied the entire sequence over and removed all the image. I did several passes refining the audio, tweaking timing, levels and transitions. After that I added images, this time WITHOUT fade-to-black transitions between every frame (yikes).
Then the hail started from Jamie De Pould on Vimeo.
I wrote this up after some of my students had problems uploading H.264 encoded video from Final Cut Express to VuVox. Their videos either didn’t play back smoothly, or resized incorrectly–it seems VuVox only supports square pixels. So I tried converting the videos to .flv using Adobe Media Encoder, and it fixed all the problems we were having.
First, export the videos using the File>Export>QuickTime Movie command. Create a folder on the desktop called “flv_convert” (or something like that), and export there. Make sure you check the box that says “Make Movie Self-Contained.”
Once that’s done, you can quit Final Cut.
Launch Adobe Media Encoder.
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This is the first post in an ongoing series about the challenges of working abroad, or even in unpredictable situations close to home.
I’ve been playing with using slow shutter speeds in my sports shooting lately. The results are very hit-or-miss, but the technique has a lot of potential.
D300, 300mm f/2.8 VR
1/40s, f/8 @ ISO400
This was one of my early attempts, I took the Syracuse v. Villanova game, and decided to shoot the second quarter with all slow speeds. That way I had plenty of time to shoot more typical stuff, but I had a lot of time to experiment as well.
This was manual exposure mode. I metered the scene and chimped on the histogram, then dialed in my shutter speed and aperture to match. It seems like speeds between 1/20 and 1/60 work best, at least for Lacrosse. If you get any faster than 1/60s, then the blur starts to look unintentional, and you get too much background detail. Slower than 1/20s makes it difficult to get a lock on your subject, so everything is just a blurry mess.
I should also note, this was also shot with a monopod. Hand-holding a 300/2.8 is kind of a pain to begin with, let alone when you’re panning.
D700, 300mm f/2.8 VR
1/40s, f/7.1 @ ISO200
Similar arrangement as before, slightly sharper.
Here’s what 1/25s looks like:
D700, 300mm f/2.8 VR
1/25s, f/9 @ ISO200
I also discovered a nice little AE lock trick to lock in an exposure value, while allowing shutter and aperture to move around.
It requires a little menu punching, but it makes this sort of thing a lot quicker.
I don’t trust the meter a whole bunch in this situation. I like to set my exposure manually, and leave it there. The problem is that turning both dials in opposite directions at the same time is hard.
First, set the meter off delay to infinite. Yes, it’ll eat into your battery life, but if you’re like me, your finger is always on the shutter anyway, so it doesn’t really matter.
Next, set the AE-L/AF-L button to AE lock hold. This removes the meter from the equation entirely, while giving you single-dial control over both shutter and aperture.
Flip the camera to shutter priority. Set your exposure and hit the AE-L. It’ll stay locked until you press it again to unlock. Now, when you turn the shutter speed dial, the aperture dial will move the same amount in the opposite direction to maintain your locked exposure. For example: your exposure is 1/60s, f/8. If you turn the dial to 1/40s, the aperture will shift to f/10. No meter to get confused, it’ll do that every time until you unlock it.
Now it’s just a matter of finding your shutter speed/panning comfort zone, and trying to anticipate the action. Even with an 8 or 9 fps motor drive, this technique reduces your chances for capturing the exact moment, so you really have to be on top of it.
You may want to set this up as a custom preset, apart from your normal settings. That way you can just flip it on and off with one click, and you won’t be running around with your meter constantly running when you don’t want it to be.
Before leaving, I called my various banks and credit card companies to give them my itinerary. When I called American Express, they told me not to worry, their computers were set up to handle the trip, no problem. At the end of the call, they also gave me the number for their 24/7 global assist hotline, should I need anything.
Stupidly, I misplaced the phone number, but at least I remembered the conversation. I pulled out my small business card, and called the international number on the back. The customer service rep connected me to global assist.
“I’m stuck in Sierra Leone,” I said. “I missed my flight out.”
I was in that weird place, somewhere between giddy and crestfallen.
The operator on the other end took all of my information, my itinerary number, and started looking up where exactly I was, and how I could get back to the States. I’ve never be envious of anyone with a cubicle job before, but I just imagined sitting at a desk somewhere in the middle of Iowa. I really wanted to be in Iowa.
Samuel asked me what I wanted to do, and reminded me that there was a man who worked at the hospital and he airport who lived close, if we wanted to stay the night there.
We drove to his house, which was less than a mile away. Somewhere in that mile, I lost most of my cell reception. Samuel’s phone worked fine, but he was almost out of minutes, and we wouldn’t be able to buy more until morning. We settled in, and I tried to sleep.
Eventually morning came. Around 8 or 9, we went to find one of the ubiquitous cell phone vendors on the main road in front of the airport. I bought 1000 units (something like $20 US), and finally got back on with American Express. They didn’t have much new information for me, but they did confirm there was a flight out in about 14 hours, with a few seats open. The bad news was that British Airways wouldn’t speak to anyone except me about the flight.
Eventually, we got on a conference call with the airline, and booked everything through to Chicago. I had to overnight in Chicago, because all the Syracuse flights were booked.
At that point, I would’ve been happy just to get to London.
I felt so much better with a plan, even if I wasn’t going to be home for another two days.
Now it was simply a matter of waiting. We headed back to the house for a little while, listened to the radio, and had some breakfast.
In the time it took us to get back to the house it also started raining. Monsooning, really.
Samuel stayed with me the whole day, until it was time to start boarding. Words really can’t describe my gratitude.
Africa is an interesting place. The man pictured here is Samuel Vamboi, my driver while I was in Sierra Leone. Without Samuel, I really don’t know what I would’ve done.
Lungi International Airport, while ostensibly in Freetown, is on an island roughly nine miles out into the Atlantic Ocean. Travelers can get there by ferry, helicopter or hovercraft (bizarrely). On the day I was supposed to depart, we decided to take the ferry. Flights in and out of Lungi from London Heathrow generally arrive in the evening (7 p.m. or so), and depart again before midnight.
Samuel picked me up around 3 or 4 in the afternoon to begin the sojourn to the airport. Traffic in Freetown is unbelievable–I probably spent as much time sitting in traffic as I did working–but even so, three hours should be enough time to get from the guest house to the ferry terminal, and on to the airport.
We arrived at the ferry shortly after 6 p.m., just in time to see the ferry departing. Normally, a 6 p.m. ferry departing at 6 p.m. wouldn’t be astonishing, but this is Africa. Nothing runs on time. That should’ve been my first clue.
No matter, everyone assured me the 9 p.m. ferry would get me to the airport with time to spare.
We waited around the ferry terminal, killing time, and I tried not to worry about missing my flight.
Naturally, the 9 p.m. ferry did NOT leave on time. Nor did it take 30 minutes to cross, as I was told. No, because the tide was coming in, the ferry took just over an hour. We docked at the ferry terminal–roughly 15 miles from the airport–just after 10. Toward the end of the ferry ride, I was getting increasingly anxious. I had a bad feeling.
Since we were one of the first vehicles onto the ferry, we were at the front. That meant we’d be one of the last vehicles off.
Amazingly, Samuel was able to maneuver our full-size Toyota Hilux pickup truck in front of half the other cars on the ferry. Backwards.
Once we cleared the ferry terminal, it was a race to the airport. We were bombing these third-world, one-and-a-half lane roads at 100 kph or more, with all manner of carts, cars and livestock surrounding us. If you’ve never heard a 2.5 L diesel shrieking at red line … it’s quite a sound.
We arrived at the airport and rushed in. The gormless man at the check-in counter simply said we were too late, that I couldn’t board the plane. There was no changing his mind.
I was crushed.
After anticipating the trip home, and SEEING the plane I was supposed to take, I simply broke down.
The people at the airport were no help, and I realized not only did I miss my flight, I had no idea when I would be able to leave, or if I had enough money on my American Express to pay the fees I’d undoubtedly rack up for changing my flight plans AFTER my flight left.
I called home, and explained (poorly), that I wasn’t on the plane, and didn’t know what I was going to do. I said I would call back when I had more information, but my rented cell phone didn’t have reception later, so I couldn’t call back until roughly 18 hours later. As far as everyone back home was concerned, I was off the grid. Ironically, British Airways told my mother I was on the plane, so they worried less than they probably should’ve.
After hanging up, I tried to compose myself, and turned to find Samuel.
“I’m not going anywhere,” he said. “I will stay with you.”
I don’t have words to describe what that felt like. It settled me enough to try to figure out my next move. I didn’t even have a phone number for British Airways.
There are any number of reasons to export a Final Cut sequence to XML. The biggest one I’ve run into recently is students accidentally opening their project in Final Cut Pro when they should be using Final Cut Express.
You can also use an XML export to transfer a Final Cut Project to Adobe Premiere Pro, and from there to a program like After Effects or Photoshop. This cuts down on exporting intermediate files between FCP and other programs.
Whatever the reason, it’s a fairly simple process.
Open the project in Final Cut Pro, and click File>Export>XML
From there, you’ll need to select an XML interchange format. I found that XML 4 works best when you’re transferring back to Final Cut Express. I haven’t tried it with Premiere, so experiment and see what works best.
I generally uncheck “include master clips outside selection,” because this gives you all the clips used in the timeline, but doesn’t include any clips in the browser but not in the timeline. I prefer to import all of my clips at once, rather than try to figure out which ones I’m missing.
I save the XML file in the same location as my .fcp files, and give it a clear name like JAMIEDEPOULD_EXAMPLEPROJECT-XML.
Once that’s done, you can quit Final Cut Pro, and launch Express (or Premiere). From there, simply click File>Import XML from iMovie. Navigate to the XML file you just created, select it, and Final Cut Express will prompt you to save the new project. I generally like to call it YOURNAME_PROJECTNAME-FCE.
When it’s finished, you have your timeline, complete with edits, right there in front of you. Import your assets, and you’re ready to get back to editing. If you’re working on a machine with both Final Cuts Pro and Express, it’s best to control+click on your .fcp, and choose “Open With,” or drag the file onto the correct dock icon. That way, you won’t unwittingly convert a Final Cut Express file to Pro.
This is from an afternoon spent with the Kissy nutrition unit. They spent the better part of two days preparing Benemix, which has all sorts of stuff in it. The final product is a powdery supplement for infants, high in protein and calcium.
Here, they’re cooking, drying and mixing most of the ingredients before they go into the grinder.
