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On trying to unblock the i-pod touch.

Byrichard

Today I tried to unblock the ipod touch and it froze the first time and started to heat up and the second time the screen went to black. I thought on two occasions that my ipod was bricked. I’ve been able to re-install everything and am now syncing the content back onto the device.

For the first attempt the device was plugged into the computer and whilst I did see the install app on the screen the display would stop responding. Whether this is due to weak wifi or an incompatibility I’m not sure.

On the second attempt the hack didn’t work and went so far as for the display to cease working. I tried re-starting it with the button and nothing changed. As I plugged it back into the laptop it detected that something was happening and so I was able to restore the ipod.

In summary I’m not going to try that again with my own ipod. I’ll wait until February when they’ll allow third party apps to be included.

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Using leopard as an operating system

Byrichard

Leopards are a strong animal capable of lifting animal carcasses into trees to keep their catch safe. It’s also the new Apple operating system and I purchased it. After taking about two hours to install the operating I’m quite happy with the new operating system.

Safari has had some new interactivity added. With most browsers the tabs are fixed at the top of the page and there’s not much you can do. If you’re in a playful mood then open up safari in Leopard and you can switch the tabs between each other. If you feel that one tab deserves it’s own browser window simply pull down the tab and it goes to a full size browser.

The user interface for the finder is quite a bit more fun. You’ve got coverflow for you pictures. What this means is that you can go through your pictures with no need to open iphoto and other applications. As a result the ability to be disorganised is greatly enhanced. At the same time looking at photographs and documents is quite a bit easier.

The time machine is an interesting piece of software that backs up your data every hour for 24 hours, then every day for a month and after that every week for as long as there’s space on the hard disk. If you’re on a desktop and your external hard drives are always plugged in then this is excellent. If you’re like me and you’re using a laptop the idea is not that great because the time machine is only active whilst I’m taking the time to plug in the hard drive. Setup is really easy therefore anyone with an external hard drive that mirrors the space used on their computer should be able to use it.  If you’re using an internal spare hard drive does it work the same way

Items in the dock look the same as in tiger except there is a blue dot at the moment to display the applications that are currently active. The mail application has an RSS feed of apple news, just in case you’d missed the latest. You have both to do and notes  included straight within the mail application.

The calendar has had one or two improvements of which the most useful is the pop out when you’re adding an event. In previous versions you would have to go to either side and type in additional information. With this one data input is overlayed  over the calendar greatly increasing usability.

The ichat chromakey technology is quite interesting. If you want you can choose any background you want from the database of videos and photographs you have on your laptop. Simply choose the background you want. Move out of shot and wait till it’s seen the image. When you move back into frame you’ve got whichever background you chose. It works moderatly well depending on the type of background you’re using though.

Leopard is a nice operating system with a number of new features that make it fun to try out and use. The way information is displayed is interesting and the additional features like cover flow for document browsing, time machine for backup and more are taking advantage of the fact that people’s use of the computer has progressed over the years. By being better at media browsing the operating system is more intuitive to use. So far I’m happy with it.

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Black Gold – Documentary about ethiopia and coffee

Byrichard

Whilst in Paris I was given a coffee due to a misunderstanding between the waitress, a friend and I and as a result this was the first coffee I ever finished. It’s almost a week later and I’ve just been to see the documentary Black Gold which discusses the plight of Ethiopian coffee farmers.

The documentary is shot in an observational style with the use of intertitles rather than voice over. As a result those that are telling the story are those that are most affected. We have one main character who works on bypassing several links in the chain from farmer to coffee shop whilst having the conventional chain being illustrated in parallel. The documentary touches on a number of interesting points but I will leave that to you to discover as you watch the documentary.

The documentary producer was present at this screening and took some time to explain the reason for which he chose this topic, how certain coffee companies tried to discredit the film as a result of which I think some time should be taken to get more information about the topic out there.

Fair trade is a hot topic so why not have a blogactionday which is focused on poverty alleviation and which informs us about what should be changed and what is already been done.

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Why I went to Paris

Byrichard

The digital era of communcation is a great one because research for video material is no longer restricted the archives of the INA, France television, BBC, TSR and other archives to find footage you’re looking for. A producer from steamboat films was working on a documentary about the walkman and found a lot of historic footage to make the subject come alive. She aslo needed some comtemporary representation of how the modern walkman is used and came across silent disco and my footage.

The screening took place at the Centre Pompidou in Paris in the basement where there are two cinema rooms. The cinema was filled to more than half it’s capacity as all those who had worked on the three documentaries met to get to know their fellow contributors. The three documentaries are The Bookworm, The Concorde and the Walkman of course. Each one is an individual documentary with it’s own merits. I had the opportunity to see the Concorde documentary almost in it’s entirety twice as I arrived whilst they were testing to make sure everything was in order.

Having watched the Walkman documentary three or four times already, once with house mates and two or three times by myself it was fun to see an audience’s reaction. It’s fun to be surrounded by a professional group of people rather than fellow students. You see them laugh at moments that are both typically French and old fashioned. What they didn’t laugh at so much is the silent disco footage, probably because it’s too close to home. People did laugh, but not quite as many as I would have liked. I suspect the reason for that is that they’re thinking of how they dance so laughing would be making a slight joke of their own dancing.

There are two reasons why I enjoyed this event. The first was that it was the first time I’m surrounded by professionals as I get my first screen credit on the big screen at a cinema projection. It was also an opportunity to meet with the people that are behind the screen producing these programmes. I look forward to future collaborations in the near future.  I look forward to what the future holds.

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Twittoholism

Byrichard

Twittoholism is seeing the world through twitter.

Rather than reading newspapers, books and other intellectual adventures you see the world through what others are twittering about. It’ a bit like a chatroom but you take this one with you wherever you go, from your bedroom to the living room, across town on the bus and even to your computer.

As you get a greater diversity of people so your twitterfull existence progresses exponentially.

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503 is an interesting protest documentary.

Byrichard

Whenever I hear that people are protesting I discount this as bored people keeping themselves entertained but upon watching the film 503 I changed my mind. The documentary is about the protests that took place over a period of 503 days when Augusto Pinochet was kept under house arrest in England for his crimes against humanity.

When interviewed the protesters explained that these actions were their way of remembering all the disappeared people. It was through the actions, like the crosses outside parliament square and the 503 day protest outside Pinochet’s house in England that helped them feel better. Describing the moment that they heard Pinochet had been arrested you saw that these people were jubilant. 503 days later that jubilation was gone but the community of protesters had expressed their concerns to an international crowd, ready to listen to what they had to say.

The documentary is different from many other documentaries I have watched and I’d recommend watching that one simply to see how protesters are not stereotypical of those we see in newspaper cuttings and films.

more info

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Current Affairs in Podcast Form

Byrichard

There is an increasing number of professional outfits now offering their content in podcast form, from Euronews to the BBC, from Reuters to The Guardian and others. As a result there are a number of great resources for news content.


The Media guardian was one of the earlier outputs and concentrated mainly on media news but since then The Guardian have diversified their content output to include a number of news programs. These include The Guardian Weekly Podcast, MediaTalk, Newsdesk, and one or two others I have yet to listen to. These programs are good for two reasons; firstly they provide world news when it’s convenient for you and secondly because professionals are creating this content therefore the content should be more reliable. They provide in-depth analysis, getting interviews, and discussions that help the listener understand the topics that are being discussed. In effect they are creating broadcast-quality programs as radio stations have done in the past.


Euronews provides their No Comment video feeds and these are more of a curiosity than factual. They show one to two minutes of edited footage without a voice over. it’s up to the viewer to, via the information previously gathered to understand what the footage is about.


Reuters create their own output in the form of a two to three-minute news summary for the day’s events.


The BBC has a great variety of content available and one of my current favourites is The BBC World Service Global News report that you get twice a day with a summary of the day’s news. It provides around 20 minutes of world news from a variety of countries. They have a number of other productions that cover a range of needs from global news to From Our Own Correspondent and others.


We then have NBC and their Meet the Press Program which is distributed both in podcast and video form. The interviews are interesting and the ability to take them wherever you go means that whilst the program is relatively long it’s available at your convenience.


The point at the moment is that there are a number of resources from which to get the latest news as a result of which some of the more classic, and badly managed more traditional (relatively) media (television) are replaced by newer on-demand content.

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Jamaican Gang Culture And South African Drug Culture – Unreported World

Byrichard

As I write this I am happy that I have been to watch quite a few interesting documentaries at the Frontline Club. The two most recent were made for Channel 4’s Unreported World. This is channel four’s “acclaimed foreign affairs series” and covers a number of topics. The two documentaries I watched were South Africa: Children of the Lost Generation and  Jamaica: Guns votes and money.


Both are investigative observational documentaries showing the progress made by the journalists as they try to uncover the stories that other documentary channels cover. The South African documentary gave an insight into the drug Tik and how, although it is mainly affecting those in the slums is also coming to the wealthier white areas as well. It is well shot and there are a few interesting interviews that give us a good insight into the problem.


When it comes to the Jamaican documentary it is interesting because of the way it has covered the gang and gun culture found in certain areas. The documentary maker and his crew were fortunate to find people that would allow them to come into this gang culture and learn more about the daily lives of these people.


During the Questions and answers session we learned more about the process, how they did some forms of pre-production before arriving, how they had difficulties speaking with Police but how the gang members welcomed them in. When asked how they were allowed to film the gangs they couldn’t really explain it. They did express disappointment, especially for the Jamaica story, on how they had been unable to cover the police point of view, and how the documentary would have gone in another direction.


Watching documentaries is a passion of mine so getting to listen to and meet the people who create these documentaries is great. Hearing the questions that people ask is also interesting because of the little details you learn through the in-depth knowledge certain of these individuals have.

A crude Awakening, the oil crash

Byrichard

What makes a good documentary is the quality of the interviews and how they are put together to inform and educate us on the topic they are tackling. A Crude Awakening – The Oil Crash is a perfect example of this. Using a great wealth of interviews and archive material it illustrates why the current consumption of oil is unsustainable. It is well constructed and has a strong message.


Basil Gelpke, born in 1962, in Basel, Switzerland has had an interesting career. He studied anthropology, economics, and the production of scientific films. He went from working in advertising to 24hr news with the European Business channel during which he got promoted to become the channel’s Paris correspondent. On assignment in South East Asia he was one of the first journalists to venture into Cambodia after the fall of the Khmer Rouge. He would later help setup N-TV, a 24hr news channel in Berlin. He did some work on the Swiss Survivor series and “Expedition Robinson” programs. In 2002 he read a paper from the Sydney based Hedge Fund on the topic of decreasing oil reserves and spent many years researching the documentary before finishing this documentary for a screening at SXSW2006.


Look out for this documentary, it’s an interesting piece of documentary making.

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How Using a Laptop for Client Led Video Editing Work Helps The Environment (Blog Action Day)

Byrichard

When I started video editing it required a powerful desktop computer and moving it around was hard. Now I’m working on a laptop. This is great for the environment and here’s why.


When the equipment you are using is portable it means that you can edit from the client’s offices rather than your own. Several times already I have gone to the office of those whom I work for. If there is a desk free beside them then they may go along with their daily routine whilst I keep working on my own work. Once there’s a rough cut I show them the edit and see whether they like it, apply any changes and once that’s done I can author a DVD.


In the past I would need a VHS machine, a tower, and a monitor. All of these take space and use energy. As a result there’s more energy being consumed. There’s then the issue of finishing a rough cut, driving to see the client, getting their feedback before driving back to the edit suite, and applying the changes. On some projects this type of process may have required quite a few trips.


Now I’m the one that moves with my laptop to the office. Work on the project and the net result is a great decrease in the number of trips that need to take place.  I’ve done my bit for the environment. I’ve also saved a few hours of commuting.


This post was part of the Blog Action Day. Check the image on the right sidebar for more information about this blog day and others.