Ruckus Media Group, an independent family digital entertainment company, today launched the new universal Ruckus application for iOS devices, including the iPad, iPhone and iTouch. Designed for families with children ages 2-10, the new Ruckus app features a collection of nearly 100 iReaders, ReadAlongs and videos from the company’s award-winning, bestselling storybook and video libraries […]
Year: 2012
Pro Tips for Photo Restoration in Photoshop
Photoshop’s tools for quality, fast acting corrections are now so easy and plentiful. I hope to add a few insider tips to your tool bag and some common sense to help make your results both dramatic and seamlessly real, not forced or artificial. My 4-part approach to restorations: Scan, Standard Image Corrections, Restoration of Defects, […]
Avid Media Composer 6.5.2 adds some very nice (and needed) features
When Avid released Media Composer 6.5 it did so with a $500 price tag and that rubbed a lot of users the wrong way as they didn't think the update was worth that price. I kicked the tires on Media Composer 6.5 and while there were a lot of nice new additions to the update […]
Read More… from Avid Media Composer 6.5.2 adds some very nice (and needed) features
Before & After VFX for Final Destination 5
Here's an awesome behind the scenes look at the bridge sequence in Final Destination 5. This scene is very heavy on visual effects, with a lot of work put into integrating practical sets, actors, and visual effects. Even with all the greenscreens they built at the practical locations, the sheer amount of rotoscoping work that […]
Videoguys’ 2012 Holiday Gift Guide
It's hard to believe that the holidays are here again. I want to apologize for getting this article out so late. It's been a very hectic past few months around here, and we're still making up for lost time caused by Superstorm Sandy. I thought about skipping this article this year, but we have so […]
48 fps: A Bridge Too Near?
Filmmaker Peter Jackson has recently performed a very public experiment in releasing The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey at 48 frames per second (also known as “HFR” for High Frame Rate). Some movie lovers, members of the press, and even other filmmakers have unfortunately deemed it a reluctantly qualified failure; Vincent Laforet wrote a particularly insightful […]
Progressive Posing – Full Length
In my last article Progressive Posing, I covered the Two-Thirds view and the Profile view. Referring back to that article, once you have achieved positioning the couple you are now able to easily change lens and create a full length image at ease anytime and anyplace. This is why I call it Progressive Posing. Now, […]
Does the Zone System Apply to HD Cameras?
My latest obsession is trying to match reflectance values with IRE values to create a “Zone System for video.” This is both easy to do and impossible, so click through if you'd like to see how far I've gotten… First, if you don't know what the Zone System is, take a few minutes and learn […]
MacBreak Studio Live
If you missed our live show last week, you can now catch it below. Steve Martin from Ripple Training and I chat about Final Cut Pro X. Normally we spend the bulk of the show answering questions, but we had a technical glitch (that we discovered after the show) whereby folks were unable to sign […]
What Good is a Macbeth/Colorchecker Chart?
Most camera rental houses have an in-house expendables store, and during a recent visit to one such store I ran across a stack of X-Rite “Macbeth” ColorChecker charts sitting on a shelf. I’m firmly convinced that the only reason people buy these is because they think there is a reason to use them for film-style […]
