The Genesis Project

By my count now we have a total of SIX HD editing partners and I'm probably missing one or more at that.  The newest addition to the lineup is an old friend from my audio background, but a new player in the video space.  Mark of the Unicorn is more widely known as MOTU.  They have made one of the premiere midi sequencer/audio editors for many years and some time ago, they branched out to create some terrific audio hardware interfaces for both Mac and PC.  I personally have an 896HD and an ultralite, so it was with great interest that I saw an ad for their new product V3HD.  This product is now shipping with compatibility for Premiere Pro for the PC (no Mac yet) and that's about all I know apart from the website listed below. 

This looks like a great piece of hardware at first glance and it's another validation of Premiere Pro as one of the top editing tools for HD. 

MOTU V3HD

Posted by Dennis Radeke at 09:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Couple of 'largish' events are happening in the near future and I'll be at the less glitzy of the two.  Either way, it's important for you to keep track of them so read on!

This is for ALL things Photoshop and if you're into Photoshop (and I have to ask who isn't?) then it's a great show to visit whether you're an amateur, prosumer or full on professional. They seem to alternate between Boston and Las Vegas and this one is in the latter.  I'll be there doing a couple of presentations on Production Premium and hopefully entice some hardcore Photoshop users to embrace video and motion into their work!  If you're there, stop by and say hello.

IBC - www.IBC.org

IBC is the NAB of Europe and while I've never been there, I've heard great things about it.  It's also a great place for companies to announce things, so it'll be an interesting week next week.  Adobe will be there in force and we'll certainly have one or more announcements there, so stay tuned to your favorite media news portal!

Finally, what would a recent post be from me if it didn't include some kind of apology?  Yes, I'm very self-depricating...  Things have been going absolutely CRAZY and as a result, I've been unable to maintain a regular blogging regimen.  On top of that, I did open heart surgery on my laptop and it takes a while to bring everything back up to snuff. 

Anyway, if all of this is new to you, click on the links above, check out the blog archives, download some tutorials and in general have fun.

Cheers,

Dennis

Posted by Dennis Radeke at 10:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This week, Adobe announced and posted a Flash player that included H264 decoding, essentially adding a new video codec for playback.  Flash 6 was the first video codec with Sorenson Spark.  With Flash 8, we added the much improved on2 VP6 codec.  In the meantime, H264 has grown in adoption and it seemed to make sense to add an open codec to the Flash platform. 

So, if you're interested in giving it a test drive, mosey on over to Adobe's Lab website labs.adobe.com

As an aside, the thing that flabbergasted me was how quickly all of our customers knew about this!  The independent artist that attended last night's AENY meeting as well as the large NYC broadcasters and everything in between.  I guess 98% market penetration has that affect on people! 

Flash Player penetration stats

Posted by Dennis Radeke at 08:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

This week, I got a chance to visit some fabulous broadcast clients and while I've got some thoughts that I'd like to share soon, the one that struck me the most is how many times incredibly talented people asked for features that already existed or didn't know about some keyboard shortcuts that would immediately help them.

Does this mean that these people aren't incredibly talented, intelligent and the like?  Of course not!  In fact, again and again we were all amazed at the quality and imagination that these artists do with our products.  We're the pastels and they're wielding Adobe...I tipped my hat to many of them and wished I had their ability... sigh...

Still, it was interesting to learn that even what I would call the expert user can be so used to doing things a certain way that he/she is surprised and elated when they learn a better way.

So, with that in mind here are two of the common ones that some people 'rediscovered' this past week.

In After Effects, with your mouse over a panel, if you hit the tilde key "~" it will make that panel take up the whole interface.  This is now true of Premiere Pro, Encore and Soundbooth as well.  This is a powerful key, but especially for After Effects users trying to navigate amongst many layers.

Actions - Use 'em!  One of the top features requested by some of the clients we visited was chiefly concerned with an easy way to create an alpha channel for compositing in other programs including After Effects. We still have work to do to make this as absolutely simple as possible, but this person wasn't aware of the common video actions folder that can be loaded into the actions palette. 

What does this mean to Adobe?  Well, for me it says two things:  First that Adobe has several very mature products with new users learning these programs. They're missing out on what 'old hands'  learned through the years. Another way to describe this is that Photoshop has over 500 menu items and it's a given that people aren't going to know all 500 of these items!

The other point is something I heard from someone who stated that we need to be making it easier on how to find the best way to do something through our various help items.  As I am want to say, this had the ring of truth to it and I look forward to seeing how we can get you the information you need (contextually) as quickly as possible. The good news is that we're thinking about this so it will be interesting to see what happens to software in the future.

On that same note, let me mention about the new Bridge Home that is a part of Bridge CS3.  If you haven't checked it out, you should since it can really help you now in learning how to do certain things.  Click on your favorite product icon on the top and the interface will display a lot of the resources available from Adobe and other sources. 

Posted by Dennis Radeke at 03:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Nothing like a little last minute promotion for an eSeminar coming up.

Fact is, I've updated the hard drive in my laptop and slowly have been putting everything back together and today I finally reconnected my blog to Contribute CS3.  I've got a lot of catching up to do as it relates to blogging, but in the meantime, I wanted to offer you a chance to join me in an eSeminar that will happen in just a few hours.  It's all about new features in After Effects and boy, there are a ton of them in this pariticular release, so we'll be busy for the full hour.

If you're interested in registering for the seminar, please click here: eSeminar: After Effects CS3 - what's new!

If you miss it (and you won't I hope!), it will be recorded for future viewing as an onDemand presentation.

See you there,

Dennis

Posted by Dennis Radeke at 09:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you're into Photoshop (and from my perspective, who isn't?), then you should consider going some time to a Photoshop World.  It's a show for Photoshop freaks and geeks and I'll say it's a lot of fun.  The one coming up is in Las Vegas and happens from 9/6-8.  If that's a bit far for you, they usually have one on the East Coast every year as well. 

As a person who likes to play with Photoshop, I still walk away amazed at some of the stuff I learn each time I go.  I'll be there again this year (working) and hopefully will get to meet a few of you.

Photoshop World

Tip - If you're looking for a way to find out about new Adobe blog content, but find putting the RSS feed in your bookmarks a bit clumsy (it is SO 2006 ;-) then take a look at iGoogle as a home page.  Essentially, you can put up whatever kind of information you want, organize it, etc. It's really nice, fast and easy.  I've got my Adobe tab on iGoogle, how about you?

Personal note - I'm in Vegas now and hope to spend a day trying desperately to take some good photos of Zion National Park.  It's near the Grand Canyon and Bryce Canyon, so you probably already have an idea of the possibilities for pictures...Wish me luck as a hobbyist photographer - I don't want to show the Photoshop World people totally lame pictures!

Posted by Dennis Radeke at 08:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

This (for me at least) was a rather larger project for me to post than most of the others.  I might even categorize it as 'intermediate.'  Anyway, I have had the project done for a while, but haven't had time to type up an outline on how to recreate it.

I will post the files and an outline here in the future, but in the meantime, here is an example of how you can use After Effects to sail through the Solar System.  I also used Audition to build the soundtrack with some help from my friends at Digital Juice with their Sound FX library.  Enjoy!

Posted by Dennis Radeke at 07:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

August 07, 2007

Track Matte tutorial

Track Mattes are one of the most powerful and versatile effects in non-linear editors and Jeff Schell from DMN has just done a great one. Check it out as it is well worth the time and will give you some great new ideas for using this venerable effect.

DMN - Premiere Pro Track Mattes

Posted by Dennis Radeke at 09:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Cereal Boxes - it's how a twisted mind thinks

If that title does grab your attention, I don't know what will! Realize that I see New York newspapers that are trying for oneupmanship on each other with crazy headlines, which means you're likely to get the same from me - sorry...

Anyway, what am I talking about?  Well, when you start working at Adobe, you start to look at everything a little bit differently and consequently, you start to look and see things in a different way than the rest of society. Case in point, my eleven year old daughter said that I'm always commenting on the design ideals of the commercial/film/tv show rather than just watching them.  It drives the rest of my family crazy!

So, in looking at a box of snacks, I looked at the logo and said, "Cool, I bet I can do that!"  So here you go...

To be honest, most of this kind of work is done in Illustrator because it's vector based graphics as opposed to Photoshop.  However, it still achieves the same look and that's what we're going after.  Additionally, there are a couple of ways to go about this, but hopefully I presented one that is easy to do.  Below are a PDF and sample file for you to reconstruct/deconstruct. 

As always, get back to me with comments. If you couldn't follow along on the directions, please tell me!  Otherwise, I'm wasting your time and mine.  Cheers!

Cereal Box Files

Posted by Dennis Radeke at 09:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

August 06, 2007

Ramblings, links and a surprise

If I were a betting man (and I'm not, just ask Las Vegas), my guess would be that you're only considering clicking on the link because of the surprise part of the title? Hmm? True, huh?  That's okay, because I'm right there with you.  That being said, there's a bit more inside than just a surprise (for me anyway) but you'll have to click on through to get there...

In general, my blog has been about beginner tips, tricks, etc for various Adobe products.  I've stayed away from making this blog personal.  However, I do relax those rules once in a while to a) give some comedic relief even if it is rather lame, b) to give some insight into who I am (that's also why blogs are so popular) and c) it gives me a chance to post again. 

The last point brings up another.  I've really enjoyed doing this blog and putting up simple little bits that people might download and go, "oh, I get that," or "ahh, so that's how that is done!"  However, it gotten tough to keep up with it and I have something like six tutorials half done. One big one of a solar system fly through is waiting for me to write up a PDF, but it's just so busy, that I haven't had time.  So, on a personal note, I confess my ineptitude or laziness, whichever you prefer.

Hello Portland! I will be visiting on Saturday, August 18th and hope to meet any who are interested in attending.  It's a special event from MacForce I'll be doing a presentation on Production Premium CS3, and my wonderful coworker Lisa Forrester will be doing the same on the Design side.

Latest eSeminar is now posted online for on demand consumption.  If you're interested in taking about 60 minutes and get an overview on what Adobe Production Premium CS3 is about, check out my latest eSeminar: Production Premium CS3 presentation  Right now, the link is right there on the top, so go get it...

Photographer wannabe? Me too!  And if you are, I'm scanning through a great little book that is general in focus, less technical than most and full of nuggets...meaning useful tips in one page chunks.  Scott Kelby's Digital Photography book.  Scott's a terrific writer and personality amongst the Photoshop crowd and he communicates in a way that is very personal/funny and yet informative.  Here's a link from Amazon as a starting point...The Digital Photography Book

On the personal side, I'm needing an extra cup of coffee today because I stayed up late to watch Tom Glavine get his 300th win.  Yup, there's a personal tidbit for you - baseball is my disease, but I can think of a lot of things worse to get caught up in. Glavine's 300th win

Now, the surprise.  At least it was for me.  When you visit the Apple Store (as I've had to with my ailing MacBook Pro), you go into The Apple Zone. Or, "The world according to Apple/Steve"  Imagine my surprise when stumbling around the Internet this morning, I see an old story about the iPhone displays actually running Windows XP????  Have the heavens come down, is the world about to end? 

"The sky is falling, the sky is falling!"

Posted by Dennis Radeke at 10:25 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

August 01, 2007

What is broadcast quality?

Believe it or not, this question was presented to me by one of the major broadcasters when they were in for a meeting at Adobe headquarters.  "What is broadcast quality," they asked?  Now the two gentlemen from the company we spoke with were very intelligent so they weren't truly asking the question, but rather to make a point.  However, the question intrigued me.

What is broadcast quality? 

The quip and answer I heard had the ring of truth - "Whatever goes on the air is broadcast quality."

Does this strike you as it does me?  The implications? 

It means that the quality is secondary to the content that is being shown.  The story, the image, the impact is more important than the actual quality?  In this world of HD, content can come from a user posting to YouTube.  Looking for an example?  How about the final video a certain Iraqi leader?  It was on every broadcast channel and it was shot on what? A cell phone!

When I think of all of the conversations that I have with people talking about what next camera to buy and how much this piece of equipment costs, I think now about how this is many times irrelevant to what you're capturing.  If you're in the area where a tornado touches down and capture it on your old single CCD DV camera and call the local news company will they take it?  Probably.  If you post a cell phone video on YouTube of a surprise appearance of (fill in the name of your favorite band) in a dumpy bar will people watch it?  Yes.

It's just like my recent post entitled, "It's still about the story..." Great content without substance has no relevance.  Poor content with substance is important and relevant.

If you're on the business side of the equation, another way to answer the question of what is broadcast quality is like this: "Whatever people want to watch"  One conclusion that I draw from this is for us to consider (again and again!) what do people care about and want to watch?

What perhaps is even more interesting is what will happen to viewing habits as more and more channels show up on the internet. In the 'ole days' we had a dozen channels if we were lucky.  Then along came cable and more specialty channels such as ESPN. Back then, nobody thought a 24 hour cable network dedicated only to sports would ever make it.  Boy were we wrong about that one!  Now, we're on the cusp of having access to thousands or tens of thousands of channels with the Internet. Within Adobe we often talk about this phenomenon that as more channels become available, they will become increasingly more specific.  One example we often mention is the knitting channel.  This would never make it on the networks, let alone a cable channel because it is too narrow a focus for a mass audience.  However, if we take the number of people interested in knitting across the world, we would have many tens of thousands that would watch it.

The emergence of the Adobe Media Player will enable people to have a viewing experience like TV but with the Internet - both in an offline and online mode.  It will empower people who are passionate about topics such as knitting to create content to reach their intended audience.  This makes me question what the landscape of broadcast will be in the future.  If you haven't taken a look at what the Adobe Media Player and AIR (Adobe Integrated Runtime) environments are all about, you can get started here:

So what is broadcast quality?  I would still say that the answer is both "whatever goes to air" and "whatever people want to watch."  The one that I'm still figuring out is, "What is a broadcast?"  Maybe you can help me answer that one.

Posted by Dennis Radeke at 10:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)