I was just in a conversation with a friend about what sorta computer she should buy.. or more to the point.. should she get this particular computer.. and.. well she didn’t have a lot of money and.. we couldn’t actually see what the price was.. but this triggered me to thinking about net books.. which I know is pretty well trotted ground in the blogosphere.. but I figure, what the hell.

The first thing you must know about me is that “I’m a Mac.” I’ve always been a Mac.. ever since there were Macs.. sure, I’ve owned 1 PC, played with Amega’s.. etc, but.. I’m a Mac.

The Trouble with Macs 

The trouble with Macs, or Apple, as I contemplate it now, is that they don’t make a netbook.. Well they make the Mac Air.. which is there idea of an ultra portable laptop computer.. The Mac Air is great except for 3 problems.. #1 Expensive.. like starting at $1500.. #2 Weak.. I think it barely has 2 GHz.. and #3 lacks a CD / DVD drive..

See, the thing of the matter is.. if I’m going to get a netbook type computer..  besides being tiny and ultra portable.. I expect it to be a secondary computer.. a kind of computer I can  take and use anywhere without really thinking too much about it.. For it to be this tiny it must have a tiny screen which makes it totally not capable of doing most of what I do on a computer.. thus.. I’m unwilling to spend a lot of money on it.. especially when you consider that it doesn’t have much in the way of power.. Thus.. $500 might be more then I really want to spend!

Not having a CD / DVD drive is not a deal killer.. but I do want a laptop that I can at least watch movies on… but that doesn’t have to be the netbook.

So the issue is, at least right now, if I want such a computer.. it’s not going to run the Apple operating system unless I hack it to run the Apple OS.. which is maybe something I should look at because.. well.. there is the question of what I would, in practice, want to do on a netbook.

Net Book Ideals 

To me the Net Book ideal is as follows: You have this computer that’s so small you can take it anywhere without thinking about it.. has great battery life.. one way or another you’re connected to the internet..In this kind of scenario.. I might like to have the ability to take images off my camera.. or a video camera.. and perhaps even edit them.. adjust them a bit, and quickly post to the internet. I want to check emails, write blog posts, maybe edit a podcast or do simple audio things… 

So one super basic reason I’d prefer to run the Apple OS is because then I can run the software I already own that does that stuff..  I don’t have to buy, or learn how to use new stuff.See, one of the issues I’m confronting is..

I do need “a better computer” then my current Mac Book. Well.. I really need firewire so I can have a decent audio interface for live shows… and currently.. it looks like I might need the 17″ Mac Book Pro for its expansion slot.. and a 17″ Mac Book Pro is not terribly portable.. but.. I can do live shows with what I have now, so I’m in no rush.. 

Do you see a Tablet in my Future? 

All of this said, there is the Rumor of an Apple tablet… which might very well meet my netbook needs.. accept.. well.. its just a rumor.. The rumor is that it’s like to have something like a 13″ screen, if that.. will run the iPhone version of the OS.. all touch screen.. This would mean I couldn’t run my current apps.. but if you look at the iPhone App Store.. I think some of these needs would be met pretty easily.. though who knows about the video thing! 

I don’t know how realistic my video ideas are, or what.. my feeling at this particular moment is.. probably the most important thing is simply to commit to them.. in a long term sorta way.

Ok, here’s the basic deal.. Video is like.. big these days on the internet.. you may have noticed? I’m basically looking at video as packaging for my music.. or as an extension of the experience of my music.. as a part of the art object. I’m really approaching video from a unique sorta aesthetic perspective… 99.9% of all video production today is produced inside of a certain set of conventions that don’t really get pushed all that much. Sure, there’s great video and film work made this way.. This isn’t a giant value judgement about that.. but its also not what I’m seeking to do.. What I’m seeking to do is approach video from a very ART perspective.

At the moment this means.. screwing around.. It’s a combination of exploring certain ideas as they come to you, and trying to learn the tools… At the moment the tool I’m working with is Apple’s Motion… which is a part of Final Cut Studio.. as an aside, its breaking news that a new version has just come out.. but we shant speak about that.

The project started on a sorta doodling branding adventure a few months back.. I was working in Photoshop and Illustrator.. trying to craft out a logo.. based on some sketches I had done.. This also included messing around with photography.. what follows is a part of that project.. as it looked at one moment in time…

 Motion is a motion graphics / animation program.. and one of the things you can do is import photoshop files.. complete with there individual layers.. I did some funky things.. and placed the different layers at different places in space.. to basically turn something like the above image into a 3D image that I could fly the camera around.. and play with various.. well.. ideas.

I’ve been working steadily on this for the last 3 or 4 days; creating these various little psychedelic video clips. The resulting clips seems to be about some kind of exploration of identity and personal branding… or at least that’s what they made me think of.

The idea originally was to simply put out a sorta complicated screen cast of my DAW.. put it on Youtube.. so that I could sorta share what I do in a certain way..  and I figured if I did that.. I’d at least need some sorta titling / motion graphic sequences.. to sorta.. make it look serious.. I may still do this.. I don’t know.. but now I’m thinking of it more like music video elements.. to be sorta remixed together latter on.

There’s a whole sorta visual language.. set of icons.. symbols.. whatever.. that make up the visual identity I plan on making for myself. [editors note: Matt has been working on this language since at least college] It’s something you are much more inclined to read as Fine Art then.. well communications / graphic design.. Though as I elluded to earlier.. I am thinking about this from something of a design perspective.

My kinda goal is to try and produce something that looks like a million bucks.. something that makes you go “wow, that’s fucking cool.” Make something that would seem to have the sorta production values you could expect from the music video of a major label artist.. way back when they had big budgets…. But something totally different.

The hard fact of the matter is I’m early in on learning to do this stuff.. and a great distance from where my ambition is aiming.. and it is not totally clear that I’ll be able to realize these goals I’ve set for myself…

Well.. whatever.. I actually don’t think those kinds of production values are all that important.. I mean they are for my vision.. but I also think if you just do good story telling.. and put together a number of good pieces… I think you really can have something.. so that’s really kinda what its about.. but.. why not aim high?

Apple announced new new Mac Laptops today at WWDC..  My story is I have last years MacBook.. which while I love it.. it’s #1 regulated to secondary status and #2 I’ve been feeling the need for firewire for audio work.. 

 Firewire and USB for audio

I don’t think firewire is as critical for audio work as many say.. but if you want to go high end in your audio interfaces… it really is. On this front.. for me, its all about focusrite or apogee… there is a now discontinued multichannel audio interface from MOTU.. which I understand is quite good.. but doesn’t really feel like an upgrade so much… from what I currently use.. and.. if you’re on a computer with only USB.. well it makes you wonder why MOTU would have discontinued it! In any event.. the cost of the MOTU interface.. is such that I couldn’t afford to do that, and get the sorta interface that I actually want.. so that my mobile interface is really relegated to.. well Kore or Zoom if I want XLRs.. not the best pres.. and I’m limited to stereo.

The difference.. with Apogee it’s the quality of the A/D conversion.. With Focusrite we have convolution based preamp modeling.. these issues are not inherent to the technology behind USB or Firewire.. the difference between USB and Firewire comes down to data rates.. and how much it effects over all performance. 

What’s up with the Brand Story?

The biggest thing I’m not getting with the new Mac’s is now every thing is a “MacBook Pro” accept for a new ancient model MacBook..  all be it updated..

To get what used to be the MacBook Pro.. you need to spend $2000.. at that point.. you get “the two graphics processors.” The deal here is one is nice to your battery life, and the other has significant performance.. The lower end MacBook Pro’s have the nice battery life processors… If you’re someone who needs the performance.. well.. you might want to go for the $2K models… or better yet the $2.3K model which now gives you 512 MB of view RAM, instead of 256 MB.. which really makes all the difference…  both of which are 15″ models. ..but none of this should miss lead you into thinking that the sub $2K models aren’t fine for video.. its more a question of if you plan to push things..

I couldn’t tell you where the line is exactly.. in terms of how you assess your needs relative to this..  But I’d say.. if you’re doing web video.. particularly that doesn’t need to be HD.. and effects and like.. motion stuff.. isn’t playing a significant roll in how you’re working.. I don’t think you need more power.. if you do that stuff it probably depends on how important that stuff is / how often you go there.

Now you get MacBooks Pros in the 13″ range.. but I’m not sure what the significants of it is.. as aren’t they just calling MacBook’s MacBook Pros now?

Speaking of smaller MacBooks

I think there’s always this trade off you make on size.. The negative of larger is.. costs more, less portable.. the plus is better productivity.. often more powerful.. you can somewhat mitigate the productivity issues by adding a monitor when your at home.. but not really while on the go.

For me..

I haven’t gotten into doing a lot of heavy production work on my 13″ MacBook…  long story… and its a secondary computer.. So the idea is “you can work on the go” which I haven’t fully even put together yet.. The main need.. in a sorta heavy production esk sorta way.. is for live performance.. for that, so far.. I’m actually pretty fine with the 13″…

If you look at the Maschine controller

You’ll note that you can see a certain amount of what’s going on just from Maschine screens.. and the software sequencer is fine on the 13.” 

And of course Kore is similar in this regard

This would seem to a theme for many a controller of this sorta ilk.. The new controllers coming to Ableton.. the Euphonix MC controllers…  

Where things get tricky is when you have to negotiate lots of windows.. which is typical for serious music production of the “studio sort” or.. you see it for video, animation… in design you sometimes see it.. but mainly its the size of the window you’re working in.. and its more of an issue if you’re working with bit map graphics then vectors.. I think..

Conclusions in the World of Matt 

For me.. the laptop is.. if I want to get untethered from this desk.. this room.. if.. say cause its nice out.. I want to do stuff on the go.. even if it just means working on the back porch.. It can be about trying to capture the vibe of an adventure.. how being someplace where things are happening.. can alter your consciousness in certain ways.. and thus later the sort of aesthetic choices you make.. There’s also.. if I were doing work for clients.. being able to show them what I’m doing on the laptop is big.. There’s live shows of course.. There’s having a computer when you’re on a trip somewhere.. being able to stay connected… I’d like to be able to go to a friends house and be like “hey, lets make some work,” and be able to do it all there… If you’re doing video or photography there’s the ability to assess things in the field.. 

There is, of course, the question of how working on a smaller computer impacts your work.. an equation that ultimately probably needs to be felt more then conceptualized.. I mean how often would I really want to lug around the extra weight of Kore or Maschine or even an audio interface?

Other things worth mentioning

1. Apple claims there’s better battery life to be had now.. like 7 hours.. but they are notoriously untrust worthy on this front.. but it’s probably safe to assume better battery life is here. The negative side of this would be.. it looks like you can’t change your battery.. though they say the life span is greatly increased
2. Now the only MacBook with an expansion slot is the 17,” which might be important if you want to connect up a fast hard drive.. or use the UAD type stuff for audio work
3. Now having a backlit keyboard is standard on all MacBook Pros.. which I had one on my MacBook!
4. There was a price drop.. of some significance.
5. Apple’s new laptops now come with SD card readers.. which is nice accept that I tend to use CF cards more these days.

What I might do.. If I was gong 13″ the model  that makes sense runs at $1.5K.. For that you get 2.53 GHz ( 270 more MHz on your processor.. so a total of $1.3K model which is.. I don’t know, doesn’t seem all that significant to me) more hard drive space.. 4GB of RAM instead of the 2 GB.. and the RAM is the main thing.. of course Apple gouges you for RAM and Hard Disk Space.. Apple charges $1000 if you want to go from 4GB to 8GB, where as the retail cost of the RAM looks  to be around $600? Perhaps the thing is to get the cheaper computer and buy and install your own RAM and a 500GB  hard drive.. just to spite them! Really.. I think for photography.. if you use Apples Aperture.. you probably want at least 4GB.. and I’m finding with music.. that I can never quite get enough RAM.. even at 6 GB… and I simply can’t use some of my software on 2GB… like Omnisphere.. But really.. I think I’m most likely to hold off doing anything… 

Earlier today, as a part of working on another blog post, I swung over to the old Youtube, checking out various tutorials on various music production tools.. What I was sorta astonished by was.. well, how bad all the tutorials that I happened to bump into.. were. This, of course, would be what we call in the biz “an opportunity.” I could attempt to make tutorials that were actually good.. I mean, just imagine, right?

What sorta tutorials would I make?

One tutorial I checked out was on the Masterworks EQ in Digital Performer.. accept it didn’t really show off very much more then “press this button, turn this knob, it does this,” and there were a number of features to the Masterworks EQ that it didn’t bother to even touch on. So, that got me to thinking what I’d do if I were doing an EQ in Digital Performer type tutorial.. Here’s a basic list.

1. What roll does EQ play in mixing: Coloration, and Frequency Shaping
2. A talk on EQs in general: Why would you use the Masterworks EQ versus other other EQs in DP, what other EQs might you think of adding to you’re studio, and why? Because any tutorials I’d make would be based around what’s going on in my studio.. I’d of course talk about Liquid MIX. But we’d also just basically talk about different types of EQs.
3. Typical EQ Applications and Guide lines: Various instruments.. including the human voice, take place along very particular frequency ranges.. and EQing those instruments in different ways have different effects.. for instance there are certain frequencies, relative to the human voice, which are the frequencies that are important to figuring out what the hell someone is saying.. 

That pretty much covers you’re EQ 101.. and really, that’s a conversation that applies no matter what production environment we are looking at. Indeed I could see.. showing EQs in other apps like Reason, or filters in synths.. 

But one assumes the subject of EQ would probably have to take place over multiple videos.. or once you start talking about filters in synths it does….

I could imagine doing so many videos on so many subjects that I eventually take you up to the level I’m at.. which, I’m starting to realize is.. actually not that bad of a level at all. Normally I feel like my music production skills aren’t really that great.. or I’m always thinking about how much more I have to learn.. how far away I am from the real masters of the Art.. but.. I’m starting to get the picture that.. if you take a look at all the people whom are involved in working in music production.. and learning it.. I’m probably in the upper half… which is a little astonishing to me as.. it doesn’t feel like I’ve really been at it long enough to make such a claim.

This has always been a part of my strategy.. even if I’ve never gotten around to it.. and I suppose its some of the strategy of this blog. See.. growing up I read a lot of guitar magazines.. and in them you’d have little tutorials or whatever.. created by all these guitar heros.. and it was clearly a part something that worked to help the guitarists careers, as the people coming up as guitarists.. well we looked up to those guys, you know? And we evangelized those guys. 

I guess the idea is really.. well my ideal teacher would be someone who shows you the stuff, and gives you some context for it.. and in the process.. you realize that you’re teacher is “A Real Artist” as a pose to someone who fits under the category of “those who can’t teach.” Frankly.. I’ve had very few true artist teachers in my life.. or true in a sense that corresponds to my ideals anyway. So.. I guess we’ll see how well it works..  

A little earlier tonight I sat through a number of motion graphics examples.. I was expecting to get a lot of eye candy wow-ness.. and while I got a bit of that.. I was left with a feeling of.. being utterly unimpressed with much of what I saw, which probably relates to the problems and issues I’ve been talking about, in my last 2 posts, on the subject of digital story telling. That said.. I did come away rather inspired.

I feel like.. as far as creative possibilities are concerned, the medium of 3D and motion graphics.. is powerful as all hell… The trouble, at least as near as I can tell.. is nobody is really doing it right..  Wow, what an arrogant statement.. well forgive me.. if you’re one of the folks doing it right.. I know.. it’s a little bit of an over statement.

But.. I’m also talking as a fine artist.. I’m also talking about the potential of the medium.. at least as I see it.. and anyway, I wanted to start to talk about some of what has me inspired.. talk about what I’m dreaming in this moment.. that kinda thing.

Dreams

The cost of the dreams 

It strikes me that anything is possible. In this simple statement.. in this feeling that anything is possible.. in there.. the god’s sing.. the music of the spheres.. just waiting for an artist to hear.. and there tail to be retold. Can you hear it?

When we talk about film making.. when the conversation turns to special effects, 3D graphics, motion graphics.. we often talk about how expensive it is. That expense would, at least in large measure, seem to be an effect of what the designers in this area are able to command salary wise.. even with a lot of work being outsourced to India.

Of all the art forms I’m interested in, there is no doubt that 3D and motion graphics is the most expensive areas. Cinema 4D, which I’m using.. retails for between $3 and $4K… After Effects is now going for around $1K, Final Cut Studio is around $1.3K, last I checked.. and there are many other tools.. plus one needs a super fast and powerful computer.. and having many computers to form a render farm.. is a nice idea..  If one is shooting video as a part of it.. pro cameras are several grand.. lighting rigs probably start at around a grand.. MoCap is more then I even want to start thinking about.. the gear to pull keys is more money… 

So just to get the tools to start learning the stuff is like.. prohibitively expensive..  or at the very least, investing in them takes a major commitment.. and then you’ll be faced with a ridiculously steep learning curve! So all of this “might” have something to do with why it’s as expensive as it is…

But lets just say you’re crazy like Matt.. and you’re like “screw it, I’ll invest in it cause I have a big dream,” now the economics are a little different. Now the economics are.. well once you’ve bought the equipment, the only real expense is the time you have to put into the work.. and arguably the regular expense of upgrades.

Of course Matt is even madder then all that! Cause I mean.. I’m also doing the sound studio stuff! The web design stuff? Yeah.. I have issues!

Ok, so implications of these here economics

So.. much like the lizard king, you can do anything..

A bit latter:

Anything seems like a worthwhile topic for meditation.. though anything might not be real. The topic of technical limitations comes to mind… limitations of skills.. as well as limitations of time… and there are still some limitations to my studio… but.. there is still, given all that, many vectors of limitlessness… 

There are lots of little ideas.. many of which have been formed over the course of.. well many years really. I have all sorts of “strategic communications” ideas… relative to the question of how to relate to the market place.. well, lets explore these..

A few days latter:

Little ideas

I think what I really want to do is create “audio visual experiences.” I put it this way because putting it any other way seem to have a certain amount of bagged to it.. it suggests certain things… that “audio visual experience” does not. 

I, of course, am a sound artist.. I kind of think being a sound artist is a huge advantage for a digital film maker.. type.. because you’re able to think holistically.. sound could be central, visual aesthetics could be central, the “art-ness” could be central, dialog could be central, a plot could be central.. and what is central, at any given moment, could shift.. and you really only have the ability to work this way if you are fluent in all these parts..

So audio wise I want to create an experience. There’s a lot of ideas I have that are unlike anything I’ve ever heard before, as a part of some sort of film.. so all these things must be explored.. along with.. just creating an amazing sonic experience.

3D

The impression I’m getting about 3D is that It’s really more about design then production. Every element.. it pays to do research for.. and its all about paying a serious amount of attention to detail.. and it might even be that I can get great results.. nearly coming out of the gate.. if I’m willing to put in the work on the research and design front.. along with a little exploration here and there…

Planning

It’s all about planning! My way of thinking about it is.. you start out with an idea and you develop the hell out of it… work everything out.. from how the sound might work, to how the plot works, the story…. all this stuff, and really refine it.. take it to an extreme.. but then, at that point.. well at a certain point.. be willing to just improvise and explore.. 

 Day latter:

 I’m thinking I need to just post this so I can go on to the next post.. I’m thinking this should be called memoirs of a meditation on digital story telling.. for the simple reason that it seems more like a record of a meditation then anything… 

I’m in this strange mode of meditations on digital story telling… I am driving into this arena after all…

I’m a strange bird, for this there can be no doubt, and so it is that when I approach anything, seems to not matter what, I can’t seem to escape a certain contrarianism.. This is apparently my little cross to bare.. as it seems to have been an issue for me, at least.. since the age of 3… So it’s hard not to think “well, I guess this was God’s idea of a joke on the world” or at the very least it’s sorta a “vocational” thing, maybe.. You ever feel this way? Well… lets explore this as it pertains to story telling.

I have this strange belief that we are all in a constant process of having these little unconscious conversations with each other.. or that there is constant unconscious communication going on.. If you don’t quite believe me.. try taking LSD sometime.. err, I better explain that one, ha?

LSD has a way of giving everything a luminous, numinous, glow. As near as I can gather, from my limited knowledge of neuroscience, psychedelics like LSD essentially create a kind of state of “brain damage,” inside of which the.. lets call it cognitive process.. of attributing causation to stuff..  produces a kind of meta consciousness experience. This, of course, would seem to expose certain structural elements of the psyche to the conscious mind.. so that we have a kind of waking dream experience.. inside of which we can explore our subjective relationship to empirical reality. LOL, boy, doesn’t that sound technical?

Reality.. well it’s something we “experience.” In philosophy and science we often try to understand reality in a way that is like a god’s eye view.. it is a way of looking that is in search of objectivity.. of verifiability.. a way of looking that would seem to be emancipated from human experience.. at least in it’s goals.. The troubles with this are many fold.. not the least of which is that we never experience reality without our “experience” of it. Inside this experience.. is our own “subjective” view point. Here in lys the value of some understanding of psychology in.. well life. 

One idea I developed once upon the time was an idea I called “the order of revelation.” The idea is.. in a world of infinite facts.. infinite ways one could come to understand something.. we only experience a limited portion of that totality.. and the “order of revelation” has to do with the order in which this stuff dawns on the conscious mind. The “order” determines “the shape” of our understanding. The order of revelation is thus the expression of the subjective on our experience of objective reality.

What shapes this order of relations is a complex of factors.. we can influence the order by means of prayer, ritual, and “magick.” Archtypes, as we learn from Jungian psychology, are what makes up the structure of consciousness and the psyche… and so the meta consciousness experience of psychedelics.. the numinous nature of them.. is about this.. and thus the connection to the order of revelation.. and the reason why so many people associate psychedelics with notions of enlightenment.

Ok.. enough of this craziness, how does this relate to the subject of digital story telling?

As I was saying before.. there is this thing I’m terming “unconscious communication.” In my last post.. (which as of this writing I haven’t posted) I spoke of the notion of “ambient story telling” which.. essentially points to this concept. We could look at this simply on the level of “what are the unconscious cues” we get as we go about.. life, from our experience of… whatever. When we get “a feeling in our gut” or.. have a feeling about something that we are unable to quite articulate.. simply have a feeling about something.. or… perhaps an intuition.. this is what we are reacting to.

The lie detector test.. which measures biometrics in relationship to questions, is a means of detecting certain types of unconscious communications… The conscious mind is giving you one story, while the biometrics is giving you another. And so it is that the world of “non verbal communication” is an incredibly nuanced world. There are simple things about.. how you’re talking.. word choices, spaces between words.. tempo of words, pitch of words, varying amplitude and volume between words.. words, phrases, sentences.. the body language as this happens.. where the eyes move.. all sorts of little, itty bitty things… are expressing stuff.

Inside of this expression, interestingly enough.. we find the imprint, on everything, of the shape of that there order of revelation…

So, before.. in that last post.. talking about a painter versus design approach to media arts.. in talking about communications versus expression.. perhaps art versus design.. all of this kind of thing.. is about this sorta thing.

So.. that 3D graphics.. and motion graphics, is largely dominated by the design process.. as a pose to a painters process.. that what we are seeing is so much about conscious design.. means that the story telling of medium are more limited to the surface then.. might be.. ideal.

Next day sometime:

Hmm, perhaps I should post this.. and skip on to the next entry on this subject.

Few days latter:

Ok, I’m really going to post this 

I like the idea of trying to get into the habit of posting everyday.. so lets see if we can’t get back into that swing.

Today I was contacted by a PR women. I had mentioned After Effects in a tweet… which was enough for her to go to the trouble of getting my email from the background image.. and message me about a PR campaign she was doing for Intel, which looks to be an ongoing series of.. kinda like motion graphics contests… and she wanted to know if I was interested, or if I might pass it on to others.

If you’re a regular reader you no doubt know that right now I’m focused on trying to develop some proficiency with with Cinema 4D… which is to say fairly high end ish 3D graphics. While I have other projects to attend to.. in general.. it would seem to me that to participate in the Intel project would require a shift of focus… which is a bit like.. you get the ball rolling and then you leave it.. and now how long is it going to take you to get that back in motion?

That said.. what I’m really looking to develop is a whole set of skills.. you render stuff out of Cinema.. you bring it into After Effects or Motion.. where you perhaps have other assets.. eventually this probably ends up in Final Cut.. and eventually render out as a final project. Inside of this scheme you might shoot video.. you might do a lot of things.. So.. moving from a pure 3D focus to a motion graphics focus.. where 3D is but one element.. doesn’t really seem like that bad an idea.

In any event I was inspired enough to go visit my local book store and pick up a couple of magazines I’d been eyeing: A UK digital arts type magazine has a motion graphics special edition this month.. and this month we also see the first launch issue of a magazine called gomotion. I didn’t buy these magazines before on account of how pricy they are.. the total was $34, but.. with all this on my mind.. it seemed like the thing to do.

Gomotion

Gomotion costs $20.. which seems to me outrageously over priced..  but, at least superficially, I must say it’s a very impressive magazine. A lot of 3D magazines are over priced.. and there’s a general feeling of immaturity about them.. or.. there not quite big enough.. but Gomotion is, in fact, rather kick ass…

What I’m digging about Gomotion is as follows: I’m in the process of giving myself a basic 3D education.. at the moment this is via the DVD based video tutorials that came with Cinema 4D. These tutorials don’t really cover all the bases of the software.. they’re basically enough to get you going… I’m only about half way through the main general course.. I’ve learned about modeling, I’m on to pre texture mapping stuff..

Bouncing around in the back of my head is past information I’ve gathered on the subject of 3D.. at one point I read a mega huge book on 3D Studio Max.. from time to time I pick up copies of special effects trade magazines.. and who knows what.. Most of this information exists in my brain on an almost unconscious level, and reflects a state of technology that is.. old fashion compared to where stuff is at today… which I’m only now getting to appreciate.

Gomotion.. has a lot of articles that are.. actually probably not bad for someone as clueless as I am.. I just read an article on character creation.. and strangely enough it conformed perfectly to certain preconceptions I’m starting to evolve as I try and work out what I want to do.. and when you see what other 3D artists wrestle with.. hear what a more advanced person perceives as the challenges.. it gives you a lot of perspective on how to approach your forward movement..  

The Current State of Matt’s 3D Plans:

There is, of course, the basic business of getting up to speed on the basics… which is really nothing more then the 101 of the tools.. the projects will take us to the next level in the other areas..  

The real project is to come up with some ideas for animated shorts.. What kind of stories do I want to tell? What kind of a challenge is it going to be to develop really good craft when it comes to story telling? I’m not totally sure what my story telling process will look like.. as I have influences coming from strange directions.. But I suppose the first thing is simply to work out what I want to explore.. write something like a script.. and then work out story boards… and from there..

Well we need to embark on a project of designing characters, sets, objects, and what have you.. that make sense for the story we want to tell…

The trouble, as I see it.. are two fold.. or perhaps one fold: There are two viable approaches as I conceive of it… one is that of the painter, the other is that of the designer. The painter process is exploratory.. it’s an adventure.. we perhaps don’t even bother with starting with a script.. we’ll find the story as we go along.. The designer process is the one where we start with a script and move onto story boards….  and blah blah blah.

So there’s a tension between these two approaches.. and the question really is.. how do we integrate them… and I think the question becomes most significant when we look at questions like.. what might we do in a 3D graphics program versus what we might do in a program like After Effects.

Indeed After effects is an interesting problem.. in that it offers the possibility of very strange work flows.. where in 3D we are purely dealing with the 3D world.. in After Effects we can deal with anything.. from photographs, still images, the rendered 3D stuff, 2D computer graphics, video… various sorts of special effects.. compositing… etc. Stuff is fairly endless.

 A few latter, now over tired, resigned to the fact that this wont get posted tonight:

Thoughts on story telling

Story telling strikes me as an amazingly rich and complex subject.. one that.. is no easy art to master.

Lets take the actor. What is good acting, or how does one act well? That’s a complex subject that can take a lifetime to master… Acting is, after all, story telling.. a part of how we tell stories.

I was trying to get to this idea of the tension between a painter versus a designer’s approach to media making.. I stepped away from writing to watch Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.. when I was struck by something..

3D Graphics is an amazingly formalist medium.. Everything in it.. was put there on purpose, consciously.. where as with film.. we are in the world of happy accidence… I’m reminded by something David Lynch said.. about how if you go in someone’s house.. say there bedroom.. you’re amazed at what you find.. because its nothing like anything any production designer could have ever thought of.. so here we see it again.. the difference between.. something like the conscious mind of design, versus the unconscious dialectics of painting.

And then I’m reminded of Tom Wolfe.. Mr Wolfe writes what he calls “new journalism” where in he goes out and makes fiction based off of a kind of journalistic process.. because.. how could you ever writet dialog like.. well like real people speak?

I keep thinking about this.. how does the way a real person speak.. what does this tell us about that person? What does the way a real bedroom looks.. what does that tell us about the person.. To some extent you might think of this as “ambient story telling” in the sense that we are talking about little nuances.. which somehow have something to do with something.. that could somehow be a part of how we might tell a story.. but they also contain a certain extraneous possibility… or at least in how we think of them.. how they might relate to our preconceptions.. which, of course, is the problem of formalism and communication type design. 

When I think of what I want to do.. a part of it is something formalistic.. always a synthesis of this with realism.. and always on the surrealistic side of things.. This idea that the unconscious is exactly what I’m after.. but not exactly as an end in it’s self.. which is perhaps what makes me interesting.. if contrasted with surrealism proper..

In my surrealist spirit.. I tend to think.. well what the hell.. do anything at anytime for any reason at all.. which is to take an anarchic approach, or attitude, towards traditional notions of structure.. and how might I weave such a thing into a story?

As you can no doubt gather.. I have some complex ideas about this subject.. which is perhaps atypical of someone in my beginner shoes..

A post ago I suggested that something like creative brilliance trumps what major studios have as there advantages.. and I suppose what it all comes down to is this.. and story telling.. and if I have brilliance in me.. I imagine it will come from an exploration of these kinds of ideas.. at least as it relates to story telling.. and this kind of animation motion graphics stuff. 

Day or two latter:

Ok, time to post. 

Since I got the new MacBook I’ve been obsessed with a new video blogging project. This seems to have come out of the blue.. not that I hadn’t been thinking about video a good deal prior.. but jumping into this like this.. The level of commitment I’m now feeling for it.. the excitement and passion I’m feeling for it.. The feeling of just being possessed by it… that is very surprising to me.

It’s as if God spoke to me and said “Matt, you must start video blogging, you must become a video blogger.” “Well God, that’s a little random, don’t you think?” Of course the trouble with God is.. there’s really no one to turn for for second opinions.. well I suppose there’s always Satan but…

It comes to me like a revelation.. like one day you wake up and you realize “this is what I’m supposed to do,” and though you had thought about it prior.. never did it command you.. . not like this.

What’s brought Matt to this new video blogging project? 

Ok, brace you’re self.. this could get long.

Somehow I always wanted to be a film maker.. since I was little kid… So it should be no surprise that I took some video and film making classes in college.. though.. the equipment at Mass Art, the only state art school in the US, was not capable of.. well I couldn’t do what I wanted to do with it.. so I never really got too into video or film making while there… really only dreamed about it.. though I did take a few film criticism type classes to kinda.. prepare I guess… 

But I can remember hanging out in the dorms.. getting high with some folks.. and telling them how in a few years anyone can own a video camera, the tools to edit it, and how we’d be distributing it via the internet.. imagining that world of possibilities.. and so.. I sorta went in that direction.. with my music, learning web design skills.. etc.

Somehow.. somewhere in there.. perhaps it was a result of my first “real job” as an interactive designer.. I was able to afford a video camera.. I also bought Premier and After Effects. I think I must have been on a G3 that could barely handle it.. it didn’t have a DVD burner, and the hard drive was tiny… so in practice I didn’t do much video.. just played around a bit.. shot video.

I started creating a kind of video library of.. just raw footage.. some of it dating back to the collage years.. with the idea that I’d eventually do something with it.

Sometime latter.. still on that old G4.. I started dating this girl whom.. I fondly refer to as Sue of Zen. Sue was hard of hearing.. needed subtitles to watch tv or films. When she was thinking about getting HBO I saw my opportunity..  ”No, you should get Net Flicks I said… I was thinking “if she needs subtitles to watch films.. she probably will be fine with foreign films.” So.. I conned her into letting me pick the films.. all the great film makers of film history.. for the year or so that we were involved.. I’d see up to 8 films a week.

The effect of Sue of Zen and I watching so many films was.. I became a horrible film snob.. I mean when you watch that many films.. that many of the greatest films ever made.. it’s hard to tolerate the crap!  I haven’t watched films like that since.. and I’ve grown a little more forgiving of Hollywood.. 

Well there was one other effect.. I became a lot more sophisticated about film.

When it came time to buy my Mac Pro.. I was thinking Video Making when I bought it. 8 Cores, a better then standard graphics card, 1.7 or something or other terabytes of space.. go for the 2 24″ HD screens..  etc.. I was even budgeting in professional video cameras and lighting rigs.. . 

But the thing was.. I wasn’t really jumping in head first into the video production stuff.. Hell, I wasn’t doing much of anything.. well, that might be over stating it. 

A few latter: 

Anyway.. so a long story, right? I can’t really get into everything about what I’m up to.. so lets go into what I’m up to at the moment..

Adventures in Apple’s Motion 3D

Motion is a motion graphics program.. that’s sorta 2.5D-ish, that’s a part of Final Cut Studio.  Motion graphics is basically animation with tittle graphics for film and TV.. My approach is basically painting plus the dimension of time… 

So I don’t know Apple’s Motion..  And Apple hasn’t done a real good job with thinking through the learning process… as the manuel is rather sucky. They have a few training videos, but they don’t really get you up to speed.. they just kinda give you a few things.. and from there you just kind of fumble around.

For the last couple days now.. I’ve been doing these little motion graphics projects.. which are perhaps more about learning the software then it is about making great work.. I’m aiming for great work, but who knows if I’ll actually get there.

Still.. I can see the potential…   

A couple days latter (I think):

I’m slowly getting to the point that I kind of understand what’s going on in Motion.. It’s not really that hard to pick up.. though there’s a depth to it that still seems a little out of reach, maybe? Or maybe there’s just a lot of things I figure I ought to be able to do, that it should be able to do.. but I can’t figure out how to do it or even if you can do it.. but then I’m new to the case….I’ve rendered out a number of motion animations.. and.. I have mixed feelings on them.. of course there not exactly meant to stand on there own.. In any event, that I now feel like I’m getting a feel for the program.. my expectations for what I ought to be able to achieve.. is now to start really going up.My latest sets of projects have been to take stuff that I’ve designed in photoshop.. or created in photoshop. In Photoshop these images are constructed with lots of layers.. In motion I take the images of the different layers, and set them up in 3D space.. so the layers now have spatial relationships between them.. and I’ve got a few lights going.. and I’m goofing around with the cameras.. and everything is sorta moving around a little..This really does feel like painting plus the dimension of time… Painting in motion, if you will. Though using this kind of language to talk about it seems to overstate it a little.What I’m doing is very much in keeping with the kinds of stuff I was doing with After Effects those few years back. The After Effects CS4 upgrade is now on my “to get list”.. and I may likely get it rather shortly.. assuming that I continue my video commitment.. 

Motion Graphics / Animation Goals

My plan of attack, technology wise, is to start with Motion.. of course. Eventually I’ll jump into After Effects… of course.. And then, assuming I can get Cinema 4D to run on this computer, well.. there’s that. The first objective, I guess, is to obtain some serious competency with Motion.. and then into After Effects. Cinema 4D I expect to be a giant learning project, and for that.. the goal is simply to get to a point where I’m able to start creating stuff to integrate into this sort of motion graphics / animation pipeline.. as a pose to going all out into 3D animation. What I mean is.. I get the ball rolling with this stuff.. and then just add pieces to it.. a process by which I hope to develop competency with the other stuff.. but real competency with that stuff.. only needs to be at a level determined by this stuff.. if that all makes sense.

Conclusions

I don’t know what will come of all this stuff, but it’s a fun adventure to go on.. and I have laid down the ground work in many ways.. to hopefully do something great.. We’ll see what happens………..

It’s been kicking around in my head for a little while now.. well the past few days, feeling inspiration to make something great. It started with DIYDays… which got me inspired to get serious about film making… and what of the From Here to Awesome Film festival stuff played at Mass Art recently….. That really got me going bit.

Then I took a look at my first attempt at video podcasting..  My impression of it, after not looking at it for ages was.. well that yes it has flaws but.. the potential it speaks for knocked me out.

My approach to film making is in no way conventional.. I would describe it as “a painters approach to film making.” Or maybe that’s my approach to editing and post production.. A way of thinking where this end of things becomes the core of the process.. and the other parts are more like “lets go get some raw materials.” In any event.. the process is that of an exploratory painter.. really. 

Raw Materials 

As it turns out.. I have some raw materials.. video I’ve been shooting for the raw materials of a project.. I have a tun of tapes going back the last.. oh, I don’t know.. lets say 8 or 9 years.. plus a few that go back a whole lot further.

The idea behind my shooting was to make a kind of record.. to kind of show you life in a way that you wouldn’t otherwise see. To try and open the worlds eyes to reality.. or something like that. Who knows, I was on LSD or some psychedelic when I conceived of it, right?

But now I’m contemplating “a new stage of raw material acquisition.” To put it another way, I’m thinking of buying new cameras. 

Thinking about Cameras 

Generally, in thinking about cameras, we have a few categories of video cameras.

1. Social Media Cams: These are generally cheap.. usually pretty pour quality.. but the kinda things you can always have on you, which is the real key here.. and they don’t really call attention to them selves.. we are talking flip cams (that run around 100 bucks) or perhaps smart phones that let you broadcast live over the internet via qik. These could also be just basic photo cameras that also let you shoot video.. even the cheapest of cheap cell phones often have this sorta option
2. Spy-ish Cams: These are cheap from the perspective of video quality.. and actually not all that expensive..  The cameras them selves are usually sub $1000, perhaps sub $500.. The real point of these cameras is that nobody knows your using them. I like the idea of being able to shoot without calling attention to myself.. both from the perspective of documenting something as it is.. without the subject becoming self conscious.. and the idea that you could create a narrative film.. taking place in real spaces.. without anyone knowing there’s a film going on.
3. Quality Video Cameras: From my perspective.. we are talking about the ability to have a lot of Aesthetic control here.. If we are talking from a serious film making perspective.. all the other cameras are rather “punk rock” where as.. here we are talking.. cinematography. These are cameras that cost many thousands of dollars.

Quality Cameras Canon EOS 5D Mark II  

Let us start with the Canon EOS 5D Mark II. This is really a DSLR.. which is to say a camera for photography.. a very professional camera at that.. It lists for $2700 for just the body, and $3500 for the body and the lens. (The lens being worth a bit more then a grand I believe). 

Besides being a pretty serious DSLR, the 5D Mark II is also a camera capable of shooting 30 fps 1080p… which it records to H.264. From a film making perspective.. being limited to 30 fps is not really ideal.. though firm ware could change this.. But over all.. for the price, it’s very difficult to beat this camera.. as a video camera. I mean.. for this price and having a lens system? Not to mention that you’re also getting a very nice DSLR? So I’ve been thinking seriously about the 5D Mark II. 

Red Scarlet 

Ok.. this is what we call in the biz a game changer. 

And

Ok, since most of my readers are probably not the type to be following this sorta thing.. let me kind of break this down for you a little.

Here’s a link to a little thing that explains what 3k means. This isn’t a totally accurate statement.. but it’s something that will point you in the right direction “3k is to HD what HD is to standard deffiniton.” 3K is ideal if you want to bring what you’re shooting to theatrical release.

The price of $3000 is.. for a red scarlet.. is probably about what you would be paying to rent, for a weekend, a current 3k camera. I could point you to $10,000 camera’s I’ve lusted after.. that are not capable of half of what this Red Scarlet is capable of.

Now the final thing that sets the REDs apart is.. its a bit like shooting with film, in the sense that you have something like a negative.. which you can develop from.. a negative having more dynamic range then actual picture out putted. This means a much higher level of aesthetic control..  

Well, I think I’ll end this post here, for now.. there’s many more subjects to cover on this subject.. We’ll see what happens. 

Adobe has announced new versions of there Creative Suits…  You can see video presentations of all there new software at tv.adobe.com. What I’ll be talking about in this post is stuff relating to what I’m sorta evaluating.. which is the Web Premium Bundle.. and After Effects CS4. On that note, lets start with some of the videos…

Adobe Web Premium CS4: 

As you might expect from adobe.. the video lies.. (I say this due to my past bad experience with Adobe… ) The video lies in that it suggests that Indesign is a part of the Web Premium Bundle.. and it is not!

My bad Adobe Experience

I thought I had posted on this.. but haven’t been able to find the post so.. here’s the deal:

I went to buy the web bundle.. but um.. the adobe site wasn’t real clear.. bad usability, and all that.. which is sorta ironic for a company building design tools! So I bought the wrong bundle by accident…  I was on the phone with Adobe on 4 ceperate occasions trying to streighten it all out.. each conversation had me moving between various people to talk to.. each seemed to take upwards of an hour.. an it seemed that nearly everyone was giving me a different story…  the long and the short of it was.. I don’t know if I’ve been refunded yet for the wrong bundle! And if you ask me it’s all about what’s bad with Adobe…. and this video being misleading is just more of the same!

On the Subject of the Bundle 

I wrote this post around the time I bought the bundle.. and provides some reasonably good background on the subject.

Web Standards

The problem with the bundle.. well it feels a little bit like Adobe “doesn’t get it.” One of the biggest revolutions in the world of web design has been Web Standards.. we design sites in such a way to separate out content, presentation, and behavior..  and introduce graceful degradation..  If this is done right.. then whatever you’re using to view the site.. be it IE, FireFox.. your PDA, iPhone.. if you have accessibility issues so there’s a voice synth speaking out the page.. whatever..  it will work on your platform in the most ideal-ish sorta way.

The trouble with the Adobe software has been that it does not enable this sorta industry standard development practices…. The learning curve nessisary to doing this kind of development is great.. and you’d like tools to help with that.. Not only that but.. “designers” tend to think visually.. and so you’d like tools that allow you to think visually.. as a pose to think code.. in terms of working out a design.. from a process perspective.. and blah blah blah.

Adobe has been… about 6 years late to the standards party? And you know.. on the internet things move really really fast.. so I don’t think there’s any reasonable excuse for this.. In any event.. Fireworks.. which is a web graphics orientated program.. will now spit out standards compliant code.. which is a groovy thing.. and Dreamweaver looks like.. they’ve done a number of thing to help with a standards based work flow.. so I am digging that.

Dreamweaver.. as of CS3, introduce the AJAX Spry framework.. This allows you to, via WYWYG, put together AJAX stuff. AJAX is.. how web applications are made, basically.. It’s kind of a way of using XHTML, JavaScript, CSS, XML, and server stuff.. to do certain kinds of stuff.. lets say. AJAX is a groovy technology and all.. but it is not without problems.. though it should be said that, as with most technologies, the problem is not so much the technology as how the technology is used…  and um… the problem with the Spry framework.. is it is much less then best practices… in how it does its things.. 

My feeling is.. I’d like to see the software get better at standards out of the box.. but at least its headed in that direction.. if at an unforgivably slow pace…. and I really need to get my hands on the software before I can really judge these things too well. 

Flash CS4

Flash CS4 is the most compelling part, at least for me personally, to the Web Premium bundle upgrade:

Flash has ALWAYS been the best tool for web based animation.. trouble is.. not a hell of a lot has happened to Flash, as far as animation is concerned.. since like.. Flash 5… we are talking the last tech bubble here! Most of the excitement in the Flash platform, since version 5.. and including version 5… has been all about the developer side of Flash.. and since FLEX is were a serious Flash developer would turn.. you’d hope you’d see better design and animation tools in Flash.. and indeed, we are now seeing them.

The new feature of being able to modify different parameters individually.. be it transparency, scale, its location on the screen.. being able to modify motion curves…  in a rather After Effects-esk way. This will revolutionize how I work with Flash.. and it’ll do this, really, on a process level.. which is a very deep thing. 

But Adobe didn’t stop there! They finally gave us IK (Inverse Kinematics.) Basically we are talking about Bones here.. which is a core feature of character animation in 3D graphics. This is also a very big thing for animation.

If all this isn’t enough.. we get some kind of a new 3D tool..  It didn’t look all that impressive from the presentation.. though I didn’t think the any of the Flash stuff looked all that impressive in the presentations.. unless you kinda knew what was going on…  I mean they were using a very boring project for there examples.. but this could be a very cool thing to.

PhotoShop CS4

There’s a lot of new stuff in Photoshop that looks interesting.. New ways of dealing with camera RAW.. the ability to bring 3D objects into PhotoShop and paint directly on them..  There’s bad news that Photoshop will not be 64-bit on the Mac.. which is a big downer.. but Adobe claims there new way of using your graphics card will more then make up for that.. This, as we say in the biz, is spin…  

Sound Booth CS4

Sound Booth is new to the Web Premium bundle. I do a lot of music production.. and for a lot of what Sound booth does.. I have better apps.. However.. it does have some spectral editing abilities.. which I would really love to play with.. and Sound Booth is more geared to working inside of this kind of media production environment.. as a pose to music production more generally.

I think it’s nice they put Sound Booth in.. for anyone who’s doing Flash.. I think sound in Flash isn’t really good enough.. I mean Flash projects don’t have enough attention paid to sound.. and this ought to help that a little bit.

After Effects CS4

Here’s the After Effects video:

So what do you think of that? Let me take you through it…

Mobile Us 

First we have a tool for creating content for multiple mobile platforms. My first impression was “Why are you putting this into after effects?” I mean.. After Effects isn’t a video editing tool.. it’s a special effects, motion graphics, animation, compositing type tool….  If I’m creating stuff in After Effects… that stuff’s next stop is a video editing program… before it’s final output.

Now ok.. this is a little complicated but..  what are you creating content for? What percentage of content is purely for mobile platforms? What I mean is.. that same content, don’t you probably want to stick it on youtube, or some other online distribution platform? If that’s the case.. you want to render stuff out of After Effects at the resolution of.. well the highest resolution you’re making your stuff for. As a result.. when you render stuff out of After Effects.. you’re not going to be saving on render times.. by aiming at smaller resolution platforms..  

The only thing I will say on behalf of this new feature is.. having guides that tell you when and where stuff in your frame is going to be cut out of on a target platform.. is very important.

Search

This is a very interesting part of the Adobe Suites… Basically.. there’s meta data that follows media through out the system.. and this is a fairly central part of the search. This is quite revolutionary stuff.. but.. if After Effects is you’re only Adobe Video / Production sorta program..  of what use is it to you anyway?

In my studio Final Cut Studio is where I work with video. When it comes to music production, that might have something to do with a scoring video… that’s taking place in Digital Performer, Ableton Live, Reason.. etc. None of this stuff will carry that meta data…  So for folks in this position.. you’re basically waiting a few years to see if Adobe’s stuff.. gets adopted by a wider echo system of developers.

I’m basically working on.. . lets call it the pro side of the DIY spectrum… what this means is I don’t often have an actual production team… and the process of inputting the meta data into this system..  will likely be neglected in most cases.. particularly if the pay off is lost as soon as I start working in one of those non Adobe products! Though apparently some of the Adobe stuff will turn audio speaking into text for the meta data… 

Matt’s Choice

Price 

The Web Premium bundle will now set you back $1700… and the upgrade (which is what I’d be buying) goes for $600. After Effects $1000 for the full, and $300 for the upgrade. That, at least in my world, is not chicken feed.

Economic Considerations 

You know.. there’s a couple things here..

1. The economy is slowing down. What does this mean to the budding entrepreneur / whomever? It means its time to stop spending money on stuff!!! I mean if the great depression 2.0 is just around the corner? Things will hopefully not be that dyer.. but whatever you think about this sorta thing.. one wants to be careful about the choices one makes.
2. On a Personal Level… I have a limited amount of cash to live off of.. until I sell the house.. and I’d like to not sell the house till the housing market / economy is in a better position then what we find today.. So again, I gotta be careful about spending money.

CS4 Bundles thangs

A lot of people you talk to are saying “There’s a new CS4 already?” These are complex tools and its hard to keep up with it all. My situation is even worse.. cause in addition to that bundle.. I’m doing video, music production, and 3D graphics..  photography.. etc..   At $600, am I going to get my money’s worth out of the new versions?  That’s my big question mark.. I mean.. If Firework’s standards support is actually pretty good.. the Dreaweaver stuff turns out to make a difference.. Of course we expect Flash to be all that.. Having sound booth has its advantages…  The photoshop stuff could really mean something..   You know I’m just on the fence about it.

After Effects 

After Effects is another matter. I own After Effects 4.0.. which is like.. pre Mac OSX… and will not run on an Intel Mac.. So I need to drop the money on After Effects just to have an After Effects! If I was getting on After Effects CS3, I think I might be passing on this upgrade.. but as of now, there’s no question that I’m upgrading. 

Other Expenses? 

So here’s some other things I’m thinking of spend money on.. in the relatively short term

1. RAM, probably a couple hundred dollars worth
2. HD Camera, probably around $700
3. Cantor Vocal Synth $400
4. Breverb reverb: $280
5. Binarual microphone set up thing.. I think we are talking about $200
6. Laptop..  more then a grand
7. If I go with such a laptop.. add $500 for time capsule 

 Out side of this.. There’s the possibility of other software upgrades…  and can I afford those?

Day’s latter:

 Hmm.. I think I should just post this as is.