Futurist Now » Vodcasting http://codeforfood.org Semi-coherent ramblings about the past, present, and future Thu, 03 Sep 2009 04:40:48 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 en hourly 1 We could start a fund for you http://codeforfood.org/2008/06/22/we-could-start-a-fund-for-you/ http://codeforfood.org/2008/06/22/we-could-start-a-fund-for-you/#comments Sun, 22 Jun 2008 17:18:09 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/?p=999 A short video interview with Nate on the ride to the airport from the end of the Berlin trip. The fund is started – send me money to contribute!

]]> http://codeforfood.org/2008/06/22/we-could-start-a-fund-for-you/feed/ 1 YouTube on the AppleTV and the iPhone http://codeforfood.org/2007/07/08/youtube-on-the-appletv-and-the-iphone/ http://codeforfood.org/2007/07/08/youtube-on-the-appletv-and-the-iphone/#comments Sun, 08 Jul 2007 09:13:31 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/2007/07/08/youtube-on-the-appletv-and-the-iphone/ YouTube logoI’m never was a terribly heavy YouTube user but now that it’s both always in my pocket and on the nice Audio/Video system at home I find myself filling a spare moment here and there with random videos. Most of these videos fall into one of four categories – cute, funny, cute and funny, or the largest category: paper-thin mid-to-post teens producing mostly random and meaningless content. I’m not entirely sure if the world is a better place having been subjected to the last category but I’d rather have crappy user created content be king than populate an internet based on censorship where such drivel isn’t permitted.

Content gamut aside one of the things that has struck me as odd over my past week of using my iPhone is how differently implemented the YouTube application is on my iPhone versus my AppleTV. They both allow for the browsing of a partial selection of the YouTube library streamed directly from the internet, but they both have some features the other lacks. Here is a breakdown of client-specific features that have puzzled me:

AppleTV:

  • On my AppleTV I can sign into my standard YouTube account using my Google credentials.
  • Because I can sign into my YouTube account I can rate videos.
  • I can save videos to my accounts ‘favorites’ list for later viewing on either the AppleTV or in a web browser.
  • Unlink the iPhone there is no way to share videos with friends. Although I understand that there is no built in web browser one would think you could at least sync the recommendation to iTunes and have iTunes send a mail using your default mail client on the desktop PC.

iPhone:

  • I can’t sign into my web-based YouTube account.
  • There is no way to rate videos, however I can view what others average rating for a video is.
  • Because I am not signed in I cannot mark a video as a favorite. There is a bookmarking feature which serves a similar need, however bookmarked videos do not show up in my favorites list on the YouTube website or on my AppleTV.
  • I can send links to YouTube videos from the mail client on the iPhone via the ‘Share’ button in the YouTube UI. Sharing is fun and creates a very social experience out of it.

All in all I think YouTube was a great addition to both product offerings, but I’m puzzled as to the disparity in the feature lists. I will be interested to see if future software updates for both platforms bring their feature sets closer together. Google’s “cloud of data” and Apple’s experience in creating engaging and intuitive user interfaces making for a market juggernaut that will be hard to beat.

]]> http://codeforfood.org/2007/07/08/youtube-on-the-appletv-and-the-iphone/feed/ 4 Project Re:M1xed http://codeforfood.org/2007/02/20/project-rem1xed/ http://codeforfood.org/2007/02/20/project-rem1xed/#comments Tue, 20 Feb 2007 21:40:33 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/2007/02/20/project-rem1xed/ My friend Mike and I had an idea of creating a movie mashup entirely from other movies. Fair use gives us the right to use up to 8 seconds of another work without violating their copyright, so why not make a short film (5-10 minutes) made entirely from 8 second or less clips of other movies.

So far we are thinking doing a homage to cult Sci-Fi movies by making our own from the leavings of others. We have a library of 750+ DVD’s to pull samples from, and access to decent video editing tools to make our job easier. We may interleave audio and video from different sources simultaneously to allow for more dialog and action options, but only 8 seconds per sample will be allowed.

We are looking for help in everything from envisioning to helping polish the final project. Obviously this is not for money, but it should prove to be a blast. If you have creative ideas that might make this better we want to hear them – join us in our creative endeavor – just leave a comment or drop me an email!

]]> http://codeforfood.org/2007/02/20/project-rem1xed/feed/ 0 More time lapse wackiness http://codeforfood.org/2007/01/20/more-time-lapse-wackiness/ http://codeforfood.org/2007/01/20/more-time-lapse-wackiness/#comments Sun, 21 Jan 2007 07:58:57 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/2007/01/20/more-time-lapse-wackiness/ Today I spent much of the day finally cleaning up my place after CES hit it like a tornado. Halfway through it suddenly occurred to me I could try using EvoCam on my Macbook in the living room. I’m also Right-click here to download the 2.8MB Quicktime 7 .mp4 file or check out after the jump for an embedded version.

I’m using Quicktime because it’s higher quality than flash and since with this one I’m experimenting with high frame-rates and larger video sizes it just made more sense. Leave a comment and let me know what you think!



 

]]> http://codeforfood.org/2007/01/20/more-time-lapse-wackiness/feed/ 1 New media stuff http://codeforfood.org/2007/01/19/new-media-stuff/ http://codeforfood.org/2007/01/19/new-media-stuff/#comments Fri, 19 Jan 2007 23:58:16 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/2007/01/19/new-media-stuff/ It’s been a busy week at work, but I’ve still found the time to put together a couple of cool projects. I finally took the time to wade through all my Lensbaby shots and collect the gems into a Flickr set entitled ‘Best of Lensbaby‘. Check it out for some of my favorites, and to see it grow over time.

In addition I also picked up a copy of EvoCam for my iMac. Bre suggested it as a Photobooth replacement when I was looking to remove the “screen flash” and I ended up falling in love with it for some of it’s more advanced features. At first I was a little hesitant to throw $25 at webcam software, but even after just a few hours I was in love with EvoCam.

It has a really neat way to set up motion activated time lapse movies using the iSight. Basically my iSight is on all the time now. Whenever movement is detected (i.e. I am sitting at the computer) it takes a photo every 15 seconds, and adds the photo as a frame in a time lapse movie. At 24 frames per second playback speed and 15 seconds of real time per frame of video it makes it easy to watch my life go by at a 6 minutes per second. Even cooler is that since it’s motion activated there are no long gaps of nothingness while I’m at work or sleeping.

I’ve got it set to cut the movie and start a new one each day at midnight so I’ll end up with a detailed log of my computer usage, and something that’s actually pretty cool as an art project by itself. Below I’ve posted a quick one that only takes up an hour or so of “real time” and was more of an experiment than anything else – be expecting cooler versions at some point in the near future.

The Quicktime version is very large, but has a keyframe for every single shot in the time lapse so it’s very high quality. I’ve compressed it down to a flash video to show here, but might be making DVD’s to mail out if any of the coming days produce anything particularly interesting or thought provoking. Without further ado:


 

]]> http://codeforfood.org/2007/01/19/new-media-stuff/feed/ 2 Making a fool of myself Intel style http://codeforfood.org/2007/01/11/making-a-fool-of-myself-intel-style/ http://codeforfood.org/2007/01/11/making-a-fool-of-myself-intel-style/#comments Thu, 11 Jan 2007 20:25:24 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/2007/01/11/making-a-fool-of-myself-intel-style/ I’m officially all Vegas’ed out, but luckily I get to leave today. We had a lot of fun, and there are a ton of great videos up on gearlive.com – check them out! I’m already looking forward to CES next year, and getting home tonight to see Skype!

A quick video to leave you with from the Intel booth at CES:

]]> http://codeforfood.org/2007/01/11/making-a-fool-of-myself-intel-style/feed/ 0 42 stitches http://codeforfood.org/2006/12/07/42-stitches/ http://codeforfood.org/2006/12/07/42-stitches/#comments Fri, 08 Dec 2006 02:12:40 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/2006/12/07/42-stitches/ I went over to the Tom Bihn factory with Skype today so he could try fitting my Macbook in some prototypes of new bags. Unfortunately Skype behaved badly with his dog Reilly and tried to get into a bit of a fight, but other than that it was a great visit. I just kept Skype on his leash and right next to me while Tom, Darcy, and myself sat around for a while talking about bags and computers.

Tom made me a longer key loop for one of my bags and I got to see the coolest sewing machine ever in action. This machine sews 42 stitches automatically into a strip to seal two ends together. It’s almost hypnotic to watch it pound out 42 stitches so precisely in about a second. I took this video of the mechanical ballet – check it out:

]]> http://codeforfood.org/2006/12/07/42-stitches/feed/ 0 Vodcast quickie: Skype with a firetoy http://codeforfood.org/2006/10/16/vodcast-quickie-skype-with-a-firetoy/ http://codeforfood.org/2006/10/16/vodcast-quickie-skype-with-a-firetoy/#comments Tue, 17 Oct 2006 03:42:53 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/2006/10/16/vodcast-quickie-skype-with-a-firetoy/ I had to share this one – I think it’s adorable. I took a video of Skype playing with a toy made of fire-hose. He loves them because once the stuffing has been removed they are virtually indestructible. Now without further ado or any apologies for the crappy video quality:


]]> http://codeforfood.org/2006/10/16/vodcast-quickie-skype-with-a-firetoy/feed/ 0 iSight Vodcast http://codeforfood.org/2006/10/03/isight-vodcast/ http://codeforfood.org/2006/10/03/isight-vodcast/#comments Wed, 04 Oct 2006 00:02:42 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/2006/10/03/isight-vodcast/ A quick post to test how well the built in microphone and iSight in my iMac work:

I would say the answer is pretty well for simple stuff like this. Obviously I won’t be shooting the next special effects blockbuster with the thing, but it does a pretty decent job for this type of application. I also note that using the new iMovie HD was surprisingly easy and painless.The Core 2 Duo also impressed when I finally exported it. It did a h.264 encode down to 320×240 and managed to compress the 95MB of DV video into about 2MB in less than 10 seconds.

Update: As further testament to how easy this whole process was I just realized that I sat down at my computer less than 15 minutes ago. In that time I was able to do two takes of the video podcast, trim it, add a title and compress it for the web – not to mention writing this post and uploading the video to my hosting provider. iMovie HD + iSight = a strong win for Sparky!

]]> http://codeforfood.org/2006/10/03/isight-vodcast/feed/ 0 But daddy, I want them NOW! http://codeforfood.org/2006/07/14/but-daddy-i-want-them-now/ http://codeforfood.org/2006/07/14/but-daddy-i-want-them-now/#comments Fri, 14 Jul 2006 23:31:55 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/2006/07/14/but-daddy-i-want-them-now/

The week is over and I’m video-podcasting again! This week I try out my new camera, and take a crash course in video editing. Sorry that it’s quicktime video, and not an embedded Flash video but I was having problems with re-encoding it and am too drained to futz with it. You might have to upgrade to Quicktime 7 if you are on Windows to see it because I encoded using h.264.

I’m happy with the camera quality, but my workflow needs a lot of work to avoid the compression artifacts that you will see in this video. I managed to have to re-compress it twice, both times losing significant amounts of quality. I also need to figure out how to wrangle audio – something went horribly awry right, but then I seemed to keep it under control.

Anyone have a recommendation of a lossless video codec that’s Mac friendly? I’m doing the editing using iMovie HD because it’s both slick and handy. Video editing in general seems to have a bit of a steep learning curve, but I’m always up for a challenge.

]]> http://codeforfood.org/2006/07/14/but-daddy-i-want-them-now/feed/ 1 Beginning of the week and I’m vlogging already http://codeforfood.org/2006/06/05/beginning-of-the-week-and-im-vlogging-already/ http://codeforfood.org/2006/06/05/beginning-of-the-week-and-im-vlogging-already/#comments Tue, 06 Jun 2006 01:13:18 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/2006/06/05/beginning-of-the-week-and-im-vlogging-already/

It’s only Monday and I’m already vlogging!

]]> http://codeforfood.org/2006/06/05/beginning-of-the-week-and-im-vlogging-already/feed/ 0 Video blog how to http://codeforfood.org/2006/05/08/video-blog-how-to/ http://codeforfood.org/2006/05/08/video-blog-how-to/#comments Mon, 08 May 2006 23:55:50 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/2006/05/08/video-blog-how-to/ Bre from I Make Things just asked me to write up a short post on my workflow for creating Flash video blog posts using only free tools available for Apple’s OS X for We Are The Media and as always I’m more than happy to share the knowledge wealth. After I finished this post I was informed that the ultimately awesome Jake had also posted a write up on the same topic on the same day. I need to give good credit to Jake for turning me on to some of the tools I use in this tutorial.

The only things ayou will need to create your video blog post (be it for a personal blog, political manifesto, or sharing your cool new technology hacks with the world) are a digital camera capable of capturing AVI’s, a Mac running OS 10.3.9 or higher, and a website or blog with FTP access to post your creation to. We are going to install a free open source tool called ffmpegX that will help us with converting the video into Flash’s FLV format. You can get ffmpegX here.

The first thing you will have to do is “capture your moment”. Use your digital camera or camcorder to record a video of whatever you want to post to the internet. I recommend using the highest quality settings possible for your video – 320×240 is a minimum resolution, but use a higher setting if you can. As with any digital camera or camcorder good lighting always helps – make sure your environment is brightly lit, and your background is not brighter than you are to ensure that your face is neither too dark or bleached out. You might want to experiment a bit with lighting to find a balance that looks good before you move on to the next steps of posting your video to the internet.

You can then use iPhoto or the finder to transfer your video to your Mac’s hard drive. If you use iPhoto to pull your video from the camera you will want to drag the file from iPhoto to your desktop or another location on your hard drive to make it easier to find for the next couple of steps. At this point you are free to use iMovie or other tools to edit your video if you want, but for this tutorial we are just going to assume you want to post your video just like it was when it came out of your camera.

Now that we have the video file open up ffmpegX. If you have not installed it yet click here to get it, and follow the instructions on the website to install this fantastic video file format conversion tool.

Once you have opened and installed ffmpegX drag your AVI video onto the window to select it as the source file. Then in the “Target format” pane of the window select “FLV” as the format to encode it to. Once your screen looks something like the below you should be good to go – click the “Encode” button to start the encoding process.

Summary

FfmepgX will generate a yourfile.flv that contains your video. The next step is to put this file and a Flash enclosure (a .sfw flash executable file) onto your website. Open up your FTP client and open a connection to your website. If you need a great free FTP client check out Cyberduck. I can recommend a great Flash standard Flash enclosure you can download this one (control click or right click on the link and select to save the target to your hard drive). Both this file and the .flv file will need to be on your website (and note the www accessible URL for the next step).

The final step in our tutorial is to put the HTML code on your website. Below is the code you will want to use:

<center><object width=”320″ height=”240″>

<param name=”movie” value=”YOUR WEBSITE HERE/flvplayer.swf?file=YOUR FILE PATH.flv&autoStart=false;”>

<embed src=”/videoblog/flvplayer.swf?file=YOUR WEBSITE HERE/flvplayer.swf?file=YOUR FILE PATH.flv&autoStart=false;” quality=”high” wmode=”transparent” width=”320″ height=”240″type=”application/x-shockwave-flash” pluginspage=”http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer”></embed>
</param>

</object></center>

You will need to change that code to reflect both the URL to the flash player and the filename for this particular video for each movie you want to post to your website. Once you save your file and view the page in a web browser you should see something like the following (although hopefully with a less haggard host):


There you have it!

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]]> http://codeforfood.org/2006/05/08/video-blog-how-to/feed/ 1 Dance Dance Assimilation http://codeforfood.org/2006/05/04/dance-dance-assimilation/ http://codeforfood.org/2006/05/04/dance-dance-assimilation/#comments Fri, 05 May 2006 00:33:13 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/2006/05/03/dance-dance-assimilation/

Or, “Borg of the dance” DANCE BORG, DANCE!

Did I just ruin my social life forever by posting this? Will I become the next Star Wars Kid and have to sue my friends? You be the judge!

(cross-posted from Gear Live)

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]]> http://codeforfood.org/2006/05/04/dance-dance-assimilation/feed/ 4 3rd video podcast – at the end of a long day http://codeforfood.org/2006/05/01/3rd-video-podcast-at-the-end-of-a-long-day/ http://codeforfood.org/2006/05/01/3rd-video-podcast-at-the-end-of-a-long-day/#comments Tue, 02 May 2006 04:24:01 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/2006/05/01/3rd-video-podcast-at-the-end-of-a-long-day/


It’s the end of a very long day and I thought I would throw up another episode of my soap-opera of a life. Apologies in advance for the rocky start and horrid finish to the podcast – I need to get some video editing software. I have iMovie HD and was able to figure out how to use it to trim and edit the video, but then when I tried to save it out as an AVI (the only format that my flash encoder can read) I was stumped.

If any Mac guru’s are listening out there – how do you export an iMovie project? Do you have a better (free) solution for video editing for a budding vidcaster like me?

]]> http://codeforfood.org/2006/05/01/3rd-video-podcast-at-the-end-of-a-long-day/feed/ 0 Second video blog post – now with flashy goodness http://codeforfood.org/2006/04/30/second-video-blog-post-now-with-flashy-goodness/ http://codeforfood.org/2006/04/30/second-video-blog-post-now-with-flashy-goodness/#comments Sun, 30 Apr 2006 19:49:54 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/2006/04/30/second-video-blog-post-now-with-flashy-goodness/


Hopefully this second blog post will show up a bit easier to consume, for you my adoring readers. I’ve used some freeware apps (for Windows) to transcode the video I took with my SD400 to Flash Video and am hosting it in a small SWF. Apologies in advance for the ultra gay Skype affections!

If this does not work than I guess I’ll just have to be sad and not 1337 like other bloggers. If it does then it means I have a complete roll-your-own video blogging solution based on Dreamhost and flash.

Now off to relax, watch some real Borgs in Voyager, and recuperate from a wonderful experience. Thanks Mind Camp 2.0 for all the great times, and all the great pictures!

]]> http://codeforfood.org/2006/04/30/second-video-blog-post-now-with-flashy-goodness/feed/ 1 My very first (5th) attempt at a Video Blog Post http://codeforfood.org/2006/04/30/my-very-first-5th-attempt-at-a-video-blog-post/ http://codeforfood.org/2006/04/30/my-very-first-5th-attempt-at-a-video-blog-post/#comments Sun, 30 Apr 2006 16:30:04 +0000 Sparky http://codeforfood.org/2006/04/30/my-very-first-5th-attempt-at-a-video-blog-post/
Watch the video
A quick technology test to see if I can get the whole video blogging thing set up. Luckily I have lot’s of cool people here helping me, and Blip.tv to run some of the back en.

This video was originally shared on blip.tv by sparktography with a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.
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