I’ve changed the blog around quite a bit this week, so if you’re now missing something you liked- sorry. And if you look around you may find a whole lot of new stuff you like even better.

I’d also like to mention that the new EmptyStreet website is up and running at www.emptystreet.com. EmptyStreet is my web design/development company, we’ve been around since 1993 and we do all sorts of fun yet corporate projects.

I spent 5 hours yesterday with a camera strapped to me, capturing material for a client.

The steadicam worked out pretty well, even though the day was a bit windy- wind is the bane of steadicams, it throws them off balance.

I’ll post stuff in a few weeks, once the spots are completed. I’m definitely getting a lot better at operating this rig.

FSB (Fortune Small Business) magazine had an article this month about making decisions. Specifically, on making bad decisions. Not surprisingly, they used the movie business as their example of how not to run your business.

They pointed out that in general Hollywood movies get made because of relationships- the studios like to do business with known quantities. They, like all of us, prefer to work with their friends. This goes for actors, writers, directors, etc.

But it seems that these relationships don’t really have much to do with a movie’s success. In fact, the more relationships a movie sports the WORSE is tends to do at the box office.

So why does the movie business insist on dealing with writers, directors, and actors that they have relationships with? Why not put that money towards more truly competitive projects that could reap a lot more cash for the studio?

Easy. FSB got it wrong- success or failure in the movie business is not really about how a particular movie does at the box office. It’s often a lot more about doing favors for your friends and expecting favors back from your friends. It’s about keeping your job. It’s about making a defensible decision, even if it’s completely the wrong decision.

And really, how is that any different from the rest of corporate America?

I’ve had my HVX200 for only a few months, and I’ve used it on a bunch of jobs- mostly small commercials, industrials, a concert film, and a short drama. I love this thing! First of all, I was smart enough to get a few P2 cards (you need P2 cards to record high definition with a HVX200- it records to solid state media, not tape, when doing highdef). And my Apple MacBookPro now has a nifty device by Duel Systems, which plugs into the cardbus slot and allows me to offload the P2 cards extremely quickly into my Mac. The new version of Final Cut Pro (shipped, should be here in a day or two) makes the P2 highdef workflow even easier. It’s also backwards compatible with my DVX100.

On set my HVX200 absolutely kills the other “prosumer” cameras I’ve used- the DVX100, the Canon H1 and XL2, and the Sony Z1:

I love the Z1 in every way except one- it records interlaced and it doesn’t record 24 frames a second. It’s great for video and industrials but for more filmic things it means I need to spend a ton of time in post converting it to progressive frames and a better framerate. That’s what we used for “Headhunting” and “Deliverance By The Slice” and it worked very well. But I don’t always have the time to do all this post work for clients on tight deadlines. Plus, it’s tape based. And that sucks.

The XL2 is nice, but it’s only standard def. And it’s tape based.

The DVX100 is still a cool camera (I used it as Bcamera for the concert video). But it’s getting old, and it’s only standard def. And again, it uses tape.

I hate the Canon H1. Just hate it. It was used on that PSA I helped out on last fall. Plus, it’s tape based.

Going tapeless with the HVX means I don’t have to log tapes and wait for long imports, and I’ve found that for my work 3 P2 cards work just fine. Most importantly, the pictures and sound are absolutely incredible. I do a lot of greenscreen, and the better colorspace of the HVX200 over the (also nice) Sony Z1 is really a godsend.

I don’t normally go on about a product. But this camera has changed how I work, all for the better.