Crossing Media

Dith Pran

2008-04-07T19:48:00.003-04:00

Dith Pran 1942-2008

My Dear Friend,

Peace, love and compassion. You always wished that for others.

You had love and compassion in spades. At the end, I hope you found peace while holding the hand of your cherished Meoun Ser Dith.

Seeing Machine

2008-01-06T15:13:00.000-05:00

And here's another impressive MIT video interview with poet who is going blind called the "Seeing Machine" in which the poet discusses a collaboration between MIT scientists and herself that allows her to see text for the first time in months via images from a computer projected onto her retina.

Elizabeth Goldring is an artist, poet and Senior Fellow at MIT's Center for Advanced Visual Studies. Her collaborative research at CAVS includes visualizing her own vision loss and developing both a visual language and "seeing machine" for people who are blind or visually challenged. This video was produced in collaboration with the MIT News Office in April 2006 as a video news release about Goldring's Seeing Machine Prototype.The video includes excerpts from an earlier documentary produced by Goldring and Ellen Sebring, as well as video art collaborations with Vin Grabill

Music and the Expressive Hand

2008-01-06T15:02:00.000-05:00

Also on one of the MIT Media lab's student blogs on Digital Dialogues is quickie sound bite by neurologist Frank Wilson, who Glorianna Davenport says...

...has devoted much of his life to studying the connections between the hand, music and emotional commitment. How can our use of hand create deeper engagement? Does the enormous emphasis on typed text that is so prevalent in today's digital world constrain us? When will tangible digital objects and broader sensory interfaces transform our engagement in the digital dialog and how will this transformation effect our development as artisans and citizens?

Fly With An Eagle

2008-01-06T14:41:00.000-05:00

Fly with Tilly the Eagle who is equipped with a web-cam on her wings. In the process you will learn all about eagles in flight and marvel.

I found this wonderful link through MIT's Interactive Experience Group in the MIT Media Lab. Students keep blogs. This blog is called Media Fabrics.

Roger Kay's Chaos of the Digital Universe

2007-12-06T10:50:00.001-05:00

For those of us using digital cameras the files keep getting larger. But how to keep track of all the pix we take? Lightroom. But that's another post.

All of us together, mostly
individual users, created 161 exabytes of data in 2006. That's 161 billion gigabytes. In 2010,that figure will rise to almost a zettabyte. That's roughly 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 bytes. My eyes go cross just trying to count the number of commas.

...writes my former former high-school classmate, Roger Kay. Our resident George School genius, Roger was reading James Joyce in his Junior year. In his blog post Chaos of the Digital UniverseRoger tells us

Now, there are many scary things about all this data. For example, if you're looking for a needle
in it, how will you find it? Will today's search techniques be up to the job? Unlikely. Particularly, if it is stored here, there, and everywhere.

So start to catalogue your digital images now.

Teen Career Video Website

2007-12-05T13:55:00.000-05:00

Free Tips & Career Advice from Production Industry Professionals

The amazing 26-year old entrepreneur Joel Holland built up this video career advice website called Kidzonline for teens, while still a student attending Babson University. The videos are free to view and quite interesting.

Here's a video spoof he filmed with Charlie Rose.

Here's an interview with National Geographic's Donna Meir. Holland writes that Streaming Futures is...

......a free, web-based show dedicated to helping teens choose the right career path. We have over 90 streaming video interviews on our site with celebrities, business leaders, athletes, musicians, and career professionals from all different industries.

Hollywood Futures is a free series of videos showcasing short 3-5 minute interviews with hit Hollywood producers, movie studio executives, success production company founders, and others who have risen through the ranks to find great success in the production industry. Interviews are conducted by Footage Firm's Joel Holland.

New interviews are added weekly, so check back or subscribe to the video podcast on iTunes.

Coyote Blog

2007-12-04T11:01:00.000-05:00

Photo Copyright Shreve Stockton 2007

So here's a super-wonderful blog called The Daily Coyote filled with beautiful photos of one photographer's newly adopted pet coyote. Equipped with a fading Canon Rebel she teaches us the lesson that it isn't the equipment that takes the photo. It's the eye and heart of the shooter.

Shreve Stockton, 30, a Vespa rider, tells us

Charlie came into my life when he was just ten days old, orphaned after both his parents were killed. He lives
with me and a tomcat in a one-room log cabin in Wyoming.

$5/Month Buys a Daily Feed of Coyote Pix
You can order prints or calenders of Charlie for $15.95, or an 8x10 print for $45 or pay $5 a month to get a daily feed of Shreve's coyote photos...

This website is an archive of Charlie's daily pictures and my stories of life with a coyote. I post a new photograph every day, but it is a five month lag behind real-time. Subscribe to The Daily Coyote to get current photos delivered to your email inbox.

I wish Shreve the very best. I hope her blog catches on in a viral manner and these semi-micro-payments earn her enough money to support her rural lifestyle and feed Charlie a steak dinner nightly.

Art Buyers Search Copyright Free Amateur Pix

2007-11-01T16:10:00.000-04:00

Adding to my previous post "Anyone Can Be a Photographer" let me show you a query I just received from Guru.com. This art buyer wants to pay someone $1 an image to find copyright-free pix online they can use.

Cheap Art Buyer

Category: Photography / Videography
Description:
I need someone whom can search for copyright-free photos on the web. I need simple images of presents for a bride and groom (25 of them). They will need to be reduced to about 80 x 80 without loss of quality, and be png format with the alpha channel set to transparent.

An example of a site is flickr.com but you can choose other sites of your choice.

I will pay $1 a photo. I need a fast turnaround. Reply only if you know you can retrieve the photos. I have more work in this area for the competent provider.

Scary indeed. But is fright the proper response? Change is good. Right? Or at least Krishnamurti tells us so. The guys shooting daguerreotypes who were frightened probably went out of business. Those that re-tooled survived. Is there a lesson for everyone in all that?

Audio Blogging

2007-10-31T11:46:00.000-04:00

Click Here to Hear This Post :

It looks as if my favorite blogging utility, Audioblogger, has been sold or re-cast as a start-up with the new name Hipcast. When I started blogging I often read passages from poets using this easy program. You register, get a code and then phone a number and blog by phone.

Today while singing the praises of this utility I checked out my past posts to send along the info and found that the podcasts didn't work. After searching around I found the Audioblog folks at Hipcast...cool name...with a much bigger agenda. What used to be free is now $9.95 a month. But you can sign up for a fee one week trial.

Think about it as marketing tool. Blog a thought or tip each day by Hipcast , calling in by phone. Then put that link on your website or in the signature line of your e-mail messages.

Blog By Telephone

Hipcast now offers three new ways to upload audio. By telephone

Call a number, speak your mind, hang up. From anywhere you've got a phone*. From the club, the game, in traffic, at the mall, at a trade show, you name it. Talk up to 60 minutes. Interview someone or even record a conference call.

Record Audio Through Your Web Browser

Have you recorded and produced audio using one of the numerous software programs like Audacity, GarageBand, Soundtrack, CoolEdit/Audition? Are you a musician that's created a new track you want to share? Upload files up to 250 MB in size and publish. It's that easy. We support most audio formats.

Or Upload Audio files

With a simple computer microphone and high-speed internet access, you can record high-quality audio right through the web browser, with no additional software needed.*

Linking Video To Your Website

2007-10-29T11:27:00.000-04:00

Do you want to embed a video player into your website without writing lengthy and complicated HTML? One typo in HTML code and it doesn't work, right? And if you're a poor typist like me...

Here's a page on The University of California's website where you can easily create an Embedded Media HTML Generator.

And you can read all about delivering video from your website at EventDV.

My Gifted Dad

2007-02-26T17:39:00.000-05:00

I watched the Oscars last night with my father, 86. It's an emotional time as he packs up his apartment to go into assisted living near my brother. After eating Vietnamese take-out we settled into two unpacked office chairs amidst piles of boxes to watch TV.

In 1963, during a brief respite from an illustrious career as a still photographer, my father was Director of Photography for the film, "Lord of the Flies". The renowned British stage director, Peter Brook, asked my father to shoot this award-winning film and gave my father ten days to learn to use a movie camera before film production began on the island of Vieques. My father had never touched a movie camera before.

The rest is history. My father, a genius of sorts, developed a whole new system for tracking and zooming. He created a gate that swung and panned along the actors as they moved. In fact Tyson Kubota, a film student at Dartmouth, recently posted this critique of my father's shooting technique. I don't think he knew about Dad's swinging gate.

First, some technical lessons:
Zooming may not be so bad after all! The cinematographer Tom Hollyman (trained as a still photographer, Lord of the Flies is his one and only credited feature film) claims that this was the first feature ever shot [entirely?] using a zoom lens. He explains an efficient technique used for camera movement: walk at a right angle to the subject and pivot the camera/zoom in slowly to create a faux-dolly effect: this allows one to continually vary the background to obscure the fact that you’re zooming (so you’re not zooming in on the same spot, which is the core reason why static zoom-ins often look ‘cheap’).

Zooming Back to Puerto Rico

Brook and my father worked in the second floor of our apartment in Puerto Rico to develop Dad's tracking technique. If you look to the left of this photo you can see me watching. If I look solemn it's because maybe I felt the production of this movie was a family affair in which everybody but me played a role. Perhaps I took the constant commands for " All Quiet On Set!" too personally.

My brother Burnes, an extra, shown here, behind his father's camera, played Douglas, while my Mother took stills and helped with casting. I flirted with the Surtees twins and did get to play a stand-in for Piggy while my father learned to use a movie camera by making tests. Click here to see a slideshow of some low res pix of my father at work with Peter Brook.

Last Night

During a commercial break in the Oscars last night I asked my father why he didn't get further into film-making after " Lord of the Flies."

He said that after shooting Lord of the Flies he realized how much there was to learn in the craft of cinematography and that he felt he was too old at that time to begin at the bottom, learning the craft.

Kubota on Dad

Kubota continues in his critique:

On improvisation:
Famed director theater director Peter Brook got these non-actor children to convincingly live the experience of their characters—he reportedly shot over 60 hours of footage. Onscreen I could sense the free, wide-open editing process this approach must have allowed him. Each shot, no matter how briefly held, has a unique richness, an eloquence and brevity that comes from a confluence of unpredictable factors: the child performers, the environment, weather and lighting conditions, not to mention everyone behind the camera and offscreen.

The precisely exposed, carefully modulated tonalities contrast with the sense of contingency and spontaneity in the framings and actor movement. The way Hollyman/Brook shoot faces is particularly inspiring: the frequent close-ups on faces with starkly lit sky backgrounds or negative space decontextualize each boy’s position in the narrative, imbuing each image with a mythic weight (I could sense the cinematographer Tom Hollyman’s background in still photography most strongly in these moments).

The film is also a masterclass in the efficient and effective use of location shooting. The film’s power comes from the aesthetic tensions it contains: between the boys’ completely ‘real’ physical ‘performances’ (their physical presence in the actual conditions of the narrative) and the almost-entirely-postdubbed dialogue that they ‘speak’; between the gritty, pocked texture of the hunters’ volcanic rock fortress and the smooth grey tones of the open sky; between the use of unexpectedly disjunctive shot compositions and editing rhythms and the supple gliding camera movements; and between the occasional music (almost always used ironically or as thematic counterpoint, never in a conventional melodramatic sense) and the ambient beauty of the rest of the naturalistic sound design. The overall attention to detail and affect is staggering; I am convinced that Brook’s daring formal approach was the perfect choice to balance the broad-strokes allegory of Golding’s storyline.

Strut Your Stuff Dad @ The Heritage

Hey Dad...Someone's blogging about work done some 36 years ago--if all of us could be so lucky. Kubota says the film is a "masterclass in the efficient and effective use of location shooting."

So Dude, listen here. You may be difficult. But you're also gifted.

You're a true Technoratti presence. Cool enough. The ladies at the Heritage will surely swoon when you show them Kuboda's blog post.

Way to go.

I be proud.

Deadly Fake Anti-Malarial Drugs

2007-02-24T11:23:00.001-05:00

Photograph Copyright Stephenie Hollyman

Click Here to View Slideshow on the anti-malarial wonder drug, made from artemisinin. This herb, also known as wormwood is now being grown in Tanzania by Awaarusha farmers. Photos Copyright Stephenie Hollyman 2007.

Indeed my heart sank yesterday while reading In the World of Life Saving Drugs, a Growing Epidemic of Deadly Fakes, in The New York Times Science Times , which says that in Southeast Asia " 53 percent of the antimalarials bought were fakes."

Estimates of the deaths caused by fakes run from tens of thousands a year to 200,000 or more. The World Health Organization has estimated that a fifth of the one million annual deaths from malaria would be prevented if all medicines for it were genuine and taken properly.
“The impact on people’s lives behind these figures is devastating,” said Dr. Howard A. Zucker, the organization’s chief of health technology and pharmaceuticals.
Internationally, a prime target of counterfeiters now is artemisinin, the newest miracle cure for malaria, said Dr. Paul N. Newton of Oxford University’s Center for Tropical Medicine in Vientiane, Laos.

SLIDESHOW ON ARTEMESIN

If you click above you can view a slideshow of photos I took in Tanzania of a village where the live-saving herbal plant artemisin annua is being grown in Tanzania.These photos are part of my ongoing multimedia project on malaria called " Fever Zone". Also include ( the white folks) are photos of agri-biz growing artemesin in Tanzania.

FIRST HAND EXPERIENCE: GETTING SICK

In May of 2005 while traveling to document malaria I was thrilled to see how well artmemisinin worked against chloriquine-resistant strains of malaria. In fact I had a chance to try out this wonder drug first hand-- thank god not conterfeit-- in Tanzania after my blood smear proved positive for malaria falciprium on a Friday afternoon. While photographing a woman with malaria who had dropped into a coma in a neighborhood clinic ouside of Dar es Salaam, I suddenly found myself dizzy, sweating heavily, and about to wretch. At first I thought it was a sympathetic reaction. But as I photographed the symptoms worsened. And I recalled that I had been weak all day.

I asked the nurse at the clinic to test my blood for malaria and continued working.

One half hour later the clinic's doctor approached me laughing, saying that I must take my subject matter--malaria-- quite seriously, because I had caught it. " Welcome to Tanzania" he boomed out as he wrote me a prescription for artesunate pills.

My WHO driver took me to a reputable pharmacy where I bought this life-saving medicine before retreating to my hotel to recover. After sleeping around the clock between taking pills during what became my malarial " Lost Weekend" I awoke on Monday. Weak but recovered.

By Tuesday I was back at work. I was lucky. If I had taken counterfeit artesunate I might have died. With excellent reporting Donald G. McNeil Jr. details the peril in which these counterfeit drugs place their users.

Many of the fake artesunate pills found by Dr. Newton’s team were startlingly accurate in appearance — and much more devious in effect than investigators had suspected.
Not only did the pills look correct, as did the cardboard boxes, the blister packing and the foil backing, but investigators found 12 versions of the tiny hologram added to prevent forgery.
In one case, even a secret “X-52” logo visible only under ultraviolet light was present, though in the wrong spot.
Another hologram was forged by hand, Dr. Newton said, by someone who obviously spent hours with a pin and a magnifying glass making tiny dots on a circle of foil to imitate the shimmer.
But the most frightening aspect appeared when the pills were tested. Some contained harmless chalk, starch or flour. But the latest, he said, contained drugs apparently chosen to fool patients into thinking the pills were working.
Some had acetaminophen, which can temporarily lower malarial fevers but does not kill parasites. Some had chloroquine, an old and now nearly useless antimalarial.
One had a sulfa drug that in allergic people could cause a fatal rash.
And some had a little real artemisinin — not enough to cure, but enough to produce a false positive on the common Fast Red dye test for the genuine article.
Those would not merely fool a laboratory, Dr. Newton noted. They could also foster drug-resistant parasites, so if patients were lucky enough to get genuine artemisinin treatment later, they might have already developed an incurable strain and could die anyway.
Such resistant strains could spread from person to person by mosquito and ultimately render the drug ineffective, as already happened with chloroquine and Fansidar, two earlier malaria cures.
“We make no apology for the use of the term ‘manslaughter’ to describe this criminal lethal trade,” Dr. Newton and his co-authors said last year in an article in The Public Library of Science Medicine. “Indeed, some might call it murder.”

Multimedia Dogizens

2007-02-09T12:24:00.000-05:00

I just read an interesting post called The Pedigree of Goodness . It's a must read for those involved in working in teams on multimedia projects. It really brings home people's need for validation and the need for team-mates to acknowledge colleagues' contributions.

She writes..

Perhaps you have seen the latest Pedigree dog food commercial? In it, the camera pans on a series of ordinary looking dogs in a dog pound, and the voice-over gives them language. The dogs say things sequentially like "I don't know where I am..." "And I don't know how I got here..." "but I know that I am a good dog..." "And I just want to go home."

She then deconstructs the notion of goodness...

And, like the dog in the pound, at the core place in our hearts all any of us really want is to find whatever reads out as h-o-m-e for us, and to be able to be there.

The dogs in the commercial want to be seen, to be noticed and ask to be acknowledged for what it is they have to give. They are the quintessential Everyperson.

Not Madonna's Malawi

2006-11-25T15:15:00.000-05:00

Photograph Copyright Stephenie Hollyman 2006

We all read about Madonna's "adoption" of a child from Malawi last month. It was probably the first time most have read about Malawi in the paper. Which just goes to show you the power of celebrity to sell news. In June you may have read my post about Brangelina selling toothpaste.

Here's a link to photos I did in Malawi in 2005 on malaria as part of my multimedia work in progress " Fever Zone."

Here, Families of Yao fishermen live in small villages along the shores of Lake Malawi, a reagion that has one of the highest rates for malaria in the world. For residents here, an attack of malaria is as common as flu to a resident elsewhere.

For although we read almost daily about the scourge of AIDS in Africa it is also a fact that malaria kills an African child every 30 seconds. Almost 97% of Malawi's population is at endemic risk for malaria. Children under five suffer on average 9.7 malaria episodes per year, while adults suffer 6.1 such episodes.

Families in Malawi can spend almost a quarter of their small annual income treating malaria. Malawi is one of the world's poorest nations in the world with a 37 year old life expectancy at birth for women and 36 for men.

Brian Storm's Mediastorm

2006-11-05T23:58:00.000-05:00

Last Fall MSNBC.com won exclusive internet rights to MediaStorm’s production, Iraqi Kurdistan by Ed Kashi. The private online auction ran for four days and was conducted at http://mediastorm.org. Participants included news, lifestyle and arts publications from around the world. MSNBC.com premiered the project on November 13th, 2006.

Since then Brian Storm has been producing and uploading exciting multmedia packages on his site. Check out Kristen Ashburn's BLOODLINE: AIDS and Family,
in which video and photos are combined with audio to create a moving cross media document. Visitors are greeted by a mother who addresses them directlt from a player window:

I said, my children, you know what I have HIV. One day I will die and leave you my children. So you must be brave and look after yourselves and look after me.

Rich Media Sells Cars

2006-11-04T20:53:00.000-05:00

Photograph Stephenie Hollyman 2005

At Photo Expo yesterday I was chatting, briefly, with Holly Hughes, Managing Editor of Photo District News, about multimedia and Brian Storm's exciting new venture MediaStorm.org which just auctioned off a rich-media story package for the first time to MSNBC online, two days ago. I asked Holly if anybody was making any money yet from producing media-rich stories. She shook her head and said, " Not yet."

Nissan Sells Cars With Rich Interactive Media

That may be true for photographers but the ad agencies working for Nissan seem to be doing OK. When I returned home, people were dancing across the Street at the Seaport Museum, prancing on a red backdrop in the cold, in front of a van where their images were being projected onto a grid of video screens. Grunged type on the truck read " 7 Days, Seven Lessons, An Interactive Experience from Nissan." It is all part of a five-city cross media campaign produced by All Points Media to promote Nissan's latest model Sentra car to young urbanites.

The agency hired Marc Horowitz, to shoot in a You-Tubey manner, The Tennessean tells us

"a California-based performance artist and photographer's assistant, and the trials and tribulations he experienced while trying to maintain a normal life living in the car for a week in Los Angeles... Besides Web logs, a My Space page and online videos, the company also bought an online "island" in the fast-growing virtual reality game SecondLife..."We shot it in what we call 'reality plus,' " said Rob Schwartz, executive creative director for Nissan's primary ad agency, TBWA\Chiat\Day...The result is a $40 million to $50 million advertising campaign that includes seven different television commercials, a variety of print ads, at least three Web sites, a couple of blogs, 15 "Webisodes" and a spot in an online computer game, where players can get their own virtual reality version of the Sentra to drive around cyberspace (where they'll see virtual Nissan billboards, too).

Cool Cars With Plugs for iPods & Bluetooth Technology

Here at South Street Nissan's newest Sentra was parked next to the van. A " Product Specialist" invited a passing tourist named Stacy to check it out. Stacy, who owns a 2005 Sentra, settled into the car's roomy front seat. When she was told that the car had Bluetooth wireless technology and that she could plug her IPod into the car's speakers, controlling the volume at the steering wheel, she shouted out " Get Out! I love everything. It's a toy!"

Stacy now headed for the red backdrop where she watched herself moving as part of the " Lesson 5: Remember to Shower Daily" episode that played on the large screen on the van. A small web cam picked up her movements and projected them back as on the screen. Her interactive "real time" guide Alonzo Wilson, from Oregon's All Points Media told Stacy he was going to " Fog". After a flick of Alonzo's remote wand, Stacy saw Eric on the screen telling us that he needs a bath and is going to the car wash. Fog enveloped each of the squares in the screen. Alonzo instructed Stacy to " wave" it away which she did with a flourish.

Nissan has built a faux site on My Space for Marc, including videos and PDF files vistors can download.

Photo Stephenie Hollyman

But there are perils along this path warn experts.

"That lack of authenticity … can come back to haunt the advertiser," warns adman Garfield. "It's a real obsession with those who live online. They don't like people playing with their minds."

Pencil Hollyman The Devil Dog

2006-10-31T11:05:00.000-05:00

Photograph Pencil Hollyman
Yes, it's true. Cindy Sherman lived down the hall from me in a loft here at South Street when she was just starting out. So inspired, my rescue dog, Pencil likes to dress up and have his photograph take in different roles, even though I tell him that he's a bit derivative. You may have read the previous post where he dressed up as a Bollywood star.

Derivitive or not, he knows I've been a slacker as of late on posting on this blog, too busy with other work. But he is persistent. So he nuzzled me awake this morning with a poke of his pointed nose, all dressed for Halloween in his Devil Dog Suit. He asked me to take this picture.

So Happy Halloween from this girl and her dog!

Festivus & Allen Salkin

2006-10-01T14:43:00.000-04:00

I mentioned Allen Salkin, the freelance writer with whom I worked last week on a NYTimes assignment. Do check out Allen's website " for the rest of us", Festivus. Salkin tells us there,

This is the home for all things Festivus, the holiday most people believe, wrongly, started on an episode of Seinfeld. This Website was set up by the author of Festivus: The Holiday for the Rest of Us, the book which shows in hilarious and 100 percent accurate detail the stunning, bizarre and sometimes controversial ways real people all over the world are actually celebrating Festivus now.

Salkin's site tell us that

Allen Salkin is an investigative reporter. He is the author of the book Festivus - The Holiday for the Rest of Us.

Allen has written on subjects ranging from the last true waterbed salesman in the San Francisco Bay Area to corruption in the Brooklyn courts for The New York Times, Details, Yoga Journal, Heeb, and other publications.

Allen has been a rubber ducky salesman in Las Vegas, a farm laborer in Crete, a casting agent in Hong Kong, a busker in Melbourne, a stand-up comedian in New York, a cafeteria cashier in Squaw Valley, a slacker in San Francisco, and a chocolate chip cookie maker in Waikiki.

For Allen's blog, journalism and photos, visit his website: www.allensalkin.com.

Magic Flute Glow

2006-10-01T14:25:00.000-04:00

Photograph Stephenie Hollyman Copyright 2006

Here's another example of my Magic Flute operatic lighting using Gary Fong's light dome with my Canon 580EX flash off camera. This was taken last week for a New York City museum.

In a previous post I spoke of letting ambient light burn in with the flash exposure to warm up a subjects'face, to produce a glow. For this portrait of elegance and elan I held the flash low and to the left, shooting with a slow shutter speed.

Operatic Footlighting

2006-10-01T13:54:00.000-04:00

If you have read my previous posts on Gary Fong's Light Dome you know what an unabashed fan I am of the effects it can produce, when used off camera axis. This last week I shot three evenings for The NY Times for a story called "Fame at 72 Proof." I worked with the tremendously talented and charming Allen Salkin, who is among many other things, the author of the book Festivus. Our assignment was a story about owners of boutique liquors and how they promote their product by donating their branded booze to hosts of high profile parties and events.

To take this shot of the maker of African Starr Rum, Jeffrey Zarnow, I used Gary's Fong's diffused milk-white dome instead of the translucent version over my Canon 580 EX flash. This cone-like covered dome really produces a nice soft white light. But don't count on using it for subjects far away. The fall off is incredible.

I held the flash with the light sphere low, using the flash to emulate a footlight at the opera. I call this my " Magic Flute"effect...sort of like when Pappageno ( sp?) plays his flute.

Careful though. Doing this can cast wicked shadows. Check your screen " chimping" after each shot to make sure you have it in the can. Try to get the subjects away from walls where shadows' " hash marks" will land. Or if you do have a wall, place the flash so the shadows become a crafted part of the photo.

Shake and Bake Event Photography

2006-10-01T13:40:00.000-04:00

Photography Copyright Stephenie Hollyman 2006
Last week while shooting an event for a major New York City Museum I played around with what I like to call " Shake and Bake " photography. No, I don't sprinkle seasoned bread crumbs over my subjects. I shake the camera as I shoot a long time exposure and let the ambient light " bake" in...while a nano-second pop of the flash produces an occasional surprise or two.

I set the white balance for the flash rather than putting an organge gel over the flash and setting the white balance for tungsten. It makes everything glow warmly and orange in the background. But the subjects in the foreground come out correctly balanced.

But do beware. There is an element of digital voodoo at work here. The ambient back ground blurs and the subjects lit by flash stand out in sharp relief...if you're lucky. So play it safe and take the standard shot before shaking your camera camera around for the next one.

And set your flash to overpower the ambient light by one stop. Otherwise your the orange from the tungsten will " burn" in to the exposure on your subjects' faces and make them look like pumpkins. ( Although occasionally I will warm up a pale subject by lengthening my shutter speed to allow a " glow" to burn in under the flash exposure.)

Vote For Spoiled Yappy Dog For Congress

2006-08-28T21:22:00.000-04:00

Click here to see, hear and interact with Spoiled Snappy Dog's campaign For Congress. Forward the link to this post and become a foot soldier in an incredibly clever viral campaign sponsored by the Ad Council to get out the youth vote in November. Listen to the radio ad for Spoiled Yappy Dog for Congress or download and print out a campaign materials such as a PDF file of Spoiled Yappy Dog for Congress to iron onto a tee shirt.

Listen to the stirring voice-over narration telling us the little known facts behind the candidate, " Born the youngest of 15, Spoiled Yappy Dog made overcoming adversity her first order of business. From day one she's had an agenda to get things done. Protecting our youth and fighting the good bites she's never chased after special interests, only mail trucks..."

If you visit the home page for Spoiled Yappy Dog at www.payattention.org you can also download PDF files of Spoiled Yappy Dog For Congress that can be printed out as door hangers.

And you can also read the latest news from the campaign trail of Spoiled Snappy Dog. This hot item just in from Rochester New York:

Too Gosh-Darn Cute
ROCHESTER, N.Y. - A recent newspaper article accused Spoiled Yappy Dog of making puppy dog-faces and flirting with the press in an attempt to win votes. Spoiled Yappy Dog’s supporters are calling it ridiculous. “Spoiled Yappy Dog is a professional. What does she have to do to be taken seriously around here? I just can’t believe voters are really that superficial,” said Tom Jones of Appleton, N.Y.

A spokesperson from Spoiled Yappy Dog’s camp said, “Her record speaks for itself,” and that “sooner or later people will know that her bark means business.”

Well done Ad Council!

Photo Essay: Of Tugs & Ship Docking

2006-08-03T12:11:00.000-04:00

Click here to play slideshow of ship docking photos

After a summer solstice hiatus am back to blogging...

A freelance life is never dull. I took last weekend on a New York harbor docking master, Captain Jeffrey McAllister. Jeffrey is the fifth generation of his family to bring tugs in and out of the port of New York. Photos copyright Stephenie Hollyman 2006.

To take the pix I spent the night on board the Robert E., a Navy tug converted to a sea-going tractor tug. Climbing down rope Jacob's ladders, and up and down ship's gangways with Capt. Jeff, I tried to catch a mini-portrait of tugboat life with my camera.

As one of the first women to break into New York harbor as a tugboat cook some long time ago, I was heartened to find that the Robert E. had a female deckhand, King's Point cadet and Mate at work. They did a great job and seem to be fully integrated into the fleet. It's no big deal for the guys either. It goes to show you that sometimes things do change.

Over the years the years I have been sponsored by captain Brian McAllister to write a history of his family's 142- year-old company, upon which now I am putting the final touches.

Neil's Tip for Better Flash, Burn & Pan Pix

2006-07-23T13:10:00.000-04:00

Photograph Stephenie Hollyman

Do sometimes you favor flash, pan and burn photography? If you are like me, you set your flash on manual and use a long shutter speed. Then setting your camera on first curtain sync you pan and blur the back ground. You cross your fingers and pray then check the LCD screen to see if you caught the moment.

I took this photo last week while shooting an event for a major museum. Towards the end of evening after I had taken the " safe" pictures required for any event I stationed myself by the stairway and panned at a 1/15 of a second as people whisked by, pointing my off camera flash to the side, clad with its Gary Fong Light Dome.

Neil Turner maintains one of the most helpful websites, dg28.com I have found re lighting. If you click on Lighting Technique you'll find answers and how-I-shot-the-assignment examples for many of the technical conundrums we all face daily trying to make silk from a sow's ear when a subject isn't that interesting visually.

All of us have played with this. Sometimes it works, sometimes not. We have learned to use this as a " toy", after getting the shot we know we want for sure. Here's a tip from Neil to raise the ante so that your next flash, burn & pan (FBP) shot becomes a keeper.

Neil's Flash Burn and Pan Tip

Neil tells us to keep the flash off camera so the subject has some shadow over which the ambient light can blur. Then he tells us when we pan to move the camera TOWARDS the light. That's how I took the picture above.

You compose the picture and during the relatively long exposure you deliberately move the camera. This one was left to right. You need to move the camera towards the flash in most cases. The ambient light then blurs and the subject is frozen where the flash catches him. It's good if the flash is off camera because the effect is strengthened by the subject having some shadow on him, over which the ambient can blur. This is done entirely "in camera" and requires no photoshop alteration. With a digital you can check what you've done on the screen and alter the light balance/direction of movement/angle of movement accordingly. I originally learned to do this using transparency film and a lot of it! I also tend to explain to the confused looking person that it's a technique to move the camera, otherwise you may have them thinking you're a bit mad!!

Cooking Up a Wi-Fi Range Extender

2006-07-22T12:50:00.000-04:00

We all love digital technology. But after assignments, editing the photos sure does take time. I like to sit on sofa with my Mac Powerbook networked via wi-fi to an Airport Express module that also connects to my desktop Mac. But sometimes the signal is weak.

So check this out. No joke. I couldn't believe it when I saw it this morning on the blog for Make Magazine. Here are the instructions for making your very own wi-fi amplifier from a vegetable colander.

Tm36usa writes "Easily receive WIFI signals from far away using a standard USB WIFI adaptor and a bit of ingenuity. This Simple idea requires no modifications to a USB WIFI adaptor or your computer. A simple way to increase the signal strength and range of your WIFI. Plus it works with all USB WIFI adaptors".

On the same blog you can also learn how to make a rodent powered night light or image transfers of photos using solvents on cloth and other non-traditional media.

It's raining out there so get thee to thy workshop and help banish weak wi-fi signals at home. ( and let me know if it works)

International Mix Tape Project: Analogue!

2006-06-28T11:01:00.000-04:00

Thanks to ITunes I listened to my CC ( Cool Cat) neice Helen, on Saturday, in New Orleans, as she served as DJ in her weekly radio program at Tulane University. Her voice was as silky as it was smooth. And this production was certainly no Prairie Home Companion in its inception, completly digital instead. So very very hip.

Even Helen's grandfather listened from his I-Mac.

Remembrance of Things Past...Living In an Analogue Environment

But this all set me musing. There's a scene in Praire Home Companion in which a character plays a vinyl record in his dressing room that makes you think " How quaint."

Yes, you have your IPOD and are hip and groovey. But are you a closet digeratti who yearns for a walk along the pathways of a less hectic time? Is a networked life tethered to a Blackberry making you increasingly anxious? Do you long for those days when meetings took place offline where smiles and laughs were real not LOL?

Do you miss analogue technology, a gentler era when music mixes were made with cassette tapes instead of computers and you, (as Daily Candy posts today) passed..." Hours spent astride double decks, fingers poised above the pause button, timing each song (juuust right), with a little MC magic added to the mix."

Fear not. Today's sweet dose from Daily Candy describes a charmingly quaint and retro society of music mixers who trade casette tapes by snail mail. By joining the...

International Mixtape Project, you can tune into a growing community of global headphone hipsters who trade old-school tapes (and compilation discs) via snail mail.

Every month you swap your precious song compilations with music-minded pen pals around the world. Imagine! Your mix prowess heard from Helsinki to Beijing! And it’s just a few stamps away.

At the moment, 30 countries are exchanging beats: Israeli microhouse, Nova Scotia neo-soul, Bay Area hip-hop, and Congolese electro-folk.

Joining is simple and membership responsibilities are few (thank goodness, because summer heat makes us l-a-z-y). Cover art isn’t a must — but hello! — it’s, like, totally the best part.

And it just might save your life.

For reel.

You can find out more about the IMP at BBC Online.

Cisco Videos

2006-06-26T10:40:00.000-04:00

Cisco has created a splash page comprised completely of video clips to sell their product Cisco Unified Communications. Visitors to the page can click on one of ten video clips or choose to view a video categorized by...yes, sigh... " solution". Heard that word before?

Web 2.0 Podcast

2006-06-26T10:28:00.000-04:00

In a BusinessWeek podcast O'Reilly Media CEO Bill O'Reilly discusses Web 2.0 , and the the architecture of participation. Here where users create the content, design helps leverage the flow of collective information.

There's no buzzword more popular in tech today than Web 2.0. Conceived during a brainstorming session for what became the Web 2.0 Conference now held annually by O'Reilly Media Inc. and CMP Media, Web 2.0 describes the new online services such as the volunteer-written encyclopedia Wikipedia, Yahoo's Flickr photo-sharing site, online marketplace eBay, and search engine Google. Unlike most of the first generation of Web sites, these services have an innate social component, often "harnessing collective wisdom," as O'Reilly Media CEO Tim O'Reilly puts it.

YIKES: Video Vixen Link Not Mine!

2006-06-15T14:58:00.000-04:00

VIDEO VIXEN NOT ME!!!!!

YIKES!

I just found that the link to the blog I created to archive my video posts called "Video Vixen" leads to a blog maintained by another Video Vixen, this one named Joan.
The code for the sub-blog " Video Vixen" where I archive posts about video uses a hyphen in its URL. Joan the OTHER "Video Vixen"...NOT ME...does not.

Self publishing without oversight of a copy editor is a life fraught with peril indeed. Even as I post this I am blushing. If you were to check out Joan's blog you would see why.

How Did This Happen?
A while back I changed the template on this blog, Crossing Media and re-tagged tagged the links myself from memory to MY "Video Vixen." Big mistake. I left out the hyphen. Even bigger mistake I never checked all the links after republishing Crossing Media with the new template. DUMB.

Sorry folks! Next time you see something like that...please let me know!

Podcast: Race and NYC Ad Agencies

2006-06-14T14:46:00.000-04:00

Ad Age really gets the Cross Media thing. They encode their video for a Flash 8 player which I now think is the way to go. And check out this podcast in which reporter Lisa Sanders talks her story Race and the New York City Advertising Industry An Update on the Human Rights Commission Investigation.

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- Ad Age reporter Lisa Sanders provides an overview and update of the New York Human Rights Commission's investigation of Madison Avenue diversity hiring practices. Both the Commission and the City Council's Civil Rights Committee are planning to hold public hearings on the issue. In the latest move, the Commission has issued subpoenas for 16 of New York's top agency executives.

Scooterati: Ironbound Rally

2006-06-13T13:50:00.000-04:00

Here is another set of photos from Saturday's Scooter block party, as members drive in a rally from New York's Brass Monkey to Newark's Ironbound district.Click on the upper right hand link on the Flickr set page to see the pix as a slideshow.

Brouhaha's Video: The Finals of the Slow Race

Here also is a video shot during last weekend's Scooter Block party by a Scooterati and videodisti You Tubes member who calls himself Brouhahavids. On his blog he says "I'm a lawyer working at the intersection of Internet and travel in New York City." Mmmm.

Don't know about You Tubes? You can read one of my previous posts, NBC Threatens Video Sharing Sites re the viral blizzard it created for a Saturday Night Live skit called Lazy Sunday a few months back.

Video Cip by Jonathan a.k.a. Brouhaha

Brouhaha Blog

PS. Although my pix are " public" on Flickr, all rights are reserved. Feel free to pass the link to this blog to friends. But rights to post pix on your blog or website must first be requested from the photographer...moi!

Scooteratti Pix: Times Square

2006-06-13T11:15:00.000-04:00

To view some of the pix from my latest personal photo project, " Scooteratti," click here to go to the Flickr set's thumbnails. Click on the right hand link for slideshow on a page.

Although these are " public" on Flickr, all rights are reserved. Feel free to pass the link to this blog to friends. But rights to post pix on your blog or website must first be requested from the photographer...moi!

Future uploads will include more pix from this weekend's Scooter Block Party, sponsored by the New York Scooter Club who throw a truly great event. Thanks guys! My newest project, four days old, seeks to explore the ties that bond scooter owners. This quirky and independent bunch live for the potholed roads of New York City and the smell of exhaust.

Slivercast Video Content Distriubtion

2006-06-10T14:50:00.000-04:00

TotalVid
If you get your broadband from Verizon, have you noticed that little click through ad for TotalVid that is being presented by Verizon Online? I finally succumbed and clicked through today.

Remember a few months back when I speculated in a post that one of the future revenue paths for cross media producers would involve producing video clips for niche audiences to download for a price? Well check out TotalVid.

A frisky start-up this distribution " channel" for slivercast content features video downloads of more than 1,000 titles. A download costs up to $4 and expires after seven days, says CNET. " In a classic up-selling move, consumers can also purchase a DVD and permanent digital version of a movie and have the rental cost subtracted from the DVD buy."

Remember how I wrote that independent content producers might make future profits by producing niche content for example on subjects like.. say... woodworking? Well, TotalVid says that it "has the world's largest collection of the most popular Wood and Woodworking how-to videos available in our convenient download format. For as little as $2.99 you can download one of our top Wood and Woodworking how-to videos and begin viewing in just minutes. "

You can sign up here to have TotalVid consider distributing your content.

CNET CNET tells us that...

Start-up TotalVid, which sells specialty videos for sports and home-improvement enthusiasts, is tapping into growing consumer interest in easily distributed downloadable video.

....The download video service market is expected to grow in revenue from $1 billion in 2004 to about $5 billion by 2008, according to In-Stat. And though that number pales in comparison with the nearly $50 billion in annual revenues enjoyed by the movie industry, the download video market's growth is happening faster.

Weegee:F8 and Be There

2006-06-09T13:30:00.000-04:00

Weegee As Blogger?

After attending the ICP opening last night of Weegee's undiscovered photos , I decided to republish this post I wrote in March.

Reading all the tabloid buzz about the rape and killing of Imette St. Guillen, reminded me of Weegee, the photographer who invented a whole new genre for us photojournalists, even as he photographed murders. If Weegee were alive today he would take to blogging like a fish to water...posting his pix in real time. Instead of smoking cigars while souping his prints in hypo Weegee today would probably be found at the closest Starbuck's with a PC, uploading his pix using wireless.

Weegee, born in Poland in 1899, took the name Arthur Felig when he imigrated to New York with his family at nine. This freelance photographer worked out of the trunk of his car which he used as darkroom through the 30's and 40's as he photographed the daily dish of newsworthy images for tabloids and the wire services. Equipped with a police scanner he roamed the city in search of its darker side...its latest murders, fires or robberies. In my previous post I briefly mentioned Weegee's pix of people watching movies, Weegee's World: Movie Goers that this consumate voyeur took in theaters using infrared film, his subjects unaware. The Side Photographic Gallery collection of Weegee photographs includes photos in a slideshow, as well, some of which I have never seen before.

Untitled (In the Movie House Watching "Haunting of Hill House")
ca. 1950, Photo Copyright Arthur Felig

"He will take his camera and ride off in search of new evidence that his city, even in her most drunken and disorderly and pathetic moments, is beautiful."

- William McCleery in Naked City

Sammy's Bowery Follies

When I read about Imette's last minutes at the Lower-East Side haunt the Falls, I thought of Weegee's Bowery Follies, where Weegee snapped pix breaks between photographing murders to catch scenes of humanity. The photos taken at Sammy's,

...was the scene of many of Weegee's most lighthearted and humanistic photographs, a great contrast to what was taking place on the street or curb or just outside the front door. The "poor man's Stork Club" became a refuge for Weegee, a safe haven allowing him to escape the blood and guts that his more salable photographs contained.
-Miles Barth

"F8 and Be There"

"F8 and Be There," Weegee was fond of saying. Using guide numbers for his flash he set the aperture on his Speed Graphic 4x5 press camera to insure enough depth of field to keep everything sharp. Stepping back he measured the space between his camera and the subject. Emotional distance was as important for Weegee as were the actual footsteps he had to take to insure that his pictures were properly exposed.

"His spontaneous, witty, and meaningful work went beyond that of a news photographer. He once said that he wished to show that ten and a half million people lived together in a state of total loneliness," Lee Gallery tells us.

As far as education, Weegee made it through the eighth grade. However, the family needed money and Weegee was needed to help work. He worked a lot of odd jobs: he helped his father with a push cart business, he even worked at a candy store for a while. It was when he had his picture taken by a street tintype photographer that he decided that this was what he was meant to do. Weegee often said that he was, 'a natural-born photographer, with hypo in my blood.' He quickly ordered a tintype outfit from a Chicago mail-order house, and after a few months he got his first job as a commercial photographer. After a few years he left the studio, due to a disagreement on what he should be paid. He then bought a second-hand 5x7 view camera and rented a pony from a local stable. He named the pony Hypo, and on the weekends when the kids were in their best clothes, he would walk around town putting kids on his pony and taking their picture. He would then develop the negatives, make prints, and go back to the families of the kids to try to sell them the photos.
Introduction to The Side Photographic Gallery collection of Weegee photographs

The web-site Weegee's World: Life, Death and the Human Drama was created in conjunction with the publication of Weegee's World by Miles Barth an exhibition at the International Center of Photography Midtown that was up from November 21, 1997 through March 8, 1998. It's worthy of a visit and proof that a web-site insures posterity for a " bricks and mortar" exhibition even after its photographs are taken down to make way for the next one.

Brangelina Sells Toothpaste

2006-06-08T12:49:00.000-04:00

Illustration Copyright 2006 Gallery of the Absurd

Brangelina's new baby, Shiloh Nouvel Jolie Pitt? Wow. Now that's a name. Let's hope she doesn't plan on becoming a photographer. That name would never fit under a photo as a credit.

The baby's pix were leaked by bloggers before People and Hola Magazine were able to exercise their exclusive for which they paid millions of dollars for the right to post pix first, writes Daryl Lang at PDN Online in an update...yes an update on this HOT HOT HOT breaking story. Updated: Pitt-Jolie Baby Picture Leaks Online

Evidentally Shiloh's birth sells toothpaste as well as magazines. Crest Toothpaste sponsored this AP video clip online of IVillage of the birth in Namibia of Shiloh.

Feeling discouraged, as a cross media producer that all your earnest and worthy story pitches are going nowhere? Maybe you should throw a celebrity like Brangelina into the mix. Malaria...go talk to Sharon Stone. She donated money for mosquito nets which made it into the press worldwide.

According to this mysterious blogger ,Celebrities are Just Like Sea-Monkeys. Check out 14's great blog, Gallery of the Absurd , Gossip Fueled Art - Updated Weekly, created by this anonymous illustrator who calls herself simply 14, Fourteen.

PDN tells us that....

The supposed prices People and Hello! paid for the photos were quickly leaked to The New York Post. In total, the photos could gross more than $10 million worldwide, widely believed to be the most ever paid for the rights to a photo shoot.

The Post's Page Six gossip column reported Tuesday that People spent $4.1 million for rights to the photos after winning an auction over the weekend held at Getty's New York office. Hello! magazine won the U.K. rights for $3.5 million, according to a Post story Wednesday by media reporter Keith Kelly. The story also said People settled for the North American rights only after offering $5 million for exclusive worldwide rights.

This gifted blogger, " 14" says in her bio

fourteen (14) has been an artist and a keen observer of the human species for centuries. Her irreverent underground art in the form of hand numbered and signed posters has been seen and collected throughout the West Coast for years and yet she has remained gleefully outside the radar of commercial success. She lives in San Francisco, CA.

Lately, she's been both fascinated and horrified by the alarming rise in celebrity culture. She noticed that everytime she flipped through a celebrity tabloid at the supermarket, she would erupt into tears of laughter and everyone standing in line to pay for their groceries would glare at her.

She always wanted to be a comic book artist, and here, in the pages of a glossy tabloid full of stalking paparazzi photos, catty commentary and the exposed bloated excess of celebrity existence, she had finally found the material to amuse and inspire her. And that is how Gallery of the Absurd was born.

The art shown here is created mostly by hand using ink, acrylic, pastels and oils on paper or canvas. Digital enhancement using Photoshop and Illustrator is also used occasionally. Original art is available and for sale. If interested, contact 14 at fourteencelebs@yahoo.com. She promises if you purchase her originals, you'll get a good return on your investment.

What is Podcasting? A Ninja's reply

2006-06-07T22:18:00.000-04:00

In February I wrote about the viral blitz of video downloads of the Saturday Night Live clip Lazy Sunday from YouTubes and how it helped launch this video sharing site into the Big Time. Now, if you are over age 12, you can go to YouTubes to learn from a Ninja all about podcasting.

Save yourself a lot of marketing dollars by clicking here Ask a Ninja: Special Delivery 1 "what is podcasting".

This Blogger Half-Naked...

2006-06-06T12:27:00.000-04:00

While trolling for links related to my brother Burnes for my last post I stumbled upon these photos of me half naked.

Yes. Only on the Internet. Half-naked, that's right. But before you get too excited you might want to know that I was only a kid and chubby too. So there you go...half-bare but hardly buff. In these pix I'm standing on the beach holding the conch shell that was given to me by a family friend, a fisherman named Manuel, who took us out on his sail-powered fishing boat from Fajardo Puerto Rico, on weekends.

The conch was used in Peter Brook's film Lord of the Flies, a family affair. My father served as director of photography while my brother played the role of Douglas and my mother was casting director and shot movie stills. Unfortunately I only got to play a stand in for Piggy in a test filmed by my father at the beach at the end of our street in Puerto Rico before the film began.

As I was chubby, I eminently suitable to play this part. Running down the beach with my brother I acted out the scene where Piggy discovers the conch shell and then blows it like a horn. Manuel had cut the tip off this shell for me with a hacksaw one time while we were sailing to Icacos, a reef-like islet just off Fajardo.

My father, a still photographer and early cross-media maven had never touched a movie camera before shooting this epic film. Peter Brook gave him nine days to learn. Hence these tests along the beach. In a future post for Father's Day I'll show you the ingenious track my father devised for filming on the beach and a swinging gate that panned with actors's movement.

You can read a synopsis of the scene I am acting out in these pix. In Golding's book it is called " The Sound of the Shell." Or click here to hear Alan Cheuse in NPR's All Things Considered, March 29, 2004 edition,

...review William Golding's Lord of the Flies, 50 years after its first publication. Cheuse says this harrowing tale of a group of schoolboys stranded on a remote tropical island still holds up today.

Online Biz Video

2006-06-06T10:57:00.000-04:00

Last week my brother sent me this link to a great promotional video produced by by 2x4 about their multimedia design business. This clip is hosted on Apple's Quicktime Pro site and shows how dazzling the new QT7 codec truly is.

It's also a demonstration of how businesses in the future will promote themselves online. Read my previous post about Google's intention to become a one-stop shop for click-through ads.

Google Video Ads

2006-06-06T10:05:00.000-04:00

I'm baaack.

Read this interesting post today on video ads on Ken McCarthy's blog Looking at Video On the Web , an always informative blog that jogs me back to posting on my own blog.

Ken tells us:

As predicted on this blog last winter, Google is adding online video advertising to its pay-per-click arsenal - and it's happening this week.

Wow. So what else are those whiz-kids at Google thinking up? It's a no-brainer that they would begin to host video ads in the future as a one stop shop. For those of us that occasionally upload video clips to hosts for streaming, the user experience on the other end can prove varied as the player wars grind on in earnest.

In a previous post I linked to Google's video site to show a cool video clip about base jumping. Although the quality is funky it's easy to play.

At the time I thought Google's business was only about replicating the success of YouTube's model. No way. If Ken is right, it looks as if Google's video hosting service was the company's test drive for what may well prove to a lucrative venture.

I see a bright future ahead in which businesses promote themselves online with video clips such as this one by Guba, also featured on Ken's blog. What better way to get to know the services a firm provides than by hearing its owners speak on a video click-through ad?

For those of us cross-media producers struggling to support worthy documentary projects, producing video ads may prove a future source of subsidy. I have been dreaming of that day ever since I registered the URL www.streamingmessages.com three years ago.

Here's Ken's post if you're too lazy to click through.

Google pay-per-click video ads

Here's a super-short cheat sheet of what the service is going to look like:

1. It will be based on the winning pay-per-click model
2. The ads will appear as small, static boxes
3. The video plays only when the prospect clicks the static image

And here's the kicker... Google will host the video.

(If there's one group that has bandwidth to spare its the guys at Google!)

Lake Malawi Calendar

2006-05-27T18:33:00.000-04:00

Photograph Stephenie Hollyman Copyright 2006
So here is my third calendar, for June. This time it is sized to fit inside a CD jewel case. You can download this file at Flickr and print it out and then display it a nifty re-purposed CD jewel case, as described by Flagrant Disregard.
To download the customized calender created with the photograph I took in southern Africa last Spring of a young boy at dawn along the shore of Lake Malawi, click here and then go to the link above the photo for " all sizes". On the next page, choose " Normal size".

I used the Flagrant Disregard's Photo Calendar Maker to create this customized calendar from this photograph taken while I was documenting malaria for my project " Fever Zone."

Photo Flagrant Disregard Calendar Display Case Instructions

To display your calendar in a CD jewel case
Obtain a CD jewel case. You can buy empty jewel cases at your local computer store or order them online. Or you can recycle one of your existing jewel cases and store the CD it contained someplace else.
Prepare the jewel case. First, gently remove the door of the jewel case, flip it around, and put it back on
Then remove the cover insert. You can remove the back insert by gently prying up the disc tray.
Print the calendar. Save the calendar image to your computer desktop. Then print it however you normally print images. Print it so that it is 4.75 inches wide (12 centimeters). This is 150 PPI if you savvy PPI. Calendars look best when printed on heavy matte photo paper.
Final assembly. Cut out the printed calendar and insert it into your jewel case.

White House Photo Op

2006-05-23T19:30:00.000-04:00

Have you ever wondered what it's like to cover the Whitehouse or the United Nations as a photographer? If you think it's exciting, you're wrong.

Play Pete Souza's great slideshow that brings you inside the Oval office with the addition of audio. Hear the cameras clicking.A White House Photo Op , online at the Chicago Tribune, surely proves that when natural sound is added to photographs it brings a story to life.

In my previous post Netizen Poynters Ken Irby Speaks, Kenny Irby of the Poynter Instutute answered my query about the power of audio when used with photography to tell a story.

The authenticity and emotional factors are increased by blending natural sound with still photographs. People are attracted by quality integration of audio and photojournalism. Both audio and still photography are powerful story telling structures, together they are extremely powerful and effective journalistic tools. The combination of a compelling photograph complimented by the natural voice of the individual explaining the context of their situation is arresting.

Of Bearded Tugboat Captains and Lighting

2006-05-22T18:58:00.000-04:00

Photograph Copyright Stephenie Hollyman 2006

The bane of any photographer's existence is direct flash. Most of us like to shoot natural light during what Jay Meisel calls the "sweetlight" time of day.

But living in an imperfect world, most often we have to pop in a light or two. We then may have to break out lights, softbox, umbrellas and stands.

Sometimes we don't even have time for that, like in this picture I took last night of Captain Brian McAllister, standing in front of his company's 105 year old tugboat, the Helen McAllister at the South Street Seaport Museum. A real dynasty, McAllister Towing & Transportation is the only family-owned company remaining in New York harbor.

I used a nifty new gadget on my flash to take this picture. This Light Sphere II Inverted Dome Diffuser, invented by Gary Fong, which really does a pretty good job.

But if you're shooting with a Canon, people do seem to turn reddish. So Gary Fong tells you to switch your camera's parameters to:

SETTINGS FOR CANON 10/20D
Gary's recommendation for all Canon 10D/20d for greatest midrange detail and optimum workflow up to 10x15" prints is:
Parameter 1: SETUP:

SIZE - Medium Stairstep

SATURATION - MINUS 1

CONTRAST - MINUS 2

SHARPNESS - PLUS 2

FLASH - E-TTL with no exposure compensation

METERING MODE: Multizone (eyeball with two parenthesis)

Brian likes the way his new beard makes him look like his great great grandfather, James McAllister who arrived from Ireland in 1864 and founded this company with a single sail lighter. Brian's wife, Rosemary, doesn't like his beard.

Brian called me to take this photo before he shaved it off.

Brian's a friend and client for whom I have worked off and one over the years a freelance basis, writing and researching a book on his family's five generations in New York harbor. It's finished now, some 250-pages. In a later post I will give you chapters to download in PDF.

Quicktime What Gives?

2006-05-17T14:01:00.000-04:00

Here are two clips encoded on a Mac. Compare this clip Hollyman CNN Story Encoded using Flip4Mac

I am in the process of re-encoding and posting some new video clips on my website. Crunching the clips I just re-encoded this story I did for CNN as a one person team, using Flip 4 Mac. It looks prettty decent except for the color cast. Compare it with the older funky encoded QT clip,against this one encoded two year ago for Quicktime to see how quickly codecs have advanced. Quicktime 7 still rocks supreme as the player war rages on.

But Apple has just programmed in some new predatory code which seems to make Quicktime take control of your browser. So if you want to play a .smil file...you just get that Big Q for Quicktime instead of the Real Player.

Peru CNN Hollyman story encoded with QT5

But Apple is suddenly sitting smug with Quicktime...I just reinstalled Quicktime Pro a night back after it reverted to a basic player, all by itself. Quicktime support was no help, telling me that all tech support for Quicktime is done by e-mail.

Once the key finally took ( you have to quit the player to do so) I suddenly found big Q's within pages on my Firefox browser where other players should have played. Evidentally Quicktime has taken over as my default player without my agreement.

In the old days one could set the default browser manually.

I just spoke with my video host Playstream and they were as baffled as me. They told me that many users were complaining that Quicktime, once installed, now seems to be taking control of their browser.

" It's a war zone out there," the rep told me at Playstream (now renamed Vital Stream). He says that the stakes are now higher than usual along the front lines of the player battlefields. Microsoft is teaming up with MTV to offer an I-Tune-like service for downloading music that can be played on a $50 MP3 player.

Learning Digital Video Editing Online

2006-05-16T13:57:00.000-04:00

There's nothing better than the spoken word combined with a visual demonstration to help us process information. Teachers in classrooms used chalkboards for a good reason. Now Powerpoint and white boards take their place.

In fact if you ever are trying to learn a new program by yourself go to one of my favorite sites www.Lynda.com and sign up for one month's unlimited usage of their spiffy Quicktime tutorials. It will set you back $20
but offer a wealth of information. I brushed up on my Final Cut Pro skills this way last Spring, before heading off to Africa and Cambodia to produce my cross-media project on malaria, Fever Zone. Seated on my couch with my laptop I played the Quicktime clips, pausing them to try the lessons for myself in real-time Final Cut mode. Sure beats reading a book.

You can also access Reno Marioni's tutorial on Digital Video editing, here on WebMonkey. Reno describes himself as living in

...jolly ol' London as a technology and digital media consultant. In the past he's worked for Sun's Object Products group and Java-based startup Marimba. He also founded the Adventure Zone Network.

HD Video Cameras Compared

2006-05-09T13:09:00.000-04:00

Photo Copyright www.DV.com

Confused about which HD camera to buy or trying to decide whether the time is ripe? No doubt we all will need one by next year.

From what I hear.... New technology needs a shakedown cruise.

DV Magazine tested 4 low-cost HD cameras so click here to read their findings.

On January 11th, filmmaker Barry Green organized a side-by-side comparison of four low-cost HD camcorders: the Canon XL H1, JVC GY-HD100U, Panasonic AG-HVX200, and the Sony HVR-Z1U. Barry was prompted to do this by rampant speculation and widely varying reported performance figures for the various cameras; he wanted to know what the cameras did relative to each other. For reference, he added two "real" HD camcorders to the mix: the Panasonic HDC27F Varicam and the Sony HDW-F900/3 CineAlta.

Rowy Sailor's Ball Pix

2006-05-09T11:37:00.000-04:00

Photograph Copyright Stephenie Hollyman 2006 All rights reserved
Here's a mini-Slide show with 20 images from the 198 I posted on Flickr from the Eleventh Annual Sailors' Ball which I photographed last Friday night.

See Yourself & E-Mail Your Photo To Friends...
Click here to view and download pix from the Sailors' Ball set I created at Flickr. You can see the rest of the pix as a slideshow or thumbnail after clicking on the link. If you want to e-mail an image from Flickr to family or friends, click on the photo which will take you to the next page where you will find the commands to do so.

Don't click on the images on this ticker below to get your pictures or you will be transported to a whole other realm..

DON'T CLICK ON THE IMAGES IN THIS PHOTOCAST.... GO TO FLICKR INSTEAD

If you want any photos of yourself taken down from this public set, let me know at blazingcontent@yahoo.com. Give me the file number for the photo and I will remove it from public view ASAP. Money raised from this event goes to the non-profit New York Harbor Sailing Foundation.

To take these pix I donned one of the many hats I wear, this one as official photographer for the Manhattan Sailing Club, to shoot this raucous event. Hosted at the venerable Downtown Association, the black-tie soiree features at least five bars on four different floors. After shooting the pro-forma awards at the beginning of the event, one of the members, a photo rep, kindly suggested I shoot the rest of the evening like a journalist a la Larry Fink". "So I took her advice.

I used long shutter speeds to burn in the ambient light and fired my flash off-camera remote with Gary Fong's Light Sphere. It was fun.

Patrick Kennedy

2006-05-07T14:29:00.000-04:00

I photographed Patrick Kennedy when he first ran for congressional office in Rhode Island some long time ago... was it 1988? So you can imagine how saddened I was to follow the story of Patrick's latest relapse and accident last week and his confession on Thursday that he was addicted to prescription pain killers. He claimed full responsibility for his actions and decided to bring it out in the open. For those of us who have watched friends suffer as they tried to overcome addictions, Patrick's story is so familiar.

" I struggle every day with this disease, as do millions of Americans, " this six-term Congressional representative from Rhode Island told the press on Thursday.

I immediately flashed back 18 years to the sticky torrid day I was assigned by Marcel Saba, then at Picture Group, to spend a Saturday with Patrick as he campaigned for his first term for the office of Congressional Representative for Rhode Island. Backed with a gurantee from Newsweek (or was it Time?) I followed Patrick in Providence, Rhode Island, while he pressed the flesh with voters accompanied by his father Teddy. I covered Patrick's back-yard birthday party that evening. Patrick told me he has severe back pain that day, and was tired. You can catch a glimpse of it in this photograph I took before he jumped into a public pool, this swimming ritual he performed daily as physical therapy.

Respecting Patrick's privacy I have never told this story except to a few close friends. But I feel it is now the time, after reading Patrick's public confession. He's very much his mother's son.

Patrick Kenndy: 1988

I arrived early at Patrick's house that morning in 1988 and quickly experienced first-hand the Kennedys' renowned ability to make members of the press feel as part of their extended family. Patrick put me at ease and we quickly bonded as we chatted about the gaff-rigged sailing boats we had both once owned called Beetlecats, his back pain, and my recent photographic work covering America's displaced homeless. My book, We the Homeless, Portraits of America's Displaced People ( Philospohical Library 1988)was going to press and I showed Patrick its cover. Patrick's mother Joan soon arrived and we were introduced.

The party that evening was going to be Joan Kennedy's first public appearence since she had ran her car onto a sidewalk while under the influence of alcohol, a few weeks earlier. Senator Kennedy had just announced that their marriage was over and that he was seeking a seperation.

Before the party, in Patrick's small dining room, Joan took me aside and told me that she planned to speak to the press about her problems with alcohol, if they attended Patrick's party. She asked my advice and I told her I really had none to offer other than to " tell it like it is."

Her eyes were clear and she was resolute. She spoke of the support she had received from her friends in the " rooms" to go public. Knowing that was how AA folks refer to their meetings I nodded. I really felt quite out of my league.

She then changed the subject, and asked me about what I had seen in Appalachia while traveling to finish up my book. She told me about her trip through the region with President Kennedy and his deep desire to begin breaking the cycle of poverty endemic to that hilly terrain.

Senator Kenndy Arrives

Senator Kennedy left the room as quickly as he had entered when he saw his soon to be ex-wife was in attendence. We moved out into Patrick's small back yard where his neighbors and other family members gathered.

A small band was playing. It was a strained but civil party. I took some pictures. But whenever Senator Kenndy was within the radious of a 24mm lens of Joan, he quickly moved away.

Joan told me that Patrick had insisted she attend. She looked relieved when no press appeared. She asked me to approach Senator Kennedy on her behalf, to request a family portrait.

Senator Kennedy was flushed when I approached him. He embraced me with his arm at first which he quickly dropped when he heard Joan's request. He swore mightily under his breath, "XXXX, she asked that?" breaking away abruptly to storm into Patrick's house. The screen door slammed shot. I looked across the yard and saw Joan quickly turn away from watching. She headed for the electric piano used by the party's band and quickly began playing "Happy Birthday."

Then in a scene only out of Fellini, a cake, Patrick and the Senator emerged from the house. The Senator was all smiles. After the singing died down and the cake was cut the Senator approached me. He put his arm around me again. He was sweaty and his shirt unbuttoned. He apologized for his reaction to Joan's request and said that Patrick had told me all about me. " Patrick told me all about your work with the homeless and even showed me your book. Powerful pictures inside. Terrific work."

There was no book by me in Patrick's Patrick's house. Just one picture from the cover.

Fast Forward

Picture Group began to fall apart for reasons better left alone. I joined Gamma-Liaison. Marcel has already left to start up an agency on his own. I thought Picture Group had returned all my pictures and was completly out of business until I received a message on my answering machine late one Friday afternoon. The William Kennedy-Smith story had just broken and Picture Group told me they had sent the photo of Patrick Kennedy with bath towel to People and several news magazines.

I called them back. They told they had already sent dupes to major publications and were lining up some big guarantees. I said I did not want the photo released as Patrick was not a suspect. This picture with a bath towel could place him in the public's mind on the beach in front of the clan's Palm Beach compound where the alleged rape occurred. I remarked I was puzzled that Picture Group still had the originals on hand.

They reminded me that I was a journalist and I needed to be more objective. I reminded them of my warning upon joing the agency that "I don't do paparazzi". I told them, " You'll just have to call the magazines and tell them the photos are embargoed. "

Career suicide? Perhaps.

Do I regret my action? No way.

Good luck Patrick.

Larry Fink Beneath the Surface

2006-05-06T11:54:00.000-04:00

Photo Copyright Larry Fink 2006

Photograph Copyright Larry Fink All Rights Reserved 2006

At the website for Larry Fink's agent, Bill Charles take a look at Fink's Oscar night party pix.
Under The Surface The Stephen Cohen Gallery website also shows some of the photos taken by Larry Fink, whose snooted flash lighting and Dutch tilts transcend the conventions of event photography.

Lurking in the Shadows With Lethal Flash

Photo Larry Fink Copyright 2006

Lurking in the unlit fringe of society functions, Larry Fink captures photographs that can sometimes startle and illuminate. Oh so cruel or just brutally honest?

I leave that for you to decide.

The Stephen Cohen Gallery website describes Fink's work as:

... a thought-provoking social commentary that demonstrates Fink’s ability to reveal the intimate in the most crowded of settings and the flaw in the most perfect of scenes. The images are iconic black-and-white photographs of American VIPs, Hollywood players, boxers, runway models and blue collar workers. In a photo of George Plimpton blowing smoke rings to the amusement of a young Ivanka Trump and her model friends, and in a surreptitiously captured shot of rising starlets just outside the glow of the red carpet, as in all his images, Fink illuminates the private and unexpected moments we would otherwise rarely see. A master of the “snapshot aesthetic,” Larry Fink is in the esteemed ranks of Diane Arbus, Robert Frank and Garry Winogrand.

Fink reflects on his work,“Some people mistake my work for satire. I don’t object because satire is a powerful force, so if the work is seen that way it serves one function. But I don’t agree. The pictures are taken in the spirit of finding myself in the other, or finding the other in myself. They are taken in the spirit of empathy. Emotional, physical, sensual empathy. This work is political, but not polemical. There is potential for the formation of an underlying theme in how the system suppresses and distorts both the rich and the poor, but it is not Marx who chooses the characters in this book; it is lust, attraction, and destiny.”

Crossing Media: Choose Your Language

2006-05-05T10:54:00.000-04:00

Thanks to the benfits of an Avant Guild membership at Media Bistro , last night I was able to attend the premiere North American screening of Snowcake, at the Tribeca Film Festival. It's a haunting indie film, with Sigourney Weaver playing the role of an adult functioning autistic mother. Sounds grim perhaps? Not really. This moving story made me think a lot about language and what medium we favor to express ourselves.

A lot of how we like to tell our stories has to do with the hard-wiring in our brains. Each media we choose to use...video, audio, writing, animations, graphics ... is almost like a seperate language. Perhaps we gravitate towards using the media that best suits our neurological hard wiring. Sigourney Weaver's character, Linda, is dazzled by snowflakes, certain sounds, and flashing lights. Dancing and bouncing on a trampoline is her favored language of expression.

Last week I spent an hour on the phone with a charming and very bright Apple Tech support rep as we attempted to reconfigure my home office wireless set-up. While we waited for modems, Airports and computers to re-boot, we chatted about multimedia story telling and bloggers. He told me he had ADD and that most of the bloggers he knew did too. For these deep-layered and multi-faceted thinkers, blogging becomes a language which allows them to communicate thinking that can not be easily verbalized in a focused conversation.

Bird Motifs: Patterns Become Language

In today's NY Times, reporter Carl Zimmer writes about language and the process of recursion in Starling' Listening Skills May Shed Light on Language Evolution . (While reading Zimmer's story online, scroll down the page to play the multimedia sound files on the same page) The scientists are now studying the ability of starlings to recognize song patterns and develop new " motifs" that are very much their own. He explores Noam Chomsky's contention, in part, that language is a set of rules for stringing words together, linking symbols with meaning, relying on so many other things as well.

Download May Calender

2006-05-01T18:48:00.000-04:00

Click here to download a calender for May that can be folded to stand on your desktop like this:

Seal the two yellow flaps to each other with tape.

The calender includes two photos from my ongoing multimedia work in progress on malaria called Fever Zone.

1899: First Wireless Racing Transmission

2006-04-28T10:28:00.000-04:00

October 1899

The Marconi wireless telegraph installed on the "Mackay-Bennett" in order to cover for the New York Herald, the international race for the America Cup.

You may have played Edison's movie on my last post of the Yacht Columbia crossing the finish line for the America's Cup in 1898. Most interesting for us wired type story tellers, the next year's race was reported by Marconi wireless telegraph on board the vessel Mackay-Bennett,the first of ship to shore radio transmissions. The radio apparatus was set up in the vessel's chartroom.

October 1899

The international yacht Cableship "Mackay-Bennett" lying near Sandy Hook lightship during the race for the America Cup.

Thomas Raddall writes in this 1951 letter:

In '99, during the international yacht
race off New York, the "Mackay-Bennett" reported the race
by wireless to the Sandy Hook lightship, which was connected
by a short cable to the shore. The idea of putting it on
the lightship was simply to get clear of the tall buildings,
electric light wires and other interference in New York
harbor itself.

The Marconi coherer which was installed in the Mackay-Bennett in 1899.

1899 Edison Film: Yachts Columbia and Shamrock

2006-04-27T20:37:00.000-04:00

Edison Collection, Library of Congress
As the Volvo sailors soon approach New York harbor take a look at this early Edison film from 1899 of the Yacht Columbia crossing the finish line followed closely by the Shamrock. Courtesy of the Library of Congress.

This race is fascinating to all of us wired folk because the cableship "Mackay-Bennett" was the first to transmit coverage of this 1899 America's Cup yacht race off New York. To read all and more than you ever want to know about international sailing races you can go to this increddiby useful page with links to sailing sites.

From Edison films catalog: The decisive moment in the great International Yacht Races is shown in this picture. Against a background of well defined clouds, the Light Boat is seen marking the finishing line in this great aquatic struggle. As the Columbia crosses the line, followed closely by the Shamrock, we see the steam from the whistle of the Light Ship announcing the well earned victory of the American yacht.

And here's another great 1903 movie by Edison you can play online from the Library of Congress, filmed by The Edison Film Company in 1903. It's a " Panorama water front and Brooklyn Bridge from the East River ".

SUMMARY
This film depicts the East River shoreline and the piers of lower Manhattan starting at about Pier 5 (the New York Central Pier) opposite Broad Street, and extending to the Mallory Line steamship piers just south of Fulton Street and the Brooklyn Bridge. The film begins with shots of canal boats or barges (from the Erie Canal via the Hudson River) docked at and around Coenties Slip [Frame: 0106]. As the film progresses, the New York Produce Exchange located at Bowling Green, Manhattan, with its distinct tower, comes into view in the background [0346]. Between here and the Wall Street ferry, there follows in order of appearance: steam tugs [0308 and 0422], a wooden hull barkentine [1032] with box barges alongside, a docked iron hull sailing ship, probably British [1448], an ocean steamer with yards on the foremast [1748], a derrick lighter laden with barrels docked at the end of a pier [2134], and a fruit steamer [2612]. In the Wall Street Ferry slip (between Piers 15 and 16) there is a Wall St., Manhattan-to-Montague St., Brooklyn, double-ended steam commuter boat [2896]. The ferry is visible immediately before a shot of the large advertising billboards on Pier 16. The film next shows the Ward Line piers (J.E. Ward & Co., New York and Cuba Steamship Co.) [3040], a Pennsylvania Railroad tug [3190], a derrick lighter [3320], and the Mallory Line piers [3692]. A Mallory Line steamer can be seen on the south side of one of the Mallory Piers [3736]. The camera begins panning out into the East River after passing pier 20, catching the fog bell at the end of pier 21 [3922]. A car float is visible passing under the Brooklyn Bridge [4202]. The pan follows the line of the Brooklyn Bridge eastward to Brooklyn Heights, where the Hotel Margaret (tall building in background) is visible just before the end of the film [4464]. This film continues the view begun in the film Sky Scrapers of New York City From the North River. Together they comprise a sweep around the southern tip of Manhattan, from Fulton Street on the Hudson to the Brooklyn Bridge.

Steady DV Video: The Fig Rig

2006-04-26T20:37:00.000-04:00

The Fig Rig

Most of us DV video shooters have at least three gadgets buried deep within our equipment inventory that we bought with hope it would help us take moving action shots with a tippy smallish DV video camera like the PD150. Steady Sticks, stabilizers, DV Caddies, you name it.

Check out this newest contraption, called the Fig Rig and watch the movie clip of its inventor Mike Figgis showing how it works. Once you hit the Flash intro page click " skip intro" to get to the video demos of Figgis with his rig. It's like a car's steering wheel to which you can attach a zoom controller, mics, lights etc.

The other night in fact I watched in amazement on South Street as a DV shooter used a Steadi-Cam Jr. to shoot a music rap video while on roller blades. He had a friend pull him along as he rolled in front of a gangstah rap type group. He was cursing the Steadicam Jr. at each break.

Since I can't roller blade the Fig Rig just may have to do for now. I haven't tried it out yet. But after I do I will report on it for you.

Broadcast Engineering awarded the Fig Rig five stars in 2005 along with its Pick Hits Award. Manfrotto manufactures this rig so you can order from your favorite retailer.

I don't know about you but my PD150 sure gets tippy when loaded down with the wireless receiver and Sennheiser shotgun mike I use as standard equipment. The first five seconds of each shot look rocky sometimes as I stabilize myself. Take a look at the beginning of my Nightline story where the editor included my first few seconds of shakey shooting. I asked her not to but she said that Nightline likes that " hand held look"...if it moves it grooves.

Whenever I look at this story I cringe. It looks like home movies, as if I can't hold the camera steady. When I was shooting my multimedia tale last Spring on malaria in Africa and Cambodia, I used a DV caddie as I was also doing photography at the same time. It kept the camera reasonably steady but all at the same height. That spells B.O.R.I.N.G. No one else seemed to think so. But hey I know how " moving and grooving" through the story makes it more exciting.

Maybe this Fig Rig will do the trick, to groove with the moves...

Gary Fong's Light Dome

2006-04-22T16:58:00.000-04:00

Gary Fong's Light Dome

I used a nifty new gadget on my flash to take a picture of the president of a 132-year old tugboat company, McAllister Towing. In my last post I showed the first photo I took with this dome, of tugboat kingpin Capt. Brian A. McAllister. This Light Sphere II Inverted Dome Diffuser, invented by Gary Fong, really does a pretty good job. It just arrived by UPS the day before taking this shot.

I held the Light-Sphere fitted flash to camera left with a remote TTL sensor on my camera's hotshoe. Then I bracketed shutter speeds to get the dramatic look I wanted.

Gary supplies an instructional DVD with every dome. He reccomends that you shoot in manual mode with the flash on TTL so the background doesn't drop out darkly.

Google Video's Gonzo Base Jumpers

2006-04-19T23:46:00.000-04:00

Here's a video posted on Google video about gonzo basejumpers, who like lemmings jump off the edge of the world to plummet....far below...only to open their chute at the last minute. Google even thoughtfully provided me with the code to paste on tis page so that you can play this from an embedded Flash 8 player. WTG. ( way to go)

Strange but I can't find who produced this hair-raising clip. No producer credits are posted on their page. I guess they are kind of like Zen artists. Or maybe they pirated this from somewhere else. I hope not. The creators deserve their credit.

World's First Racing Crew Recruited Online

2006-04-19T13:04:00.000-04:00

Photo ABN2

The crew on board the ABN 2 is probably the world's first racing crew ever recruited online. According to the team's site, seven sailors were chosen to race as crew on board the ABN2 in the Volvo Ocean Race from 1,800 resumes submitted through an open competition on the Web. Their website tells us,

Crew TWO is comprised of high potential sailors
younger than 31 who have yet to sail around the world,
but who have extensive sailing experience. Seven of the eleven crew members have been chosen through a very tough and careful selection process. Originally
1,800 resumes were sent in from an open web competition. Of this group, an initial 80 candidates competed in crew selections all around the world, and were finally narrowed down to these seven.

Cell Phone Hyper-Linked Narratives

2006-04-19T11:00:00.000-04:00

Photo Guggenheim Museum
Remember Nam June Paik the Korean father of video art? At the time you never really knew where he was leading but his work was always interesting and provocative. The Guggenheim Museum says

No artist has had a greater influence in imagining and realizing the artistic potential of video and television than Korean-born Nam June Paik. Through a vast array of installations, videotapes, global television productions, films, and performances, Paik has reshaped our perceptions of the temporal image in contemporary art.

Take a look at this elegant and artful Microrama site, which uses cell phones to create abstract "mobile hyper-linked video stories," in the spirit of Paik's Fluxus collaborations, with a " commual" experience.

Once you hit the home page, click on the link for mobile-video-hyper-story. You'll see an array of nine screens before you. Each of the screens represents a different hyper-linked cell phone narrative. Then click on the letter next to the screen that catches your eye.

I chose narrative F during which we see the author's eye ball while watching red paint being rolled and hear him sing off key " I woke up this morning."

The stories on this site are pretty straight forward. But the whole project is interesting to view...

Clicking on the link from the home page for mobile photos then leads you to photo galleries created by each of the users. Nicola's Trainvistas features you guessed it...vistas from trains. Carolina's Electric Lights offers us a series snaps that use artificial light and and fixtures as subject matter.

Who are these folks? They feel kind of Dutch. I'm contacting them for a Netizen inquiry. Stay tuned for a future post.

Microrama says

MICRORAMA a space for interactive mobile communication.
As mobile-phones are made for communication, this site tries to get
people together with videos.

The stories start with 9 small videos. From there you can continue
(click on a big-letter) with the possibility of 3 different junctions.

You choose a story, you make a video with your mobile-phone and
you upload it. Each video should end in an open way to be answerable.

You can also only look at videos and see them all (if you click on
a video it stops and by doble-click it coninues).

Microrama is an experiment, a site where you can take part
and tell a small piece of a story.

Great Embedded Video Player

2006-04-17T13:53:00.000-04:00

I have previously posted from the front lines of the video player wars. While researching the Volvo Race for an earlier post I clicked to play one of the videos on this official site hosted by National Geographic. Since my preferences are set to play Quicktime and I suspect the site's default is set a Windows Media player, nothing happened.

But here's the good news. Their embedded media player allowed me to easily click on a link for " change preferences" to Quicktime. The video quickly streamed in its full Quicktime 7 glory and there I was down below with Justin Ferris making sail repairs onboard The Black Pearl. And I was also able to download the text transcript for the video clip after.

There was no sensation of the boat's rolling or pitching however. Cross media can't do everything yet!

W.T.G. Five Star Alert

That certainly merits a Way To Go ( W.T.G.) five star alert.

Sailing Around the World Online

2006-04-17T13:02:00.000-04:00

Join the sailors on the Volvo race ( formerly the Whitbread) online as they race around the world at the media rich site Volvo Ocean Race .

Got What It Takes to Handle the Chili?
See how you do on the Big Blue. Take the helm online the Volvo Race with this way-cool Sailing Simulator , devised by the folks at National Geographic. I just jibed when I used too heavy a drag on the mouse as we were running before the wind. Fortunately I didn't knock off any heads or capsize the boat. The simulator warned me after

You've got the wind at your back but you can't relax. It only takes a slight wind direction to send your sail swinging to the other side--possibly capsizing the boat.

If you want to see what capsize looks like click on this almost photo I took of an almost capsized boat last Fall while shooting as official photographer for the Manhattan Sailing Club. You can see some of the pix I shot last season on my website www.blazingcontent.com. Click on the link for MYC to see the pix.

The Volvo sailors arrive in New York the first week of May. They will tie up at lower Manhattan's North Cove Marina which I hope to cover on this blog. One of the many hats I wear is as official photographer for the Manhattan Sailing Club, based at North Cove.

The simulator's " salty speak" says that other ways to say sailing downwind are
" running", sailing before the wind," sailing free" or even poetically " scudding." This simulator is a great way to brush up on racing skills. If only I had time to play more...

Stalking Mountain Goats

2006-04-15T17:17:00.000-04:00

Curator from The Museum of Natural History Clad in Mountain Goat Drag

Can you tell the difference between a chipmunk and a mantled ground squirrel? If not, watch the vintage silent movie video " Gettting Our Goat" at the New Dioramas Web site at the Museum of Natural History. Watch the " picket pin " squirrel (incorrectly called a gopher ) nibble nuts proffered by a early Museum naturalist in the field. Watch a scientist stalk a grouse on hands and knees while teams wth pick axes brave the snow " on over the pass" in search of elusive mountain goats. Watch another naturalist dressed up like a mountain goat trying to woo these shy beasts, as he clambers along the edge of cliff and stone, wearing horns and a cute suit that looks like Dr. Denton's pajamas.

The hand-painted dioramas at Museum of Natural History were the closest New York City children could ever get to virtual reality in pre-Internet days. On any rainy Saturday the Museum's massive halls echoed with the sound of footsteps as children held their parents' hand and stood planted in awe of lions, hippos and other beasts arrayed in front of hand-painted dioramas.
Click here to hear an audio clip of a gorilla's roar and read all about gorillas. Click on the video link and let Curator Steve Quinn lead you on a Video Tour of the Mountain Gorilla Diorama describing diorama artists at work. Watch the video Akeley In Camp on one of the Museum's most gifted diorama artists, who was part of a group of

...brilliant, passionate, and sometimes eccentric artists and naturalists who made the American Museum of Natural History's dioramas include the larger-than-life African explorer and taxidermist Carl Akeley, who survived a bull elephant charge and a leopard attack during his expeditions, which inspired some of the most extraordinary habitat groupings of African wildlife ever seen

George Petersen and James Perry Wilson on location in Wyoming.

Further down on the MNH page find this this video, narrated by Ray de Lucia, which features archival footage of James Perry Wilson at work on the Fisher and Porcupine diorama in the Hall of North American Mammals, we are told.
Richard C. Raddatz (1879-1937)
Radditz joined the staff of the AMNH in 1924,

and was trained by taxidermist Carl Akeley. Raddatz accompanied Akeley on his last expedition to Africa in 1926, collecting foreground accessories. He returned to Africa in 1937 to assist in gathering materials for the ostrich and warthog diorama, when he died of a sudden heart attack in Nairobi, Kenya (then in British East Africa), at the age of fifty-eight.

Click on to view the virtual tours of dioramas. Spin Alaskan Brown Bears and bison around with a click and drag motion of your mouse on the Museum's Quicktime "virtual dioramas".

Explore online this fascinating exhibition devoted to what was once New Yorkers' favorite virtual reality experience... visited offline... in a stately bricks and mortar environment, The Museum of Natural History.

First Photo From Mars

2006-04-15T16:59:00.000-04:00

NASA Photo
Just in from Mars! No joke. NASA gives us the first photo taken on Mars, one day before all our taxes are due. But exactly is this "First Context Camera Image" of Mars? And how much of it is digitally enhanced?

NASA tells us:

04.13.06 This is the first image of Mars taken by the Context Camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The spacecraft began orbiting the red planet on March 10, 2006. During its 10th close approach to Mars, on March 24, it turned its cameras to view the planet's surface. Although the images acquired were about 10 times lower in resolution than will ultimately be obtained when the spacecraft has finished reshaping its orbit for the mission's primary science phase, these test images provide important confirmation of the performance of the cameras and the spacecraft.

This first image by the Context Camera includes some chaotic terrain at the east end of Mars' Valles Marineris, seen along the top (northern) edge of the image. The image has a scale of about 87 meters (285 feet) per pixel, which is 14.5 times lower resolution than will be acquired during the primary science phase. Typical images from the Context Camera acquired during that phase of the mission will have a resolution of 6 meters (20 feet) per pixel, and will cover an area about 30 kilometers (18.6 miles) wide.

Note that, because these are initial, test images, there is some linear striping in the images. This results from incomplete removal of pixel-to-pixel variations in the Context Camera detector by the present calibration software. One use of the test imaging is an opportunity to fine-tune the calibrations before the primary science phase begins.

Moon Walkers Made Into Art

Which reminds me. If you live in New York drop by the hallway of the Hayden Plamatarium at The Museum of Natural History to see an exhibition of images taken by the first men on the moon. An " artist" cropped and reprinted these to make art out of science.

Audio Blog: Walt Whitman's America

2006-04-15T15:15:00.000-04:00

Hear Walt Whitman Reading

Photo AP

Walt Whitman's lines from "Ontario's Blue Shores" in Leaves of Grass seem particularly relevant as we read about the national ground swell of support for immigration reform.

Click to play the audio reading of the poem as you scan the lines...

O I see flashing that this America is only you and me,
Its power, weapons, testimony, are you and me,
Its crimes, likes, thefts, defections, are you and me,
Its Congress is you and me,
(The officers, capitols, armies, ships, are you and me,
Its endless gestations of new States are you and me,
The war (that war so bloody and grim, the war I will henceforth forget) was you and me,
Natural and artificial are you and me,
Freedom, language, poems, employments, are you and me,
Past, present, future, are you and me.

I dare not shirk any part of myself,
Not any part of America good or bad,
Not to build for that which builds for mankind,
Not to balance ranks, complexions, creeds, and the sexes,
Not to justify science, nor the march of equality,
Nor to feed the arrogant blood of the brawn beloved of time. . . .

And a little further on...

I am for those who walk abreast with the whole earth,
Who inaugurate one to inaugurate all.

(Page from Walt Whitman's Notebooks, Library of Congress)

Fiskar's: The Cutting Edge in E-Commerce

2006-04-15T12:24:00.000-04:00

Fiskars.com invites you to share your stories online and maybe sell you some of their cutting edge tools. Their marvelously inventive site hovers between the virtual and the creative life lived offline,where things are cut and pasted. What looks at first like an an artful site for user-generated content is actually an innovative e-commerce site. For that Fiskars deserves four stars for creating e-commerce " info-tainment" for those of us with that uncontrollable urge to tell stories in a media versatile manner.
What exactly is Fiskar selling online ? Basically it's selling widgets. No, not desktop software Apple and Yahoo widgets, but real tools that you handle and manipulate with your hands in the real world to get things done offline. Fiskar's products include paper cutters for scrapbooking, highly specialized garden tools, splitting axes and paper cutters that would never sell in a store. Check out these Garden Widgets.

To sell these tools that cut things Fiskars has created a virtual community of scrapbookers, gardeners and knitters who do the real thing offline. And they keep their branding down. Thanks guys.

Niching Content With Knitting Needles

Are gardeners just mucking around or waxing spiritually as they scatter seed across the ground? Debbie Anderson of Concord, North Carolina, a gardener, treats us to a cartoon of aliens in a spaceship and asks, “Who says the rows must be straight?” When “In my garden, my hair is red and my daddy’s name is Warbucks, ” says Anderson.

The results are fun to view. Pages from participants' journals are displayed on the site along with Fiskars's queries or instructions.

John Jordan of
Granville, Ohio, created this page in his journal in response to Fiskars' directions to

Draw a line across the middle of the page. On the top half, express how you feel when you are doing chores that have to be done (cleaning, bills, grocery shopping, etc.). On the bottom, express how you feel when you are scrapping/crafting.

Following Fiskar's directions to draw a scenario of what the world would be like if everyone took up sewing and/or quilting, Kate Mikkelsen of Chicago, Illinois pasted a close-up shot of a knitted scarf in her journal that becomes a landscape. Underneath the picture she hand=writes: "Oh we would be so well scarved," telling us that her passion is

Finding the perfect color combination, in just the right yarn for a pattern you’ve been itching to do - well, that’s just the best.

Is this niche content or what? Who would ever think that knitters could be so passionate about what they do with needles and yarn?

Stitching Together a New E-Commerce Model?

For the community journal project, Fiskars' site tells us

We invited gardeners, papercrafters, sewers and quilters to share their stories with us. We provided them blank journals to use to express their feelings about the things they love to do. We've selected just a few of the insightful, funny and unintentionally brilliant pages we received and posted them in this creative community. And, in each category, you'll find a Featured Journal packed with lots of extra pages and stories to explore.

Do U Crave a Tactile High Offline?

After spending hours glued to your computer's keyboard do you lust for real materials like thread and colorful cloth material? Anne Cale of Reston, Virginia advises us, Start quilting. It will help you understand your part in the cycle of life.

Project Orange Thumb

Fiskars also created Project Orange ThumbSM to support community garden groups with tools and materials.

we see community garden groups as innovators in their communities. We believe it's important to support the people who make communities better places to live.

The comany's ingenius marketing honchos named Project Orange Thumb in honor of the orange handles on their extremly ergometric scissors.

I know them. I own a pair. Some mornings in a caffeinated rush I zip through the NY Times, madly clipping articles which never get mailed for friends to read, turning yellow on my coffee table instead. It's a great tradition in my family. "

Warm Fuzzy Branding For ARTSY EARTHY Folk

You can bet that Fiskars is creating an incredibly loyal bunch of users who will rally to their orange brand with warm and fuzzy feelings created by the interactive site.

Way to go.

Talk Among Yourselves

2006-04-14T22:18:00.000-04:00

Here's another interesting widgit. I'll ask the question and you start the discussion.

GPS & Mapping Photos:Time & Place - everywhere

2006-04-14T12:43:00.000-04:00

GPS Assisted Content: the Appalachian Trail

Read this post and dream about the near future when we all can post GPS assisted travelogues on our blogs, perhaps even linked to Google maps which readers can use to zoom in on your location from the comfort of their desktop. Talk about Armchair travelogues.

Actually the future is here. But I have been too busy to check if Google and Flickr's co-venture works for me, the daffy non-techinal techie. Maybe you have more time on your hands than I do today to check out this video tutorial Geotagging Flickr photos with Google Earth Flickrmap tells us:

Google Earth is by far the best source of geographic information on the web. Combined with the Flickrmap Geotagger you can easily add geographic information or "geotags" to your own Flickr photos. Adding geotags allows you to use various web scripts and applications designed by the Flickr community.

Kentaro Toyama has this fascinating post on experiments using metadata and GPS positions to help create location-specific content and

...browse photos by time and location. As you navigate in the map panel to different parts of the globe and set the timeline to a particular time interval, the photos in the thumbnail panel show only those photos which were taken somewhere on the visible map and between the dates you selected.

Check out Kodak's E-Story about one hiker's journey along the Appalachian Trail that was created with GPS data. To be honest Kodak's story of " Sneetch" hike is kind of boring. But the navigation is not if you think how it will soon be available for all to use routinely. Maybe even coupled with Google's Maps?

Kodak tells us,

Sneetch is our hiker's trail name. She's a young, married woman with an engineering background. She's taken a six-month leave of absence from her job, and with her husband, Scott's support and encouragement, is pursuing her goal of hiking the A.T.

After purchasing a GPS device, says Toyama, carry it on your person whenever you shoot photos. Handheld GPS units typically store a time-stamped record of where they've been, so it's possible to transfer the location data stored on the GPS device onto a photo by matching time stamps.

After downloading the Media eXchange Client you can begin to tag your not only with exposure data and a time stamp, but also with the GPS data. Later on that data can be utilized to help build a site such as Kodak did on the Appalachian Trail. The GPS locations are the literal links for navigation for the posts.

Once your photos are time-stamped and location-stamped, software allows you to take advantage of this information in a variety of ways. Software that can make sense of location-stamped photos is just now beginning to appear on the mainstream market. An experimental research project, The World Wide Media Exchange (wwmx) is an example of one *type* of software.

Liberated Digital Photography

2006-04-14T11:49:00.000-04:00

The future of Memories By Dane Howard

At Webmonkey , Dane Howard writes about how shooting digital " disposable photographs" makes us all better photographers, how empowered by instant feedback via the LCD screen, we keep shooting to get a better shot. He says we become liberated.

I tend to agree. I have become a much better photographer since going digital.

Check out his online version of The Future of Memories. He includes free narrative photo templates for slide shows created by different designers. I will be testing these out and posting the results for you to evaluate.

Dane writes at Webmonkey:

When you start shooting with a digital camera, your mentality begins to change. You change from a scarcity mentality to an abundance mentality. You begin to realize that you can shoot hundreds of pictures on a memory card and not worry about wasting film or money. This was very liberating for me — and I have a photography background! I can't say enough about what the digital camera has done for my willingness to take pictures. I found myself using it more often and more liberally. I would experiment with the settings and take advantage of the immediate feedback. If I didn't like the picture I saw, I erased it on the spot.

Dane Howard, The Future of Memories

Typepad Photo Album

2006-04-14T11:30:00.000-04:00

Click here to see photo album hosted by Typepad

I am trying out different blog providers having outgrown Blogger. Each has its merits. I will share with you what I discover along the trek...

Here's a photo album I easily created with Typepad, filled with photos I took during the blizzard.

Working Alone: Kevin Sites

2006-04-12T17:21:00.000-04:00

In a previous post , I wrote about Kevin Sites and his talented reporting in three mediums as a one a person team for his content " channel" at Yahoo, called " Hot Zone." Halfway into the year of reporting the world's war zones as a one person team, Hot Zone at Yahoo, Kevin Sites reflects on working alone:

Working alone: tough, but worth it
I work by myself for a couple reasons. Number one, you have more mobility. Normally when you go into a place and you have a crew and you have a boom mic and a big camera, people tend to change. They're not as comfortable on camera.

So, I like to mitigate that situation with just having me and the person there. And, I hold my camera just about chest level. I talk to them. I maintain eye contact. That's very important while I'm doing these interviews because I want them to feel comfortable. I don't want the dynamics of the interview to change.

When I was out in the field I was reporting from 8 in the morning to 7 or 8 at night. By the time you get back, you are very tired from just reporting. And then you have to write your story. You're doing about a 1,000 word-dispatch every night. You've got to input your pictures into the computer and the video. I would actually do a rough cut of the video I had.

So I'm working in three different mediums. And I have to transmit this all through the satellite modem. So, the first month that I was in Africa I thought, "This is crazy."

We started to develop a rhythm. We started to see that maybe, let's focus on the print story first. Let's make sure that we have the notes, and that that story is well told. Then we'll add the photographs and then we're going to add the video. Once we figured out that rhythm, I think things became a bit smoother.

Christos Gates and Video Encoding

2006-04-11T23:41:00.000-04:00

How to encode video ? Yikes so many not always delicious options. It makes you wish that all these competitors in the player wars would decide like in that 60's song,to try " to smile on your brothers," and " get along with each other right now," with one set of specs. But hey, Woodstock's peace and love wavey gravy days are long past as the player wars heat up. Sigh says this aging hippie trying to adjust.

Full Disclosure

A full disclosure is maybe in order here. I sang Kumbaya but didn't do drugs.

Christo's Gates Encoded for Quicktime using reference movies

Above you'll see a " Streaming Message" (TM) clip I produced last year in a few hours after seeing Christo's Gates in the snow up in Harlem. I compressed it for three bandwidths and then created a reference script. I guess how it works is it pings your computer to see your bandwidth before playing. It doesn't seem to work if you have a Firewall however. And it looks funky in places. Tonight I will re-encode the clip using QT 7 and post the results for you to compare.

iTunes:One Billionth Download

Suddenly there's money in the arena of downloaded content. When big bucks are at stake the kids in the sandbox start duke it out in earnest rather than share toys. They're looking at Apple which announced that music fans to their iTunes Music Store

" have legally downloaded one billion songs from the iTunes Music Store since it launched less than three years ago. The billionth song “Speed of Sound” was purchased as part of Coldplay’s “X&Y” album by Alex Ostrovsky from West Bloomfield, Michigan."

Encode For All Three Players?

For the moment, I believe the short answer is " encode for all three" players...Flash, QT and Windows Media if you want to reach the largest number of folks. Take a look at this player skin Aquent uses for messages from one of its recruiters. They have encoded for Flash, Windows & Flash.

I like to compress my Quicktime movies using Flip 4 Mac so it can play on Windows Media players. Granted the video doesn't look as great as Quicktime but you can bet more people will play it and you will reach the largest amount of users with your video content. On my website the clip is encoded for both players and the Windows users far out number the QT users. In fact after looking at Aquent's player skin here, I have decided this is the way to go, all three.

Some say Flash indeed is the way to go, even if perhaps it's not as great as QT. I'll write about that later.

Ken McCarthy Weighs In
I opened up Ken McCarthy's always informative newsletter next. He was trying to answer this query. I had asked him the same question earlier, as have others in what he calls a real " horse race"...

Every format has enthusiastic fans who claim their way is THE way to encode video for the Internet.

If only it were that simple.

Flash and Apple have made impressive strides, but according to Jan Ozer, the author of a recent detailed study comparing online video formats, "rumors of the demise of other codecs have been greatly exaggerated. Here's his answer Jan Ozer's Press Release for Streaming Video Report

You can subscribe to Ken's great newsletter " Looking at Video On the Web" at his blog.

Yahoo's Hot Content Zone Left to Simmer

2006-04-11T23:37:00.000-04:00

Photo Copyright Kevin Sites

When Yahoo's media group announced last summer their plan to launch media-rich original programming online, digital story-tellers chortled with glee. We rubbed our hands together in keen anticipation of a bright new era for content producers.

Lloyd Braun, the former chief of ABC Entertainment, was the uber-producer behind this ambitious endeavour. With clarion calls blasting, Yahoo's media group announced plans to produce original TV-like programming for the Internet including sitcoms and talk shows. Braun, the newly appointed chief of Yahoo's media group, launched Yahoo's first venture in original programming, "Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone", devoted to the coverage of war and conflict by this exceptionally talented multi-tasking Duracel Bunny who reports as a one-person team in almost real time from the field.

Yahoo's Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone
" Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone" is a model that most of us cross-media producers are dying to replicate...to follow our bliss on great stories, working as what Sites calls " SoJo's", solo journalists, reporting from the field with text, video and photography, within a blog-like context. Last February Kevin Sites won WIRED's Rave Award reported Boing Boing.

You can read Sites' latest cross-media report posted 15 hours ago from Besland, Russia in Chechnya where he reports a stirring tale Grief Without End, in cross-media on on a mother whose son, " Amzat was one of 331 people killed — half were children — after a hostage situation at a Beslan school ended in chaos and tragedy." He includes a photo essay with an eloquent story in text.

How Does Kevin Do it All Alone?
When it was launched, Kevin Sites' venture seemed the logical next step in what has been a slow crawl for venues to develop for SoJos. Those of us trained by VNI/NYTImes TV ten years ago to report alone as videojournalists with Hi-8 cameras were heartened. You can see Sites' photo essay on how a "sojo" (solo journalist) files a live report from the field (or doesn't) here. You can also find Sites' original pre-Yahoo multi-tasked reporting at the blog he created as the first of its kind.

Kevin Sites Multi-Tasking as a Sojo ( solo journalist) Photo Kevin Sites

Lost Mojo @ Yahoo?

The boys in the garage who created Yahoo still have their edge, we thought last Fall while following Sites' multimedia reports. How daring and bold. Yahoo is positioning themselves as pathfinders again, reviving the company's early mojo to create something new, daring and different.

Today's New York Times reports that the company has now decided to scale back their plan to produce original cross-media programming generated by pros. Yahoo now says it will concentrate instead on content acquired from other media companies or generated by users instead. And why not? User generated content is free.

Would 60 Minutes have survived at Yahoo as a start-up?

Not.

Original Content Placed on Back Burner by Yahoo

With Google nipping at his heels, Yahoo Chief Terry S. Siemel has apparently clashed with Lloyd Braun, the head of Yahoo Media, as Braun tried to implement this new business model, " to make the Internet look like television," writes the New York Times. Reports of Braun's demise at Yahoo have been greatly exaggerated says Lloyd Braun who seems to have changed the tone of the tune he was previously singing. See previous post on birds who sing too much The NYT quotes a more chastened Braun now saying, " Original content is the salt and pepper on the meal. It is certainly not the engine driving us. "

Although the public will ultimately suffer as Yahoo decides to dumb down, the company's shareholders will benefit from the projected increase in revenue from advertising. Yahoo says users stay in Yahoo's space longer while creating and sharing their content in sites such as Flickr, devoted to photo-sharing. The longer the company is able to keep users in Yahoo space, the more advertising Yahoo is able to sell.

Yahoo says although it is placing plans to produce original media-rich programming on the back burner for now, it will not cancel "Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone. " Showered with kudos and highly admired by media pros, " Kevin Sites In the Hot Zone" had only 791,000 users in January, what some might say is a respectable audience but
" marginal for Yahoo with more than 400 million users, " writes Saul Hansell.

Today's New York Times quotes Lloyd Braun,

"I now get excited about under-generated content the way I used to get excited about thinking about what television shows would work,"he said.

Mr. Braun insisted that Yahoo would would not abandon its efforts to have original material, but he said it would embark on only a handful of new ventures this year, not the dozens he had been promising last year.

-The New York Times, Saul Hansell, March 2, 2006

How Much longer will Hot Zone Continue?
The header for Kevin Sites In the Hot Zone reads: "One Man. One Year. A World of Conflict."

Has Sites and his " Hot Zone" become a little too hot...hot...hot for Yahoo to handle? Will they pull the plug soon? Because this reporter with a soul and passion doesn't report " Bang Bang " stories which consist of familiar stories on the Boys With Big Toys in Iraq. Google his name and check out what conservative bloggers are saying about Kevin Sites. But it will certainly be no surprise for Sites if he wakes up one morning to find that the plug has been pulled.

In April of 2003 Susan Mernit reported at USC's Online Journalism Review, on "CNN's decision to force war correspondent Kevin Sites to stop posting items to the popular blog he created while on assignment in northern Iraq," which touched off "an ongoing debate on blogging as a legitimate form of journalism."

Will Kevin's contract be renewed? I hope so.

Or maybe not, for Kevin's sake. He must be exhausted.

And Kevin, if you are reading this post, please do take care. You are covering a beat where PTS is as endemic for journalists as bullets, buzzards and death. Do stop to consider the sad story of Keith Carter , the South African photojournalist featured in the new short doc, screened at the IDA's DocuNYC on Saturday.

Bon Courage.

( Full disclosure: Although I am a big Kevin Sites fan I did not lift the title for my cross-media project on malaria called "Fever Zone" from him. I chose it two years ago.)

-Stephenie Hollyman, New York City

Audio Post: "I, Too" by Langston Hughes

2006-04-10T17:07:00.000-04:00

This afternoon New York's immigrants marched down lower Broadway chanting " si se puede" ( We can do it). I joined in too. After all my great grandfather arrived her as Irish immigrant. A poster handed out by the Hospital Workers Union reminded me of this poem by Langston Hughes.
US Postal Service Stamp

You can hear me read "I, Too" on the audioblog. You can set up your account to audioblog.> Then telephone 415-856-0205.

Why not? April is Poetry Month. But don't ask me who decided THAT...

I, Too

I, too sing America.

I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes,
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.
Tomorrow,
I'll be at the table
When company comes.
Nobody'll dare
Say to me,
"Eat in the kitchen,"
Then.

Besides,
They'll see how beautiful I am
And be ashamed--

I, too, am America.

Langston Hughes

From The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes,
edited by Arnold Rampersad
(New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1994), p. 46.

Trans-Species Dog Pencil Goes Bollywood

2006-04-06T18:23:00.000-04:00

Pencil Goes Bollywood

What blogger worth their weight neglects to bring a dog into their posts?

I sent this press release via e-mail to my stoic friends last Winter. I had taken my ten year old mutt for a walk by the South Street Seaport Museum where an Indian film crew was shooting the last scene of a Bollywood epic.

I asked the director if he wanted to include Pencil in the shot. That moment the stars were whirling in a Bangala dervish as a camera on tracks spun around them, guided by a focus puller along a set of tracks. He tilted his head and looked over Pencil quickly with his keen and seasoned eye.

"This is the last location we're shooting," he told me. Maybe we can work the two lovers walking your dog into this scene."

Pencil perked up and hopefully began twirling the two whiskers that make him look like a catfish into a handlebar mustache. After all this was a Sikh production.

But it was just not meant to be. So I wrote this press release when we returned home.

I am sure some of my friends thought " Why doesn't she just go get a life?"

Maybe they do have a point.

AGING BOLLYWOOD STAR DOES CAMEO

Pencil Hollyman appeared dapper today in a silk scarf
as he returned from retirement to make a brief cameo
appearence in the Bollywood epic film Kabhi Aluida Na
Kenna, being filmed at the South Street Seaport . The
cast includes the renowned Hindi stars Shamrukm Khan
and Rani Mukerji. The reclusive aging canine star
refused to answer any questions, after a brief photo
session, and nipped the heels of A New York Post
reporter who tried to follow him back to his trailer.

" I'm so sorry that Pencil doesn't suffer fools
gladly, " Pencil's publicist and owner Stephenie
Hollyman, told the star's disappointed fans who had
waited in the cold since early morning for a glimpse
of the eminent and grizzled actor, " but as you know
he truly has a heart of gold. So please forgive him. "

Why Not Christiane Amanpour For CBS Anchor?

2006-04-06T14:55:00.000-04:00

In my previous post you heard from Netizen Jill Geisler, at The Poynter Institute. Let's now pursue another line of inquiry. Does a woman have to be a "looker"...or just plain "perky", to succeed in the rough and tumble world of network TV?

Let's hope not.

A case in point is Christiane Amanpour, CNN's chief international correspondent, who risked her life daily to report from Bosnia. She wore one of two striped shirts for each of her standups. When she was cold she donned a battered ski parka trimmed with fake fur, that had a hole burned into it by acid that leaked from a battery, she once told Mike Wallace at 60 Minutes. Standing before the camera she leveled her eyes straight at the audience, her feet firmly planted on the ground, clad in Dr. Marten boots, not high-heels. Occasionally she wore a scarf to soften her look.

For those of us starting out here was a real life role model for us to follow along a less-traveled and higher road.

But is Amanpour possibly the exception to network TV's unspoken "Golden Rule" ? Men can look grizzled and tired but women on air must be blonde and petite?

Well I do have to admit that if there were any advice I would offer Amanpour, it would be "Ditch your 60 Minutes safari jackets!"( Did you know that during the Vietnam War Hong Kong tailors called them TV suits? ) Otherwise Amanpour's "look" suits me just fine. But what some embrace as authentic and real, network suits may shrug off as " rough" or not " telegenic" enough for an anchor.

That Leads to My Next Question .

So why wasn't this ground-breaking dean of bang-bang journalism offered the vaunted chair at CBS instead of Katie?

Could it be that this bullet-dodging reporter looks too serious for a woman ? Did the number-crunching wonks at CBS read the recent study that says beauty often comes before brains when women are judged by others?

The New York Times reports today that two economists, Markus M. Mobius of Harvard and Tanya S. Rosenblat of Wesleyan University, ...reported on an experiment they ran that tried to undercover the root causes of the so-called beauty premium.
A prepublication version of their paper "Why Beauty Matters," was published in the March 2006 Economic Review.

A Lady Who's Paid Her Dues in Spades
This much is sure. Packed with integrity, Amanpour has worked her way to the top with solid hard work and bravery. She began graduating summa cum laude from the University of Rhode Island with a bachelor of arts in journalism, where she was friends with John Kennedy Jr.

Kindly Correct These Myths If They Are Wrong

After that, Amanpour toiled in obscurity as an assistant as one of the numerous minions at CNN's International desk in Atlanta, beginning in 1983, for some long time. One of her booses denied her repeated requests to get out in the field. So I was once told by an editor in Atlanta.

If I err use the e-mail link to the right to set me straight. I don't want to create an urban legend. The link column for this blog only shows up if you are using Firefox or Safari for your browser.

...Back to Amanpour

While on vacation in Europe, taking a break from her desk job, Amanpour rushed to Berlin just as Germans began to pull the Wall down. When Amanpour phoned her bosses at CNN from the scene they really had no other choice but to assign her to the story. There were no other CNN correspondents around. So I have been told.

Little Foot Grows Bigger

All the rest is broadcast history as this obscure news desk assistant...a " little foot" who was at the right place at the right time... quickly became a mighty and courageous " Big Foot" who risked crossing snipers' free firing zones in Sarejevo to get the story right.

A Guy's Guy?
Some pundits call Amanpour "a guy's guy." Say what? Not this gutsy and talented reporter...Amanpour clearly remembers from whence she came and feels the responsibility to bring others along.

Sure, she swears like a trooper along with the best of the guys. And get this! She often carries the sticks ( tripod) to assist her camera operator . Does that make her a man?

I hope not.

I am told Amanpour toils with her crew in a true spirit of solidarity. She's no " bully broad". For sure she's not Leslie Stahl. In fact, in Bosnia, Amanpour often worked with an all- female crew. It works for her.

Don't believe me? Try to get somebody to say something bad about Amanpour.

No chance.

Heard From the Pulpit: For Women Only

See what I mean? Doing and being the right thing works. Especially if you're a woman.

When you're fighting for a story use your elbows to compete along with the best in the heated fray. But after, stepping from down out of the ring, do remember to take off the gloves. As you wipe the sweat off of your brow there may be a sist'ah standing next to you whom you elbowed while inside the ring, trying to get the big story.

But you're not in the ring now. So take a deep breath.

Try to be friendly. And if the sis'tah is just beginning in the biz take a deep look into her heart and try to decide if she's worthy of mentoring. Stop for a few minutes to chat and maybe offer advice. Hopefully there's enough of good things to go around.

And back in the newsoom just try to remember that one woman's promotion is not your loss. Jealousy and back biting get you nowhere.

But if the sis'tah is really a wolf in woman's clothing, just slide on by.

Do not engage. Believe me. This advice comes from hard-won experience.

Netizen Jill Geisler Replies About Katie

2006-04-06T10:36:00.000-04:00

1977: Jill Geisler with Co-Anchor Zimmerman and Portrait of Walter Cronkite

I contacted Netizen Jill Geisler, Group Leader, Leadership and Management Programs at The Poynter Institute, last night, after posting a link to a memo she facetiously posted at Poynter online for Katie Couric to read. I asked Jill to respond to my previous post in which I discussed " gravitas" and Cronkite's contention that women's higher registers make their voice less suitable for voice-over narration. Would Katie ( not Katherine), a former high school cheerleader, have the mojo to command Cronkite's former pulpit I queried ? Can a voice fueled by emotion, not testosterone, carry weight for viewers?

Jill sent me two pictures of herself, the one above, that she wrote me,

...should make you chuckle. It is a copy of an ad that my station ran in 1977 when I was named co-anchor of the 6pm news. We were a CBS affiliate and the news followed Cronkite. And yes, we had a puppet named Albert the Alleycat on the weather.

Today, having pioneered as one among few women anchors, Geisler tells us that things hopefully have changed for the better, that Couric,no wilting lily, should do just fine.

I agree. Remember when Couric ambushed President Bush Sr. while she was onstensibly reporting a " softie" tour of the Whitehouse with Barbara Bush as her guide some long time ago? President Bush Sr. wandered onto the scene for an orchestrated cameo and probably regretted his decision to do so after Couric peppered him with hardball questions instead of puffballs.

Jill Geisler wrote me last last night in a mellow mood, telling me that things indeed have changed and that

I'm not really concerned about Katie's vocal tones. She's managed to communicate effectively on the Today Show to this point. I don't think she needs a voice transplant to do the Evening News.

What people of a certain generation (mine) need to remember is that people
40 and under in this country have grown up surrounded by women in positions
of authority - teachers, doctors, attorneys, their bosses. Katie's ascension to the anchor chair at CBS is no culture shock to them.

Ms. Geisler concludes: Perhaps you can see why, nearly 30 years later, I sent congratulations to Katie Couric for moving into Cronkite's chair.

Thanks Netizen Jill Geisner, for taking the time to answer my query and for your thoughtful and informative response. And your picture, as they say, " is worth a thousand words," bringing us back to 1977.

A Woman's Voice: Katie Couric

2006-04-05T17:18:00.000-04:00

"After listening to my heart and gut," Katie Couric tells us she has decided to leave the Today Show to don the CBS anchor crown for a one-year probationary trial. David Shedden, the director of The Poynter Institute's library, just posted this interesting history of network anchors. Jill Geisler, also at Poynter, writes this open memo to Couric:

Good going, Katie.
The chair you'll occupy can be a pulpit.
What's your sermon?
Countless women in journalism hope your message is simple: news leadership isn't gender-limited. Old boys’ networks improve with estrogen therapy. And charisma and intellect aren't mutually exclusive.

Stay strong, Katie.
The chair you’ll occupy can be a target.
How will you dodge the snipers?
Speak truth to power, prudently but fearlessly, although messenger-killing is a sport these days. Be exacting about accuracy in a world steeped in speed. Be an ambassador for ethics, a voice for journalistic values.

Well well well. What's an anchor with a woman's voice to do in what Geisler calls
" an estrogen-charged environment?"

Earlier today The NY Times reported that the father of broadcast journalism, Walter Cronkite, ate salt and bread and spoke the truth and was bitten after for having done so. He said that men's voice's were better for voice-overs than those of women. Why? He said that we women speak in a higher register.

I don't think Cronkite said this out of malice towards women or jealousy over Couric assuming his legendery seat. I think he was referring to that thing called
" gravitas" that emerges best from voices that reach from the lower register. Because of hormones men speak lower.

GRAVITAS?

Gravitas? Think of the time when when you heard " This is CNN..." in the old days, mouthed by the Darth Vader in the very lowest register that a male voice can utter. Now THAT is gravitas.

As a woman do I take umbrage with Walter? No way. My voice ain't the best. Check it out here by clicking on the broadband video version of a multimedia story I did for UNICEF in October working for a few days at their HQ cross-purposing video from the field for online usage. (I wrote the script after looking at the B-Roll and then tracked the narrative and followed up with a text story.) Or click to play the post with my Nightline story.

If you listen to my voice it's rather " thin", lacking gravitas. But it works OK. When I'm tired, my voice even cracks. So I've learned to compensate by going soft..kind of like speaking for NPR. Should I take steriods to lower my voice or slug back whiskey and smoke cigarettes to lower my voice? No way.

Will you ever hear me on the Discovery Channel? Probably not.

But for crossmedia and breaking news stories my voice works just fine.

And for CBS Katie Couric's voice is perfect.

More later in another post...

April Calender Download

2006-04-03T19:18:00.000-04:00

Photograph Copyright Stephenie Hollyman 2005 All rights reserved

To download this April calender to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the George Washington Bridge go to Download April Calender "original size" link. Then print the calender out on a sheet of good 8.5 x 11.5 inch photo paper and tack it on your wall.

I took this photo at dawn some years back standing on a huge boulder along the cliff at Ft. Lee, New Jersey while shooting for The Port Authority Annual report. It set me off on a chase to photograph all of New York's bridges. 911 security measures stopped me reaching that goal but I did have a show at the South Street Seaport Museum called
" Bridging New York."

You can make a calender like this one with one of your own pictures thanks to the blog Flagrant Disregard.

Broadband Rising

2006-03-29T12:04:00.000-05:00

After a two week hiatus I am back to blogging.

The New York Times reports that Broadband use is on the rise. No surprise. Right?

But did you know that it has more than doubled over the past three years?

The NYTimes says that a new Nielson/Net ratings study has found that " broadband use has exploded to 68 percent of web users today from 33 percent three years ago. " That's great news for those of us who work in rich media.

Photo Editing Katrina

2006-03-14T09:42:00.000-05:00

For those of us who work primarily as photographers, a talented photo editor can make or break our stories. Either we marvel at the spread of photos laid out on a newspaper or magazine or we cry bitter tears of disappointment. We then staple a picture of the the errant photo editor on a dart board.

Only joking.

Some say that photo editing is a highly intuitive art...a " talent thing" that can't be taught. Could be. Most definitely it IS a subjective process, no matter what anybody tells you.

This last September Kenny Irby, invited picture editors to offer some observations about Hurricane Katrina coverage. Here's what they said. Best Practices: Images of Disaster and How They Were Captured

A Flash plugin is required to play this show.

Digital Video Editing

2006-03-12T17:29:00.000-05:00

There's nothing better than the spoken word combined with a visual demonstration to help us process information. Teachers in classrooms used chalkboards for a good reason. Now Powerpoint and white boards take their place.

In fact if you ever are trying to learn a new program by yourself go to one of my favorite sites www.Lynda.com and sign up for one month's unlimited usage of their spiffy Quicktime tutorials. It will set you back $20
but offer a wealth of information. I brushed up on my Final Cut Pro skills this way last Spring, before heading off to Africa and Cambodia to produce my cross-media project on malaria, Fever Zone. Seated on my couch with my laptop I played the Quicktime clips, pausing them to try the lessons for myself in real-time Final Cut mode. Sure beats reading a book.

http://www.webmonkey.com/webmonkey/02/15/index4a.html?tw=multimedia

Digital Video Editing
by Reno Marioni 24 Apr 2002
Reno Marioni lives in jolly ol' London as a technology and digital media consultant. In the past he's worked for Sun's Object Products group and Java-based startup Marimba. He also founded the Adventure Zone Network.

Patrick's Shareware JavaScript Slideshow Generator

2006-03-12T14:53:00.000-05:00

Patrick Fitzgerald, the Code Bandito Who Generously Shares His JavaScript Slideshow Generator With You To Use

For all of you ambitious code monkies out there here is a link that is worth its weight in gold, shareware in the very best sense of the word. With the slideshow wizard created by Patrick Fitzgerald you can now create a quick and easy JavaScript slideshow. In fact, in order to use this tool, you don't even have to know much at all. You just have to like to cut and past the URL's from where you store your images.

I use Flickr for now.

You may have seen the Flash slideshow Snow Struck Seaport I created for this blog, using code and the instructions from a fellow Blogger user. Now that the post is archived deep within Blogger the slideshow doesn't run. I also had problems re-sizing its player window and had to re-write some code on my Jogger template to fit the player.

Full Disclosure

I don't write code. I just cut and paste. Flash? I'd like to learn it but don't have time...or maybe even the apptitide to do so. I'm not very good with numerical concepts and have a terrible memory for anything that doesn't interest me. Like code. HTML? Fine. It's easy and WYSIWYG. And I go to always useful WebMonkey if my memory fails me while tagging.

Patrick Fitzgerald's Free JavaScript Slideshow Generator

That's why Patrick's shareware is so perfect for daffy story-teller folks like me.

I found this free tool while checking the source code for a slideshow on the site for the Side Photograhic Gallery home page which I saw while researching my previous post on Weegee. I tried playing it with various browsers and it does just fine. Check it out yourself.

Go to BarelyFitz Design's JavaScript Slideshow wizard and play around. If you don't get it, Patrick has even been nice enough to do a demo where he shows you how to do it. Patrick's Slideshow Demo includes his voice.

Thanks Patrick! When I get some time this non-techie will play around with your useful wizard. Although he doesn't charge for usage of this code, Patrick Fitzgerald does accept donations. Since 1994, Patrick Fitzgerald has created and maintained sites for diverse clients — from Fortune 100 corporations to non-profit organizations.

Blindly Covering Baseball

2006-03-11T19:05:00.001-05:00

Photo Courtesy www.athomeplate.com

Stuck on the subway today I flipped through the pages of The New York Post. You never know what you'll find. There below a photo captioned " Kiss That Baby Hello!" I read about radio baseball reporter Ed Lucas, 67, getting married. He's legally blind.

Equipped with an inner sense for baseball, www.athomeplate.com says Lucas "does not do the play by play although he does have the uncanny ability to determine where a hit ball will go just by the sound it makes coming off of the bat

Pretty amazing, wouldn't you say? We all have our stories to tell and figure out how to use the right media to do so.

You may be asking yourself how does a blind man report on baseball games. Ed hasn’t always been blind. Even though he was born with a congenital eye disease he was able to see. He had a love of baseball from a very young age, as both of his parents were fans of the Giants – that is the NY Giants, prior to their move west. As a matter of fact the last game that Ed saw was the 1951 thriller in which Bobby Thomson hit the “shot heard ‘round the world”.

He was twelve years old. He came home from school and watched it on TV with his family. After the game he went outside to play baseball in the nearby sandlot and was hit between the eyes with a baseball. Shortly afterwards, he lost his sight – partially due to the eye disease that he was born with, although doctors believe that being hit in the head with a baseball may have also contributed in the loss.

So, how does he do it? He does not do the play by play although he does have the uncanny ability to determine where a hit ball will go just by the sound it makes coming off of the bat. Ed’s method is this – he sits in the press box and listens to the local radio broadcast of the game. Then after the game he goes to the field or the locker room or press area and interviews players about what happened during the game – perhaps an extraordinary play or call or any incident that may have been out of the ordinary. He adds his notes to the tape and sends it in to someone that types and submits it for him. He has had articles published in many newspapers and magazines.
www.athomeplate.com

Yesterday Yankee Stadium become the wedding chapel for Lucas and his bride, 51-year-old Allison Pheifle, a major baseball fan who is also legally blind. Yankee legend Phil Rizzuto introduced the two several years back.

Congratulations.

Totally Submersive IMAX Big Screen Experience

2006-03-11T11:02:00.000-05:00

Photo Courtesy www.boingboing.net

IMAX beckons us to head out to our nearest large screen theater to enjoy their latest 3D extravaganza, IMAX Deep Sea 3D, which Imax co-CEO Brad Wechsler says is
" giving the consumer a reason to get off the couch." On the same web page a Netflix ad tells us that we can enjoy movies in our home. What's a person to do with so many choices at hand?

Are you asking ME? If so I would say, take a look at this trailer and then head for the nearest IMAX theater with your favorite squeeze. Put on your cool sexy 3D shades and go retro like bloggers at Boing Boing did. Movies at home are for rainy nights and take-out Chinese food. Nothing rivals the Big Screen for the ulimate sensory experience.

View the IMAX Deep Sea 3D Trailer with Quicktime 7

Spin through the deep with your small screen for now, watching the IMAX Deep Sea Trailer here after downloading the Quicktime 7 player for Mac or Quicktime 7 player for Windows free. Let the ocean's surf sweep onto your screen while your fingers stay dry on your keyboard.

This truly immersive and submersive movie experience was shot with the world's largest camera, weighing in at 1,300 pounds in its underwater housing. Big Bertha, billed by Deep Sea 3D director Howard Hall as " almost totally impractical," needs two people for its operation and costs $60 a second to use.

No small screens here, as in Little Screens, Little People,my previous post. Nestle together with your friends and listen to the stirring surround-sound musicial score. Hear Johnny Depp and Kate Winslet narrate this ode to the marvels of Big Blue life down under. Feel yourself flinch with real fear ...into your date's arms... while jelly fish seems to swim one foot away from your popcorn.

Feel your spirit and soul soar as you float through current and tide with turtles, little and BIG fishies, manta rays... just a few of the many deep-sea denizens that share this planet with us. But if you don't believe me, read all about it at Wired or www.boingboing.net.

Photo Copyright Arthur Felig

Remember Weegee's pix of people that watching the first 3D flix in the 50's? Weegee, my hero, worked out of the trunk of his car which he used as darkroom through the 30's and 40's when he invented a whole new genre for photojournalists. Take a look at images taken in movie theaters, he shot using infrared film, from an ICP exhibition now online, Weegee's World: Movie Goers.

Stay tuned for more on Weegee at a later date.

Little Screens, Little People?

2006-03-06T10:53:00.000-05:00

Photo Copyright Dennis Chamberlin

Viewer as Victim?
Last night we heard many times Oscar recipients talking about the impact that viewing a film on the " big screen" can have. And indeed for this movie maven, films projected on the big screen have always been the greatest escape. But now, with small screens so pervasive, "technology can transport us so far, and so fast," writes Jessica Helfand in her book Essays on Graphic Design, New Media, and Visual Culture. Indeed it is almost " scary to think of the viewer as victim," as the
" precipice between believability and brainwashing grows narrower by the second. "

Photo Copyright Dennis Chamberlin

The more we grow accustomed--indeed addicted--to the screens around us, whether in the form of television, computer, film, or a combination thereof, the more we imprison our minds and restrict out capacity to exercise thoughtful independent judgment.
Jessica Helfand,
Essays on Graphic Design, New Media, and Visual Culture

In the previous post Smart Mobbers' Endangered Digits I wrote about Smart Mobbers who communicate using text messaging.

Photographer Dennis Chamberlin's " Screen Culture"

Shortly after reading Helfand's essays I stumbled across Dennis Chamberlin's photo essay, " Screen Culture" of people interacting with screens, what he calls their " new reality". I found Chamberlin's work displayed at www.sitewelder.com a web site provider for photographers where we both host our sites. I contacted Chamberlin and requested permission to include a few of his images on this blog. He kindly complied and also included his personal statement.

Dennis is now an assistant professor at the Greenlee School of Journalism and Communication at Iowa State University. A contract photographer with the New York Agency, Black Star from 1989-2005, he worked as a freelance photojournalist based in Poland from 1987-2002. His clients have included National Geographic,
The Economist, Forbes, GEO, Liberation, Newsweek, TIME Magazine, New York Times Magazine,
US News & World Report, PepsiCo. International, Procter&Gamble, and International Paper.

Screen Culture: Photographer's Statement

Over the years we have incorporated technology into to our world to such a degree that we no longer notice the role it plays in our daily lives. Televisions, and in a much broader sense video screens, have a ubiquitous presence in American culture. The technology involved, whether high definition television or portable video games, is purported to increase communication between individuals and allow for greater dissemination of information, but in practice these technologies have isolated us from one another. I have seen this phenomenon while making the images for this project, whether it is with adults lost in the world of a favorite television program or my own children entranced by a blinking object on a computer screen.

Photo Copyright Dennis Chamberlin

My approach toward the project is in the tradition of straight documentary, and the photographs are the result of observing the subjects as they become engaged with the media in front of them. We all spend a part of our day staring at screens, sometimes while at work, or perhaps as a way to relax at the end of the day, and I think that most of us can see ourselves somewhere in these photos.

We tried an experiment for one year in our home: to live without television or video games. After a couple of months of this self-imposed exile from popular culture, we bought a computer with the capability of viewing DVD movies on its 17"” screen. This was sufficient for the first year. After a year our 11 year-old son bought a used Gameboy on the internet. One day, a couple of months later, he sold the first model to his younger siblings and used the money to buy a better Gameboy purchased from a friend who had recently received an even newer model. Then came the used television, received as a gift from a relative. A television without a DVD/VCR combo player isn'’t of much use so that was the next acquisition. Our home is now pretty well outfitted for the moment, but we are still lacking a plasma screen as well as camera phones. We used to talk with one another. Now we stare at screens.

Dennis Chamberlin

Netizen Kenny Irby Speaks

2006-03-01T17:15:00.000-05:00

Kenny Irby, Director of the Visual Journalism Group at The Poynter Instutue. Photo Ben Russell/NewsU

This is the second query of what will beome a regular feature of this blog. Called "Netizens Speak" I queried Kenneth F. Irby, Visual Journalism Group Leader & Director of Diversity Programs at The Poynter Institute For Media Studies last night, asking, "How do you think people process audio content vs visual? What is power or strength of one over the other?" Eloquent as ever, Kenny just replied.

For me, I think that the web affords media companies a tremendous opportunity to enrich reporting and information delivery. Information consumers now have far more options than every before and journalists must meet these needs to remain competitive in this new age media consumption. Audio is the new hot things for print outlets. Albeit, it is not new really new--- radio has been around for a long time. The authenticity and emotional factors are increased by blending natural sound with still photographs. People are attracted by quality integration of audio and photojournalism. Both audio and still photography are powerful story telling structures, together they are extremely powerful and effective journalistic tools. The combination of a compelling photograph complimented by the natural voice of the individual explaining the context of their situation is arresting.

-Kenny Irby, The Poynter Institute

DocuDay NYC Videos Coming Soon...

2006-02-28T14:42:00.000-05:00

Stay Tuned. Videos With Doc-Makers Coming Later This Week
Marshall Curry, Director of Street Fight, Photo/Hollyman c. 2006

As soon as I find time to edit the video I shot I will upload these reports from the IDA on:

Marshall Curry filmed, produced, wrote and cut his great epic doc Street Fight as a one person team, a terrific tale about the 32-year-old Rhodes Scholar/Yale Law School grad Cory Booker who ran for mayor of Newark. Marshall's quest to tell the story of one man's fight against an entenched political machine is especially relevant today. More on Marshall later...

And also more on the film making team of Dana Adam Shapiro, Jeff Mandel and Henry-Alex Rubin who brought us Murderball, a terrfic sports story about quad rugby, played by quadriplegics in armored wheelchairs.

Praise be to the International Documentary Association (IDA)

Thanks to IDA, AKA International Documentary Association and its Executive Director, Sandra Ruch, along with her capable team of volunteers, New Yorkers were treated to a day-long feast of documentary films yesterday at the DGA's elegant Florence Gould Theater at 57th Street. The Zulu have a word called " Indaba" that stands for a forum in which share ideas and collaborate. Sounds like DocuDay NYC. The Sundance Channel provided much-needed funding to make this all possible.

Over this next week I will be uploading some videos I shot at the fest during some Q&A sessions which Ruch conducted with film makers whose works have been nominated for Academy Awards. I will try to encode the audio track as MP3 files that you can play on your computer or download and listen to in your iPod on your way to work. Inshallah. God willing. And my time willing.

Join the IDA

If you are still reading this post you should join the IDA too , a wonderful community devoted to documentary film-makers. You get a magazine subscrition too.

The Power of the Spoken Word: Norman Corwin

2006-02-26T16:43:00.001-05:00

Photo Courtesy www.normancorwin.com

Saturday, at the IDA's DocuDay New York I began thinking about the power of the well-spoken word after feasting on a great short, A Note of Triumph: the Golden Age of Norman Corwin. This must-see short by Eric Simmonson and Corinne Marrinan is a powerful profile of Corwin, often called radio's poet laureate, whose broadcast over CBS Radio on May 8, 1945 created a whole new genre for story telling. Says Ray Bradbury of Corwin, " He taught us then not only how to open our mouths but how to insert bright pebbles beneath our tongues so that eventually we might fire forth a sentence not only worth listening to but thinking about. "

This short has been nominated for an Academy award. You can download a ballot here what the Academy says is "the easiest way to make your predictions and keep track of the winners on event night. " With this official ballot in hand you can chomp on popcorn with friends and even make bets.

A Note of Triumph: the Golden Age of Norman Corwin

In the Oscar-nominated documentary short A Note of Triumph: the Golden Age of Norman Corwin, Studs Terkel talks about the first time he heard Norman Corwin read his "A Note of Triumph " on radio for CBS. It was a poetic ode to peace, broadcast with the end of World War II in Europe. Turkel says he was attending a dinner party when somebody said,
" Hey turn on the radio." With a flip of a switch , Corwin's resonant voice crackled into life with Hank Peters, a soldier, who says " I am dead of the mistakes of old men... Never were such questions asked of this day...What do we know now we didn't know then?"

Turkel says that on that long distant night, as guests heard Corwin's voice and great words, " Everything stopped--drinks in hand, suddenly everything stopped." Even though 58 years have passed since that night, and though Studs Terkel is now deaf, he says that " in my minds eye I can see it. "

Robert Altman lauds Corwin as this radio man who changed everything... launched a whole new medium...radio drama, with what Altman says is one of the " greatest poems of the 20th century". Righteous matter indeed. Corwin describes soldiers returning from World War II, wearing " a great chunk of rainbow around their helmets."

As such Corwin has much to teach all of us struggling to write scripts. He demomstrates the transcendent power of a few well-chosen words to incite the imagination via audio. It's about writing for the ear rather than for the written page.

You can read and hear this > NPR report This I Believe by Corwin, now 95 and follow his script as you head him read it aloud.

Here's another " bright pebble " by Corwin:

Among the things not to be neglected are the expressions that have been forthright and persistent in American history, expressions in which the common person is recognized; Walt Whitman's sense of the importance of the individual. He's got a poem in "Leaves of Grass," the sense of which is: the president is there in the White House for you, not you here for him. It's a poem that expresses the value and the almost sacred obligation to recognize, to give dignity to the individual. After all, nature does. Nature respects us. There are billions of people on this globe. Think of it. No two of them have the same thumbprint.

Will a new Corwin emerge as a pod-caster soon? I hope so.

Tom Bettag, Nightline & Cold Calls

2006-02-26T11:23:00.000-05:00

, originally uploaded by .

Click here to play Nightline Clip in Quicktime QT

This is the first of several posts on encoding video both on the Mac or PC for playing over the Internet. I encoded this clip for streaming over high bandwidth.In the next posting I will encode for a progressive download so you can view the clips and compare. I will also encode using Flip 4 Mac, the codec that allows a Mac user to encode for Windows Media Player.

I produced this story as a one person team on assignment for Nightline in 2000. I shot the story with a PD150, a wireless and shotgun Sennheiser mike. I wrote the script with the kind mentoring and assistance of former Nightline Executive Producer Tom Bettag. In Nightline's Washington studio I recorded the voiceover and worked with a talented Nightline editor as we crashed on this story.

...A Little Shoptalk. Tom Bettag, Ted Koppel

Ted Koppel and his longtime producer, Tom Bettag, left ABC's "Nightline" in November, not to retire, but to forge on mightily. Not long after Koppel departed, he became managing editor over Discovery Channel's news documentaries, with Bettag remaining at his side as executive producer. In a Broadcasting & Cable interview, Koppel On His Jump to Discovery, Ted Koppel talks about this next Big Leap Forward for the most talented duo in broadcast news.

Excerpted Ted Koppel Interview, Broadcasting and Cable

These folks are serious. While Tom Bettag and I are a couple of grueling greybeards who can probably afford to go off and retire, the rest of our team are not. They are being very generously compensated.

What are you going to get out of Discovery that you wouldn't get elsewhere?

An environment that is conducive to doing the kind of programming that we want to do. And a relationship with people of integrity and talent that is consistent with the kind of relationship Tom and I have had at Nightline over the years. The great joy of Nightline was, we could always do what we thought was important. The great joy of Discovery is that we can expand beyond even what we have done in the past.

The Power of a Cold Call

In fact, if you think " knowing someone" is the only way to get cross media assignments, here's a story to chew on. It was a "cold call" letter to Tom Bettag that set me out on my quest as a cross-media maven. I wrote a letter to Tom at Nightline. In it I expressed my interest to work with his team, as a " reforming" photographer who hoped to break in to TV news. I was then 40 something. Good luck you say.

Tom Leads to VNI...

This was before e-mail. Tom thoughtfully answered my letter on ABC letterhead that was typed. ( Those of you born after 1990 might refer to this archaic form of comunications a " hard copy.") In his reply Tom suggested that I contact Michael Rosenblum, who was then doing a start-up called VNI ( Video News International ). Michael believed that the next new thing was videojournalists equipped with Hi-8 video cameras, working as a one person team.

This is another long story I will delve into later... But to finish up on the Tom Bettag story. I did sign on to VNI and learned to write, shoot, report and track stories as a one person team.

...And then VNI Leads to The Digital Journalist...

Michael and his co-venture partner eventually sold VNI to the The New York Times. By that time I had graduated to shooting and producing stories on my own for CNN, WTN and CBS TeleNoticias. Shortly after, I founded The Digital Journalist along with my VNI colleague Dirck Halstead as partner.

After a story on our partnership appeared in Photo District News, Dirck told me he had trademarked our company name in his own and went off by himself. But that's fine. Come all ye. He's done a great job and built up The Digital Journalist as the go-to site for all involved in creating cross-media. He also conducts " Playtypus" workshops. I also hear he is an adjunct professor at University of Texas at Austin, the perfect venue for him to empower and incite the next generation of cross-media story tellers.

And back to Nightline. The Circle Comes Round

But to get to the end of the story. In 2000 I finally worked with Tom Bettag at Nightline. And it just goes to show you the power of a single cold-call, well-timed, thoughtful and properly executed without perstering. And my hat goes off with deepest gratitude to Michael Rosenblum as well who trained me to shoot video in the first place and write scripts. Two Pros

Proof of Lateral Thinking In Action

Only twenty mintes ago I began to write this post about encoding video and now find myself crafting a post instead that ends with an annecdote about the power of cold calls. What gives?

Check on my earlier post Big Bang Thinking and the earlier post on hyperlinks. No I'm not a Big Banger. Only in my dreams. But I certainly enjoy writing and thinking in a lateral manner although I also perform fine in the linear world.

Which is why I do cross-media.

How about you? Send us your thoughts to Send Comments To "Crossing Media"

Download March Calender

2006-02-23T18:37:00.000-05:00

Celebrate the 75th anniversary of the George Washington Bridge by downloading this PDF file which I created JUST FOR YOU with one of the favorite photos I have taken. It's exclusively for my Crossing Media readers.

Calender folded in half after printing

And thanks to all of you for being so supportive during my first month online as a blogger. Your feedback has been great. Keep it coming!

After downloading the 8.5x 11 inch calender you can print it out at home on your inkjet printer. A heavier paper than usual is best. Rather than use expensive papers like Epson's I use instead HP's " Premium Brochure & Flyer paper, Matte. It's double sided and probably not archival. But what calender is archival? You can buy it at Staples.

So download my PDF calender.It's free and it's pretty too. It's a nine MB files so will take a little time to download.
Download Calender Don't be daunted by the horizontal stripes in the file after downloading. It seems to print out just fine.

Fold it in half vertically and you have an instant desktop reminder.

And thanks again. Your feedback has been fantastic.

Smart Mobber's Endangered Digits

2006-02-23T11:17:00.000-05:00

In earlier post Western Union Stops Telegrams I wrote about a whole new passle of users out there some call "Smart Mobs" that communicate via their fingertips using text messaging technology. In my last post I introduced you to Ben, a college student who communicates with his buddies online via AOL's Instant Messenger. Along with 5 million others, Ben helped create a viral blizzard for the NBC video clip from Saturday Night Live called Lazy Sunday.

Reuters reports today that in Britain, Ben's peers have new disability, where Text Text Messaging Boom Leads to Digit Damage. There mobile text messaging has become so popular that " millions of users no suffer injuries to their thumbs and fingers because of their love of keeping in touch," reports Reuters on a recent survey conducted for Virgin Mobile.

Over 93.5 million text messages are sent every day but all this digit action has lead to an explosion in people reporting cases of repetitive strain injury (RSI).

Thirty-eight percent more people suffer from sore wrists and thumbs due to texting than five years ago and 3.8 million people now complain of text-related injuries every year.

The survey for Virgin Mobile found the texting phenomenon shows no sign of slowing. Over 12 percent of the population admit to sending 20 texts per day and 10 percent confess to sending up to 100 texts every day.

Charles Darwin studied biological adaptation in the Galapagos, where finches over generations on isolated islands developed different beaks to help them forage for food. Question from this scientifically challenged blogger....Will the fingers of the grandchildren of Smart Mobbers evolve as well?

That question leads me find an expert online to ask that question. Stay tuned for another N.I.C. ( Netizen In Cyber Space )posting.

In 2003, Howard Rheingold writes in his must-read book, Smart Mobs:

I learned that these teenagers and others in Japan who were staring at their mobile phones and twiddling the kepyboards with their thumbs were sending words and simple graphics to each other--messages like short e-mails that were delivered instantly but could be read at any time. When I looked into the technical underpinnngs of telephone texting, I found that these early texters were walking around with an always-on connection to the Internet in their hands. The tingling in my forebrain turned into a buzz. When you have a more persistent connection to the Internet, you have acess to a great deal more than a communication channel."

A 12-Step Program for Text Messagers?

One risk, for these text-enabled communicators, say some psychologists, is that it can make these peeps " uncomfortable with more intimate facto-face conversations." In fact these same professionals cite their worry about a new culture developing addicted to "excessive text messaging." Will future professional conferences for psychologists feature seminars on teatment for ETMD, ( Excessive Text Messaging Disorder) ?

World's Fastest Texter

Last year Scottish factory worker Craig Crosbie was crowned the world's fastest texter after he took just 48 seconds to type out the 160-character message: "The razor-toothed piranhas of the genera Serrasalmus and Pygocentrus are the most ferocious freshwater fish in the world. In reality they seldom attack a human."

Whew. Try to type that yourself. It's daunting. Especially for me a hunt and peck typist. My mother told me in school not to learn toucgh typing or I would end up as a secretary.

Earlier in India a similar contest was held where Karan Sachdev, a second year student of Delhi University, was crowned Indian SMS king. He punched the same message as Crosbie in 66 seconds, in what The Times of India says was a " tough competition."

Music Fun Life conducted an online poll of its visitors, many of whom are avid text messengers. They asked: "Craig Crosbie as just crowned the world's fastest texter. He completed a complicated twenty-five word message in just forty-eight seconds. Is texting killing the art of conversation?"

44.44% said "yes" and 55.56% said " no."

What do you think?

Netizen Ben Replies

2006-02-21T09:57:00.000-05:00

In a recent post I wrote about how NBC Threatens Video Sharing Sites who have facilitated users posting copyright protected clips online. In a recent viral blitz, 5 million users downloaded, and then uploaded one Saturday Night Live ( SNL) clip called "Lazy Sunday". NBC would rather they pay $1.99 at the iTunes store to download the clip or view it for free exclusively at the NBC branded site.

Lazy Sunday Taken Down

So NBC's lawyers prevailed as you can see from the notice above which I just lifted from YouTube to see if Lazy Sunday was available for free playing. It's obvious that NBC lawyers made the decision that protecting their content was more important than any viral buzz the clip had generated. It was a tough call to make for NBC I am sure.

But maybe are they shooting themselves in the foot? Would anybody actually pay $1.99 to view this clip?

So What Does Netizen Ben Think?

In yesterday's postWho's Ben The Netizen? I wrote that I would ask Ben Kreeger, a 19-year-old college student who I found in Googled Land, if he would pay $1.99 to download this video clip if it weren't available for free.

Ben did not have his e-mail address posted to the profile section of his blog. Instead he had an AOL Instant Messenger address. I left a comment on Ben's blog instead. I also asked if he objected to my writing about him in this blog. He said " no problem" and sent this informative reply last night:

Ben's reply

As for your question, I don't think I'd be willing to pay for something like that. I'm a big fan of downloading
television shows through BitTorrent or IRC, or even recording them myself on my PC. If there's a show in the iTunes Music Store that's decent enough (The Office, Monk), and if I had a video iPod, I'd buy an episode for $2, sure. But I certainly wouldn't pay $2 for a short skit off SNL that's gonna be all over the internet already.

Who's Ben the Netizen?

2006-02-20T16:55:00.000-05:00

Ben Kreeger, age 19, has staked his spot in cyberspace with a blog. He was one among 5 million other Netizens that downloaded the Sturday Night Live" Lazy Sunday" video clip and posted it online. In my last post NBC Threatens Video Sharing Sites I wrote about the viral buzz NBC's " Lazy Video" clip received, as reported by Boingboing on Friday and the The New York Times today. NBC lawyers are threatening video sharing services where the clip is hosted, uploaded by users. NBC wants people to buy the clip at iTunes for $1.99 or play it only at NBC's web-site where they will be branded on the rump by the NBC peacock.

In my post I ask "But will Smart Mob users like benkreeger.blogspot.com pay to download video content when there's so much out there for free? Ben tells his fellow Netizens " I ripped this. It's at the address above...there's a link to it in a .zip file, in .mp4 format."

I found Ben in Googled Land. I'll ask him if he will pay to download content and tell you what I find. If he doesn't want to answer I'll take this post down.

Ben certainly sounds affable enough and he's cute too as you can see from his photo. Ben's Blogger profile has saved me a lot of work. Before I even contact Ben I have learned from his blog that Ben says he is a 19-year old college student. A Virgo, Ben says he's lovestruck, resilient, a photographer and music nut. He's writing his post while listening to the Rolling Stones, who he says, " Well, they're performing as best they can. Let's face it, they're aging poorly. "

He passed his microeconomics test with a score of (175/200) and says "I'm drinking less pop and coffee and whitening my teeth, because nobody likes a hideous smile (or a frown, for that matter)."

"Peace, love, and boredom. I'm out, " he tells us on his way to take a shower.

NBC Threatens Video Sharing Sites

2006-02-20T12:54:00.000-05:00

Photo Coutesy NBC

Underneath a lengthy New York Times headline , reporter John Biggs reports today that A Video Clip Goes Viral and a TV Network Wants to Be the Only One to Spread It. In a previous post I touched upon Smart Mobs, these groups of users that connect with each other on their own through email and instant messaging. The Forrester Group calls these emerging connections" Emotive Networks," which it defines as interconnected groups, "composed of individuals engaged in communication and support."

Some of us may prefer to forge our friendships in real time. But there's a whole new media-obsessed pack out there that thrives and communucates by passing along links to "cool" content. These connected buddies hang together in cyber-pace and can create a collective viral bllzzard overnight with just a few taps of their digits on the computer keyboard or phone pad and a cut and paste command.

You have heard about " talking drums" in Africa, used to spread the news? It works. I know. I have watched viral campaigns in action transmitted by drummers while I lived with the Dogon in Mali. Today's Smart Mobs don't use drums. Read my post about Western Union Stops Sending Telegrams: Text Message a Loved One Instead

Lazy Sunday Video Clip: 5 Million Views

"Lazy Sunday", a satiric rap video that stars Chris Parnell and Andy Samberg of "Saturday Night Live" was first broadcast by NBC on its website on Dec. 17, 2006. Since then a Smart Mob of netizens have watched this clip a total of five million times.
The clips is now hosted at YouTube.com one of the free video-sharing sites which posted the clip.

Most network chiefs would be thrilled to see their content promoted in such a viral fashion, building cool online chatter, notes Biggs in today's Times, "The online popularity of "Lazy Sunday" has been credited with reviving interest in "Saturday Night Live" at a time when it is in need of some buzz."

Not NBC.

Opening Salvos: No Creative Commons Here

No Creative Commons here. The opening salvo has been fired . NBC lawyers have threatened You Tube with legal action under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The company would rather sell the clip online at iTunes for $1.99 or post it for free viewing on its branded site.

Some may call this short sighted, for publicity like this can't be bought. Smart Mobs are quirky and highly selective. "VH1 and other television and movie producers were increasingly putting their own clips, trailers and music videos on YouTube in hopes of jump-starting their own viral phenomena," says Julie Supan, senior director of marketing for YouTube.

No Chump Change

Do the math. NBC has. $1.99 paid 5 million times can quickly add up. As I wrote before, that's no chump change.

But will Smart Mob users like Ben who has his own blog, pay to download video content when there's so much out there for free? Ben, 19 years old, tells his fellow Netizens " I ripped this. It's at the address above...there's a link to it in a .zip file, in .mp4 format."

Flowers and Chocolates From NBC for YouTube ?

Boing Boing Blog says that NBC "should be sending flowers and chocolates to YouTube, not nasty-grams from lawyers. The free video on the NBC site can only be played But only Windows users can access the video on NBC.com -- the site in general is kinda buggy for non-Windows users."

Copyright Troubles Ahead for User-Posted Content ?

The New York Times article continues,

Julie Summersgill, a spokeswoman for NBC Universal, said the company meant no ill will toward fan sites but wanted to protect its copyrights."We're taking a long and careful look at how to protect our content," she said.

YouTube and others in the new wave of video-sharing sites have so far managed to avoid major legal problems even though they often carry copyrighted material without permission.

"This is an example of the copyright troubles that are waiting for YouTube, Google Video and all the other video hosting services that rely on user-posted content,"said Fred von Lohmann, a lawyer at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital rights group.

Alex the Talking Parrot Online

2006-02-19T18:04:00.000-05:00

Photo Courtesy Brandeis University

So you thought that your child was difficult when faced with learning boring arithmetic tables? No, maybe they're not learning disabled, but like Alex the Parrot, more interested in learning what interests them most. In Alex's case it appears he prefers a piece of four cornered wood to answering researchers' questions.

If you're still reading this blog instead of tackling something boring at work here's another link to help you waste some more time. In another post I told you about the great audio collection of bird songs at the British Library. Now you can hear Alex, the chatty and sage African grey parrot, speak by clicking on the audio link at the bottom of the page at the British Library. Although only endowed with a walnut-sized brain, Alex has been trained by Dr. Irene Pepperberg at Brandeis University, who says he understands a numerical concept akin to zero -- an abstract notion that humans don't typically understand until age three or four. " Go below to read more on Alex and the power of the word " No" when spouted by a stubborn parrot.

Alex The Remarkable Parrot With A Mind of His Own

A remarkable case of avian vocal learning has occurred in a scientific laboratory in the U.S.A. It concerns a talking African grey parrot called Alex trained by Dr. Irene Pepperberg. To quote from Dr. Pepperberg's account, Alex "is able to participate in some forms of inter-species communication" (by which the author means she can converse with the bird!). Alex is capable of demonstrating more than simply the ability to imitate human speech patterns.

But what exactly can Alex do? The bird was trained to identify vocally certain objects by name, e.g. "key" and "paper". It was also taught to name certain colours such as "green" and "blue", and certain shapes with labels like "three corner" (easier to learn than triangle) in order to categorise objects with respect to colour and shape. It also learnt to recognise quantities of objects up to five and learnt the functional use of the word "no" as well as phrases such as "come here" and "wanna go". After five years it had been taught a functional repertoire of about 40 vocalisations.

Whenever he incorrectly identified an object, Alex was told "no ". After about 18 months of training, he began to use the word to his trainer when he appeared to wish not to be handled. Trainers then started to use the word "no" when refusing to relinquish an item desired by the parrot. Soon Alex would use the word "no". When refusing to identify a proffered object, he would say "no"; also when he had finished with his water, and when tossing an unwanted toy back at a trainer! The following is an excerpt transcribed from a tape and illustrating how the bird uses the word "no". It appears that Alex is using the word in order to refuse one task so that he can request a preferred item, a piece of four-cornered wood:

Trainer: Alex, what's this?

Parrot: No!

Trainer: Yes, what is this?

Parrot: Four-corner wood (indistinct).

Trainer: Four, say better .

Parrot: No.

Trainer: Yes!

Parrot: Three. ..paper.

Trainer: Alex, "four", say "four".

Parrot: No!

Trainer: Come on!

Parrot: No!

Trainer: Alex!

Parrot: Paper .

Trainer: Alex, what's this? Come on.

Parrot: No.

Trainer: You can do it, come on!

Parrot: No!

Trainer: Yes!

Parrot: Paper.

Trainer: What is this?

Parrot: Four-corner ...paper .

Trainer: No! Four-corner what?

Parrot: Three (four? - not distinct) wood.

Trainer: Right, four what wood?

Parrot: Key.. ..No!

Trainer: Yes, what's this?

Parrot: No!

Trainer: (Laugh)

"No" is also employed to reject unacceptably small pieces of food, and to reject toys apparently too worn to be of interest. In many cases the refusals to identify or relinquish are accompanied by the turning of his head away from the trainer.

Snow-Struck Seaport

2006-02-12T16:25:00.000-05:00

If you clicking here to see the slide show of photos I took during the blizzard you'll have to go to my website. The java-script doesn't seem to be working once this post was archived.

So go to my web-site where you can see the show as a pod cast using Slide on the home page. Then click on the link above for Snow Struck Seaport to see the large Flash slideshow. Before leaving do click on this audio blog post below. Open a new window to play the slideshow as you listen to Hart Crane's words.

Audio Blog: Hart Crane's To Brooklyn Bridge

Here are photos I took this morning of my South Street neighborhood in the snow, keeping in mind Crane's line...

" Already snow submerges an iron bound year..."

On a previous post on audio blogging I read Hart Crane's poem "To Brooklyn Bridge" and pledged to illustrate it with photographs over this next few weeks. Click here to hear the poem.

Hart Crane's " To Brooklyn Bridge"

Vlogging:AKA Video Blogging

2006-02-11T21:10:00.001-05:00

Rocket Boom Vlog

Vlogging? No it's not the latest Winter sport at the Turin Olympics. It's video blogging. "V" for video and "blog" jammmed together to form a new word that is also the web's newest evolution. So far there almost 10,000 Vloggers out there. But how about the quality of the content? Well, for now kind of mediorcre on the whole. Remember Hemmingway's homily to the effect that giving someone a typewriter doesn't turn them into a writer?

But that will change. Remember Kevin Kostner building his baseball field amidst cornstalks in the movie " field of dreams?" He said " build a field they will come." And they did.

Click here to listen to this excellent Webmonkey Radio Podcast on Vlogging reported at Mac World.

This great Vlog, Rocket Boom, was brought to my attention in a newsletter on Internet marketing published by Ken McCarthy . To subscibe you can contact @ Ken McCarthy .

Vlogs: The Boom Heard Round the Internet:

According to McCarthy, Andrew Baron is behind the camera and Amanda Congdon, 24, is the host at RocketBoom. McCarthy says already 100,000 visitors click in each day to view this Vlog. Rocket Boom's studio? A living room in the Upper West Side of Manhattan, where out-of-pocket costs top a dizzying $25/day. Today's story for instance is filed from Kenya by one of Rocketboom's " Field" correspondents, Ruud Elmendorp. It's an interview illustrated with B-Roll of a political folk artist, Joseph Bertiers, who works in Kenya, a fascinating "niche" story that sadly might never find its way to broadcast media.

In addition to shooting this clip, Elmendorp probably cut it as well and then compressed it for streaming. Rocket Book didn't have to spend thousands booking time on a " bird" (satellite) to transmit the clip back. It was probably sent by FTP by Elemdorp with a click or two of a mouse.

You can play these clips on your computer or on the latest i pod, Just remember to turn the sound down at work or your boss won't wonder why you have so much time on your hands.

That's certainly one of the ways futurists say online video content will go, providing niche content such as this. Humor helps too. After all most Net content is about "infotainment", not education. People have shorter attention spans online. So make it short and sweet and if you can throw in a chuckle or two...even better.

Undoubtedly the money will follow soon after for these pod-casters. If they don't get tsunnami-ed by the BIG Players. Already I-Tunes licenses video content for parters. $1 a pop to play a clip may seem like peanuts but those micro-payments add up quickly.

Prodigem: Personal Broadcasting Freedom?

Comgdon and Barton host ther VLOG at Prodigem whose home page states they use BitTorrent technology.

Intrigued? So am I. I don't have time to produce and edit daily video Vlogs but others will. Hmm.

Or maybe I do?

Thinking aloud here...How about doing a daily post on Sal, that gifted woodcarver at the South Street Seaport Museum? Maybe uploading daily reports as he shows paid subscribers how to carve a ship's nameboard? Promote them with a message at forums for woodcarving and classified ads in woodcarving journals.

Or how about a dog training Vlog?

Not. At least for now. Too busy with other work. But it is intoxicating, thinking of all the possibilities.

More later.

Stablized Lenses for Digital Photography

2006-02-11T17:00:00.000-05:00

The photo to the right probably leads you to ask," Why are these two men laughing? " Well they just bumped into each other after leaving the stage of a press conference at a Dead Sea hotel in Jordan and I was able to grab it because I had a stabilized lens. You can read about the new generation of digital stabilized lenses in NY Times story. . I took this picture as an afterthought two years ago, while traveling as UN Secretary General Kofi Annan's photographer in Jordan while he attended the Quartet negotiations, seeking with others to broker a "roadmap towards Middle East peace."

I rushed ahead of the SG at the end of the press conference in order to get in the motorcade that would leave without me. Before heading out the door I turned around quickly and snapped this photo at 800 ASA with my lens in AF and stabilized mode, I had no idea I had captured this moment until later.

Once in the motorcade whizzing back to Amman from the Dead Sea, at maybe 80 miles per hour, I decided to test the
" sports" ( horizontal panning ) stabilizer selection on my then new, 70-200 F. 2.8 lens. I had previously used it hand held to shoot meetings of the UN Security Council leading up to the war in Iraq, but never used the lens in action. So while we blazed down a highway with sirens blasting, I set my Canon 10D camera to follow focus mode ( sports mode) and chose some flags out on the highway for my test.

Back in Amman while editing and transmitting the pix I was stunned. Although the meetings with SG, Colin Powell and the " Quartet" that day in attempt to broker a Middle East peace had gone nowhere, at least my test photos of the flags were acceptably sharp.

Niche Video Content: Panther's Burn Baby Burn Hot Sauce

2006-02-08T14:01:00.000-05:00

Play Burn Baby Burn Panther Hot Sauce Video Story

So what are some Black Panthers doing today? Looks like some members are making hot sauce, no joke, their latest HOT ... VERY HOT new product. Burn Baby Burn Hot Sauce is being distributed by Everett and Jones Barbecue in San Francisco's East Bay, according to CBS5.com. Black Panther David Hillard and Fredrika Newton, widow of the former party leader, say their hot sauce is "going to have a label on this bottle that's going to explain the context of what we mean by Burn Baby Burn, and give people some education. " Their goal they say is not to make money but to target a whole new generation that may think that "Huey Newton is a cookie".

In a previous post on Rocketboom.com I wrote about the power of a Vlog to tell an interesting story to a niche audience. Here's an example with a video story I found while researching my last post. As an aside in my post on bird and audio content I asked " What are the Black Panthers doing today ?" After googling I found this great story. ( Sigh... already done) I didn't pay a cent to view the video because that is the biz model for now. But in the future, would I pay maybe 25 cents to view this report by a CBS affiliate? The text version would be the teaser. Probably. If it grabs my attention. And how will you grab my attention? By appealing to my "niche" interests.

But how do you bring people to your niche content like this video clip? Write provocative meta-tags for a clip like this including maybe " baby boomers, race relations, Hewey Newton, hot sauce, 1960's, revolution, armed revolt etc. and not only will NSA's search robots go crazy but Google's and Yahoo's as well. And if CBS5.com were charging 25 cents a play for this clip, with a teaser for free, they can count on collecting more than chump change over the long haul.

Hot sauce? You bet.

Publishing the content is in our own hands. Right now.

Making money doing so? Not yet. But it's coming.

Power to the people right on.

Birds Who Sing Too Much: Streaming Audio vs Download

2006-02-08T11:40:00.000-05:00

The British Library has a marvelous collection of sounds gathered in the field. What is interesting is that none of the sounds can be downloaded. They are streamed instead, using a pesky Real Media Player which stopped me dead in my tracks this morning as it forced me to download the latest Real Media Codec 3....which I thought I already had installed.

Birds Who Sing Too Much

Have you ever wanted to know what the song of a dotterel sounds like? Cheryl Tipp, of the British Library helped me hear one for the first time ever this morning on my couch in New York. Was it worth the wait? You bet. Not for the Real Media codec but to listen to the bird calls and roars of black panthers in the field. To paraphrase Melville's Ishmael, if it's ever a dull grey "November of your soul" just head for this site and listen to robins' dawn songs to get a lift.

In this truly transcendental cross-media moment you can also read all about young bird calls, bird calls as "deceitful mimicry" birds that " talk to themselves," and even about " bird to man communication" while you listen to the shrill and agitated cries of birds who perhaps " love too much."

If you want to get even into this Emmersonian moment open up another browser window ( or use Firefox) go to my post Hyperlinks and Lateral Story Telling where I wonder if hyperlinks, as in Hart Crane's poem " Forgetfulness" are " like a song that freed from beat and measure, wanders... like a bird that coasts the wind. " You can also read Hart Crane's avian-inspired poem in entirety here while listening to birds chirping on a Real Player pop-up window from the British Library site.

Or if you're still reading this blog instead of tackling something boring at work here's another link to help you waste some more time. Hear Birds Singing by clicking on the audio link at the bottom of the page at the British Library.

A Creative Commons License for Dotterels?

Of course the biz model here is " build a field they will come", with copyright registered in the name of The British Library, not the name of the amateurs who did this incredible recordings. You can listen, but you can't use these sounds. If I want to "use" the sounds I will have to pay for a license. Fair enough. The BL states that "The recordings on this site are for private listening only; copying, broadcasting or reproduction is prohibited". Am I reproducing by attaching this link? I will let you know later after I have asked the BL the same question later today.

Black Panthers Roaring

You can also listen to the sounds of bamboo rats, bare-faced tamarins, black panthers and other creatures here. No the black panther doesn't start singing " Power To the People". He roars. In fact that brings me to to the unrelated thought...where have all the Black Panthers gone? Go to my next post to find out.

The Wildlife Section of the British Library Sound Archive

Cheryl Tipps describes the British Library Sound Archives

I work for the Wildlife Section of the British Library Sound Archive and thought you might like to hear about our collection of wildlife sound recordings. We've existed since 1969 and currently have over 150,000 recordings of wildlife vocalisations and soundscapes, provided mainly by amateur recordists. You can find details of these recordings by visiting the BL website at www.bl.uk and following the links to the Sound Archive's online catalogue (click on catalogue, then Sound Archive). You can also find out more about the section by visiting our webpages at http://www.bl.uk/collections/sound-archive/wild.html. Around 400 recordings from around the world can be heard on our Listen to Nature pages, so please go and take a look!

Stabilized Lenses & Action

2006-02-07T13:25:00.000-05:00

I took this photo in October during the last race of the season of the Manhattan Yacht Club as I stood in club's Zodiac rubber raft. The wind blew at 26 knots, gusting upward with sudden gale-force bursts. This snap is a solid and tangible demo for how well the stabilizing technology works. To take these pix I tethered myself with a line slung around my ample behind which was secured to the rubber raft's bow with a bowline. Like a dog at the end of a leash, I created a bosun's chair of sorts that gave me balance as we madly careened across New York harbor. I bounced right along, dipping and swaying, bracing my knees, sort of like Tai-Chi.

At this point you might well ask... " just what was she doing THERE?" I can't blame you. In fact I often ask myself that same question. It does get confusing.

But all of us " Cross Media" producers do have to wear many hats. Don't you? We have to be versatile and supple like bamboo. This day, however, I wasn't just wearing another different hat , but foul weather gear instead, in my role as official photographer for the Manhattan Sailing Club to which I belong. Everybody took a pounding that day but my camera kept ticking as we chopped across harbor swell, rushing to rescue the crew of this boat which looked as if would capsize. Luckily it righted itself.

I used Canon's 20D digital camera. Without the stabilizer on the Canon 70-200 f. 28 lens I never would have captured the shot. The photo was taken at 800 ASA with Canon's 70-200 f. 2.8 stabilized lens at 1/160 at F.14. I set the camera to shutter priority mode and wracked this zoom lens out to 200mm. I set the stabilizer to vertical mode to correct the up and down pitch of the boat.

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