Video is for the birds

I am working on a wedding video. I have been working on said wedding video for months.
I have never encountered so many technical difficulties and bizarre error messages like I have on this video.

I have spent countless hours on this video. I would say probably 80-100 hours without any hesitation or exaggeration. I was within reach of being done. I mean, one evenings worth of work left and it would be finished.

I left the video for two weeks while I started the show I am working on. But this weekend I thought I would get back at it and finish. Well guess what. The files wouldn't work. They wouldn't open. "The project could not be loaded, it may be damaged or contain outdated elements." Ceremony GONE.
I spent that whole night working on fixing it. Googling the error message. Trying what it suggested. Install, uninstall. I even tried installing it on my lap top as a last resort. NO GO.

So I have asked everyone I know for help over the last few days. Everyone has horror stories.

Tonight. I got back in the saddle. Still gone. Oh well. Go to the other file - the before the wedding getting ready. At the very least I will export the video and have that one in my hand. It opened the file no problem - but wait - the file is empty. What do you mean empty - there is nothing in it - it is like I opened a new project!
Are you kidding me. #$#%#%#*&%$@#*&(#%$&@(#$*&!@#(!*$)*^%$&#*(@(#$*%&$#@*!(*#&$%$#*&$%^$
Okay. So I had a little cry over it. No big deal.

I google some more.

I restore my computer to the day before I finished the file.

Still no go.

I text Jason (we are working on the wedding together) "all is lost. I give up"

He texts back an equally optomistic responce as I search "recover" for the tenth time.

BINGO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I guess the restore brought up auto saved files.

I now have both files. I have backed them up on both of my external hard drives and on my CPU.

I am very happy right now (and exhausted over all of the anguish that it cost).
Only another eight hours wasted with no results.
At least I don't have to start from scratch!

Charlie Houdini and HO2008-1747

Our plan for little Charlie while we are away from the house has been a Pet Pen.  This is a 16' length of fence that is 2' tall and in 2' sections.  You can create a wall or a square or a circle, all designed to keep your puppy where he should be.  Well that little monkey.  He has figured out how to climb over it.  It is the cutest little thing - he looks very human like.  He did this once outside while we were building the fence.  We saw him climbing but not higher than the first rung.  Then later he was out.  Having not seen him escape we thought maybe through the bush we were using as the other side of the wall.

Today, I left for work and put him in his little circle in the kitchen with all of his accoutrement.  When Logan stopped by on his lunch to let him out - he had let himself out and was upstairs.  He had made his way to his favorite spot in our whole house, the nook at the end of our bed beside the hope chest.  Little turd.  

Our first line of defence is to remove the angles and just pen a straight line across the opening of the kitchen to the living room.  This will give him access to the whole kitchen - but may make it more difficult to climb.  We will see.

In other news.  It may seem like a long time since I have talked about my little business since the new house and new puppy.  But today I sat at City Hall for over 2 hours to get myself a Home Occupation Permit.  Glass Imagery is officially a business.  Up next - the launch of my web site!

Feels like...forever

Sarah got married June 23rd. It is October 30th. And I am still working on her wedding video. Keeping in mind that I was still working on Lindsay and Dan's video until not long before Thanksgiving. But it feels like I have been working on it forever. I would write up a longer blog but I have been on the computer all night and am bored.

Name and Logo

I have been playing more seriously with the idea of my own little videography company. I guess I have decided on the name Glass Imagery from a post of long ago . This is my first mock up of a potential logo.

What do you think? This is just my art. I will talk to some other "creative" folks to get some opinions. And Logan has a few good ideas we will try. Let me know what you actually think.

Day Nine of Nine

Today is my last day off before I just back into the crazy, and all consuming live of theatre. I am excited and nervous to start up with Lunchbox and don't feel like I have prepared enough. Oh well. That is what they are paying me for next week. That and I have had to much fun slacking off this week.

Derek and Rory were in town this weekend. We went out for breakfast yesterday after an interesting game of run around as they tried to secure tickets to the Riders / Stamps game. We drove them to the game and they seemed to enjoy themselves. The game didn't go well - but they did discover why people from Sask can drink. They need to in order to make it thru a game.

We went out for dinner and then the three of us drove Logan to work. I have never been in a cop car so he grabbed some keys and let us hop in. He wasn't on duty yet so we couldn't take it out for a drive or log onto their in car computer system - but it was still cool.

Then we headed out to Wildwood for a drink where the three of us ordered the sample tray of all of the beers that they brew. It was fun to compare and sip and discuss the flavours. Stef, Jason, Tyler and Raveigh joined us for a bit. Back to our place for a quick game of Wii and then had to put the pooped travellers to bed.

Today I want to finish up all the things that I really didn't get around to like I had planned. Let us review the checklist

- Prepare for starting prep week at Lunchbox Theatre
- Sew slip cover for the Haughey's pink and purple couch
- Complete Sarah and Tyler's Wedding Video

Okay, I did prepare a bit. Reread the opening of a guide to create my checklists for starting at a new theatre. Had the script emailed to me. Contacted equity (the theatre professionals association) to learn how much money I had to give them in order to work but for them to do nothing for me. But I didn't organize my shit - my literal stationary, binders etc to see what I need to replace. It is like starting school again.

I did complete the slip cover for the couch. And it looks really good I might add. It did take me three 8 hour sessions (including fabric shopping). But it is complete. One check mark for me!

I am not even close to finishing Sarah's wedding video. I have completed their Getting Ready segment. It will certainly be the hardest part because I captured almost two hours of video between the salon and her house. I got it down to 22 minutes. That is pretty damn good if I do say so myself.

I guess I did enough. Entertained, created and enjoyed. Couldn't ask for much more.

Day Two

Today is the second day of nine days off before I go back to my actual job, my career, what I have worked toward for so long, the reason I have to go thru summers of crap.

So far, yesterday, I uploaded Sarah's wedding onto the computer and solved major problem that has been haunting the stupid thing for weeks. My editing program auto saved three files that were each 10Gb to the hard drive. Deleting those saved almost half of the memory space. We also went out to Original Joes for drinks.

Today I did the laundry and hung out with Logan during the day. We did a little searching on the web for homes for sale. We looked at stuff downtown and places out by his district office (very far away from downtown. The express bus takes 30 min). For the same absurd amount of money we can buy a two bedroom house with garage or apartment style condo of 800 sq ft. Depressing. I think we will stay put for a little longer.

I have begun editing Sarah's Wedding and hope to complete it by the end of my 9 days.

Checklist for my time off:
- Prepare for starting prep week at Lunchbox Theatre
- Sew slip cover for the Haughey's pink and purple couch
- Complete Sarah and Tyler's Wedding Video

We will see how she goes.

Nights at home

When Logan works nights I get to come home to an empty apartment. I am not really a fan. He has the car and I have an evening alone. I am catching up on my tv, and on blog ready. I have also done some misc searches on the net. But I am bored. I guess it is just me and my editing. But I am mad at it right now cause I can't get it to burn onto disc. It is not much use on my computer.

Ceremony complete!

Of the four weddings I have edited thus far I have always started with the Ceremony. This is mostly because it is the most important part of the whole day and I want to give it that extra energy that comes with starting a project. I am happy to report that it is complete. The sound quality is not great but I tried to even it out. And there are some shaky moments. But it is all there. And I happen to like it - if I do say so myself.

What next? Hard to say. We will see what tickles my fancy when I open up the program.

New video whoas

As I mentioned in a previous blog, Logan's sister Lindsay was married on the long weekend. I now have a brother-in-law.
While at that wedding I had a number of jobs - most importantly was the job of stage manager. But I will not blog about that.
The other was self imposed. I took two video cameras and attempted to practice being a videographer. This is easier said than done when you have a million other things to be worried about. (I had some great help from Stef and Tyler!)
But now we are home and I am back to editing. You all remember those days of old when I would complain about the troubles I was having with my own wedding footage. Well let the complaining begin again.
My first complaint is about lighting. At the church it was pretty dark - except for the windows that are right behind the band and the readers - thus creating great silhouettes but no good shots. The second is about sound. Both camera angles are producing crap sound with muddled words or terrible hiss.
But I do still love doing it. Frustration and all.