The trailers of two feature films both shot with the RED One camera: “Che“, and “Knowing“. Che feels more like a documentary, while Knowing feels more like a real Hollywood movie. It’s good to see digital taking over film cameras little by little.

Interestingly, viewing these films, they don’t always have very shallow depth of field — certainly not as much as 35mm adapters attached to cheap-ass consumer camcorders have. They feel much more natural, and yet, they still don’t look like home video. That’s because the composition of the scene, the lighting, dynamic range, and grading, are more important than just a shallow DoF scene. Another thing that bugs me with 35mm adapter footage on places like Vimeo, is the fact that 95% of them are just tests. Test this, test that. No footage of value to speak of. So why buy them then?

Geeks.com, sent over two interesting gadgets for a review, one that geeks will find interesting, and one that videographers will.

* 9″ Axion AXN-6090A Widescreen Portable DVD Player

This portable DVD player comes at the very affordable price of $70. It has a 9″ widescreen but low resolution LCD, and it can play NTSC DVDs. It has AV in/out support and cables, a battery, and a remote control. The device is amazingly cheaply made, the case is probably one of the few gadgets I’ve ever reviewed that feels so cheap and fake. However, so far, the device has hold together and its software hasn’t outright crashed.

There are some buttons on the device itself to control DVD playback, brightness and volume, but you will find more setup and menu options by using the remote control. This means that if you ever lose the remote control, you will lose a large part of options. Regarding compatibility, I found that the DVD player was unable to playback the double-sided DVD “Drowning Mona”. It did play single-sided DVDs though. I wouldn’t be surprised if the player had trouble reading home-made dual layer DVDs, but I had none to try out.

Visual quality is pretty bad when playing back the DVD, as the LCD is low-res. While the video picture itself is manageable (your eyes will probably get used to it after a few minutes), the subtitles are almost unreadable because of the low-res — and that’s a real problem.

However, this DVD player can have another, more useful usage: as external monitor on camcorders with 35mm adapters. The player has A/V-in support, so you just connect your camcorder’s female AV cable to this player’s male AV cable and you are good to go. Many in the videography scene use the Sony DVP-FX820 model that can rotate its screen, and has a high res LCD. However, I found that the difference in visual quality between the two monitors, when using the AV cable, is minimal! Sure, Sony’s LCD is still a bit better, but not by much.

A small problem is the large battery that extend on the back of the device quite a bit. The battery can playback a two-hour movie fine, and can serve up to 3+ hours as an external monitor. A car adapter is included. As for the weight, it’s almost the same between the two monitors. Regarding the overscan that screens usually do to the incoming video feed, the Axion monitor “sees” a tiny bit more horizontally than the HV20 LCD does, and about the same vertically. The Sony monitor can “see” much more of the area that’s been recorded recorded, both horizontally and vertically.

Overall, this device is pretty bad as a portable DVD player, but if you are a budget-conscious videographer who is handy with tools and can create a custom tripod stand for this device, and doesn’t need screen rotation (or you can use rails that mount the camera rotated instead), then this is not a bad deal at all. For $70, the Axion is $100 less than the Sony monitor, so you got to ask yourself if screen rotation, and marginally better battery life and RCA quality is worth the extra cash for you. Geeks also sells some other DVD players that can act as external monitors (with some googling you can easily find which ones have AV-in).

* Bluetooth v2.0 Class 2 Mini USB Dongle

This is my favorite Bluetooth dongle of all times. It’s so incredibly small that never looks ugly by sticking out as most dongles do. This small dongle is ideal for those who have netbooks that come without Bluetooth, like the Acer Aspire One and most of the Eee PC models. It’s a class 2 dongle, so up to 6 meters reception was good with my Ubuntu netbook. If you own a netbook, or a laptop without Bluetooth, this is a must have!

We went to a party of my husband’s team tonight, had some good time. Most of the Google Android engineers were there, so it was nice to meet new people, and see some old friends too from the BeOS days (lots of ex-Be engineers seem to work for Android). I quickly met with Andy Rubin too, the founder of Android, and co-founder of Danger.

In the news today there’s this major scientific research about mind reading. The scientists behind it believe that in 10 years time, casual mind reading will be possible. In 50 years, you probably won’t be able to lie anymore, to anyone — not just the cops.

What do you think of a society where telepathy is the de facto way to communicate and not your vocal cords? Terrorism, crimes, will be in the minimum. Even drunk drivers would be able to be stopped before even turn on their car engine. Everyone will be able to live a life where the fellow man is not a con-man or a murderer, because the bad apples would be already “taken care of” early on.

Personal achievements will still be yours, because if you were the first to create something, no one can lie about it and claim that it was his/her invention — but the fruits of your labor would be shared with everyone. This would be true for art, literature, science…

On the other hand, you will have no privacy. Every thought of yours, no matter how embarrassing might be (at least as our current social system thinks of it as embarrassing), every memory of yours, will be shared with the whole. You will be like an ant, working for everyone else.

But is this really bad? What if this is the next step for humanity or any other advanced civilization? Political systems, family, religion, social reforms all have FAILED to create a danger-free society. People still rob houses, people still kill others, people still try to cheat the system, people still lie every day, even to their loved ones.

The reason why this piece of news touched me is because of this experience of mine, about 10 years ago. At least for the hour that I was “under”, I experienced this so-called telepathy-based (authoritarian) society, but all I could feel throughout the session was loneliness. So I am a bit in the middle of the pack regarding this matter.

So what do you think? Would you trade your privacy, and the right to own your thoughts, for a safer society? I mean, shitting on a in-house toilet might sound the right thing to you, but up to 100 years ago was a ludicrous idea for many places in the world, and a laughing matter too. So before you start replying like a hot headed redneck, think both sides of the story first.

* You know how I know that we are in a recession? This is the first year that SciFi Channel didn’t produce a mini-TV series for December, as they traditionally do.

* In last night’s “UFO Hunters” episode, the 1997 Phoenix Lights sighting was investigated. The Phoenix Lights is the most blatant appearance of a UFO over a large population — even the (ex-pilot) governor of Arizona saw the humongous object that night over Phoenix. However, something stroke me at the end of the episode. You see, the producer of the show, Bill Birnes, is a blind believer on UFOs. He runs the UFO Magazine and more often than not he jumps to quick and otherwordly conclusions (something that’s not true with his collegues: the level-headed and all around very cool guy Pat Uskert who I interviewed back in April, and the ex-Nasa scientist, skeptic and real hot Dr. Ted Acworth). So basically, this is a show that has a… professional blind believer, an open minded guy from next door, and a skeptic scientist running it — which is why I like the show. Now, at the end of the show, Ted (the skeptic) said that there’s something more is going on with these lights, Pat believed that this is indeed an alien UFO, and Bill said that… this was an experimental military vehicle. And this was curious to me, how this major sighting, with hundreds of people that saw it and recorded it, the most solid mass experience in the history of UFOs, is just a “military vehicle” according to the blind believer, Bill. And then it hit me. I realized that the whole thrill of conspiracies and UFOs has its base exactly in the mystery about them. From the moment you make the phenomena “common”, where everyone can see a UFO, or believe in it, or even if the government comes out and says “yes, there are aliens visiting this planet”, the whole mystery goes away. And people like Bill are mystery and thrill seekers, they are not there to find the truth about the phenomena, but to satisfy their own psyche! If aliens were to be revealed to us, Bill would be devastated! This reminds me a lot of the “Twin Peaks” TV show. No matter how much people were crying out to the writers to reveal the mysteries, when that happened, the ratings went down, everyone stopped watching the show. Everyone was on board for the mystery, no matter if they THOUGHT they wanted the truth. They didn’t.

* “Heroes” is a fucking mess. So Sylar kills Nathan/Pete’s father with a fucking bullet? Why not stop the fucking bullet, take his brains out so he can take his powers? Sylar is a power-seeker, and the father is the most powerful villain, so why not use him? The writers of Heroes need to be fired. All of them. I hear that Pushing Daisies’ writer Brian Fuller is back to the show, but it’s too late now. And Hiro losing the “light” immediately after getting it? Why not the guy stealing it before Hiro got there if it was that easy? And how was Claire able to get back to the Nakamura house so easily? This show needs to be canceled. Now. They create a show for geeks, but the show is not written by geeks, and so details like this are easily observed by most of us. It’s like trying to sell to Jay Leno a racing car that was designed by novelists instead of engineers.

As I wrote at the blog of Stormrider, I don’t support the current riots. The rioters simply wanted a reason to just go out and have some raw fun at the expense of other people’s properties. The policeman who shot the kid might have been wrong, but this doesn’t mean that you riot over a single person’s bad decision. Bad decisions that cost lives happen every day, everywhere. The way you fix that is by taking the case to the court. That’s how things are done properly without more people getting hurt or losing their life’s worth of sweat. I am a very liberal person, libertarian at some points too, but not a violent anarchist.

Commenting is back. Unless I remove it again… Additionally, RSS now will only show a summary and not the full text. You will have to come and read the post on this site to get the full text. The reason I did that is because more often than not I update my blog posts, but most of the web RSS readers don’t refresh the posts to show the changes. I hate that, sorry. Besides, there are no ads in this blog, so I don’t do it for any such purpose. Finally, I have enabled gzip support, so this blog should now load faster.

Update: With the help of Adam, now the RSS feed is full again, but it will have 1 hour delay before it publishes the newest posts from this blog. This will give me enough time to catch & fix potential typos in the posts before you get it on your RSS reader.

Update 2: It only took a day for the comment section to piss me off and interfere with my life, so they are now closed again, and never going to open again.

“316” is the title of episode 7 from the 5th season of “Lost” that returns on TV this coming January. But what does it mean? “Lost” is full of such puzzles of course, and that’s its whole beauty. Now, there are two ways to go at the problem. We can either take the 316 number as a number, or as a meaning.

If were to take the 316 as a number, we need to find a formula to fit it in the 4 8 15 16 23 42 numbers, as these are the mysterious numbers that every Lost fan learned to love. Unfortunately, I haven’t found a formula about it. If we take the numbers as a meaning instead, and searching on Google for it, doesn’t return anything of value.

Maybe some back-reading would help. Episode 6 is called “The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham”. This is John Locke’s story under the pseudonym of “Jeremy Bentham”, after he came back to civilization from the island and had to conceal his true identity. During that episode, we see how Locke is killed (this is not a spoiler, we already know he’s dead, and in a coffin).

So, what if we try to see the 316 number with a religious subcontext? Religion won’t be the first time Lost is using it for its puzzles. So, this is what John 3:16 says in the Bible:

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

So I think that this episode has to do with the resurrection of John Locke, back in the island. Besides, the actor still has a contract with the show. 😉

Sawyer is my favorite character on “Lost”, mostly because he has such funny lines, delivering them while he’s dead serious. Sawyer has a southern, almost redneck, accent, that makes his performance even funnier. The following quotes are taking place in the island their plane wrecked, and in the jungle, far from the civilization.

Locke: Does any of this look familiar from when you were coming back?
Sawyer: Well, yeah, there’s my favorite leaf. How could I forget this place?

Sawyer: Put your mangos where your mouth is.

Sawyer (sarcastically): So, a tribe of evil natives planted a ringer in the camp to kidnap a pregnant girl and a reject from the VH1 has-beens. Yeah, fiendishly clever.

Jack: Where’s Locke?
Sawyer: I don’t know. I think he said something about going to the store for a pack of smokes.

Sawyer: Doctor playing golf. Woo, boy howdy, now I’ve heard everything. What’s next, cop eating a donut?

(Sawyer just shot a polar bear)
Kate: Where did that come from?
Sawyer: Bear Village. How the hell am I supposed to know?

Jack: You know how to handle a gun or not?
Sawyer: Well, I know at least of one polar bear that seems to think so.

Jack: Sawyer…
Sawyer: One second, I’m like this close to the high score on Donkey Kong.

Hurley: Did that bird just say my name?
Sawyer: Yeah, it did. Right before it crapped gold.

Ana-Lucia: Shut up. When I tell you to do something, you do it… I say move, you move… I say stop, you stop. I say jump, what do you say?
Sawyer: You first.

(Sawyer is asking Kate for a kiss)
Kate: Are you serious?
Sawyer: Baby, I am tied to a tree in the jungle of mystery. I just got tortured by a damn spinal surgeon and a genuine Iraqi. Of course I’m serious. Hell, it’s only first base.

(Ben shot Locke with a gun, but Locke keeps protecting Ben)
Locke: Apart from his mouth, he’s completely harmless.
Sawyer: His mouth put that hole in your gut?

Sawyer: Brother, you gotta wake up and smell the goat crap here.

Sawyer: I don’t know if you Islams got a concept of karma, but I get the sense this island just served you up a heapin’ platter of cosmic payback.

Jack (angry): Get up.
Sawyer: Why, you wanna see who’s taller?

Sawyer: My uncle. He uh… died of a brain tumor.
Jack: What type of tumor was it?
Sawyer: The type that kills you.

(Sawyer has headaches)
Kate: That’s it, get up.
Sawyer: What?
Kate: Get up. You’re going to Jack [the doctor].
Sawyer: Do I get a lollipop?
(Scene switches to the caves where Jack diagnoses Sawyer)
Jack: Have you ever had a blood transfusion?
Sawyer: What? No.
Jack: Taken pills for malaria?
Sawyer: Nope.
Jack: Have you ever had sex with a prostitute?
Sawyer: …..What the hell has that got to do with anything?
Jack: Is that a yes?
Sawyer: Yes.
Jack: Have you ever contracted a sexually transmitted disease? [Sawyer doesn’t respond] I’m going to take that as another yes. When was the last outbreak?
Sawyer: Go to hell, Doc.
[Sawyer leaves the scene, annoyed]
Kate: I know he deserved it, but…
Jack: He just needs glasses.
(Jack goes back to the beach to find Sawyer)
Sawyer: If you’re looking for a stool sample, you can forget it…

Van Blumreich is one of my favorite indie directors. His “Imprint” short story was amazing and could easily expand in a full featured movie. His music videos are an example of inventive camera work and ideas too. This week Van will release another short movie, named “Fury“, so it’s a good timing to grab a Q&A with him.

1. Tell us about Fury. How did the idea came to be? How long is the film?

Fury is a coming-of-age story about morality and adolescence. It focuses on the relationship between two friends, Scott and Danny, who are faced with a difficult decision after hitting a homeless man while driving under the influence. The idea came from a CNN article I read about teen sport killing that really shocked me. I wondered, “What could cause these suburban kids to lash out so violently”? I thought it would be a provocative issue to explore. That article, along with the John Knowles novel “A Separate Peace” were the starting points of inspiration. I really wanted to tell a story that reflected the confused morality that is seemingly rampant among kids today.

The film runs about 25 minutes.

2. Why the RED instead of an EX1 or DVX with an adapter? Did you buy the RED camera or rent it?

Ever since the RED came out, I really wanted to get my hands on it. Just the latitude on the camera is astounding, and the ability to shoot in 4K attracted me in case of a film-out later on. It’s a little out of my price range at the moment, so I rented from Rick Darge, a RED camera operator I met on the DVXUser forums. He liked my previous short film (Imprint) and so I flew him down to work on Fury. We became good friends and worked well together on set.

3. What are your thoughts on the new RED announcements? What cameras do you own/play with?

I’m definitely interested in the new Scarlet camera. I’m curious to see how it performs. I think what the RED guys are doing is very cool, breaking down their cameras and offering components so that you aren’t left with an obsolete camera down the line.

I own a Pansonic HVX200 and a Redrock Micro 35mm Adapter. It’s been a very trustworthy camera. I’d really like to upgrade to the Panasonic HPX170 down the road. It handles noise better and includes a built-in Waveform Monitor and Vectorscope.

4. I am sure you heard about the success of the HV20 and HV30 in the amateur artistic videography scene. What do you think about these sub-$1000 cameras?

I think they are great. They really allow people to create great looking content at an affordable price. I think if the final product is just going to be showcased on the web, these cameras can do amazing things. It’s when you want to blow it up to film or project it on a screen that I think the illusion wears off. But still, I think they are great cameras to learn on but definitely have limitations.

5. You’ve done both, so how different is artistically a music video to a short movie?

They are similar in some regards, but I feel that the processes differ in that music videos are more focused on what’s happening externally and films are focused more on what’s happening internally. With music videos, you convey feelings and emotions more through the images, colors, and music. With film, I think the feelings and emotions are more causal, coming more from the relationships between people. I think it’s important to understand this difference, because a lot of music video directors go on to direct films and end up with movies that are great to look at but missing that internal focus.

6. Did you have to secure locations, get permits for Fury? Or was it easier than that?

We secured almost all locations for Fury. I learned from experience that unsecured locations can be a huge headache, especially when they try to shut you down in the middle of shooting. We had a security guard call the cops on us before and I had to plead with him to let us go. So this time around, I worked with the Houston Film Commission and contacted all the right people concerning permits and such. It is sort of a time-consuming process, but saves you from getting trouble. But I still find the philosophy of “it’s better to ask for forgiveness than permission” very true in some cases.

7. What do you think of using Creative Commons Attribution licensed music for your films?

I think it’s a nice affordable option, but I personally like collaborating with someone who can create original music for my work. But if a particular piece was perfect for my film, then I might consider using it.

8. I read that you helped out NBC during the Olympics, in China. What was your experience?

It was an unbelievable experience. I studied abroad in Beijing and was dying to go back for the Olympics. Luckily, the universe conspired in helping me get there. I assisted with the NBC Today Show. It’s kind of hard to describe in words, the whole experience, but it was definitely a once in a lifetime opportunity. I made some good contacts from it, and plan to go back soon and do some narrative work.

Thanks Van!