Few things are more frustrating than a great dive with a pro-sumer camera. HDV is simply inadequate due to Inter-frame or I-Frame MPEG recording. And that’s only the beginning. Low-to-no color sampling [4:2:0 vs. 4:2:2], minuscule data rate (25Mbs vs. 100 Mbs), and use of mini-DV tape vs. tapeless workflow add to the nightmare, but most importantly HDV does not meet broadcast standards. HDV I-Frame compression compares groups of frames to determine the compression algorithm. [see below] That’s fine for a ‘talking head’ interview where very little changes frame-to-frame, but ask yourself the logical question. Is any frame of underwater video similar to the one prior? Much less the last 15-frames? Of course not, and so the results are substandard at best. DVCPRO is a professional broadcast format. Most importantly each frame is compressed separately. HDV is doomed to consumer cameras. As broadcast standards get more demanding HDV will be kicked to the curb, left at the dock.

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Want to shoot Pro High Definition? - Buy our rugged, balanced, high quality AquaVideo Marine Case for the Panasonic HVX-200 P2 camcorder. This is the first system to provide true production level, 24p 4:2:2 recording in a compact and affordable underwater package. Rated to depths of 50 meters/165 feet, it is easy to set up and easy to use. Did I mention quality??? See our HD PodCast or our store main page hd2o.tv or the clips below in this FLOG.

[caption id="attachment_907" align="alignright" width="288" caption="DVCPRO-HD ~ u/w housing for HVX-200 "][/caption]

Buy Our Rig: includes the housing and light kit; ships in a secure plastic bin. $3000.00 studio@hd2o.tv

Optics are designed to provide an extreme wide angle view – for dramatically clearer, more colorful underwater pictures. (The lens I use  - Century .75x bayonet specifically for the HVX200 - MSRP $1195) Glass dome port optical system (not acrylic) is optically neutral; corrects for distortions and aberrations and allows true lens-magnified macro and zoom-through without having to change lenses or optical setup. Stainless steel closure clamps, five front and five back, are quick and secure the 1″ acrylic end-plates with spring-loaded locking latches to prevent accidental opening. X-ring seals are highly reliable.

Controls to all major camera functions are on this rig to include; power, record trigger, zoom, focus, iris, mode, user 1, 2, 3, white balance, A/B presets, etc. About 48 lbs dry, this rig is small, self contained, rugged, and extremely agile in the soup. 10.75” diameter allows the camera?s LCD to be open and viewed through the clear backplate without glare. Velcro secures the battery pack for the SuperNova 250w 3400K HID light-kit. We use a 100GB FireStore FS-100 which also fits below the camera mounting plate, or use P2 cards.
Ships in a plastic bin; 16″x18″x24″.

HVX200 Camera, Century .75 lens mount, FireStore FS-100 are NOT included.  studio@hd2o.tv

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Intra- vs. Inter-frame compression facts :

[Wikipedia] Most compression systems used for acquisition in the digital cinematography world compress footage one frame at a time, as if a video stream is a series of still images. This is called intra-frame compression. Inter frame compression systems can further compress data by examining and eliminating redundancy between frames. This leads to higher compression ratios, but displaying a single frame will usually require the playback system to decompress a number of frames from before & after it. In normal playback this is not a problem, as each successive frame is played in order, so the preceding frames have already been decompressed. In editing, however, it is common to jump around to specific frames and to play footage backwards or at different speeds. Because of the need to decompress extra frames in these situations, inter-frame compression can cause performance problems for editing systems. Inter-frame compression is also disadvantageous because the loss of a single frame (say, due to a flaw writing data to a tape) will typically ruin all the frames until the next keyframe occurs. In the case of the HDV format, for instance, this may result in as many as 6 frames being lost with 720p recording, or 15 with 1080i recording [3]. An inter-frame compressed video stream consists of groups of pictures (GOPs), each of which has only one full frame, and a handful of other frames referring to this frame. If the full frame, called I-frame, is lost due to transmission or media error, none of the P-frames of B-frames (the referenced images) can be displayed. In this case, the whole GOP is lost.

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Could this be ‘yo mama’? Odds are she is ‘everybody mama‘!

After 15 years of rumors, researchers made public fossils from a 4.4 million-year-old human forebear they say reveals that our ancestors were more modern than scholars had assumed, widening the evolutionary gulf separating humankind from apes and chimpanzees.

You’ve got to see highlights of the extensive fossil trove, a female skeleton a million years older than the iconic bones of Lucy, the primitive female figure that has long symbolized humankind’s beginnings. One million years more human history? This throws a serious curve ball into the entire theory of human existence. Could there be even older human existence? Could ‘yo mama’ be the oldest? This is NOT the old human ever, because who was her mama?

An international research team led by paleoanthropologist Tim White at the University of California, Berkeley, unveiled on Thursday remains from 36 males, females and young of an ancient prehuman species called Ardipithecus ramidus.

Unearthed in the Awash region of Ethiopia starting in 1994. The creatures take their scientific name from the word for “root” in the local Afar language. They aren’t the oldest known fossils of hominids — as prehuman species and their relatives are called — but constitute the most complete set discovered so far.

Read on, see a slide show and interactive graphics via Wall Street Journal:

Fossils Shed New Light on Human Past.

Apple Computer - is well known for excellent engineering and that has never been more apparent than inside the multi-core Intel architecture inside the newest Mac Pro dubbed Nehalem. As a government contractor I have the honor of providing products and services within my specialties. Mac systems for video production is one of those areas. I just finished rocking out two (2) systems which are loaded to the gills. I’d like to tell you where they are going, but if I told you I’d have to kill ME!

Two identical systems to the one I have in my own studio and so I was entrusted to configure them for the military with components and software that would make anyone squeal with glee. Did I mention 16GB of RAM? Ya, that too, however this system has three RAM channels and share across all processors. Adding RAM to slot 4 will reduce the bandwidth speed on channel three and the RAM in slot four by half.  This can be a negative for programs like Color, Motion, but the full rack-o-RAM is a positive for running multiple programs at the same time. I will be curious to performed the bench tests with 12GB; my system has 16GB installed.  Get the scoop from the source:  “INTEL”

R U Looking for more MAC stuff? Use the search!

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Phantom HD GOLD - A camera specifically designed for demanding cinematographer.

Vision Research introduces the second-generation Phantom® HD GOLD. There are over 100 Phantoms in constant demand at major rental houses.

This camera is not a high-speed camera in the traditional sense, but an instrument that gives the cinematographer 35mm depth of field either at HD or 2K resolutions with stunning results. The Phantom HD GOLD combines the visual quality of high-definition imaging with ultra-high frame rates in a exquisite specialty camera.

When it’s TOO FAST TO SEE, TOO IMPORTANT TO NOT SEE.
A sense of time: Combine 35mm visual quality with super fast frame rates and extremely fast exposure and you’ve got a single camera for all shooting needs.

• 555 @ 2048 x 2048 true 2K
• 1,029 fps @ 2048 x 1104 (2k 1.85)
• 1052 fps @ 1920 x 1080
• 1500 fps @ 1280 x 720
• 4,410 fps @ 256 x 256 (scientific)
• Selectable 8- 10- 12- 14-bit pixel depth
• Six micro-second shutter
• On-camera controls

When your imaging requirement is a feature film or network broadcasting of rapidly moving sport events, commercials, music videos, nature documentary, monitoring a rocket launch, or innovative creative work on a specialty film project, the flexible and virtually limitless control of the Phantom will provide unforgettable, unmatched footage. Accepts 35mm PL-mount lenses and can use a Nikon F-mount.

Phantom HD GOLD allows any frame rate, from 1 to 1,000, in increments of one. Shift the frame rate to move the scene into a futuristic viewpoint. Or shift the frame rate a lot and the scene becomes a long-passing moment in ultra- slow motion. The camera’s shutter is variable to 1/500,000 of a second to combine with radically adjustable framing rates for seamless control of the duration, speed and time of a story element. The Phantom can be configured for “live” broadcast , NFL, or studio production with continuous video outputs (720p, 1080p, 1080i). Multiple triggering and recording modes are tailored to application including pre-roll.

See recent projects captured with a Phantom [ jump to view ]

The Phantom HD GOLD is available with 32 Gigabytes of internal memory, but this is just the start of methods to capture and store work. Hot-swappable, non-volatile, solid state recorders; Phantom CineMags, are low profile modules that mount snugly to the top of the camera body to store 256 or 512 Gigabytes each.

Serious Cinema Spoken Here!

HD PodCast - Got KIDS? Too bad.

Too bad more television shows are not produced for young kids. I hear complaints from parents who state most children programming is animation cartoon based. One DVD called The Reef has animated fish, but they don’t teach anything about the Ocean. The fish character speak English, have human-like roles, engage in social situations about every aspect of life with little to nothing about the reef or fishes. Have you ever seen a fish talk? So what is the educational message?

How about a television show about the Ocean in a format kids can enjoy? Young kids can’t experience the reef so let’s bring the reef to them.

Perhaps there is enough kids programming to satisfy the federal mandate, but few are designed to engage kids with science on their level or drive them to the local aquariums. Just more of the same after school cartoons. Boring…

With the exception of the host, this is a concept for kids. Unfortunately I missed the awesome opportunity to attend this year’s National Geographic Producers Workshop @ WGBN Boston. Gives my team a year to wait and hope we are selected next time. What a team!

• Host: Paul Dymon (temporary, cheap, stand-in for real talent)
• Voice of GOD: Bob Cummings (free labor)
• Announcer: Garry Lee Rosenberg (illegal alien)
• Music: (stolen from) Garry Lee Rosenberg
• ICE: Remote from Key West (slave labor)

NO ACT OF KINDNESS SHALL GO UNPUNISHED!

Best view is the HD PodCast on iTunes:  “CLICK” or try the pop-up player.

The second video is seven minutes filled with fun and laughs.

sub titled: Get your fat white ass outside of the cage with that hand full of chum for a real shark thrill!

Video Podcast - While researching the Hawaiian monk seal for a potential documentary with NOAA I stumbled on the ugly exploitation of sharks in the region. It is shocking to realize with all the research on sharks shark tours are becoming an even MORE popular visitor attraction. A recent scuba-moron to Oahu’s North Shore called it ‘exhilarating’. With an attitude, “I just wanted to do it once.” They headed for the hotel with a small polite group of Native Hawaiians on their heels. They were explaining to the fat backsides that Hawaiians consider the shark to be ancestral Gods. Feeding them for entertainment is disrespectful to their culture. Heck, it’s disrespectful to all things in the Ocean, in food chain and the ecological balance. Hawaiians and Hawley alike want the operators to stop.

To be clear: There is nothing wrong, in fact it is smart to use a shark cage. It is very wrong when a dive operator is feeding sharks for people in a cage.

[caption id="attachment_582" align="alignright" width="280" caption="No food today? Let's head to the beach for a bite."][/caption]

Surfers and environmentalists fear the tours will teach sharks to associate people with food. When the sharks don’t find tourists in the little ‘happy meal’ steel cage what do you think will happen next?  While the tourists watch the news from the Lazy Boy some surfer or diver will be missing a limb. The sad part is sharks don’t even like the taste of human, but when confused and taunted the shark will snap and strike at anything.

Sharks sit at the APEX of the World Food Chain. Sharks will gather in areas of tour feeding. The additional shark population will also create great competition for natural prey and cause stress or deplete other marine life in the process.  But that’s of little concern to the impatient tourist who wants a rush right now.  Want a rush? Go down without a cage, see how a shark reacts to a hand full of chum.  Oh, that isn’t as pleasurable? The disrespect may seem temporary by the ‘only once’ gang o’ fools but the damage lives on long after the thrill is gone.

Joe Pavsek, owner of North Shore Shark Adventures, said, “If you read the law, you’ll understand that I’m not breaking any laws.”  (Dhaaaa, why am I an idiot?)  Just because you can doesn’t mean you should. Joe Pavsek then revealed this jewel, “We don’t have to feed the sharks. We do it for the customers.” That’s why Joe is an idiot. What would be wrong with the anticipation that you might be lucky and see a shark? Not stimulating enough for an over-stimulated couch potato. The same potatos think they are great athletes because of their dozens of hours with a video game.

More than 400 Hawaiian residents packed a town hall meeting and successfully launched the anti-shark tour movement. State lawmakers have vowed to draft legislation to shut down the tours. Listen to world renowned underwater photographer Stephen Frink has to say about the state of this magical animal.

 

 Legendary Photographer Stephen Frink on Sharks: Play Now | Play in Popup

For the record: Federal law clearly prohibits feeding sharks 200 miles off Hawaii to include the Pacific territories and Samoa. The only exceptions are made for fishermen who harvest them for food, and scientific research for the benefit of the shark.

Ever hear of unintended consequences? Joe is dead wrong and needs to be stopped before someone innocent is declared dead right.

It’s not nice to fool with Mother Nature!

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CREATIVE ASSIGNMENT: CAN Prevent wants people to feel empowered to stop child abuse. Click the logo for the task force web site.

YOU CAN make a difference. We are urging people to report child abuse if the see it, sense it or know it. Help kids and families get education and support to stop the cycle of violence that child abuse causes.

LVHD produced a 30-second awareness campaign for the task force. Music and lounge act provided by Garry Lee Rosenberg really draws attention in a new way to an old problem. He uses a classic song with a snappy melody and adds a lyrical twist to create an original timeless message. Sticky Message stays with you.

A couple quick videos showing the modular design, quality engineering, and ease of access inside our brand new Mac Pro 8-core Nehalen machine. [Click the image to see this machine on Apple's web site.]

• Yes it is super fast when compared to our former workstation.
• No you cannot have the old machine. Macs don’t retire.

The machine formerly known as “The G5″ has plenty of life now serving as our audio workstation, so our audio workstation is capable of posting HD should we need it, while providing a nice step up in sound design.

• Each clip is a bit over two minutes.
• It’s a GREEN machine, very energy efficient.

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Four years ago a computer engineer with the military, was in my studio poking my new Mac workstation.

“To me they’re tools not toys.”

The latest and greatest at that time from Apple wasn’t super impressive. His project was built on the Apple architecture; 1028 machine networked processors; they too were using Ultra-SCSI 320 dual channel RAIDs for super computing. I was impressed. At that time he spoke of the future, he told of an 8-Core system; code name “Nehalem”. He also told me I should shave my soul patch and get in shape. Can you imagine?

Click to continue reading "Review: Apple Mac Pro"

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