Final Cut User

  Matthew Bennett(Matthew’s site) posted some amazing tests with a DVX and Andromeda kit to achieve 1000fps.Check the vid here. 1000fps Andromeda Hack.Matthew is a editor/motion graphics designer in Toronto who has been shooting tests with the DVX Andromeda mod ,  EX1 and RED One . The test looks super smooth and man makes you want to get working with some cameras like this. Some still shots and clips are also at  REDUSER that Matthew has posted.Original post on Reel stream forumsforum link, by the way  anybody know what happened to them. (reelstream)?    Edit: Seems Matthew had fun with AE and some slow acting so it is actually not a hack at all and was faked . Ah Matt is looks good anyway . You got me .Per Matt fourm post.

My first post was a fraud… that clip was faked with slow acting, AE’s timewarp filter, compositing and particles in AE. 

The idea popped into my head to post it with that story, and I couldn’t resist. 

The phantom hd camera has been my wet dream lately, so I thought I’d just try and do a simulation with the andro. I guess it sounded plausible, though, no? 

Anyway, to get a ‘1000fps’ faked effect, you can use these shots as a reference. Like say for the cereal shot, I shot myself with the open boxes, and moved very slowly, shooting at 23.98. I rendered that in sculptor, took it into AE 8.0, and applied the timewarp filter to slow it down to 25 percent. Timewarp draws new interpolation frames, to further smooth out my already slow-mo acting. Then, I used trapcode’s particular to create a stream of ‘cereal’ particles, and composited that into the shot, using masks and duplicate layers to hide the birthplace of the particular stream. Voila, simulated 1000fps. 

Apple has released the 10.5.4 update for Leopard with a bunch of updates and fixes under the hood. As always if your mid project or do not need a current fix wait for the poor souls eager enough to jump on the new updates. If you have a test machine then go for it. My usual steps are to clone my drive before an update, disconnect all external devices except the keyboard and mouse, get the update via the web download on Apple’s site versus the software updater(there are a few different builds when updates come out) and repair permissions as a just-in case. 

Additional Information

What’s included?

The 10.5.4 Update is recommended for all users running Mac OS X Leopard and includes general operating system fixes that enhance the stability, compatibility and security of your Mac.

General

• Includes recent Apple security updates.
• Resolves an issue with saving and reopening Adobe Creative Suite 3 files on a remote server.
• Includes additional RAW image support for several cameras.
• Addresses an issue that may result in a partially installed X11 application.
• Improves L2TP VPN client reliability.

AirPort

• Addresses AirPort reliability issues with 5GHz networks.
• Addresses AirPort issues that may result in slower performance in Logic Studio or MainStage.

iCal

• Improves overall iCal reliability for meeting requests, cancellation notices, delegation, and syncing with iPhone.
• Resolves an issue that prevents deleting an iCal event without notifying the creator.
• Addresses an issue in which events in all calendars affect availability.  A checkbox now enables information-only calendars to be transparent from free/busy lookups.
• Resolves a UI issue preventing delegated calendars from showing up as a separate window.
• Addresses an issue with copying and pasting attendees from one event to another.
• Resolves an issue in which iCal may not delete events after a specified time interval, even when set to do so in iCal preferences.
• Addresses an issue in which To Dos cannot be marked private.

Safari

• Addresses a potential performance issue when loading secure web pages.
• Resolves issues that may be encountered when accessing secure web pages with client certificates that reside on a smart card.

Spaces and Exposé

• Addresses an issue in which switching from a space with a Finder window keeps the Finder as the active application instead of the application residing in the destination space.
• Fixes an issue in which dragging an application from the list of application assignments in Spaces System Preferences does not assign the application to the desired space.
• Resolves an Exposé issue that may result in only a subset of windows being shown.

   Apple K base article on the update.

  It seems like this past week we lost some amazing people now George Carlin. Like him our not he was not afraid to speak up and say what was on his mind.He was really funny in alot of his roles in movies and tv. I can remember sneaking out to my living room at night to watch his HBO specials when I was younger. RIP George we will miss you . It seems like we always loose good people in 3’s .

 Media Temple which happens to be my hosting of choice for all my sites has gone and done something really cool and set up a beta(private) you can sign up for .(You have to have Mac Sever experience and 10.5 server knowledge). Since TUAW has the skinny on it no need to copy and paste so I will put the links up for Media Temple and Tuaw story. If you are looking at hosting your own server or just some services then check this out very cool things being done with Apple software and dev teams at Media Temple. Media Temple Beta Overview  TUAW Story 

Stan Winston, an Oscar-winning visual effects artist, has died at age 62.

Winston died at home Sunday evening after a seven-year struggle with multiple myeloma, according to a rep from Stan Winston Studio.

“Stan died peacefully at home surrounded by family,” a spokeswoman said.

Winston won three visual effects Oscars and earned multiple nominations. His first Oscar was for James Cameron’s “Aliens” (1986). Winston later won for “Terminator 2: Judgment Day” (1992) and 1993’s “Jurassic Park.“

original link via 

LA TIMES

I’ve been all over the place, going from feature to feature lately, but I have a pile of reviews on my desk that I’ll be filtering in over the next week or two.  

Including
The New LaCie 4x external Blu-ray Burner
Zacuto Z Riser
Redrock Micro X 
Redrock Support System 
Redrock Mattebox (in the near future)
MOTU V4HD (in the near future) 

One book I can’t wait to get my hands on is Ron Brinkman’s Second edition mega book  The Art and Science of Digital Compositing  Amazon Link . Ron has been in the compositing software game for a while being part of original Sony Imageworks employees then co founding Nothing Real which if you have followed Apple and compositing software Nothing Real created Shake which was then bought by Apple .I was fortunate enough to finally meet Ron and NAB and he couldn’t have been a more pleasant guy to talk to . Ron left Apple little over a year ago(similar when Shake stopped getting updates) and he is now working with The Foundry on Nuke(amazing compositing software).If you need some summer reading I would have to say pick up this book as Ron describes it this is the book he had wished he could have made with Vol 1 because of the updates to high quality photo printing . So if you are serious or interested in getting into visual effects as a career and need some knowledge pick up this book when it comes out .(seems shipments have been pushed back a few weeks to 1st week of July )Oldie but goodie interview back from 2002 with Ron done by Mike Seymour at Fxguide.com  Fxguide interview Ron’s Blog

Apple just released 10.5.3(420 mb download) as always be careful to jump right on it and let others go through the heartache of learning what is broken/fixed. Never update a production machine  during a project especially quicktime updates .One thing I always do is I never touch software updater I always go out to the combo updater from the Apple website . Why? Because each update is a little different(delta/combo) from the updater to the download from the support page and knock wood have not had any issues in a long time from doing the combo updater from Apple.

As for the 10.5.3 update this is what Apple says on it.The Mac OS X 10.5.3 Update is recommended for Mac OS X 10.5, 10.5.1, and 10.5.2 Leopard. It includes general operating system improvements that enhance the stability, compatibility, and security of your Mac. For detailed information about security updates, please visit this website. Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard is packed with over 300 new features, installs easily, and works with the software and accessories you already have.  Kbase article

Bug fixes to be focused on :

• Audio Applications
• Video Applications
• 802.1X
• Active Directory/Directory Services
• AirPort
• Back To My Mac
• Graphics
• Installer
• Mail
• Spaces
• Time Machine

As always BACK UP YOUR MACHINE REGULARLY its your own fault in this day and age if your not backing up your systems. Drives are dirt cheap and with Time Machine and a slew of other applications like Carbon Copy Cloner and Super Duper there is no excuse not to have some workflow in place.

Quick note Adobe has added more to their great beta offerings this time with Soundbooth,Dreamweaver and Fireworks. I am a big Soundtrack Pro guy but my buddy Dennis Radeke has been getting me to check out Soundbooth more and I do like some of the feature set in it.Some of the new Soundbooth in the CS4 beta

“The Soundbooth beta showcases a host of new features for creative professionals to complete their audio production tasks more efficiently, including the new multiple track support which allows users to edit multiple audio clips on a number of tracks, and the new ability for users to match volume levels across audio files. Also included is the capability to preview MP3 compression settings before saving them and a new speech recognition technology that lets users create transcripts of dialogue tracks quickly and search them for words and phrases within a timeline.”

Looks good and man just think if Apple had a open beta like this how much better user information they would get.It is good to see Adobe so hungry on the development side of things it will only advance the application offerings and stability of the applications when they actually do launch.Here are some the links. 

 Adobe Press Relase on beta’s. Adobe Labs Download

Dennis Radeke’s Adobe blog    John Nack’s Adobe blog.

 A good friend Peter Wiggins who is not only a great editor and graphics guru also parades his chops with making fxplugs for Final Cut Studio with his idustrial revolution plug ins for use with Noise Industries FxFactory.   The great thing about this plug in it that it is free to download and it is also free to get FxFactory and some of the plug ins that come with it are free as well(You can upgrade to FxFactory Pro with many other features and plug ins for$399). If you have ever wanted to recreate iTunes like actions of  CoverFlow from Apple then this is the best and simplest thing for you .”CoverFlux takes a folder of up to 25 images and automatically displays them in the 3d fan style of Cover Flow . The reflection ,preview stack and displayed stack are all calculated equally “. You need to be running FxFactory and Leopard (OSX 10.5) to enjoy this.Peter was showing this off at the Noise booth at NAB and got alot of WOW’S and buzz around it.Check out the example movie Sample Movie. Between what FxFactory already has under the hood and the combination of idustrial revolution plug ins you will surely take your effects up a few notches  with FCP and Motion. The links will take you to the install and demos.Noise Industries- FxFactory.??????Idustrial Revolution- CoverFlux.