fanta in 30 seconds

confessions of a pixel pusher

Many spots feel long and lost @ 30 seconds. this one does not

zodiac articles

confessions of a pixel pusher media

about the Camera
Local news in Napa Valley
the NY Times

Saw it today in it’s final form. Well, as a 35mm print. Which was kind of sad. On a projector that has serious focus problems. I liked it. It will be interesting how the general public will react. It is certainly not what people expect when they mention “Fincher” and “Serial Killer” in one breath.

zodiac screening

confessions of a pixel pusher media technology

There will be 2 screenings of ‘Zodiac’ on 2/18 in Los Angeles. The movie opens on March 2nd.
The flyer from Camera House who organizes the screening since they provided the camera and capture system. You will have to rsvp I believe. Angus, Wyatt and myself will be part of the panel discussion at 4pm.

good review

confessions of a pixel pusher misc

good review for Zodiac

The posters are all over LA. It is kind of weird, not having a credit. But I had enough time to get over that. More important is that it did work: All frames ended up where they should be. Which makes me very happy.

faster than you think

confessions of a pixel pusher internet technology

I just looked at the download speeds of interdubs and am surprised, and then again, not surprised how many people have fast connections these days. And how many actually have really really fast connection. It looks that fios is a big hit for the people that use interdubs from the client side. And a couple of bigger companies have indeed pipes that are as wide as you would think they are. It must be an interesting experience to use the internet with 45Mbit: Lot’s of slower sites and some that are pleasantly fast. Nice that interdubs is one of them. Very nice actualy.

Los Angeles Final Cut User Group Meeting

confessions of a pixel pusher

Tomorrow we will talk again about “Zodiac”.

he is dead, alright

confessions of a pixel pusher media

Crispen Porter and DD camp out in the uncanny valley

some better coverage at stash.tv

If I would be Michael Bay I would be worried.

Here how people reacted to it:
(random, unbiased sampling, there simple was no single positive voice, except of the the press release that the makers pushed)

just creepy
it doesn’t get more unoriginal than this lifeless horror sequel
To me, it looks more like Dana Carvey made up to look like an old man.
freaky
grotesque
“kinda creepy” doesn’t do a thing for my appetite
It’s a desiccated undead zombie-mummy in a bowtie, and it will steal your soul.
.This is so horrifying, it makes me want to hide under my desk
It was so completely believable that I threw out all our popcorn so that zombie Orville wouldn’t tempted to visit.

a corporate flash site that does not suck

confessions of a pixel pusher internet marketing media

ILM’s Pirates 2 show and tell

Usually VFX companies have a hard time telling the world about their work. Either they keep their ‘secrets close to their chest’ or they simply lack the skills to communicate well. Lately a certain diss-interest of the public can be added to the list: The fact that something is not real in a movie is not worth mentioning anymore. The bar is much, much higher now. And -of course- ILM in Pirates2 reached it big time with Davy Jones. Their site about the fx is surprisingly good, informative and fun.

While looking at the blogs that link to the ILM page I found this 80’s TV piece

at Visual FX blog.
I had no idea that Lasseter / Disney did try to make “Where the wild things are”.

DI workflow for the departet

confessions of a pixel pusher technology

The ASC has an interesting article about the DI workflow used on “The departed”. It is interesting, yet not surprising, that Michael Ballhaus watches HD dailies and is happy with them. Only a few short years ago it seemed a sacrileg to abandon film dailies.
Interestingly there has not been any technological breakthrough since then. HD is still 1920×1080. But people probably know now better how to do these things, and creatives are more comfortable with a digital aspect, since their final product will be created digitally anyway in the DI suite.

As for the rest of the “Departed” workflow it might have made sense at the time to procede as described at each step. But after a cursory read I am left with the feeling that the movie bounceds in and out of lots of formats in the process. I have not seen it, but it looked good from what I heard. Ballhaus’ movies usually do.

what’s michel doing?

confessions of a pixel pusher