We refreshed the Autumn Gem web site this evening. The original site was blog-centric, whereas the new site is focused squarely on the film. We’ll be updating the content on the site more frequently now that our Spring 2010 Tour is about to get underway. Rae and I just returned from Southern California where we screened the film at UC Irvine. Photos and commentary to come soon! In the meantime, check out the new Autumn Gem web site!
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Everyone who knows me knows that I often found with my camera by my side. Since picking up my first digital camera back in 1998, I’ve been taking photos nearly everywhere I go. Up until recently, I’ve primarily just took photos with my DSLRs, but thanks to the 5D Mark II, I’m now shooting more and more video.
Over the past two weeks, I’ve taken a combination of photos and video at the Edwardian Ball, the Apple iPad Special Event and at Stanford University. This weekend, we celebrated Dan’s birthday at Sushi Rika in San Francisco. Dan and Juliana will soon be leaving the Bay Area, so we wanted to have one last extravaganza before their departure. I figured Dan wanted to have a consolation dinner, as our beloved Chargers lost to the Jets (again) in the NFL playoffs two weeks ago.
I once thought I had a storage problem with the RAW files from the 5D Mark II, but it’s nothing compared to storing video. Full 1920×1080 HD files at nearly 50mbps! I had to start deleting video clips from the camera near the end of the night since I ran out of room on my 8GB memory card! My photo (1.5TB) and video (1TB) hard drives are getting full, so the time will be soon to upgrade to 2TB drives.
Sunday afternoon, Rae and I edited this three and a half minutes video of highlights from Saturday’s celebration. Click this link to see the full 720p HD version. Hope you enjoy it!
If you didn’t figure out from the title of this post, the music in this video is from Taylor Swift and Journey.
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While on tour with Autumn Gem, Rae and I having been traveling with two MacBook Pro laptops. It certainly gets heavy lugging around 15 pounds of computers, adapters, and cables around. We’ll still need to bring one MacBook Pro with us on our next tour, but I can see the iPad replacing the other one. With the iPad-VGA adapter, we’ll even be able to run our presentation and film straight from the iPad! While the output is not HD, it’s more than adequate in the venues we’ve been screening Autumn Gem in. The iPad really is a great device for creative professionals who want to showcase their work: photos, videos, illustrations, you name it.
Here’s a photo of me from the Apple Special Event introducing the iPad. More thoughts to come soon!
In place of the top hat and corsets from previous years, Rae and I decided to wear our Qing Dynasty era costumes from our documentary film Autumn Gem. Fortunately for us, these outfits were from the same timeframe of the Edwardian Era (turn of the century, 1900s). We received several, “Your costumes are great!” comments from people in attendance. Rae and I had just watched the pilot for Caprica, and I remarked to her that it felt like we were in the virtual nightclub from the beginning of the episode!
Although I took a few photos during the event, I concentrated mainly on video Saturday night. Between all the waltzing, the crazy costumes and the on-stage performances, there was plenty of great moments to capture. The off-stage lighting was quite dim, making focusing a challenge. For those interested in technical details, I shot the video with my Canon EOS-5D Mark II camera, 24/1.4, Nikkor 50/1.8, 135/2 lenses, and a Zacuto Tactical Shooter with the Z-Finder eyepiece attachment.
The next day, Rae and I created this three and a half minute music video from the Edwardian Ball 2010. Ladybug’s Pas de Deux from Rosin Coven provides the soundtrack. Click here to see the HD 720p version on SmugMug.
And here’s some photos from the event.
The saying, “Newton never dies, it just gets new batteries,” still holds today for some people. Sad to say, but for me, I’ve pretty much retired my Newtons. The eMate which functioned as my alarm clock had made way for my iPhone. My MP2100 is somewhere in a box right now. There’s one task remaining for me, and that’s patching the ROMs to fix the dreaded 2010 bug. I honestly didn’t think about 2010 when Apple cancelled the Newton back in 1998, and now it’s here. Time flies!
Despite the small turnout, we had a good time at the anniversary meeting. I’m testing some new video equipment, and, along with my usual photos, I shot some HD video footage during the meeting. Here’s a 5-minute clip of Flash, Mike, Gopi, and Sir Izaac talking about their membership in SNUG, the 2010 bug and the rumored Apple tablet. Enjoy!
Photos were taken with a Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 lens attached to my 5D. I like the manual focus action on the Nikkor, but I do find the focus to be a little off. Maybe it’s just my old eyes getting to me!
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Before the concert, Rae and I met up with Chun and Genny at Bean Bag Coffee House, right across the street from The Independent. Chun had Vienna’s Warm Strangers CD, but she never heard her perform live. She called up her friend, Vin, to come see, and they both had a wonderful time. Vienna Teng Fan Club + 2!
Yesterday evening, Felix, Rae and I went to the San Jose Tech Museum to see the Star Trek: The Exhibition exhibit. We went as part of a private event, which meant the usual prohibition against photography and videography was lifted. I hope that also means that I can post these photos up on my web site too!
Everyone who knows me knows that I’m a huge Star Trek fan (Star Wars too, I’m an equal opportunity sci-fi fan). I’ve been to other Star Trek exhibits in the past, but this one was clearly the best. For instance, they had recreated several sets from TOS and TNG, including the bridge of the original Enterprise! It’s too bad that I didn’t have any Star Trek uniforms in my closet, or else we really could have had a blast role-playing throughout the exhibit. Another set that was recreated was the Guardian of Forever from the classic TOS episode: City on the Edge of Forever. I just had to jump through the Guardian just as Kirk, Spock and McCoy did in the episode! A TNG-era hallway and transporter room rounded out the rest of the large-scale set recreations. Having gone through the process of building a set in our garage for Autumn Gem, I could appreciate the work that went into building these pieces for the exhibit.
We spent nearly two hours at the event and had a blast. If you’re a hardcore Star Trek fan, I highly recommend going, even if they don’t allow you to take photos or video in the exhibit halls. Star Trek: The Exhibition runs at the San Jose Tech Museum of Innovation until January 3, 2010.
Over on our Autumn Gem blog, I posted a recap and analysis of our packing strategy for our 25-day, 17-stop tour of the documentary. We’ve gotten packing light down to a near science, but there’s always room for improvement. Ideally, we’d like to go from three pieces of luggage to just one. Identifying what worked and what didn’t will help us reach that goal in the future! In an ideal world, I’d love to travel for months at a time with just a backpack. Computing and camera decisions always factor into the ability to do this, however. Carrying around a full-sized, 15-inch laptop (two of them on the tour!) and a digital SLR makes this nearly impossible.
When Rae and I traveled to France and Spain, I made what was at the time a painful decision to leave the computer and camera behind, taking only a small Canon PowerShot with me. In hindsight, it was a great choice, as the reduced bulk made moving from place to place much easier. Despite wheels and handle, rolling suitcases really do a number over time. At the time we went to Europe, the iPhone and iPod touch didn’t exist, but these devices today can replace a laptop for email and basic browsing tasks. Finally, a newer cameras like the PowerShot G11 or S90 offers the manual controls and RAW image support that I’ve come to rely upon in my DSLR.
The other benefit of packing less is that you have less to worry about losing. It was pretty easy to make sure that we had everything we needed before traveling to the next tour location; there wasn’t much to begin with!
Read the rest of the article on the Autumn Gem web site for more about our packing strategy during the tour.
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