We were deeply troubled to read this week in the LA Times of significant legal challenges to the First Amendment rights of a documentary filmmaker.

Joe Berlinger made a documentary about Aguinda v. Chevron, a class action lawsuit filed in 1993 against Chevron’s oil operation in Ecuador. Chevron is demanding all Joe’s outtakes — more than 600 hours of video material — as part of their legal defense. Is this an issue of First Amendment rights, trying to uncover the truth, or a large corporations acting as a bully? One judge in a lower court has already ruled in favor of Chevron requiring Berlinger to surrender his footage. On Wednesday, July 14, U.S. Court of Appeals heard oral arguments. And the impact for filmmakers could not be more significant.

This case raises issues of: Who is a journalist? What constitutes free speech in documentary filmmaking? What rights, if any, does a corporation have to media shot by someone that is not a corporate employee.

This week’s Digital Production Buzz featured Jonathan Handel, Of Counsel, Troy/Gould, talking about the First Amendment implications and ramifications of Chevron Oil’s case against documentary filmmaker, Joe Berlinger.

This is an interview that everyone interested in documentary film production needs to hear. Because if the wrong side wins, the effect could be chilling.

It took the Appeals Court exactly a day to reach a preliminary decision. Listen to learn more.

Click here to listen to the interview.

Click here to listen to the entire program.

Click here to read the original LA Times article.

And click here to read the followup article on the Court’s ruling.

Please tell your friends about this interview – because the results affect all of us.

Thanks,

Larry

P.S. Click here to learn more about the Digital Production Buzz.

The Digital Production Buzz wrapped up its 2010 NAB Show coverage over the weekend.

During the show, our team of almost 30 staff and volunteers interviewed more than 250 people, created 36 seven-minutes News Briefs, and more than nine hours of Special Reports!

You can listen to all our coverage at: www.nabshowbuzz.com.

Plus, we created a special NAB Wrap-up show for The Buzz this Thursday with a look at two new social media websites and a behind-the-scenes visit with the people that make NAB possible. Be sure to listen in.

As for me, I’m going to take a nap.

Larry

Just a very quick note – as it is now about 11:58 PM – that our podcast, the Digital Production Buzz is located on the trade show floor at the 2010 NAB Show as the official podcast. We are right next to the Post Pit – South Lower Hall, Booth 8826.

We’ve already created two shows – you can listen to them here: www.nabshowbuzz.com. (Well, OK, if you want to be technical, the second show is done as of ten minutes ago, and will be posted in the morning)

We have a team of almost 30 people – both staff and some GREAT volunteers – helping us put together a huge range of news and special reports. However, it’s too late at night for my brain to think clearly enough to blog about it. (By the way, while we are fully staffed for this year, we’d love to have your help next year!)

I’ll have all kinds of photos and gossip to post later in the week when I have time to breathe.

Starting tomorrow, Monday, at 9 AM, we are streaming and posting live five-minute News Briefs on the hour. Everything will be posted here — www.nabshowbuzz.com — as well as on iTunes and our website.

Our NAB coverage ends this Saturday – a WEEK of special shows and almost 40 News Briefs. Almost 14 hours of programming in five days, way more than 300 interviews. Then, I’m taking a nap. (Visit here to learn how you can put The Buzz on your website!)

By the way, thanks to the NAB for appointing the Digital Production Buzz the Official Podcast of the 2010 NAB Show. Thanks to our sponsors – Adobe Systems, Zeiss Lenses, Pond 5, Data Robotics, and Focal Press - for their financial support. And thanks to our incredible producer, Cirina Catania, and Associate Producer Debbie Price, for their tremendous efforts that make these shows possible.

More later, time to get back to work….

Larry

In less than 48 hours, the Digital Production Buzz will start broadcasting from the floor of the 2010 NAB Show. (Currently, I’m surrounded in boxes, cables, and packing crates as we get our gear packed up and loaded it. You wouldn’t think we’d need this much stuff!)

We will be originating eight one-hour Special Reports every night, starting Saturday and close to 40 five-minute News Briefs starting Monday.

(I’ll have more on our gear and booth setup on Saturday after we get everything assembled and hooked up.)

But there are a couple of pieces of new technology that we are working with that have me very excited.

First, our final signal path – out to the streaming server – is now fully digital using fiber-optic TOSlink cable. What I just learned is that every Mac has a built-in fiber-optic port (both in and out) on it – you plug in via the headset or microphone adapter.

This is very cool! So the audio out of our mixing console goes into an Aphex Compellor then out as an AES/EBU digital signal to a TOSlink converter from Hosa, then into the Mac. We are premiering the new sound on tonight’s show — then using it for all our NAB News Briefs.

Second, thru an arrangement with Vericorder, we are using their new iPhone app that turns an iPhone into a professional grade audio and video portable recording device. We split our reporters into two teams, half are using Marantz digital recorders, and the other half are working with iPhones. Getting the media into our network from the iPhone is a bit tricky and I’ll report more on that after we work out the system on Sunday.

Still, there’s nothing like working with new gear under live broadcast conditions to see if it lives up to its promise. I’ll have more for you later during NAB.

For all the latest NAB coverage, visit: www.nabshowbuzz.com.

To post the Digital Production Buzz to your website, visit: www.digitalproductionbuzz.com/syndicate.

To learn more about the Aphex Compeller, visit: www.aphex.com.

To learn more about Vericorder, visit: www.vericorder.com.

Thanks!

Larry

For those of you listening to the Digital Production Buzz last week, you heard that our co-host, Michael Horton, was somewhat, ah, distressed that his laptop died.

In fact, it died about 30 minutes before the show started.

We did everything we could think of — including ideas suggested by listeners to the show — to bring it back to life. No success.

As is the way with these things, it had been a while since Michael backed up his hard disk. You can imagine the panic — all his work for the upcoming NAB SuperMeet was on that computer.

Fortunately, we learned over the next couple of days that the hard disk was fine, it was only the graphics card that died.

Still, this was a classic example of the need to regularly backup your data. A hard disk is cheap compared to the price of losing your irreplaceable data.

I’m looking to hearing a report from Mike on this week’s show about what fixed the problem.

In the meantime, please consider this a reminder to be SURE you are backing up your data regularly.

Larry

As many of you may know, I write a monthly newsletter covering Final Cut Studio. (Sign-up for your FREE subscription here.) We are now in our sixth year of publishing, each issue generally runs around 40 pages.

For many years, when the latest newsletter was published, last month’s issue would be disassembled and key articles were posted to the website. This worked great… until last year, when our wizard of a webmaster left to run a bakery. (Deep sigh…)

At which point, the back issues started piling up.

Well, we finally broke thru the log-jam and have started posting new articles again to the website, within the last week, I’ve posted more than three dozen, with several dozen more to go.

To see the latest tips, techniques, and commentaries, check out the complete list here, in our Editing Library. We currently have hundreds of on-line tutorials – all totally free – that you can access at any time.

Or, for even faster results, try searching for what you are looking for here.

Thanks!

Larry

P.S. You can purchase the complete content of all my 2009 newsletters – over 500 pages! – in PDF form for only $19.99. Click here to learn more.

I’ve been invited by Dublin City University and Institute of Technology – Tallaght to present two days of seminars in Dublin this weekend.

* The session on Saturday is designed for students and new users.

* Sunday is for more experienced Final Cut Pro folks.

Click here for a full list of what I’m talking about, along with instructions on how to register. (Thanks to Adrian Brett for making this weekend possible!)

If you are anywhere nearby, I’d love to see you.

Larry

I’m spending the week at Broadcast Video Expo 2010 in London (well, Kensington Square, if you want to be specific.)

This is the UK’s largest show focused on video production gear. If you listen to the Digital Production Buzz tonight (www.digitalproductionbuzz.com) you’ll hear reports from Scotland and the BVE show.

However, after I finished recording this week’s show, I discovered two interesting products at the show that I want to share with you.

First, is Gridiron Flow. This software tracks what files are used in your projects, the amount of time you spend working on a project, and helps you backup and archive the elements in your projects — all, essentially, automatically. While I can see how it can be a tremendous timesaver for Photoshop and digital still artists, I’m still pondering its usefulness in a Final Cut workflow. However, Apple is talking about it recently, so this is definitely worth checking out.

Second, is: Tools on Air. Basically, this is a TV Station/broadcast facility on a Mac. This is brand new, from an Austrian company. NMR is their sole distributor and they are looking for US distribution. This puts the power of multi-camera ingest, switching, recording, and playout in a Mac. A single MacPro can handle up to eight cameras and two MacPros connected together can handle up to 16 cameras.

If you were looking at the Newtek Tricaster, this was announced two days ago and is worth a look. Pricing and distribution are still fluid – this is brand new and likely to get US distribution quickly. (Thanks to Jonathan Tyrrell for pointing me to both these companies.)

More soon, I’m off to explore. (I also have some new audio interviews with new products for 3D and RED that I will post as soon as I get them edited.)

Larry

I’m getting ready to head to Scotland, England, and Ireland for a two-week series of Final Cut Studio seminars. (You can read about where I’m going and what I’m discussing here.)

When I’m in London, in addition to speaking at the Broadcast Video Expo, I’m conducting a full-day class on plug-ins that work with Final Cut Pro for Academy Class. I’ve never done an entire day on plug-ins, so I’ve been doing my research on what to present and what to say.

One plug-in that I like a lot is PluralEyes from Singular Software. This plug-in allows us to easily create synced multicam clips in Final Cu Pro. Bruce Sharpe wrote it, along with another staple in the podcast universe called “Levelator.”

Anyway, Bruce is a cool combination of computer scientist and audio guy, based in Vancouver, Canada.

The reason behind my writing all this is that I’ve been getting a lot of mail recently regarding shooting and editing DSLR video in Final Cut Pro. While the workflow continues to improve, there are still some kinks that need to be worked out.

One of these is that DSLR cameras often do a very poor job recording audio. A great solution to this to record audio on a different piece of gear than you record the video – a process called “double-system recording.”

Hollywood has been doing this for years and it works great. However, if you aren’t used to it, it can be very confusing. This process becomes more complex because DSLR cameras don’t shoot at the traditional NTSC frame rate of 29.97 frames per second, instead they shoot at the much more logical 30 frames per second. Which can cause audio problems.

That’s where Bruce comes in. He’s written a very helpful blog that discusses this whole issue, along with easy solutions on how to resolve this in Final Cut Pro.

If DLSR work is in your future, take a few minuets and read Bruce’s posting:

brucesharpe.blogspot.com/2009/06/dslr-dual-system-audio-999-solution.html

Thanks,

Larry

Tonight, on the Digital Production Buzz, Mike Horton and I interviewed Ken Miller, formerly the #2 executive – and 20-year veteran – at Aaron Spelling Productions, and now head of his own production company – My Media Productions.

It was great fun to talk with the producer of such massive hits as “Love Boat,” “90210,” “Charmed,” and dozens more. He had a very simple philosophy – focus on the story. However, in this case, we got him to describe his process in more detail.

Ken’s background was film. He started as a music editor and worked his way up. Toward the end of our interview we discussed the impact tapeless media is having on episodic production, as well as the changing dynamic of funding production.

Mike and I both found the interview fascinating. I’ve created a special excerpt of it, which you can listen to here: (TRT: 14:41)

Ken Miller interview on Digital Production Buzz

Or, click here to listen to the entire show:

Digital Production Buzz – Jan. 28, 2010

Thanks,

Larry