Multimedia Platypus

May 2010

Every year, we visit the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) convention in Las Vegas. It is the world's greatest toy store for anyone who wants to see the directions this industry is moving towards.

The convention fills three huge halls of the Las Vegas Convention Center plus the Las Vegas Hilton, where most industry meetings and ceremonies are held.

This year, the NAB exceeded last year's attendance with more than 88,000 visitors. It is the second largest show in Las Vegas (behind the Consumer Electronics Show).

Most people who want to see what the latest in technology portends for changes in the industry will walk an average of five miles a day through the halls and outdoor exhibits.

PF Bentley and I undertook this trek yet again, and the changes in the industry are momentous, and it is fair to say that a lot of it is being driven by DSLRs that can shoot HD video. At the Canon booth alone, there were over a dozen rigs that have been designed to stabilize shooting with these cameras.

Everywhere we went, we saw former still photojournalists toting their Canon 7Ds or 5D Mark IIs from Zacuto or RedRock rigs.

Many of these photographers have realized that in order to continue in video journalism the time is long past to make some basic changes.

We have surveyed some of the equipment that we think will be changing your lives.

How about this, the season finale of the TV program "House" was shot entirely on a Canon EOS-5D. That's quite an endorsement for Canon. Here's the link to the article. According to the guy who shot the episode, Canon is bringing out some cine-style lenses to make it easier to actually shoot a lot of video with the camera. Interesting. 

Canon's EOS E1 plug-in for Apple's Final Cut Pro video editing software is now available. The plug-in enables video captured with the EOS-1D Mark IV, EOS 7D and EOS 5D Mark II to be more-rapidly converted to the ProRes codec, plus it allows for the addition of timecode and other information to inbound footage.

The EOS E1 plug-in is available from several of the digital SLR support pages on the Canon USA website, including this page for the EOS 5D Mark II. Follow the link and then choose Mac OS X from the operating system popup menu to access the download.

There is a PDF of the user manual on the support page as well here and includes information on which resolution and frame rates are supported in the EOS E1 plug-in, in addition to basic guidance on its use.

A Canon Europe announcement last month described the plug-in this way:

The plug-in will convert EOS MOVIE footage to Apple’s high quality ProRes 4:2:2 codec at approximately twice the speed of Apple’s standard conversion. Additionally, users will also be able to add timecode, reel names and metadata to footage quickly and easily – further enhancing the experience of EOS MOVIE users when editing their footage.

I am interesting  platypus multimedia

I wanted to share this and would love some feedback how to do it better next time. It was my first time doing a video story and I just really want to improve so all criticism welcomed! The last of a rhino species on the edge of extinction taken from a zoo in Europe back to Africa! Thanks so much.

The Washington Post's Howard Kurtz has a very interesting column today on the "one-man band." He interviews Scott Broom, a former "coat and tie" journalist for 27 years and had to reinvent himself with the aid of a three-day boot camp. It's a good article and a highly suggested read.  

This, by the way,  is exactly what our Platypus Multimedia workshop is for, to help photographers who want to expand their knowledge into video and to turn reporters into video journalists to the point where they can do it all. Both Dirck Halstead and PF Bentley have been teaching this course a long time (ten years) and they know how to make journalists into better, all around journalists. 

by Tom Burton

The official hoodie from the 1999 Platypus Workshop

By Dirck Halstead

We start on a Friday night with a reception then I give the keynote. Saturday morning we go through the basics and fundementals of video, then a basic training session on the Canon 7D. At noon, you are out with the camera to do the first exercise. At 3pm sharp you are back in the classroom for your first critque of what you have shot. BTW, you are only allowed to shoot ten minutes on this exercise. After dinner break we have the first of three evenings of looking at the kind of videos we want you to be able to make at the end of the course. On Sunday you spend the morning in class, then go back out to shoot your second exercise, returning for the critique. The evening is another showing of quality video. Monday morning back in class for instruction in story telling. That afternoon back to shooting to do your first small story. We critique that, but at this point we decide if what you have shot is cutable into a one minute piece. Half the class generally makes the cut and they are ready for the Tuesday class in Final Cut Pro editing. Those who have to reshoot exercise number three do that that afternoon (quickly) and by three almost everyone is starting to cut their one minute pieces. This is hands on, in which the instructors and TAs help you. Wednesday morning we critique all the 1 minute pieces.

Since the Platypus Multimedia workshop is using the Canon 7D I thought it appropriate to have at least one review of the camera on our site. I have been finding a lot of new sites lately concerning photography, some good and some bad. This one, photocrati is quite a nice site with lots of good stuff on it. I'll endeavor to excerpt from it on a regular basis and link to really good articles. Here is their review of the Canon 7D: 

by Jack Neubart 

I was all set to begin this review with a diatribe about all the negatives pertaining to movie shooting and Live View, but then thought better of it and opted to take the journey into 7D-dom with a positive foot forward. When you look at the real meat and potatoes inside this machine, you’ll discover, as I did, that when you peel back the movie capture veneer, the Canon EOS 7D is a very capable DSLR. 

In the late Nineties I knew I needed a lifeboat in a hurry.

After 29 years of trotting the globe for Time Magazine, I could see that the photojournalism I had known was sinking. Budgets that today would be unimaginable were being slashed, not just at Time but at all the other magazines and the movie studios that I had worked for.

If you are a photojournalist today, you know exactly what I am talking about.