How to Increase the Performance of Your Canon Kit Lens.

Testing conditions for Video Stabilisation software!

My last post, a general mediation on the Apple Macbook Air, Final Cut Pro X, and editing video while you are waiting attracted a reasonable number of comments. Stabilisation seems to be a hot topic at the moment, especially considering that it is one of the planks that Adobe’s new After Effects CS 5.5 is standing on. The piece of video I used to illustrate my recent post was a challenging piece for any stabilisation technology, considering that I was hand holding an iPhone 4, on a windy day, walking backwards on a beach!

In order to demonstrate what’s possible, I ran the same footage through the following tools:

• iMovie 11 on the Mac
• A demo ProDAD Mercalli V2 plugin for Premiere Pro CS5, hence the diagonal lines
• After Effects Warp Stabilizer in CS5.5

Sunrise over Manly beach on a glorious winters morning

I am not normally a fan of the HDR function of the iPhone 4; my subjects are usually a little too dynamic for HDR to work well.

I think it works ok for this shot of sunrise over the beach in Manly this morning as I set off for the day.

The Beach

My day job is IT; a necessary part of that role is waiting. Wait for a process to finish, wait for somebody to complete a task, wait for equipment to boot up.

I dread to think how much of the last 15 years have been spent waiting.

So while implementing a major production change this week (and encountering some frustrations) I put my “waiting” time to good use by testing out Adobe After Effects CS5.5 and Premiere Pro CS5.5 on my Macbook Air to put together this little video. Shot on an iPhone 4, Warp Stabilizer in After Effects (more on that in another post), and finished up in Premiere Pro. I don’t think it turned out too bad, and the “Air” behaved very well, especially considering it is the lowest, 2Gb RAM, 64Gb HD model.

What’s really great about it is it’s “there when you need it” availability. Small and light is good, but some of the other things really make a difference. Like it’s ability to wake instantly from sleep, whether it’s 5 minutes or 2 weeks since you used it; or it’s long battery life. Sure, I had to go for lunch when rendering out the stabilized footage from AE, and the final footage from Premiere, but the video mostly played back in real-time on Premiere, and if I rendered the time line, I could scrub forwards and backwards without pause.

Premiere Pro CS5.5 on Macbook Air

This was my first time using After Effects, and similar to Premiere Pro, there is a fairly steep learning curve. That said the Warp Stabilizer is simple to use, and very, very effective. It practically looks like I am floating out there! I know that it is one of the key features that Adobe is using to sell the CS5.5 upgrade, and it nearly looks like it might be worth it. Premiere Pro and After Effects are getting a lot of interest of late since the release of Final Cut Pro X from Apple.

Apple Final Cut Pro X

A lot of the pro video and film editors are dissatisfied / distraught over the missing interoperability features in FCPX, and videos comparing features, performance, and migration methods abound. I like this one comparing the Stabilizing function in FCPX and the Warp Stabilizer in After Effects:

When all is said and done though, FCPX looks like a very polished offering for the casual / prosumer video editor on the Mac, such as I am. One app (essentially), with all the output options I would typically need, and interesting media management capabilities; I only wish there was a trail version available. I would love to compare the performance of both when editing Canon 7D footage on my Macbook Pro. FCPX seems to offer GPU rendering on all Macs, whereas the magnificent Mercury engine of Premiere Pro is only at it’s best when paired with one of a select group of Nvidia GPUs, none of which are typically offered by Apple. Or are they…?

How come I didn’t find this link sooner? More on this too, later.

Some Nice Drama…

Some nice drama in the sky over Sydney this morning on my daily commute. I just love the trip across Sydney Harbour at this time of day; despite suffering a bit of a winter cold, I prefer to sit outside and enjoy the view.

Please forgive any image quality issues as it was taken with an iPhone on a slightly rolling ferry deck, edited with Photoshop for iPhone and uploaded with the WordPress for iPhone app.

Ain’t technology wonderful .

Lecia M9-P. Just a bit expensive…

From Leica launches M9-P professionally targeted rangefinder: Digital Photography Review, my camera lust has a new target. I fear it will be forever an unrequited relationship!

“The girl with the bow dress” by Jamie Beck

Some random pho­to­graphy related links which have caught my eye over the last few days:

• From Me To You: a photography blog by Photographer Jamie Beck. Such a simple idea, which he calls a “Cinemagraph”, but absolutely stunning — add a little bit of movement into the image. Many, many, many mentions of the magic photo’s in the Harry Potter movies. I might have to give this idea a try.
• Photography Book Now by Blurb: PBN is an international juried competition celebrating the most creative, most innovative, and finest self-published photography books – and the people behind them. The logical destination for the images I am working on at the moment (South East Asia, 2003) is a photo book; this might speed thinks up a bit!
• Paid-For Photography Competitions: Speaking of competitions, Haje Jan Kamps has a very timely and interesting perspective. Would have been more timely if it was before I entered the Head On Portrait Prize!

I’m looking for someone who is pretty obsessed with gear.   If you get a certain kind of high with getting a chance to be the very first to hold a prototype in your hands – this is the job for you.   The catch?  You need to have a good understanding of Word Press and some HTML – the more the better – as you’ll be helping to develop the “My Gear” section of this blog.  I’m looking for someone to work part time for 2–3 days a week regularly throughout the year.

via Help Wanted for the Blog « Vincent Laforet’s Blog.

Gadget & WordPress Geek for Vincent Laforet? Where do I sign up?

All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you.

— Ira Glass (via NPR)

Brilliant quote, read the rest at the source link.

Short version… keep at it.

Photosmith – the iPad mobile companion for Adobe Lightroom

Did Adobe just miss the boat for an iPad Lightroom App?

If Photosmith had been available a year ago, I probably would be rocking an [amazon_link id=“B0013FRNKG” target=“_blank” ]iPad[/amazon_link] now rather than an [amazon_link id=“B0047DVRQW” target=“_blank” ]Apple MacBook Air[/amazon_link]. It can import, view, rotate, tag, rate, label, keyword, caption, images, including RAW, and then sync them to [amazon_link id=“B003739DVY” target=“_blank” ]Lightroom[/amazon_link]. If and when I get an iPad, this will be on my must buy list! Check it out in iTunes.