This is to wish you a Merry Christmas from V2V Church and myself, hope you have a wonderful holiday season, get lots of presents, and that the year 2011 is a very good one for you.
Thursday 23 December 2010
Monday 27 September 2010
HD Video mixer Review Datavideo HS-2000
If you are interested in purchasing an affordable multi-camera HD switching hardware solution, then you might want to have a read of my Datavideo HS-2000 HD mixer studio review.
The HS-2000 is based on Datavideo's SE-2000 5 channel video mixer currently the cheapest HD broadcast quality switcher, and you would be surprised at the features and capabilities of the system.
The video below shows what it can produce.
The HS-2000 is based on Datavideo's SE-2000 5 channel video mixer currently the cheapest HD broadcast quality switcher, and you would be surprised at the features and capabilities of the system.
The video below shows what it can produce.
Saturday 7 August 2010
Datavideo UK support service
Following a recent purchase of a Datavideo DN-200 tapeless digital church video recorder, I had the opportunity of experiencing the support side of Holdan Ltd, the UK distributors of Datavideo equipment.
My local V2V church in Wembley bought the DN-200 so we could digitally record our sunday services thus reducing the time it took to produce our weekly podcasts, but after using it for just 2 sessions, I noticed a problem with the DN-200, it would shut off recording before service was over! Since this was the first time of me as a video producer using datavideo equipment I wasn't sure what to expect when it came to support, I was soon to find out.
My first port of call was to contact the reseller from whom we bought the recorder who advised me to contact Holdan the UK distributor as they had full manufacturer access and a better support infrastructure to deal with any product issues I had.
So on a thursday morning I fired off an email to the technical department at Holdan providing full details of the faulty unit (S/N, firmware version, etc) and the problem I was having. I didn't get any acknowledgement to my email but thought I'd wait a few days, but by monday with no response and not wanting to spend another sunday without a reliable recorder, I decided to call Holdan on the phone.
On getting through to the datavideo support guy, I explained the problem, was advised that if I could get the DN-200 to them by Wednesday, they would either have a relacement unit or get mine repaired and sent back to me by Friday.
To cut a long story short, they had the unit by Wednesday, and I got a replacement unit on Saturday.
What I didn't like about my experience was:
1. My email was recieved by the Datavideo support manager, but was not acted upon or passed to a technician to follow up or investigate.
2. I had to continue to chase them up to find out what was happening to my DN-200 unit, and despite promises to call me back several times I never got a call.
3. There were about 3 different people that I had to deal with, each time I called it was someone new testing the unit in the lab.
Because the DN-200 recorder is a new Datavideo product in the UK, I suspect there were a few teething problems as the quality of datavideo hardware is high, and thus hope to buy more of their units.
My local V2V church in Wembley bought the DN-200 so we could digitally record our sunday services thus reducing the time it took to produce our weekly podcasts, but after using it for just 2 sessions, I noticed a problem with the DN-200, it would shut off recording before service was over! Since this was the first time of me as a video producer using datavideo equipment I wasn't sure what to expect when it came to support, I was soon to find out.
My first port of call was to contact the reseller from whom we bought the recorder who advised me to contact Holdan the UK distributor as they had full manufacturer access and a better support infrastructure to deal with any product issues I had.
So on a thursday morning I fired off an email to the technical department at Holdan providing full details of the faulty unit (S/N, firmware version, etc) and the problem I was having. I didn't get any acknowledgement to my email but thought I'd wait a few days, but by monday with no response and not wanting to spend another sunday without a reliable recorder, I decided to call Holdan on the phone.
On getting through to the datavideo support guy, I explained the problem, was advised that if I could get the DN-200 to them by Wednesday, they would either have a relacement unit or get mine repaired and sent back to me by Friday.
To cut a long story short, they had the unit by Wednesday, and I got a replacement unit on Saturday.
What I didn't like about my experience was:
1. My email was recieved by the Datavideo support manager, but was not acted upon or passed to a technician to follow up or investigate.
2. I had to continue to chase them up to find out what was happening to my DN-200 unit, and despite promises to call me back several times I never got a call.
3. There were about 3 different people that I had to deal with, each time I called it was someone new testing the unit in the lab.
Because the DN-200 recorder is a new Datavideo product in the UK, I suspect there were a few teething problems as the quality of datavideo hardware is high, and thus hope to buy more of their units.
Friday 9 April 2010
New Red Driving Instructor TV Ad
I was watching TV yesterday, when I noticed that red driving school was now airing a new marketing advert for its driving instructor training services.
Anyone based in the UK will know that since the economic recession started in the late 2007, that Red having making some brisk business cashing in on those who suddenly found themselves redundant, and needed a new job and source of income, one of the reasons why the TV advert was so successful was the promise of the ability to be self-employed, choose your own working hours and earn up to £30,000 a year. This sounded like something that a lot of TV watchers could do especially since the only required skills was the ability to drive and have held a full UK licence for 3 years!
To cut a long story short, after about 2 good years of success getting over £3000 from 10s of thousands potential driving instructors (PDI), people began to see that the TV ads were not telling the whole true story. Qualifying to become an instructor was not as easy as they had marketed, it also took longer than people were told, and not everyone made the grade just because they knew how to drive. One of the other main problems were that people were taking out loans to fund the training, and while these finance options were interest free within the first year (career development loans), they had a hefty APR if not paid off within the interest free period.
A lot of trainee instructors were not qualifying within 12months and thus had to start making repayments something they had never thought of before.
Finally with a lot of media attention, and internet lobbying, the red driving school bubble burst in Feb 2010 when LVG ltd went into administration.
A week later Red driving schoo was back having been bought by a private equity company, a new media marketing agency was appointed, and this resulted in the new Red driving school TV advert.
I am closely monitoring the progress of the new company driving results ltd to see if the same business model is what they hope to continue to forge ahead with, as the UK public is a lot more aware of the truths about becoming a driving instructor.
Anyone based in the UK will know that since the economic recession started in the late 2007, that Red having making some brisk business cashing in on those who suddenly found themselves redundant, and needed a new job and source of income, one of the reasons why the TV advert was so successful was the promise of the ability to be self-employed, choose your own working hours and earn up to £30,000 a year. This sounded like something that a lot of TV watchers could do especially since the only required skills was the ability to drive and have held a full UK licence for 3 years!
To cut a long story short, after about 2 good years of success getting over £3000 from 10s of thousands potential driving instructors (PDI), people began to see that the TV ads were not telling the whole true story. Qualifying to become an instructor was not as easy as they had marketed, it also took longer than people were told, and not everyone made the grade just because they knew how to drive. One of the other main problems were that people were taking out loans to fund the training, and while these finance options were interest free within the first year (career development loans), they had a hefty APR if not paid off within the interest free period.
A lot of trainee instructors were not qualifying within 12months and thus had to start making repayments something they had never thought of before.
Finally with a lot of media attention, and internet lobbying, the red driving school bubble burst in Feb 2010 when LVG ltd went into administration.
A week later Red driving schoo was back having been bought by a private equity company, a new media marketing agency was appointed, and this resulted in the new Red driving school TV advert.
I am closely monitoring the progress of the new company driving results ltd to see if the same business model is what they hope to continue to forge ahead with, as the UK public is a lot more aware of the truths about becoming a driving instructor.
Thursday 4 March 2010
Kwame Nkrumah-Acheampong Ghana Snow Leopard finishes Olympics bid
Ghana's Skiing snow leopard Kwame Nkrumah-Acheampong finished his bid in the recent 2010 winter olympics second to last in his Slalom skiing event, but it was a performance to be proud of, finishing 47 out of 102 starters where many atheletes including highly ranked USA Bode Miller failed to finish the course.
Kwame (35), is now retiring from the sport, and is hoping to open a grass skiing resort in his home town of Ghana to encourage youngsters from his native land to take up the sport and hopefully compete in future winter olympics events.
In total there were 6 African nations represented in the 2010 Vancouver winter olympics, they were Ghana, Kenya, Morocco, Ethopia, South Africa and Senegal. None of them won a medal.
Kwame (35), is now retiring from the sport, and is hoping to open a grass skiing resort in his home town of Ghana to encourage youngsters from his native land to take up the sport and hopefully compete in future winter olympics events.
In total there were 6 African nations represented in the 2010 Vancouver winter olympics, they were Ghana, Kenya, Morocco, Ethopia, South Africa and Senegal. None of them won a medal.
Thursday 25 February 2010
MacBook Pro Laptop Applecare Warranty
I have bought 2 Apple MacBook laptops for my video editing activities over the last 2.5 years, and always taken the extra Applecare extended warranty cover on these comptuter products.
The first MacBook was a low spec 13 inch which with Final Cut Express, Apple Tiger OS installed and a 80GB hard drive was my launch pad of video editing on an Apple Mac and served me for about a year before I sold it (to someone I knew) and acquired a more powerful and higher speced 15 inch MacBook Pro also opting to extend the normal one year warranty to three years.
Now with both Mac laptops, they have experieced a hardware failure around 18 months after purchase and the Applecare warranty product has saved the owners a very heft repair bill. Because Apples are more expensive and exclusive I would advise anyone getting them to always add the warranty extension. My Apple MacBook pro has failed twice and on the last occasion it cost over £700 (it was in workshop for 2 weeks) to replace a motherboard when the grahics chipset gave up the ghost!
You have been warned, even Apple Macs are not perfect!
The first MacBook was a low spec 13 inch which with Final Cut Express, Apple Tiger OS installed and a 80GB hard drive was my launch pad of video editing on an Apple Mac and served me for about a year before I sold it (to someone I knew) and acquired a more powerful and higher speced 15 inch MacBook Pro also opting to extend the normal one year warranty to three years.
Now with both Mac laptops, they have experieced a hardware failure around 18 months after purchase and the Applecare warranty product has saved the owners a very heft repair bill. Because Apples are more expensive and exclusive I would advise anyone getting them to always add the warranty extension. My Apple MacBook pro has failed twice and on the last occasion it cost over £700 (it was in workshop for 2 weeks) to replace a motherboard when the grahics chipset gave up the ghost!
You have been warned, even Apple Macs are not perfect!
Monday 15 February 2010
Valentines Video Production Love Message
This is a simple video production I put together for my wife to convey my love to her on Valentine's Day Feb 14th 2010.
Being a sunday, it was shown on my local church's IMAG projector screen, thus earning me a few brownie points with my spouse.
The video was edited on an Apple MacBook using Final Cut pro. The heart effect was created by using a simple color key filter over a heart matte graphic with 2 motion keyframes used for the Ken Burns zoom effect on the opening picture.
Being a sunday, it was shown on my local church's IMAG projector screen, thus earning me a few brownie points with my spouse.
The video was edited on an Apple MacBook using Final Cut pro. The heart effect was created by using a simple color key filter over a heart matte graphic with 2 motion keyframes used for the Ken Burns zoom effect on the opening picture.
Saturday 13 February 2010
Ghana goes to Winter Olympics 2010
Ghana has an athlete representing the country in this year's winter olympics being held in Vancouver from Feb 13th to 28th Feb 2010.
Kwame Nkrumah-Acheampong is a Milton Keynes based UK born Ghanian who took up the sport just 5 years ago when he got a job managing a dry ski slope in Milton keynes.
He has since honed his skills enough to reach the international standard required to qualify and participate in this years 2010 winter olympics and has arrived in Whistle, Vancouver, Canada.
He will be competing in two events the Men's Giant Slalom on the 21st and the Men's Slalom on 27th Feb 2010.
According to his official team, he is currently not getting any official monetary support from his home Ghanian country, and has only made the journey so far with the help of private and corporate sponsors.
Visit the Ghana Ski Tean Website to follow his progress.
Kwame Nkrumah-Acheampong is a Milton Keynes based UK born Ghanian who took up the sport just 5 years ago when he got a job managing a dry ski slope in Milton keynes.
He has since honed his skills enough to reach the international standard required to qualify and participate in this years 2010 winter olympics and has arrived in Whistle, Vancouver, Canada.
He will be competing in two events the Men's Giant Slalom on the 21st and the Men's Slalom on 27th Feb 2010.
According to his official team, he is currently not getting any official monetary support from his home Ghanian country, and has only made the journey so far with the help of private and corporate sponsors.
Visit the Ghana Ski Tean Website to follow his progress.
Thursday 11 February 2010
Apple Macs are not perfect computers
This is just my personal opinion based on the experience I've gained while using both an Apple 13 inch macbook and a 15inch macbook pro laptop computers for video editing personally and in my church environment over a period of 2 and a half years.
Prior to getting the 13 inch mabbook, I have never used an Apple computer before, and while I knew they were very popular for graphics and video editing work, I also had for some reason the belief that they were the perfect alternatives to Windows based PCs not only because they used a superior operating system that was virus free, but more stable and did not crash, but also had a more reliable hardware platform. Well I must have been dreaming, because Apple Macs do crash, and both laptops have been in for repairs at least twice within the first 18 months of their purchase, and I have only been spared the cost of expensive repair bills because I had Applecare warranty which extended the initial 12 months cover to 3 years.
I was actually very surprised the first time Final Cut Express crashed on me during some crucial video editing of a very important production, it was as if the impossible had just occurred, since then I have now gotten used to firefox closing unexpectedly and even the tiger and leopard operating systems giving up the ghost on me, while hardware wise hard drives have failed, graphic cards gone puff and a soundcard stop outputting sound from the headphones socket.
Now don't get me wrong, I love my Apple MacBook laptops, but I seem to have been give the impression that they were perfect computers which they are not, maybe more reliable that microsoft windows operating systems and the various manufacturer's offerings, but you still need the extended warranty especially since they are more expensive than PCs, but I don't think I will go back to PCs for my video editing software and hardware needs.
So if you are thinking of joining the Mac ranks, by all means go ahead, it is not as step a learning curve and you might have been made to believe, and while you might need some time to get used to things, there are popular programs like office suite, firefox and Skype that all work on tiger or leopard os.
Prior to getting the 13 inch mabbook, I have never used an Apple computer before, and while I knew they were very popular for graphics and video editing work, I also had for some reason the belief that they were the perfect alternatives to Windows based PCs not only because they used a superior operating system that was virus free, but more stable and did not crash, but also had a more reliable hardware platform. Well I must have been dreaming, because Apple Macs do crash, and both laptops have been in for repairs at least twice within the first 18 months of their purchase, and I have only been spared the cost of expensive repair bills because I had Applecare warranty which extended the initial 12 months cover to 3 years.
I was actually very surprised the first time Final Cut Express crashed on me during some crucial video editing of a very important production, it was as if the impossible had just occurred, since then I have now gotten used to firefox closing unexpectedly and even the tiger and leopard operating systems giving up the ghost on me, while hardware wise hard drives have failed, graphic cards gone puff and a soundcard stop outputting sound from the headphones socket.
Now don't get me wrong, I love my Apple MacBook laptops, but I seem to have been give the impression that they were perfect computers which they are not, maybe more reliable that microsoft windows operating systems and the various manufacturer's offerings, but you still need the extended warranty especially since they are more expensive than PCs, but I don't think I will go back to PCs for my video editing software and hardware needs.
So if you are thinking of joining the Mac ranks, by all means go ahead, it is not as step a learning curve and you might have been made to believe, and while you might need some time to get used to things, there are popular programs like office suite, firefox and Skype that all work on tiger or leopard os.
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