I completed this video in a very short amount of time for the iChapters.com – Livin Digi Contest – since they were running a promotion that the first 5 entries before this last weekend would receive $100 iTunes gift card. So I’m just waiting for them to send it to me now. The contest is still open for entries, there’s less than 10 right now.
If there’s anyone with an iPhone and is curious about an application, make a comment below, I’ll try and buy it with the iTunes gift card and post a review in the comments below.
As it stands now, I’m currently in 5 contests: LG Film Fest, Doritos, Wonderful Pistachios, Mountain Dew, and Livin Digi. I’m going to try and finish two more videos for contests that are both due in about two weeks so stay tuned for those too. That’ll put me at 7, so hopefully something will come out of one of them.
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A little aesthetic experiment yesterday when my new 28mm lens came in. (click for a bigger version)
Over the past two months I haven’t had a job. I’ve had to make one for myself, and it is more difficult than I thought it would be, especially with this type of work. By entering in contests there is a chance at huge pay-off, but each entry tries to bring their A-game every time so that is what I’m tasked with (but the last one I would say I brought my A-game, was the Doritos one, these other since then have just been trying to more volume to increase my chances of winning a contest). The competition continues to improve and I think if the Excedrin contest were to run today, there would be much stiffer competition to which I don’t think my video that did win, would prevail against the competition that is out there now.
I think the trick to continuing to produce work is to not get hung up on details too much, but take the advice of a helpful guy over at makecoolshit.com and just get started. Even if it’s just test shots or the real footage you’re trying to get. That has helped me out a lot when I get hung up on the creative side of things: I just get started working, taking footage, and let my mind be open to possibilities and try to remain flexible in my idea.
I also just ordered a new quad-core iMac (the i7 one) with Final Cut Pro. So I’ve finally made the decision to switch from PC to Mac, and here are the reasons:
This new quad-core looks like Mac hitting back on those PC ads where they show how much cheaper a PC is than a Mac (or see this raunchy spoof, or this classic from a convention). This new iMac is freaking cheap compared to Mac has done in the past in several ways: it has almost the exact same performance as a quad-core Mac Pro but is much cheaper and just to buy a 27″ screen (which is what this iMac is) by itself would be $900. And the main reason being Final Cut Pro. If this software was offered on a PC, I would probably stick with a PC, but Apple makes it so it’s only available for Macs. I’m also getting the same Adobe Master Collection Suite that I have been working with, but only really for Photoshop and After Effects.
I received my new 28mm f/1.8 lens in the mail today and so that’s the reason for the random circle experiment pictures. It works out closer to what a 50mm lens looks like on a regular 35mm camera, but the Canon 7D has a cropped sensor so it’s a little smaller (factor of 1.6) than a 35mm camera. I like the 50mm look because its a good general focal length since it’s close to what we see with the human eye naturally.
Other updates are I can’t wait to go see Bill Cosby this weekend and get some flying in this week for one of those videos.