Well Top Gear fans, looks like the U.S. version on the History Channel is a go. Autoblog had a post about it yesterday. You Tube has the trailer. I will reserve any judgement until I have seen the entire first season.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pzBcQ93e6Ns&feature=player_embedded
Yesterday I posted a article over at the Editblog on PVC about a recent Canon 5D multicamera show that Premieres Saturday night on GAC. Gary Allan: Live From the House of Blues is one of the first 5D multicamera shows that I am aware of. To get a taste of the show check out the song “Today” that was pulled from the show for a music video:
Here’s the airing schedule:
March 06, 2010 10:00 PM ET
March 07, 2010 2:00 AM ET
March 07, 2010 4:00 PM ET
March 11, 2010 10:00 PM ET
March 12, 2010 2:00 AM ET
Set your DVRs!
Late last year I edited a multi-camera concert for country artist Gary Allan. It was shot at the House of Blues in Chicago on Canon 5Ds. The 5Ds gave us some really great images that’s kind of unusual in a live show. It will premiere on Saturday March 6 at 9:00 PM central on Great American Country so set your DVRs. I’ll be writing a more detailed article about the show over at the Editblog on PVC. In the meantime, enjoy this little sneak preview:
I had the tv on Letterman the other night and he was pimping the premiere of the new Survivor series. He apparently got the date wrong as I heard a really bad audio dub go by in the background. I rewound and yep, it was bad. If you’ve ever been to a Letterman taping you know they like to do the show live to tape and not go back and edit if at all possible. This was obviously the quickest fix but man is it bad. Just listen for the word “eleventh.”
Starting this Sunday, May 10, HBO Documentary Films is going to begin air a 4 part documentary series on Alzheimer’s disease called The Alzheimer’s Project. Normally I probably wouldn’t promote or post about an HBO film but this series looks to be a bit more important than most. Alzheimer’s disease is a cruel brain disease that affects over half of all Americans and has an indirect cost estimated at more than $148 billion annually. Any disease with that kind of broad reaching impact deserves a special event like this that HBO is producing. I’ve personally been affected by the disease as my mother suffers from Alzheimer’s and I’ve seen the toll it can take on both the victims and their friends and family so I’ve been encouraging all that I can to watch this series.
But what if you don’t have HBO? It is after all a premium channel that you have to pay extra for. It would appear that HBO is going to provide access to this entire series in almost all media outlets available today. If you have come across the printed advertisements for The Alzheimer’s Project in any number of major magazines you may have seen the list of where the program will be available:
It may have happened before but I’m not aware of any other multimedia event that has been broadcast across so many different “new media” outlets. It’s a great use of most all of the distribution channels available today to get the message out about this important subject. Thanks for taking the time to read this post and I hope you are able to check out this documentary series. You can find out more information on Alzheimer’s disease below:
I’m a big sports car fanatic and there is a great automotive news magazine called Motorweek that has been airing on PBS for years. The show has a mix of automotive reviews and performance tests, tech tips and feature stories. It’s produced in a very formal, laid-back kind of style. It’s not overly flashy, the graphics aren’t too high-tech and the show generally has a more low budget feeling that a lot of other automotive shows. Flashier shows like Car and Driver Television and Motor Trend TV have come and gone but Motorweek still motors on. The show is currently in its 25th year and recently aired a special episode looking back at those 25 years. It’s fun to watch historical shows like that because you can see the talent age as well as the cars get newer, more stylish and more technologically advanced. You can also see the quality of the video as the formats changed over the years. I don’t know exactly what they shoot on but you can certainly look at the image quality and see things have gotten much better. And while the graphics still aren’t too flashy today they are a step above what they began with 25 years ago when all they had was a character generator.
The most telling thing about the changes over the years comes in the editing. The show’s producer, host and creator John H. Davis makes a specific comment on the editing and the pace of the show. He says that in the beginning in an 8 minute “road test” the show would use less than 25 edits. But in a 5 minute test today they use 3 times that. Let’s break that down: Early shows – around 3 edits a minute. Today’s show – 25 edits a minute. Of course these numbers aren’t exact for every segment but they show a nice example of how the pacing of television has changed over the years. First and foremost, technology has changed making it easier to edit. There is a funny segment in the 25th Anniversary show where we see Motorweek’s editor, Taylor Baxter, showing a producer a segment off of an Avid. You can be sure that in the old tape to tape editing days that things might not have always been that much fun in the edit suite. And as the technology changed, so did the styles and the expectations of the viewer as MTV came along and shortened all of our attention spans. MTV is always credited as the big arbiter of editing style, and while that is probably true, you can see those changes and shifts in style even in a small show like Motorweek. To all the cast and crew, keep up the good work as both television and car buffs need a good automotive magazine. I’ll post another blog entry on your 50th anniversary show and see how far we’ve gone then!
Tonight I watched My Name is Earl (on NBC) for the first time. Funny!!!! I had heard it was a very good show and all I heard was indeed correct. It’s a bit raunchy so not for the kiddies and some really nice little gags that slide in unexpectedly. And best thing of all is there is NO GOD AWFUL, DISCTRACTING LAUGH TRACK. Did I mention there is no laugh track?
I particularly like the subtle freeze frames that are used to transition from scene to scene. Transitional devices can be obtrusive but fun as in the builds on and off in the sitcom Home Improvement or just obtrusive and obnoxious as in 3rd Rock From the Sun. The freeze frames in MNIE are just subtle enough to punctuate the scene that you have just watched while giving the little cue that it’s time to move on to the next scene. MNIE is most certainly a quirky show that is a bit of a self-aware of its quirkiness (I think I saw Earl smirk directly to the camera once), so the freeze frames do not feel at all out of place.
The freeze frame itself is a great edit device when used properly. The most famous and 
most powerful of which would have to be in François Truffaut’s The 400 Blows when the lead characters looks directly into camera at the end and the frame freezes. It gives one a chance to study that face but also maybe to ponder the future that the young boy might (or might not) have. I myself ripped this exact shot off once in a short film where the drunkard lead character turns to camera with his uncertain future.
There are lots of examples of freeze frames in music videos. One great example is in Aaron Tippin’s “Kiss This.” It was edited by a fellow editor here in Nashville named Adam Little. It is a song (as you can imagine from the title) about people telling others off and to “kiss this and I don’t mean on my rosy red lips.” The video is about a bride telling off her husband because of his wandering eyes. Aaron picks her up in his hot rod and they run from the law. The song is punctuated with some very distinct down beats and there a lot of freeze frames on those beats (and sometime 2 freezes on double beats) and they really drive home what this runaway bride might be feeling.
Freeze frames have been around for a long time but of course non-linear editors make it easier than ever to use them. But like all edit effects, it’s got to be used sparingly and more than anything else, it has to be used right.
This article prompted me to wonder exactly what is wrong with Martha Stewart’s Apprentice;
http://www.drudgereport.com/flash4.htm
(The above link is no longer current)
I think the biggest problem revolves around that fact that Martha’s version is exactly the same as Donald’s version, only with Martha. Of course that is exactly what they were going for. But 2 of the best things in Donald’s version, “you’re fired” and Donald’s own personality, are missing from Martha’s version.
But the one thing that probably could save Martha’s Apprentice is to give it enough elements to make it its own unique show. The producers have duplicated the elements down to the exact same shots. We get the many stock footage shots of New York City, the boardroom or conference room, the somewhat useless secretary outside the boardroom (though Martha’s has a few more tasks), the lackeys who are the “eyes and ears” of the stars, the same facial close-ups of the contestants as they react to things done and said, even duplicates of the shots of the door handles of the boardroom closing as contestants leave. Oh yea, and the door shot of the remaining contestants walking back into the loft at the end of each show.
While there is nothing wrong with this kind of thing (except maybe the useless secretary) it becomes tiring in Martha’s version because it is duplicated almost verbatim. Why not keep the same show concept but make the new version unique in its own right. As much as I love New York City, it would have been nice to get to know another US metropolitan area. Sure Martha’s company is head-quartered there but maybe that’s a clue it won’t work. While the loft that Martha’s contestants live in seems the idea choice, it is too close in concept to the one that Donald’s contestants live in, making me feel like I am visiting the same space twice a week … and that may be once too many. The fact that Martha can’t use the words “you’re fired” leaves an awkward, non-climactic moment at the end of each show. Sometimes I’m not even sure if she has cut the person she is addressing or not. And of course there will be a corporate reshuffle every few weeks to even up the teams. If you want some real drama, let a team of 6 or 7 take on a team of 2 or 3. Skew the rules a little bit (kind of like a form of drag racing called Bracket Racing) and let them go at it. Like the original, a keen ear can pick up the subtle differences in the voices of the Donald and Martha when they address contestants in the boardroom, indicating that they have had to edit the show with voice over to make it all work. While I’m under no misconceptions that this isn’t done ALL the time in reality programming, it can be distracting in the quiet confines of the boardroom. And while Martha’s daughter and the cigar-toting sidekick do a good enough job they can only be compared to George and Carolyn from the original, so by comparison, they pale. What about some kind of video conferencing technology that could bring Martha right to a task to comment on some of the action (that is if she couldn’t be there in person). Of course, she may be too busy for that so she may be too busy for the show in general. But Martha’s version is probably more of an image piece after her prison stay more than anything.
The biggest difference between the 2 Apprentice programs lets Martha write a letter to each losing contestant at the end of the show. While the idea is good, the letters are often just tokens and not of any real constructive criticism to the losing constants. It also takes away the last dig that the losing contestant can give to their former teammates. This comment in Donald’s version while in the taxi can provide some great drama as well as allow the fired contestant to either redeem themselves and show they are a real human being or just let the viewer know he or she is exactly the schmuck we all though they were!
Can Martha’s Apprentice be fixed? Probably not if they leave it exactly like it is. A “retooling” is in order if it wants to survive. Better yet, cancel it and give us a Hollywood version all revolving around the movie biz!
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