What a fantastic day today. It started with me waking up at 6:30am (after going to sleep at 2:00am due to watching the TV show 24 with my wife on DVD (Season 4 Episode 2….great episode by the way). Anyhow, I left Excalibur and got on the monorail in MGM to head on to the Las Vegas convention center. It was a very long walk, but I need it anyhow. So it’s all good.

Now, let me talk about the actual conference.. My day consisted of the following classes:

1) 9:00am to 10:15am – DV Essentials
2) 10:30am to 11:30am – Podcast Keynote
3) 11:45am to 1:00pm – Final Cut Pro – Trim Like A Pro
4) 2:00pm to 3:15pm – Adobe Ultra II Keying Tips & Tricks
5) 3:30pm to 4:45pm – Running A Small Production Studio
6) 5:00pm to 6:15pm – Finding The Right Shot – Shot Composition

I will talk a bit about each class, but you can access my full class notes here if you want them (they are not organized, but there is lots of information.)

DV Essentials
This class was taught by Douglass Spotted Eagle. I’ve heard of him before when I use to edit with Sony Vegas 5. I never took a seminar with him, but this one was pretty good.

It was really an introductory class, covering lots of different topics for DV production. I did enjoy it and did learn some new things regarding microphones. The class covered a lot of material, from Cameras and tripods, to microphones and lighting equipment to must have accessories such as cables, c-clamps, headphones, audio accessories, lens cleaner, DVI to RGB connectors, extra tapes, etc.

Podcast Keynote
The key note (there were 2 of them, one was by the editor of Blood Diamond, but there were way too many people in line and I didn’t feel like waiting) I attended was the podcast keynote presented by Hayden Black, the producer of the highly popular (he said it was popular, so it must be true!) webisodes Good Night Burbank (check out http://www.goodnightburbank.com).

It was a very inspiring talk on how you can start your podcast with only a “dream” and a little equipment (and some talent) and turn it into a real business generating money and doing what you love to do (in his case, writing, producing and starting in his very own video podcast).

Thought, he did mention that they are still not in the “black”, but are in talks with different folks on making that happen (I’m in talks with a variety of folks too, the only problem, is that they are not answering me, it’s just me talking!)

Final Cut Pro – Trim Like A Pro
Jeff Greenberg, a renowned trainer on Avid, Premiere Pro and Final Cut Pro taught a class on Final Cut Pro 5 and how to trim your video (edit) like a professional.

He gave many neat keyboard shortcut tips and tricks that I didn’t know (since I use the mouse a lot) so that was fun learning. For example, you can use SHIFT+T to make your tracks larger (and smaller).

He also spoke about “head and tail” editing, trimming edges, single sided roll edit, double sided roll edit, a slip edit and a slide edit. All very interesting ways of editing your video that improves your performance (the quicker you can edit the better).

Adobe Ultra II – Keying Tips & Tricks
I use Adobe (used to be Serious Magic) Ultra II a lot for all of my training videos and thought, “What could I learn from this class?”

Boy I’m glad I took it. Rod from the DVPA (Digital Video Professional Association) gave a pretty good and thorough presentation on Ultra II. I actually learned a really great technique on keying with Ultra that will improve my performance, delivery time and quality in how I key my training on demand videos.

Ultra II is an alternative software to keying then what you have within Adobe Premiere Pro and/or Adobe After Effects. This software uses “vector” keying, which, as he explained, is a formula based (mathematical based) way of figuring out what color to key out.

This software works extremely well with DV footage, which is a horrendous format for keying out backgrounds (due to its 4:1:1 color space as compared to HD which has a 4:2:2 color space….I’ll talk about color space in a future blog).

Up until now, it was more of an art (at least for me) on getting a good key. Rod provided and very nice formula that turned the “art” into about 80% science (you still have to fiddle with some controls, but it’s much easier to key now).

So in the end, I was very glad I took this class. If you work with DV footage and are shooting green screen, I would highly recommend you take a look at Adobe Ultra II for your keying needs (just check out the Adobe site).

I will be posting an eLearning Training On Demand video on Ultra II very soon. Look for that in the very near future.

Running a Small Production Studio
Ok, so I was a bit overloaded and tired of technology, so I wanted a class that taught the business of running your own business (or as in my case, I manage an interactive media department, but I run it as a business to stay competitive with the outside agencies).

They covered many things, from Business Development, to what services to offer, to what gear you need to have versus you’d like to have, to creating budgets, managing customers, employees and outsourced staff, to figuring out what to charge.

This class was taught by Douglass Spotted Eagle (the same guy that taught DV Essentials) and his partner Mannie Francis.

What I took out of this class is that you must run your business like a business and make money, no matter how creative you want to be, you need to first make money to be able to continue doing what you love to do.

This is what I try to do for the company I work for. I manage my department as if it was a separate business, trying to “make a profit” on every project and save money on costs while delivery top quality service to our customers.

Finding The Right Shot – Shot Composition
Out of all the classes I took today, I found this one to be the most “creatively inspiring”.

Since I do lots of corporate type videos (training, communications, etc.) I end up just concentrating on delivering and making the deadline, and sometimes forget the creative side of the process.

This seminar brought me back to shooting the video the correct way, regardless if it’s just a training video, a communications video or just a head shot. Shoot it right and make it look nice. That’s the key.

Dan Selakovich, a renowned filmmaker (everyone in NAB is renowned, I need to be renowned too) taught this seminar which covered shot composition, camera movements, the camera line (axis) and props. He also had at the end a great wrap up with recommended reading and movie watching list.

This particular class lifted my spirits and pumped me up into being more creative and watchful of how I shoot my videos.

It has also re-kindled my love for movies. I’m going to rent more classic movies to watch how the great masters such as Roman Polanski, Orson Welles and Alfred Hitchcock made their movies.

So that’s it. That’s my recap of how day one of NAB 2007: Post|Production World went for me. Tomorrow, I have another full day of classes, so I can’t wait.

Now, I’m going to go to bed and watch Episode 3 of Season 4 of 24 with my wife. I want to see what happens next. Will Jack Bauer be able to fly in this episode? I mean, he can do everything else. Maybe when the show finally ends, they’ll end it by announcing that he is really a robot and not a person. I mean, the guy doesn’t go to the bathroom, sleep or eat. Ever!

Anyhow, another “4 hour” sleep day today. Oh well. Life’s short, I don’t like to sleep through it.