smays.com

Chroma Key effect with CamTwist

I finally figured it out. Sort of. If you can count stumbling on the right configuration and being unable to do it twice in a row "figured it out." But I now know that it can be done. (The background image is lobby of our new offices in Dallas.)

My setup is pretty crude. Two flood lights from Lowe's and a few yards of green felt on the basement wall. It's pretty clear that lighting is critical for this effect and I might have to come up with more or better lights before I try a video background.

And streaming (over the wifi) from the basement isn't gonna cut it. Too slow. Gotta get an Ethernet jack down here or set up in the upstairs office. But hey, that's what weekends are for, right? I'm proud to say I PayPal'd the CamTwist guy $50. It's worth far more than that.

smays.com TV

Shredded memories

My friend David, who lives in southwest Missouri, found some... I hate to call them scraps or debris... shredded memories from the weekend tornadoes that hammered parts of four states.

He posted them to his blog in hopes someone might recognize the photo and help get (what's left of) it back to the owner.

Regular readers of this blog know I loves my photos and I keep iPhoto backed up nightly. And I take great comfort in having many of them on flicker or embedded in a post here.

If you have a shoe box full of photos but lack the time, tools or patience to scan them... send them off to one of the many services that will do it for you. I'd add: then hire a high school kid to put them up on flickr, but a lot of folks are just not comfortable with that. But it give me great comfort knowing mine are safely floating in cyberspace.

When the time comes, I'm going to figure out a way to see that they stay up (out?) there after I'm gone.

When I get famous, I'm gonna be a dick, too.

From Huffington Post: "It should come as no surprise that Bill O'Reilly has always been a screamer, but it's always nice to have video proof. Below, watch a vintage meltdown from his "Inside Edition" days that has just resurfaced (via Gawker), in which he freaks out over bad writing on the teleprompter and unleashed an obscenity-laced tirade towards the writer. [My original link was to YouTube. They pulled that. You can watch Big Bill go ape shit here.]

Brush with Near Greatness: Juli Crockett

It never ceases to amaze me how many of the people I mention here find my humble little notes and get in touch. I could mention a few but it would be the worst kind of name dropping. Okay, I'll mention one.

A week or so back I gushed about the song Fuck 'em All by the Evangenitals and how I had searched (unsuccessfully) for the lyrics. Well, guess who left a little comment love:

"I'll tell you what...  I'm going to add Fuck 'em All to the Evangenitals website, and I'll put the lyrics up there just for you. :-) Give me a few days, and as you wish, so it shall be. Thanks for finding us, for listening, and for hearing."

Love, Rev Juli Crockett (lead singer/songwriter) - The Evangenitals

Like the lady in the DirecTV commercial (the redhead with the big ass) says, "How cool is that?"

Mom

iMage Webcam, CamTwist and Ustream

I've been trying to assemble the best combination (for me) of hardware and software for streaming live video. The ease-of-use and price (free, for now) of Ustream.tv has made it possible for any nimrod to play in Wayne's World.

MacBooks, with the built-in iSight camera, make live video just that much easier but sometimes you want to point the camera the other direction, so an external webcam enters the picture (so to speak).

This weekend I've been playing with the iMage webcam from eCamm. It doesn't look like much but --for $60-- it delivers a very nice image and you can put it in your pocket. I've mounted mine on a small tripod.

The final --and most exciting-- piece of the puzzle has been a freeware app called CamTwist. CamTwist works very well with Ustream.tv and comes with an amazing set of features and a UI that's intuitive and easy to use. If you're interested, I recommend this short video, but let me mention some of the cool things CamTwist does:

• Stream your desktop. Rather than making your webcam the video source, CamTwist lets you stream all or part of your computer's desktop. Let's say I wanted to show some co-workers in Des Moines how to use a new piece of software. I could simply stream the demo over Ustream. Much better than me trying to remotely "take over" their desktop.

• Slide Show. The slide show source allows you to stream still pictures. You can drag pictures to the list from your desktop and even iPhoto.

• Movie. With the movie source, you can play movies over your broadcast. You can drag in several movies to the play list or select a single movie with the movie selection button. Next Saturday George and I are gonna take another run at streaming live from the Coffee Zone. Instead of just watching us yacking for half an hour, we can play video clips as part of the live feed.

• Flickr Set. Similar to Slide Show, the flickr set source will fetch pictures from a flickr feed and stream them on your broadcast. Why would you want to do this? I don't know, but it's cool.

• Picture-in-Picture. Once you have your video going, it's possible to overlay another video source on your video.

• Chroma Key. Sometimes called a Green Screen. This is typically used to create the appearance that something is behind you, such as a picture or a movie. George and I figured out the other features but I haven't tried this one yet.

There you have it. An inexpensive webcam; a feature-rich piece of freeware; and --for now-- a free streaming solution at Ustream.tv. Do we have any program that's especially compelling or useful? No. But that will be the easy part. And when it comes up, we'll be ready to share it with the world.

The county takes care of our bridge

We've had a good bit of rain recently and it's made it difficult getting back and forth across the bridge to our place. Here's a clip from this past Friday. The guy down the road has a truck so he drives when the weather is iffy.

Technically, this clip doesn't belong in the Don't Look Down series because the bridge isn't all that high. If you haven't seen Sorcerer, I highly recommend it. Directed by William Friedkin and starring Roy Scheider.

Hillary's Downfall

Not for Hillary supporters or the easily offended.

The Trump Tower of Kennett, MO

Our Man in Kennett, Charles Jolliff forward this digital clip for the Kennett, MO newspaper:

"Jan McElwrath, executive director of the Kennett Chamber of Commerce, announced there will be a ribbon-cutting ceremony held at 2 p.m., Monday, May 19, 2008, at the new Ely Walker Apartments. "Although I'm sad to say that Gov. Matt Blunt will be unable to attend, I'm very pleased to say that Ms. Sheryl Crow will make an appearance," McElwrath said. "So we are expecting a wonderful turnout for this event."

So, Sheryl Crow is second-choice after the governor? Uh huh.

Before being converted to posh loft apartments, the old Ely Walker building was a shirt factory. I remember walking by on a hot summer day and peering in to watch row upon row of women making shirts. No air conditioning back then and the work looked damned hot. But these were probably pretty good jobs that --like so many others-- have moved off-shore. I'm sure my old hometown would like to have them back.

Let's hope Charles is feeling fit enough to get some pix of SC holding those big scissors.

A wee laptop with possibilities

You see all kinds of laptops at the Coffee Zone. PC's and Mac's of every description. This morning I saw something I had not spotted before. Small, white... almost like a baby MacBook.

I barged in on the nice man (a lobbyist) trying to enjoy his scone and working on his ASUS Eee PC. Runs Linux, has a flash drive, built-in webcam and three USB ports.

And costs about $400. Not for the power user but a very slick "web appliance."

Twittering the news?

I don't know if this is breaking news or something everyone already knows. But AgWired's Chuck Zimmerman Twittered what might have been news (Chuck's tweet is the one on top).

When I demo'd Twitter to one of our reporters, all he could see was ("Who cares if someone's plane is delayed?"). For some the online glass is half full, for others...

UPDATE: More from Lost Remote.

Missouri State Capitol

My first thought was, "How'd they do an ice sculpture in the fountain?" This interesting shot was taken by  co-worker and Super Shutter Bug Jim Foucault.

"The next generation doesn't like radio."

Jerry Del Colliano is a professor at USC, broadcaster and program director and founder of Inside Radio. And a blogger:

"The next generation doesn't like radio. Not the stations. Not the concept. There's simply less need for it in their lives.

New technologies will not only replace radio among the next generation, they already have. And this generation is huge -- with as many Gen Y'ers as there are baby boomers.

Without the next generation the radio business will continue to hit the wall. Once the present economic downturn ends -- still a long way off -- there won't be enough new young listeners to help radio continue to grow. It becomes a losing proposition. More radio listeners die and fewer new radio listeners use traditional radio.

The next generation wants to stop, start, time-delay and delete its programming. This generation wants to mash it up -- have a say in what it sounds like or how it is used. They want to deliver it to each other -- share it -- at will. They want community (what we used to call local radio) through social networking online.

One of the hardest things for me to deal with in my years of working with the next generation is that they don't like radio and don't understand what I like about it. When I describe it, they say what I am describing is not what they hear on the radio.

We're an industry in denial that technology has changed the game. But only radio people have the power to adapt and create new content for a new generation and on the devices they use.

But to begin, we have to understand that more has changed than how to deliver radio programming. It's not about the technology. It's the sociology."

When I can safely speak to a young person (early teens), I ask them about radio and get pretty much the same responses as Professor Del Colliano. What's the joke... denial is not just a river in Egypt?

Omaha man saves own life with self-tracheotomy

File this under: You've Got to Be Shitting Me

"An Omaha man apparently saved his own life by performing an emergency surgery on himself. Fifty-five-year-old Steve Wilder awoke in the middle of the night last week and couldn't breathe. He'd had breathing trouble after a bout with throat cancer several years ago and his windpipe had swollen shut as he slept. Wilder says he knew he only had one option, as an ambulance would never arrive in time, so he gave himself a tracheotomy. He used a steak knife and poked a hole in his throat, which brought a gush of blood -- and a rush of air. He could breathe. He says it didn't hurt. Doctors say it saved Wilder's life but they don't recommend what he did -- call 911 instead." [Radio Iowa - Nebraska Radio Network]

Holy crap. I need help getting a splinter out of my finger.