Yesterday was a really crap day - I had to do a little work on a Flash animation - and it took almost all day.

Flash is such a rubbish program - everything is counter intuative and they keep changing the rules of syntax for the programming every time they release a new version so if you search for a solution online the chances are it won't work on your version!


Anyway, that's now solved and out of my way.

I was also contacted by a debt collection agency yesterday about a TV I rented from Forbes Direct years ago - I cancelled the contract 2 years ago and they've suddenly decided I owe them money - it's crazy and quite rubbish behaviour from what claims to be a reputable company...

anyway, I’ve decided that if Forbes are going to be difficult about this TV rental nonsense, I’m going to offer to donate the money to charity if they drop their claim – if they refuse then I’m certain they’ll loose far more in lost business when people hear about their behaviour than they gain from pursuing me…

In the end it’s too small an amount for them to take me to court over it – there’s just no justification- likewise, it’s too small an amount for me to concern myself too much with arguing with them over it. I have, after all, plenty of better things to do.

TV AD
The benefits of adding to my advertising on Google started to appear today. I got contacted by a company from Malta who want me to do some graphics for a TV add for them… sounds interesting and I’ll keep you posted as it develops.

DVDs
I rendered out a DVD of the semi-completed documentary and made copies to send to some of my contributors – just to make sure I haven’t messed up on any of my facts.

It looks like I’ve missed the boat for the documentary market – but it doesn’t matter – they’ll still be able to sell at the next one and the thing will be placed on the website as soon as it’s finished.

I also sent off a little edit of a 5 minute mini-doc based on some of the documentary to a company called CurrentTV. They’re a company set up by Al Gore for young people and they broadcast 5-7 minute documentaries… I thought it might be good to see if they’re interested in a small part of the project as it’s not that tough to produce a 5 minute edit when most of the shots are in place already.

The two minute rule
In rendering out the project I hit a problem that annoyed the hell out of me on the last project. Premiere Pro seems incapable of handling a 50 minute documentary all in one go and crashes constantly during rendering.

Now, OK I’m pushing it hard – There’s lots of effects filters and transitions. I combine different types of footage on the timeline and want an HD master and half of my doc is made up of HD rendered 3d footage – which is very nearly uncompressed – so I can see it’s problem.

My solution is to render the entire project 2 minutes at a time, load those sections into another Premier Project and re-assemble them. It’s a major hassle, but I’m not as annoyed with it this time round because I know it will eventually work.

I did get annoyed enough to decide to double my computer’s memory - (my system’s only got 2gb – and that’s pushing it for HD at the best of times). However, when I phoned the company who made the PC world (I know, a geek like me should build their own editing PC, and up to now, I have, but when my last machine got sick, I needed to replace it fast and it’s just so much easier to walk in and know that when you get it home, it will work the moment you turn it on – with an operating system and anti-virus stuff…)

Anyway – they told me the motherboard wouldn’t take more than 2gb… swings and roundabouts. I know if I replace the motherboard (which is what I eventually did to my other PC) all the software won’t work and it’ll be a major pain.