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Well, it is not a bust since I woke up this morning to the sounds of the weather alarms going off and busted out west. Right now I’m sitting on the MN and South Dakota boarder area in the Tornado Watch and just waiting to see if this is worth hanging around for. But I was able to come out and shoot some stock footage for another project that I’m working on of some stuff in Western MN so it is not a total bust. As soon as I wrap up this photo and video shoot out here and get back to the chase or looking at the stats, I’ll figure out if I’ll hang around for the rest of the weather or no weather events or go home.

Ok, almost done with the dvd encoding stuff then letting the computer go on auto pilot as I go scuba diving.

Wow, this is a lot of stuff to work with here with Encore.

Well, the coffee is brewing and the Adobe Encore is loaded on the computer and now I have to figure out how to use it.

The DVD project is done for the most part. The editing is done and I just need to work on the credits, dvd layout, paperwork and graphics.

So since the new DVD project is so huge that it has to go on a dual layer DVD and I needed to get my hands on Adobe Encore to be able to work with the massive thing on one disk. Otherwise it would be a 2 disk format.As for the project reviews. This is what is been said so far.”Video Looks like it’s 100% perfect – No problems that I could find!”

But I’m happy to be on a normal schedule again. I woke up this morning at 5am and hope to get this stuff done by noon and then off to the lake to go scuba diving.

Ok, I managed to get everything done with the DVD project and now it is just encoding for the demo for the distro folks to proof.

I got that done while busting my ass to get the other stuff done. Today was a good day. We were busy with a ton of new video coming in. Brian nailed the squall line in Florida and even got video of a boat sinking in Sarasota, FL while Bill was in North Carolina in the outer banks shooting a couple packages for BNVN that was on CNN and TWC.

He got some wicked footage that looked like a tropical storm out on the Cape.

Wow, yesterday was pretty insane with the video from Tony and getting it on the air with CNN in about 2.5 seconds after it happened.

Ok, it was a little longer then 2.5 seconds but it was asap broadcast quality from the field right after it happened. The cool part was that he did not even have to break off the chase to get the footage out and was able to keep chasing and up to BNVN. WTF is up with TWC… Tornado Time, 2:40 footage in the hand time 3:40 and the storms were rolling towards Dallas. Wedge tornado on the ground and they decided to wait for free footage or tower cams but at the same time the CNN desk was like um name your price because were rolling with it since this stuff is heading for Dallas. Wedge Tornado on the ground in Seymour, so you people in Dallas, watch out this is coming your way…

Or a freaking tower cam and “if you catch stuff, send it in for free and we will use it on the air” bull shit. Oh well, TWC is turning into the lifestyle network vs being a real news channel are focusing in on the NEWS when NEWS happens. Oh well, such is the life of a stringer and the stringer network… Today I’m just trying to finish up the corrections to the hurricane project that Chris found. Then it is off to try and catch Dander and Dumpster Juice tonight.

I am now back on a normal schedule. The video project is done, I’m just working on the layout of stuff for it but the editing is FINISHED.

This week has been a strange one.

I was out shooting for some rushed weather video for TWC and shooting some snow video in a pinch to get to them for the evening show.

Well, I’m up late working with Scotty on the Wisconsin weather video that he is out shooting for the Cantore crew. Their live crew is in Milwaukee but it’s not snowing there. So Scott is in Madison shooting snow video for them so they can say “See, It’s Coming This Way…”  

Anyways, I’m up working on the audio balance to wrap up the project and put it to bed.  

Just driving home from a late night run to Iowa. I watched a great light show just south of Mason City Iowa.

The chase gear needed to be modified some. I needed to wear the winter weather gear as the OAT is 42F out.

But it was worth it. One of the first images of 2007 made my season since I have been trying for a while to get this shot.

Up all night, sleep all day…
I got all the voice overs in on the tracks. I’m just going through everything now and syncing it up and all I can say is damn…

My goal was to make a kick ass video but now, I have done it. I have blown away the Charley DVD and I won some film festival for that project. This is my best work ever and is going to be my resume tape now.

The Audio sounds great, the timing is perfect, damn, its all finally coming together. Now I just need to finish up the contracts for the video so I don’t have a repeat of the bull shit with the ego trips like I did with some people with the Charley and Fury projects. I will be looking for beta viewers to check it out in a day or so.

Ugh, the fn voice overs are now done. Everything is now in the computer and I’m just doing the rough layouts right now. I’m going to try something else which is save the project as an AAF file and then try and import it on the laptop using Adobe Pro 2 for the final editing to balance out the audio.

I started this project right after the first of the year. Its taken a lot out of me and I could have done so much more with my time. But as soon as this is done, I’m going to start working on my resume to get more paying gigs. So sick of the storm chasing spec work these days when I could be making a lot more working as a freelance editor and shooter. Yes I still love chasing storms but this is not where the money is anymore.