First video with Flip Video Ultra

This is my first try at uploading a video with the new Flip Video Ultra. My first billion attempts failed miserably. I had to delete many of my first videos off of my camera because of suspected curupted data. Sadly, I had to delete all my show and tell of my iPod, along with many other videos I had spent countless hours (or minutes) recording.

I am still having trouble getting my camera to work on my Toshiba Laptop at home as it seems like everything freezes up whenever I try to open the software. Luckily, I was finally able to make a rough video and get it to save in our Mac Lab.

After uploading it onto the computer I put it into final cut prob and transformed my 35 sec video into about a 20 sec video. HOPEFULLY THIS WORKS!!!!!! when I click post.

1st Show and Tell

For our first assignment, we were asked to do a "show and tell" about something meaningful to us on our new Flip Ultra video camera. At first I wanted to show off my new English Bulldog Puppy, Lola. I attempted to make a video of of me talking about Lola, with her in the picture, but it was too difficult to work with a live animal and no camera man behind the camera. Also, I had to sit down in order to try and keep Lola in the picture and this just didn't work too well for me. Next I figured I would talk about some of my baseball autographed plaques. When I attempted to film this there was too much glare off of the glass inside from the artificial light. I was unable to go outside because it rained all day Friday, I had to work 8am-6pm on both Saturday and Sunday, and it was breezy and slightly raining out on Monday.

So as I was driving back to school from my house, angry that I could not find anything to show and tell, I looked at my iPod to change a song and realized, thats it. The reason I thought my iPod would be perfect to show for this project is because it incorporates a lot of things that are meaningful to me. The first reason is that my iPod is with me almost all the time. I listen to it in the gym, I listen to it in the car, sometimes on the way to classes, and even at night when I am going to bed. Another reason it is meaningful to me is I one day hope to work in the music business. Right now I am interning for clear channel radio in Hartford and I love it. I listen to all types of music and I one day would love to have my own radio show, or just work behind the scenes in radio or the music industry.

What a better object to show and tell that represents music then an iPod. It holds every piece of music I have from my favorite artists to my many playlists that get me through every day. Music that helps me get through tough times, and music that motivates me to get through a great workout, its all in one place, my iPod. I will soon have my edited video loaded on this blog for you all to see, but first I wanted to tell you why I thought my iPod is so meaningful to me.

Since I didn't get to do a stand up show and tell of my puppy I decided to post a short video of her playing instead. Stay tuned for the stand up show and tell of the iPod but heres a quick video of Lola and my moms dog Bernard playing together to hold you over until then.

Reality Shows, Enough is Enough

Even as late night talk shows begin to re-surface, the apparent lack of writers is obvious. Last night, while I was watching Conan, he spent about 5 minutes killing time by putting himself in control of the cameras. Not only was he not funny, but it was very annoying as it accomplished nothing, and didn't even have a joke to go along with it. The only thing I find worse on TV than shows without writers is the incredibly annoying reality shows, and prime time game shows.

With the writers still on strike, reality shows along with the new batch of prime time game shows, are taking over television now more than ever. It seems like a new show is on every night of the week, with each becoming more and more ridiculous. FOX, the same channel that once aired Man vs Beast has recently created, The Moment of Truth. Contestents simply have to be honest when answering extremely personal and revealing questions. It only takes 21 questions to get $500,000 yet the show still takes an hour just to see one contestant lose after question 13.

Deal or No Deal manages to keep a fan base show after show, earning two shows a week, although nothing about the show ever changes. The girls wear new dresses, every now and then there will be a themed show, and no one ever wins the million dollars. The show still takes an hour for just one completely over-the-top dramatic contestant to pick 25 suitcases. The best part about the entire show is when Howey kicks it to commercial at the (note the sarcasm) completely unexpected perfect moments, which he does about 20 times a show.

MTV has completely done away with its innovated idea of Music Television and has launched a full out reality lineup. Although the station has produced some hits such as The Real World and all the Challenge spin-offs, nothing seems to change. Each Real World cast is more and more like the season before, and the only reason the challenges are interesting is because they get all the free alcohol they can drink, which obviously leads to confrontation.

Survivor hasn't changed in 15 years (or whenever it started), American Idol has only produced two hit stars that lasted more than a year (Kelly Clarkson and Carrie Underwood). Spin-offs such as Americas Got Talent and Americas Next Top Band has produced nothing at all. The Power of 10, 1 vs 100, and Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader, along with the previously mentioned shows of this blog are either rip offs of European shows, or very similar to one another.

All in all I think its time to bring back the writers, and bring prime time television shows back. My Thursday nights are empty without new episodes of the Office. The only good that can come from this strike, is if the writers are at home coming up with phenomenal ideas for their shows so everyone can get right back to work when this strike finally ends, making the shows even better than they used to be.

Reality Shows I Do Like
Rob and Big
All Celebrity Reality on VH1