The Peacock app still sucks, especially with commercials

I have peacock and mostly watch the Olympics on it, and have for quite a few Olympics and the app has always had the same issues, especially with long Olympic events. If you pause a long event sometimes when you come back it jumps back to the beginning, which is a huge issue because you can only fast forward by jumping ahead 10 seconds at a time and you are forced to rewatch all the fixed commercial breaks! Especially problematic with 2+ hour events! And the worst part is the issue has persisted year after year! It is so annoying I will often just give up on events, because it is so frustrating!

Engadget on Amazon doubling the amount of commercials per hour, why did we leave cable and why didn’t everyone have TiVo that could skip fucking commercials?

From Engadget, this article on Amazon doubling the amount of commercials per hour to up to 6 minutes! It really makes you question streaming! I mean I had commercials on cable, but I used a TIVO, which still has a better Tv interface than any I have ever seen and a remote that fit better in the hand, but it also let me fast forward through commercials and sometimes just skip them! Sure either way YouTube I can fast forward through commercials but never automatically skip them, but ones on streaming are unstoppable and this is on Paid Streaming Services! It is amazing how they get us to pay and have forced commercials! Things get worse unless we pay more to not have commercials!

CUT/DAILY #239 This wasn’t possible until now

This sounds insane, check it out at Cut/Daily (free registration required). https://www.youtube.com/live/f_I-R6tFslQ?si=2ISge8Z2ycMhcqs3&t=1335&ref=cut-daily.com This is insane! So basically with a powerful server you stream your media frame by frame and can edit anywhere with an internet connection without downloading media (so much more secure way to remotely edit). THIS IS THE FUTURE!

Daily Beast on the lost art of DVD Special Features, thanks to Streaming

Liz Arcury at Daily Beast has this article. I just talked about Jonny Elwyn's favorites, but this is another article that hits home for me, as I cut so many great DVD behind the scenes. The really sad part is that most streaming is going to end up with commercials anyway, because that is the only way for it to make money, sadly the best part of streaming will go away. And so many movies are not available on streaming and almost none of their special features are available anywhere. Even the one place that still does some special features, Disney does not go in depth enough. And I miss audio commentaries too. Working on Lord of the Rings was a dream job, but BTS features got smaller and smaller, till they were nothing but using EPK footage, and now even that is gone for most features. It is really sad for film students, and film lovers.

Jonny Elwyn on the Best DVD Extras for Film Editors on Film Editing

From Johnny Elwyn, and I of course appreciate it after working on DVD Extras for years, including Lord of the Rings, King Kong and some of the Hobbit. It really is such a shame that there are basically almost no special features being produced anymore, as they barely have any for streaming except for a few for Disney+. I did love doing special features, but now there is basically only the EPK footage to make very crappy and short special features.

ProVideoColation on Using NDI Tools with Premiere Pro for Zoom Review Meetings

Nick Lear has posted this article on using NDI Tools instead of a streaming box to stream your Premiere Pro timeline over Zoom. This is of course not going to work as well as a dedicated streaming box. And though he says the audio from Premiere will also now playback on your machine (not sure how it does that, but he says it works, but I doubt they can hear you talk, so I would recommend LoopBack to the mix so you can combine Premiere and your Microphone to make audio (and run your computer through headphones so their isn't audio feedback). Pretty that you can try getting this running for free (or $99 for Loopback), though obviously dedicated hardware will run better.

Blackmagic has released an updated web presenter in 4K for $695 a great solution for work from home streaming

Blackmagic design has done it again and have released a 4K streaming version of the web presenter. The previous $495 version could accept a 4K signal, but it only could output at 1080, but this can output at a full 4k for a better signal for $695. And like the previous model it has a USB C out so you can connect it to your computer as a web cam to use in Zoom. And with my UltraStudio 4K I could easily run it via the SDI input without bothering the HDMI out (though it also has an HDMI out). I was talking to a DP with the director on a notes call and I really wished I had this setup so We could do live sessions. I know a lot of producers like to do a session in person and being able to stream live to a producer and talk really is something I need to add to my setup soon so I can continue to work at home. I am really looking forward to trying out Sofi Marshall's setup and getting this going.

postPerspective’s Karen Moltenbrey on remote editing The Queen’s Gambit and the documentary time.

A must read on remote editing during Covid. I also love that the Queens Gambit was cut on an iMac. I also love that Tesorow would also love to work remotely with in person screening, mixing and color correction. I completely agree, remote editing should be the future of editing. Now to figure out how to write off computers now that AB5 in California has made being an independent contractor and all of it’s tax benefits basically illegal.