George Ebersole

On hacking; I traced my information being hacked and stored in some university in China (I can't recall the name of the town nor the school), and I was outraged. It wasn't just some Asian university student, but I'm betting more PRC shenanigans for whatever reason. I've had the same thing happen from Russia and Germany, and probably other places, but in end I wound on top of things.

*EDIT* the most severe hacking incident I ever had was having my old phone number spoofed, and hundreds of dollars in charges being pushed on my account. Nothing to do with my PC.

I think Apples might have had some "don't use" armor back in the 90s, but I'm not so sure that's the case these days. The Sony pictures North Korean hacking incident, was on an Apple based network? I can't recall.

I'll echo what Landon says about computers breaking down. I've been building my own rigs since 1992, and the primary culprit is heat and/or parts like an HD bearing going bad that causes a lot of issues. I'm embarrassed to say that one time I hadn't serviced an old late 90s Pentium when it started to act weird. I opened up the case and parts were crammed with dust bunnies. A thorough cleaning seemed to give it new life, but I eventually had to build a new computer because of increased hardware demands by newer media focused software.

Strictly speaking, for screenwriting or basic home finance, my old 386 would have worked just fine had the HD not gone bad. Oh well.

The colors look muted, but I'm guessing that's because of the overcast sky. I'm curious, is the image ever so slightly soft because of that as well, or is that also because of the clouds?

I refuse to use anything related to Microsoft. I don't want to own a computer that thousands of people in Russia and China are constantly trying to crack into. That anything you click on could be a virus or malware or spyware. Frankly, I also don't like fixing windows because when it breaks, it usually means reinstall, which is a rarity on Mac OS.

 

I don't understand what the issues are with the pricing. Nobody in their right mind would walk into an apple store and buy a brand new computer, that's financial suicide! Apple has a fantastic online refurb store with "new" computers for between 15 - 30% off. I usually wait until it hits 30% off and then nab something, so with CA tax and shipping, it's close to 18% off sticker. Now if you're like me and don't really care about new vs used, craigslist is your friend. Most of my computers have been used models, where you're buying a $2500 machine for $750 - $900?

 

So yes... if you're going to the apple store and looking at pricing, it's a lot... but that's not the only way to buy an apple computer.

That's interesting. I didn't know that had such a thing. Pulling another all nighter here, and browsing at their offerings I found this;

https://www.apple.com/shop/product/G0P88LL/A/Refurbished-Mac-Pro-27GHz-12-Core-Intel-Xeon-E5

Not sure I need a Xeon CPU. ... if I was doing feature work, or high end commercials, then I might splurge on one of these, depending on what the client was paying me. As it stands my i7 has 14 virtual, and 32gig.

An interesting page. Not sure I'll ever use it, but selling used gear is a bit of a departure from their old business model. Thanks for the heads' up.

P.S. my current configuration gets roughly 21k on the geek bench table. I tend not to follow benchmarks for anything, even gaming unless I'm building a new system. I think at some point you have to ask yourself if your final product necessitates an extremely high end machine, or will the software be able to compile all the hidden data that you didn't use during editing, and display it in the final edit. Because when it comes to showtime to the client or audience, that's when image quality matters.

*much snippage*

 

You could make a cheaper PC that gets that score, but it wouldn't run Mac OS well if at all and probably be worthless in a year or two anyway.

And that's key, because I've no desire to run any Mac software. My history with Apple is scattered and abysmal at best. Maybe they make a decent rig now, but it took them over thirty years to do so, and for my money it's still overpriced. I don't need instant or on the fly frame compiling. I make my edits, let the machine do its thing, then when it's done I hit the playback button to see what I got.

Like I say, if I was doing heavy graphics, and by graphics I don't mean titles, but serious CGI work, then I'd dump several thousand into a server type machine. But, I'm not down in LA, I'm just a hobbyist, and like I say, if I can get crisp digital that's 24fps looking to emulate film, then I'm happy. None of my junk will ever be projected in a theatre, and I think for guys who do corporate video it's the same thing.

I don't know, maybe the bar's been raised for corporate video. Even so I can't imagine any of them really wanting RED or Arri quality image for a year end sales meeting or training vid. Maybe to sell their stuff to distributors ... I can see a demand for that if the cost justifies the return, but even then you could still do it for less money with a high end PC.

I'll say this about Apple, and maybe things have changed and I'll add that I won't be making any friends with this comment, but when I used to shoot video down there the atmosphere was casual and juvenile. To me that reflected in their products. If they're cranking out better computers, then it's in no small realization that the serious business owner nearly always went for a PC, and still does. I think Apple's "hip" culture has woven its way into Hollywood, but with the realization that they needed to crank out some serious hardware and are still playing catchup with high priced hardware.

Congrats on keeping your last Mac for that long, but I'm of the opinion that you could have saved money with a PC. I still have my XP machine from 2001. I don't use it for anything serious, and certainly not for media (not high end anyway), but it does its job.

Well, for my money it depends on what kind of project you're working on. My rig here in my office would need an overhaul and, as you say, cost nearly as much as an Apply, but, unlike an Apple, I can tweak this thing until the cows come home and save money to keep up with whatever it is I'm working on. That verse having to dump a massive amount of cash for a new Apple every couple of years.

I don't work on features. Hell, I don't work on anything anymore other than what little footage I capture with my DSLRs, but since I can get 24fps-ish look to whatever it is I've shot, it's therefore good enough for "government work".

If I was working for Disney, then I'd need to either clone my guy, dump in a parallel port MB and another CPU and high end NVIDIA, but, even doing so, that computer's going to last ages compared to a fresh of the factory floor top of the line Apple.

I don't knock current Apples for being performing machines, but again, it's the same thing with the first Macs. Macs took Apple several ages backwards, all the while real computing was done on IBMs and IBM PC clones. To me that's still the case with Apple trying to play catchup by marketing primo over priced computers.

Just my opinion.

Having said that, it does seem like most of the directors and local production houses I've comes across here in the Bay Area use Apples. Go figure.

I'd also look into PC market as well. Price to performance with Mac is much less. Apple has become a consumer company, and I have not seen any of their products - even the ones they label as 'pro' - to be anything close to pro level. Yes, they are reliable (but so is PC), and their OS does have some neat features, but nothing that Windows can't do.

 

All I'm saying is, do your homework. Talk to people on both sides of the game. The iMac Pro's are expensive - I have been building computers since I was 12 - and in my opinion, the hardware side of the new Macs is severely limited.

 

Another thing to consider: The new IMAC's use Vega GPU's from AMD. I started with one, but returned it for an nVidia GTX 1080ti, which performs at least twice as fast as the 64 did - and given the modern editors use GPU more than the do CPU, I'd put your focus away from raw core-CPU power and toward the GPU.

 

I'd be happy to share my 32-core, 64GB, 12TB Storage system part list with you. It all cost me less than $3,000. A 10-core iMacPro is around $10,000. 1/3 the CPU cores for 3x the price.

For my money Apple hasn't made a decent computer since the Apple II way back in the day.

I built my 32gig rig with an Intel i7 and win10 for less than $2000. If you're doing serious CGI work, then it's just a matter of dumping in more RAM.

AMD used to perform much better at higher clock speeds than Intel. But that was five to ten years ago. I'm not sure if that's till the case today, but I keep hearing that AMD is the processor to have for heavy graphics work. And I'll echo what Landon said about Nvidia, you can't really beat their cards. They also make special "super sized" cards with uncounted loads of onboard video RAM for both graphics work and multiple (octopus) display work.

Apple makes a sexy machine, and even having worked down there via contracting with lots of other companies, they're more sales and image than actual good hardware. I coded on the fist Apples as a boy, learned basic and C on Apples, but it's the same problem now as they've had historically ever since they clamped down on unlicensed dupes of their architecture, they sell the public on style over performance.

Having said that you can get a decent Apple rig for editing, but you're shelling out cash for something that only they can fix, and you can do better with a custom design or a DIYer.

All the best dude.

I cautiously recommend Francis Ford Coppola's "virtual studios", largely because it's gravitated away from discussing serious screenplays at times and devolved into a free for all (FFA) off topic forum.

Having said that, there are professional screenwriters there (there used to be more five plus years ago) who do table work to be critiqued. In the "submit work" section there used to be two to three pages worth of scripts to DL and read, each page showing 20 or 30 scripts. Now there's barely half a page at times, though last I checked traffic had picked up some.

For small cases, it hard to beat Pelican. I don't really use them anymore, since I now have my gear in larger 'road cases' - but I still keep my Rokinon lenses in one.

Those look fairly decent, but for some reason I can't find large hard cases anymore with those oversized padded nylon straps. I may give them a shot anyway.

The irony of discussing this on the internet, an invention developed by the military...

Geek Hat on; developed by "Ma Bell" back in the 30s, perfected for the USAF, and specifically for missile silos to communicate with one another. I think Queen Elizabeth sent her first email in the late 60s or 1973.

Thank you Doctor Scott Patterson of the BECA department at SF State.

Back to the OP; back in the day (60's, 70's, 80's and before) you didn't pay sales tax on mail order items purchased out of state. I think the logic was that the shipping cost was essentially tax because whoever was actually bringing you your ordered item was passing on the tax to you in the shipping charge, that, and in theory, you weren't in whatever state you ordered your product from.

If you have any old mail order catalog there's usually a subtotal at the bottom of the order form that asks you to include sale tax where applicable.

Having said all that, there were a handful of states that I think actually charged sales tax on out of state purchases, but I can't remember the details. I don't know what the law is for internet orders .... I'm too lazy to look it up right now.

Just an FYI.

Heh, you know, dude? Reading your posts here, I feel like I've actually read your book. ;)

It depends on who you deal with in Japan, or it's been my experience.

I've essentially stopped doing business with Amazon, and have taken my business elsewhere. I think once people realize that their former open consumer society is no more and that their prices are continually going up, that they'll take a hit at some point.

I really liked Amazon for a long time because you could get things there that sometime you couldn't get on ebay or craigslist, and you could read some fairly frank reviews of products. That's not the case anymore. Local camera stores and other businesses need my dollars more than Amazon anyway.

No response, whatever. Here's another Hawaiian Airlines montage with lots of clear shots with lots of detail and vivid colors. I'm not really interested in Hawaii or any of the islands as such, but I really do like the technique used here to capture these images.

Cool, thanks.

It looks suspiciously like the technology Sony used for their first Digital audio recorders, although those mostly used U-Matic tapes.

That's interesting. I didn't know that.

More uses for VHS;

I've got a couple of DSLRs, and I'd like to get a couple of cases, one for each. One camera has three lenses, a wide angle 30mm, the lens it came with (50?), and a 120mm zoom. The other has two lenses; a standard focal length factory lens and a 55mm zoom.

Any case recommendations would be most welcome.

Well, I did say most people here would probably already know what this guy had to say. I still found it interesting in an academic sort of way. I'm not a big Back to the Future fan, but I liked having the details pointed out.

Whatever.

For you retro-tech fans, this is pretty basic stuff for most people here, but some of the younger cinematographers might find this interesting.

Naive question here, and I should know the answer, but I don't; are commercials shot at a higher frame rate than features and TV? They sure do seem sharper than features and TV show.

Well, has it effected the quality of projects you've been hired for?

One other note. To me it's akin to people phrasing their statements as questions. Like ... "I'm going to the store." verse "I'm going to the store?" when both phrases mean the exact same thing.

It's a kind of placation and short cut, and it bugs me.

Whatever. I guess jump cuts are here to stay ... sure do wish there was a law though.

 

I suspect there's rambling off the point at various stages, so is sharpening it up with the cuts as if it was radio..

 

It would be more impressive if she could deliver the polemic without the jump cuts, just clear thought..

That's kind of how I feel about all YouTube media, not just that young woman. And I think that's what my instructors were getting at. Oh well. I needed to vent on the topic. Thanks for the replies.