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Angels-Yankees matchup: Catchers
Backstop platoons give clubs options for offense, defense
By Steve Gilbert / MLB.com
Mike Napoli
.272, 20 HR, 56 RBIs
Jeff Mathis
.211, 5 HR, 28 RBIs
Similar to the Yankees, the Angels have a catcher who is clearly superior at the plate -- Napoli, just like Jorge Posada -- and a catcher who is better behind the plate -- Mathis, much like former Angel Jose Molina.
Napoli is an offensive force with the ability to drive the ball to all fields, while also taking his fair share of walks because of his patience at the plate. He's the Angels' all-time leader in career home runs by a catcher with 66 and has hit exactly 20 home runs in each of the last two seasons.
M. Napoli - J. Posada
First Base
K. Morales - M. Teixeira
Second Base
H. Kendrick - R. Cano
E. Aybar - D. Jeter
Third Base
C. Figgins - A. Rodriguez
Angels - Yankees
Angels - Yankees
Middle Relief
Angels - Yankees
B. Fuentes - M. Rivera
Angels - Yankees
M. Scioscia - J. Girardi
Coaching Staff
Angels - Yankees
Angels - Yankees
So while Napoli provides the offense, Mathis is a much better defensive catcher because of his athleticism and is better at throwing out runners. Mathis had a higher fielding percentage than Napoli and threw out 26 percent of runners trying to steal, while Napoli threw out 22 percent.
But the biggest difference comes in the ERA of the team when the two are behind the plate. The team's ERA of 3.99 when Mathis catches is far better than the team's ERA of 4.86 when Napoli is behind the plate.
That's the main reason why Mathis will start in Game 1 with John Lackey on the mound, with Napoli likely catching fellow starters Joe Saunders, Jered Weaver and Scott Kazmir as the series progresses.
And if the Angels come up in a situation where Napoli isn't behind the plate and they need a pinch-hitter behind the bench, they can do it with steady backup catcher Bobby Wilson on the playoff roster.
Jorge Posada
.285, 22 HR, 81 RBIs
Jose Molina
.217, 1 HR, 11 RBIs
With a mainly set lineup, the catching spot is the only one that seems up for debate. Joe Girardi has not said yet how he intends to split up the playing time behind the plate between Posada and Molina.
In the ALDS, Molina started Game 2 with A.J. Burnett on the mound, while Posada started the other two games, as well as pinch-hitting for Molina in the sixth inning of Game 2 and getting three at-bats.
Offensively, Posada is clearly the better of the two. As the team's primary backstop, he had an outstanding year at the plate and hit .364 in the ALDS. Posada is not as highly regarded defensively as Molina, but is not a liability behind the plate, his cross ups and passed balls in Game 1 with CC Sabathia notwithstanding.
Molina, however, developed a good rapport with Burnett catching the right-hander's final six regular-season starts as well as his lone playoff appearance. A good defender, Molina does not bring much to the table offensively. Whether Girardi feels Molina and Burnett's comfort level is enough to sacrifice some offense in Game 2 of the ALCS will be a storyline worth watching.
Both Posada and Molina threw out 28 percent of the runners trying to steal against them, an important factor given the Angels were third in the AL in steals this year and are aggressive on the basepaths.
The Yankees carried a third catcher in the ALDS in Francisco Cervelli and are likely to do so again in the ALCS, given the way they utilize Posada and Molina.
Edge: Even
Steve Gilbert is a reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

subset: commoncrawl


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Mel Taylor was thirteen years old when she found her Mr Right. Twenty years on they remain blissfully in love. She has the man she adores, a gorgeous daughter, a great job and a dream home. But Mel's seemingly perfect life is spoilt by a dark secret and a niggling fear that her good fortune can't last for ever. Despite her husband Adam telling her to live for the present and stop worrying about the future, Mel can't shake the feeling that someone is about to call time on their happiness. And then it happens.
©2011 Linda Green (P)2014 Audible, Inc.
"And then it happened"
I loved this booked! I enjoyed the way that chapters were dedicated to one person at a time... telling their side of the story. The reader, Suzie Aitcheson, was brilliant, giving each character their own personality and voice.
I laughed out loud at some of Adam's comments while he was in a coma .... it was so easy to believe.
I was listening while gardening and never has weeding been so enjoyable!
"An unusual and beautiful story"
This is a story of love, hope and commitment. Memorable and uplifting and well narrated. I really enjoyed it. It's the second Linda Green novel I have read and I will read more; she writes with great insight and emotion.
Easy to read.
Fabulous book. I read it over the course of a week and thoroughly enjoyed it.
"Amazing story"
A thought provoking story. Makes you wonder how you would react. Enjoy listening very much.
"Narrator's attempt at Yorkshire accent put me off"
Different Narrator. I really could not enjoy this book because of the narrator's over-exaggerated attempt at a Yorkshire accent, I have lived in Yorkshire for 58 years & we definitely don't pronounce things as she does, example this is supposedly the voice of a university educated character who is a lecturer and is given to pronouncing the word "half" as " haf" - she spoke more like a farmer in a James Herriot book. Also her interpretation of a child's voice was cringeworthy and more like a character in a cartoon. Had to send it back - shame as the story was probably ok, but not brilliant.
Definitely not
The story idea was ok
Above says it all
"Terrible, irritating narrator "
The narrator was just awful. Stupid, grating and childish voice. I couldn't get past chapter one which is a shame because I like the author.
"And then it happened"
Loved this book. The humour, the pathos. Brilliant book. Will read it again and again
"Best Narrator I have heard"
Lovely story with a realism and which could effect anyone's life
Narrator portrays the different characters with a true realism so you hear their emotions.
Offers true life humour, sorrow, regret, delight and hope. Has been a pleasure to listen to.
"Hoped it would improve. - it didn't"
The narrator's voice annoyed me; I've lived nearly all my life in Yorkshire but have never heard such exaggerated expressions and words. Too many predictable local references. Nearly sent the book back on several occasions but hoped it would improve - sadly, for me but didn't. I'm sure it was an accurate portrayal of a brain injury but the story was dull and all too predictable
"True to facts which is good"
This was a good story, and did not change medical facts to conveniently end all happy and merry. It was a good story, and recommended. I did enjoy it, and the narrator is very good
"And Then it Happened"
An beautiful, inspiring story about true, committed faithful love through the best of times and the worst of times.
"Dark Chick Lit"
This was the first book I'd ever read by Linda Green. Given the dark nature of the story, I'm reluctant to trust her again.
Throughout the story Mel, the wife, alerts us to something terrible she'd done in the past. This impacts many of her decisions, and one in particular. Adam, her husband, knows that Mel's perspective on life is one where she waits for the other shoe to drop into her very happy, perfect life.
Then the shoe does drop.While I don't mind a bit of tragedy in my chick lit, or realistic situations, I do mind that light beach reading doesn't have a lighthearted resolution. Although probably a "true to life" ending, it was depressing.
However, it is very well written.The juggling Mel does is appropriate.The inconsistent support she receives adds to the depth of the novel. Mel and Adam's daughter is simply adorable. The pace is good. Green's talent as a writer is evident.
As always, Aitcheson is a wonderful reader. She is one of my favorites.
It's possible that this type of story line is not typically Green. But since this was my first read by her, I cannot comment on that. If you can accept a dark topic and an ending that is unsettling, then by all means the book is fine. If you want something more along the lines of a Sophie Kinsella novel with lots of humor, then bypass it.
"WOW!! Great book!"
Fabulous, Moving and Real
I had a few watery eye moments and a few giggle moments. The whole book is very moving and make you question "Would I do the same if this happened to me?"
Just a fantastic book! It was narrated really well, she did different voices for the characters. I could not stop listening! This is my first Linda Green book and I have downloaded another to listen to next.
Only about 1/4 of the story left to listen to but wanted to write a review - its so good. One of those stories your remember for some time.
Not too many charaters which kept me emmersed in the main storyline between husband and wife Mel and Adam. Normal life .. quite perfect actually then something happens.
Its this "something" that really keeps your gripped and wanting to discover the outcome. I dont want to give anything away but I really do recommend this book. I usually only listen to my books in the morning at the gym but I found myself even listening to it in the car.
Narration by Suzy Aitchinson is great - adds so much more to the story.
"Tragedy is Main Theme"
Wow - this book was not at all what I expected. It is a story of an unfathomable catastrophe that happens to a family of 3 - Mel, Adam, and 4-year old daughter Maya. The family is put to the test and defines a whole new level of level and commitment.
Based on my last read of Linda Green ("Things I Wish I'd Known", awesome book!), I expected a story of intrigue with a bit of humor - well, there is some humor in this book, but it is dark humor. The primary story line is very sad. For me, having a husband and 4 year old daughter myself - it was just too depressing to put my head in this family's life.
Having said that - if you enjoy the inspiration of undying love and commitment, of rebuilding your life after tragedy, this book will not disappoint. I could not wait to see what happened next.
"A story of unconditional love"
committed unconditional love
The main character's passion, persistence and sense of humor.
Mel's acceptance of a "different" Adam.
This is a great tale of love overcoming tragedy, undying commitment, trust and acceptance.
"not bad"
Overall, it was a good listen I am not a huge fan of british chic lit but this was good enough
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Each day leading up to the Big 12 Championship game, our resident experts will break down one of the key questions surrounding the matchup between the Tigers and the Sooners.
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Real Salt Lake came so very close to
making history in Mexico City, but a late goalscoring furry denied the MLSers
as they fell to Cruz Azul, 5-4, in a wild Champions League match hindered by heavy
rainfall and a waterlogged pitch.
Real Salt Lake had paced a 3-2 lead with just two minutes remaining on the clock. Had they held on to that tenuous advantage, they would have become the first MLS team to have won a meaningful game in Mexico.
However, as perpetual rain turned the field to a small lake, a series of slap-stick routines resulted in an outrageous four-goal scoring flurry that saw Javier Orozco finish the night with four goals and Christian Gimenez tally a stoppage-time winner for the host Cementeros.
Cruz Azul jumped out early after youngster Orozco received a pass off of a quick restart that found him in behind the defense, and he easily sidestepped Rimando to score the goal.
Real Salt Lake leveled in the 23rd minute after a deflected ball found its way to Espindola's feet, and as he maneuvered in behind the defense he was fouled by defender Horacio Cervantes. Alvaro Saborio stepped up to convert the tying PK.
Saborio added his fourth goal of the tournament near the end of the first half as he picked off a back pass by Cervantes, who had not accounted for the pool of water between himself and the goalkeeper. The ball failed to travel the full distance back to his teammate, and Saborio pounced on the opportunity to give RSL a halftime lead.
The Mexican side came out in attack mode in the second half, intent on getting an equalizer. However, RSL would capitalize with a counterattack when Saborio put pressure on a defender and picked his pocket. He then played a wonderful square ball that caught Fabian Espindola, who put the ball away with his left foot.
Cruz Azul narrowed the advantage in the 75th minute when Orozco scored his second of the match. He collected the ball off of a free kick with his back to the goal before turning and taking a shot that deflected off of the leg of an RSL defender. The deflection caught Rimando diving to his right as the ball headed toward his left and into the net.
In the 87th minute Orozco scored his third of the match to bring it level, and then added a fourth in the 89th minute to give Cruz Azul the advantage.
However, Will Johnson appeared to earn RSL the point two minutes into stoppage time. The celebration would be short-lived, though, as Cruz Azul took the re-start down into the RSL end and scored with a blast from the top of the area by Gimenez.
RSL comes close to history in 5-4 defeat at Cruz Azul
Real Salt Lake came so very close to
making history in Mexico City, but a late goalscoring furry denied the MLSers
as they fell to Cruz Azul, 5-4, in a wild Champions League match hindered by heavy
rainfall and a waterlogged pitch.


text:
Hello everyone. I'm new to this board. I just heard about it recently at a quilt show in Atlanta. I just learned how to sew a few years ago. I'm a mom to three boys between the ages of 12 & 2. I enjoy sewing, but don't have a lot if time unfortunately. Currently I have two different quilts I am working on. My style definitely lends itself more to the modern style. Looking forward to getting to know you all over time! I am so impressed by al of the pictures that I have seen so far.
Just a beginner,


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INDIANAPOLIS — The Vikings have begun the process of meeting with their unrestricted free agents at the NFL scouting combine, general manager Rick Spielman said Thursday, Feb. 21. And while a number of teams have released veteran players to clear cap room this week, Spielman said the Vikings aren't planning to go that route yet.
The Vikings could wait until the days before free agency begins on March 12 to make moves with some of their veterans, which gives them time to see if those players would be willing to restructure their contracts. The Vikings reportedly have more than $12 million in available cap space, so they might not be in a hurry to make moves yet, anyway.
"I don't anticipate anything happening at this point," Spielman said of releasing veterans. "Now, as we get through and get closer to that new league year, we'll see where that evolves. So I'm not going to ever say we're not going to do anything. We may. I don't know yet. We'll see how things progress."
Defensive tackle Kevin Williams could be a prime candidate for a restructured contract; the 32-year-old's contract will count for $7.5 million of cap space in 2013. Cornerback Antoine Winfield has a $7.2 million base salary for 2013, though the 35-year-old is coming off one of his best seasons.
Other teams have made a series of high-profile moves with their veteran players in recent days. The Green Bay Packers cut former NFL defensive player of the year Charles Woodson, while the Indianapolis Colts released seven-time Pro Bowl defensive end Dwight Freeney.
Follow Ben Goessling at twitter.com/BenGoesslingPP.


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Published September 1, 2011
UB has created a new position of chief sustainability officer to provide leadership and direction for sustainability initiatives as the university works to implement ambitious environmental objectives.
"UB's Climate Action Plan calls for the university to reduce or offset greenhouse-gas emissions enough to achieve climate neutrality by 2030," said Dennis Black, vice president for university life and services. "As our university grows, it is vital to have sustainability built into our evolution. This new position will help us operationalize our commitment to the environment."
The creation of the new position came at a point in UB history when it was constructing and renovating new buildings and facilities designed to new eco-friendly standards, including a 3,200-panel solar array at the Flint entrance to the North Campus. Other new developments include William R. Greiner Hall, a state-of-the-art residence hall that opened in August. The building was designed to earn UB's first gold rating under the U.S. Green Building Council's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) rating system.
Ryan McPherson was named chief sustainability officer, effective Sept. 9, 2011. Prior to that, he was UB's associate vice president for government and community relations. As chief sustainability officer, McPherson coordinates university-wide environmental efforts through UB Green, the campus environmental office, partnering with the Environmental Stewardship Committee. In collaboration with university and community partners, he promotes sustainability among the campus community and helps build and improve programs that incorporate sustainability into UB operations.
Robert Shibley, campus architect and dean of the School of Architecture and Planning, said UB's appointment of a chief sustainability officer marks a new level of commitment to environmental stewardship and the university's responsibilities as a charter subscriber to the American College and University Presidents Climate Commitment.
"Creation of this position demonstrates the importance of sustainability as a key principle in all of the university's operations, as well as in its educational and research programs," said Shibley, who chairs UB's Environmental Stewardship Committee. "Ryan McPherson's consistent record as an environmental leader on this campus, and in the wider community, makes him the ideal candidate for this exciting new position."
Since he joined UB in 1999, McPherson has served in a variety of government relations, community relations and external affairs roles. As UB's associate vice president for government and community relations, he led the university's federal, state and local government agenda and community relations, working to achieve government and community support for the UB 2020 strategic plan.
He has served as chair of outreach and communications for the Environmental Stewardship Committee since 2008, and formerly chaired UB's Greener Shade of Blue Committee. A resident of East Aurora, he is active in community environmental initiatives and causes.
Prior to joining UB, McPherson served in a variety of legislative, research and development positions for organizations in Washington, D.C., and in New Hampshire. He received a JD from the UB Law School in 2002, graduating magna cum laude, and earned a bachelor's degree in political science from the University of New Hampshire in 1996.


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The importance of search engine optimization (SEO) for businesses is growing every year. To understand why, you need only ask yourself when the last time you picked up a phone directory was. Search engines such as Google are where consumers turn for information, whether on a computer, laptop, tablet, or smartphone. Although competitors such as Bing and Yahoo! are solid alternatives, Google commands more than 80% of the worldwide search engine market.
Forrester Research, Inc. predicts that in 2012, U.S. companies will spend more than $21.5 billion on search marketing. About 90% of this total will be on paid search (such as Google AdWords), about 9% on SEO agency fees, and about 1% on SEO technology (online SEO reporting).
Organic vs. Sponsored Search ResultsWhen I first read these figures, I was a bit surprised at the allocations, considering the findings from a 2011 User Centric, Inc. study in which participants' searches were tracked using eye-tracking technology. The study revealed that sponsored results above Google organic search results were looked at 90% of the time and, on average, for only 2.8 seconds. Compare this to the 100% of viewers who looked at the organic search results and spent 14.7 seconds, and the 28% who viewed the right-hand-side sponsored results for an average of 4.4 seconds, and you'll appreciate just how important organic search engine results are for driving users to websites.
Within organic search results, SEO marketing company Optify measured click-through rates on first-page results and found that 36.4% of searchers clicked on the first result. The remainder of the top five results had click-through rates of 12.5%, 9.5%, 7.9%, and 6.1%, and the bottom five ranged between 4.1% and 2.2%.
That's a lot of studies and stats to analyze. But the obvious conclusion is that organic search engine results should be the goal of most SEO campaigns, yet businesses are spending 10 times more on paid search results (which don't include display ads, which account for about the same level of spending as paid results do). Flip that around, and you'll realize that if you could solve the SEO problem and generate top-level organic results, you could tap into a huge potential market for your services among prospects searching for the type of services you offer online. Read on, and I'll show you how video producers are well-positioned to offer a solution to that problem.
Caption: Video results with screen shot, within organic Google searches
Enter Social MediaIncreasingly, social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and LinkedIn are important drivers for traffic. While social media has been credited with an increase in consumer interaction, marketers often forget that the goal of social media from a strictly sales perspective is to drive traffic to your company website. This is an important point, and I'll come back to it later when I discuss video SEO and YouTube.
The way Google calculates search results is a topic of much debate. Part of the challenge in SEO is that the algorithms that Google uses change all the time in an effort to keep results relevant, as well as to discourage "black hat" SEO marketers who use tactics that aren't approved by Google. What we can agree upon is that content-rich websites, with lots of links from other webpages, and keywords in the body, titles, description, and metatags will rank higher than ones that lack relevant content, keywords, and links from other websites. Flash sites also do poorly because Google can't index those sites as easily as HTML ones. SEOmoz assembled a 132-person expert panel for its 2011 Search Engine Ranking Factors report, and those experts' collective wisdom produced a nine-factor broad algorithm of what is important for search engine rankings.
As the owner of Shawn Lam Video, a Vancouver Video Production company, I've been really frustrated with how difficult it has been to maintain a high organic search ranking for my key search terms. One effective way is to get lots of links from other websites in the form of search terms, rather than in the form of URLs. For example, you'll note that I hyperlinked Vancouver Video Production in the first sentence of this paragraph on purpose--it not only points back to my website but it also tells Google what search terms to connect with my website.
Not every link is equal. What is also important is that websites that link to your website are both relevant and authoritative; they will then pass on lots of link juice (authoritative and link juice are both SEO terms).Unfortunately, for every high-quality and relevant link earned, I've found that some of my competitors can purchase links or commission an SEO company to generate bogus links for them, and the sheer volume of low-quality links can equal or outweigh a normal quantity of high-quality links. There is also no shortage of SEO companies that are willing to guarantee you first-page rankings; I get an email or telemarketing call offering SEO services on a weekly basis. Part of the problem is that their black-hat methods can still produce results, and companies covet high search rankings so much that they keep paying these companies, which perpetuates the cycle. Stick around; as promised, I'm going to present you with a white-hat solution that offers additional benefits. But first, here's a little history.
The Video SEO Dark AgesSeveral years ago, when high-bitrate videos were 500Kbps Windows Media Player files that had to first be downloaded and then played in Windows Media Player, I hosted my own videos on my website hosting package and allowed my clients to link to the videos from their websites. This generated lots of traffic for me but also, and more importantly, links to my website. I was also fortunate enough on the SEO side that some of my early clients produced sports model competitions, and those videos were popular on early online forums, generating traffic and link juice for me. With videos hosted on my web server, viewers didn't even need to visit my website in order to generate traffic and links for me; they had only to view a video that I was hosting. For a few years this helped me maintain the No. 1 spot for my most valued key search terms.
But all this link-love changed when I started using video-hosting services, such as Brightcove, Vimeo, YouTube, and Amazon S3 (paired with a player, such as the JW player) to stream my videos. I switched because I wanted faster transfer speeds that a web host could (or was willing to) provide for me. But I lost all of the link juice that my videos were creating for my website, especially when they were embedded off of my website, such as on a blog, a social media site, or a client's website. All Google could see was a link to the video-hosting service, except for the occasional video production credit that I asked for but that was rarely or properly implemented. Most links were done with anchor text that was my URL and not a keyword-rich link as in my example earlier on.
At the same time, Google added the tag that allowed websites to display links but not pass on link juice to the linked site. This was mostly to avoid spammers from clogging up blogs and forums with spam comments in order to get links back. But video-hosting companies, including YouTube, also used the tag and, as a result, no link juice flowed to the content creator from their sites or from embeds. Understandably, this is why I have never been happy with off-site video-hosting solutions; they rob me of the SEO potential from the content I create.
The Challenges of Today's Video SEOSo where does all this leave video content producers when it comes to SEO? Has Google crippled our ability to be ranked? It turns out that Google, which now owns YouTube, started to include videos in its search results. More importantly, the search results to videos also include a thumbnail of the video, which stands out in a sea of text results. Not surprisingly, YouTube videos dominate the results because Google has accorded it the highest authority of all the video-hosting websites. But there is still room for the video-producer Davids to compete with the YouTube Goliath.
One of the first steps in getting a website listed on Google is to submit and maintain a Google site map, which tells Google the URL of every page on your website. A similar site map for videos also exists, but because most online videos are hosted by video-sharing websites and then embedded, most companies aren't even aware of video site maps; they aren't relevant to them, and they can be a bit tricky for novices. Google doesn't support metafiles that require a download of the source via streaming protocols, meaning it won't index a YouTube video embedded on your website and give you credit for it, which would allow the video to be seen in search results with a link to the webpage on your website where it is hosted.
Videos uploaded to video-hosting sites such as YouTube are automatically added to the hosts' own video site maps, and the titles, descriptions, and other metadata are used to populate the site map fields. So it's possible to get your videos listed in Google search results, but the link goes back to YouTube, not your website, and getting links and viewers to your website is the goal of SEO. Notwithstanding getting video views, the problem with sending a viewer to YouTube is that YouTube does a really good job of distracting your viewers with suggestions for other videos it might want to view, including the videos of your competitors.
Caption: Author beating YouTube in Google search rankings
Enter WISTIALet's do a quick recap before I present you with a brilliant solution for video SEO. The goal of SEO is to get listed on Google search results, in order to drive viewers to your website. The problem is that video that is hosted on video-hosting sites serves to drive traffic to the video-hosting site, even if it is embedded on your website. The solution is to use a video host that conforms to Google's site map requirements and passes on SEO benefits to you for videos it hosts and that are embedded on your website. The solution that I use for video SEO is Wistia, a Boston-based online video management company.
Caption: The Wistia Social Bar adds social media links to embed codes
In addition to video hosting and video site maps, Wistia also offers two other noteworthy features. The first is the ability to easily add social media sharing, via outlets such as Google+, Facebook, Twitter, email, and embed, via the Wistia Social Bar. There is even an option to add the Wistia logo; when you do so, you can also add a link back to your website. This is great for creating SEO links on sites that embed your video, although I wish the logo was customizable or more white-label.
The second really cool features are some very advanced analytics, including heatmaps. Heatmaps show how much of a video is played, which parts are played, and if portions of the video are viewed multiple times. All of these stats are displayed in an easy-to-understand analytics page on a video-by-video basis. To find out more, read my blog post about Video Analytics.
One of the things I learned from my own stats was that in a longer 15-minute corporate presentation video, many of my client's viewers tended to watch the first third and last third of a clip only. When I once brought these findings to my client, I suggested that we break each video into three to five smaller videos and describe the content of each section to make sure the message got across to viewers; this way, viewers can more efficiently find exactly what they are looking for (a keyword-rich description might also benefit SEO). I don't know if this will produce measurably better results (in this case, an increase in investment dollars), but at least I can analyze video metrics, suggest changes, and report any viewer trend changes.
Caption: Video sitemap creation is easy with Wistia.
All of this increases my value to my clients and provides more service to them than the simple viewer counts and lack of SEO potential that are the built-in limitations of popular video-sharing sites.
Wistia accounts are accessed online and allow you to create and share video project folders with your clients. These folders can be accessed by a custom link that can be password-protected for additional security. In true Wistia fashion, private user sessions are also tracked, so I'm able to see if and when my clients have viewed some or all of their videos, which parts they skipped over or watched multiple times, and commented on. It also allows them to share or download the source file.
Another nice touch is that the comments can be linked to a specific timecode, which makes it so much easier for my clients to communicate where edits are required on drafts. Wistia automatically re-encodes the source file for mobile devices, and in the spirit of content liberation, it allows these files to be downloaded as well. I've found the private user session stats to be very useful when working with my clients (especially when I'm waiting on edit decisions); I can gently remind them if I haven't seen any activity associated with their Wistia session, or I can contact them if I have seen activity but haven't received feedback.
The Deluxe Wistia account comes with 20GB of storage and 100GB of bandwidth per month. Bandwidth is calculated on actual viewing time, so it stretches much farther than you might expect. Additional storage or bandwidth can also be purchased.
Video SEO Best PracticesIn the cat-and-mouse game of SEO, it is challenging to keep ahead of the competition and changing SEO best practices. Fortunately for video production companies, there is finally a solution that allows video producers to get more search engine love for their own websites and for those of their clients. Wistia makes it so easy for video producers to get SEO results; I can see many of them adding Video SEO Expert to their talents. I know I will.
Author's NoteWhen I first heard about the launch of EventDV magazine in 2005, I knew I wanted to write for the magazine. Two years later I got the chance when I met Steve Nathans-Kelly in Jacksonville, Fla., at the 4EVER Group's Video 07 conference. I was one of the speakers, and when I saw him in my conference room, I decided I would approach him afterwards to see if I could realize my dream. After seeing my presentation, he had the same idea and asked me to join his team as a columnist. It has been a privilege and an honour (I'm Canadian and I'm going to spell it my way this time) to write for the EventDV community for the past 5 years.
I've also decided to launch my own video production training website at www.thevideoproductionpro.com, where I'm going to continue my own journey and discussion of video production business mastery that I embarked on with EventDV readers 5 years ago. In the meantime, you can follow me on Twitter @shawnlamvideo or subscribe to my public Facebook feed, ShawnLam1.
Shawn Lam (video at shawnlam.ca) runs Shawn Lam Video, a Vancouver video production studio. He specializes in stage event and corporate video production and has presented seminars at WEVA Expo 2005–2009 and the 4EVER Group's Video 07. He won a Silver Creative Excellence Award at WEVA Expo 2008, a Bronze CEA at WEVA Expo 2010, and an Emerald Artistic Achievement Award at Video 08.


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Working in Woden's octagon pods
See-through walkways stretch out like arms from Callam Offices circular towers, like something borrowed from a Doctor Who episode.
The original design on Woden Town Centre's eastern edge has never been completed.
A vision unrealised: architect John Andrews on his original design
Internationally acclaimed architect John Andrews designed more than the three octagonal pods and their long walkways which stand like an aging space ship. His original design had 26 pods.
ACT Property Group senior manager Tania Shaw said if the original design was completed it would help functionality.
"It's very easy to get lost," Ms Shaw, who worked at Callam a decade ago, said.
"Because you've got that pod design, you sort of have to figure out which lift you have to take and which direction you are going.
"It is easy to become disoriented in the middle of the building."
On three levels and accessed by two lifts and walkways, the solar-passive building was designed in 1973. Construction took from 1977 to 1981 to complete.
Instead of being built from the ground up, it's suspended from above.
Suspended particleboard flooring works like a false ceiling, leaving a gap of 700mm for ducting and other services. Ms Shaw said the floor creaked and had often been repaired.
Facades are floor-to - ceiling glazing.
Curved acrylic glazing covers the continuous concrete walkways. Some doors have windows you would expect to see on a ferry.
Toilets, tea rooms, and cleaners stores are in the circular service towers. Lifts and yellow stairs also rise through towers.
Ms Shaw said staff enjoyed easy access to the town centre to bank and shop and buy lunch.
Because of all the glass, air conditioning works harder in summer and sometimes breaks down.
Heritage -listed in 2007, the building can't be altered too dramatically, even though it gets hot in summer.
"It's made our staff put their thinking caps on to try and come up with creative ways without undoing heritage fabric of the building," Ms Shaw said.
Internal shading, blinds and roller blinds help cool the place.
Outside ledges support perennial nesting pigeons.
"It is quite cute when you work in the building, but a pain from a building management point of view," Ms Shaw said.
"They've got ledges that are part of the architectural structure and that's a very nice spot for the birds to nest."
The building was first used for a TAFE college before it was refurbished for ACT government departments.
The ACT Government's Shared Services department which occupies Callam Offices will move to new government offices at Gungahlin in the future, after which the building and surrounding land will be put on the market.
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Thinking about how to approach your business relationships and evaluate the role of ethics.
By Marty McGhie
At some time during your business career, it's likely you've experienced a situation in which you have been treated unfairly by someone else in a business deal. Or perhaps you've had a situation when you found yourself taking unjust advantage of another in a business or a personal relationship. While it may not have been illegal, it just felt wrong. Open up the newspaper or browse the business headlines and you'll quickly realize you're not alone -- you can find examples of people behaving unethically throughout the business world.
My intent here is not to teach (or preach) what is right and what is wrong. Rather, my objective is to get you to think about how you approach your business relationships and evaluate the role that ethics plays in those relationships.
Employees, suppliers, and customers
First off, let me clarify that when I say "unethical" practices, I'm not referring to intentionally illegal or fraudulent activities. While fraudulent and illegal actions certainly qualify as unethical, there are many instances where unethical practices would not be considered illegal. In fact, one of the quickest ways someone often justifies an unethical act is to declare, "Well, it's not illegal!" Let's examine a few areas to consider whether you practice good ethics.
One of the key areas of focus in your business will always be the employee-employer relationship. There are certainly areas where employees can be unethical with their employer such as inaccurate time reporting, padding expenses, or just wasting time. The inundation of social media, for instance, has become a serious topic when it comes to the productivity of employees – so much so that many businesses are now setting policies to avoid the amount of wasted time that can occur.


text: A talent search, even when it's extensive, is chump change in the context of a major blockbuster. Searching for a new actor to play Superman might take time, but it wouldn't be all that expensive by the standards of studio spending. The only way finding a new Superman would be costly would be if they signed an established major star. If they do a reboot then Routh has to go in my opinion. Keeping him but casting a new Lois and dropping Jason would be too discordant and it would seriously muddy the clean break WB would need in marketing terms for a Superman relaunch.


text: Ok, Ladies, can you suggest someplace other than ebay or craigslist where you all sell your tote bags that you make, and even the ones that you don't make yourself. I have a few that I have made, as well as a retired Vera Bradley, but I live in such a small town, there really is no place locally. I know that Etsy does not allow non-handmade items. So, if you have any ideas, I would appreciate them. Thanks in advance. :)


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Discussion in 'Science Fiction & Fantasy' started by Colin Xavier, Nov 3, 2009.
Read the whole crazy letter here
Wow, I knew he was a fan but $10,000? That's a lot of money.
10 grand, that's pretty funny.
Yeah, i'd bloody buy em for 10 grand too.
More significantly, if I had them after this last movie, I'd sell them for $10000,
Already being discussed.
Didn't see that.
Still I'd like to top his attempt at most insulting bid. 5 bucks! Gimme the reigns to the franchise and I'll make a Terminator movie that will make the original look like T2!
I love this guy.
I wish Arnold Schwarzenegger would buy the rights.
I love Joss, but the Terminator franchise is so played out by now, I'm not even sure James Cameron could breathe new life into it.
Drew McWeeny from HitFix.com (formerly Moriarty at Aint It Cool News) sums up my feelings on Terminator pretty eloquently here:
I do think someday the franchise could be rebooted... maybe as a trilogy starting with the future war, then the events of the first terminator as the sequel. I think the series needs a loooong break, however.
I don't want the rights to the whole franchise but I do wish to buy some of the trademark rights for my own line of killer robots and defense network computers. I'm hoping the vague name recognition will help me sell some units to skeptical DOD bean-counters who don't remember the movies all that well.
They'd be fools to pass up my offer! My robots will exterminate humanity at twice the efficiency and half the cost of any of my competitors! Plus, if you order now, you'll get your own personal Summer Glau or Kristanna Lokken model absolutely FREE!
I just want to buy Cameron.
He has expressed an interest in them and has been in talks with one of the Hedge Funds that are pursuing the rights.
Another film and we may well see it on Ebay.
The first Terminator film was the only one I really liked, anyway.
For sake of Pete... if we must have two concurrent Terminator rights threads, can we at least keep this one to Whedon's lame-o "humor" piece?
If you can't handle multiple conflicting timelines, you shouldn't be posting in a Terminator thread...
Ouch. Kinda got me there. But I reject TSCC, so I reject this secondary thread also.
Don't you know, it's Joss Whedon. He gets twice the love.
And, for something to be a humor piece, it has to be funny.
Separate names with a comma.


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Marriage isn't about sex, says Helen MirrenAlice Philipson
Published: January 4 2013 - 1:36PM
She is seen as something of a sex symbol, especially after the red bikini picture that emerged from a holiday five years ago, but Dame Helen Mirren has said that sex does not make marriages last.
The actress said that she and her husband were not "remotely romantic" and viewed Valentine's Day cards with horror.
Dame Helen, 67, stars in the film Hitchcock as Alma Reville, who was married to the Hollywood director for 53 years. The film deals with the sexless relationship between the pair as she supports him during his career. "People get together for reasons other than sex and, although it's important in the beginning for most couples, it's not what makes marriages last," Dame Helen told Women & Home magazine. "But I think the power of partnership in marriage is under-recognised in our society. That's what makes marriages work, not sex."
Asked about love and her own marriage to Taylor Hackford, a director she met in 1984 when she starred in his film White Nights, Dame Helen said she would be "completely horrified" if he gave her a Valentine's card.
"Taylor and I aren't remotely romantic with each other," she said. "And actually we appreciate the lack of romance in the other person.
"I'd be completely horrified if Taylor gave me a Valentine's card. That's not our sort of relationship at all – we would pour cold water on that sort of thing.
"We even forget to get each other birthday presents – I'm always thinking the day before, 'Oh, I must get Taylor something for his birthday.' Without being corny, we try simply to be considerate to each other every day rather than lavishing each other with gifts."
The couple share homes in London and Los Angeles and spend long periods away from one another, which is described by Dame Helen as "important".
Despite missing her husband when she is away, she said distance "stops us taking each other for granted" and "gives us space".
Dame Helen, who has worked in film and theatre for more than 40 years, also disclosed in the interview that she still gets stage fright.
She will shortly be back on stage in The Audience, a play about the private meetings held by the Queen with her prime ministers.
"I still suffer terribly from stage fright. I get sick with fear," she said. "Not every night, but at the beginning and on occasion – not necessarily when I'm expecting it."
Dame Helen first played the monarch in the 2006 film The Queen, which covers the aftermath of the death of Diana, Princess of Wales. The actress said she had been "determined" not to play the Queen again as she believes it is "dangerous" to return to a role, but changed her mind after meeting the play's cast and crew.
Asked whether she saw the Queen as a "tough cookie", she replied: "No, that's not how I think she is at all.
"I see her as emotional and quite vulnerable. And I also think she has the most fabulous sense of humour."
Dame Helen also shared her views on religion, saying she "can't help" being a Christian because she's British.
"I'd describe myself as a Christian who doesn't believe in God," she said.
"I can't help being Christian because I was brought up in Britain, and the morality of Christianity is part of the fabric of this country."
The actress said she "believed" in meditation but was "too lazy" to do it. Her new year resolutions, she said, were to go to the gym, lose weight and to stop procrastinating.
Hitchcock is in cinemas around Australia from January 10.
The Daily Telegraph
This story was found at: http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/movies/marriage-isnt-about-sex-says-helen-mirren-20130104-2c8bj.html


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Gardy joins elite company with milestone win
By Rhett Bollinger / MLB.com
CLEVELAND -- A day after picking up career win No. 1,000 against the Indians on Saturday, Twins manager Ron Gardenhire was able to reflect on the accomplishment while sitting in the visiting manager's office at Progressive Field before Sunday's game.
Gardenhire said he was happy to finally reach the milestone, and appreciated the support he received from his players and coaching staff after the game. But he also said he's ready to move on and focus on the rest of the season, now that the milestone is behind him.
"I guess it's relief, because we want to move forward and play baseball," Gardenhire said. "It was a fun day yesterday to get a win against a good team and give our team a chance to win a series here. That thing has been hanging out there for a pretty long while. So the guys were excited and got to shake some hands, and now we can move forward and play some baseball and get on the right track."
Gardenhire said the club's public relations staff informed him that he was one of just 10 managers to accomplish 1,000 wins with just one team, and he thought it was cool that he followed in former Twins manager Tom Kelly's footsteps, as Kelly also was on that list of 10 managers that also includes six Hall of Famers.
"It's pretty amazing, to tell you the truth," Gardenhire said. "More than anything else, I'm with an organization that has given me this opportunity. There's not a lot of other organizations that do that through thick and thin. We've had some good years, but we've had some rough ones the last couple years, so you have to be lucky to have an organization that believes in you."
Gardenhire received more than 200 congratulatory texts, including messages from former Twins such as Justin Morneau, Michael Cuddyer, Torii Hunter, Joe Nathan, Jacque Jones and Johan Santana. Pirates general manager Neal Huntington also sent a text, which surprised Gardenhire.
"It was good to talk to a lot of people I hadn't heard from in a long time," Gardenhire said. "So it was cool."
But Gardenhire joked that he was upset he didn't receive anything from President Barack Obama.
"The president didn't call, so I was disappointed in that," Gardenhire said. "But I know Mr. Obama is a White Sox fan, so I didn't think he'd call me."
Willingham day to day with bruised left wrist
CLEVELAND -- Twins left fielder Josh Willingham left Sunday's game in the bottom of the second inning after being hit by a pitch on his left wrist in the first inning. He was taken for X-rays, which came back negative, and he's day to day with a bruised left wrist.
"He's sore but it's not broke," Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said after the Twins beat the Indians, 10-7. "We'll figure it out tomorrow."
Willingham was plunked by Indians right-hander Justin Masterson on a 90-mph fastball with one out in the first, but remained in the game for the rest of the inning and was in left field for the bottom half of the frame.
But when the Twins took the field in the second inning, Jason Bartlett replaced Willingham in left field.
It marked Bartlett's second career appearance in left, as he also played one inning there against the White Sox on Thursday.
Arcia to see team doctors for wrist; DL a possibility
CLEVELAND -- Outfielder Oswaldo Arcia is expected to have his right wrist examined by team doctors once the Twins return to Target Field on Monday, and could be placed on the disabled list if he's not ready to play by Wednesday.
Arcia had his right wrist examined by Dr. Thomas Graham of the Cleveland Clinic on Sunday, and Graham found nothing serious in Arcia's wrist, according to Twins assistant general manager Rob Antony.
Arcia, who was given anti-inflammatory medications, was held out of the starting lineup on Sunday, with Jason Kubel starting in right field in his place. The plan is for him to test his wrist by swinging in the batting cages on Monday, if he's cleared by doctors.
But if he's unable to play by Wednesday, Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said Arcia could hit the 15-day disabled list, even though the Twins remain hopeful he'll be able to avoid it.
"It's just day to day," Gardenhire said. "He's taken his medicine. So we'll give him a couple days of rest, and he'll get checked out by our doctors at home. We have a day off Tuesday, and he probably won't play Monday. So we'll see how we go with this. So by Wednesday, we have to make a decision here. We can't play short. We're just not going to do that this year."
Twins' offense a pleasant surprise
CLEVELAND -- The offense has been a pleasant surprise for the Twins early this season, as they entered Sunday's game fourth in runs scored in the American League, with 28 through their first five games.
Twins manager Ron Gardenhire admitted that he was nervous about how the offense would perform this season, especially considering how much hitters struggled to score runs in Spring Training. Josh Willingham and Jason Kubel both had rough springs, in particular, but have fared well in the early going.
"I was a little worried about the way we swung the bats in Florida," Gardenhire said. "But we've always said, don't put too much stock in that, because guys are getting in shape and ready for the season. But yeah, you'd like to think guys would start getting into a groove the last week of Spring Training, but we didn't have too much of that. So I was not panicked, but panicked."
Gardenhire said the Twins still need to cut down on striking out, as they led the AL in that category with 54 entering Sunday.
"We're swinging a lot better, but we're striking out a lot," Gardenhire said. "Lots of caught looking. So if we improve that, our chances will get better because we've been swinging pretty good."
Rhett Bollinger is a reporter for MLB.com. Read his blog, Bollinger Beat, and follow him on Twitter @RhettBollinger. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.


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Fray Angélico Chávez History Library
From Ancestry.com Wiki
P.O. Box 2087
120 Washington Ave.
Santa Fe, NM 87504-2087
This research library collects materials to document the history of New Mexico, the Southwest, American West, and Meso-America. It is a participating repository of the "Online Archive of New Mexico" and maintains vertical files and newspaper clippings.


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© 2009 MLB Advanced Media, L.P. All rights reserved.
Obstruction call affects Indians-Reds
Sizemore awarded home plate after triple
By Mark Sheldon / MLB.com
CINCINNATI -- One way or the other, controversy was going to consume either the Reds or Indians in the seventh inning of their series finale on Sunday at Great American Ball Park. Before winning, 4-3, in 11 innings, Cincinnati was leading, 3-1, with two outs in the top of the seventh when a strange play allowed Cleveland to tie the game.
After Grady Sizemore hit a two-out RBI triple to the right-field corner that scored Luis Valbuena, Jerry Hairston Jr.'s relay throw to third base went past Adam Rosales.
Sizemore broke for home as left fielder Jonny Gomes alertly ran in and backed up the play with a sliding stop of the errant ball in front of the visitors' dugout. Gomes fired a perfect throw home, where the sliding Sizemore was ruled out on a tag by catcher Ryan Hanigan, according to home plate umpire Mark Wegner.
"I don't think I've ever seen that one," Reds manager Dusty Baker said. "No. 1, I didn't think we'd throw the ball because I thought it was a sure triple. That was a very heads-up play by Jonny Gomes to be there backing up. When I saw that ball didn't go into the dugout, I was trying to figure out who was there throwing the ball. It was Jonny."
Third out, right? Wrong.
Both teams were headed off the field until the run was allowed to score when third-base umpire Rob Drake ruled interference on Rosales for standing on the base line in Sizemore's way. Gomes' potential web gem was wiped out.
"My best play of the year and I've got nothing to show for it," Gomes said. "I'm chewing rocks."
Television replays showed Rosales standing on the edge of the dirt by third base but hardly in Sizemore's way. Baker argued with Drake and Wegner to no avail as 27,796 fans at Great American Ball Park booed heartily.
"He just said that Rosales has to give the baserunner the right to run," Baker said. "I didn't see an obstruction. I just couldn't believe it."
"I didn't feel Grady even grazed me at all," Rosales said. "I couldn't believe it. After Jonny made that outstanding play, I don't know how you could take that away."
Had Gomes' nice play held up and Sizemore not scored, Wegner would have had Indians manager Eric Wedge in his face instead of Baker. Replays also showed that Sizemore eluded Hanigan's tag and was likely safe.
"I went out there because I thought he was safe," Wedge said. "The way he maneuvered his body and got in there, I thought he was safe. They had called him out."
"It's tough. I felt like I got in," Sizemore said. "But I looked at the replay, and it's tough to see. The camera angle was pretty far back. I wasn't aware [obstruction had been called]. We didn't necessarily run into each other. He was more in my path, and I had to hesitate a little bit. I was a little surprised [Drake] called it."
Sizemore was credited with the triple and went home on an error charged to Rosales that tied the game at 3 and cost starter Johnny Cueto a possible victory.
"At the time, we were all upset, but we had to go on," Baker said. "I had to stay in the game to manage. It took a while to get out of you, but I just reminded the guys to forget it. They were talking about it and the coaches were talking about it."
The controversy, at least on the Reds' end, was minimized after they pulled out the win on Alex Gonzalez's walk-off RBI double to center field in the 11th.
"It's over," Rosales said. "We won. That's the most important thing."
Mark Sheldon is a reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.


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kc77 wrote:Flatland_Spider wrote:just brew it! wrote:Seems to me this degree of customizability is more valuable on an embedded platform with limited RAM and/or mass storage. For modern desktops and servers the size of the OS on disk and the memory footprint of the kernel are largely irrelevant. Disk space and RAM have both gotten cheap enough that only people with OCD care.
OTOH, a rather high percentage of computer geeks *are* afflicted with OCD to varying degrees, so there you go I guess.
A glut of computing resources and how the optimizations only produce minimal performance gains have been arguments against compiling from source for a while.
It is a little OCD. I like knowing what switches my programs were compiled with, and it's nice to know I don't have stuff that I don't need to cause security holes. Less code is better.
GCC for a lot of the older archs is pretty damn good with just march=native but the newer archs can still show some pretty big gains, 25% or more is'nt uncommon. Here's a comparison done on my system.
The top two are march=native. The bottom was compiled with this.Code: Select all
-O2 -pipe -march=bdver1 -mno-movbe -mno-fma -mno-bmi -mno-tbm --param l1-cache-size=16 --param l1-cache-line-size=64 --param l2-cache-size=2048 -mtune=bdver1
Here's another comparison with Apache.
To say my machine appeared to be something else after making those adjustments during compile time would be an understatement.
Sure, some specific packages gain a big boost using specifically-tailored compiler options. However I really think that is overkill to custom-compile an entire distribution, even considering how too aggressive compiler setting can wreak havoc on some programs.
I used Gentoo for 3 years and I was very satisfied with the results, but now I am much more pleased to use a Fedora or Debian-derived distro and compiling the specific package that benefit from aggressive optimization


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Grass Sickness Linked to Clostridium botulinum Bacterium
- May 1, 2004
- Topics:
United Kingdom (U.K.) researchers recently found that grass sickness is strongly associated with low antibody levels to the bacterium Clostridium botulinum, indicating that affected horses couldn't fight off infection. Findings from the study, which was conducted at the U.K.'s University of Liverpool (UL), funded by The Home of Rest For Horses, and published in the Equine Veterinary Journal, might lead to routine vaccination against C. botulinum in U.K. horses.
Chris Proudman, MA, VetMB, PhD, CertEO, FRCVS, of UL, said, "The disease involves antibody levels in the horse, which we can influence--this opens the door to vaccination as a preventive measure."
Grass sickness usually is fatal and presents itself in two different ways--either as severe colic, or as weight loss and difficulty eating. Both manifestations are a result of intestinal nerve damage that partially or completely paralyzes the gastrointestinal tract, rendering it unable to digest food. No U.S. cases have been found.
Proudman's team collected biological samples from horses affected by grass sickness and control horses (without grass sickness)--blood for antibody evaluation and fecal samples for evaluation of parasite status. "We then collected a lot of questionnaire data related to the management of that horse, in particular the way it's fed, the grazing history of that horse, any other disease that horse suffered recently, anthelmintic (dewormer) use, vaccine history, and all aspects of the horse's management," he said.
The primary finding involved the antibody levels--the lower a horse's antibody levels to C. botulinum, the higher his risk of suffering from the disease. A secondary finding included an age association--the horses at highest risk of grass sickness were 4- to 5-year-olds. Tertiary findings included management factors. The research confirmed prior findings that recent feed change was a risk factor, feeding hay or haylage in the diet was protective, and grass sickness was associated with ivermectin use.
"We suspect that the recent use of ivermectin is merely a marker for horses that have had very thorough worm control, their worm burden has been suppressed, but for reasons we don't understand, that has increased the risk of these horses suffering from grass sickness," he said. The higher the fecal egg count, the lower the risk of grass sickness. He can't make recommendations regarding ivermectin use and grass sickness--further research is needed to understand this finding.
Can U.K. horse owners assess their horses' risk? Only at a crude level, said Proudman. "A horse that is young and is grazing a premises that has had grass sickness previously--that horse would be at an increased risk." (See www.TheHorse.com/ViewArticle.aspx?ID=1574 for accompanying grass sickness studies.)
About the Author
Stephanie L. Church, Editor-in-Chief
Stephanie L. Church, Editor-in-Chief, received a B.A. in Journalism and Equestrian Studies from Averett College in Danville, Virginia. A Pony Club and 4-H graduate, her background is in eventing, and she is schooling her recently retired Thoroughbred racehorse, Happy, toward a career in that discipline. She also enjoys traveling, photography, cycling, and cooking in her free time.
Related Content
Scottish Researchers on the Hunt for Cause of Equine Grass Sickness
Type A Botulism in Horses Described in Case Review
Equine Grass Sickness Reviewed
Emerging Neurologic Syndromes Discussed at World Equine Vet Meeting
Vaccination Schedule Guidelines
"Tuesday Talk" Highlights Neurologic Issues
Beware Botulism in Wet Weather
More on the Recent Grass Sickness Link to Clostridium botulinum
Equine Grass Sickness Linked to Clostridium Botulinum
Botulism's New Threat; Will Horses Have Vaccine?


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New worries about Fukushima
Unexplained plumes of radioactive steam have been rising from Fukushima's Reactor Building 3, Could a major meltdown be on the way?
Fukushima's Reactor Building 3 exploded on 13th March 2011 as a result of a hydrogen buildup, breaching the building's containment and emitting a huge plume of radiation. The reactor itself is in meltdown.
And now fresh plumes of steam have been seen coming out the structure. These have now been confirmed by Tepco, the owner of the nuclear plant, from 19th December onwards. The company believes the steam is coming from the fifth floor of the building.
However it does not know the cause of the steam. Lethal levels of radiation and the physical damage to the structure have so far made entry and inspection impossible.
Possibility 1 - a meltdown is taking place
The Reactor 3 fuel storage pond still houses an estimated 89 tonnes of the plutonium-based MOX nuclear fuel employed by the reactor, composed of 514 fuel rods.
Ever since the explosion Tepco has been concerned that if the spent fuel storage pond dries out, the intensely radioactive spent fuel rods would melt down and produce further significant radioactive emissions.
One possibility is that this process may now be taking place. In the event of water loss from the pond, the water would begin to overheat and produce clouds of steam, prior to a complete meltdown. If this is the case then a second major nuclear disaster at Fukushima is in the making.
Aerial drone photo of plant via cryptome.org
Read more at ENN Affiliate, the Ecologist.


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CARSON, Calif. – Landon Donovan's ankle injury may have been more severe than the LA Galaxy forward initially thought, but he has no plans to let it hamper him as he looks to help LA clinch a berth in the 2013 MLS Cup Playoffs on Sunday.
Donovan was unavailable for Wednesday's 1-0 victory with the Montreal Impact due to a left ankle inflammation, which forced him to exit early from international duty with the U.S. National Team last week. With the Galaxy facing a situation where a draw or a victory against the San Jose Earthquakes puts them through to the postseason, Donovan believes that the time is now to get back on the field.
"The ankle is not great, but we're going to try to play. This is the time of the year where you just have to get through it," said Donovan on Friday following LA's penultimate training session before the California Clasico. "I've been out long enough and I miss playing with these guys. I want to do whatever I can to help contribute. I know what this means so we're going to try to play.
"Realistically, I've been told that I need six weeks of rest, but that's obviously not going to happen. Even getting four or five days helps a little bit," he added. "It's still going to be painful, but you just cross your fingers that you don't do further damage."
Even the traditionally guarded head coach Bruce Arena noted that the team is "anticipating" that Donovan and center back Omar Gonzalez (left hip strain) will be able to play against the Quakes on Sunday after both were unable to participate against the Impact.
If Donovan does take part, he'll have the opportunity to take sole possession of the MLS all-time leading goal scoring record as he is currently tied with Jeff Cunningham at 134 goals. Although being so close to such a career milestone may be distracting, Donovan admits that he's put little thought into breaking record due to LA's tough postseason chase.
"If it happens great, if it doesn't then hopefully I'll be able to do it at some point. I don't think about ti as much as other people do, right now, the focus is on getting in the playoffs," said Donovan. "Maybe I'm different in that way that it doesn't really occur to me. I'm confident that it will happen at some point, but if I don't score for the next 15 league games, I'm not worried about it. I just want to win."
Think Donovan should play? Rather LA save him for Seattle?
Share your thoughts below.


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Americans Resolve to Reduce Credit Card Debt: Survey
Most Americans with credit card debt believe that getting out of debt is "extremely important" and plan to start doing so this year, according to a new report.
This finding is unveiled in the "2014 Americans and Credit Card Debt Survey." Based on poll of 2,223 adults, the survey was conducted online Jan. 1-9 on behalf of Credit.com, an online credit education and financial services company.
Among the survey's findings:
- 45 percent of respondents believe they have too much credit card debt;
- 51 percent believe of those with credit card debt believe it is "extremely important" that they have a plan in place in 2014 to pay off the debt, while another 21 percent say it is "somewhat important;" and
- 84 percent of those with credit card debt say it is extremely or somewhat likely that they will start paying it down this year.
Originally published on LifeHealthPro. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.


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The three Mac-based apps will act like a field monitor to help you set up your shots. They all read the FireWire DV stream live from your camera and let you use your computer's screen (usually a laptop) as a field monitor. All three apps give you various tools to help evaluate your camera settings before you take the shot, and they'll even let you record live to your computer's hard drive, much like a FireStore, but without the extra features. These three very innovative apps are DVDxDV's Veescope Live, Red Lightning's HD Monitor, and Divergent Media's ScopeBox.
You'd almost always be using a Powerbook, MacBook, or MacBook Pro in the field with these apps, so I tested them on a 17" Powerbook with 2GB RAM and a portable bus-powered OWC FW800 drive via the built-in FW800 port. I connected a Panasonic HVX200 via a WiebeTech Firewire 800/400 card in the CardBus slot. I followed up with a very brief check of performance on a quad-core G5 with 4.5GB RAM for a performance comparison.
I'll cover these three applications, looking at documentation, interface, monitoring, zebra/scopes, recording, and extra features, progressing from the lowest to highest cost: Veescope Live, HD Monitor, and finally ScopeBox. I won't cover every detail of each, but rather I'll give a general overview in order to rank them and hopefully inspire you to try them out for yourselves. They cover a wide price range, and along with the features they all have in common, each has its own unique set of tools. All three have downloadable trial versions so you can test-drive them before you purchase.
VeeScope Live 1.02 beta To begin with, let's look at Veescope Live (VSL) by DVDxDV. It is the lowest priced of the three, and the most compact and basic, but it doesn't lack in functionality and usefulness. At $100, it is a very nice package. If you are on a budget, or simply need basic functions that will make your on-site shooting experience easier, VSL will be all you'll ever need. I should also note that during my last day of testing these apps I got a beta version (1.02) of Veescope Live, which should be out by the time you read this article.
Documentation: The supplied documentation is accessible via the VSL Help menu and is very nice and easy to understand. Since the application is so basic and easy to use, minimal documentation is needed (this is also true of the other two products in this comparison). Every function is covered in a concise manner. There are two keyboard shortcuts that I found handy for zooming the image to full screen, and one for opening and closing the tool drawer at the bottom of the screen. Aside from those, I don't see a need for a lot of keyboard shortcuts here, due to its single simple screen/tool-drawer interface.
Interface: Of the three applications tested here, VSL is the easiest to use. The main video window is resizable by dragging the lower left corner. Along the bottom of the video screen is a drawer you can open and close, with five tabs for input, record/display, pattern, scope, and background settings. Each tab reveals its own specific settings (above, left).
Monitoring: In my testing with VSL, DV-SD video played back pretty smoothly. Turning on zebras or the chromakey function tended to introduce some very minor latency, or a stuttering of the video playback—but not nearly enough to interfere with setting up a shot or monitoring a recording session. HD 720 and 1080 both had slightly more latency, which increased over time while running VSL for 25 minutes non-stop. But it was still not enough to really interfere with the program's basic purpose. Recording in HD modes, when latency was at its worst, got to be a little annoying after a while—particularly on the laptop. On the quad-core G5, latency was pretty much all but gone, as it was with the other two apps. All in all, I found the monitoring feature of VSL to be very usable, a great improvement over the LCD of a typical DV camera. If you're shooting HD, this is a must-have minimum for true HD focusing. No HD-capable camcorder has an LCD adequate enough for true focusing when it's of major importance. VSL, though it's the most basic and inexpensive of the three apps, is still a great improvement and proved itself to be very useful for this purpose. I even found setting up shots with SD video to be much easier using VSL. It was a real pleasure to be able to see so much more of my image's detail before I hit the Record button! The monitor features a title/action-safe overlay, as well as an array of monitor adjustments: brightness, contrast, saturation, and tint. These adjustments are not set up in a step-by-step calibration fashion, but they're useful nonetheless. You can also control aspect ratio (helpful with DVCPRO-HD 720's aspect quirks), and there's a very nice blue gun feature for evaluating your image.
Zebra/Scopes: VSL's zebras are very nice with black for the high (white level) and white for the low (black level), and seemed to correspond closely to the zebras in the camera at the same settings. I found them very useful and very easy to read. Unlike the other two apps, you can't set your own zebra colors in VSL, but these look good enough to be very usable in the field. I found it very easy to see them when shooting outdoor scenes.
As for scope overlays, VSL offers only waveform and vectorscope overlays. The video image goes to black and white when you turn on one or the other scope, making the scopes easier to see over the video. In extreme cases, being able to adjust the opacity of the video image was a great help in making the scopes much easier to read. The scopes showed up very clearly without dimming the video image in most cases. As with the other two apps, scopes and zebras are all easy enough to read and very useful in the field. I would have liked to see more detail in the scopes, though. If you need real pinpoint accuracy, they aren't detailed enough.
Recording: Recording is very simple. You click the "Choose file . . . " button, and select a destination and a name for your recorded clip. Then you just hit the Record button. VSL does not support stopping or starting recording from the camera, so you have to hit Record on the interface. And that's about it. It's that simple. All recordings are in their native codec as a QuickTime file. As a producer who shoots tapeless almost exclusively now, this is a fine alternative to more expensive (and more sophisticated) tapeless recording solutions. I had the footage record directly to an external FW800 drive with no real problems at all. I do miss having a time code reading, however. It also takes a few moments to start up a recording session once you hit the Record button, and again when you stop and it closes the recording session. Not a problem, but the other two apps respond more quickly. And it doesn't recognize the Record button on my HVX200. Not a bad thing, but it could be a handy feature to have.
Extras: For extras, VSL also offers chromakey and background image functions. The chromakey tab allows you to do live chromakeying while setting up your shot, which I found to be extremely helpful for that type of work. You can use the default chroma green setting, or change the chromakey color via a typical Apple color wheel color picker. You can also adjust luma, chroma, and saturation ranges, and T luma, T chroma, and T saturation, as well as H/L/S mixing controls. (The "T" in these settings refers to "transparency." For example, "T luma" refers to the transparent portion of the luma. All the T controls specify the transparent range of the color components.) The de-spill filter is really useful with various settings, and switchable from blue to green de-spill. You can even switch the de-spill function on and off with the click of a mouse, which made evaluating the shot easier.
The background function (above, left) allows you to choose a QuickTime movie or still-image file to run in the background when the chromakey function is enabled. Thus, if you already have your CG background, you can overlay your chromakey shot live on top of it in order to properly line up the live shot more closely. Although live recording of this keying work is not possible at this time, these functions still proved quite valuable in setting up chroma shots to match as closely as possible live-in-camera to greatly minimize work in post.
HD Monitor 1.0.1 HD Monitor (HDM) is a very impressive application that offers its own unique features and is priced at $499. It supplies more evaluation options than VSL, but there are no direct chromakey functions. That said, I found HDM well worth the price and very useful for more sophisticated productions. If I have to choose only one, it's the best of the three apps, in my opinion, due to its clip manager and integration with FCP.
Documentation: HDM comes with a PDF user manual. Just like with VSL, it is simple, as the individual functions are not overly complicated. HDM does have a larger user manual since it offers many more functions than VSL. It even covers the necessary information you'll need to create image files with an alpha-channel in Photoshop for its overlay function. The Help menu offers a very handy quick view of the keyboard shortcuts that can make learning and using HDM much more efficient.
Interface: Although a bit more complex than VSL, HDM (left)is still very useable and useful with only four windows in the main interface. There is the main video window, which is resizable across the whole computer monitor, just like in VSL. It gives a bit more info about the video stream with a shot clock showing how long you've been shooting your clip, the clip name, the remaining recording time, and a video zoom setting. And each window can be accessed or closed using keyboard shortcuts, making it a very easy interface to use.
There's the Mini View window that allows a quick look at the raw video feed while the main video window has the various overlays on it. When you're zoomed in, for example at 100%, you'll only see a small section of your image. This allows you to zoom in and check details without having to mess with your main image view. You can also drag it around to box in the section of the image you need to evaluate. It's a very handy feature.
The View Options window is small and compact, and it holds all overlay functions such as zebras and image overlays, center crosshairs, title/action safe guides, rule-of-thirds guides, and more—all of which are very useful tools for shooting in the field.
Finally, there is the Clip Manager window, which is the best part of this application. I'll discuss this window in more detail later, but it is the one feature that puts this app over the top.
Monitoring: Monitoring was on par with VSL, with initial latency and its increase over time being slightly more minimal than VSL, but not by much. It will function with SD, 720 HD, and 1080 HD video. HDM can also flip and flop the video image, which is helpful when certain lenses do this to the video image in the camera. Plus there's a 16:9 squeeze function that helps for 16:9 squeeze modes on non-16:9 cameras that offer that function. One feature I particularly like in the Viewer window is the ability to scale an image size in and out quickly, smoothly, and easily in one of three ways: via a drop-down menu, the mouse's scroll wheel, or a keyboard shortcut. At 100% you are seeing a 1:1 pixel ratio; at 400%, a 4:1 ratio.
The other feature I really like is the pop-up menu in the Viewer window. Right-click in the window and a menu comes up letting you control the overlays, zebras, aspect ratio, and orientation. But it also has an optimize function that will shrink your viewer screen to fit the size of the image, eliminating all the empty gray area around the image. Zebra/Scopes: There are no scopes at all in this application, but the high and low zebra overlays can be turned on separately, and you can set the color and opacity of each independently. HDM does offer other overlays such as TV and title safe zones, canter crosshairs, thirds, 16:9/4:3 indicators, and audio meters. The color of these other overlay tools can be set by one master color control. If this app had just a vectorscope and waveform monitor (in color like ScopeBox's), along with 720 support and a timecode readout, there'd be almost no reason to look at any other app but HD Monitor.
Recording: All recording is handled by the Clip Manager window (left), which is the major feather in HDM's cap. Here, you can set a destination folder and name your clips, as well as assign shot labels, a rating, scene and take tags, comments, attributes, and log notes. The window shows a list of the shots you've recorded with a row of information such as clip name, duration, file size, creation date, and more. The ability to assign so much information and organize clips makes this the perfect tool for larger, more complex productions, especially if you want to go tapeless. There is also an XML-export function that will import your collection of clips, including all the metadata you've added, directly into an FCP project. This makes the clip manager very valuable and useful in the field. The Record button is in the main viewer window, so you can monitor your shot as you record it. As with VSL, I do miss having a timecode reading. But it responds to the Record button on my HVX200, which is a nice touch!
Extras: HDM also features an image overlay option that allows you to import a PSD file or a still frame from a clip you've recorded to lay over the video image for various image-comparison purposes. The user manual shows how to use this to compare shots, and how to create a PSD in Photoshop to use as an overlay image. If you shoot a scene and need to come back and re-shoot it, or get it from a different angle, you can use a still of your first take as an overlay, and be assured that your second take will match the first accurately, thus eliminating a potential post- production headache.
ScopeBox 1.1.1 ScopeBox is the most expensive of our trio, with a price tag of $699.99. It offers two sets of scopes (four total) that neither of the other two apps offer. But it's also relatively lacking in some respects, and does not supply any overlay/ keying assistance or clip- management functions.
Documentation: As with the other two, the ScopeBox documentation covers all the basic functions of the tools available in the software. It comes as a PDF document that is packaged with the application. But there is no help menu as with the other two apps, and the keyboard shortcuts are only available by looking at the actual menus.
Interface: This app boasts the prettiest interface (left) of the three by far, but it's also the most awkward and cluttered. Every function, tool, and scope is its own window. These are all bound by the application's master window. It's important to note that there are keyboard shortcuts to add the various windows (known here as "palettes"), but there are no keyboard shortcuts to close the windows. Once a palette is open, hitting its keyboard shortcut only opens another instance of that same palette. You'd think it would close the palette that's already open. I found this to be a tad awkward in actual usage in the field.
All palettes are resizable, and you can save custom window layouts, which saves ScopeBox from being a difficult interface to manipulate in comparison to the other two apps we've looked at. Setting up your own layouts means you have to move windows around and resize them every time you open or close one single tool or scope. I shoot outdoors a lot, and in a variety of settings, and my needs can change with each shoot. So any number of saved layouts sometimes fulfilled my needs on each shoot, but not always. If you shoot in the same setting over and over, then the custom windows function will take care of this issue for you.
My only other problem with the GUI is the black and dark gray interface. In the studio it's nice and pretty. But outside, even with a hood on my PowerBook, it was too dark and I found it extremely difficult to see the borders, making moving and resizing very difficult.
The bottom of the application window has a blank field. When you click on a palette to highlight it, its controls show up in this field. This function eliminates some of the confusion of ScopeBox's multiple-palette interface.
Monitoring: As with the other two apps, there is video latency. ScopeBox did not demonstrate any discernible improvement over the other two lower-end apps where latency was concerned, which was disappointing for a product that claims to compete with hardware scopes. I was also unable to sync to the Record button on my HVX, a glitch the folks at ScopeBox acknowledged as a Panasonic issue.
The image became clear only when I enlarged it enough to be able to focus accurately, which was the major drawback to this interface. First, I had to activate the Viewer palette, then hit a keyboard shortcut to "solo" that palette (which makes it fill the application window). Then I had to hit a second keyboard command to make the application window itself full screen. I would have expected one keyboard shortcut to make the video image go full screen, since that's the first and main purpose of these types of apps. Also, when I had several windows overlapping each other, I had to go to a menu to choose which window to bring to the front. More reasonable keyboard shortcuts that function in a traditional Mac way are a needed improvement to this application.
SD, of course, had next to no latency (much as in my tests with VSL and HDM), and HD slowed it down as much as the rest. It is nice to be able to pull up a tool that lets you see the camera's current time code, even if it takes room away from the main view of the image you're trying to evaluate. That is one feature of ScopeBox that I really did like over the other two apps.
Zebra/Scopes: ScopeBox's scopes are nice. You can set the colors as you choose, and they are easy to read against the video image and seem to match those in my camera pretty well. And I will say the scopes have more controls and function better than those in the other two apps. There are more scopes available in this app than the other two, including waveform and vectorscope, along with RGB and YUV parades, and luma and RGB histograms. They all have some very nice options available such as a sample rate, weighted or non-weighted, and monochrome or color-on-some. The color scopes just blew me away. But when you enlarge them too much, they seem to pixelate a lot. Again, these scopes and their individual controls are what make this app unique.
Are they as good as hardware scopes? I'll leave that to some engineering lab to determine. But they are cheaper than hardware scopes, and actually look good and are responsive, considering the video-image latency. I will assume that an Intel Mac laptop will perform with less latency than a PowerBook. But then the majority of us are not on Intels yet.
Recording: Recording is another separate palette, in addition to all the other palettes that you may have open. Here you'd want to make a custom recording-window layout to quickly set up for your actual recording session. You have an option to enable or disable locking to the camera's Record button. I found the HVX did not work with this option in HD mode, but did in SD 60i mode.
You are allowed to specify a reel name, a clip name, and the location to save the clips. The clip name is preceded by a number beginning with 1—that allows you to record several takes of a shot and later be able to track the order of those takes. It's not anything near what HD Monitor offers, but that feature was what made HD Monitor unique. I did notice that audio in HD modes was very noisy and full of non-stop dropouts, as well as some static-like noise. Several clips recorded nothing but digital noise for a second or two at the very beginning of the clip. The audio recording was much better in DV mode, but HD made sound recording useless. This was no problem on the quad-core G5, although I don't lug my seven-ton G5 along when I'm on location. The audio meters actually showed all four channels of the DVCPRO-HD format, and seemed to respond quite accurately.
Extras: The extras for this app are the extra scopes listed above, and the timecode palette. The frame rate is displayed in its own window, which can be handy in judging the latency stutter in the on-screen video image. But you have to be knowledgable about what various frame rates look like. It may also help you figure out if your system is being overloaded and not recording properly. On my PowerBook, the numbers jumped around so much from one extreme to the other that it was not a useful feature. The G5 showed much less erratic behavior of the FPS Badge, as it's called. One very nice touch is the recording buffer. Just like in some cameras and tapeless recording devices, you can set a recording buffer to capture a specified amount of video before you actually hit Record. It loops the specified amount of time recording, then when you hit Record, it attaches that buffer to the start of your recording session. This could be useful for fast-action live events that allowed you to attach your camera to a Mac laptop. It is also able to interface with some I/O solutions such as AJA. But I don't see this as something you'd drag your tower around for. This type of app is really for the field, where laptops are dominant.
I also really liked that I could open a QuickTime movie in SB and read all my scope feedback live as the movie played, or stop it on one frame (above, left). This could be a nice way to evaluate clips as a sort of quality-control measure before importing them into an FCP project.
Conclusion After spending a lot of time with all three of these applications in environments ranging from studios to backyards, pow-wows, and a boat speeding through the swamps of southeast Louisiana, I found them all impressive, and believe my workflow could benefit from incorporating any of them. I was thrilled to set a GretagMacbeth color chart in front of my camera and check it against my screen. The feedback, and the resulting quality control it gave me over my image before I hit the Record button, was nothing short of fantastic. I should also mention that on a quad-core G5, almost all latency problems disappeared, and performance improved a great deal for all three apps—which probably bodes well for their use with Apple's newer multicore laptops.
If you can't afford hardware scopes and field monitors, or if you're a student or a pro on a budget (aren't we all?), any of these applications can make your life much easier without requiring you to make a huge investment in equipment. If we could take the color scopes from ScopeBox, the clip manager of HD Monitor, and the chromakey tools of Veescope Live, we could begin to have one application that would dominate the Mac shooting community. But then again, I'm still trying to find a cell phone with useful features I actually like, so it's not as if there's a perfect product out there serving all possible needs in any space.
Veescope Live is just killer for the price if you need to focus and evaluate levels, and especially if you do chromakey work. Along with the added features it promises to deliver in the future, it could really become a force to contend with—that is, if it stays in the same relative price range. It's great, simple, and worth the money. I'll rate VSL best for interface, but overall, I'll rate it second. The lack of clip management knocks it down a peg. Still, it's a fantastic value for the price.
The folks over at DVDxDV have let me in on some possible future upgrades on Veescope Live that sound amazing. One planned feature is an FCP plugin. You would then be able to import your Veescope Live chromakeying settings directly into its FCP counterpart. That way you can bring your keying settings over just as you had them set up in VSL. This is very important, because keying in VSL is nothing short of amazing (left). I've never set up keyed shots so quickly, precisely, and easily. The next iteration of VSL will also include a magnifying glass that will let you see your image details with a 1:1 pixel ratio, not to mention some much-needed clip- management features. I'm impressed with the enthusiasm and dedication over there at DVDxDV. This app gives the most bang for the buck.
HD Monitor is also very impressive. For the price, you get a fantastic group of tools. Add in a waveform and vectorscope (with color), and I'd rate it as the total king of the hill; but as is, it's still a worthwhile product.
The interface is compact, fast, and straightforward, and it's also well thought out. For the price, I think it will suffice for most end users. Like VSL, HDM does a great job for the price. The clip manager by itself is so useful and valuable, I have to rate this app as my favorite. Is the clip manager alone worth the $400 difference between this and VSL? Very marginally, to be honest, but it is by far the best feature of all three apps. I do like the streamlined interface and keyboard shortcuts. The lack of waveform and vectorscopes is disappointing. They're the only two scopes I usually need on location. If they added those two scopes, and in color, for this same price, I'd be totally blown away.
ScopeBox is a tad pricey compared to the other two apps discussed in this article. Don't get me wrong, I think it's a really great application; I simply think the interface needs to be cleaned up. Are parade and histograms worth the extra money? The interface is not nearly as straightforward as the other two, though at a glance it's visually prettier. Also, the interface is very hard to see with all that solid black when you're outdoors, even with shades around you. I just don't see the justi- fication for the price difference. To be fair, the ScopeBox folks claim it competes with hardware scopes and Windows-only software scopes that shouldn't be priced this high either.
I think the most I'd pay for a product like this would be the $500 for HD Monitor. But with the promised upgrades to HDM and the low price of Veescope Live (which it could easily sell for a bit more money, honestly), some folks may be forced to come down in price and clean up their interfaces. I love ScopeBox, but I feel that compared to the other two, it's a tad overpriced for what it delivers. It needs a more Mac-like interface in terms of looks and usability. If you do want to work on a tower with an AJA card, this would be the one to go with for sure. But on a laptop, if you don't need histograms or parades, I don't see the point.
ScopeBox really does shine when it comes to scopes. The color, weighting, and levels of sampling make these scopes really effective for situations that demand a great deal of accuracy. But for most of us shooting TV commercials, industrial training films, low-budget indies, and the like, the limited utility of the additional scopes just doesn't justify the higher price. Are these fantastic scopes worth the extra few hundred bucks? That's going to be a personal decision each producer will have to make on her own. The cluttered interface, and lack of any other tools beside the scopes, places this application slightly behind the others as my third-place pick in this lineup of apps. Let me qualify that by stating I don't think any of these apps are bad products; they are all fantastic and deliver a lot of powerful tools most of us until now could not have afforded to own. Picking one over the others has not been easy.
Ultimately, it's up to you to determine what features you need the most, and what price you're willing or able to pay for those features. There are demo versions of each product available for download at the companies' respective websites. I'd just warn against paying for features you won't really use, and recommend that you be sure to pay a fair price for what you do need. No two of these apps are exactly alike, and all three are breaking new ground in making video production totally digital, if not totally tapeless. They're not just monitors, and they're not just scopes; their functionality can go well beyond those features. Any one of these apps can greatly improve the shots you get right off the bat. And we have lots of new features coming in future updates that I am confident will make these apps even more valuable in the field.
[Note: After this article was completed, brief testing was done on a 17" MacBook Pro with 4GB of RAM. The video latency discussed above almost completely vanished when run with the identical setup on an MBP, as opposed to the G4/G5.]
Ben Balser is an Apple Certified Trainer based in New Orleans. He specializes in training and consulting, and also produces documentaries, educational material, and commercial work.


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I have to admit that I loved the movie but there are parts that I didn't like and others that I enjoyed.
What I didn't like:
-While I know that the meadow was very important in the book, hope it was on screen didn't bother me. It was how Edward showed what happens to them in the sun. It was like "bam" shirt open, skin exposed and sparkles. No hesitation or anything. I was disappointed by that.
-Even though I loved all the "human's," I was upset that alot of the movie was Bella's interaction with them. From what I remember and I could be wrong but she wasn't really that overly friendly with them. I wish more time was spent on her and Edward.
-I was disturbed by how the makeup wasn't consistent. I noticed on my second viewing how Edward's neck wasn't done to match his face and sometime's he didn't even look all that pale. I think Kristen could have passed as a better vampire.
-Jasper just kind of creeped me out. The look on his face was actually disturbing to me.
What I did like:
-I loved Billy as Charlie. I think he made the movie for me. His reactions to everything was perfect.
-The cafeterial scene when the Cullen's were walking buy the windows. Perfect!
-The baseball scene was great. It showed how much the Cullen's enjoy each other and how much fun they have as a family.
-The Nomads: I loved it when they were walking and then they come out of the fog to break up the game. I think each one was cast well and they played their parts to a T.
-I enjoyed the ballet studio scene when Alice jumped on James and broke his neck. I just enjoyed the whole fighting scene between James and Edward.
Ambrosia-We have a local wine tasting here also and it's like a whole day event and it's the best. I haven't been in a couple of years and for someone who doesn't like wine at all. I have to say that local wine makers seem to have the best wine.