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Just came across a one-page site by Jan E. Schotsman which offers a couple of video tools for the Mac, and at zero cost.
Fix your video
The JES Deinterlacer does a fine de-interlacing job, but despite its name, it does more. It lets you slow down the frame rate, interpolating the in-between frames. Click here for a comparison between iMovie and the JES Deinterlacer. Feature list:
- Deinterlace movies (half height/normal height/double frame rate/blend,adaptive/simple).
- Change field dominance (for PAL films with fake interlace).
- Reinterlace from one or two movies.
- Standards conversion (PAL<->NTSC or custom).
- Inverse telecine.
- Trim, shift, simple color correction, noise reduction.
- Change encoding (RGB gamma, video range/full range).
- Fix jagged edges.
- Pitch preserving sound track for half speed.
- Change movie speed, reverse movie.
- Interlaced in/out, progressive in/out.
- Includes utility to view and edit image description extensions and movie and track geometry
Clean up your video
If you have noisy video, the JES Video Cleaner may be the quick tool for you. It also allows for removal of logos. I imagine this must be great for cleaning up consumer camcorder footage with a burned in date.
- General noise reduction (adaptive)
- Remove logo
- Average two movies
- Remove cross-luma
- Remove periodic brightness variation
Vintage computing
If you still run OS9, he has a helper program that allows for transfers > 2GB.
And if you have an old Power Mac, he offers a program for uncompressed capture of SD video.
Finally, Jan has a little app to fix the blue cast on a monitor under Mac OS 10.4.
Previously I wrote about the difference between Apple and Microsoft in One Sentence, but here I stumbled upon a little video showing the fundamental different philosophies between Apple and Microsoft, as shown in their packaging.
One tries to do everything — offer the customer anything that is technically possible, and ends up in a bloated mess-up. The other boils appliaces down to their essence, and makes them look like a gem.
The top 5 priorities of Microsoft and Apple
Microsoft
- Technology
- Technology
- Technology
- Usability
- Design
Apple
- Design
- Usability
- Technology
- Design
- Usability
One-line Vistaâ„¢ Joke of the day
Can anyone confirm the rumor that Vistaâ„¢ Service Packâ„¢ 1 will install Windowsâ„¢ XPâ„¢?
When I was a kid, I loved making flipbooks. They could have between 2 and 100 pictures. Flipbook.info is a great site that has many videos of antique flipbooks.
I was delighted to find out that there is software to print out your films, and make a thumb-able movie. For the Mac there is the free DYI flipbooks, and if you are on Windows, you can start your search here.
A US sandwich chain is taking the concept further and made a human flipbook:
And a fun how-did-they-make-it film:
Gems from the Web:
- A closer look at Apple’s new ProRes 422 video format - Despite compressing HD footage to a size smaller than raw standard definition video, the codec’s demands on the CPU and disk speed are light enough that a MacBook Pro can play editing-grade video in full HD resolution.
- Apple developing active desktop feature for Mac OS X - An enhancement to the Mac OS X operating system under development by Apple looks to pave the way for active desktop pictures, or desktop backgrounds that can include motion graphics and alter themselves based on user actions or the time of the day.
- High-quality photos of Apple at NAB 2007 - Apple’s presence at the National Association of Broadcasters conference this week includes a mind-boggling on-site server demonstration comprised of 130 Xserve components and over 3 miles of fiber optic cable.
- How to Get out of a Car That’s Hanging over a Cliff - will you know how to escape before the car plummets to the bottom?
- iPhone could turn technology world on its ear - Awareness of Apple’s iPhone device had spread to nearly 50 percent of U.S. consumers, with a significant chunk of those people expressing sincere interest in buying the device without having first seen one in person, a broad market survey has shown.
Gems from the Web:
- Verbarius - A clock that spells out the time.
- Optimus Maximus - A new approach to typing: a keyboard with a tiny LCD screen in each key. Could be great for translators, but also video editors and anyone who needs to remember shortcuts. Pricetag: 1500 USD, delivery expected for November 07.
- Cult of Mac - Wired News - It’s become apparent that Apple has released a device capable of much more than playing digital media in the living room — they’ve put out a full-fledged computer for dirt cheap. David Scharf took it upon himself to re-christen the delightful box.
- Top 10 Apple products which flopped - Some of these I have never heard of. For obvious reasons, I guess…
- Danger Room - Michael Jackson is in discussions about creating a 50-foot robotic replica of himself to roam the Las Vegas desert…
- Dvorak Isn’t Drinking the iPhone Kool-Aid, Thinks Apple Should Can the Device - Apple should pull the plug on the gadget before it is too late.
- Top Secret: First shoot! - We just finished a shoot with noted cinematographer and camera operator, Charles Papert, for an as-yet-secret project, with the Canon XL H1.
- Creating Passionate Users: Creativity on speed - One of the best ways to be truly creative–breakthrough creative–is to be forced to go fast. Really, really, really fast.
- TI’s Mini Movie Projector - Texas Instruments is showing off its Pico, a DLP projector that is chiquitito enough to be incorporated into the bottom of a cellphone.
- Creating Passionate Users: How to host a product/feature design party - Forget focus groups. Forget endless meetings and brainstorming sessions. Throw an ultra-rapid-design party, and do it in a single day.
- The MDI Air Car - the world’s cleanest car. - With the incorporation of bi-energy (compressed air + fuel) the CAT Vehicles have increased their driving range to close to 2000 km with zero pollution in cities and considerably reduced pollution outside urban areas.
- Chiquita Brands Funds Right-wing Death Squads in Colombia - If you have bought a Chiquita banana over the last 10 years, it is very likely that part of the money you spent went to right-wing paramilitary death squads in Colombia.
- TypePad: Censorship against blogs - If just sending an email to Six Apart is enough to remove a post that your company don’t like, what is freedom of speech for Type Pad customers?
- Windows Vista - Beneath the gloss they have hidden traps that take away important consumer rights, force expensive and environmentally damaging hardware upgrades.
- dotherightthing.com - Popular Stories - Do the right thing and change the world…
- 5 Reasons to NOT upload your Music or Videos to a Third Party - If you’re going to go through the trouble of cutting a video, mp3, Podcast, etc., spend the money and host it yourself. That way you don’t have to agree to some of these bizarre Terms of Use.
- BBC NEWS | Business | Google’s copyright nightmare - Until now most copyright holders had little incentive to sue YouTube. Now that YouTube is part of the Google empire, with a market capitalisation of $129bn (£70bn), there is a serious incentive to let the lawyers off the leash.
- Highway shut for butterfly travel - Taiwan is to close one lane of a major highway to protect more than a million butterflies, which cross the road on their seasonal migration.
- TV networks plan rival to YouTube - “NBC Universal and Fox will put top shows such as 24, House and Heroes as well as hit movies on the site”
- Federal agency bans Microsoft Vista - “At least two federal government agencies are refusing to upgrade their computers with Microsoft Corp.’s Windows Vista operating system, citing concern over costs and compatibility issues.”
