Back deck, Tuesday morning
5 – 6 inches already down plus more on the way
Roads were bad, snow covered and slippery. I really appreciate the Subaru’s all-wheel drive on days like this. News reports were not good for the orchards around here; many orchards had blossoms that froze in the unexpected storm and up to 80 percent of some fruits, such as apricots, will be lost. I fear our cherry tree and lilac bushes have been affected.
The snow has (mostly) melted in the last few days with only a few piles in the shade remaining. The cold temps have stayed, though, with below freezing readings that will continue for a few more days. Pam is covering some of the iris and white lilac every night in hopes of lessening the frost damage. We will only find out how effective this is when the wather warms up again.
In other news…
I decided I needed a basic program for video editing. I had occasionally taken video clips with my low-resolution Flip recorder, including some of the Sanderling lot driveway being built. I ended up with Apple’s iMovie. It was only $15.00 and appears to have the basics I am looking for: transitions, titles, stitching together various clips, and saving in a format (MP4) that will play on almost all web browsers.
Below is my first attempt at producing a video using very basic techniques. Subject is putting in the driveway on the Sanderling lot.
Powered by Cincopa Media Platform for your website and Cincopa MediaSend for file transfer.
I consider this video a “dry run / get experience” type of project. Next week we go to Boise to visit Felicity and listen to her vocal group, North West Harmony, sing at the Sweet Adeline convention. I will be recording the trip with a higher-quality Canon camcorder and will attempt to produce a “travel video” when I get back. Hopefully it will be a bit more artistic than this one, but how artsy can you get with an excavator?
Trailer update: I found a knob for the trailer stove. In California. An RV service place says they can get one and will ship it to me. (Sometimes small victories mean a lot…:) It will take 2 – 3 weeks to get here though. I suspect it has to come from China or Taiwan…. $2.46 plus shipping, and I bet the shipping will be more than the cost of the knob!
That’s it for now. Thanks for looking in!
Pam’s 2 cents worth:
Do ya think Jer is trying to tell me something (like, he expects me to bake in the RV oven) by making such a fuss over the oven knob?
Probably don’t need an “oven knob” to bake — could use a pliers instead.
It would be a good idea to use the oven a few times though — baking, oven temperature consistency, etc would be a good thing to measure…
Video came through well and looks good. I’m sure you’ll experiment with transitions, transparent captions, etc…
The snow & cold temperatures are extremely annoying (and don’t bode well for flowering plant life). Flurries only in southern Wisconsin, though I’ve heard as much as 2 feet of snow hit northern Wisconsin!
WOW – it’s a movie of big boys playing in the sand with big boy toys! Love it!
As I was watching, my mind wandered back to 903 playing with real toys in the pea gravel driveway. We had metal construction toys (probably flippin’ antiques now, huh?)
And what a fantastic transformation. Really looks nice. The video really tells the story – more so than pics for me.
Yeah, WE got your snow today. Not to worry about the flowers though because we don’t have any!
I hope you guys have a fantastic time with Felicity! I will be looking forward to future videos. I am curious – that video took NO time to buffer.. why is that?
Becky:
We still have some of the kids’ metal toys in the attic f the garage. Pam says I should get them on Antiques Roadshow…
A couple of people have commented the video makes it feel more “real” somehow. I just wish the wind had not been so strong or the Flip recorder not so sensitive to it. Most of what you hear is wind noise.
Buffering…I saved the video in MP4 format, 640 x 480 resolution. File size came out to about 30.2mb,just over 10mb per minute of video. The file is hosted on the Cincopa web site, which appears to have very good internet connections. I use Cincopa for all my photo gallery and video hosting. Cincopa provides all the code needed to insert a video player and associated video clip into an HTML page.
Thanks for the note!
Boy.
I am wondering what your garage attic does NOT have! hehe
Good info re the video – thanks!
oh boy!
glad we get video clips now too!
jack of all trades you are jer 🙂
lol about pam’s comment–that would be my concern as well!