Dining Room Table Reviews – The Apple iPad
Tuesday, August 10th, 2010Here it is, a bit late, and with a new show opening.
And here’s the trailer for the next product review to be released in September.
Archive for the ‘Show Ideas’ Category
Dining Room Table Reviews – Canon Vixia HF R10 Camcorder
Monday, July 19th, 2010I keep forgetting to post my latest reviews. Need to set up a check list one of these days.
Channel Progress Report
Tuesday, May 25th, 2010So where do we stand today in our attempt to launch Canada’s first national public access television channel?
Slowly but surely, it’s moving forward!
A partnership is in the works, finding the first cable company to carry the channel is ongoing, development of the Automated Broadcast System is continuing, new Canadian programming is being found and put on the air…
But the best news is that the latest Linux distribution upgrade to our broadcast servers appears to have resolved the frequent synchronization issues we were having with the live Internet broadcast. Under the old system, the Internet streams would frequently go out of sync by as much as a second. But since the latest updates were applied, we’ve yet to find a single show go out of sync.
The only issue we’ve encountered is with the MPEG4/H.264 encoded test stream, which crashed while attempting to stream a movie that had caused us problems in the past (it worked perfectly on all the other test streams). So we’ve decided to drop the MPEG4/H.264 format altogether. The test stream would have never gone into production anyway since it’s encumbered with too many software patents whose excessively high licensing fees could have reached the tens of thousands of dollars per year.
And with Google announcing the development of a new competing open source streaming audio/video format called WebM or VP8, very soon there won’t be any reason to consider patent encumbered audio/video formats at all.
Because of all of these improvements, this corporation will soon begin offering consultation services for organizations wishing to implement their own Internet and cable based television channel infrastructure at a fraction of the cost of traditional television channels.
Yes, it’s a new era for broadcast television, one that is no longer encumbered by legacy equipment or software licensing fees, allowing all of us to concentrate on what’s most important: the content.
The Trade Show Show – Salon Son et Image 2010
Sunday, May 16th, 2010The video of the 2010 edition of the Salon Son et Image is now available on YouTube. Enjoy!
Dining Room Table Reviews – Nokia N900 Smartphone
Tuesday, February 16th, 2010It’s been available on YouTube for a while now. Enjoy!
Just be advised there might be a serious design flaw with the microUSB connector. More info here.
Next up, an iPad maybe? Hello Apple?
Show Idea – O Canada
Monday, December 7th, 2009Yes, this is what’s played when the service signs on or off the air, so it’s not really what one would call a proper television show. But why use the same, stuffy O Canada segment normally provided by the federal government? Why not allow Canadians themselves to produce their own rendition of our national anthem?
The only drawback with this concept is that anyone leaving their television set operating overnight may be in for a rude awakening when the service signs on in the morning and the O Canada happens to be performed by a Heavy Metal band.
All submissions will be considered and properly credited if accepted.
Dining Room Table Reviews – Canon HF200, Sanyo VPC-TH1 Camcorder Shoot-out
Tuesday, June 30th, 2009In my ongoing quest to find the best camcorder suitable for the production of TV shows on the cheap, I’ve found these two. But can a $200 720p camcorder realistically compete against a $700 1080i camcorder?
The final video was rendered at 720p to help even the playing field. Will there be a small difference between the two camcorders? Or will there be a huge difference? Watch and find out.
Show Idea – Get ‘er Done!
Friday, June 5th, 2009Reality shows. Often perceived as the scourge of prime time television.
The primary goal of the vast majority of these shows is to humiliate and demolish the self esteem of the participants. It is the complete opposite of the mandate of traditional game shows where the participants are strongly encouraged to do their best. And while it’s okay to have a few of these shows on the air (they’re still great for a few laughs and some shock value), there’s something seriously wrong with the television landscape when it seems as if half of the shows are humiliating inducing reality shows.
That’s where “Get ‘er Done!” comes in. Instead of finding the worst in a person, the show will try to bring out the best out of them. An example of an episode would be a team of part-time handy-people with limited skills being taught advanced carpentry techniques while working on a needy family’s home or even a town’s community centre. Both the participants and the viewing audience will learn simple skills that can make all the difference in any home improvement project.
An important note. This channel will not accept any television show littered with a ton of product placements, transforming the entire show into one long infomercial. This is too often the case with most fishing, wilderness and car shows. However, nothing prevents the show from being underwritten by a major corporation who gets mentioned prominently in the opening and closing credits, or during a key moment in the show. This is what I would have preferred in this season’s Discovery Channel Canada show “Canada’s Worst Handyman” where the teams went shopping at Canadian Tire, but the name of the store was never actually pronounced on the air. If the producers had taken the time to properly disclose the sponsorship of the show during the narrative, it wouldn’t have appeared as an incredibly huge product placement scheme.
What I want is full disclosure of the show’s sponsors. Don’t hide them in the background.
Show Idea – Ephemeral
Friday, June 5th, 2009Do you remember those movies from the fifties and sixties that were shown in school or at community events to inform (or misinform) the general public? Civil defense films, health and hygiene films, science films, propaganda films, war department films…
On “Ephemeral”, a different film will be viewed each week, and a guest panel of experts, community organizers and concerned citizens will discuss the relevance of the information presented in the film. Is the information accurate? Or is the film a twisted and potentially dangerous piece of propaganda that could do more harm than good?
Most of the films will be provided by The Perlinger Archives available at The Internet Archives.
Show Idea – The Trade Show Show – Salon Son & Image 2009
Monday, April 27th, 2009Coverage of the 2009 edition of the Salon Son & Image, from the Sheraton Centre in downtown Montreal.
A big thanks to the Salon Son & Image, the Musée des Ondes Émile Berliner, and to Stereophile’s John Atkinson, Stephen Mejias, Art Dudley, and Robert Deutsch. Music by “From the Hip Live at Veasleys Jazz Base” available at The Internet Archives.
http://www.salonsonimage.com
http://www.berliner.montreal.museum
http://www.stereophile.com
http://www.archive.org
