EOY Update #4 – 8/10/09 – New videos uploaded

Bianca Nicole at EOY 2009 - Talent Competition

Hey pageant fans,

Well after about 8 hours, I have finished with EOY DVD for Sunday night only.  I finished the first draft yesterday combining the two cameras together into one video (some of you saw the process yesterday as I broadcasted live on our internet TV channel).  Today, I went through the 4 hour video and took out all of the down time, talking in between categories etc.  Then I had to put in the names for all of the contestants for both Evening Gown and Talent and then create boards for all of the guest entertainers.  After that, I had to fix some audio anomalies (so annoying) and then I created the intro video montage before the actual pageant started.

I am pretty much done.  I haven’t created the DVD yet – I am still debating whether I am going to put in CG names for each contestant as they were announced at the beginning of the pageant (I am still waiting for a list of the contestant names and spellings) but other than that, I am finish.

Tomorrow, I will upload 10 hours worth of video (2 cameras for Saturday’s show) and then start that editing on Wednesday.  Unfortunately, since it takes 10 hours to move video to the computer – that will take up all of my day so I can’t really edit until Wed.

I posted 4 new videos on Planet Q TV all around what happened on Sunday night + I posted the presentation video we created for Xavier Cole for the men’s competition.  We hope you like the videos.  Well I am calling it a day.  Enjoy…until tomorrow…have a great week.

Thomas

EOY Update #3 – 8/9/09

Now that I have uploaded all 8 hours (2 cameras) of Sunday nights EOY pageant, it is time to edit.  I decided to edit live on our internet TV channel that you can get to from our website.  At 12:30pm – I did the first 2 hours of the pageant and right now I am doing the last 2 hours – which is talent, entertainment, farewell and crowning.  So if you read this blog now (its about 6:53pm EST on Sunday Aug 9th, go click on the live internet TV button from our home page and chat with your friends and enjoy the editing of the pageant.  After I finish this first draft of the edit, tomorrow I will go through all 4 hours, cut out the down time, add graphics, text and etc and finish up Sunday night’s video – hopefully, if all goes well I will be done tomorrow.

Thomas

EOY Update #2 – 8/7/09 – 10pm

Update News for EOY

Hey pageant fans…time to call it a night – wanted to give a quick update on what was accomplished today.

1) Miami International Closetball – 3 hours of video content was uploaded to the editing workstation. Will begin editing video tomorrow (Saturday).

2) EOY 2009 – 4 hours of video content (Sunday Night Camera 1) was uploaded to the editing workstation. Will upoload 4 hours of camera 2 tomorrow after I finish editing Miami Intl Closetball – but if the editing takes me longer than 5 hours – I may defer to Sunday.

3) I replaced the two EOY preview videos on Planet Q TV. I noticed the older videos were showing some signs of playback issues (slight stuttering issue) so I replaced it with a higher quality .flv file. Plays back beautiful now.

4) I updated the shopping page on Click Click Expose. Retail price changes go into effect tomorrow for all EOY 2009 products.

I think that’s it. Have a great weekend everyone.

Thomas

EOY Update #1 – 8/7/09

Sorry to all of our readers of this blog – the next few weeks are going to be full of pageant news and Entertainer of the Year news but I will try to mix it up.

Bianca Nicole - Entertainer of the Year, FI 2009 Winner

1.  First I want to say congratulations to Bianca Nicole and Xavier Valentino Litter for winning this year’s EOY competition.  It was another fun year and fun pageant to watch.  Eric took pictures at Finals Night and I will have some of them up in a couple of days.

2.  Before I can start working on the EOY pageant DVD, I have to complete some projects that are on my desk prior to EOY.  Miami International Closetball fans – we haven’t forgotten about you.  I am capturing that video right now as I write this.  My goal is to finish that pageant by Saturday.  Congratulations to Lashawn Denne Chanel for winning this 1st annual pageant held in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.

3.  We are also in the process of completing a major duplication request (500 DVDs) along with a redesign of our corporate website: www.empirevideoproductions.com and some changes have to be made to the International Week 2009 DVD.  Needless to say, this week has been hectic.

4.  We had a great time meeting our fans and friends at EOY this year.  Thanks to all those who came to say hi and chat with us.  It is great talking to all of our supporters as we are always striving to make things better.

5.  Some people have asked if I am going to do a preview trailer for Saturday and Sunday nite.  The answer is yes – as soon as I have captured all of the video – I will knock out a couple of trailers to watch.  All preview trailers will only be on our video sharing website: www.planetq.tv.  I will not have it up on You Tube until much later on this month.  Head to our website:  www.clickclickexpose.com and click on the button that says Planet Q TV – its our own video sharing website designed specifically for the gay and lesbian community.

6.  I have not taken down the pre-order special that is on our website.  Prices will go back up by $10 to $15 so if you haven’t order yet, do it now.  When I get a free moment, I will update the website and prices will go back up to our normal retail level.

7. CONTESTANTS – If you want your presentation video in the DVD – you must mail it to me this week.  When I start the editing next week, if I don’t have the DVD – it will not be included in the final product.

8.  WE HAVE WON OUR 3RD PRESENTATION VIDEO CATEGORY.  As you know (or may not know) – we have done presentation videos for contestants who desire our service.  Shae Shae LaReese and DeeRanged have used our presentation videos and they have won their respective pageants and/or categories.  We are proud that we did Xavier Cole’s video this year and while he was 1st runner up – he did win the presentation category.  We are 3 for 3 – woohoo – way to go Xavier – good job.

9.  That’s it for now.  Look for a new update in a couple of days.  I won’t be starting on EOY until probably Monday.  Any questions, just let us know – shoot me an email: ccevideo@empirevideoproductions.com or give us a call: 305-695-0095.

HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND and thanks for your continued support.

Thomas

Now Playing on Click Click Expose TV – 4pm – May 9 – EOY 2008

Now Playing on Click Click Expose as of May 9th at 4pm EST – Entertainer of the Year, FI 2008 featuring the amazing talents of Nina West.  Enjoy this surprise performance.

Thomas

Missouri EOY Preview Video (Friday Night)

The preview video is up for you to see the Friday Night competition.  Sorry I can’t embed the video into the blog (wordpress doesn’t take the Brightcove player) but here is the link to view the video.  Hope you enjoy it.  By the way, I added 12 new videos to Planet “Q” TV – some music, gay commericals and if you remember we talked about  the first gay soap opera kiss on our podcast show “Talk Mess With Adrian and Thomas” – well the video is up in the “our stories” folder.

Thomas

Boy I’m glad I didn’t buy an iPhone

Hey guys and gals,

Sorry I haven’t been on the blog in a while but I am back again for more info and stuff (hehe).  So if you were one of those people who just had to have the iPhone when it came out – I feel so sorry for you.  $200 price drop announced.  Boy would I be flippin mad about that…..but I digress….

I have spent the last couple of days optimizing the website – so if you are a Firefox user – every page except for the two videos on the home page should display correctly.  For the longest time, I could not figure out how to structure the page correctly for you guys but I figured out a work around.  So everything should display nicely – the home page – the videos are a little too low but are still viewable and usable.  I will test it out on opera a little later today or tomorrow to see how it displays.

If you are an advertiser or want to advertise, the link for the order form is not working.  Just send us an email – I am going to change the advertising system over completely so that you (the end user) will have complete control over what you order, how you order it and what you upload.  That new system is coming in about a week or so.

And finally, today is my computer administrative day.  That is when I go through the editing workstations and remove all of the files and assets for the last few projects I have been working on.  So EOY (which took up tons and tons of hard drive space) is being dumped (by the way I have the original EOY opening intact – hopefully I will get too showcase that soon) – the miss black oracle pageant files are being dumped and I am now going throught all of my DVD computer files, DVD archives and doing a purge.  These workstations work great but they easily get bogged down in hundreds of files and thousands of little links and it is easy for a file not to be functional anymore.  Sometimes it is just plain better to archive in a different format.  It’s tedious work but it needs to get done (Besides I need the space for the pageant we are filming this Sunday – South Florida International Newcomer).

Adrian and I had an interesting discussion/argument on the next direction for Click Click Expose – are we heading in the right direction, do we provide content that people want to see, do we need to produce original video content, etc. . . etc…I WOULD LOVE TO KNOW YOU’ALLs opinion – WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEE NEW AND DIFFERENT – WHAT DO WE NEED ON OUR SITE THAT WILL KEEP YOU COMING BACK FOR MORE.  SHARE WITH US YOUR OPINION – I WOULD LOVE TO KNOW HOW WE CAN MAKE OUR MULTI-MEDIA WEBSITE ONE OF THE BEST PLACES TO VISIT AND BE ENTERTAINED.

THANKS…..

Updating Planet “Q” TV & EOY Opening Controversy

 I love this poster – You ever heard the expression Loose lips, Sink Ships…well maybe that should be the motto given to those who have speculated, rumored and offered all kinds of explanations on why the opening of the EOY video was modified.  Am I here to set the record straight – NO.  Why you say?  …our company is bounded by a professional code of conduct.  As members of two professional videographer associations, our conduct and business practices are govern by some very specific industry standards – these standards insure that our product, our dealings with clients and the decisions we make are of the highest ethical standards.  Needless to say we were approached with a legitimate business concern and with consultation from the owners of EOY we govern ourselves accordingly.  There is no pressure, no strong arm tactics – no bowing down to the man.  Believe you me, we can hold our own in court – but there is a bigger picture here to consider – a professional code that should be respected, honored and listen too – even if we may be in our legal rights.  And thus changes were made.  PERIOD – THAT’S IT.  I wonder if more people were to follow ethical code of conducts, maybe we wouldn’t have many of the problems that seem to plague this wonderful world we call gay pageantry.  My hats off to you all who stay above the fray and keep it professional and ethical.

my soap box is done (LOL).  NOW FOR SOME GOOD NEWS.   Don’t have $60 to spend on the EOY DVD, check out the pageant pay per view.  You can rent for 7 days portions of the EOY video for as little as $2.99 up to $5.00.  It’s a great way to see the video without spending a lot of money.

 MORE GOOD NEWS…Have you been to Planet “Q” TV lately??  Well I am on a video uploading spree for the last couple of days.  Look for at least 21 new videos added.  Everthing from a funny paraody on boy bands, 3 episodes from the Dudershow to some cute eye candy from the Athens Olympics Diving competition.  Ever wanted to see what the Ancient Greeks did at their games – well I got some hot video for you to see as well…. More and more gay videos than you can shake a dirty hankerchief at ….or something like that.  Check it out – OUR OWN GAY AND LESBIAN VIDEO SHARING SITE – PLANET “Q” TV.  I hope you enjoy the videos.

Got some suggestions, comments or things you want to share with us….email us at anytime or give us a call.  We would love to hear from you.  Until then….

Thomas

The office is back open – the move is done

Hey everyone…It’s been a little less than a week since I have been on the blog but we are back.  We have successfully moved the office and we are back online with all of our equipment and processes (Hooray!!!) – Man I hate moving – it is a pain in the but to tear the office down and then to rebuild it but we had to do it.

All of our orders for EOY 2007 have been fulfilled except for 1 person who was delayed.  Our error rate (bad encodes or damaged goods for our initial orders) was 1.4%.  We are pleased with that rate and the quality we have been able to deliver over the initial EOY orders.  There has been a huge interest in this year’s DVD and reports are that people have enjoyed the DVD – awesome!!!

NEW NEWS – We have a new podcast show starting this THURSDAY called Pageant Soup with Steve and Marlowe.  It will be all the 411 on gay pageantry – dirt, news, gossip and a little fact thrown in for fun.  Check it out!! It will be apart of our podcast network of shows which you can subscribe via iTunes from our home page.

Well that’s it for now…don’t forget to check out our DJs tonight on CCE Radio – DJ Louie B kicks it off at 6pm, followed by DJ Joelapuss at 8pm, DJ Carlos Dali at 9pm and DJ L Calderin at 11pm – CLICK TO LISTEN TO CCE RADIO HERE to check out the great music.

Thomas

EOY 07 – Editing Update – Day 13

oyyy…13 days, sleepless nights and mountains of papers, tapes, envelopes and empty ink cartridges – the 2007 EOY DVD has been finished.  I have 3 boxes next to me filled with everyone’s order ready to be mailed.  Next Day air and international orders will get priority first, followed by orders made between July 1 – July 26.  Followed by orders made July 27 through Aug 10th.  If you placed your order after Aug. 10th, your DVD will not ship until Thursday or Friday August 16th or 17th.

Below is a general email message sent to all folks who ordered via our website  – I am including it here in case you are one of the folks who ordered and did not get the regular email updates.

*****************************

Good Evening everyone,

This email will be a little long.  I would like to encourage everyone to read all the way through it and then email me if you have any questions or concerns.

1)  Despite a 1 1/2 day delay in production due to some editorial concerns that had to be addressed, I am happy to report that the DVDs are finished and will ship tomorrow August 13, 2007 as promised.  If you received an email alert from the United States Postal Service saying that your DVD was or is going to be shipped Tuesday or Wednesday, you can disregard that date.  We were originally going to stagger our deliveries based on when you placed your order.  I am  happy to report that we will be able to mail all orders at the same time.

2)  Your DVD was made on high speed DVD media.  It is 98% compatible on DVD players made after mid 2005 (There is presently no 100% compatibility on DVD duplication media).  If you have an older model DVD player, you will experience play back issues due to the changing nature of DVD media in the past 2 years.  Unless you recently bought a $15 Walmart DVD player, you should be okay for DVDs made after mid 2005. .  Please remember that dust, dirt, finger prints and smudges can affect playback.  Use a lint free cloth or other smooth type surface to clean the DVD disk before playing.

3)  If you have an issue with your DVD or other customer service concern, please email us at: ccevideo@empirevideoproductions.com so that we can address any issues you have.  You can also call our office at: 305-695-0095 during normal business hours 9 am to 6 pm.  Please note that we will be out of the office Monday thru Wednesday so email will be your best option for those days.

4)  You will receive 6 DVDs (2 for Friday Night, 2 for Saturday Night and 2 for Finals Night).  To maintain the highest quality standard, we chose not to compress all of the nights events onto one DVD per night.

Thank you for your patience as we worked as fast and as hard as we can to produce another quality EOY video for you.  We hope you enjoy the show.

Thomas Garnett Jr.

Owner/Member-Manager
Empire Video Productions, LLC

www.empirevideoproductions.com

Click Click Expose (Gay Entertainment Media)

www.clickclickexpose.com

305.695.0095

EOY 07 – Editing Update – Day 9

Well folks…just when you think you are finished and ready to move on to the next stage – someone throws a wrinkle in your plans.  I had just finished making the DVD master for Friday Night and I was working the DVD master for Saturday Night when an editorial concern was brought up which had to be fixed.  Because of that change – it required me to re-master the Friday Night DVD (Disk 1) which I am doing now at 11:40pm at night.  I will let the workstation run through the night on this project.  Then I have to re-do Disk 2 (that won’t take as long as it does not require me to change any major files within the DVD).  Then I will encode and set up Saturday Night.

After I have made those 4 disks and Adrian has had a chance to QA all 4 disk – then I will begin the duplication process and labeling all those DVDs…allllll thoooossseee DVDs – there are so many.  Once I complete that, then I am waiting on word from the owners on a editorial decision on the Sunday night disk and then I will start producing them (probably on Saturday).

So we are nearing the home stretch – one of the toughest part (the creation of the DVD) is finished.  Now its duplicating, labeling, art work and getting the orders ready to be mailed.  We’re almost there….

Thomas

EOY 07 – Editing Update – Day 7 & 8

Well I am close to wrapping up this EOY project. It has been a long haul. Yesterday was a difficult day – Adrian and Tara had many start and stops in their over 10 hours of tapes for Friday night which made audio/video sync a nightmare. I think I spent over 2 hours just sync video together even before I started editing. That night was running long and I had just over 5 hours of multi-camera footage to go through. It was reduced down to 3 hours and 10 minutes.

But alas….Friday is done with everything – I am now making the files I will use to make the DVD. Saturday is done with everything – I will be making the files I will use to make the DVD. Sunday I still have do a creative opening and the top 10 – I will probably do that last after I make the Friday and Saturday DVDs. Also Adrian needs to QA all 3 nights to make sure everything is okay.

So that is where things stand right now. So I am getting there – next is the DVD creation process.

Thomas

EOY 07 – Editing Update – Day 5

Somebody shoot me!! oyyyyy – well the goal of getting through all 4 hours of saturday’s multi-cam footage didn’t happen – by midnight – I had had enough – so after 30 minutes – I left the rest for today….so from 10am to 2pm – I went through the remaining saturday footage switching camera shots…..long, tedious and fighting the 1000 yard stare —- staring at a computer screen for 4 hours will drive you nuts especially when there is a ton of stuff that won’t be used in the final product.

So I wrapped it up by 2:10pm or so and I went through one of the fastest drop edits I have ever done. Since I was pretty annoyed right now….I flew through the timeline in 20 minutes dropping all of the crap out (normally I make my workable file then edit but I wanted the initial edit done NOW) – so I was dropping crap like a hot potato….contestants not ready yet – DROP, hurricane telling an ad because someone did not have their prop on stage, DROP – crowd won’t shut up during Q & A, DROP DROP DROP – flying through the time line cutting out all manner of nonsense. My next update will tell you what I cut the timeline down too…how much you want to bet I shaved off a hour or more useless banter off???

I am exporting my workable file now (that’s the file I will use to create my graphics, titles, opening montage, etc – not to mention closing all of the gaps where I dropped stuff) – once my workable file is done – I will create another sequence and start putting the final touches and graphics done – probably another good 2 to 3 hours of work maybe more depending on how creative I intent to make it.

For now while my file is exporting – I need an energy drink or two or three…..

Thomas

EOY Finals Night Preview Video

EOY 07 – Editing Update – Day 4

Well I am happy to say that 95% of Finals Night video is done. Today is where the hard work is done. I take a 3 hour and 4 minute rough draft and have to do several things: 1) first I go through the entire video minute by minute and take out all of the down time, mistakes and anything that will take away from the general pace of the video – so the video was trimmed down from 3 hours and 4 minutes to 2 hours and 30 minutes; 2) second I have to create the motion graphic lower thirds – that’s the names you see at the bottom of the screen – we use motion graphics for those which have to be created, adjusted and added to the timeline – boy that takes time; 3) third I have to create the motion graphic cards that introduce each segment and each former entertainer – nothing really fancy here – nice motion graphic that matches the color theme of the evening in letterbox format; 4) then I have to create the names for each and every contest and every former that performed; 5) fifth – I correct for audio anomalies if I can (they had some small audio issues that night) which of course we pick up rather well because we are patched into their system and finally; 6) I render all of my files, graphics, audio etc so that I can preview the entire timeline in realtime.

So 95% done – the only thing I have left to do (which Adrian will assist) is create a creative opening to the video and I want to re-do how we will showcase the top 10 since the filming of it was uninspired. I think Adrian has some ideas of what he wants to do here – so we will sit down to discuss that.

I started at 9am and finished around 3pm. So I think I am taking a break for a couple of hours. When I return – I will throw up the 8 hours of video for saturday night and put together the rough draft video of that night- so about 30 minutes or so to sync up mulitple audio/video tracks and then I have to go through all 4 hours of video and pick out the best camera shots for the night. So that will be the last thing I work on tonight so about 5 more hours of work…the life of an editor….

So if I were to tally up the time spent so far in editing and working on this project for the last 4 days – I would say I am at 26 hours of editing (just me) – Adrian and Tara logged in 34 hours of filming (together) and 3 hours of editing, uploading and encoding the preview clips. hmmmmm…….