YTC043 - Some Musings on the iMac

Something different for this video comment, I'm on the move! 

In homage to Robert Llewellyn, I thought I'd do something different today and record some comments whilst in the car! 

It's pretty much a stream of consciousness, so apologies if it's a bit incoherent in places. The video angle is pretty weird too!

Not in HD as I recorded it with the front facing camera on the iPhone 4 (and apologies for the weird camera angle!).

iPad 2 Prize Draw Winner

As promised, I did the random prize draw on Sunday morning (1st May 2011) to select the winner of the iPad 2.

As usual, I downloaded the membership list from my membership system. Double checked all the entries were valid and checked for any duplicate entries. Entered the beginning and ending row numbers from the spreadsheet into random.org and pressed the button.

The winner is:

Steven Pearson from Evesham, UK.

Many congratulations Steven.

I've just sent him an email to confirm his address and will get the iPad 2 out to him after the Bank Holiday weekend.

Commiserations to all the other members who didn't win, but guess what...

I think I'll give away another iPad 2 at the end of June!

Quick Update & White iPhone - Video Comment

I've had a few people asking where my video comments have gone and why I've stopped doing them?

So here is the first one for quite a while!

Some Thoughts on Video (and Audio) - [Part 1]

There's a lot happening in the video space at the moment, so I thought I'd put together a series of blog posts on my perceptions and my experiences, as I change the way I both handle and consume video based media.

Apple TV Fixed (Sort of!)

A quick update is needed on my woes with the Apple TV and my, not so old, rear projection TV. Regular readers of the blog will know that, despite having the Apple TV for a while, I've had some issues getting it to work with my Sony HD rear projection TV. I won't bore you with the details (they are here if you want them), but let's just say I've now reached a satisfactory resolution...

The Sony TV is gone and I've replaced it with a Panasonic PG50G20B - one of last years models. I went with a Plasma TV on various Twitter recommendations and I have to say, the picture is stunning! Absolutely blown away how gorgeous it looks.

The main result though, is that the Apple TV works a treat.

No issues at all, just hooked it up and away we go.

There are several changes that have happened in the passed few months that have caused me to re-evaluate how I manage my media, and set me down the path of replacing some key bits of technology. Probably best to start from the beginning...

The Starting Point

Previously, I had a ton of media sourced from all over the place, DVD rips, BluRay rips and other assorted sources(!). Consequently, the video files were in all different formats and in all different resolutions - from SD material to 1080p.

To cope with this, I had a Mac mini connected to my main TV with a Drobo for storage, using Plex as the primary UI and media management software. Plex worked a treat, but having a full blown computer under the TV was a bit restrictive. Yes, it could play anything I could throw at it, but I really was the only one who could operate it.

Occasionally, I'd switch over to the Mac mini (connected via an external HDMI switcher) and wouldn't you know, all I'd get is a black screen and need to reboot it.

Major inconvenience.

So I decided to swap out the Mac mini for an Apple TV and reuse the Mac mini for something else. I've not gone down the route of jailbreaking the Apple TV but I may look at that at a later time.

The Problem with Multiple Formats

I've also done a lot of travelling recently, and needed to copy movies across to my iPad. Invariably, before I could transfer the movies, they needed to be re-encoded in a format that the iPad could play.

Yes, I know things like Zumocast can transcode your movies on the fly remotely, but that's really no good at 30,000 ft.

So based on fact I was going to use the Apple TV for my main TV viewing, and I'd like all my media to play on the Apple TV, my iPad and my iPhone natively, I took the decision to start the process of re-encoding all my video media to 1280x720 Quicktime. The quality of 1280x720 vs 1080p isn't really an issue for me, 1280x720 looks mighty fine to me, even on the 50" plasma.

Although re-encoding my entire video library is a fairly onerous task, at least I have a Mac Pro to help ease the process. The 64bit version of Handbrake allows all 8 cores to max out during the encoding process, so it's pretty fast. I also found a neat Applescript that automated the task for me, so I didn't have to manually add each movie file to the HandBrake queue individually. I detail the process in a recent ScreenCastsOnline show although it is a members show!

The addition of Metadata and passing the video files into iTunes is handled by iFlicks - another Show - and as of now, I'm pretty much up to date with encoding everything to the new format.

I'm more than happy with the performance of the Apple TV with the 1280x720 files and it's such a relief not to worry about various formats anymore, when copying files to the various devices.

All the media is currently stored on my Mac Pro, but I'll probably setup the Mac mini as a dedicated Media Server - just not physically connected to the TV.

Still to Come

The major revelation though has been using AirPlay from the iOS devices to the Apple TV...wow!

Airplay is built into iOS 4.3 allowing you to "transmit" video across from your iPad or iPhone across to your Apple TV. The process is seamless and as far as I'm concerned, a huge deal. Only this week, I've seen three different apps launch that utilise AirPlay turning the whole media consumption experience on it's head.

It's not just video though.

With a subscription based service like Spotify and some 3rd party apps, I've been able to completely redesign how I play my music around the house.

Stay tuned!

Two devices?

I've been at the NSConference for the past few days. The sessions are a mixture of both highly techie software development topics, interspersed with inspirational and hugely motivating sessions on broader subjects, subjects that are applicable to anyone making a product or delivering a service.

It's also a great place to network and socialise.

But back to the sessions....

I knew that a lot of sessions would be too techie and that I'd really get no benefit from them. So I brought some extra "stuff" that I wanted to work on, with the intention of spending some quality time away from the techie sessions.

However, after three days, I found that the extra "stuff" has largely remained untouched.

Why?

Because during that time, I've been catching up with twitter, reading my RSS feeds and generally consuming information. It's just so easy to do!

Obviously, there is value in Twitter and RSS but it's not very productive. I also find a similar problem when working from home. Twitter has become my virtual water cooler but unlike in a normal working environment (where I'd visit the water cooler every couple of hours)' I find myself hanging around all day, when I should really be back at my desk!

What to do?

This morning, I picked up a blog post from Seth Godin.

I think Seth has captured exactly my dilemma, but more importantly, offered up a solution involving a re-assignment of roles for various devices.

I'm here with my MacBook Air and my iPad, both of which have Twitter, RSS, Safari, email, etc. I can pick up either device and use either for work or "enjoyment".

What if I apply the proposed demarcation of roles by using the MacBook Air just for work, and the iPad for other activities - the activities I enjoy, rather than the activities I need to focus on to make myself more productive?

What if I delete Twitter and my RSS reader from my MacBook Air and only use those services when I'm on my iPad?

In fairness, I prefer to use my iPad for Twitter and RSS, and do turn to the MacBook Air for more productive tasks anyway.

Would this demarcation work, or do I just need to exert some self discipline?

Let's try it for a week and see how it works out.