Hasta La Gadget!

Intel cares about you. It cares that your data is safe and secure in a sturdy storage silo of the solid state variety. In order to enlighten you on the dangers that old and dusty magnetic hard drives pose, it has kindly fashioned out a short film detailing graphically the fate of your 1s and 0s when they’re kept on an HDD that suffers an unexpected impact. It’s atmospheric, thrilling stuff, which we dare not spoil for you here. We’ll just say it ends on a pretty hilarious note and point you to the video below.

Continue reading Intel posts a short film about SSDs and the folly of not using them

Intel posts a short film about SSDs and the folly of not using them originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 31 Mar 2011 17:23:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We all drool over the hi-res video shot by cameras like the RED EPIC, but for indie-film types, processing the massive files produced takes a lot of time (and therefore money) and not everyone has an ARRI ALEXA to do native recording compression. Enter the Atomos Ninja and Samurai HD recorder / monitor / playback devices that take your 10-bit video and compress it in Apple’s 1080p ProRes QuickTime format to make your post-production life a little easier. The Ninja pulls video through HDMI and deposits it on your choice of 2.5-inch HDD or SDD storage, does playback via a 4.3-inch 480 x 270 touchscreen, and has continuous power thanks to dual hot-swappable batteries (available in 2600, 5200, and 7800 mAh varieties). Meanwhile, the Samurai matches the Ninja’s specs, but swaps out the HDMI connection for HD-SDI ports and adds SDI Loop-Through to connect an external monitor, a larger 5-inch 800 x 400 display, and 3D support (if you get two Samurais genlocked together). Both units have FireWire 800 and USB 2.0 and 3.0 connections for offloading your vids. Those with Spielbergian aspirations can pony up $995 for the Ninja right now, or pay $1,495 for the Samurai upon its release this summer.

Atomos Ninja and Samurai HD video recorder / monitors bring compression jutsu to pro filmmaking originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 26 Mar 2011 11:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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In case you haven’t heard, there are websites out there that will let you download movies and software using a little something called the BitTorrent protocol. And while the majority of cinematic fare available is of a non-DMCA-approved nature, filmmakers and organizations are increasingly turning to torrent sites to get the word out. For instance, in 2009 a filmmaker named Hanna Sköld worked with the folks at The Pirate Bay to distribute her film Nasty Old People. And indeed, there seem to be as many zany ways to get your work out to audiences these days as there are filmmakers.

One scheme that recently piqued our interest was concocted by the folks at Distracted Media. The Australian company is crowdsourcing its latest production, The Tunnel (not to be confused with Chunnel: 32 Miles of Danger) by selling individual frames for a buck a pop. Of course, “owning” a frame gives you nothing more than the opportunity to say that you helped an indie filmmaker out, but it’s a worthwhile cause. And at 135,000 frames that’s a lot of dollars! When the film is done, it will be distributed via BitTorrent for free — alongside an actual DVD release by Paramount Pictures which, when you think about how reluctant Hollywood has been to embrace the internet, is pretty wild. Check out the (NSFW) trailer after the break, and then hit the links below for more info. Tunnel should make its premiere this May.

Continue reading Paramount Pictures, BitTorrent team up to distribute feature film (video)

Paramount Pictures, BitTorrent team up to distribute feature film (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 17 Mar 2011 20:26:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Photojojo’s latest novelty-cam is the Fujifilm Instax Mini 50, in handsome piano black. The instant film camera is slimmer and smaller, and yet packs in a few new features. And despite not having Lady Gaga in charge of design and strategy, Fujifilm embarrasses the shamefully poor efforts of Polaroid these last few years.

At 4.5 x 4 x 2 inches, the Instax truly is mini (in film camera terms), and adds a two-shot self-timer, a “smart” (auto) flash and a crispy black coating. The lens is 60mm, you get exposure compensation (but remember, each shot is a frame of film used) and a removable close-focus lens will let you shoot as close as one inch (without the adapter, the focus range runs from just under two feet and off to infinity).

Last night, I was eating in a bar with the Lady and some friends. An old chap came in with a giant instant camera (a bigger Instax, by the look of it). He offered to take our photo for money. This used to be commonplace, but now it’s almost laughable. I don’t begrudge the poor guy a living, but there were at least four cameras at our table, and not just in cellphones. It’s like the roving sellers of pirated DVDs who approach me in a bar when I’m reading my iPad and try to sell me a movie. I’m all like, “Dude?”

Anyhow, the Instax looks to be a real-life Instagram, although you’ll have trouble sharing the pics. It’ll cost you $149 in the Photojojo store (with two 20-exposure films thrown in). Further film will cost $22 per roll, which should remind you why God finally deigned to give us digital cameras.

The Fuji Instax Mini 50s Piano Black [Photojojo]

See Also:

• Fuji Instax Mini 7 Proves Film is Still Best – For Instant …
• Polaroid Lives! New Camera Uses Real Instant Film
• New Insta-Photo Cameras Seek to Ride Long Tail of Polaroid …

Something you already knew to be true has just been confirmed by Omnicom’s Interbrand brand consultancy division: Apple reigns supreme in Hollywood films. Interbrand’s Brandchannel website dug deep into the fetid bowels of product placement to reveal Hollywood’s preferences (paid or personal) in the 33 films that hit the US box office number one slot in 2010. Brandchannel identified 591 total brand or product appearances for an average of 17.9 placements per film, with Apple appearing in ten of the top films for a 30 percent share — Nike, Chevrolet, and Ford each appeared in eight. Incidentally, Iron Man 2 won the dubious distinction of being cluttered with the most identifiable brands (64) in 2010. Apple is actually off from its peak of 50 percent of number one films in 2008 and 44 percent in 2009 as demonstrated in the chart after the break. But it’s not for a lack of trying. Brandchannel contends that the competition for brand placement has simply intensified resulting in fewer appearances of Janoff’s U+F8FF.

Continue reading Shocker! Apple product placements dominate Hollywood

Shocker! Apple product placements dominate Hollywood originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 23 Feb 2011 04:39:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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