Author: Benson Hendrix

Benson Hendrix, APR has been called everything from a “social media zen warrior” to the ” ‘Rowdy’ Roddy Piper of Public Relations,” and from a “behind the scenes powerbroker,” to “the loudmouth PR love child of Henry Rollins and Anthony Bourdain,” but doesn’t really believe any of it (except maybe the “Rowdy” Roddy Piper part). Hendrix is the Digital Media Manager for the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology and loves helping organizations and people tell the stories that are important to them. He is also an adjunct social media instructor at the University of New Mexico, and the Social Media Strategist for TEDxABQ. In the few minutes a week he calls "spare time," he relaxes with his wife and chases his dream to be a better photographer.
media, public relations, Technology

It’s called “You”Tube for a reason

Posted on by Benson Hendrix

I was thinking about this post while giving a presentation in class this evening. We had an open ended assignment where each person presented on a topic related to the mass media. Being interested in online communications, I focused on Web communications by mass media outlets. That got me thinking about bloggers (which I wrapped up the presentation with) and how people in my profession should look at content creation vs. pitching to bloggers.

A lot of PR peeps are looking at how to pitch bloggers and other A-list social media mavens instead of working towards creating their own content.This is fine, but it’s as if the mindset of PR people around the globe continues to be:

“I’m in PR. I’m used to pitching people, sending stuff out. I must pitch the “media.” I’m not going to create my own content. I don’t shoot video, and sound like I gargled with rusty razor blades.”

Trust me I know where you’re coming from. I don’t have that creamy radio voice either and am more “Body by Buddha” than “Body by Jake.” Ya know what, that doesn’t matter. It’s all about authenticity. It’s about your company becoming the media outlet, instead of waiting for reporting from the media which may never come. It’s about PR person as civic journalist (or corporate journalist) than traditional “pitch man.”

(This also matters to you and your personal brand. You are your own Hollywood director. But wunder-dude Chris Brogan has a lot of great articles on this. I may give my own humble take later (but read Chris first))

Your company should become part of the conversation, not just treat bloggers/podcasters/et al as one more media outlet to just pitch to. Remember, it’s called “YOU”Tube for a reason. Use it to create your online brand, then your company will piggyback on the “you” brand (if you identify yourself as working for that company).  Then other bloggers might get interested in your product/organization.

And your first efforts don’t have to be Hollywood-esque. Just get some practice time in with your camera and some software. Here’s a little footage of me practicing around with my Flip Video Camera and the Sony Imagination Studio software. There’s also more relevant footage (PR wise) that I shot for work located here.

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apple, Technology

Good on Ya, Apple, Inc.

Posted on by Benson Hendrix

Just to reinforce my love of technology, and that i’m not averse to Apple, Inc. I bumped into this story while on Twitter.  A high school kid had emailed Steve Jobs (and just how in the heck did he get THAT email address, I’ve gotta ask) and asked if he could get the college educational discount for the latest copy of Final Cut Studio.  MInd you, not a free copy, just for the $600 or so discount (still willing to pay $700 for it).

Well, this email got forwarded to Richard Townhill, the director of Pro Video Product Marketing for Apple, who emailed the kid back and asked for his address to send him a free copy of the software.  How cool is that!  Apple, Inc gave this kid an early Christmas, and created another evangelist to boot. Not too bad!

HT: aGEEKspot

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computers, iLife, iLife for PC, Sony, Sony Creative software, Technology

iLife for PC Review: Sony Imagination Studio

Posted on by Benson Hendrix

(Update: Sony announced the release of Imagination Studio Suite 2 this week.  I’ll be looking it over in the coming weeks and posting an updated review here as soon as it’s done. – Benson)

The Christmas season is quickly closing in on us.  While the current economic conditions might be forcing you to take a second look at what you might include on your present list, if you or someone who’s been nice this year are interested in creating your own podcasts or video pieces then you might want to check out something softer on the pocketbook – the Sony Imagination Studio.

A little while back I talked about Sony’s new Imagination Studio Suite, offered exclusively through Dell’s Web site.  (Now available at Sony Creative Software’s site, among other places) Dell seems to be moving to the fore on providing PC consumers with a version of Apple’s iLife. First they offered something from Adobe that could be installed on certain XPS systems.  Now they are offering Sony’s answer to Apple’s popular suite.

Since writing that post, it has become the most viewed piece on this site, once again hinting to me that there are a lot of people out there interested in finding an answer to Mac fans love of iLife. Also, a lot of people have clicked through to check out the software on Dell’s site.  I don’t know if anyone purchased it, maybe Dell would have that info (probably not).

So I decided to give this suite of programs a brief run through.

I had my first run in with the program suite at the 2008 New Media Expo, while hanging out around the Sony Creative Software booth.  Voxana and DJ Papi Love from the AcidPlanet Web site were handing out demo copies of the the Imagination Studio Suite to the attendees.

Voxana and DJ Papi Love
(Me with Voxana and DJ Papi Love from AcidPlanet at the 2008 New Media Expo)

I brought some of the CDs back to ABQ and handed them out to my co-workers and family members.  While I don’t think any of my co-workers have picked up the programs yet, I’ve been able to give them a bit of a shakedown, as part of my ongoing search for a PC equivalent to Apple’s iLife package.  Sony’s Imagination Studio Suite offers many of the same PC programs as iLife, except for iWeb – but as I’ll point out here, between free blogging sites (such as WordPress or Blogger) and Facebook/MySpace, there is no need for iWeb.

And away we goooooooo…..

Sony Vegas Movie Studio Platinum

Sony Vegas Pic

Vegas Movie Studio is the video editing software included in the Imagination Studio Suite.  The layout of the editing suite is different from Apple’s iMovie – Vegas Movie Studio has a more traditional, linear video editing layout than iMovie does.  Vegas Movie Studio has also proven to be a more powerful video editing program than the built in Windows Movie Maker.

In Vegas Movie Studio, the user has separate tracks for multiple video and audio tracks.  You can have individual tracks dedicated to dialogue, background music, special effects in addition to multiple video files.

Importing the audio and video elements to a project were easier to import into Vegas than iMovie.  With iMovie I found that if I didn’t import just the right file, in just the right way, while hopping on one foot under a waxing moon and preparing a chicken blood sacrifice, the video file wouldn’t import correctly.  While with Vegas, a simple click on Project > Import Media opens up a menu showing the importable files.  For digital video capture, a quick click on the Capture Video button calls up Vegas’ capture menu.

I found Vegas to be very easy to edit with, I used it to trim and edit video footage of both Barack Obama’s and John McCain’s visit to campus.  After editing the video, I was able to export the final video directly to either YouTube, or Sony’s own AcidPlanet.com podcast/video cast/music site.  A pop-up screen asked for all of the necessary information to log into either service and input all of the necessary information for the video submission (login and PW, name, description, tags, etc.)

One of the things I had a problem with in Sony Vegas was locating the trimmer, so I could slice video files as necessary without bringing in multiple copies of the same file when adding cuts to the project. This could be user error in part, but I notice in Premiere Pro it’s part of the lower right hand menu, which makes it very easy and quick to make the necessary slices. Update: This was user error. All you need to do to trim down your video in Sony Vegas Studio is place your marker where you want the video to be cut, and hit the “S” key. That’s it!  How freakin’ easy is that?!?

Cinescore Studio Plug-In

Vegas Movie Studio, in the Platinum Pack, Platinum Pro Pack and Imagination Studio Suite, comes loaded with the Cinescore Studio plug-in.  Cinescore is Sony Creative Software’s soundtrack creation software, and Cinescore Studio is a stripped down version of the program. It’s not an actual program in Imagination Studio, it’s a plug in with Vegas Movie Studio.  All you need to do is right click on one of the audio tracks and click “Insert Generated Music” to activate the plug in.

Cinescore Pic

From this menu you can select the type of music you wish and a number of variations of the music you want to include in your project.  In the next screen you can select the length of your music file, the composition style and more.  Cinescore Studio will then insert it into your movie project.  This is a great way to get some quick background music for a podcast or movie scene.

When you are working with the audio section of your project, you can right click on any of these tracks and the “Edit Selection in Sound Forge Studio” appears.  Clicking on this allows you to edit the dialogue in Sony’s Sound Forge Studio.

DVD Architect Studio

DVD Arch Pic

Sony’s DVD Architect Studio is the company’s DVD Menu creation software.  Since most people will be uploading videos to Web sites such as your blog, YouTube or AcidPlanet, unless you are creating DVDs for a film project, DVD present, etc. there is a minimal need to use this software.

Should you need DVDs for any reason (family gatherings, etc), DVD Architect Studio is a good choice to create your DVDs.  There are many different DVD menu themes for you to pick from, and more are available from the Sony Creative Software Web site.

Sony Sound Forge Audio Studio

Sound Forge Pic

One of the programs in iLife that I find to be very beneficial is Garageband, Apple’s audio editing, looping and podcast creation program.  Trying to put so many things together in one program can lead to a bit of clutter on the screen, and trying to edit interviews in Garageband leaves these weird bubbles of text in the file that you have to remember to pull back together for a coherent podcast or audio file.

However, Garageband does have a specific setting when you want to record a podcast, with tracks set up for voices, jingles, additional recording, and a window for you to drop and drag artwork for your podcast.  And the Garageband browsers are great when it comes to locating files not only by name, but type of file as well.  This probably comes from providing so many loops for your specific software package (such as Apple does).

Sony’s got two programs that fill this need for PC users.  The first of these programs is Sony’s Sound Forge Audio Studio.

I’ve primarily been using Sound Forge Audio Studio to edit podcasts at the university, and clean up audio in some of the video pieces I’ve been working on.  Editing files in this program are as easy as highlighting a bit of text and deleting it, or cutting and pasting the file, or adding various effects to your heart’s content.  The best way to figure out which effects you want to use with this powerful program would be to play around with a test audio file and the included effects.

As with Vegas Movie Studio, you can publish your files to the Web, using Sony’s AcidPlanet Web site.

The other half of this tandem of programs is…

Sony ACID Music Studio

ACID Pic

ACID Music Studio is the stripped down version of Sony ACID, Sony’s industry-standard music looping software.  Loops are just short music files that sound like one continuous piece of music if they are repeated.  When you start combining multiple loops, such as a drum beat, a couple of guitar loops, you can create your own music.

Some of these loops are available on CDs or download from various locations, from many musician stores to Amazon.com (where you will find some pretty good deals) to Apple (if you have Garageband) and Sony Creative Software (which, as expected, work well with ACID).  ACID Music Studio comes with a large library of loops at your fingertips after you install it. If you are interested in music loops, a Google search for “Music Loops” will give you many more answers than I can give you right now.

I haven’t spent as much time working with ACID as I have been with Vegas and Sound Forge studios.  But I like what I have tried so far with the program.  Adding loops is as simple as drag and drop and then using a “brush”-like tool to repeat the loops in each track.  I’ll add another update once I have more practice with ACID, and possibly a couple of completed songs on the site.

Photo Go

Photo Go Pic

Photo Go is a cool little program that allows you to keep track of your digital images and do some basic editing to them.

Puppy Pic

(Awwwww, I always told her she’d be in pictures)

You can color correct images, crop, rotate, remove red-eye, and correct brightness and contrast among the editing features.  You can’t sharpen your images, but this is something that can be taken care of using Windows Live Photo Gallery or Picasa 3.

One thing that would be nice would be a way to export your pictures to Flickr or Google’s Picasa.  There are simple ways to work around this.  Flickr Uploadr allows you to drag and drop pictures to upload to your Flickr account.  Or, should you prefer using Windows Live Photo Gallery, you can upload your pictures to Flickr as well.

And then there’s iWeb

I’ve checked out iWeb on the Mac.  It’s a cute program that gives you quite a few pre-built templates for various needs for beginners or those not interested in Web site creation.  Honestly, it’s easier if you go to WordPress.com (where this blog is hosted) or Blogger.com and create a blog for your basic web needs.  You can use your blog as your web page, kind of a “Grand Central You” for your content creation and social media needs.

From your blog page you can link to your Flickr account, YouTube account, upload your podcasts, etc.  This serves as a better replacement for your probable web content needs than iWeb.  And should you need a Web page presence, you can always check out the templates at Open Source Web Design.

What about help?

One of the things I like about Sony’s content creation software is that at startup you can allow the “Show Me How” menu of tutorials to pop up, in case you have any questions or want to learn more about what you can do with the software.

Show Me How

These tutorials will take you step-by-step through how to do each of the tasks, with a window going from one part of the screen to the next, highlighting each task and showing you exactly where to click and what to do next.  The lessons are quick to follow, not taking more than a few minutes each.  I’ve found them invaluable when working with the software.

All in All?

For the price, anywhere from $150-$200 depending on the current discount available at Dell.com, the Imagination Studio Suite fares very favorably when compared to Apple’s iLife suite.  Having used both (I have a Mac laptop at work) I find that I actually prefer using Sony’s software.  That might be because I’m more used to a Windows set up.  This suite of programs give you all but one of the options of iLife, and as I’ve pointed out here, you don’t really need iWeb.

For years PC users have heard Mac users talk about iLife and how there’s nothing on the PC side that can compare with it and how beautifully integrated the programs are, and how iLife is one major reason for people to switch to Mac from PC.  There’s a little bit of arrogance behind those statements, but for a while it was hard to locate a simple suite of programs that worked together in an integrated fashion for the PC side.  These programs were available separately from Sony Creative Software, but individually they would have cost more than the suite.

If you’re a fledgling podcaster, or YouTuber, or movie maker – or even not so fledgling – you’ll find these programs useful to your endeavors, for the price.  It’s the first step before you move on to either the Adobe Production Premium Creative Suite (another set of programs I really recommend when you want to take the next step to more professional tools) or Sony’s professional level tools – Vegas, Sound Forge and ACID Pro (which I haven’t tried).

Rating: 5 rugby balls out of 5.

17
Technology

You think you've got me figured out?

Posted on by Benson Hendrix

Well, now it’s time for something completely different.

The active and play-ful type. They are especially attuned to people and things around them and often full of energy, talking, joking and engaging in physical out-door activities.

The Doers are happiest with action-filled work which craves their full attention and focus. They might be very impulsive and more keen on starting something new than following it through. They might have a problem with sitting still or remaining inactive for any period of time.

Feh.  Take that Slayn. 😉

HT: Andrew Sullivan

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iLife, iLife for PC, Sony, Technology

iLife for PC – If You Build it, They Will Come

Posted on by Benson Hendrix

(UPDATE: I have a review of the Sony Imagination Studio Suite HERE)

About a year ago, I wrote a post about the iLife suite for Mac (which to be honest, isn’t all it’s cracked up to be – I tried to use it at work and Garageband is the best, and only decent, program in the suite) and that some companies should try to come up with a PC version of the iLife suite, if Steve-O Jobs didn’t want to release his beloved suite.  I even put together some bundles of PC software from Sony, Adobe and Open Source/Windows built in software to show how these could work together.

It turns out, Sony was listening. Not only that, but they also appeared to take quite a bit of my advice. 😉

Now I don’t know if they were reading this blog per se, but since I had been writing about it, and the biggest hits on here by far are my iLife for PC posts, and that I’ve got just enough of an ego to think I had an impact, 😉 I’m gonna say the crew at Sony Creative Software (great people by the way, I met them at the New Media Expo – more on that later) and Sony picked up on the need for a content creataion studio for PC vibe and created a new suite that includes the software I mentioned before (Vegas Studio, ACID Studio, Photo Go, and Sound Forge) with an addition I hadn’t thought of – Cinescore Studio, so soundtrack music is quickly available for any length of video you wish to create.

This new suite of software is only available from Dell, another interesting move since Dell was also offering a small studio from Adobe that was Dell only.  A big move for Dell, getting a nice suite of software to compete with iLife that you (might be able to) get on preloaded on a Dell.

So ladies and gentlemen, let me present you with Sony’s new content creation studio – the Sony Imagination Studio Suite.

Studio

Sony’s Imagination Studio includes all of the tools you need, sans iWeb, to create content and get it up on YouTube or Sony’s own AcidPlanet (what?  you expected them to export to the nightmare that is Mobile Me?).

So what is in this new iLife for PC possibility?  Let’s take a look at the tools!

Continue reading →

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Uncategorized

Damn, Today was a Good Day

Posted on by Benson Hendrix

I’m wrapping up the evening’s festivities and getting ready for a quick nap before heading to work tomorrow morning and I realized that it was a pretty good day.  I’m on a compressed work week at the university, working four 10 hour days instead of five 8’s, so I had the day off, which works great for me because my fiancee also has Monday’s off.  (There’s been a little bit of consternation in the media about the compressed work week – how dare those ungrateful people working for the university work only four days instead of the five we have to work.  Of course, the media want us to work five 10 hour days and only get paid for 40 hours, like they do, but that’s a story for another time).

Most of today was spent working around the house, playing on the XBox 360 (Call of Duty 4 and Half Life 2, Ep 2) and planning out the rest of my work week.  This month’s UNM Today stories are due on Aug. 11 and I’ve got a light writing load this month.  Although our office is also working on an experts list for the upcoming election.  Keep your eyes on this space to find out more soon!  I’m only working a couple of days this week, my birthday’s on Friday (big 35, now I’m looking at the downside of my angry 30’s) and I’m heading to Vegas next week for the New Media Expo and Podcasty Goodness Convention.  I’m really looking forward to that.

But the big news for today comes from the future Mrs. Net News 54.  She went to meet with her heart doc today and came away with pretty much a clean bill of health!  As some of y’all know, earlier this year, she was rushed into the hospital with a weak heart – her blood ejection fraction was around 20%, which was perilously close to “Danger Danger Will Robinson!” status.  Today her ejection fraction was back up to 55%, which is normal, and the doctor’s weaning her off of some of her meds now that her heart is stronger.  So my birthday present came early this year, and it’s all I really wanted anyway – my fiancee to be OK again. 🙂

Well, it’s time to crash and get ready for another exciting day of PR goodness!  Watch this space soon for my thoughts on “educational consumers,” or as I like to call it, WTF?

Peace out, Space Cowboy.

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