Videos On Demand...

What can we get done? What will we get done?

College Power Hour, Black Out Juice Documentary, TV Power Hour, Jack Bauer Power Hour, Best of Movie Power Hour...

We gotta prioritize. It sounds like a lot, and with only 5 more weeks of school it might seem like even more than we can handle. Before Tony has a heart attack (because he's already explained his position to me a number of times), I would like to state that I agree that College Power Hour is the most important of all of our video endeavors. I see it, as I'm sure many of you do, as a college scrapbook that we can drink to; sort of like our own yearbook. Next, I think Black Out Juice should be completed. Sam and Tony have both volunteered to spend their time working on this, and it'll be pretty straight-forward editing once we sync-up the audio with the video. TV Power Hour, Jack Bauer Power Hour, and Best of Movie Power Hour are the projects that we really need to kick around, discuss the possibilities, and decide whether or not they will come to fruition by the end of the semester.

There are lots of factors to consider with each video, too many for any one man to worry about. And so, at the risk of sounding formal (or even remotely similar to a character on "The Apprentice"), I think we should set up project managers for each video. Everyone will probably be asked to help out in some way on each of the videos, but it would be the project manager's responsibility to organize, keep on schedule, delegate, and oversee all aspects of the video's completion.

Since Tony and Sam have volunteered to handle Black Out Juice, I guess one of them will be in charge of piecing it together and securing the necessary materials. Limmer has offered up his hard-drive as the storage unit for the project. A digital camera is still needed to capture and import the footage.

Earlier in the semester, I sort of thrust College Power Hour upon Chris. I hope that wasn't too presumptious of me. If Chris is still interested in heading it up, that'd be great... if not, we'll figure something out. Tony has set up the g-mail account for all of us to send our pictures to. We should probably all do that within the next week. The more pictures we get, the more options we will have. I'm estimating that we'll need at least 1200 photos (20 photos for each minute). We'll have to come up with 60 categories, as well as 60 different songs. We certainly don't need to use Final Cut to put this video together, we could probably just use one of the photo programs that Apple offers. I believe Sam spoke about one that he has on his computer.

Okay... so now we get down to the not-so-necessary, but incredibly enticing opportunity of creating more Power Hours... People love the Movie Power Hour series. The DVDs are gaining a following throughout the Northeast, Georgia, parts of California, and will soon be hitting the Midwest (once we send out copies to random students at big, state universities). People are sharing them with their friends, they're talking about them with their parents (maybe that's just me and my sister). And let me point out that it's not very often that you have access to such a wide variety of tv shows, movies, digital video cameras, and editing equipment. TV/Movie Power Hours can also be extremely draining, and so it's great that we have so many people to help out with the planning, selection, execution, and post production aspects of each video. We have everything at our fingertips. I really want to take advantage of our resources and complete at least one, if not two more power hours that people will be talking about and enjoying for years to come.

TV Power Hour
An Update - We currently have a list of about 40 shows that we have copies of either on DVD or on VHS. Yesterday, Bry, Lim, and I compiled a wish list of over 20 shows that we could record off of the television and onto a blank VHS tape. We should still keep brainstorming and tossing out shows that we think might work well.

Questions and Issues - How we do find the best minute from each Series? The answer is, we probably won't. Most of the shows that we're using have shot almost 100 episodes, or more. We'd simply have to pick a good minute from one episode and test whether or not it holds up. Would we want to add different genres (aside from drama and comedy)? Should we include a minute from the Weather Channel, a minute from Rachel Ray, a minute from ESPN, a minute from QVC, a minute from Nickelodeon Games and Sports, etc...?

Gameplan - Selecting the right minute is what normally takes the longest time while constructing an MPH. So I think it would save a lot of time if we assigned 6 or 7 shows to each person (shows that that person really enjoys and has seen a number of times), and then have that person watch the shows in their free time; scanning through to find a minute that would work. For example, we would have Mark try to find minutes in "The Shield" and "The 4400," and Limmer can skim through "90210" or "Martin."

Outlook - I was real excited about taking this project on, but then I started wondering how it would turn out, and if people would be psyched for just about every minute, like with MPH. Sam pointed out that TV Power would have a wide appeal (with shows ranging from "X-Files" to "Boy Meets World" to "Spider-Man" to "Grey's Anatomy.") I agree, and that's why I think this project would be worthwile. Nonetheless, I'm not sure if each minute will be the highest quality (since we'd be settling for a good minute, and not seeking out the best minute). Still, I definitely want to do this and I think it would turn out nicely.

Jack Bauer Power Hour
An Update - The possibility of a JBPH has been discussed in many social circles. Hoefl proposed the title a few months ago, and the Circle 14 guys have also kicked around the idea. To the best of my knowledge (and according to the Google Search I did), no one has ever actually made a Jack Bauer Power Hour.

Questions and Issues - Would there be spoilers? Most likely, yes. Sam brought up this issue and also pointed out that we would targeting a much smaller group of people. Certainly, we would be aiming to appeal to only a niche group (24 fans who love Jack Bauer and have followed all the seasons) but I (personally) know tons of people that belong to that group, and I know that they would, without a doubt, love to drink to a JBPH. How would we distinguish between clips? We've talked about using the clock. Would we make each clip 57 seconds and then cut to the clock as it ticks from :58 to :59 to 1:00? This raises the issue of allowing people to know just how far into the power hour they are? Is this 1) good thing 2) bad thing, 3) doesn't matter? People can already just look at the DVD player and find out how far they are? But this would be flashing it right in front of their face... We would probably also fade in the season and hour for each clip.

Gameplan - Bry has seasons 1-3 (I believe), and I'm sure we could get a hold of season 4. We would need to talk about (preferably over an order of wings) our favorite moments from the series. A few spring to my mind almost immeadiately: season 1 - jack in the limo with the rag. season 2 - interrogating Nina. season 2 - jack springing back to life. season 4 - jack wandering off into the sunset. season 1 - staircase scene. season 3 - the mexican brothers want jack to shoot Chase.

Outlook - I was taking a shower yesterday afternoon, thinking about TV Power Hour, and then I started to imagine the possibilities of a 24 power hour. I couldn't stop thinking about how sweet it would be. 24 resembles a movie, and minutes wouldn't be too difficult to find. We would be so invested into each clip, and we could orchestrate the entire power to follow a story arc that we designed. We could have 5 straight clips of Jack Bauer interrogating suspects!!! I'd like to get some feedback on this one. If the DVD comes out nicely, Tina has suggested that I market it to Fox.

Best of Power Hour
An Update - Tony is big on this one. It wouldn't take long. We would just need to decide which 60 clips would make it.

Questions and Issues - Would this take anything away from MPH or MPH2?

Gameplan - It's up to Tony.

Outlook - It's up to Tony.


Keeping all these points in mind, we must also recognize that time is not exactly on our side. It has been proposed that we might work on these projects during Senior Week, but I'm planning on remaining in a drunken state of elation throughout the entire week, paying little attention to any deadlines, dates, or projects. During finals week however, I would be able to devote a solid two-three days of work. I probably have 4 or 5 full, weekend days available during the weeks leading up to finals week. Tony, Limmer, and Jared are also Final Cut savy and could lead an editing session if and when they are available. Like I mentioned before, it's finding the right minute which usually takes the most time, and we can all search for minutes in our spare time at home. Another big issue is finding a digital camera that we can use to capture footage with. Ben Don would probably let us use his for a couple of weekends, but we couldn't use his to capture the Black Out footage (his camera does not take DV tapes).

So what do you guys think? Let's talk about it at Wing Night.

Long Live Power Hours