Life of Elling

Moving the blog

2009-12-06T13:21:00.001+01:00

My blog has found a new home at elling.montages.no. Feel free to stop by! I will still keep this site up, as an archive of my old postings.

Oppavsofaen.no Going Live

2009-08-03T21:16:00.000+02:00

I shot some sequences for the Norwegian Socialist Left Party in spring, which are now live at oppavsofaen.no. You can choose from a list of names, relations and subjects to tailor your very own personalised speech with party leader Kristin Halvorsen and send to a friend via e-mail. The speech is automatically generated from a (wide!) range of names and sentences/speeches that Kristin performs on camera. The concept might not be revolutionary, but as a photographer it was an interesting project to take part in.

Web video compression and color grading is quite a pain in the a**, and maybe one of the biggest challenges for the web as a serious challenger to traditional TV (and even, some day, the cinema). I had a few sessions with the bureau about the final image and how they should compress it, and soon realized how much they have to compromise to reach the largest possible number of viewers. Broadcast television on the other hand is a more or less defined environment, where a minimum of quality is ensured between all the different TV units out there, and you have a reference for where you should put your colors and contrast.

With the latest version(s) of Flash and the introduction of H.264 compression, you can make some really good quality video with relatively modest bandwidth consumption. But not everyone has the newest version of Flash. And some people still use a dialup modem. And even if you pass those requirements, you still need a powerful computer to play back high quality video without glitches. For some applications you can go for the best possible setting and just rule out some of your audience, but for a political party (and I guess most other commercial uses), that's not even a remote option.

And the photographers cry at night.

But there is light at the end of the tunnel. With the introduction of Mac OS X Snow Leopard, PC and Mac will finally have the same standard gamma setting. And maybe in some future development of Flash video, the client or server will be able to quickly scale down video to match the wide range of system configurations out there. Also considering the constant advancements in video compression, it gets more and more viable to make high quality, consistent, visual experiences available to the masses in the not to distand future. In the meantime, we're still allowed to dream of better days.

For this project we ended up using a quite new version of Flash, because H.264 is just that much better than it's predecessors. The clips are downrezzed to from 4k to 2k for editing, and finally 720p for publishing. A bit of compromise on both ends, and the result is quite acceptable in my opinion.

The sequences were shot on RED with Cooke S4 primes at Zone 5 Studios in Oslo.

Screengrab from Gitarfyren

2009-07-20T00:30:00.001+02:00

As promised, a screengrab from the short film Gitarfyren (Guitar Fellow), directed by Viktor Enoksen and shot under the midnight sun in Tromsø this past week. (Colors manipulated in a hurry in Photoshop (gamma 1.8), alas, it might look too dark in Windows.)

The film was shot on a Panasonic AJ-HDX900 with a set of Zeiss DigiPrimes on DVCProHD-tapes. It was a really fun week, collaborating again with some of my oldest friends. Looking forward to see some edited material in the fall.

Moving Into Production On Gitarfyren

2009-07-12T13:20:00.000+02:00

Spending a week in Tromsø to do final prep, and shoot another short film for young director Viktor Enoksen, called Gitarfyren (Guitarfellow, I guess, in English.) It's a quite fun project about those annoying people who crash parties with their guitars, puppy eyes and annoying singalong pop songs — and will become a sort of crossover between a zombie movie and a musical, with some exciting combat choreography by the eminent Kristoffer Jørgensen (who is now working with the upcoming Norwegian ninja movie Norwegian Ninja — check them out on Wreck A Movie.)

Needless to say, it will be a fun week before I head back to Oslo and start moving my stuff to Lillehammer, where I will spend my next three years studying the art of cinematography at the Norwegian Film School. Will try to post some fun screengrabs at the end of the week.

Zippo finally completed

2009-06-15T16:03:00.002+02:00

Zippo, a short film I shot more than a year ago for my friend and director Faisal Osman has finally been finished and screened at Nordic Youth Film Festival in Tromsø. The film is available to watch online at nordlys.no (crappy resolution, though).

Vote for Besøk on NRK

2009-05-15T18:14:00.002+02:00

Besøk was nominated for NRK Filmpolitiets Short Film Award 2009 today. Go to http://www.nrk.no/p3tv/besok-kortfilm-09/ to watch the film (in crappy resolution) and vote. The film was unfortunately rejected from the Norwegian Short Film Festival this year, but might still make it if we get enough votes from the public.

Ulstein Campaign 2008

2009-04-18T22:15:00.001+02:00

The greenscreen industrial project I shot with Norwegian athlete Kristine Eikrim Engeset last year is now online over at Frost Media (Look for "Ulstein Campaign 2008", click on "Video" in the lower right corner). My footage is a part of the opening sequence where the athlete is getting ready to start, symbolising the mentality of the customer who design and build large sea vessels.

First Edit of New Showreel

2009-03-22T22:20:00.000+01:00

Put up a first edit of my new showreel on the website. Feel free to have a look and give me some feedback. It would be very much appreciated.

http://www.runaroundfilm.no/jehf/showreel.htm

Another One Goes Online

2009-02-12T15:55:00.021+01:00

Short film Under the Surface now also has a blog of it's own. Director Viktor Enoksen and I will keep it up to date with news about the film and it's journey throughout the world. First stop, a screening at the Sami Film Festival in Kautokeino, and a closed screening in Oslo, Norway.

Behind the Scenes: "Eksperimentet" by Robin Jensen

2009-02-11T16:05:00.001+01:00

Just a couple of behind the scenes-shots from a short film I gaffed in the fall. The title is Eksperimentet (The Experiment), it is directed by Robin Jensen, and shot by DoP Patrik Säfström. Go see the Norwegian documentary Jakten på Hukommelsen, which was also shot by Patrik, and being screened in Norwegian cinemas shortly.

2009 Thus Far

2009-02-09T11:22:00.001+01:00

Quiet days around here now that my laptop is being repaired, but that just means I've had more time to read books and make photographs. Maybe I should get rid of the laptop all together.

Starting preparations for two new short film projects with directors Viktor Enoksen and Christian Loennechen whom I collaborated on respectively Under the Surface (premiered at TIFF 09) and Gullfeber (still in editing) last year. Both new projects look really exciting, and will be shot sometimes this spring with funding already in place. I've also been gaffing on a feature production at Exposed Film Production, a film by Severin Eskeland called Snarveien (Shortcut), as well as lighting some commercials the past few weeks.

Next week will see the official (but unfortunately closed) Oslo premiere of both Under the Surface and Besøk, in addition to a few other short films I've been lighting on at Frogner Kino. If you're interested in getting in, contact me and I'll see if there might be an available ticket.

Exciting times.

Besøk picked up by the Norwegian Film Institute

2009-01-22T12:53:00.002+01:00

Short film Besøk has been included in the Norwegian Film Institute's lineup of Norwegian short films. Have a look. For more news and information about the film, head over to the official website.

Going To Tromsø International Film Festival

2009-01-12T12:00:00.004+01:00

Heading into a really exciting week with two shorts I photographed being screened at Tromsø International Film Festival. As usual, I'm taking the week off to go up there and watch films. Besøk (The Visit) and Under the Surface are screened in the Films From the North program, if you're in the neighbourhood...

Besøk has a small blog up on http://shortfilmthevisit.blogspot.com/, take a look. Also, check out the Facebook fansites: Besøk, Under the Surface.

Backbeat People Music Video

2008-12-23T13:50:00.002+01:00

Throwing out a little Christmas greetings, and another music video I worked lights on that recently popped up on YouTube (see some behind the scenes photos here). The video was shot on Ulvøya in Oslo this summer. Since most of the video was shot in highspeed, I still can't get used to the slow tempo the song has in real life. What we heard on set was more of a smurf hits version.

Anyway, Happy Holidays!

Pimp Our Commercial

2008-12-05T23:34:00.003+01:00

Shot a short commercial for Oslo municipality this week, for a campaign called "Pimp Our City". The commercial is basically a rap video, and was directed by my new and talented friend Joakim Molteberg. Also had the pleasure of working with art director/production manager Raymond Johansen on this one. Including a couple of quick grabs below.

Karpe Diem - Vestkantsvartinga

2008-12-01T15:40:00.002+01:00

Did a bit of lighting on parts of the new Karpe Diem-video called Vestkantsvartinga. I thought the concept was quite cool, aiming to remake the Fresh Prince in Bel Air opening sequence, as well as NWA's Straight Outta Compton in between all the rapping and whatnot. Turned out quite allright. The video was photographed by Øystein Mamen and directed by Andreas Hjertø. Have a look.

Besøk selected for TIFF 2009

2008-11-27T13:30:00.004+01:00

Short film Besøk has been selected for the competition program Films From the North at Tromsø International Film Festival. The film was shot last summer in a studio in Tromsø, and has been in editing and post production for more than a year now. Marte Magnusdotter Solem is directing and playing the main role of the woman who lives in a wooden box in the forest. I did the cinematography, and have been assisting Marte in the post production process.

Screengrab featuring the two main characters

Among other great contributors are Martin Loïc Lotherington as the visiting man, Gjermund Andresen with some amazing art direction, Hanne Hukkelberg who layed down a great score and her brother Thomas Hukkelberg who did the rest of the sound effects and mixing, Jo Eldøen and Karl Bryhn who have worked with compositing and background plates, and the rest of the amazing crew of filmworkers and carpenters pictured below, who contributed two weeks of their summer holidays to make the film happen. Not to mention Joachim Lyng who helped with funding, and getting the project off the ground. (And the list goes on, but I'll get back to that later).

Our amazing crew, gathered on the set

We're all looking forward to a great week in January in the Paris of the North.

And Another One

2008-11-18T09:50:00.001+01:00

Another teaser for Reinert's horrorfilm-project online. As usual, explicit imagery.

First Teaser For Hora Online

2008-11-17T14:35:00.001+01:00

As promised, a few teasers are starting to appear for the Norwegian independent horror flick "Hora" made by my friend and director Reinert Kiil. Have a look!
Warning: The clip contains some violent and sexually explicit imagery.

Anyway, good luck to Reinert.

Attention Abroad For "Hora"

2008-10-16T07:30:00.002+02:00

The horror film "Hora" that I did lights and a bit of photography on this summer is starting to build some reputation abroad. BD Horror News have written a story about the production, calling it "Indie Film to Watch" and "damn promising". The film is still in editing with director Reinert Kiil and won't be out until sometime next year, but I know a few teasers are just around the corner.

(Warning: This is a film for specially interested adult individuals. Contains some seriously disturbing imagery.)

"Gullfeber" Is A Wrap

2008-10-07T18:45:00.003+02:00

Short film "Gullfeber" is officially "in the can" (well, harddrive would be more appropriate). Here are a few grabs straight outta REDAlert (some contrast-adjustment applied):

Wrap Day Two

2008-10-04T06:07:00.004+02:00

We've moved indoors for the three final days of shooting. Working in a barn is much more comfortable when it's pouring down outside, which of course makes the crew happier. Included yet another screengrab.

Wrap Day One

2008-10-02T21:54:00.001+02:00

Completed first day of shooting on the short film "Gullfeber". Weather was terrible, but we managed to fight our way through all the shots we needed to do. Included a small screengrab.

Final Week of Pre-Production

2008-09-25T11:30:00.001+02:00

Images from location scout

These are busy days, as we're entering the final week of preparations for the short film "Gullfeber" (translates to "Gold Fever"). The film is directed by Christian Loennechen and produced by Future Film and Ravn Wikhaug.

This will be my first opportunity to use the RED ONE on an actual production, and I'm looking forward to see how it performs in the wild. We'll be shooting one day of exteriors in and around a car on a deserted stretch of road, and three days in an abandoned barn where the main action takes place.

Images from location scout

The director wants to do a quite stylized look, and the challenge so far is solving it with limited light resources in a large location that requires careful power distribution. But we've still got time, and I'm confident we will be able to find good solutions.

First day of shooting is next Thursday, and wrap-time on Sunday.

Behind the Scenes: Unknown

2008-09-13T17:30:00.000+02:00

Assisted gaffer (though mainly DoP) Martin Edelsteen on a music video this spring. Just got a few behind the scenes shots back from the lab. The music video was directed by Kristoffer Metcalfe as one of his final projects at the Norwegian film school, and was shot by fellow student and DoP Magnus Flåto. The band actually did not have a name at the time of shooting, and I still don't know if they do.

The video was set in a large house in Oslo where the band actually lived for a while, and featured a dead vocalist, a party with the band and a lot of dancing girls, large amounts of smoke, and a fake sun that was dollied in and out of takes. Fun. The entire thing was shot on the Silicon Imaging SI-2K.

All pictures taken during my "cross processing-phase":

Gaffer, choreographer and director reviewing a take

The band and the fake sun

Again, bandmember standing by the piano

Gaffer and camera assistant

Self-descriptive

The director relaxing between takes

Stella Mwangi - The Dreamer

2008-09-08T11:27:00.001+02:00

Did some gaffing for DoP Eirik Tyrihjel on the music video for "The Dreamer" by Stella Mwangi. Shot on RED in Nydalen Studios, Oslo, a few weeks back. Take a look:

The video is directed by Andreas Hjertø, and produced by MTG Music.

Showreel 2008, 1st edition

2008-09-04T10:40:00.002+02:00

Finally got around to putting together my 2008 showreel. It is a bit fragmented because a lot of the material is still in editing, so I aim to make a second edition a bit later with whole sequences. It's all on my website. Big thank you to Daniel Hansen who let me borrow his music.

Behind the Scenes: "Siste stopp" by Eilif Bremer Landsend

2008-08-27T13:00:00.002+02:00

Had some time to snap pictures while gaffing on the short film "Siste stopp" by Eilif Bremer Landsend this summer. The film is written and directed by Eilif, with Torkel Riise Svenson doing the cinematography.

We had four days of production in Tromsø in July, shooting in a hospital, on a bus and on top of a mountain. The film is about the journey of a sick old lady, towards her final destination (English for "Siste stopp"), with distinguished actor Henny Moan playing the main character. Watch out for this one at Norwegian festivals next year.

Director and cinematographer discussing the shot

Director Eilif Bremer Landsend

Cinematographer Torkel Riise Svenson

Shooting on the bus

1st assistant camera Viktor Enoksen

Main actor Henny Moan, watching the take

Sound recordist Christian Caspersen

Checking the gate

Happy director

Fresh Out Of The Can

2008-08-12T15:05:00.001+02:00

Had a busy summer gaffing shorts (3 in total), but also had time to squeeze in some cinematography for director Viktor Enoksen on his short film "Under the Surface".

The film is about all the stuff that passes through our head, even when we're awake. We follow into the mind of our main character, and get an impression about his life, as he's making breakfast for his kids in the morning.

Putting up a few stills from the onelight-scan of the S16mm material (all, of course, uncorrected):

The Enemy Is Among Us

2008-04-13T12:01:00.001+02:00

Photo © John-Erling Holmenes Fredriksen

I'm sitting on the roof of my house
With a shotgun and a six pack of beer
The newscaster says "the enemy is among us!"
As bombs explode on the 30 bus
Kill that middle class indecision
Now is not the time for liberal thought

So I go hunting for witches
Heads are going to roll
So I go hunting

(Bloc Party - Hunting For Witches, Lyrics: Kele Okereke)

Looking For Graphic Artist

2008-03-14T13:55:00.004+01:00

We're in the final stages of a short film production, and looking for a graphic artist to join the project.

The film was shot last summer, all studio, partially green screen. We need to get in touch with a graphic artist who would like to work with the backdrops for the green screen part. We've got some ideas of what we want, but we're also open for ideas and suggestions. Bottom line is we're in a fictional world where anything is possible, so it's not quite realism we're looking for. Michel Gondry has been sort of a visual reference during pre-production.

There is unfortunately no money in the project, so anyone interested would have to do it because they like the project, and could use the final product for their showreel.

Here are some uncorrected grabs from the final edit of the film:

The film is directed by Marte Magnusdotter Solem, while I am cinematographer, and assisting Marte with the visual part of post production.

If this sounds like your kind of project, contact me, and I'll give you more information about the film and the production.

Short Film Bonanza

2008-01-30T14:14:00.000+01:00

Wrapped a new short film production this weekend with upcoming director Faisal M. Osman. The film was shot on location in a nightclub on Oslo's westside, as well as exterior locations on Grünerløkka. Named "Zippo", the film will be edited in the coming weeks, and hopefully premiered in March.

With no time to rest, I'm jumping straight into a new project with director Reinert Kiil, shooting interior scenes Sunday, and exterior scenes in two weeks for his new short "Den utvalgte" (working title).

Both films will be aiming for festivals this summer, so keep your fingers crossed.

"Nina" at TIFF

2008-01-10T15:33:00.000+01:00

If you want to catch short film "Nina" at this years festival in Tromsø, here's the rundown on when and where:

Fokus sal 4
17. Jan @ 15:30
19. Jan @ 13:30
20. Jan @ 15:30
Åsgård
18. Jan @ 20:00

For more information, head on over to http://www.tiff.no/.

(Poster photo & design: Kristian O. Gundersen)

"Nina" In Competition

2007-12-07T22:06:00.000+01:00

"Nina" will be competing in the Films From The North program at TIFF 2008. The film is currently in the final stages of editing, and should be done in time for Christmas.

First Edit of "Nina" For TIFF

2007-10-17T16:49:00.000+02:00

Just finished the first edit of short film "Nina" with director Maria Bock. Below are some screenshots from the film. (PS: All the images are unaltered shots straight off the timeline, the film will obviously be color graded at a later point.)

Our Camera Obscura

2007-09-13T19:38:00.000+02:00

So we built a Camera Obscura today. In a burst of creativity (or boredom perhaps), co-worker Eivind and I decided to turn our office into a basic camera house. We covered all windows with black cloth, and made a small hole, AKA our iris. As we taped shut all remaining glitches in the "lens", the world outside started appearing on our floor, walls and roof. Wow.

Me holding a piece of diffusion filter in front of our "iris" to expose the outside world. (Photo ©: Eivind Vaa)

Left: Relaxing between exposures, "iris" is the bright hole in top right corner. Right: The Camera Obscura in action. (Photo ©: Eivind Vaa)

The excitement of actually making a camera and capture (well, not permanently of course) an image of our surroundings, temporarily made us forget that the invention is roughly a thousand years old. Bummer.

Inspired by the worlds largest image recently captured in California, we managed to put the image up on a quite large piece of Lee 216 White Diffusion. Next step, capturing the image. Just need to research how. I wonder why we don't do this more often.

The outside of our camera, it's definately not a compact one... (Photo ©: Eivind Vaa)

Tommy Going Abroad

2007-07-04T13:23:00.000+02:00

Short film "Tommy" went ahead and won the Prix UIP Grimstad at the Norwegian Short Film Festival this month. To top it off, director Ole Giæver won the Talent Award at the same festival. This means the film will travel abroad to compete in the European Film Awards. Who would have known.

It's a Wrap!

2007-07-04T12:49:00.000+02:00

This summer is going to be a busy one. I'm back in Tromsø to make two shorts and some commercial stuff to fill the gaps, before returning to Oslo in August. Just finished shooting the first short, working title "Nina", with Maria Bock (formerly Hålogaland teater) directing.

The main character "Nina" discovers her mother is cheating with the neighbour

We've been testing the Panasonic HVX200 with the Redrock Micro and a set of Nikon Primes, and though it's certainly a cheap way of shooting HD with filmlike depth-of-field, it gives allright value for your money. The main issues are edge sharpness and overall softness of the image. You also have to make sure you zoom enough into the projected image with your camcorder to avoid some quite disturbing vignetting. Handheld is a bit tricky unless you get a shoulder-mount and a good external monitor to mount upside down (the adapter flips the image). As usual, you get what you pay for. The system is worth trying out, and should have a good marked just below the more expensive solutions out there.

Tommy On The Silver Screen

2007-06-13T23:20:00.000+02:00

Tommy is competing in the Norwegian Short Film Festival this week, so if you happen to be in Grimstad, make sure you don't miss it. The film has been color graded from scratch and printed to 35mm film at Nordic Film Post Production, and this will be the first official screening of the final product.

Another Award

2007-05-01T16:17:00.001+02:00

Tommy grabbed another award last week for "best fiction" at Minimalen Short Film Festival in Trondheim. We are currently working on a transfer to 35mm for screening at The Norwegian Short Film Festival later this year.

Looking For New Screenplays

2007-04-16T23:55:00.000+02:00

A good friend of mine, and cooperator on many projects, is searching for new screenplays. His aim is to find a good story that he can develop in cooperation with the writer, hopefully to become good enough to be realized by a Norwegian production company as a feature film.

If you're working on a script, and would like to try a project like this, please contact me and I'll redirect you. He is looking for anything, doesn't have to be a finished script. If you have a treatment or a pitch or maybe just an idea, he'll want to hear about it.

He has previously developed two screenplays that are currently in the process of getting funding. Contact me for more information.

Anamorphic, how hard can it be?

2007-03-24T23:22:00.000+01:00

Obviously wrong aspect

Personal blog graphpaper.com discusses why people keep stretching 4:3 images on widescreen TV's, when it obviously looks wrong. And rightfully so. How can people not notice the obvious, that people grow fat and images look plain ugly? My eyes really hurt whenever I see this, I'll either have to look away, or try to switch it over somehow.

Christopher Fahey suggests that there is something wrong with the eyes and brains of these people. He might be right, but you'll also have to add the fact that a lot of people probably don't even know that they can switch. And if they at all notice that something is wrong, they probably think it's an error made by the broadcaster or the manufacturer. I've also heard people argue that the image gets too small if they view it "correctly". I guess they want to squeeze as much size out of their TV as they can get. Bigger is better, right?

But the biggest issue to me isn't what people do to screw up their own viewing experience. What really ticks me off is the fact that major broadcasters don't seem to be able to tell the difference. We're talking professional producers of television here. Being a photographer, I often deliver images for broadcasting, and have been frustrated to see my images turn out totally f-ed. Both anamorphic (16:9) images stretched to fill a 4:3 broadcast, and 4:3 images stretched to fill an anamorphic broadcast.

So, my 5 cents. People may commit all kinds of perversities in the comfort of their own homes, I don't really care, just pity them. But for the love of whoever is up there, please put some competent people in charge of producing television. If you can't tell the difference between 4:3 and 16:9, you really should consider doing something else with your life.

Easter production

2007-03-19T22:50:00.000+01:00

New project coming up this Easter, going to Tromsø to start shooting a music video for up-and-coming local outfit The Fernets. This first shoot is a performance-part with the band, while the main storyline is still in planning.

Room With a View

2007-02-08T17:41:00.001+01:00

Finally settled into my new apartment in Oslo after having intended to move for half a year or so. Anyway, I can now be visited in Louises gate 15b, just call me.

And The Winner Is...

2007-01-21T13:45:00.000+01:00

After receiving lots of positive feedback throughout the festival, "Tommy" went ahead and won the Tromsø Palm last night, a shared victory with short documentary "Prirechnyy". Needless to say, we are absolutely thrilled about all the positive attention.

Read more:

"Tommy" premiered at TIFF

2007-01-19T02:15:00.000+01:00

Short film "Tommy" premiered at Tromsø International Film Festival this week, receiving great audience response, a 5 out of 6 score in Bladet Tromsø, and a 6 out of 6 score in Nordlys. If you haven't seen it yet, there are still two more screenings, Friday and Saturday.

TIFF '07

2007-01-15T23:31:00.001+01:00

If you are attending Tromsø International Film Festival this week, remember to check out short film "Tommy". It is screened in competition program 1 of Films from the North.

Delayed christmas gift

2007-01-06T03:21:00.001+01:00

My new laptop arrived this week, a delayed christmas present for myself. After a year of getting picked on by my Macintosh-fanatic friends, I am going to spend the next year getting picked on by my Windows-fanatic friends. That's right, I switched to a Mac.

Now I just have to figure out what to do with my Ferrari laptop. It still packs quite a punch compared to the latest and greatest, and I'm hoping to find a safe new home for it.

(PS: Notice the timestamp on this post, my sleeping habits are totally f-ed up)

New Videos Online

2006-12-23T01:15:00.002+01:00

New videos have been put online on the Runaround Film website, and more will be rolling out in the next few days. One of them is the brand new trailer for Hålogaland Theatre's "Cabaret". Take a look.

Tommy at TIFF

2006-12-04T18:29:00.000+01:00

Short film "Tommy" (working title "Vidda") has been accepted into the "Films From the North" program at Tromsø International Film Festival 2007.

We're currently in post production on the images, while the sound is being mixed by Andreas Revheim.

Pictures From Amsterdam

2006-11-03T20:01:00.001+01:00

I took my girlfriend to the capital of the Netherlands last month to celebrate her birthday (she doesn't want me saying how old she got though), and of course, to relax for a few days. A little delayed, but here is a short picture report.

Me and my girlfriend in the park

We spent the daytime in cafés and museums, and then spent the evenings enjoying what the city had to offer in terms of food and culture. There are great exhibitions of Rembrandt and Van Gogh, as well as some interesting bits on the impressive history of the Dutch people. I guess I'll have to admit I'm a bit of a history nerd (securely locked up in a bullet proof closet, though).

My girlfriend in the park outside the National Museum

Boat on the channels

I guess you have to question the logic behind living north of the Arctic Circle, when central Europe can offer 20 degrees and sun in October. But that's life, at least we can get out of here when it gets too bad.

Fall in Tromsø

2006-10-19T00:55:00.000+02:00

Fall (and quite soon winter) is upon Tromsø. I wish it wouldn't be so cold.

Moving to Oslo

2006-10-17T15:52:00.001+02:00

After a long search, I have finally found myself a place to live in Oslo. My new apartment is located near Bislett, and will be ready for me in the beginning of December. I am moving together with my friend and co-worker Torkel, and hopefully the third member of Runaround Film - Andy - will follow us shortly thereafter.

The Shining - Family Edition

2006-09-29T09:22:00.000+02:00

Nectarios Leonidas of Flippant News is visiting the third annual advertising week in NYC. He found this great "alternative" trailer for Kubrick's The Shining, result of editors challenged to cut a new trailer with a new genre for the original film.

Also check out the rest of his site for some highlights of good commercial videos made in recent years.

Apple, What's up? 7.0.1 Messed Up

2006-09-28T14:18:00.001+02:00

A big selling point for Apple has always been the fact that stuff they make "just works" right out of the box, no bugs, no viruses, no nothing. And to a large extent, this has been quite true compared to what Windows users have to deal with.

Maybe with the exception of the latest release of iTunes. I was one of the lucky people not to be affected by all the problems other users reported after updating to the 7.0 version of Apple's mediaplayer. My iPod worked just fine, and I had no problem with album art, skippy playback or any of the other issues reported by fans worldwide.

Yesterday, Apple released an updated version 7.0.1 to address these issues, and I decided to update, just in case... And what do you know. After updating my flawless 7.0 to 7.0.1, my iTunes is messed up. Skippy playback, and crashes on exit. Listening to music on my computer is currently a nightmare.

What's up Apple? Why did you mess up my iTunes? You're currently losing a lot of credit in my book. I guess it's time to take those annoying Mac ads off the air, because the "just works" selling point just isn't valid anymore.

Tags: iTunes

Cronic Masturbator

2006-09-24T12:47:00.000+02:00

Check out Dave Chapelle in this hilarious version of the Apple Mac commercials:

Deadline

2006-09-23T13:06:00.001+02:00

After a week of intense work on the edit, the infomercial for Norwegian entrepeneur Secora is getting ready for launch. Yesterday our client visited us in Tromsø to look at the film, and to approve the current edit.

Next week will be spent working with music, voice and post production, and then we are aiming to make a sound mix the week after.

Amsterdam, Here I Come

2006-09-18T22:46:00.001+02:00

That's it, I'm going :)

Booked the flights and the hotel today for a trip with my girlfriend to Amsterdam early next month. We'll be celebrating her birthday, and generally enjoying ourselves. Just hoping for a bit better temperatures than what we're having in Tromsø right now, not to mention the weather.

Any tips on things to see in Amsterdam is greatly appreciated.

Fixing Issues Caused By Uninstalling Pinnacle

2006-09-13T10:25:00.000+02:00

I am writing this to help other people who might be having the same problem with their computer.

As some people, including myself, have experienced, removing Pinnacle video editing applications from your computer can cause some serious pain in the a** afterwards. I had a trial version of Pinnacle Liquid (now bought by Avid and renamed Avid Liquid) installed, but decided to uninstall it again. Suddenly these weird "missing dll"-errors started appearing in other applications.

To be specific, Quicktime and iTunes started shouting about missing dll's on startup. It wasn't a complete showstopper, both applications would run anyway, but it was quite annoying to have to click three popups every time I tried to watch a filmclip or listen to music. After a quick search on Google, I found that other people were having the same issues after uninstalling Pinnacle, and Quicktime/iTunes weren't the only applications to be affected. You would think a quick reinstall of the affected apps would fix the problem, but no, the errors kept popping up.

The files your system claims to be missing are the following: vfmpegu.dll, dialogsu.dll, fileiou.dll, futilu.dll, gbtoolsu.dll, setfileu.dll, vafxu.dll. I decided to make a post on the Creative Cow support forum for Avid Liquid, and after a few weeks I finally got an e-mail from Edgar Vallejo containing the missing dll's.

How to fix it

Fixing the issue is quite simple once you have the files. I have uploaded the missing dll-files to our company web server and will walk you through the process.

Start by downloading each of the files I have linked below. For most browsers you can either just click the link and opt to save the file to your computer, or right-click the link and save the file. Preferably, make a new folder somewhere called "liquid missing dll" to put them in (to keep them all in the same place).
vfmpegu.dll, dialogsu.dll, fileiou.dll, futilu.dll, gbtoolsu.dll, setfileu.dll, vafxu.dll
Select all the files and choose to copy them, either by right-clicking and selecting "copy", or by using the keyboard shortcut ctrl+c.
Browse your way to the "system" folder inside your "Windows" folder (usually c:\windows\system\).
Paste all the files in the "system"-folder, either by right-clicking and selecting "paste" or by using the keyboard shortcut ctrl+v.

Basically, just get the dll-files into your "c:\windows\system"-folder, and you're done. The errors will stop appearing. Big thanks to the Creative Cow-people, and Edgar Vallejo in particular for helping and providing dll-files.

I have also uploaded the dll-files to DLL-files.com as an alternative download location.

Oh, and Pinnacle, I am no software engineer, but this seems like poor work from you guys. You might (or Avid might) want to look into preventing this from happening.

Update: If you have any trouble finding/downloading the DLL-files, e-mail me and I'll hook you up.

Update 2: Avid seems to have released a fix of their own now. I haven't tried this myself, but at least one reader reports that it works. http://www.avid.com/onlineSupport/supportcontent.asp?browse=&productID=0&contentID=9334

Technorati tags: avid liquid, computer, dll, error, fix, itunes, liquid, missing, missing dll, pinnacle, pinnacle liquid, quicktime, software, troubleshooting, windows

100 Awesome Music Videos

2006-09-12T14:16:00.001+02:00

Found another good site that compiles a list of music videos found online. This time it's all about YouTube. The guys over at Pitchfork seem to have spent an unhealthy amount of hours on the Tube, and made this list of 100 awesome music videos they encountered along the way.

Quite a few really good ones in there, as well as some personal favourites of mine. Worth a look, allthough some of the videos unfortunately have gone offline since this list was made.

Faroe Islands

2006-09-10T16:38:00.000+02:00

I went back to my roots this week, at least in terms of language, visiting the Faroe Islands for a seminar about the PICYBU project. I'm not actually involved with this project, but I was asked to go by Tvibit to hold a short speak about filmmaking and how Tvibit has been a vital part of helping me achieve my goals in life.

This small part of the Danish kingdom is located off the west coast of Norway, and consists of several small islands. There are roughly 50 000 inhabitants here, of which about 20 000 live in the capital city of Tórshavn. It's not the kind of place you often get a chance to go to, so I grabbed the opportunity the second it came up.

On our way back to the hotel

It turned out to be a smart decision, Faroe Islands is a quite spectacular place and the inhabitants are very friendly. During the week we were treated to a delicious meal of lamb in a real farmer's home, we were taken on a trip around one of the islands with a very nice sailboat, and we were given an exclusive concert inside a cave of sorts. The captain on the boat also dived for shells, and served us a dinner of blue shells and fish.

Hopefully I'll get the chance to go back some day. I know my girlfriend wants to ;)

OK Go

2006-09-04T19:45:00.000+02:00

I've started loving this band OK Go more and more lately. Apart from making some great music, they are doing hilarious music videos of themselves performing choreographed dances. Check out the hits Here It Goes Again and A Million Ways to see what I mean.

Yesterday I found this clip of their performance at the MTV Video Music Awards 2006, and man, these guys keep amusing me to no end. They have taken the choreography gimmick to new heights by performing the song live by just dancing on threadmills like in the video! And they sure know how to do it, no slip ups in a rather advanced dance. I guess they're probably singing to a playback, but it doesn't matter, it's all about the dancing :)

Check it out:

(Notice how the letters on the threadmills read out "OK Go")

That's a Wrap

2006-09-03T20:56:00.000+02:00

After a day of shooting, "Vidda" (working title) is ready to move into the editing room. The production has been put together by director Ole Giæver in relatively short time, and was shot on a mountain outside Tromsø yesterday.

Heavy winds caused some trouble early on, and we had to move location causing earlier loss of sun. This in turn gave us trouble keeping 100% consistency, which will be a challenge when we start editing it together, but I think we'll manage.

Bjørn Sundquist and Ole Giæver on the set

We operated with a small, dynamic crew, aiming to work fast and thereby allow for more improvisation. The story took some really interesting twists up there, especially thanks to input from our excellent actors Bjørn Sundquist and Anders Baasmo Christiansen. Working their way through the story, the actors in collaboration with Ole managed to add another dimension to the film, which should end up quite nice.

Next step; piecing it all together.

View From The Car

2006-08-31T20:20:00.000+02:00

Waiting for the ferry at Melbu

Well, I've survived so far, just one more day of shooting in Lofoten and Vesterålen, and then I'm going back home to do the short film with Ole Giæver.

It really is a beautiful place of the world, but I'm only treating you to a crowded ferry harbor :) Bummer, isn't it?

Ivar Hagendoorn's Favourite Music Videos

2006-08-28T18:43:00.001+02:00

For the music video fanatic (like myself), check out Ivar Hagendoorn's excellent collection of favourite music videos. The page links to videos from director's like Chris Cunningham, Michel Gondry and Spike Jonze, in addition to Hagendoorn's personal favourites for each year since 2001 (and a few "oldies").

He's done a great job of finding all the videos in different places on the web, and collecting them, but unfortunately you might experience a few dead links.

I am personally very fond of Michel Gondry's work, especially "Daft Punk - Around the World" and "Chemical Brothers - Star Guitar".

This site is extra useful now that you can put videos on your iPod, especially since most of the videos seem to be Quicktime already.

Busy Week

2006-08-27T11:15:00.000+02:00

This week is going to be an unusually busy one. First off, I'm going to Lofoten and Vesterålen to shoot some pictures for a commercial video we're doing for Norwegian entrepreneur Secora. It's a three day shoot, and unfortunately booked in at the very end of the week. Which means I'll just barely get home for the next gig this week, a short film with director Ole Giæver, shot on location Saturday.

We were supposed to be done shooting with Secora by August, but as usual there has been delays in the process, and we're just wrapping it up now. There are some things you can't prevent, no matter how well prepared you are...

Back in Tromsø I'll just catch a good night's sleep, and head out again. We'll be shooting the short film on a mountain outside Tromsø with actors Anders Baasmo Christiansen and Bjørn Sundquist, who's characters will be trying to avoid each other. It's a tricky situation in the middle of nowhere, and I think the outcome will be quite funny.

Location scouting outside Tromsø with Ole

I guess I've lived through worse before... Next Sunday will be spent sleeping ;)

Cheap Film Does Not Always Equal Good Film?

2006-08-24T13:53:00.001+02:00

The big surprise at Bergen International Film Festival (BIFF) last year was the feature film "Sirkel". Produced on a total budget of 300$, it went on to win the audience award and the young talent award. It is now available for download on www.sirkel.org, so I decided to watch it last night.

First off I have to emphasize how impressed I am with this production. Anyone who has ever worked with narrated film knows how hard it is to actually make a full feature film with actors, locations, crew, equipment and so on. There's a long and painful process (and a lot of people) to go through before what starts out as a good idea ends up on the big screen. It is close to impossible to do this with a 300$ budget.

But this is what the guys behind Sirkel accomplished, and I have no doubt about the talent of the people pulling this off. I am beyond impressed about these people, and I am convinced that a lot of them will go on to have a long and successful career in film.

I am however a bit critical to the reception this film has got. Because as a finished work of art it is just not that good. I have to compare it with another Norwegian film released to cinema last year, "Sinus". Both films were made on practically no money, with volunteer crew that would work odd hours just to see their dream come true. Both films had stories that in my opinion weren't good enough. And both films were a great success, at least compared to what they started out with.

When "Sinus" was released, some of the reviews in serious Norwegian newspapers were close to not even mentioning what it was about, they just talked about how amazing it was that the film had been finished in the first place. And then stamped a 5 out of 6 score on it. Likewise, "Sirkel" was given the audience award at a festival known to have a lot of good movies on the program.

If the budget of a film should make a difference when judging whether it's good or not, yes, they are both worth top scores all over. My point is that after watching these films I am not filled with the excitement and joy that I am usually filled with after watching a good movie. I was actually bored to death while watching. I was however filled with excitement and joy on behalf of the filmmakers, their dedication, and their obvious ability to go on and make actual good movies in the future.

I have a feeling that films like these don't actually sell the story happening on screen to the viewer. They are selling the story happening behind the camera, and people are loving it. I guess you could compare it to the joy parents feel when watching their kids' school play in the first grade.

The last thing I want to do is discredit any of these film productions and the people behind them, but I think that a film should be judged on it's own as a film, either good or bad or somewhere in between. Regardless of budget (high or extemely low), famous faces or big marketing budgets. All young filmmakers should try to make as much film as possible, to learn as much as possible, but let's watch a movie for what it is.

My Brother on the Tube

2006-08-23T15:55:00.000+02:00

Worth checking out, my guitar-fanatic brother on YouTube. He's filmed himself playing, and seem to be quite popular judging by the comments and ratings. This is Bach, heavy edition:

On a sidenote, he's going into the army - His Majesty the King's Guard - this fall.

Trailer for Hålogaland Theatre

2006-08-23T14:08:00.000+02:00

Just finished a new trailer for the theatre play "Mysterier" on Hålogaland Teater in Tromsø. The play is based on the book by Norwegian writer Knut Hamsun, and opens on September 7th. Oh, the voice is in Norwegian:

The trailer is produced by Ferdinand Films and directed by Ole Giæver. I was hired to do the photography and editing, as well as the visual effects we've done in post. The project is low budget, shot on the theatre's own DVX100 with the main actor from the play.

For this play, the theatre is trying out a new approach to marketing. All the material is yellow, there will be yellow banners up all over town, and the poster is yellow with a picture of the actor hanging in mid-air. For the trailer, we tried to use the same visual style, while adding some mood with the music and the voice that vaguely describes the setting of the play.

Even though the budget is low, it is still a very enjoyable project. The theatre is a very good client, and they are always open to experiment, at least compared to other commercial clients. I'm always happy to work with them.

This is the previous trailer we did for the theatre.

Undergoing Changes

2006-08-21T22:20:00.000+02:00

After being accepted into the new Blogger beta, my blog is undergoing some changes. I will be experimenting a bit with both content and form, and maybe incorporate some new stuff as well.

People Coming And Going

2006-08-06T23:15:00.000+02:00

My friend and former roommate Maja is going abroad this year, more specifically to Belgium to work with youths, learn new languages and generally just experience new exciting stuff. Her thoughts on the matter can be found on her new blog, http://majaibelgia.blogspot.com/, so far in Norwegian only.

Anyway, good call Maja! I wish more people would take the time to have a look at what the world has to offer before commiting their future to a specific education or profession they haven't really thought through too well. (No offense to those who are very determined about their future at a young age, just to those who bore themselves through an early education they don't want, just to make life hell for future customers, clients and/or co-workers in a profession they hate).

So, have a nice trip Maja :)

(I was going to post a nice photo of Maja from a party some time ago, but decided I don't want that kind of trouble)

Return To Normal

2006-08-02T22:59:00.000+02:00

Another summer is coming to an end, and life is sloooowly getting back into it's usual rythm. I've started work on two film projects that will occupy my time until the end of September, and I'm trying to figure out where I'll be located after that.

But there are still a few weeks left of summer, and Northern Norway has finally been graced with sun and nice temperatures. After a summer of cold rain, it's nice to bring a beer to the beach and just relax after a day of not-so-hard work. My friend Torkel and I made a pact to use every day of nice weather to the fullest this summer. We haven't had trouble fulfilling that promise so far, and with the recent change of weather, we've spent just about every afternoon with our friends on the beach.

I was going to use this little entry to show off the nice weather we're having, but then I managed to delete the picture while importing it to my computer. I won't go into details, because it's just incredibly stupid, but it's gone now. The good news is that there is more sun on the horizon, and plenty of Kodak moments to come :)

The Greatest Concert

2006-07-12T14:16:00.000+02:00

After attending the greatest live musical event I have ever experienced, my love for the work of Pink Floyd has (if possible) just grown. Roger Waters brought his crew of highly skilled musicians to the Roskilde Festival this year, and gave what must have been more than 70 000 people an extraordinary experience on the final night.

The sun was slowly setting as people gathered for the concert. Roger Waters came on and started playing some of the old Pink Floyd classics, showing off a few of his visual tricks, and generally just warming people up. Even though he is an old man by now, he was surprisingly playful and energetic. Pink Floyd's lyrics contain a lot of criticism towards society on a metaphorical level, and Waters used this effectively by making it valid for todays political situation, mixed with a few new songs that specifically targetted George Bush.

The audience immediately picked up on this, and left no doubt as to which side they were on. Waters even teased them by sending sheep-noises through the speakers, using the surround capabilities of the stage to make it sound like there actually was a flock of sheep somewhere in the audience. After about an hour of Floyd classics, some new material and lots of political humour, he announced that the legendary Dark Side of the Moon was next up, and then left the stage. The sun was gone, the moon was up, and the audience was anxiously awaiting one of the greatest concept albums of all time, played live with no pauses.

And then it happened. Roger Waters and his band entered the stage again. Not a word was said. The entire stadium was once again turned into a surround sound system, and the familiar sounds from the opening track started pumping out all over the place, making people cover their heads not to get hit by the coins dropping from the skies.

The band was fantastic, the singers were great, and Roger Waters was in his ace. People were singing along to the lyrics, but it was all drowned by the performers on stage. The big crash on the end of "On the Run" was so massive that the ground started shaking. Apart from a few small variations, they performed the songs exactly like they were recorded, even the improvised female performance on The Great Gig in the Sky was reenacted by one of the fantastic backup vocals.

Dark Side contains one of my all-time favourite songs, "Us And Them", and I was not at all disappointed. As the sound of "Eclipse" died out, people went totally mad. It was like watching 70 000 virgins, all getting off at the same time. There was no way they were going to let him get away with it that easy, so even after playing for more than two hours (concerts at Roskilde don't last more than about an hour), he had to come out again, and play another half hour of Floyd classics.

When the band finally went off stage for good, I saw a man, probably in his late fifties, who had to be supported by two younger men next to him. He was crying so hard he had trouble standing up. It was truly a night to remember.

For more images from my trip, check out my Picasa Web Album.

Roskilde Festival

2006-06-23T13:43:00.000+02:00

It's vacation time, and this year I'm heading to Denmark for the Roskilde festival. I'm expecting a lot of good concerts, a lot of good fun, and hopefully all sunshine.

Looking forward to finally see Kashmir, one of my favourite bands for the past year, live on stage.

35 Millimeters

2006-06-19T23:11:00.000+02:00

I had the chance to spend one day on the set of "The Kautokeino Rebellion" a few weeks back. Norwegian cinematographer Philip Øgaard is working with director Nils Gaup on this large scale Swedish-Norwegian co-production, and was kind enough to spend his Sunday sharing experiences with a small crew from Tvibit.

Most of my projects are shot on various video formats. My experience with shooting on film is limited to a Super 16 mm film where I was first assistant cameraman. The film vs. video discussion is a heated one, but I personally really like what you can achieve using film over video. I won't get too technical, but among obvious differences you could mention that film perceives colour in CMYK versus video's RGB (video looks more like what your eye perceives), and the fact that you can achieve less depth of field on film. And the harder to explain argument that film images have more soul. It boils down to preference, you decide what look you want for your film, and decide on one or the other. Provided your budget allows it.

Anyway, the topic of the day was shooting on 35mm. We discussed different aspects of Philip's role as a cinematographer, and considerations he would take for a shoot. Philip is widely acknowledged as one of the best cinematographers in Norway (if not the best), and it was interesting to hear his thoughts on the subject.

A specific issue for "The Kautokeino Rebellion" was whether to go digital or not. Latitude is another advantage of film, and especially for this high-contrast shoot in winter-Norway, Philip was worried about the latitude he would lose when going digital for post production. A lot of the interior scenes also relied on bluescreen for exteriors in windows, and when going digital, he might be left with 6 stops of latitude to work on. This is not far away from what you can achieve on one of the better video formats.

At the end of the day, Torkel and I were given a strip of film to expose in the studio. With first assistant cameraman Patrick acting, we constructed a small scene with different cameramoves and challenges exposure-wise. We had a few nervous moments in front of Philip, trying to determine what exposure we would use, and how high we would dare putting our highlights. Patrick found this really funny, and made a song called "Fear of Exposing" while he was waiting. Yeah, real funny.

I must say it was inspiring to work with these guys. There is so much theory in my head about shooting on film, and it was really nice to get some more hands on experience doing it. The next step will be to try and get a photography-job shooting film. And of course, even more Dias-photography with my light meter.

You can check out more pictures from the workshop in my Picasa Web Album.

Utilities For Digital Video Editing

2006-06-13T09:45:00.000+02:00

Working with digital (or non-linear) editing for film and TV, you often face problems with different types of file formats. This is especially true for TV, where the material you want to use isn't always tailor made for your production. How do you get that file into your editing suite?

On the other hand, you might have a finished video that you need to distribute fast and/or easy. Maybe you want to send it by e-mail to get your client's approval, or you simply want to put the video on your website.

There are numerous ways to solve these input/output issues, and I thought I'd share two of my favourite (free!) applications. AVIcodec and SUPER ©. (PS: These are PC only applications).

AVIcodec

I recieve a lot of footage to be used in various productions, and working with DV on a PC means a lot of AVI files. As you might know, an AVI file could be a lot of things, with a number of different codecs and compression amounts. For a quick way of checking that AVI you just recieved, AVIcodec is a nice tool. Just right-click in Windows Explorer and click AVIcodec, and the program will show you detailed information about your file. Also works with a number of other file formats.

Get it here

SUPER ©

I also recieve a lot of footage that ISN'T a DV or uncompressed AVI. SUPER © is a "universal player, encoder and renderer". You can drag just about any videofile into the program, and quickly export it in a number of formats (even compatible with your cell phone).

If you are working with a lot of different clients on different projects, this could be an invaluable timesaver when shipping out updates by e-mail or via your website. Or it could be a big help getting that one video clip you wanted to use into your editing suite. It could actually do a lot of things, depending on what you need it to do. Just take a look at the supported file formats...

Video format: 3gp/3g2(Nokia,Siemens,Sony Ericsson) asf, avi (DivX,H263,H263+,H264,XviD,MPEG4,MSmpeg4 etc..), dat,
fli, flc, flv (used in Flash), mkv, mpg (Mpeg I,Mpeg II), mov (H263,H263+,H264,MPEG4 etc..), mp4 (H263,H263+,H264,MPEG4), ogg,
qt, rm, ram, rmvb, str (Play Station), swf (Flash), ts (HDTV), viv, vob, wmv
Audio format: ac3, amr, mp2, mp3, mp4, mpc, ogg, ra, wav, wma

As you can see, this is an invaluable buddy for publishing your video on the internet or for use on different types of portable mediaplayers (especially the popular iPod Video and PSP).

Get it here

These are both freeware, and definately worth a look!

Good Year For Norwegian Film?

2006-05-25T18:54:00.000+02:00

The Norwegian Rush Blogg is reporting live from Cannes Film Festival, and conclude that this could be a good year for Norwegian film. Not only are we represented with four films, the critics seem to really like what they are seeing. Jens Lien and Stefan Faldbakken are both mentioned as exciting talents, and The Bothersome Man by Jens Lien is promoted as a possible winner of the International Critics Week.

Free Jimmy (International Critics Week), Sniffer (Short Film Program) and Uro (Un Certain Regard) are the other Norwegian films in the festival this year.

With a history as little brother to acclaimed film nations Denmark and Sweden, it's nice to see Norwegian films doing well abroad. There seems to be a lot of talent in the new generation of Norwegian filmmakers, which has given us several good films in the recent years.

For more recent Norwegian films, check out Uno and Kissed by Winter. Definitely worth a watch if you can get your hands on them. And for the contenders at Cannes, good luck!

Emmerhoff & The Melancholy Babies - Black Mark

2006-05-23T14:20:00.000+02:00

I'm working on putting all my work on Google Video . It's great fun digging up some of the old stuff from my archives, so I thought I'd share a bit. To start it off, my very first music video production.

The band, Emmerhoff & The Melancholy Babies, is based in Bergen, Norway, and released an album last year called "Electric Reverie". I was hired by the production company Filmfalken to do the video for their single "Black Mark". Here goes:

We are experimenting a bit with the visuals here, but the story is not too complicated. When we first heard the song, Erling Falch (the producer) and I both thought it had sort of a sci-fi feel to it. Erling had the concept of making a video where we put the faces of the bandmembers on the bodies of the actors, and managed to get his hands on some old american sci-fi films.

I took three or four of the films, and edited them together to a 3 minute long continous story. The band has a quite grown up audience, so we did a "slow" edit, based on a few good scenes from each film, giving each image time to sink in.

There's a lot of good humour in these old movies with their primitive effects, and I really like the visual style. You can see how they've used footage of tidal waves, blended onto another picture to recemble fog-like smoke. Or how they use an aquarium in front of the camera to simulate underwater footage. And it works very well, even though it's primitive. There are also some hilarious plots.

The rest of the video was more or less done in After Effects. We shot some really simple headshots of each bandmember from 8 different angles where they sing through the entire song. Afterwards it was just a matter of keying out the faces in After Effects, making them follow the original faces using motion tracking, and finally making them look like the original footage. Mostly we just used basic effects like different types of color correction, levels, blurs and so on. But we finished it off with DigiEffects, adding different types of filmdamage and recreating irregularities found in the original film footage.

The final result was an interesting music video that somehow stands out from the crowd. This was done on an extremely low budget (and only in 7 days), and I think we managed to get good value for our money.

And if you're wondering about the legal issues here, using copyrighted material, we consulted a lawyer on the issue. By only using short snippets of each film (below a certain percent of the entire film), and manipulating each image to such extents, we found ourselves within the quotation right. It's the same principle Google uses to publish entire books online in their Google Book Search, by only allowing the user to access small portions of it.

Feel free to leave a comment on what you think about the video, I'd love some feedback, even though it's not "fresh" work.

Check out my website to download an iPod video version of the video.

Links on Monday - May 22

2006-05-22T00:36:00.000+02:00

It's Monday, weekend is over, and you're back at work. You're bored. It's time to sit back, put your feet on your desk, and enjoy ten minutes of healthy distractions. (Goes well with a cup of coffee too).

Cute animals (http://www.cuteoverload.com/)
If you love animals, this is the site for you. The cutest pictures of the cutest animals, all shapes and sizes.
Interesting website (http://www.tidelandthemovie.com/)
Way to release a movie! Website for the upcoming film "Tideland" by Terry Gilliam, and what a website! Worth exploring.
Cool pictures (http://www.funnies.com/sandcastles.htm)
I guess some people put a little more effort into their sandcastles than others...
Useful tool (http://www.drchinese.com/letter.html)
If you are from a dysfunctional family, this tool will help you write letters to tell them off.
Cow humour (http://www.cowabduction.com/)
Showcase of alien cow abductions, complete with eyewitness accounts, messages to the aliens, and several "gadgets" to help prevent future abductions. Hilarious.

That's it for this edition, see you next week for more.

Petition to Fix Gmail's "Custom From"

2006-05-19T10:30:00.000+02:00

The discussion started over on Lambi Pooch, where Rakesh Agrawal wrote an excellent article on how you can use Gmail as your professional e-mail server and client, and why it doesn't work. I continued by writing an article on two specific problems with Gmail, and explained how another online e-mail client (FastMail) solve these in an excellent fashion.

Finally the discussion ended up on Hawk Wings, where Tim Gaden summed it up and explained why he thinks FastMail is the superior e-mail client for the "e-mail fanatic". The bottom line of the discussion is that Gmail can act as an excellent online replacement for your offline e-mail client (typically Outlook or Thunderbird), but it is still lacking a few "professional" features to complete the puzzle.

One of the most critical features mentioned by all three writers is Gmail's custom from feature, and how it doesn't work the way we need it to work.

The problem is that in a lot of e-mail clients (like Outlook), the e-mail you send will appear to be coming from "yourname@gmail.com on behalf of yourname@work.net", instead of just "yourname@work.net". This could potentially make people question your seriousness.

Getting it fixed

This has now resulted in a petition to Google over on Petition Spot, to fix this feature, and make it "mask" your Gmail address properly. Like for instance FastMail does. I would encourage everyone who finds this useful to sign the petition.

And if you're interested in how you can set up your Gmail for this purpose, read the original article by Rakesh Agrawal. It features most of the tips and tricks needed to empower your Gmail client and make it your all-in-one solution for e-mail handling. For the advanced user, I also recommend checking out the FastMail email client.

Links on Monday - May 15

2006-05-15T23:13:00.000+02:00

It's Monday, weekend is over, and you're back at work. You're bored. Enjoy ten minutes of distraction.

Perplexing animation (http://www.zoomquilt.org/)
This collaborative arts project has resulted in a rather perplexing animation in an endless loop. The details are very nice, and you can sense some sort of story in there somewhere. Just follow the red line.
Funny read (http://www.nostalgiacentral.com/features/20moviethings.htm)
Some things only happen in movies. Here are 40 good examples.
Posters from a lost time (http://www.tululuka.net/alco/)
Sovjet propaganda posters encouraging people to not drink alcohol. I've always been fascinated by graphics from the Sovjet era, I love the style, the colours and the symbols. Have a look.
Flash game (http://www.yeeguy.com/freefall/georgerag.swf)
Watch "crash test dummy" George Bush fall down a painful trail of bumper balls, or use your mouse to help him suffer a bit extra. Great satisfaction for your money (it's free, so...).
Office advice (http://pix.mybll.de/problemloesen.jpg)
Difficult start of the week? Problems piling up on your desk? Don't worry, here's a piece of advice on problemsolving. And if everything else fails, duck and cover.

That's it for now, I'll be back with more links next week. Feel free to leave a comment on what you think about this.

Tags: links, humor, art

Flickr Related Tag Browser

2006-05-13T14:09:00.000+02:00

Ever wondered what kind of fruit a "pomegranate" is? You could look it up on Dictionary.com, and find out that it is "a large globular fruit having many seeds with juicy red pulp in a tough brownish-red rind". Yep, very descriptive. But it doesn't really help you visualize this fruit in your head.

Solution? Head on over to Flickr Related Tag Browser, and see for yourself!

Flickr is a wonderful community website that lets you upload and share your photos with the rest of the world. People take photos of the strangest things, put them on Flickr, and tag them with descriptive tags. Having become very popular, Flickr is therefor also a very useful database with photo documentation of the world.

This has been taken advantage of by the team at Airtight Interactive, who created the Flickr Related Tag Browser. It is a flash based search engine that lets you surf the Flickr "tag space". Type in a keyword, hit search, and see all the pictures that carry your tag. In addition to this you can surf related tags, following a visual trail of your choosing to the end of the universe.

I think the fascination for me personally is about the same as my fascination for Google Earth. The opportunity to go on a visual journey of the world is just amazing, and you'll be surprised to see the amount of pictures in there. I found some nice pictures of the place where I grew up (search for "Senja Norway"), my hometown Tromsø (search for "Tromso"), and then I travelled to the other side of the world, visiting Kilimanjaro and Kathmandu.

The search engine is also very responsive, making it feel good to explore it. I like the stripped-down nature, combined with nice animations, and navigation just by moving your mouse to the right spots on the screen. It's really responding to your moves.

If you've got a minute, go take a look at what Berlin looks like at night (with Japanese people all over), or find the lost city of Atlantis. You can also search for different categories, and brush up on your yoga or immerse yourself in the world of cricket. And if you ever need to determine the exact looks of a pomegranate, it's a really nifty tool to have in your toolbox.

Useful? Could be. Enjoyable? Definitely! Enjoy.

Tags: photography, internet

Top 5 Things I Want Improved in Google Bookmarks

2006-05-12T22:15:00.000+02:00

Google Bookmarks is Google's well hidden attempt at online bookmarking. It's got all the basic features - you can add your favourite sites and apply labels - and it supports feeds for integration with your browser. But that's about it. Apart from being an online storage for your links, it's not really useful yet, and most other similar services (like del.icio.us) beat the crap out of it. So here is my top 5 list of things I want to see improved in Google Bookmarks, whenever Google decides to improve it:

The ability to put together a search query in my favourites, and then be supplied with a feed containing all the results.
Currently you can only view 10 items per page. So if you have a label that contains 16 items, and you want to add this label as a live bookmark to Firefox, you have to add two live bookmarks... One for each page! Google Bookmarks doesn't seem to supply feeds based on your currently active combination of labels, instead it supplies a feed for the currently active page. Which would be a selection of 10 items based on sorting options.
Integration with Google's other services and applications.
Currently there is little to no integration with the rest of Google's range of services. Natural products to integrate Google Bookmarks with includes Google Desktop (there is a gadget for del.icio.us, but not for Google Bookmarks), Google Toolbar, maybe the upcoming Google Notebook and of course Google Search.
Some more AJAX/web 2.0 love.
The keyboard shortcut system that Gmail and Google Reader for the most part share, would do Google Bookmarks good. The ease and speed of navigation in these applications are amazing.
Tracking of my useage stats.
It would be nice if Google tracked my useage stats, allowing me for example to easily access my own most popular bookmarks.
A public directory where I can browse and search all the bookmarks from different users by tags.
Currently you cannot do much with your bookmarks. Being a collection of links that you personally have given the thumbs up, already categorized through tabs, it is a valuable resource for other surfers. Most other online (or "social") bookmarking services offer directories like this, and I think it is a really nice way of finding quality content inside a defined genre (read tag or combination of tags).

So why don't I just use some of the other already available services that already offer a lot of the things I'm requesting? I don't know. I want Google to organize my bookmarks.

Tags: google, bookmarks

PostSecret

2006-05-11T11:12:00.000+02:00

I stumbled upon this interesting blog today, called PostSecret. It is an online community arts project, displaying ordinary people's secrets as submitted on homemade postcards.

Reading through a few of the postcards, you come across real life stories hidden behind a few words and maybe a picture. Political statements, worries, humour, melancholy, even personal tragedies or stories of happiness - it's all there.

A lot of the postcards are also very creatively crafted. I like the handmade finish and quality of the visuals, even though some of the cards are obviously made on a computer. Some submitters also seem to have put a lot of effort into using symbolics in the combination of pictures and words, as part of their message to the world. This makes it an enjoyable visual journey.

What fascinates me the most, are those obscure thoughts that sometimes pop up in your mind, that you would never say out loud. Like this one:

I hope there's another 9/11-type accident here in Manhattan
Because then real estate prices will drop
And then I could finally afford to buy an apartment.

I realize this is a horrible thought and I'm going to hell for it.

Yes, it is a horrible thought, but I bet most of you at some point have thought horrible thoughts when frustration gets the upper hand. Not that you would ever carry them out, or truly wish for them. You just hide them inside yourself.

If you look at it in a bigger perspective, this is also very important documentation of todays society. What do people care about, what problems do they face in life, what goes on in the mind of a contemporary citizen of the world?

The blog seems to serve many different functions, as people mail in responses to the postcards, with advice, encouragement, or just to declare their sympathy. Some people even seem to find therapy in the secrets they read:

Dear Frank:

Everytime I visit postsecret.com, I find a secret I never even knew I had. I'm getting to know myself a lot better.

-California

I guess the best conclusion you can draw from this project, is that people are very much alike, disregarding physical attributes or cultural differences. When you strip them down to their best hidden, sometimes embarassing secrets, you find common denominators. They care about the same things, and share the same worries.

So if you've got a few moments to spare, head on over to PostSecret and read a few postcards. Maybe you'll find something you can relate to. It can be quite nice to discover you're not the only thinking the way you do.

Tags: art, blog

Lambi Pooch: Using Gmail for work

2006-05-09T12:32:00.000+02:00

Rakesh Agrawal has written an excellent article on his blog about taking Gmail one step further, using it as an e-mail client to handle all your e-mail accounts, and not just your Gmail. I have been using the same method for a while, and I am loving it. I recieve my work mail as well as my private mail in the Gmail interface, and can send mail from the Gmail interface with my work address as well as my private address.

It works like an online version of Outlook, now also featuring an excellent calendar.

There are however some downsides to the experience, which Rakesh address in his article. I would like to focus on two of these.

You can setup your work mail in Gmail, so that when you send e-mail it appears to come from your address at work and not your Gmail address. The problem is that in a lot of e-mail clients (like Outlook), the e-mail you send will appear to be coming from "yourname@gmail.com on behalf of yourname@work.net", instead of just "yourname@work.net". This could potentially make people question your seriousness.

There is also the problem of how to retrieve your work mail into the Gmail interface. This can easily be solved by having your work mail forward to your Gmail address, but you might not have that amount of control over your work mail account. Especially if you work at a large enterprise with a large e-mail system.

Enter fastmail.fm, the company with the solution to both these problems. Before Gmail arrived, I used this paid e-mail service as my main e-mail client. It is still the most advanced and feature-rich online e-mail client I have seen. The amount of things you can do with this client is just amazing. Actually, the only reason why I switched to Gmail was the user friendly interface, the great search, the storage space and the integration with other Google services.

Anyway, two great features offered by fastmail.fm are "POP links" and "personalities".

Personalities address the first problem with Gmail. You can setup different personalities in your account with different addresses associated with them. Just like in Gmail, only with fastmail.fm your mail actually appears to be sent from this address, and this address only. If I create a personality called "work" with the associated e-mail address "myname@work.net", my mail will appear to actually have been sent from this address. No "myname@fastmail.fm on behalf of myname@work.com", thus effectively keeping my integrity intact. You can actually create a personality called "bill gates" with the associated e-mail address "bill.gates@microsoft.com", because fastmail.fm does not even attempt to validate that the address actually belongs to you, like Gmail does. Apart from the lack of validation, this is exactly what I want from Gmail. By the way, you can also setup different signatures for each personality. It's a small thing, but it makes a difference.

POP links address the issue of retrieving your work mail into the online interface, an important issue if you want to use it as an e-mail client. Basically, fastmail.fm has taken the one feature that all "offline" e-mail clients offer, POP access, and implemented it in their online e-mail system. So instead of having all my other mail accounts forward mail to my fastmail.fm account, I just have my fastmail.fm account download the mail from my other accounts, using POP access. This addresses the issue of e-mail accounts that you cannot forward from, especially your work mail at a large enterprise.

I actually had my fastmail.fm account download one of my work e-mails, that I could not forward, via POP, and then forward it to my Gmail account, just so I could keep all my mail in one spot. Kind of complicated, I know, but it works. Now, if Gmail could implement a feature like this, it would make it all-powerful as far as I'm concerned.

Basically, Gmail offers a great experience if you set it up to be your default e-mail client, with all the advantages of handling all your mail remotely via an online interface, but it still needs to address a few issues to really be able to really replace Outlook. My advice; look to fastmail.fm, because they have some really innovative solutions that make them a fully featured online e-mail client.

For tips on how to setup your Gmail to handle your other e-mail accounts as well, read the original article by Rakesh Agrawal: Lambi Pooch: Using Gmail for work.

UPDATE: You might want to check out the continuing discussion "FastMail vs. Gmail" over on Hawk Wings.

Tags: e-mail, gmail, google

Art vs. Cash

2006-05-01T22:23:00.000+02:00

Working my way up in the world of film production, I continously face this one dilemma. On one hand, I want to do as much fiction work as I can. But a lot of the cinematography jobs I can get on fiction films are either not paid very well or not paid at all. Don't get me wrong, they are challenging and interesting jobs. But if the film is low budget, salary is the first place the producer will make sacrifices.

On the other hand is commercial work. It is well paid, and there is plenty of it. But it is not as fun, nor as challenging as working with fiction. The past year, I have been working full time as a commercial filmproducer in Tromsø, and though money has not been a problem, I haven't had any time for other projects. And to be honest, it really gets to me.

Commercial projects have tight deadlines, and high demands for efficiency. No matter how hard I try to prioritize, I always end up too tired to do anything else. Especially in Tromsø where the industry is still very small, and a lot of the time I have to both produce and be creative at the same time. It's like my brains are plugged into a creative vacuum cleaner 24/7. So my time off work is spent relaxing with my girlfriend. (Which is of course very nice, but it doesn't help getting things done). I think it is safe to say I am at a low point right now, and I need some changes.

Therefore I have decided to quit. My boss will recieve my letter of resignation tomorrow - by summer I will be a free man. The plan right now is to spend a few months doing projects of my own, before I either help establish a new film production company in Tromsø, or I move to Oslo to work as a freelancer.

I will still have to do commercial films for a living, but hopefully I will be able to constrain it to certain areas of time, and then be able to spend some actual time on my own projects. There are some promising short film productions coming up, and I'll be aiming at landing at least one of them for myself.

Tags: life, film, film production, work

Lucky guy

2006-04-27T14:33:00.000+02:00

I think I must be a very lucky guy. At least considering circumstances. I have been struck ill, and what better disease to be struck ill by than the kissing disease (also known as infectious mononucleosis). Basically, I can't do anything physically stressing to my body, I have to relax all day, but there is no fever, headache or pain to worry about. Apart from a slight tiredness, I feel just fine.

It's like having a two week vacation; I can catch up on my books, watch some films I've missed, and even play a bit of Civilization, my all-time favourite computer game.

This is of course a serious disease, and could have serious side effects if not taken seriously. But I have to admit, it could have been much worse. So all in all, I'm quite happy being ill at the moment. Let's just hope it doesn't last too long.

Tags: life, health

"B Block" at Grimstad

2006-04-12T14:57:00.000+02:00

The short film "B Block" by Ole Giæver was accepted into the competition program at Grimstad short film festival this year. I did the photography on the film and, naturally, I'm excited about the news.

Grimstad might be the most prestigious short film festival in Norway, and an excellent place to showcase your work in front of important people in the industry. Ole is going to the festival to represent the film, and hopefully this could lead to more screenings at other festivals. I am working on putting the film online at Runaround Film, just have to get permissions from Ole.

That makes one entry from Tromsø this year, next year we are aiming at five.

Tags: film, film production

Writely - The Web Word Processor

2006-04-07T00:24:00.000+02:00

One of the most exciting things happening on the web these days is called "Web 2.0". Basically, it's a technology that take webpages one step further, from being purely informative documents, to contain entire applications without consuming too much bandwidth. Gmail is an example of such an application, an online e-mail client that interacts without having to load pages for each time you click on something.

Another such example is Writely. It's a word processor, like Microsoft Word, WordPerfect, OpenOffice and others, but it's all online. The application operates inside your browser, and your files are stored on a secure internet server, allowing you to access them at home, at work and on vacation in Brazil. No effort involved. You can collaborate on documents with friends, co-students or colleagues, and export your work in a number of formats on a number of locations. I'm still not done exploring all the possibilities.

With increasing availability of wired and wireless internet connections, and the increasingly portable nature of our digital daily life, the Web 2.0 is surely going to give the classical computer application a run for the money, and I'm not complaining!

Google Labs recently acquired this company, and closed down the BETA to become invite only (like Gmail). Thanks to our friends at Googlified, I've managed to get an account. So if you want an invitation, leave your e-mail address in a comment, and I'll send you one.

Tags: invite, web 2.0, ajax

Creative Searching?

2006-04-05T15:39:00.000+02:00

For a funny little something on a Wednesday, check out elgooG. It is a website mirroring Google search, just taking it one step further and actually mirroring the site. Yep, it's all backwards. And yep, it works, you can search with it. Just remember to put your query backwards!

So, what good is this? Well, I guess it is of no use whatsoever, but maybe if you are really stuck trying to find something on the internet, you'll find it helpful to shake things up a bit by trying your queries backwards. At least you could get some interesting results.

The website owner also suggests using the site to practice reading backwards, a useful skill when reading signs on cars, or when playing Scrabble.

Tags: google, search, humor

Watch Out For the Icelandics!

2006-04-04T20:26:00.000+02:00

Definitely worth checking out, young Icelandic filmmaker Þórgnýr Thoroddsen and his website Trendbreaking. I first met him at Nordic Youth Film Festival a few years back, and then again at NUFF last summer. He was there with co-director Guðmundur Arnar Gudmundsson to screen their joint effort "Þröng sýn" (English "Hidebound").

The film won an award for best soundtrack, but I think it could easily have taken home even more silverware. The story is quite simple, a universal story of a young man who is concerned about the relations between humans in today's society, but what really blew me away was the visual work. The film was shot on DV, but later animated on top of the DV material, using no less than 16000 drawings from 1350 members of the general public.

As well as a large scale arts project, I think it is a really nice film, with a touch of pure genious. You can watch some previews on the website. I'm looking forward to hear more from these guys.

Oh, and yes, the soundtrack is really good...

Tags: art, film

End of a Century

2006-04-04T18:30:00.000+02:00

Everything must to come to an end. Yesterday, we announced the immediate disbanding of the Tromsø-based film production network "Paraplyen". Through three years of existance, Paraplyen has initiated eight short film productions, indirectly put four of our people in the Norwegian national film school, as well as creating a lot of positive PR for Tromsø outside the city limits.

Is this dramatic for Tromsø's filmmaking community? Certainly not. It is actually a huge leap forward. Paraplyen was obviously a success, and the unique approach to filmmaking has proved itself very effective at the level we have been working the past few years. Tromsø has certainly made itself known as a city commited to film, but apart from being described as very talented, we haven't managed to break through on the national scene.

As a response to this, youth culture house Tvibit has launched a project aimed at the semi professional filmmakers called "Tvibit +". The long term objective is to move one step closer to creating a thriving professional film industry in Tromsø, with a constant flow of feature film productions for our talented filmmakers to work on.

The problem with Tromsø is that it's a great city to learn and develop your creative skills in, until you are about 20 years old. With no creative industry to work in, all our talented people move to Oslo where the industry is located. This does not only apply to film. Did you for instance know that internationally reputed electronica duo Röyksopp originally came from Tromsø?

So, why couldn't Paraplyen just aim higher? Well, the problem with Paraplyen was always that it didn't have a working organization, and there was no money to pay anyone to administrate it. Basically, it was a mailing list with names of ambitious people who would work for free on each others films. Don't get me wrong, you can go a long way with talented volunteers, but sooner or later you are going to hit the roof.

Tvibit has a good organization with fulltime employees in offices on a daily basis, as well as a stupendous amount of knowledge when it comes to financing their projects. And this is the key. We need to unlock that government treasure chest, which currently injects most of its funds into the centralized industry.

Paraplyen is still here in spirit and it's noble principles will always be printed in our minds. But as far as taking the community to the next level, we need a different approach.

What's the plan then? Well, there are already three feature films being written, where two could be entering production next year, one already partially funded. Tvibit + has also initiated five short film productions, all aiming at next years Grimstad short film festival.

I don't mind moving out, actually, I'm sure I will. Being 20 years old, I still have a lot to learn, places to see and things to experience. But I would also love the option to stay in my home town if I want to. Exciting times are ahead. And I firmly believe we're on the right track here.

Tags: film, film production, tromsø

I Found Teddy!

2006-03-28T19:42:00.000+02:00

Surfing around the internet today, I discovered an interesting arts project. Someone is collecting teddybears from secondhand shops in my home city Tromsø, and publishing their images online. The objective is to find the original owners, and uncover stories and memories connected to the teddies.

So I opened the site to look for some of my old friends, and what do you know, there's Mickey on the front page! My friend and faithful companion through a tough childhood in the 80s (yeah, it was a difficult decade :p).

Allright, so I don't know yet for sure that it's the actual teddybear that I drooled on 20 years ago, but at least it's an exact match. I'll just have to dig up some childhood photoes of me and Mickey to prove our past friendship. We went through a lot together, first steps, potty training, and the likes... I hope he isn't mad at me for abandoning him to play with newer and cooler toys.

The project website is in Norwegian, and can be visited at http://www.secondhandstory.no/.

Tags: art

Google, What Would I Do Without You?

2006-03-26T16:52:00.000+02:00

I have always been a Google user. When they launched their search service in the 90s, it revolutionized my use of the internet. Before Google, there was Altavista, Northernlights and the likes, and none of them really worked for me. I didn't find I was looking for. Part of the reason for this was of course that the web as a whole was quite new then, and hadn't really become that useful yet. But when Google arrived, it was just better. Fast, lightweight, versatile and accurate.

Anyhow, until recently, I have continued to use Google for searching the web, and I've always been amazed to see the kind of information I could dig up. With the right techniques, and some experience, you can find out almost anything in a matter of minutes. It's so bad, you can even use it to cheat at pop quiz with your cell phone! I did set up a Gmail account quite early, and I noticed that Google started launching a whole range of other applications and services, but I never looked into it. To me, Google was for searching.

It's now been three weeks since this changed, and Google became everything for me and my digital daily life. All my contact with friends who live far away now happen on Gmail. I use Google Groups and Google News to read up on the status of the world. I organize my pictures in Picasa, and distribute them to my friends and on my blog straight out of the application window. Yeah, and I've started writing a blog.

Google even helps my business website. I am part of a collective filmproduction company called Runaround Film (all text in Norwegian). A big part of our website is the presentation of our showreels and samples of our previous work. When we launched the site, we published video as Quicktime files and Windows Media files. You had to download the file, and install the right application to watch them. That was until I discovered Google Video. Now Google stores all our work on their server, and lets us play the videos directly on the website, as an embedded Flash movie. For free!

Google also offers a desktop search, which is a great service, but I have to admit that I prefer Microsoft Desktop Search on this one. It just works better for me.

I am a portable guy, and I depend on having a lot of information available wherever I am. Storing information on a hard disk locally has never worked for me, so the Google philosophy of global availability makes this a perfect marriage. With the Google calendar (CL2) launching shortly, and rumours of a Google online harddrive coming up, I think this is going to be my online home for quite some time.

If you'd like to know what I'm talking about, contact me and I'll invite you to the Gmail BETA. I still have about 94 invites to hand out, and they keep giving me more.

I try not to get religious about computer related things, I use Mac and I use PC, and I'm not fanatic about any of them. But when it comes to Google, I think I'll have to make a small exception. Google, I love you!

Tags: google, life

Joy Division Reborn

2006-03-25T15:27:00.000+01:00

Following my recent passion for English post-punk heroes Joy Division, I have discovered a fantastic Norwegian band called "Monomen".

The band appeared on stage at by:Larm 2006 in Tromsø, and blew me away. As we all know, Ian Curtis died in 1980, but I believe he was reborn as this kid from Sørumsand about 8 years later. This kid (yes, he is only 17 years old, though you wouldn't believe it) has an amazing dark, soulful voice, with a striking resemblance to the legendary Joy Division singer.

Monomen has so far only released one EP, but hopefully they will follow up with an album soon. You can listen to the EP online (the site is in Norwegian, but just click the speaker icons).

Tags: music

E.coli? WHERE?!?

2006-03-21T14:19:00.000+01:00

Norway (yep, that's the place where I live), is currently in a state of horror. An E.coli-bacteria has slipped through our tight immigration policy, and as a result several kids have died. One effect is of course a drastic rise on opinion polls for the political party "Fremskrittspartiet", as their main objective is to build a 20-feet wall along our border. (For those interested in politics, they now share the number one spot with the socialist "Arbeiderpartiet".)

The other effect is mass hysteria when it comes to eating meat.

What is E.coli anyway?

Escherichia coli, named after its discoverer Theodor Escherich, is a bacteria living in the lower intestines of warm-blooded animals. It is mostly harmless, but certain strains can cause food poisoning. It can be lethal, especially to kids and elders, but only at a rate of 2-5 % or so.

See Wikipedia for more information.

So, back to the point. I was having lunch yesterday. Well, I actually have lunch every day, but this particular lunch turned out more interesting than most. I had bought some sausages from the local grocery store, and being a realistic kind of guy, I didn't much bother about the E.coli hysteria. That was until I read the news. At 12 o'clock the national researches working on the E.coli situation finally discovered what they think is the source. In a press announcement, they warned people against a certain brand of sausage with certain product numbers, produced in a certain period of time. "Oh..."

Well, here I am, waiting for the illness to strike. The bacteria has an incubation time of 2-14 days, so it could take a while. But I'm optimistic. If I should get ill, (the chances are quite low), I'm confident that I'll survive. I even took a picture to show my grandchildren.

I call it "the day grandpa stared death in the eye, and laughed at it". (Sorry about the quality, snatched it with my cell phone).

Oh, and I'm being a bit overdramatic...

Tags: life, health