December '07 Holiday Gathering
As we have for the past several years, we celebrated the holiday season and the completion of another year of great MCA-I meetings at The Fox and Hound English Pub and Grill in Centerville.  The nice crowd of MCA-I members, their spouses and friends enjoyed drinks and munchies provided by the Chapter, as well as pool and other pub games along with lots of conversation and networking.  Thanks to everyone who came, and to our December Sponsor of the Month Industrial Video Corporation.
 

November '07 Meeting
In November, we wrapped up the 2007 meeting year with a trip down to Cincinnati to visit one of the oldest and most advanced video post production facilities in this part of the country - The PPS Group.  After enjoying pizza and drinks in the lunch room, host Dave Dittgen lead us into their incredible High Def edit suite (a snug fit for our crowd) for a presentation on what PPS is doing in the retro world of cel animation.  Animator Joe Busam talked about the renewed interest cel animation, and how he stays busy creating hand-drawn animation sequences for TV spots and other productions.  Joe explained that he draws the characters frame-by-frame in pencil on pin-registered tissue paper, them scans the drawings into a computer.  He then uses special software to create clean lines, fill the colors and animate the frames, then these sequences are  combined with video shots and computer-generated animation and effects to produce the finished piece.  After seeing some samples of Joe's eye-catching animation work, we stopped briefly in the impressive PPS tape room before heading upstairs to PPS's video studio.

There, motion graphics specialist Chris Young from Dayton gave a fascinating presentation on the state of computer graphics.  Chris showed many samples of how computer graphics are being used to alter and enhance traditionally-photographed scenes in movies, as well as create entire new worlds of animation and effects.  Computer graphics are becoming so powerful that there is now essentially little or no noticeable difference between real and fabricated images.  Several of the samples Chris showed included split screens of raw scenes shot for movies like Zodiac and Pirates of the Caribbean 3 next to the finished scenes with incredible computer-generated backgrounds and characters.

Many thanks to Dave Dittgen and the PPS Group for hosting our November meeting, and to Chris Young for his mind-boggling presentation.  Also thanks to Tape Central, our November Sponsor of the Month.

October '07 Meeting
In October, we met at the School of Advertising Art in Kettering where Ian Lawson & Ryan McCoy gave an enlightening presentation on the current state and future of the internet.  As graduates of SAA and now instructors there, Ian and Ryan's presentation on "Web 2.0" covered a wide range of the developments and trends, including the exploding focus on rich media content (Flash), social websites (Facebook, MySpace), interactivity and Wikis (sites with visitor-contributed content).  In addition to covering many of the technical aspects of creating web content (XHTML, XML, AJAX, Java, Flash, etc.), they showed samples content created with them.  Many thanks to Ian and Ryan for their fascinating presentation, and to Joanie Spain of the SAA for hosting our meeting and providing the food.  Also thanks to Industrial Video Corporation, our October Sponsor of the Month.

September '07 Meeting
At a location fitting of the infamous date, we met at the Hamilton County Emergency Operations Center on September 11th, 2007.  In a joint meeting with the Apple Final Cut Pro Users Group from Cincinnati, we were treated to a rarely-given tour of the new Emergency Ops Center by operations manager Steve Sierveveld.  Located on a hill west of downtown Cincinnati, the state-of-the-art Center  was built in the former headquarters building of Slush Puppy Inc. 

At the core of the Ops Center is a large room with over 70 computer workstations and a giant 24-screen video wall which serves as an operations center for emergency personnel during a disaster or other emergency situation (such as a chemical spill, etc.).  The room has unlimited internet access, scads of backup power, and the video wall can display any broadcast or TV channel or from any computer workstation, in any combination of the 24 screens.  Off the large operations center room were smaller rooms for the press, management meetings, and situation rooms - all with computers and media access.  It was interesting to note that all of the computer were docked laptops, so the operators could take them to other locations and work during a prolonged emergency event.  Roscor was the main contractor for the video wall and its related equipment, and Dell supplied all of the computers and docked flat screen displays.

Also located in the building is the dispatch center for the Cincinnati Police and Fire Departments - we were able to look through the door but didn't go into this room to avoid disturbing the staff.

Many thanks to Steve Sierveveld of the HCEOC for arranging and conducting this excellent tour - this is the kind of facility you can tour only with a professional association like MCA-I!  Big thanks to our September Sponsor of the Month Industrial Video Corporation for providing the pizza and drinks for the meeting.
 

August '07 Meeting
Each August our chapter holds our Production Showcase, where we invite members and guests to bring samples of their productions to share and discuss.  This year we held our Showcase in the auditorium at the Berry Women's Health Pavilion at Miami Valley Hospital in Dayton.  A number of members and guests showed samples of TV spots and corporate videos that they've produced, including Norm Kern - Kern Video Productions, Morgan Howard and Fred Boettger -WHIO-TV, John Pugnale -MVP Video Creations, Jim Jones - Cherry Voiceworks, Chris Young - freelance motion graphics specialist, Kurt McGlocklin - AMG Digital Studios, Andrew Estevez - City of Dayton TV network, Bruce Linebaugh - LineMark Communications, and several others.  Thanks to everyone who brought samples to share, and special thanks to Doug Magilvy of Miami Valley Hospital for hosting our 2007 Production Showcase!
 

June '07 Meeting
In June we met at the beautiful new recital hall at Kettering Fairmont High School - an appropriate venue for a meeting on working with talent!  Marsha Roof, owner of the Roof-Goenner Talent Agency in Dayton and Columbus, led a discussion about working with professional talent.  She gave a lot of tips from the perspective of an talent agency owner and actress with years of experience doing commercials and industrial productions.  Supplementing Marsha's insights were  Scott Lange, well known union voice talent from Cincinnati, and Jim Jones, the most popular voiceover announcer in the Dayton area.  Scott and Jim contributed many valuable pointers and voice session war stories that kept the audience rapt and amused.  As an added bonus, nationally-recognized professional whip artist Gery Deer from Beavercreek was on hand to give his perspectives as a "performance artist."  He concluded the meeting by performing some of his most popular whip routines, including slicing a newspaper and extinguishing candles.

Many thanks to Marsha, Scott, Jim and Gery for making our June meeting so interesting and memorable!  Thanks also to Laura Hutchens for hosting our meeting at Kettering Fairmont High School, and to our Sponsor of the Month for July Tape Central.
 

May ’07 Meeting
Every May, our meeting is a recap of the giant NAB tradeshow held in Las Vegas in April.  This year, Industrial Video Corp. hosted our NAB Review meeting at their new facility in northern Cincinnati.  Branch Manager Mike Sparke began with a presentation that highlighted the hardware and software he thought was new and exciting for media producers.  In the post-production arena, his list included Apple’s new Final Cut Studio 2 and Final Cut Pro 6 non-linear editing software, AJA Io HD input-output interface box, Avid’s Script-Sync software, and the CaptionMaker CPC-700HD closed caption software.  In the growing world of HD cameras, Mike discussed the high-end Red ONE camera, the GVG/Thompson Infinity, The Sony XDCam EX, the Panasonic AG-HSC1U “beer can” camcorder, and Panasonic’s AG-HPX500, AJ-HPX2000 and AJ-HPX3000 DVCProHD camcorders.  Other equipment Mike mentioned was the Sony BVM-L230 HD CRT monitor, the AJA FS1 sync generator, GVG/Thompson Indigo switcher, the Canon Canobeam DT150HD free space light beam transmission system, and the Harris/LG MPH™ in-band mobile DTV system.

After Mike wrapped up his enlightening presentation, Rich LaRue from the Miami Valley Communications Council once again treated us to a whirlwind tour of NAB with a rapid-fire slideshow of photos he snapped at the show.  Rich’s famous slide shows are almost as good as actually being at the show, without the miles of walking through the massive Las Vegas Convention Center! 

Thanks to Mike Sparke and everyone at Industrial Video’s Cincinnati office for furnishing the delicious spread of food and the presentation, and for being our May Sponsor of the Month.  Special thanks to Rich LaRue for chauffering us down to Cincy in the MVCC van as well as for his (as always) great slide show!
 

April ’07 Meeting
In April we met at Promedia Digital, which was formerly known as Video Duplication Services (VDS) by everyone involved with video production in the Dayton area.  After the “meet and eat” hour and being welcomed to Promedia by Dayton manager Susan Guffey, Andrew Estevez discussed the upcoming Ohio Senate Bill 117 that will open competition in the cable TV market, but at the same time will slash funding for government and public access cable channels.

Next, Jason Norrod from Tape Central in Columbus gave a very informative presentation about some new trends in video gear, including HDV cameras, Blu-Ray DVDs and DVD recorders.  Following Jason, his wife and business partner Dawn Norrod talked about the many changes in recording media.  She said that S-VHS tape is being nearly discontinued by the tape manufacturers, VHS tape production is being drastically cut, and she discussed the status and availability of a number of other video and audio tape formats.

Thanks to Jason and Dawn for their presentation, and to their company Tape Central for being our April Sponsor of the Month.  In addition, many thanks  to Susan Guffey and everyone at Promedia Digital for hosting our April meeting and providing the food.
 

March ’07 Meeting
Our March meeting was supposed to be our February meeting, but a snowstorm on Feb. 12th forced us to postpone until March. We met at KTV, the video production facilities of The Kroger Company in downtown Cincinnati.

A large crowd from Dayton and Cincinnati showed up to see the newly-refurbished KTV facilities, network with fellow media pros, and listen to our two presenters for the evening.  Joyce Bentle talked about the training productions they produce at KTV for the 17 chains of stores owned by Kroger across the U.S. They have recently set up a satellite download system that can send video programming to any store or group of stores in the company.  The stores are equipped with a special phone that provides 2-way voice communications, a computer and a TV screen that displays the programming from the satellite network.  Currently, Kroger has 4 satellite channels to distribute training and other internal communications programming to individual stores that are scheduled to receive it.

Next up, Gary Templeton talked about what it’s like to work for and travel with a rock band!  He works for Nocturne Productions, a company that provide video and staging services for many of the biggest touring acts, such as Madonna and Paul McCartney.  Last year, Gary traveled across Europe with Guns-N-Roses as the video engineer for the tour.  He was responsible for setting up the 4-camera video system that covered the show on a projection screens and a large LED video display on the stage. During the concert, Gary operated the camera control units to keep the images constantly tweaked, then tore down and packed the video gear in the trucks after the show.  Gary dispelled a lot of the myths about what it’s like to tour with a rock band... it really means very long days, a lot of hard work, and mind-blurring travel, but it can be rewarding and enjoyable for those on the various technical crews.  Gary supported his talk with a slide show of photos he took on the GNR European tour, and passed around official crew ID badges and several bands’ tour itinerary books for us to look at.

Thanks very much to Joyce Bentle and everyone at KTV for hosting the meeting, providing the food and talking about what goes on at their facility.  Also many thanks to Gary Templeton for his fascinating presentation on touring with a rock band - in April he’s off to Japan and the far east to continue the tour with Guns-N-Rose... be sure to say “hey” to Axl for us!
 

January ’07 Meeting
To kick of 2007, we had a very special joint meeting with the Greater Dayton Advertising Association and the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC).  The dinner meeting at the Crowne Plaza in downtown Dayton featured a presentation by Mike Curie - a communications and PR specialist with the United Space Alliance, the contracted organization that handles many aspects of the Space Shuttle flights for NASA.

Mike described how he began his career as a disc jockey in Ohio and Texas before landing a job in communications with NASA before he joined the United Space Alliance.  He talked at length about crisis management planning, and working with the press during the Challenger and Columbia disasters.  Mike also discussed the technologies used to communicate with the Shuttle and many interesting facts about the Shuttle program, then wrapped up his presentation by showing a very cool promotional video produced by the Space Alliance.

Many thanks to Mike, the GDAA and IABC for a meeting that was truly "out of this world."  Also thanks to our January Sponsor of the Month Tape Central.