James Tauber : James Tauber's Blog 2004/08

blog > 2004 >

James Tauber's Blog 2004/08

Note to Titles-Only Atom Feed Subscribers

I've noticed that the number of subscribers to the titles-only feed is decreasing (with a corresponding increase in the full-text feed subscribers).

It just occurred to me that there are probably some titles-only feed subscribers that don't know that a full-text feed is available.

Oh, and now that production on Alibi Phone Network is over, expect me to get back to work on Leonardo.

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 30, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : (permalink)

Film Project Update: Second and Final Day of Shooting

Well, I'm glad we were ahead yesterday because we had a near disaster today.

We got off to a great start at a house we were fortunate enough to be able to use but we didn't get done until an hour after we'd told the owners of the house we'd be finished.

There was a mad rush to pack up everything and get it in James Marcus's car to take back to the office for the remaining scenes. However, after it had all be loaded up, Tom tried to start the car and the key broke. Without a spare, this would have been distressing at the best of times. But when it was the main equipment transportation for the entire shoot, the whole day was in jeopardy.

We managed, however, to move all the equipment to other cars and share rides to get back only a few hours later than planned.

The final shots were a mad race against the sun but we got everything done.

So principal photography is over. I'm actually quite sad—we had a great group of people and, stress aside, it was a great deal of fun.

I now need to sleep for 20 hours straight. After I've recovered and have caught up on some of the other aspects of my life that have been neglected during the making of this film, I'll be starting on the editing.

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 29, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : Categories filmmaking alibi_phone_network : (permalink)

Film Project Update: The First Day of Shooting

We ended at 6.30pm today, exactly 12 hours after the main cast/crew call. Things went exceptionally well. The actors were awesome and we had a phenomenal crew, some of whom were friends of friends and who turned out to be excellent. We even got an extra scene shot so we're looking good for tomorrow.

There were only two problems that arose. One was the buzz of insects that sometimes held up a scene in a garden. The other was a very humorous sequence of goofs where every elevator except the one our actress was in front of answered the call and opened. To the old adage of "never work with animals or children" I now add "or elevators or insects".

I am absolutely exhausted. But we survived our first day.

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 28, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : Categories filmmaking alibi_phone_network : (permalink)

Film Project Update: First Call

I'm writing this on location at 5.30am. Majority of cast and crew will be arriving in the next hour. I'm printing the latest script updates from Tom and once James Marcus (who'll be 1st AD) comes in we'll go through the day's schedule.

Actors came in last night for a final rehearsal (also a first rehearsal with the two male characters together). My combined Script Supervisor / 2nd Assistant Camera pulled out last night. Otherwise things are going well.

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 28, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : Categories filmmaking alibi_phone_network : (permalink)

Film Project Update: On the Eve of Principal Photography

The equipment has arrived. The shooting schedule and shot list has been finalised. We have all our props. James Marcus has had a hair cut. I've done my laundry.

Two more hours until the actors come for a rehearsal. Fifteen hours until the first call for principal photography.

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 27, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : Categories filmmaking alibi_phone_network : (permalink)

Film Project Update: Good News

Yesterday we got confirmation on the final location. Then today I got the letter from SAG approving our application for an Experimental Film Agreement.

Funnily enough, when Tom, James and I grabbed some Chinese food for dinner, my fortune cookie said "good news will come via mail".

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 24, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : Categories filmmaking alibi_phone_network : (permalink)

Film Project Update: Second Crew Rehearsal

On Sunday we did another full day of crew rehearsal. Came up with a great interior crane shot with the jib. In the afternoon, two of the actors came by and we did a bunch of scenes with them including a thirty-foot tracking shot in a parking lot. We've since asked our rental place if we can get more track for the principal photography so we're set to get sixty feet.

The actors we've cast are great. This should be a great shoot.

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 24, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : Categories filmmaking alibi_phone_network : (permalink)

Film Project Update: First Crew Rehearsal

Today was our first full-equipment crew rehearsal.

Tom, James and I, along with Production Assistants and Stand-ins Travis Bennett and Virender Dogra filmed two scenes: one a tracking shot and the other a dialog scene.

Immediate observations: firstly, the combination of 24p and cine-like gamma on the Panasonic DVX-100A is stunning. Secondly, use of a track dolly adds incredible production value.

All three together led to the most professional, film-looking shot I've ever done in my time as an amateur digital cinematographer.

After dinner, James and I went through the script and did a shot-by-shot breakdown. For most of the dialog scenes, we've planned a fairly standard combination of master shot plus tight and wide shots in both directions for good coverage in five shots per dialog scene. For some of the more action-oriented scenes we have some more fine-grained shots planned.

As both the cinematographer and editor, I found myself having to be strict about separating what we wanted to film for coverage with how I would eventually edit it. Sufficient coverage will be crucial.

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 22, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : Categories filmmaking alibi_phone_network : (permalink)

Film Project Update: One Week To Go

This weekend I've rented the full set of equipment we'll be using. This will give us the opportunity to get familiar with it, both in general and in the specific context of our locations.

I've rented:

camera (24p MiniDV)
tripod with fluid head
dolly with 30' track
jib for crane shots
lighting kit and reflector
shotgun mic, boom, mixer, headphones
monitor

We have verbal agreements from all three cast members. I'm almost finalised with SAG (the person I've been dealing with there has been excellent). We have all but one location secured.

Biggest risks at the moment are: securing last location, bad weather, actor/crew illness.

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 20, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : Categories filmmaking alibi_phone_network : (permalink)

Film Project Update: The Auditions

At 3pm on Tuesday, went to pick up the camera and tripod and FedEx the documents to SAG.

At 5.30pm we went to the Marriott to set up the room.

From 6pm to 8.30pm we had numerous people come in and read for us.

The first thing I learnt was that headshots do not tell you much about whether a person would fit a character or not. There was at least one person that I was so sure would be a fit for one character based on their headshot but ended up being a much better fit for a completely different character once I saw their facial expressions.

Second thing I learnt was that actors will read any given line so differently from each other that it doesn't even seem like the same line.

We got some excellent performances. Actors deliver lines so much better than non-actors. It was really amazing to see. And our SAG member - he had such a presence that when he walked in the room, I felt like I was meeting someone famous (super nice guy, though!)

During the audition, we ordered some food and when the waitress walked in, I was speechless because she looked exactly like what I imagined the female character would look like. So I got James to go ask her to audition. She couldn't then and there and we didn't really want to risk losing our first choice from the auditions and take a chance on someone who'd never acted. I think if we were more experienced at directing actors, we might have given it a go. I still want to give her the opportunity to be involved in the film, though, as she seemed excited about the whole thing.

But the actress we chose for the principal female role was a great actress, even though she didn't have the look we were initially thinking, so I think we made the right choice. If the waitress had turned out to be an actor, it would have been a cool "discovery" story, though.

So, basically, we have our three choices for the principal characters now. Two have verbally accepted, just waiting on the third.

Tomorrow I have to check with SAG whether I can get the agreement I need with them.

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 18, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : Categories filmmaking alibi_phone_network : (permalink)

Film Project Update: Auditions Tomorrow

Well, we've organized equipment rental and auditions should be over in 24 hours time. I'm about to finalise the schedule and budget to fax over to SAG. The actress we all liked the best from the headshots can't make the film which is a huge disappointment to Tom, James and I. I'm hoping someone else comes in and blows us away. I've asked the SAG actor we all like for the male lead if he can help out with casting the female part.

I said last update that I'd reveal the name of the film in this update.

Our film is called The Alibi Phone Network.

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 16, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : Categories filmmaking alibi_phone_network : (permalink)

Maximizing the Differences

OpenFlow mostly agreed with my post on XML and RDF but took issue with me on one point that I think was a misunderstanding.

When I said "the default serialization of RDF as XML should not be the principal way RDF is interchanged", I wasn't against serializing as XML. I meant that a generic RDF to XML serialization isn't necessarily going to result in the optimal XML schema.

XML should be the way RDF is expressed but I don't think a single (or even small handful of) generic mappings is going to give you nearly as nice XML as if you tweaked the mapping for the particular ontology.

OpenFlow suggests "A canonical way of expressing RDF would probably go a long way in minimizing the differences (and flame wars) between RDF and XML" but I don't want to minimize the differences between RDF and XML because I think they serve a very different purpose. I'm trying to reduce the overlap in order to minimize the flame wars.

One advantage of the RDF ontology + mapping + XML schema approach over the RDF ontology + generic XML serialization is people who don't like the generic RDF/XML serialization don't have to use it; they can invent their own XML schema.

Furthermore, we RDFers don't have to lament over every "non-RDF" XML schema developed. We can hope that the developers of individual XML schemas would provide a mapping to an RDF ontology, but if they don't, someone else always can.

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 14, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : (permalink)

OPML Sharing and Polling Security

Prompted by Scoble, I uploaded my OPML to Dave Winer's OPML sharing site.

You should too!

I was just about to comment that it would be nice—along the lines I was suggesting in Aggregation Versus Hosting—if you could just provide a URI for your OPML and have the site pull it in on a regular basis.

Well it turns out you can. Thank you Dave!

Now if Bloglines would take the same URI (via polling plus the ability to force a reload) I'd be even happier.

Making a resource available for polling rather than uploading it to a variety of sites raises some additional security issues. What if I wanted to make my resource available to aggregator.example.com but no one else? One possibility would be to submit the URI along with a username and password that aggregator.example.com could use with Basic Auth to retrieve the URI. Alternatively, and more securely, aggregator.example.com could publish a public key and I could configure my site to encrypt the resource using that public key whenever aggregator.example.com requested it. I wonder if either would fly.

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 14, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : (permalink)

Film Project Update: Two Weeks Until Principal Photography

A couple of people have asked for an update on the film. Things are going well, although I made the decision to push back the schedule a little.

Auditions are taking place next Tuesday. We've rented a meeting room at the Boston Marriott Burlington. Most of the locations have been chosen although we're still scouting a couple more. Arranging the equipment rental is a little behind as is getting workers' compensation insurance. The latter means we're going to be cutting it fine for the SAG agreement.

But overall I'm confident. Principal photography is scheduled for 28th and 29th August. My next film project update, I'll probably announce the film's working title.

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 13, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : Categories filmmaking alibi_phone_network : (permalink)

My New PowerBook

I just bought an Apple PowerBook. So all you Mac users out there, email me your tips on the "must-have" apps/tools I need to download/buy and I'll post them here after a little while.

UPDATE (2004-09-18):

What people recommended (in no particular order).

Thanks to Simon Willison, Robert Fleming, Michael Twomey, Bill Anderson, Chris Adams, Ashley Aitken:

Launchbar (3 recommendations)

http://www.obdev.at/products/launchbar/

"if you prefer keyboard over mouse"

"having a fast search engine for apps, documents, contacts, etc. really changes the way you work."

"quick access to applications/URLs/email addresses"

WorldClock

http://www.mabasoft.com/downloads/worldClockDeluxeX.html

"for international travellers/workers like yourself"

DragThing

http://www.dragthing.com/

"a more powerful version of the Dock for power users"

iTerm (4 recommendations)

http://iterm.sourceforge.net

"a much better alternative to Apple's Terminal.app."

"replacement for terminal"

"(though I've temporarily reverted to Terminal.app for some stuff as I'm getting bad load issues with iTerm). For me it's terminal with tabs."

SubEthaEdit (3 recommendations)

http://www.codingmonkeys.de/subethaedit/

"a fantastic text editor, and that's even before you start playing with the collaboration features."

"is collaborative editing as it should be. I know I've moaned about it in the past, but I still like it, and it's great for group editing."

QuickSilver (3 recommendations)

http://quicksilver.blacktree.com/

"makes the Dock obsolete - an awesome way of launching programs and quickly finding files and contacts."

"having a fast search engine for apps, documents, contacts, etc. really changes the way you work."

"is a must (at least until spotlight arrives). Ctrl + space + first few letters of app's name = great way to launch stuff for people used to keeping an xterm around to launch apps."

VLC (2 recommendations)

http://www.videolan.org

"an open source video player, plays almost any format you throw at it (including DivX) and unlike QuickTime allows you to play things in full screen mode."

"Video file player"

NetNewsWire (4 recommendations)

http://www.ranchero.com/netnewswire

"an excellent RSS / Atom news aggregator."

"RSS client"

"THE news aggregator, just buy it (I know there is a lite, but just buy it)."

FireFox (2 recommendations)

http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/

"Safari is good, but I find things like gmail work better on firefox. And type ahead find is hard to beat when you are addicted to it."

OmniWeb

http://www.omnigroup.com

"it's a very user-oriented browser which relies on the Safari rendering engine."

Salling Clicker

http://www.salling.com

"if you have a Bluetooth phone you can use this as a remote control for your computer (iTunes, PowerPoint, etc.) and to execute arbitrary commands based on state changes - pause the DVD player when you get a call, lock the screen or adjust IM status when you walk away from the computer, etc."

BluePhoneMenu

http://www.reelintelligence.com/BluePhoneMenu/

"completes things from a Bluetooth perspective - it manages your SMS history, maintains a call log, displays your addressbook entry for incoming calls along with options to reply w/SMS or punt the call to voice mail."

uControl (2 recommendations)

http://gnufoo.org/ucontrol/

"this lets you remap keys and enable scroll-wheel emulation on a trackpad (I use function+trackpad for scrolling all the time)."

"remap keys/enable "scroll-wheel" like support w/ trackpad. I use in conjuction with sidetrack"

Sidetrack

http://www.ragingmenace.com/software/sidetrack/index.html

"take full control of your trackpad"

QuickTime Broadcaster

http://www.apple.com/quicktime/products/broadcaster/

"allows you to stream / save arbitrary audio and video streams. I've used it for recording and streaming talks."

RsyncX

http://www.macosxlabs.org/rsyncx/rsyncx.html

"a resource-fork-aware version of rsync with a graphical front-end. I give it to portable users for backups since SSH works anywhere on the Internet and it's usable over slow connections."

TinkerTool

http://www.bresink.de/osx/TinkerTool.html

"a front-end for a bunch of system customizations."

SSHPassKey

http://www.codefab.com/unsupported/

"an Aqua ssh-askpass equivalent. If you script SSH but don't use an SSH agent this will prompt you for your password."

Little Snitch

http://www.obdev.at

"control outbound tcp connections"

MenuMeters (2 recommendations)

http://www.ragingmenace.com/software/menumeters/

"a set of CPU, memory, disk, and network monitoring tools for MacOS X. (sit in toolbar)"

"is great for spotting runaway apps and generally getting a feel for your mac's status."

Geektool

http://projects.tynsoe.org/en/geektool/

"is a geek's must have, it prints console messages (you know, the stuff which winds up in the syslog) in a discrete manner to your desktop. Great for spotting apps which are throwing wobblers (helped me pin down an odd issue with Control Center)."

Desktop Manager

http://wsmanager.sourceforge.net/

"gives you virtual desktops. I just have the menu bar desktops and drop the desktop panel myself."

Ecto

http://ecto.kung-foo.tv/

"is an excellent blogging tool (I'm using it right now)."

Emacs (2 recommendations)

http://www.mindlube.com/products/emacs/

"I almost didn't get my new job 'cos they thought I used vi (allegedly). Emacs is very nice once you've activated the pc-mode stuff, then you have sane selection and navigation."

GnuPG

http://www.gnupg.org/

Thunderbird

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 13, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : (permalink)

Aggregation Versus Hosting

Last week, in DOAP and the Next Advogato, I touched on my desire for sites that allow me to use my own website as the authoritative source of information while at the same time publishing that information and aggregating it with that from others for the purpose of searching, rating, etc.

In Some 'Web as platform' noodling, Kottke ponders the opposite: putting different components of your digital life out on different websites: using one site for your photos, another for your playlists, another for your calendar, etc.

But this is exactly what I don't want to do. I'm happy to publish my blog and open source project info on Advogato but I'd like it to act purely as an aggregator of my RSS/Atom and DOAP feed, not the authoritative source. I'm happy to use LinkedIn but I'd like LinkedIn to poll my FOAF - not have LinkedIn be the authoritative source. I'd like to be able to publish events from my calendar to Upcoming.org rather than enter them in Upcoming.org and use their feed if I want to use my own info on my site.

I think there's a lot of value in pure aggregation sites. I like the value-add that reading blogs in Bloglines provides in terms of references and recommendations. But I'm not interested in pulling my blogroll from them, I'd rather push it to them (or have them pull it from me).

The value of a LinkedIn or Upcoming.org is in the aggregation, not using them as an authoring tool or repository for one's own data. They should focus on competing on the value-add of their aggregation. I don't see any disadvantage for them in opening up the input mechanism to pull the source information from external authoritative feeds (or support the information being pushed to them).

I'm not ruling out the need for information hosting services. But I think aggregators and hosting services are different beasts and separating them provides many advantages to both providers and consumers of information.

UPDATE (2004-09-25): Now see More on Aggregation Versus Hosting

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 11, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : (permalink)

Hackers and Painters

I started reading Paul Graham's Hackers and Painters this weekend, in somewhat of a random order. I've read five essays so far and have thoroughly enjoyed every single one of them. It is not so much that they are introducing me to new ideas as expressing in an interesting way ideas I've had for a while. So I found myself not so much saying "I'd never thought of that before" as "I'd never thought of putting it that way before".

Clearly, I'm coming at the book already sharing many of Paul Graham's views. I'm not sure the book would convince people who hold alternative views to change their mind. This is evidenced by the strikingly bi-modal distribution of ratings on Amazon.com:

5 stars: 10 reviews
4 stars: 3 reviews
3 stars: 0 reviews
2 stars: 0 reviews
1 star: 5 reviews

But certainly I'm recommending the book to non-hacker friends as well as to friends I already know share a lot of the same perspective.

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 9, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : Categories books : 0 comments (permalink)

DOAP and the next Advogato

I've recently been reading about Edd Dumbill's Description of a Project (DOAP) project.

Machine readable descriptions of software projects is something I've dabbled in since 1998 when I started XMLSOFTWARE.COM. Around that time I worked a little bit with Lars Marius Garshol's XML Software Autoupdate (XSA). Microsoft had Open Software Description (OSD), although OSD was more designed for describing component dependencies whereas XSA was designed for software directories to be able to poll to get updates from developers (a use-case DOAP would be suited to as well).

Given that a lot of this site is about open source software projects of mine, I'll probably add DOAP support to Leonardo at some stage, probably around the same time I add FOAF support. But I have the same questions about the relationship between DOAP and, say, Freshmeat or Advogato as I do between FOAF and the Orkuts and Linkedins of the world. Namely: how can I use my own website as the authoritative source of my own FOAF and DOAP information while at the same time that information being available in directories for searching, rating, etc.

The RDF-nature of both FOAF and DOAP means that what is really needed is a general mechanism that does this for any RDF, although FOAF and DOAP specific support would make a great start.

I'm thinking for starters of a version of Advogato where you just specific the URI for your FOAF, DOAP and RSS.

by James Tauber : Created on Aug. 1, 2004 : Last modified Feb. 8, 2005 : (permalink)

Great Hackers, Python, Java, Eclipse and Chandler

In his latest essay, Great Hackers, Paul Graham suggests that one mark of a great programmer is that, given the choice, they'll program in Python rather than Java. He points out that Google requires Python experience, even when hiring for Java positions, because it attracts better candidates.

Almost all of my "recreational" programming over the last five years has been in Python. I'm not saying that makes me one of Graham's Great Hackers, but it is certainly the case that, given the choice, I write in Python and not in Java. In fact, the only time I write in Java outside of work is when I'm writing plugins for Eclipse. The Eclipse platform is seductive enough that it keeps me writing GUI apps in Java, even when I have the choice.

The implication is, though, that if there were a Python equivalent of Eclipse (the platform, not just the IDE), I could cease to write in Java all together whenever I had the choice.

The first step would be getting something like wxPython to the level of SWT+JFace. Next would be a standard plugin framework.

The last couple of months I've wondered if Chandler might be the best avenue to achieve this. It already has a pluggable "parcel" framework and if it is going to compete as a PIM, it's going to have to drive wxPython to the level of SWT+JFace.

I still stand by my prediction about Eclipse being the next Emacs but I'd love to see a Python equivalent, whether it's Chandler or not.