MediaStorm projects nominated for three Emmy Awards

MediaStorm is thrilled to announce that three of our 2009 projects have been nominated for the 31st Annual Emmy Awards for News & Documentary.   Driftless: Stories from Iowa, by Danny Wilcox Frazier, was nominated in the New Approaches to News & Documentary Programming: Documentaries Category. Once at the center of the U.S. economy, the family farm now drifts at its edges. In Iowa, old-time farmers try to hang on to their way of life, while their young push out to find their futures elsewhere. Driftless tells their stories.   Times of Crisis was nominated in the New Approaches to News & Documentary Programming: Current News Coverage Category. In Times of Crisis, Reuters charts 365 days of global financial upheaval to see how lives have changed as a divergent world embarks on an era of historic challenge.   Surviving the Tsunami: Stories of Hope was also nominated in the New Approaches to…

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MediaStorm’s Guide to Using Apple’s ProRes 422 Codec

One of the questions I'm asked most frequently about Final Cut is, "When do I use Apple's ProRes 422 codec?" To tackle this question it's first necessary to understand a few things about codecs. Shooting video is a very intensive digital capture process. It requires cameras to capture lots of information in a short amount of time. To handle so much raw data, most cameras need to compress what they capture. A codec is essentially a compression scheme, a way to encapsulate so much material into a containable format. Standard DV footage, for instance, uses a compression scheme referred to as the DV codec. Similarly, HD footage -- 1080i60, 1080p, etc. -- uses the HDV codec. Codec takes its name from “encoder” and “decoder” since your computer must now decode the encoded file during playback. When you create a new sequence in Final Cut, you are building what will become a new…

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Worth Watching

Another group of stunning/important/innovative multimedia and video projects we've been watching lately. If you have any to add, please let us know in the comments! You can see previously featured videos here. 30. Leave Me from Daros Films Fictional films can have great impact. - Brian Storm 31. Bugs! from Ryan Enn Hughes Wicked. - Brian Storm 32. UP THERE from Jon Gorgeous short film, shot as part of The Ritual Project sponsored by Stella Artois. - Jessica Stuart 33. The Future of Publishing A good example of why you should watch pieces until the end. Thanks to Michael Croan for the tip. - Brian Storm 34. Prison Valley by Pilippe Brault & David Dufresne with Upian for Arte "Prison Valley" in Colorado includes more than 36,000 inmates in 13 prisons. The web documentary is a state-of-the-art showcase of in-depth, rich media reporting from Brault and Dufresne, innovative concepting and sublime implementation…

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Apply now for the Ian Parry Scholarship – deadline extended to this Friday, July 9

Good news for anyone considering applying to this year's Ian Parry Scholarship: The Ian Parry Scholarship 2010 deadline has been extended to Friday 9th July 10am (UK Time). Applications are digital. FTP instructions and application forms are available from www.ianparry.org The Ian Parry Scholarship is designed to award young photojournalists with a bursary that will enable them to undertake a chosen project and raise their profile in the international photographic community. The Scholarship is aimed at traditional or contemporary photojournalism and photographers with strong story telling capabilities. Ian Parry was a photojournalist who died whilst on assignment for the Sunday Times during the Romanian revolution in 1989. He was just 24 years old. The Scholarship was set up by Aidan Sullivan and Ian’s friends and family in order to build something positive from such a tragic death. The competition is for photographers on full-time photographic courses or who are 24 years or…

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MediaStorm Contributor, Chad A. Stevens, fights to finish his film and save a mountain

The Coal War is the story of a symbol and a struggle: one mountain destined to be destroyed by the coal industry and a courageous effort to bring renewable energy to the heartland of America. MediaStorm Contributor and former Producer Chad A. Stevens has been working tirelessly for the last several years to document the fight going on near Coal River Mountain, and is looking for help to finish the film. Visit The Coal War site to find out more about the film. You can also check out (and support, if you're so inclined) their campaign for funding to finish the film on Kickstarter: Chad's work on the topic of mountaintop removal has also included Leveling Appalachia, a project for Yale Environment 360. Harvard's Nieman Storyboard recently published a story on the project: Chad A. Stevens on choosing sides and choosing stories: two approaches to mountaintop removal mining

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