You know how for some oddball celestial reason that there is somewhere in the universe that half a pair of socks gravitates to? Or where rogue coat hangers hang out? Or the tops off pens, potato peelers and the caps off the toothpaste go?

I have this problem with some of my video gear. Well not some, one thing specifically and I cannot fathom why or how.

Lens caps.

I applaud the person who integrated the lens cap into the body of the camera but this of course does not apply to many types other than compacts. dSLR cameras in particular seem to have the ne'er-do-well versions that simply go feral when they get the urge.

I KNOW I don’t put them in strange places or am forgetful, it’s just not in my makeup. I have never lost or locked in my car keys for example and have little sympathy for those that do.

But give me a camera with a loose lens cap, and as soon as I take it off, you can almost guarantee its immediate absence from the current plane of time and space.

Does anyone else have this issue? How do you deal with it (or a similar problem)? Are single socks and lens caps somehow strangely genetically related and at birth have a primeval urge to run away together?
It’s got me stumped.

Over the last couple of weeks a bone of contention has arisen, and whilst I know the reason behind the situation, it doesn’t make the lack of a solution any more palatable.

It involves the problem of tech stuff redundancy.

I appreciate that technology has to advance and this it does in the main, remarkably well. Perhaps an exception might be … no I cannot think of anything off the top of my head; perhaps the electric shaver? However it is annoying to have a perfectly good piece of equipment rendered almost useless by the change in something else.

Let me explain. Two of my senior writers on Auscam magazine due to circumstance still have a need for Firewire technology. They both have a large investment in professional camcorders that use this mode of data transfer (I am in the same boat by the way although to a far lesser degree).

Sadly though, they cannot take advantage of the advances in laptop or data transfer technology as Firewire has been dumped (mostly) in favour of USB 2.0, USB 3.0 and the supposedly upcoming Thunderbolt. There is a Dell laptop apparently but it is over the $2K mark which is way out of sync with the rest of the universe.

In a second case, the workflow of the TV station demands that Firewire still be used, but the only way now is to cough up in excess of $1800 to get a suitable adaptor. Expensive in anyone’s books when 3 years ago a Firewire card was about $50…

A third example is a perfectly good Acer Ferrari laptop that hums along nicely with Windows 7 64 bit, has a fantastic screen and keyboard, DVD burner, big hard disk and working Firewire but the internal fan has failed. This unit is 5 years old but the fan is apparently no longer available.

If this was any other piece of equipment – refrigerator, stove, vacuum cleaner etc – then consumer affairs might step in and help out. But it seems hi-tech is exempt.

As stated at the top, I understand that tech has to advance, but that is small succour when an initial investment of anything from $1K to $20K or even more becomes redundant through no fault of its own.

I bet you’d shy at counting all the dollars you have sitting in a box in the shed or spare room that is wasted due to a small component failure or change in tech.

It seems once again the question of price of IT / gadgets / software in Australia versus the US has reared its ugly head – so much so that the Government appears set to launch an enquiry.

Among my peers the big talking point is the current price Adobe has set for the new CS6 suite which has been set at somewhere around $1500 more than its US equivalent.

Now I am not qualified to comment on Adobe’s pricing as I do not have all the facts; to say the price is too high would need me to know the intimate details of their balance sheet and I doubt they will release that to any journalist. I suspect even the Government may be hard pressed to get that data at any enquiry.

What I do know though is it is interesting that people are talking about overpricing at the same time as companies such as JB HiFi and Dick Smith are announcing losses. This tells me one of two things; sales are down and hence profit margins follow, or the pricing levels of products are wrong.

If it is the former, then management needs to find out why (and I suggest including looking very hard at staff performance and ability) and remedy, and if the latter, then pricing policies and fixed and variable costs need to be addressed.

And this of course also brings into play the eternal grey marketing argument. I know people who don’t think twice about buying from overseas, but it’s not something I personally do.

My business is reliant on Australian vendors and distributors who are my advertisers at Auscam so it would be rather hypocritical of me to do so would it not? And many of my friends and colleagues are reliant on these companies for their income too whether it be as suppliers or even employers (or journalists dare I say).

I know that for some cost saving is the prime issue and I can’t argue with that as that is an individual decision. But I have learnt finally to try and look at the bigger picture. It’s far more interesting.

Are we becoming satisfied with mediocrity I wonder? Yeah, yeah I know, harping again.

Everywhere I look around me it seems we are, especially in the area of creativity. Have a look at the ‘net to see this is so. Even people who should know better appear to be happy to post photos online that are poorly lit, grainy, badly composed and in short, awful.

The same applies to video on YouTube etc.

In the haste to ‘capture the moment’ as the PR spin keeps explaining it as, we have lost all pride in the workmanship to make the ‘moment’ a magic one as against a mediocre, forgettable one – before we take the next ugly shot or clip.

The frustrating thing is that the steps necessary to go from mediocre to excellent are so simple and basic. Turn the flash on, make sure the subject is not backlit, use the camera ‘scene’ settings, use something to stabilise the camera and frame the subject.

Most importantly though, and where a huge leap in quality can be gained, is don’t be in such a bloody hurry to post the image to Facebook, Flickr, Twitter or whatever. It’s doubtful indeed there are people waiting breathlessly for your next photo to magically appear that they can coo or ‘cor!’ over.

So spend some time after the fact to use the tools available to tweak the photo, remove red eye, perhaps crop it or resize it; you don’t need to be a Photoshop whizzo you know! The software that probably came with your camera will do most of the basic things, and even the freebie apps in Windows and on the Mac are better than rudimentary and have Wizards to make these tasks easy.

Finally, and at the risk of sounding like a broken record, get up close and personal with your camera or (gasp) smartphone’s manual.

Right now, NAB is on in the US. For those not necessarily in the “know”, this is the one big show of the year that all major (and minor) vendors deem it fit to announce their new product line ups for the coming year.

NAB stands for “National Association of Broadcasters”, and in true US form seems to make out that all of the good stuff is United States of America-land sourced. Nothing could be further from the truth.

For example, Australian company Blackmagic has announced no less than 25 new products ranging from a new cinema camera to switches, video cards and converters.

Similarly we also have in Australia the world renowned RØDE Microphones which also creates the Event series of studio monitors.

Germany is well represented with the range of ProDAD video editing package plugins including Adorage, Mercalli and Heroglyph that work with most major editing packages including Edius 6, Sony Vegas, Adobe Premiere and others.

If you want to keep up with the waterfall of product announcements, at Auscam magazine we are setting up a special NAB section during the course of the day, so feel free to pop by at http://www.auscamoinline.com