Fortress Of Freedom Board

[Maurice Ali]

Back to a weekend of video editing. What I would not mind having is a jib (a crane by any other name...with a mechanism that keeps the camera oriented as you move it around) and we could probably rent this but would be nice to have. We actually have a arm and stand for a static shot, but the jib gives you smooth motion..... As for a dolly, we can use our Manfrotto dolly and tripod - finally make use of that 1200 dollar contraption; and even though the wheels are hard rubber a soft rubber tape will make it run smooth for a shot or two. I am even looking at home made Foley Effects as we get that mic. close to the performers and lose the background noise.

Funny thing is that we are walking that fine line where ordinary individuals can produce as opposed to the economic realities of just having a semi-pro come in and help out. That is a grey area in our little experiment here. I am getting to know people and for airplay we can get this kind of help, if this is what we really want.....that is the question.....



That pic. is our video editor and it is an old photo but you get the idea. That is one work station as the video and sound workstations are truly specific machines now and are off-line with the office internet computer and reception computer also area specific.


Audio!


Reception, gone is the Mac.....


Here is my office.....

I have an aditional computer for visiting questionable websites..... Note that I still use crt sceens for editing as the brighness and such are not so variable with orientation. I use two dual lcds at the office workstation when editing photos and graphics as well as the web.....


Here is our - stay at home - old studio camera on our makeshift - dolly.....


Some more.....

The reason I seemed preoccupied with organzational stuff the last little while and not specific projects, is....because that is what is needed for us to continue. Money is king and if and when I sit infront of a banker or venture capitalist, they are just going to look at the paper work and judge me by that. They really don't care if the lighting was perfect or if the audio was clean - you can buy that..... What they are interested in is if this guy infront of them has the business accumen to set his organization properly to handle the activites the come into being - before - they happen. The technical end is quite irrelevent. The only one who does this here is me - so now you know. We do the best we can in our projects and I deliberatly go the documentary route as you avoid bad scripts and bad acting. Ordinary people are the best actors when they live their own experiences. But we are looking to make our fictional experimental film, because I want it on the resume, no one trick pony here. We will actually try to get this one right and show the world we can do it - most importantly, complete each project. That's enough babble for now.....

Oh, there is one thing I will not play safe on - and that is the creative side of the project. Like I said, the businessmen don't care about the intricacies, so I can leave it to the crew to try new and exciting things. I alway let FOF performers do their own thing, because that is freedom of their creativity and does little to harm my side of the organization..... See, I ain't so bad after all.....

[Maurice Ali]

One "BIG" day for me - I can say this:

http://fortressoffreedom.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=5018#5018


Like I said above, I can say that and mean it! My mom said it to me a few months ago that I was now a producer...I finally believe it! Once again, if anyone had told me what I would be up to five years ago, I would have laughed, told them to f**k off and walked away. Life is full of surprises.....


Here is another photo of the dolly way down low and the other tripods with cameras for compaison.





On second look at that poor excuse for wheels mounting an obsolete camera for show to laypeople, all I can say is: "Please someone give me expensive dolly on tracks and eight foot jib....."

[Maurice Ali]

Sorry for the delay.
When things are quiet like this it usually means deals are being made and stuff is a happening.....

[Maurice Ali]

Well TWENTY6HUNDRED's TV show is off to the CRTC for certification. That gives us seven TV programs and means possible series distribution!

Read it here:




http://fortressoffreedom.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1946

[Maurice Ali]

Our first commercial advertisement for Spin City Music is basically done and will be sent to the vender for review before final finishing.....



Shameless commercialism you say...but we have to have money to survive and advertisng is the way for us to do that.....

[Maurice Ali]

I am integrating the ZOOM H4 into our workflow. It is the only solution at a price point we can afford at this time. I spent much of last night testing it and it is everything we need. Only gripe is the clock which is two seconds slow every hour. I can live with this and resynch as I got the best leasons making music videos.....

I can use this on the boom and get 96khz and 24bit audio from almost any audio microphone there is. Two XLRs with phantom power and two phone jacks and also a lowly mini-jack..... Plus the two onboard condensor microphones for journalism work. The thing looks like a tazer with the bars protecting the microphones.....

Definately a cool toy.....


I didn't really sleep last night so I will hop in and sleep till I can not sleep anymore. Funny how your life goes on and time goes by and can't be got back. The old clock just keeps ticking and you can not do anything to stop it, everyone is mortal - there are no supermen..... I am clinging on to whatever youth I have left, or perhaps I am just kidding myself..... It is a bit depressing to see what you may have missed out on. I know I missed out on many things, It can get to you sometimes. What you thought of as a heady advantage in your younger years may not pan out in your later years. Sure you may be able to pull a few rabbits out of your hat even at an advanced age, but where are you in the end..... This FOF thing has took many years of my life and the tail end of my youth, I sure hope it was worth it.....

[meggen]

[quote= try using "taken many years...." or drop the "has" in front of "took" and stop your whinning about loosing your youth to FOF - You made your choice when you started FOF.. Sorry buddy, but you should be more positive in life and may be you will find a companion

"Maurice Ali"]I am integrating the ZOOM H4 into our workflow. It is the only solution at a price point we can afford at this time. I spent much of last night testing it and it is everything we need. Only grip is the clock which is two seconds slow every hour. I can live with this and resynch as I got the best leasons making music videos.....

I can use this on the boom and get 96khz and 24bit audio from almost any audio microphone there is. Two XLRs with phantom power and two phone jacks and also a lowly mini-jack..... Plus the two onboard condensor microphones for journalism work. The thing look like a tazer with the bars protecting the microphones.....

Definately a cool toy.....


I didn't really sleep last night so I will hop in and sleep till I can not sleep anymore. Funny how your life goes on and time goes by and can't be got back. The old clock just keeps ticking and you can not do anything to stop it, everyone is mortal - there are no supermen..... I am clinging on to whatever youth I have left, or perhaps I am just kidding myself..... It is a bit depressing to see what you may have missed out on. I know I missed out on many things, It can get to you sometimes. What you thought of as a heady advantage in your younger years may not pan out in your later years. Sure you may be able to pull a few rabbits out of your hat even at an advanced age, but where are you in the end..... This FOF thing has took many years of my life and the tail end of my youth, I sure hope it was worth it.....[/quote]

[Maurice Ali]

[Maurice Ali]

Here is a photo of the ZOOM H4:





Totally pro and able to handle everything we have. I placed a pen and my other digital audio recorder to give a sense of size. That small recorder fits in my breast pocket and has recorded many a conversation that others would not want aired.....


I had a cold this weekend so I stayed indoors and worked on video. I will take things easy today and get plenty of sleep.....

[Maurice Ali]

Sorry for the update guys, actually I have been posting but privately as I have been depressed lately and figured I should not bother you. Anyway it is nothing major, just the weather and a bad cold. Actually I am excited because we were offered Prime Plus One !.....the rate to handle our revolving credit.....

Yep, that is what gives me a hard-on these days. Any better than that and FOF starts pissing with the Big Dogs.....how cool is that.....

Yes now I sound like a businessman, because financing is what will keep this organization going. I don't really think many of your realize just how close we are to being "for real." I also don't think most of you realize just how close the series is to being a reality.....that idea is original and great and real..... Think about that.....

Off to bed as I need to get over this cold.....

Prime Plus - 1!!!

[Maurice Ali]

These are truly the dog days.....

Still sick and this has a major effect on my disposition. Everyone is involved with Christmas activities so I am pretty much alone on things right now. I have finished with music manufacturing for a few months and this is one less thing on my mind. It really makes a difference when you can put a whole folder of activities to sleep for awhile.

My priorities now are still music promotion and the TV stuff. Brasseur's show is the priority for regular programing and Spin City is the priority for commercial advertising. Man is it hard to continue sometimes with so much on the plate. All you can do is just put your head down and keep knocking off small jobs one by one.

There are differences between the music world and TV land. First is the money - TV has money and it can be intoxicating to deal with billion dollar companies. People have devalued music but will still pay big time for TV and movies. Anyway, back to the differences. The people you deal with are also different. Music has more musicians in line managerial jobs while TV is the more traditional business mentality. Music world is much more laid back, actually I am kind of an outsider there while in TV land I am just a "pest" of no consequence. But when I deal with TV people I can be at my subterfuge best and it's all accepted as normal business activities, no egos involved. I can exact the response I want playing the game with TV guys. You deal with university educated, mostly "square" individuals like me and oddly enough they are more likely to really get what I am all about. Well I am back into the world of television again. And again, I am the only one who can do this at the organization.

Can I actually get the FOF experiment shown as a series - what was a pipe dream is actually something I can sell as we put out the shows individually.

It is tempting to think I could have screwed up and be in the process of shutting things down and licking my financial wounds. To just worry about the simpler things in life..... But things just keep getting ratcheted up and bigger. This is scary in a way as it could really all go "poof." But we have to try our best. Nobody is born with a halo over their head so I know we can compete in terms of interesting programing. Exciting and scary at the same time. And an interesting story on how we do things - but sitting here Indian style on the floor at four in the morning fighting a snot cold is a reality of what drives the project and what drives me.

I just wish I had a crystal ball, I am not young anymore and the dice is rolling and the stakes are higher......

[Maurice Ali]

There we go.....lucky thirteen shows - or a regular season of programing.....


http://fortressoffreedom.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=5037#5037


Now I have my big stick.....

[Maurice Ali]

Now we are in the race.

I can shop the projects around in their present state and if there is any interest work can be started directly from the last change. This can be done because all work was edited on AVID editors. Almost all broadcastors and production houses use AVID and the reason is simple - Make, Manage, Move - I can simply unplug my hard drives and plug them into the network's editors and all files and projects intantly open as they did in my computer, using the EDL function in the editor. The pros can do a better job of editing and finishing, all they need are the cutting room copies I make.....

Series production with that 2 terabite "war chest"of video is easy. I have held off on the newspaper as I want to get more video of actual printing and distributrion for the show. The first episode and the extra 30 minutes added onto Real Life were always available, that easy. The second variety show only needs a host, I even have the comedians lined up if need be..... That just leaves the epilogue which can only happen as we wind things down from it's present stage; but that still leaves me with the 11 episodes.....

Completing the bulk of music production gives me the concentration to go at this and the writer's strike keeps doors open for the time being. Somewhere, some cable station would not mind filling some time with this experiment.

[Maurice Ali]

I was at the bank today and refinanced some of our revolving credit. Funny that I have to put whatever talent I have to the most important things like financing. That is the most important thing, more important than creativity or guts and drive. Nothing happens without money.

I am on the editor for the rest of the weekend and downloading sound clips as that is our weakest link in video.

Still a bit sick and depressed. Personally, there is no future in this for me if you understand me, this is for you.....

As odd as it sounds, the bigger we get, the more isolated I get, the more fomal the relationships. I actually had more fun as we go back in time. Lonely at the top - the top of what.....hehehehehehe..... I still operate on the fringe of society, but us renegades can still have positive effect.....the why is always the funny question.....

[Maurice Ali]

Ok here is some more.....

We had a rather large loss last year and it turns out that it constantly works in our favor.

First is that we used it dealing with high end places like Metalworks. Not only did I get two CDs and video for TV, but I got much more..... I got my guys recording beside guys like Tom Cochrane, I changed schedules for Glass Tiger and had SAGA phone and e-mail me all day to switch studios (I made them wait all day.....bastard that I am (i.e. I was a big SAGA fan in the Eighties and loved every minute watching them squirm.....) - we got studio six - the high end one - and an extra technician out of it.....). I had Mike Bul lard run (yes run.....) up to me and shake my hand and introduce himself to me because someone there told him I was a TV and music producer (I am a TV and music producer? Hey I like that.....). I spent over an hour with the Bare Naked Ladies when they recorded there, no problems with the security, everyone knew who I was after half a year I was the well known and could come and go as I pleased (that was the highlight of my perceived identity as a music producer, that I was known in Toronto.....hehehehehe..... I also caught Jeff Ma rtin formerly of the Tea Party doing what he does best and will say no more. And TWENT6HUNDRED probably does not know the real cost of getting Pri nce's engineer to work with them (that is until Prince went on American Idol and then pulled Stu the next day.....).

Things like that.....

The other way the large loss works is financial. It was large but not fatally large, it was just right. A loss like that means you are not a vanity; and the leisurely way I just carried on gives the impression that we must have something on the ball here (and yes we do.....). It was a surprise that impresses everyone and it worked for us today. Small gross profits and small losses are trademarks of non-entities and we are not that anymore. Just funny how that has really worked out for us.....


Or let me put this another way.....


The reason I am so giddy about a bank treating me like a small up and coming corporation, is because we may indeed be a small up and coming corporation. This type of recognition has a small snowballing effect in that it makes it easier to start talking venture capital to people. I have four years and many accomplishments here and we finally have the smallest bit of "buzz." I can actually begin to think about approaching the Business Development Bank Of Canada for example. Nobody smirks at my business card anymore (well almost nobody.....hehehehehehe.....) actually that has gone from a joke, to a kid, to interest; and now silence.....Sometimes I bring up what we are doing, but it comes across as bragging if I read people right so I am trying to curtail much of the talk..... Off to bed now.....