Blog | Robert Ouimet

Video: Kris Krug at the Multimedia Gallery

Vancouver photographer Kris Krug is multi-tasking even more than usual during these Olympic Games, and that’s saying something.

He’s been contributing photos to DigiBC at VX Showcase events, his photos have been featured in the Los Angeles Times, he shares them with the world on Flickr, and at Staticphotgraphy.com (love the images of the skaters).

He and I got a preview tour of the Multimedia Gallery at the BC Pavilion last week, and I thought it might be fun to turn the camera around on him a bit – and give you a glimpse of kk+ in action…

You can find Kris on Twitter, or contact him through Staticphotography.com

Vancouver Company Offers Free SMS to Haiti

I’m working with DigiBC on a new project called VXperience, and one of the things we’re doing is spreading the word about British Columbia’s incredible pool of innovators working in a variety of digital sectors.

We’re just starting to gather up some of their stories, but I wanted to get this information out as quickly as possible.

Branko Zurkovic from U pside Wireless emailed to say that IPIPI.com is offering free text messaging to Haiti.

He says the company wanted to do what it could to help out, so their offering their service free – making it possible for friends and relatives to text to either of the networks in Haiti for free.

I’ll let Branko explain more in this clip:

click to play

To get set up:

go to IPIPI.com
create an account (it’s free)
click on ‘contact us’ and let them know you want to be able to send messages to Haiti
your account will be configured to let you send message for free

And you can help out by sending this information to anyone you think might be able to use it.

The Podcast Desk

Here’s a peak at my podcast production desk.

Almost all the podcasts I produce for clients involve on-location recordings – so after the sound has been gathered, I spend a lot of quality time huddled with this gear, assembling the material and doing whatever post-production is needed to the audio.

Typically, production involves multi track mixes of eight to 12 tracks, and up until recently I’ve been doing that work with Adobe Audition.

I switched to Pro Tools last year and regret not doing it sooner – the learning curve is quite steep, but once it clicks, everything just falls into place, particularly if you’ve ever worked in a large multi track studio environment.

I should point out that even though I’m a huge fan of Pro Tools, I still recommend Audion to people – it runs well on just about any PC and is still an inexpensive way to get going with multi-track audio software. (When Adobe bought what was then called Cool Edit, I thought they’d bury the software, but Adobe has continued to support it)

Here’s the guide to what’s on the desk (click either image to see a larger version).

1. ProTools 8

2. Tannoy Active monitors

3. Ipod

4. Phone audio interface/patch for
recording phoners, like on BrainPicker.ca

5. Headphones

6. Microphone

7. CF cards from Sound Devices field recorder

8. Pen for Wacom tablet

9. Mixer for house sound

10. M-box (audio interface for ProTools)

11. Wireless keyboard

12. Must have – coffee

13. Must have – analog notepad

14. Midi keyboard

15. Mackie MCU control surface

In the field I use Sound Devices gear – their digital recorders and field mixers are simply the best. People accustomed to those tiny consumer recorders find the gear big, but for flawless & dependable field recording, there simply is nothing like it. I am almost always running on battery power, and I can go for a solid 4 hours without even worrying about a charge – and that’s with a full 4 channel mixer feeding into the digital recorder. And coupled with custom PortaBrace bags, I can use the stuff in any kind of weather.

John Ralston Saul – Podcast

“We start to accept that ridiculous language in which citizens are referred to by politicians and administrators as clients.

We’re not clients of government.

We own the government, it’s our government.

There isn’t a single thing of government which we don’t own, how could we be clients ?

And we aren’t buying shoes, we’re talking about the rights of citizens within their own society.

We’re not stakeholders, we’re citizens.”

– John Ralston Saul, speaking at the PLAN 20th Anniversary evening at Christ’s Church Cathedral in Vancouver, November 20, 2009.

John Ralston Saul is an award winning novelist and essayist, and one of Canada’s most outspoken champions of freedom of expression.

His most recent book is called The Collapse of Globalism and the Reinvention of the World. It’s just the latest in a series of best selling works that have been translated into 22 languages and sold in over 30 countries. Earlier this year he become the first Canadian to elected president of International PEN, the association of writers devoted to defending freedom of expression.

John is also the patron of PLAN (Planned Lifetime Advocacy Network), and he was the featured guest speaker at PLAN’s recent 20th Anniversary celebration in Vancouver.

I was asked to record the evening, and you now can hear the John’s keynote here:

Online Photo Gallery

I’ve been meaning to build a simple online gallery to display photographs I take of my home on Vancouver’s North Shore.

I used Slide Show Pro quite a bit for client sites – the built-in content management system makes it easy to change high impact visuals, yet have lots of options for how they are displayed.

For this photo gallery I wanted to keep things really simple. You can see it at iLoveNorthShore.ca