The Vid Biz – Page 3 – lee-lawmaster.com

End of Year Headache… I Mean Upgrade

After finishing my last slide transfer job, the client asked me if I could transfer 120mm negatives. My scanner had been good to me, but I needed an upgrade and a way to take some money off of the books so the tax man wouldn’t eat me alive. I told him that I would get back with him after the upgrade.

The CSR where I really work, just upgraded a scanner and I really liked the one they went to. It’s a HP ScanJet G4050. When I researched it, I loved it even more. With the ability to scan up to 16 35mm slides at a time, and also do medium format stuff such as 120mm, I went for it. Also since my previous scanner was an HP, I had some familiarity with how their software and systems work.

I always try to read reviews very carefully before purchasing such a product, and I should have listened.

Many of the reviewers just spoke about problems with Vista – I figured such a problem, and that’s why I don’t plan on upgrading for a long time. There were some though that should have brought up a red flag. They spoke of problems installing the software altogether. XP SP2 and IE 7 have thrown a wrench in HP’s software since they both came out. I had problems with my old scanner because of this, but I didn’t think it would affect a new one, with different software.

I installed the software and everything went fine. I scanned a few bank statements, but ran into a problem after the third, it would just freeze. Alas, a problem. So I tried the first thing to come to mind, uninstall and re-install. That’s when I came into a world of trouble. The software wouldn’t fully uninstall. So I had to manually delete everything (including registry entries), just to re-install. HP doesn’t support their products (except computers) on the weekends or past 6pm Mountain time, so I was SOL. I searched deep for solutions, but only found clues.

I even installed the Vista software that came with the scanner, and it worked the same way, perfect several times and then freezing. I gave up for the evening and decided to make a fresh start in the morning. I installed the full software suite that I downloaded from the HP website and ta-da, it works now!

I might go to Canon or Epson for my next scanner. Hopefully that will be several years down the road.

Sliding On

Recently I have been scanning slides for a new client. He worked with my father at Westinghouse/ABB back in the day. He has given me over 700 of these babies, and let me know via email last night that there are more.

With my single slide scanner I have been making headway, but it’s very time consuming. My slide scanning services have been utilized very much, so this is one area I will be improving on once I have the funds. An automatic slide scanner runs about a cool grand.

There’s only one trick to scanning slides. It’s not easy to find which side is the “correct” side. Most of the time, the only way to correctly distinguish the back from the front is if text of some type such as signs are reverse or not.

Time For a Little Something “On The ROX”

I am now with no constant clients for my business, so I’m starting the daunting task of saving my favorite little show from B-town from dust.

I have a new game plan now which I think will be better for the long run, but I still need YOUR help. Yes I mean you!

Many episode masters have heat damage, and I can do no better than getting a copy of the already damaged master. If you have ANY episodes of ROX, formerly J&B on the ROX email me, I’m begging you. It doesn’t matter if you only have half of an episode, please send it!

Without help from the public, I will need to start looking into alternatives to possibly restore these damaged episodes. The only drawback is that restoration costs money. If I have to go this route, donations to ROX would be most helpful.

Another way to help is to buy Season Zero which has been available on DVD for over a year now!

The new plan is to burn each episode to DVD once it is to a good standard. This will save space on my hard drives and save my work. Once I have a season completed, it will be released to DVD for the world to consume.

Forgetting the past is just like destroying the future, so help me save ROX’s history!

When It’s Feast or Famine, I Try To Feast As Much As Possible

This year so far has been somewhat of a growing year for my business, LML Video Services.

I have added new services, and I’m currently planning a commercial. If you have any interesting ideas let me know, as I’m always open for suggestions.

Last weekend I delivered some Cassette tape to CD transfers (the first ones I have done). The client gave me 24 more tapes to transfer! They have all been Sherlock Holmes sets that are not available on CD. I have completed 12 thus far, hopefully I will have the rest completed by the end of the week. I do know copyright laws, and anyone owning copyrighted material can make a “sole backup” copy of any work they have purchased. Each of these transfers has a disclaimer on them stating, “Transferred to CD for backup purposes.”

My New York client is sending me some more video transfers as well. Thanks Marc!

I have also organized everything. I am now using QuickBooks, keeping track of expenses and income, and making backup copies of reciepts. I have everything saved on my PC and a binder. I will use a new binder for every year. This will help when the tax man cometh, and should the time come, business loans and credit cards.

My new plan is to save, instead of spend. I have been spending every dime I have on improvements since the word go. Since I believe I have adequate equipment I am cutting back the spending. The next step for me is bigger and better everything. These items aren’t cheap, so I’m working on starting a business savings account to help save for future expansion.

UPDATE: Interestingly enough, one set of the Sherlock Holmes tapes was manufactured and distributed by a company in the same town as my New York client.

Bloomingpedia

Bloomington has it’s own “pedia.” It’s basically a clone of wilkipedia, but everything is related to my hometown.

There are many interesting articles about what Bloomington is and what this town used to be.

My wife is constantly trying to find ways to promote my business, which I appreciate greatly. She added it, and I did a little revising.

Then I looked up ROX, and came up with nothing. Always being grateful for all the nice things the guys have done for me, I made an article on it about ROX.

I only hope that people who watched the show in it’s hayday will append to what I’ve started.

This town has a vast, rich history and I think this is a perfect way to try to remember those things that don’t make the history books.

Check it out: http://www.bloomingpedia.org

Disconnected

It’s been a long time since I last posted. Part of me feels bad for leaving it abandoned for so long, I wouldn’t even have this if it weren’t for the kindness of Editor B.

Since starting my new job, I have felt “disconnected.” My life has been connected to computers and technology since I was a teenager and I haven’t had the time to enjoy my computer much lately. I cannot access computers while at work

Many things have happened since then, so I will update. Hang on, cause there is much to say.

My daughter has officially graduated 1st grade, and left the state. She took my heart with her. With the help of my wife (thanks Rach) we made her a goodbye present. A DVD filled with a slideshow with pictures of her and everyone who loves her. It also included video of many of her loved ones saying goodbye and giving some life lessons.

I’ll miss you sweetheart!

My video business has suddenly picked up. I am now more busy than not with projects people are wanting me to do for them. I am going to advertise for the first time as well. It also helps out high schoolers so I say why not? I have also added a new service: Cassette tape to CD or MP3 transfers!

Work has been crazy. I have been pushed to a point where I no longer think of it as a possible career anymore, just a job. I am treated like scum, which is also what I clean. With the heat and humidity, I can barely stand it. Just like a few of my co-workers.

My little sister has moved in with us for a couple of weeks. Her lease was up, and she has a new place lined up. It’s just a matter of timing until she gets in.

We have picked up the pace on house projects. Over the last few weekends we have removed the hideous wallpaper around our home.

Interestingly enough, underneath all of this were drawings. These drawings were made by the children who lived here at the time. We only have the kitchen and Taylor’s room to go. Currently I am prepping the walls for paint. We need them to be as perfect as possible for the deep, rich tones we have decided on for paint.

I also installed a new light fixture in our dining room. We found a beautiful set for the dining room and foyer areas. The one for the foyer has 2 tiers and is much larger. Installation will be a different story though, as the ceiling is 1 1/2 stories high.

I cut down the dead tree in our backyard, that was fun! I haven’t done that in over 10 years! I have cleaned up much of it, but there is a lot more to go. I am saving as much as possible for firewood, as I would like to use my fireplace sometime.

I wrecked my truck:(

The damage isn’t bad, just the bumper and a side piece to it. I was returning from mowing at work, and while backing up jack-knifed my trailer. It’s easy to do with a trailer that’s so small you can’t see it behind you. And it just happens that my neighbors grandson just wrecked his truck which is essientially the same as mine. It’s totalled, but the bumper is good! I spoke with him today and I might get a new bumper on the cheap!

Hopefully once a few things settle down, I can start posting more often.

Terabytes & Heat Pumps

Our household and my business recieved some nice upgrades this week.

Our new heat pump was installed Wednesday, and took all day. It was amazing to watch the guys rip the old POS out. What was even more amazing is the technology that goes into this piece of HVAC equipment.

The difference is amazing, as we can’t even tell when it turns on. The best part is that we are now saving a boatload on our home heating and cooling costs, thus saving the environment a little.

We will be receiving $650 in rebates, divided between a tax credit next year, and a rebate from our electric company.

I also purchased another hard drive to expand my capabilities for video transfers. This brings me close to having a terabyte of storage space. (For those of you who don’t know what a terabyte is, it’s 1,000 gigabytes, or 1,000,000 megabytes or 1,024,000,000 bytes.) I am now at 900 gigabytes, divided into 4 hard drives.

This new hard drive is a SATA (Serial ATA), which I have had no experience with. So far it seems to be much better, as the data transfer rates are almost double from the standard IDE connection. This makes editing video, rendering video and burning DVD’s that much faster.

My only problem with the SATA connection is more of a windows problem. When a “hot swappable” device is attached to a windows PC, an icon is automatically placed in your “tray.” I am very anal about my computer and this icon bothers me because I don’t need it, or want it!

I have done some searching on this subject, and found some clues, but nothing that has erased this icon from my desktop thus far.

Myspace

I have resisted to have anything to do with myspace. I have thought from the get-go that it was for teenagers and just plain sillyness.

For some strange reason, one of my good friends, Craig, started an account for moi. He could of just signed it up as a personal thing, but no, he used my business!

I have tried to make it a nice place to show off my skillz, but to my surprise I have pictures of cars, and comments that are crazy as can be on there.

So down this road I go, where I stop? I’ll never know.

I must have to say that myspace has many capabilities for networking. That is currently what I am working on with it. If I can get the word out regarding my business, the possibilities are endless!

Now That’s An Upgrade

Thank you Tampax, for providing me with that line 🙂

Anyway, we finally converted to a LCD monitor. Not just any though, as we went all out with a 19″ widescreen.

It’s a Sceptre DVI model, with a 8ms response time (I guess that’s good?)

I am downright amazed at the difference in size and quality. Working with many video applications, screen size is everything, and this gives me that and then some. The window loaded on the screen is the maximum size we had on our 17″ CRT monitor, big difference.

I also upgraded our speakers as our old ones were attached to the monitor and had no stands. I decided to go with Logitech on this one even though I had my doubts. I’ve never had much luck with their products. I must say I’m sold on this one though. The model X-230 2.1 speakers are excellent! They have the best rating on newegg, and the best part was the price, a mere $35.

These speakers are so good, I personally think they rival my truck’s stereo, which cost a grand!

We also upgraded our internet connectivity. After 7 months on dialup we switched back to DSL. It’s like a drug, once you have it, you can’t stand not having it. This time it’s with a different provider Smithville Telephone/Bluemarble, I was one of their first DSL customers back in 2000. It’s twice the speed of our old DSL at 1.5Mb/s, but double the price.

The only weird thing is that since we used my wife’s IU credentials, we have to actually “connect” to the DSL. I had never used this type of connection before, but it’s a VPN (Virtual Private Network.) When I picked up the equipment and signed the paperwork nobody informed me of this. I actually had to call tech support about why we weren’t connecting. That’s when I found out and fixed it quickly.

This Is Costing Me What?

Since I am now running LML Video Services like a business and not my personal piggy bank, I am trying to reduce some of my ongoing costs as much as possible.

This has become very frustrating, especially with DVDs. It seems as if the cost has risen by 50% since the last time I purchased any.

So if any of you out there know where to get some high quality “Inkjet Printable” DVD+R’s, please let me know. I currently use Verbatim, as they have shown through many tests to be playable in many brands and types of DVD players.

The only other area of cost savings that I can find are DVD cases and paper goods (case inserts, shipping supplies, etc.). Any good ideas would be appreciated greatly.

I have also started using QuickBooks. I have the simple start version, which is all I need. It makes things much easier than my old system which was just excel spreadsheets for check registers and invoice/reciept templates. Now I can track all of my costs, income and customers. It’s awesome!

The next step: Eliminate using PayPal. The bigger question is if a small guy like me can afford to.