April 8, 2024

Eclipse.

We were nowhere near totality with today’s eclipse. While the sky darkened, it became chilly and some of the morning birds sang their morning song. That was rather neat. I went for a walk during the eclipse, which achieved about 75% totality in this part of the country.

Here’s raw time lapse footage from our rooftop. It’s interesting to see how the clouds moved in as it got darker. Coincidence?

Editing.

I vastly admire the wildly talented folks that script, light, record, and produce video on the channels I enjoy. I admire even more the folks that use Linux-based tools to do all the editing and post-production work. Either I’m not geeky enough to figure out how to make cinematic magic using Linux tools or my tricked out PC running Linux isn’t tricked out enough. Perhaps I’ve grown accustomed to the sheer speed of Apple’s series of Apple Silicon chips.

All of my videos in recent weeks have been edited on my Apple M2 MacBook Air. This computer will continue to pull its weight in this arena, as I’ll be editing video while on the road during next month’s storm chasing trip. I was telling my husband Earl that if I get as much footage as I hope to grab while chasing storms, I might need something with a little more oomph when I get back and start building “recap” videos.

Years ago, when I worked for a radio station owned by an advertising agency, the video editors used a powerful Mac of the era running Avid software and they did some amazing things with editing videotape. I was thoroughly impressed with what they could achieve with a Mac back then. Here it is 30 years later and I still find my Mac based tools the best way to edit video quickly, accurately, and to my production standards. This is nothing against Linux-based tools, Veronica at “Veronica Explains” does an AMAZING job with kdenlive on her Linux rig. Jay at LearnLinux.TV produces equally amazing results.

I just don’t think I’m wired to sit down and learn the ins and outs of Linux based editing tools right now. I’m too antsy to pop in and pop out and show clouds and waterfalls and mountains and small towns and the like.

The best tool for any computer user is the tool that gets the job done. And I’m sticking to that philosophy.