Category: Technology

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New York Cine – Man of Steel Podcast

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Last night I headed out to the land called Astoria to sit down with the guys from New York Cine and talk to them about my perceptions on the new Superman film, Man of Steel. This was my forth time on the show but my first time with them live in the studio. I usually Skype in for the interviews, but this gave me a chance to meet all the guys in person. I always have a great time with them on these podcasts because they are true film and pop culture nerds like me. Anyway, it was a pretty good discussion. So check out the podcast below.


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End of the semester… and on to new adventures!

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Today was the last day of finals. The students in my HUW 269 New Media Project lab capstone course were scheduled to turn in and present their final professional portfolios. The final presentations are always interesting because it gives the students, and me,  an opportunity to see how far they have progressed as multimedia artists since the beginning of the semester. This year was a little different. In addition to displaying visually stunning portfolios, these capstone students, many who had graduated last week,  surprised me with a end of the semester thank you party. They bought pizza, cake, and soda that we all chowed down on as we laughed and critiqued the final portfolios that were presented.

In the 12 plus years I have been teaching at LaGuardia Continue reading “End of the semester… and on to new adventures!”

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Finally, new Mac Pros

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Apple finally is going to release an update to the Mac Pro desktop, and for the first time since they started producing these top of the line towers, I am NOT planning on getting one. This is because I have migrated away from Final Cut Pro to Adobe Premiere Pro, thus eliminating the one reason why I would need a mac this powerful. So without a specific mac application to drive a purchase of this magnitude, I cannot see dropping this much money on the new system.

All of my other software, primarily the Adobe Suite, is cross platform and can run quite well on cheaper PC based equipment. Plus Premiere Pro already integrates much better with After Effects and Photoshop than Final Cut. And according to my research I am not alone in this belief either. It seems that many professional videographers have made the switch away from Final Cut to other platforms because of the debacle that was the initial release of Final Cut X.

All of the other mac specific applications that I use now, like xCode and iBook, can be easily be handled by lower end systems like my Mac Mini and my aging mac laptops. And while I will concede that the cylindrical design of the new Mac Pro looks cool as hell, the price, good gracious, the price is going to be astronomical. As a person more than willing to spend money on cool stuff, I just don’t see a single mac application that would necessitate getting this system. However the challenge for those intrepid people that do decide to get one will be in figuring a way of keeping this monster under 6 or 7 grand if they go with an 8 or 12 core option.

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Yipit…..Yipit good!

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The “agita” that I was feeling yesterday over my preparation, or lack thereof, for my iOS programming course started to ease today.  A large part of the reason for that was that Vin Vacanti, the founder Yipit.com, spoke to our class on the topics of entrepreneurship and tech startup creation. Yipit is a daily deal aggregator that recommends personalized daily deals from websites such as Groupon, LivingSocial, Gilt City and dozens more.

I have listened to many speakers over the years and I would have to say that Vin was one of the best. He offered excellent insight on the mindset of the success entrepreneur. He took us through his process for starting and implementing a new business. The main take away from his speech was that while learning to code is very important, don’t be afraid to go implement manual processes, especially in the startup phase of your venture. I would highly recommend that anyone interested in starting a business to check out his blog (http://viniciusvacanti.com/).

However, I still have a ton of catch up to do on the iOS programming.

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Objective C and end of semester burnout!

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My journey into the world of Objective C and iOS programming continues, and in truth, it hasn’t been a happy transition. I am actually dreading class tomorrow morning because I have been so far behind. Since the beginning of the iOS course I have accepted a new position, negotiated the conditions of my new responsibilities, finished up the PPR, promoted my recent academic research, and supported the efforts of my students in the last few weeks of the semester. I foolishly thought I was going to have much more free time to practice my coding as the semester winded down. Now as I type this out it is painfully apparent how ludicrous that assumption had been. Silly rabbit, Trixs are for kids.

Luckily the semester will be over this week and I can finally shift gears.

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VHS Massacre Interview

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Today I was interviewed by the producers of the upcoming documentary, VHS Massacre, which chronicles the rise and fall of physical media from the origin of film all the way through the video store era and into digital media. The filmmakers wanted to question me on my take about how digital distribution, the proliferation of high speed data connections, and online piracy has hastened the demise of physical media like vhs tapes and CD-Roms. Much of the documentary focuses in the impact of the changes on B-movie and cult films.

The documentary is directed by indie filmmakers Thomas Edward Seymour and Ken Powell, two of the same gentlemen that produce the NewYorkCine Radio podcast on pop culture and film. VHS Massacre is scheduled to be released sometime in 2014.

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New Media PPR Presentation

As I mentioned in an earlier post, every five to seven years academic degree programs in the CUNY system have to undergo a process called a Periodic Program Review (PPR). Because I am the sole full time faculty member for my program, the research and drafting of the report for the New Media Technology degree became my responsibility. Last week I shared some examples of the process and action plans emerging from the PPR at the annual Instructional Staff meeting.

The following video is my presentation of the PPR report findings to the LaGuardia Community College faculty.

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iOS Code training

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As I mentioned in an earlier post, I am finally getting around to learning Objective C. It has been a few years since I have worked with a language like C. I knew it was time to rededicate myself to coding, however I was nervous that time away may has taken a bit of a toll on my skills. The brain is like a muscle in some regards. I am having to use parts of my brain I haven’t used in a long while. I guess I have focused too much on academic publishing instead of coding and pure development lately. When you combine that with programming within Continue reading “iOS Code training”

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Behind the Seams at JITP – Changing Tenure Standards

A few weeks back I was interviewed on the process of publishing in the Journal of Interactive Technology and Pedagogy (JITP) and what the future holds for digitally engaged faculty within the academy. The video above is an edited version of the conversation that I had with some of the editors at JITP on my experience in submitting a controversial article to them for publication.

I say controversial because over the past two years a large Continue reading “Behind the Seams at JITP – Changing Tenure Standards”

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Changing tenure and promotion standards – JITP Online Journal

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Finally, the article that I submitted on “Establishing a New Paradigm: The call to reform the tenure and promotion standards for digital media faculty” premiered today in the Journal of Interactive Technology and Pedagogy. The focus of the article is to illustrate the challenges facing digital media faculty as they march towards tenure and promotion, and present a case for reform of the current system. The article was a deeply personal research project for me as it chronicled my journey through the tenure system at LaGuardia.

The introduction for the journal prominently featured a brief editorial review of my article that was rather positive. “Establishing a New Paradigm” was described as showing “how the tenure and promotion processes for most faculty working and publishing with digital technologies are ill-suited to recognize, reward, and nurture the intellectual and scholarly activities that such academics must undertake to stay abreast of rapid changes in their fields”. I was elated that the editors thought that I argued “forcefully that the academy must adapt its employment structures to more explicitly support and reward precisely the type of work that lies at the heart of the other three pieces in this issue”. I have to admit that those words brought a smile to my face.

A digital copy of just my article on tenure and promotion reform can be found here in pdf format.