Recently while in Key West I had the opportunity to fly the JetLev water-propelled jet pack. The JetLev R200 has only been on the market about 6 months, and jetpackadventures.com in Key West, FL is the first location in the U.S. to get one. I happened across their promotional video before my trip and knew it was something I had to do. Flying isn’t very difficult, in fact you’ll be up and out of the water before you can even flap your wings. The challenge is finding the perfect balance between leaning sligthly forward and aiming the thrusters to obtain the correct angle. This angle helps you move forward while also moving upwards. I imagine it compares a lot to flying a helicopter where your forward momentum is gained by tilting slightly fowards.
The jetpack is attached by a hose to a 250 hp auxillary craft which looks a lot like a jet ski. This outboard boat sucks water into the hose and delivers low pressure, high flow water through a 33 ft (10 m) hose to the jetpack where thrust is generated by forcing the water through [...] continue »
Ari and I spent some time talking today, in depth, about what she wanted from life. This was not a deep, philosophical discussion but rather a way for us to connect and for me to make sure I understood what she was interested in and what she was looking for in her life right now. After all, she’s not quite nine…
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Yesterday I played cello in my first concert. Check out my video below and let me know what you think!
In our first article on the subject, “Capturing Great Concert Videos“, we touched on the basics of how to shoot video at your favorite shows. Since that article was written, high definition (720/1080 HD) point-and-shoot (P&S) cameras have become commonplace and more and more people are recording their favorite artists and sharing them on YouTube. Now that the bar has been raised for the average quality video, if you want your videos to stand out you are going to need to take some steps to differentiate yourself. The first step is to start with the tips in our last article so you can learn about cameras, where you should stand in the venue, and what type of memory card to buy. Let’s move on to selecting the best camera currently available for shooting concert video.
Although our Canon camera has served us well since 2008, it’s time to upgrade to something with more than 3x zoom and 720p video. Finding a new camera is a daunting task amongst all of the various models out there – and if you recall from our first article, finding something with decent audio recording capability at a concert venue is not easy. We literally scoured the Internet for months looking at various camera review sites and forums for the right replacement. We thought we found it in the Panasonic DMC-GF3XK, a micro four-thirds (mini-DSLR) camera with a Lumix 14-42mm interchangeable lens and adjustable audio gain. We purchased one and took it out for some testing. The video quality was beautiful, but we were not impressed with its limited zoom. We quickly learned that the optical zoom capability of a standard lens is determined by dividing the larger number into the smaller number. In the case of this 14-42mm lens you divide 14 into 42 arriving at 3x optical zoom. So we returned it and were back to the drawing board.
After more research we narrowed our search to [...] continue »
One thing about moving into an older home is never having a shortage of things to fix or upgrade. Our garage certainly fell into this category, as it has become the main entry through which most people enter our home and subsequently is the first thing they see. Having a show worthy garage has never been on our list of essential home improvements but attention definately needed to be given to the large crack running through the garage floor, windows that wouldn’t open with glass falling out, water damage on the walls, paint peeling from the floor and the horrendous peg board.
Garage before: Paint peeling from the floor and peg board wall.
Initially we contacted a local company called Those Garage Guys for an estimate on leveling the floor and recoating it in an industrial grade epoxy. Looking only to receive a quote for the floor, I was shocked when I was given a $20,000 estimate to redo my entire garage with slat wall, cabinetry and epoxy flooring. I pressed for a price on just the floor and was told [...] continue »
