I've been very fortunate to work on some great training products. Education is something I've always had a passion for and I'm constantly looking for new ways to make the technically complex accessible to people of all skill levels. Below you can find out a little more about the educational products I've worked on.
Books I've written
If you’re an experienced editor who wants to get up to speed on Adobe Premiere Pro, then look no further than this fast-paced but thorough guide to Adobe’s flagship editing program. Enjoy the ride as three experienced editors take you step by step through the entire editing process in Adobe Premiere Pro. You’ll learn to perform professional editing tasks such as project management, multi-format editing, color correction, audio mixing, titling, effects, and delivering your video onto tape, the web, and mobile devices. Plus the whole process moves at an accelerated pace so you can get back to editing even faster. Within a weekend, you’ll learn everything you need to know to use Adobe Premiere Pro confidently for your own projects and client work.
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With the arrival of high-definition video-enabled DSLR cameras, photographers are faced with an opportunity for creativity and a competitive edge in their field unlike anything they’ve experienced before. Add to that the expanding demands from a video-hungry audience and it’s no longer a matter of if you are going to add video to your repertoire of skills, it’s when. Here to guide you in a thorough exploration of the video-making process — from preproduction to post — and to ease your transition from still to motion are four veterans who speak the language of both photography and video fluently. With their clear, instructive approach, they quickly get you up to speed on everything from picking your gear, to properly lighting for motion, to using professional-level audio, color correction, and editing techniques, to media management and outputting, and much more
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On a Mac, the sky's the limit for creating professional video. With all the tools available though, it can be a daunting task to decide which ones offer the best solutions for combined efficiency and high-level results. How can you effectively communicate your vision to clients and crew? How should you calibrate your camera for multi-camera and green screen shoots? Is it better to do your keying in After Effects, Motion, or Final Cut? How do you manage large amounts of media and a multitude of formats for multiple software applications? In Video Made on a Mac, you'll learn the answers and much more. Chock-full of practical advice and step-by-step instructions, each chapter provides insight on the critical components of production and postproduction that can make all the difference when you're up against a tight budget and schedule.
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Updated for DVD Studio Pro 4.2.2, this best-selling, Apple certified guide uses striking real-world footage to build four complete DVDs and share a Blu-ray disc. It covers how to use DVD Studio Pro on its own, as well as how to integrate it into your workflow with Final Cut Pro 7, Motion 4, and Compressor 3.5. Each lesson takes you step-by-step through an aspect of DVD creation and finishing, with hands-on projects for you to complete as you go.
You'll learn to storyboard your DVD and plan its interactions, set chapter markers, build still and motion menus, and add overlays and subtitles. You’ll also work with multiple audio tracks and camera angles, create smart buttons and custom transitions, professionally encode audio and video files, and build useful scripts.
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Packed with more than 500 techniques, this book delivers what you need to know-on the spot. It is suited to editors of all experience levels.
No need to wade through tomes of documentation. Final Cut Studio On the Spot presents immediate solutions in an accessible format.
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Today's digital production tools empower the small team to produce multimedia projects that formerly required large teams. Orchestrating a production requires more than proficiency with the postproduction tools. Final Cut Pro Workflows: The Independent Studio Handbook offers a cookbook of postproduction workflows that teams can follow to deliver an array of products to their clients. It describes appropriate postproduction workflows, team roles and responsibilities, and required equipment for some of the most common media productions. Combining the wisdom of traditional roles and responsibilities with an understanding of how FCP facilitates a new flexibility where these roles/responsibilities can be redistributed, this book sheds light on workflow processes and responsibilities, and includes 7 real-world workflows from a diverse range of projects
Books I've contributed to as a technical editor
Ideal for students and editors on the go, this is the quick look-up guide you’ve been hunting for. Veteran trainer Brendan Boykin uses clear, concise explanations and an easy-to-use format to put the essential techniques, most-used tools, and most-efficient workflows at your fingertips. A compendium of Final Cut Pro best practices, tips, and quick-glance reminders, plus a great summary of what’s new in Final Cut Pro 7 including iChat Theater support, the redesigned speed tools, and sharing projects on a Blu-ray disc. The book's compact size makes it easy to fit in a jacket pocket or computer case so that readers have it handy when they need it most.
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In this guide to Apple’s masterful new color grading and finishing application, award-winning colorist David Gross starts with the basics of color balancing and correction and move on to the fine points of secondary grading. Topics include scene matching, using vignettes to isolate and track regions, creating advanced color effects and “looks,” skin tone adjustments, and adjusting the composition and framing of a shot. As with the other titles in the Apple Pro Training Series, each chapter in this Apple-authorized guide represents a complete lesson--with a project to complete and a review section to reinforce the lessons. Superb footage, including several BBC productions and broadcast commercials, provide real-world examples for you to work through as you master this revolutionary software.
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This advanced, Apple-certified guide to video and film color correction picks up where APTS: Advanced Color Correction and Effects in Final Cut Pro leaves off. The book assumes a basic knowledge of the mechanics of color correction, and focuses on the field-tested techniques professional colorists use to obtain superb color grading. Extremely practical, the book works step-by-step through real-world examples of the problems and challenges colorists face most frequently. Written by video professional Alexis Van Hurkman, this book provides comprehensive training in the real-world color correction and management skills editing pros use every day in the field. Readers will learn how to maximize quality when color-correcting with Final Cut Pro, scene-to-scene color matching, correcting for broadcast specifications, changing color corrections midstream, day-for-night treatments, and more.
Online Training
In Color 1.5 Essential Training, colorist Robbie Carman details how to use Final Cut Studios dedicated color grading application to stylize projects and improve their look. Robbie explains the principles of color grading, discusses the color wheel and tonal range, and decodes color terminology for new users. He shows how to prepare a Final Cut Pro project before sending it to color and how to use video scopes to evaluate a clip while making corrections. He provides information for new Color users as well as experienced colorists looking for whats new in this release.
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In Final Cut Server 1.5 Getting Started, Robbie Carman shows how to set up, administer, and integrate Final Cut Server into a production workflow and keep digital assets safe and organized. The course covers installing the server and client software, configuring users and groups, uploading assets, and using the check-in/check-out procedure for working with files. Archiving, automation, and metadata customization techniques are also covered.
Online Forums
In addition to my book and online training work I'm a forum moderator over at Creative Cow. Currently I'm a moderator in the Apple Color and DSLR Video forums. I encourage you to come over and join the discussions. If you have questions about Apple Color and DSLR video this is the best place to ask questions and find answers.