HomeMovies
Latest
Watch thousands of unseen British films released by the BFI
For decades now, Brits have been shooting amateur movies about their holidays, personal celebrations and experiences at huge, historic events. They're valuable snippets of UK history, but often they're never seen by the wider public. Today, the British Film Institute (BFI) is launching a project called "Britain on Film," which offers free online access to thousands of archived videos. Some were shot by amateurs, while others, such as this tour of Edinburgh by Sean Connery, were commissioned for professional projects. Roughly 2,500 film and TV titles are being released today, with 90 percent of them being free to watch. Many have never been seen before, or not since their first showing, and reveal unique, personal perspectives of how British life has changed over the years.
TiVo launches remote video and picture sharing
Because heaven knows we've just been pining for an easier way to see all our friends' and family members' crappy home movies, TiVo has just announced a new service that will allow users to route video content directly to other people's Now Playing lists. Created in conjunction with a company called One True Media, the unnamed feature lets anyone with a PC and broadband connection upload vids or photos to a special site, where they are then sent to a specified list of subscribers who own either a Series2 or Series3 box. Unlike YouTube or Google Video, the uploaded content is strictly controlled and not open to the public, making it less likely that your buddy will have to suffer through your nephew Timmy's school play or that little Timmy will accidentally see the bachelor party footage that got your buddy dumped. Luckily, signing up with OTM requires you to shell out some loot on the regular to keep the vids flowing -- "as little as" $4-a-month or $40-a-year -- which should keep the intra-family video spamming to a minimum. The service goes live today with a special trial offer of five free uploads, so go on, give it a whirl -- just make damn sure that you're labeling your swag and keeping salacious footage out of the wrong hands.[Via PR Newswire]
The dreaded iMovie: "Your project is unreadable" error
With [insert your preferred holiday here] fast approaching, I'm sure many of you will be dusting off the trusty video cam and shooting hours and hours of home movies, with the goal of subjecting your family and friends with tedious hysterical clips, for years to come. Once you've captured all the merriment, most of you will probably use iMovie to edit your work. You'll spend days, if not weeks, clipping here and there, adding effects and transitions and titles and picking the perfect soundtrack and getting the timing of that Ken Burns effect just right. You'll finally finish, at 3 in the morning, and finally settle into bed, content that your flick is masterpiece on par with It's a Wonderful Life. But in the morning you'll realize you forgot something. That mole on Aunt Mary's chin is pretty scary and even iPhoto's "retouch" tool couldn't hide it, so maybe you should soften up those frames to make your film a little more kid-friendly.So you drag yourself out of bed and head back to your iMac, open iMovie and BAM! Instead of your project opening so you can jump right in to edit, you get an error message. iMovie exclaims "Your project is unreadable." You try again. But it taunts you. "Your project is unreadable" You reboot the computer, because that's always a magical cure-all. But no... "Your project is STILL unreadable."Personally, I'm more familiar with the "Your project is unwatchable" message - but that's after I've shown the movie. Let's face it, both situations can leave you feeling quite helpless. While there's no going back for me, there is still a chance for you to recover.Head over to Apple's support pages and bring up article # 93222: iMovie: "Your project is unreadable" Message. There, you'll find tips for salvaging your many hours of hard work and getting your film back in the can. Here's a recap, for your convenience:
Your home movies in iTunes
You have got to love The Onion. Today, they've got a great parody article up announcing Apple's intention to sell everyone's home movies in the iTunes Music Store for $1.99 each. From the article, "quoting" Steve Jobs:"As soon as you record that precious footage of your daughter's first steps, you'll be able to buy it right back from iTunes and download it directly to your computer and video iPod." Now that's funny. What will they think of next, Macs running Windows?Thanks to everyone who sent this in.
