Some recent work
Don’t think I’ve posted this yet. It’s a bumper I did for Pine Ridge Church a month or so ago. Check it:
Archive for 'Alive Media'
AJ Mind Dump
Well, blogging has been sketchy as of late. Just really been a lot of things here and there going on that have kept me away. This will probably be pretty random:
- Loving the fall, even more than usual this year. I was trying to think of why, and I think I’ve nailed down several reasons. Last year this time I was feeling incredibly overwhelmed because I was trying to get the remaining media, lighting and other pieces together to help launch the West Campus at Cedar Creek. That and I was also beginning an online start up side business which I had to lay to rest this summer (that’s another post for another time). It was a crazy time last year. Plus, it seems that in this area we’re actually having a fall with some cooler temps here and there this year. The trees have been pretty brilliant, too, in all their colors.
- Kind of along with that, I think this year I’ve actually taken the time more to “breathe” and enjoy the fall and Thanksgiving season. I’ve had a chance to really think through how blessed I am…and we are. God forgive me for the times I haven’t told You enough just how grateful I am for everyone and everything in my life.
- Can I be real? Is it okay here to do that? This past year has been an incredibly dry time in my life spiritually. It’s been difficult. Just been going through a lot on the inside and for a guy that usually wears his emotions on his sleeve, that’s not always a good thing. I sit here now, not having a whole lot of “answers” about the things I’ve been praying about. I think that is how life is sometimes, that it is not so cut and dry and we don’t always understand why we go through those times…not on this side of Heaven anyway. That said, I am hopeful.
- Been working on several web projects over the past several months. Here are a few that have gone live: Symphony Orchestra Augusta (previously the Augusta Symphony), Gateway Community Church, relaunch of 4Thought Media and the Swank Co.
- Feeling like I really want to become an After Effects guru. I’ve pretty much run the gamut in Final Cut Pro, but am still kind of a novice in After Effects even though I’ve done a good many projects in it. Looking to spend some time over the next several months learning more.
- Heading to Macon, GA for Thanksgiving this year. Haven’t been there in 3 or 4 years so it will be good to see everyone there on my mom’s side of the family. Looking forward to hanging out with my sister, too.
- My Christmas List: 1. Gift cards to go shopping for some clothes 2. chocolate 3. a new defensive coordinator and linebacker coach for my DAWGS………..and World Peace.
- Speaking of the DAWGS, really sad to hear that UGA VII passed away yesterday. Wasn’t very old at all and died of a heart attack. Came across this short video put together with Larry Munson below. The word is now that they won’t get another UGA until after the season.
- That’s about it for now.
Deeper Wednesday Night
Check Back Around 8:30 PM EST for Deeper LIVE
UPDATE: Sorry, our connection is too slow. Thanks for tuning in.
a web project: YPA
I’ve had the opportunity to work with Wierhouse over in Augusta and one of their clients on a web project that went live last month. My end was taking the design and coding out the css, html, database and such. The site needed to be setup as a content management system so that the client would be able to update it on their own.
Exponential Live Blogging
The internet connection has gotten bogged with so many users so I’m going to take notes and post later on.
web design must-have: firebug
One of the firefox extensions that I rely on for just about every site I design is Firebug. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been designing a site and everything works well except for one detail. What I like about Firebug is that I can right click on any word, image, anything on the page and chose “Inspect Element” and it will show the css as well other info. Great tool for any web designer.
TNC’s Website
Over the last several months I’ve had the opportunity to help True North Church revamp their web presence. The new site is a pretty “clean” look, but has some really nice features, too. They have a great crew over at TNC. Love their ministry and the fact that they are impacting the place that I grew up in (North Augusta). The site is still a work in progress as there are some accent images, video elements, etc. to be added, but for the most part, it is up and running. You can check out the site here.
Sermon Message Videos Online
We’ve been working through the best solution for Cedar Creek to deliver messages online in a video format. While there are a ton of different options out there, we have landed on Vimeo for now. We tried Lightcast Media, but the cost compared to Vimeo’s plus account was significantly more. Plus, for our purposes, we get a very good quality video delivery from Vimeo. Vimeo’s plus account is around $60 per year compared to several hundred dollars per month for LightCast Media. Vimeo offers a ton of upload space as well. I had several criteria that I was trying to achieve that led us to where we are:
- Good quality – having a good user experience is important.
- Cost – we want to keep it affordable. LightCast Media is a great service and down the road, if we consider doing an internet campus, we will revisit them. If your church has the funds and puts a high priority on online delivery, I would go with LightCast.
- Easy and reproducible process – for our multi-sites we deliver the message on a P2 card same day. For the online message, we also record a dvd of the message and rip from there. We needed a process that was fairly easy to replicate for volunteers and paid staff. We do use some compression software that was an investment, but the rest of the process is relatively easy with some instruction. Our goal is to have the video from Sunday online by Tuesday morning/Monday afternoon. The audio podcast is usually online by Sunday afternoon.
- Archiving past messages – Vimeo offers a good solution where users can view past message series online by visiting the CCC Vimeo page.
- Added bonuses: Vimeo gives gives easy options to share videos, embed in blogs or Facebook pages, gives you 5gb of uploads per week, easy upload, and has a clean/easy to use interface.
Here is Phillip’s message from 2/22/09 to give you an idea of the quality and delivery.
death to IE6
So apparently the Norwegian’s are pretty brilliant. Several large Norwegian websites have started a campaign to urge Internet Explorer users to upgrade from version 6 to a newer version. As a web designer, I cannot stand IE6. You can have a website working on every conceivable computer operating system and browser, and IE6 will somehow mess with the design. IE 6 was first released 8 years ago… If you’re still using IE6, listen to a friend: let it go…really, it’s okay. You’ll feel better about yourself, I promise 
a new resource: graphicriver.net
Came across a new resource today in doing some browsing. It’s Graphic River (http://graphicriver.net/). Kinda like istockphoto.com. Definitely has some great resources for Graphic and Web Designers. Very professional and affordable images. You can probably find some great resources for developing sermon series graphics and other backgrounds as well.
Alan Jones is the media pastor at 
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