You think you have computer problems?

I post this because, in retrospect, it is vaguely humorous to me. And, to show those of you who think you’re the only ones to ever have computer problems, that this is indeed not the case.

Sunday evening I began work on a video tribute to show at my great-uncles funeral the following day. As these videos usually are, it was rather a last-minute deal. And, in this particular case I had less time than usual because I had started assembling a storage shed kit manufactured by the makers of Hell over the weekend and couldn’t stop it half completed as it would most likely been destroyed by the wind and such.

I was already frustrated to the point that I had no patience left for anything else. I about tore my screen door off the hinges, for instance, as my house had shifted and it no longer worked the way I expect screen doors to work.

Luckily, I had most of the pictures already in digital form and had scanned in the rest. This is usually the most time consuming part. In a decision that would haunt me for the rest of the evening, I chose to use Windows Movie Maker (WMM) to create the video rather than my normal PowerPoint. I dropped the photos in, added captions to each and sat back and thought… wow, that was easy. Ha, ha. Ha, ha, ha. Ha. My nightmare begins.

Each picture was only showing for 5 seconds- not nearly long enough. No, problem, I though, I’ll just increase the time. Turns out, there is no such option. Seriously. I Googled it. This is, by far, the most ridiculous thing I had ever discovered missing from a program. I was expected to manually increase each slide by dragging a little bar over to 10 seconds. For 70 slides. I found a work around though. WMM has a feature where one can slow all the slides down ½ speed. Which makes each slide 10 seconds. Good. For now.

I then run through it to discover that the captions don’t stay with the photo, but on position in the timeline where I put them. So I had to manually move 70 captions under their respective photos. And also increase the time by dragging the stupid little bar.

Ready for music. WMM won’t accept iTunes music. Which was expected- same way with PowerPoint. So I use this little program to convert the iTunes file to WAV. However, it has decided it can’t find my audio input device, so that’s out. Rather than struggle to figure out that problem, I just whip out my notebook computer to do the conversion there. I don’t have the program, so I go to download it, only to discover my wireless network is down due to my router crapping out the day before. So, I manually connect my computer to my temporary replacement wired router but it will not connect to the Internet. Absolutely refuses. My mind boggles. So, finally I connect it to my neighbor’s wireless internet which drifts into my house occasionally (thanks, neighbor). I get the program downloaded and go back to my desktop to get the music. I burn it to a CD since I can’t access my network to get the files off iTunes. Back to the notebook—the music absolutely refuses to play. New idea… run an audio cord from the desktop to the notebook and record it that way. It records… absolute garbage. I don’t know why—copy protection probably. I finally got the music converted on the desktop by downloading a different program.

Now time to insert the music into the slide show. Works out fine except it’s three minutes longer than the photos. Usually, I would divide the music by the number of photos I have and change the duration of all slides accordingly. But, as I mentioned before, not possible in WMM. So, I had to manually adjust each photo an additional five seconds or so, until I got the length right. This, of course, threw off all the captions again. Got those fixed. Okay… finally done.

Time to burn to DVD. I have an external DVD burner and TV in my office I use. I play the video to the DVD burner and record it. Only, my TV has quit working. Dead as a doornail. So, I get a really long cable and run it to my bedroom TV. Which is on channel 60 for the satellite, but needs to be on channel 3. Which is not a saved channel. So I dig out the remote only to find the batteries dead. I change the batteries and find it still doesn’t work. Turns out the batteries had corroded and damaged the little bouncy spring thingies. So, I got a knife and scratched all that off and finally got it to channel 3.

Only it turns out after all that, WMM did one thing I liked… it lets me burn off a nifty DVD with menu right from my computer. I try to forget the last half-hour I spent connecting a TV.

It’s now 2:00 in the morning. The computer is doing something called encoding that is taking forever. I decide to call it a night with an Advil PM because I’m so wound up yet so tired. I did get it finished up the next morning with little time to spare.

So, if you somehow read this whole thing, think of this experience the next time you have a computer issue and maybe it won’t seem so bad. And, take my advice, if you’re using something that works, by all means, just stick with it. And stay away from WMM.

San Antonio

SanAntonio_27Sept2009_Alamo (13)
Originally uploaded by brad_holt

Thursday through Sunday found me in San Antonio for a little extended weekend getaway. It was rainy and cool on Thursday, but the weather was beautiful for the rest of the trip. Stops included the Alamo and Riverwalk (of course), the Spanish Missions, SeaWorld, and a few other things.

There are some photos on Flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/brad_holt/sets/72157622476607040/