Seacoast History Blog # 122 
July 22, 2011

The last time I did video the equipment weighed a ton and cost an arm and a leg. Back in the 80s I took out a loan for a used video production studio that set me back more than $100,000. It was the size of a Volkswagen. I paid the loan back in five years at something over $2,000/month. When I tried to sell the machinery a few years later, digital had arrived, and I had to let the whole system go to the scrap man for $900. The experience soured me on making movies for a while. But time marches on. The other day I bought a FLIP camera. It shoots better quality images than my old analog system, requires no expensive magnetic tape, holds two hours of HD footage, weighs only a few ounces, and fits in the palm of my hand. It cost $129. (Continued below)

All that has nothing to do with this story, except the part about me getting out of the video business for years. It was during those years that my nephew Ryan grew up. He went to high school, joined the US Navy, and saw the world. He was just three years old when I started fiddling with video. Ryan had long golden hair then, and for his birthday I wrote a song to show him how to spell his name. I was his godfather, after all. I recorded the song myself on a four-track cassette tape system using a synthesizer. First I set down the rhythm track on a primitive digital drum set, then layered on all the instruments, track on track, and recorded the vocals. You can do that now on your laptop. I did it with a load of equipment sitting on my bedroom floor, as I recall.

DIRECT LINK TO "Ryan's Rock Video"

I was pleased with the tune and was doing some early work with a videographer named Paul Gould. He was working with standard VHS tape at the time, and getting pretty good quality out of it – good for the prehistoric era we were in. Each time you duplicate magnetic tape it gets a little fuzzier, and garden-variety VHS was pretty fuzzy to being with. By third or fourth generation any production was a shadow of its former self. But Paul managed to put together a kiddie-rock video and synch it pretty closely to the audio tape, which was no easy task. I think he was working out of his bedroom at the time – or maybe a room in my apartment. I stuck in some very rough footage I shot of Ryan’s birthday party. A few friends sat in at the end to create a fake band, and we were off to the races.

Fast forward 25 years and take off a lot of hair. Now I’m thinking of shooting some video myself to create bonus videos for an e-book I’m working on. I buy the Flip and shoot some footage. It’s about 100x easier than it used to be. You press one button. That’s it. When I uploaded the test footage to my computer the software asked me if I wanted to post the movie on Facebook or YouTube, an astonishing simple process. One button and you’re video can be seen by the world.

So you probably think I did that, but I didn’t. Instead of posting something new, I ended up poking around on YouTube. Imagine my surprise to discover my old video there among zillions of homemade films. Ryan, now all grown up, had posted the video that his old uncle did for him back when Ronald Reagan was President. That probably explains why my father, who is still an avid computer geek, bought himself a converter that turns old videos into digital files. He probably sent a DVD copy of the 1986 video to Ryan who posted it on his channel on YouTube. So be careful what you put on tape, my friends. The world has grown as small as an iPhone these days.

And while we’re on the topic of Baby Boomers making videos, I hope you’ll give a listen and look to this new piece by Jeff Landroche (aka Landrock). Jeff was my sound engineer for decades and we did scores of soundtrack projects together. No one has a sharper ear or a defter hand or more editing skill at the soundboard.

DIRECT LINK to "Starting All Over"

I haven’t seen much of Jeff since I got out of the video biz. We both had life changes, but we’re both still kicking. Jeff has always been a monster Beatle fan and performed in Beatle tribute bands. His personal record albums usually have a Paul McCartney feel to them. This one is no exception. And if you long for the “old” Beatles like some of us – this song crosses an enormous chasm.

What if -- you may ask -- the Beatles still sounded as they did in the 60s, but had the experience of a lifetime to write about? Would they be bitter old men? “Starting All Over (at the end)” by Jeff Landrock takes that giant leap. It’s as familiar as the Beatles ’65 album and as innocent as a high school love song, but tinged with mortality. What do you do when things fall apart at 60? You pick yourself up and start over. And in this super Boomer anthem, Jeff starts over with hope and enthusiasm, and with as little regret as he can muster.

Over the next 20 years we’re going to hear a lot of songs about Boomer angst for the good times gone by. I’m not looking forward to it. This tune gives me hope that a few us are going to go on, not moaning about the past, but blending the old and the new with energy and purpose. Okay, so we screwed up. Okay, so we didn’t change the world. Okay, so we don’t have much time left. But maybe, just maybe, today’s the day.

© 2011 by J. Dennis Robinson, all rights reserved.