Elegant Distractions

After ten months of discussions, planning and expeditures the motorcycle trip and video project has been cancelled due to a lack of motorcycle riders.

Two of the riders bailed last month. The final one, Mark, pulled the plug today. He was the mastermind of the trip where I was just the videographer who volunteered to record the adventure.

After the test ride Saturday it became evident that he would lose more than he gained if he continued with the project. Carol and I will find something else to work on this summer. Somehow I expect to turn this into a good thing.

At least I got a new Pathfinder out of the deal.

Posted by director at 05:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Naturally, we needed to take the new Pathfinder out and get her good and dirty. And learn how she handles when the pavement ends.

We headed out for a test ride yesterday. Turned out to be the hottest day of the year so far, a milestone that could have been achieved even ten degrees cooler.

The route we picked took us into the Olympic mountains. Even though we reached a maximum altitude of 3086 ft. that was significantly below what was intended. Snow turned us back. Twice.

Dean and Bryce joined us on the ride even though they won't be on the Big Ride. Wish they were going along.

I learned a few things about the run-and-gun style of filming. I have to get faster at getting out and setting up the shot. I took shots with the Fig Rig and without. The Figg shots were very nice but it is such a hassle jumping out and getting the thing out and ready, then putting it back in the seatbelts to secure it from flying around the Pathfinder's cabin. Ended up taking the final few shots completely hand-held.

Posted by director at 11:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Yesterday, we took a test ride with Mark and two other bikers up into the Olympic mountains (more on this later). I had loaded some three hundred waypoints into my Garmin Nuvi 360. Sure, I knew that it wouldn't show me the Forest Service roads we took, rather it was an exercise in loading and using waypoints via GPX files.

Now the issue is how to clear out those waypoints without going one-by-one through the 6 click process of deleting them. On some sites people have resorted to simply resetting their devices (as I did myself one time). However, there is a better way.

* Connect the GPS device to the computer
* Open MapSource on the computer
* Load up current.gpx from the GPS device
* Edit the waypoints, etc.
* Do a "Save As" to a different file name on your computer. Be sure to save as a GPX file.
* Disconnect the GPS device and boot it up.
* From the menus, use the "delete all" feature to remove all of your favorites.
* Right now current.gpx on the GPS has nothing in it. This is a good thing.
* Reconnect the GPS to the computer
* Copy the edited GPX file to the GPS into the same directory as current.gpx
* Disconnect the GPS and boot it up. You'll find only your new set of waypoints on the device.

TIP: If you are going to load up a ton of waypoints into your Garmn, it makes sense to save a copy of current.gpx onto your computer beforehand to make reverting that much simpler.

Posted by director at 11:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

This summer the Spousal Unit and I will be working on our first major video production in three years. Bloody well time.

We will track, from the comfort of a new Nissan Pathfinder, a small group of motorcyclists 6000 miles from Seattle to the Artic Circle in Alaska. The exact composition of the bike gang is rather fluid for this late in the game but that is largely due to family health issues for some members. We hope all the best for the ailing family members.

We have a great deal of work to do before we leave. The first order of business is acquiring the Pathfinder, which will take place on April 30th if all goes according to plan. It better, since a test ride will happen on May 17th and there's no way the old Maxima will be chasing bikes up logging roads.

I also want to sell my Sennheiser ME80/K3U and get a ME66/K6. The K6 uses normal AA batteries. Wouldn't mind handing on to the ME80 but once I have the ME66 there's not much point.

I'll be blogging about the Alaska project prior to leaving and perhaps I'll have enough notes from the drive to write at longer stops and when we return.

Posted by director at 09:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)