So far, I have not found an effective way to import PowerPoint slides into iMovie / FCP. After much trial-and-error, I have still found that taking a screen shot, pasting into Photoshop, and saving as a PNG seems to produce the best (of the worst) results — and even that produces substandard images, in my opinion.

Here’s what I’ve tried so far:
1. From PowerPoint, export to JPG. Produces a crappy-looking JPG file for each slide.
2. From PowerPoint, “make movie.” Produces a crappy-looking MOV file that mimics your presentation’s settings.
3. From Keynote ‘06 and ‘08, export to movie (DV/DVCPRO - NTSC). Produces a slightly less crappy, but still unsatisfactory result.

The presentation that I’m trying to bring in to my video has quite a few “spreadsheet” slides with lots of small text as well as charts with lots of data and lines all over the place. Those slides are pretty much completely unreadable using all of the methods indicated above. When making a screen shot, I notice that image gets all funky when you import it into iMovie, and although it’s readable, it looks blurry, like the camera went out of focus. Distracting and annoying to say the least.

I can’t believe that there isn’t an easier way to do this. Anyone out there making graphic slides for your iMovie/FCP videos? If so, how the heck do you do it?

Day 13 of 30

Miss me? Wondering where I’ve been this week? My flaky Internet connection has kept me from doing important things like checking my e-mail and blogging. *gasp*

Bright and early this morning, I drove to Oceanic to swap out my ailing cable modem with a new one: the third Webstar in two years. The last one lasted one day short of a month. Not a very good track record, if you ask me. I don’t know why businesses purchase crappy equipment, causing frustration to customers and likely more cost to the company in the long run. I was an early adopter of broadband and remember the honkin’ huge cable modem they gave me back then. It was built like a tank and ran for years and years before it finally retired itself. Now, they have these small, cheap plasticky modems that seem to roll over and die if you just look at them funny. Frustrating!

Let’s see how long this one lasts before it craps out. Will this drive me into the arms of another ISP? After more than 10 years of being a loyal customer and enthusiastic supporter of RoadRunner, my dissatisfaction with the frequent downtime due to crappy equipment just may push me to look into other alternatives. RR, you better hope this modem lasts more than a month.

I have an unnatural fear of kiosks. This is mainly because some kiosk vendors are about as aggressive as vacuum cleaner salesmen and I have a very real problem with high pressure sales. The problem is: I can’t say no. So, instead, I am keenly aware of which kiosks have vultures poised to attack, and I deliberately avoid them.

On the flip side, there are some kiosks that offer some really cool wares. Rod shares his gadgety find on DaScoops.com. iPod fans will really appreciate this one. This is one kiosk I won’t be avoiding.

Here’s an excerpt:

I first saw Gizmobies at Meadows Mall in Las Vegas. I thought they were so kewl, I wanted to buy an iPod just to plaster some on. But since they weren’t readily available in Honolulu, I passed on buying an iPod - and bought a Samsung K5 instead.

But hold on to your earbuds! Gizmobies are now available at Ala Moana center. I don’t know how the guy did it, but he was able to secure a kiosk right in front of the Apple store. Talk about location, location, location! Read the rest of the article>>

My cable connection has been pretty fickle as of late. Without warning, the cable light on my modem will decide to flee the country or disguise itself as a Christmas tree light, blinking incessantly. Either scenario is bad news for me, because that means my Internet connection has just gone south.

Whenever I call Oceanic to report a problem, they tell me that there are no outages in the area and we go through the rigamarole of troubleshooting the darned thing, which is basically all the steps I took PRIOR to calling them anyway. Then, they offer to schedule a tech for me — two weeks from now.

Do you realize what kind of panic would befall me if I couldn’t connect to the Internet for two weeks?!

Then, mysteriously, the light goes solid again and suddenly, we’re back in business. Weird stuff. Even as I type this, I wonder if my fleeting connection will abruptly crap out on me and render me unable to post this entry.

Perhaps I should click “Publish” now before I will be forced to pull my hair out in a net-less frustration.

A nifty tip for T-Mobile customers from Rod at DaScoops.com:

May 13th isn’t just any old day. It’s the day we thank our moms for all they do for us. And what better way to do that than send her a message from her favorite kid? Whether you send Mom a text message, a photo message, video message, or an IM, it’s FREE all day on Mothers Day.

Read the whole article here.

Did he just say the f-word? That’s right, folks, it’s FREE. Gee whiz, it makes me wish I was with T-Mo.

Thank you to Derek and Richie for their suggestions and assistance with fixing the broken blog! Actually, it’s our fixed blog now!

All it took was upgrading the old K2 theme. I love it when things work like how they should.

You know what makes me grouchy? Seeing those pesky $1.49 charges for directory assistance on my wireless bill. Did you know that you can get directory assistance for free? If not, allow me to give you the 411…

I’ve used Free 411 a few times (dial 1-800-FREE-411). It’s free because you have to listen to a short ad before receiving your requested phone listing. Unlike directory assistance offered by your wireless provider, Free 411 does not connect you to the number, so have a piece of paper ready.

Today, I saw an article on my TechCrunch RSS feed about Google launching their own version of free 411 called Goog-411. To access it, just dial 1-800-GOOG-411 (1-800-466-4411). Goog-411 has a couple of one-ups on Free 411, such as the convenience of automatically being put through to the requested number and, if desired, having the information sent to you via SMS.

I haven’t tried the service myself yet, so if you get the chance, let me know how it works out for you.

So, now that you know, add Goog-411 to your Contacts list and save yourself a nice chunk of change.