Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Another Pothole on the Information Highway


So, to hype the Death Star novel coming out next month, I thought it might be interesting to put up one of those flack-it vids on YouTube. Slide show, with stuff from the Star Wars universe, me reading a chapter, like that.

My collaborator Reaves thought it was a good idea, and we ran it past our editor. After some discussion with the Powers-that-Be, they decided it was okay for us to do it.

My collaborator, being a big Hollywood guy, knows actors and production folks who, he said, would love to do it just for the exposure. Great by me, I said, go for it.

Time passed. Reaves moved from one aparment to another, work got in the way, the usual, and he didn't get to it.

So, I thought, what-the-hell. I put together a rough slide show, recorded myself reading a dramatic scene from the novel, albeit not as well as a professional actor would by any means, and turned it into a QuickTime movie file. Told my editor, who, naturally, wanted to see it first. No problem, I'll email you a copy.

Ah. But even compressed, the file choked her mailbox, and her server won't let it through.

I thought about putting it up on YouTube under an innocuous name for her to see, then taking it down before anybody else had a chance to look at it, in case they decided it wasn't up to par, but given how YouTube has millions of viewers surfing, there is a chance somebody might get it and bandy it about, so, no.

I didn't ask about FTP sites, but I'm guessing she doesn't do FTP, since she works from home and isn't a computer geek.

So I burned a copy to CD and mailed it to her.

So much for living here in the future ...

7 comments:

  1. http://www.google.com/support/youtube/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=57739

    FYI.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Steve,

    www.yousendit.com for any file up to 100 megs.

    I use it all the time and if someone can read an email and has a web browser they can get the file.

    and ti's free

    ReplyDelete
  3. So the yousendit.com link seems to have done the trick. Whether my editor will approve of the slide show or not, that's another question -- at least she should be able to get it.

    Thanks for the help, guys.

    If they approve, I'll put it up on YouTube ...

    ReplyDelete
  4. We use Yousendit all the time. I've sent 60mg files easily.

    ReplyDelete
  5. My editor, alas, was not impressed.

    Prolly 'cause I don't have enough technical expertise to cut the slides and V.O. together so that the pictures match the words.

    It wound up a bunch of random SW's images fading in and out under the reading.

    Nor could I get that neat credit SW's credit crawl I came across to embed. I had it, but it wouldn't paste.

    Ah, well. You do the best you can with what you got ...

    ReplyDelete