By Gordon Meyer

P3GizmoGuy@gmail.com

I’ve been using Final Draft for over a decade now and was really looking forward to breaking in the new Version 8.  Is it in fact worth the $79 upgrade fee if you already have Version 7?   I’ll give it a qualified yes mainly because of what I consider to be a massive screw-up with one of the features I use fairly often.  But I’ll get into that later.  Let’s first look at highlights of the new features, beginning with Scene View.

One of the most powerful techniques professional screenwriters have used for decades has been to write scene descriptions on 3×5 cards that are then tacked onto a bulletin board so you can see the overall structure of your film at a glance – kind of like a storyboard without the illustrations. 

Scene View is a cyber version of this system, which enables you to easily play musical chairs with the order of your scenes by simply dragging and dropping the scenes in outline form.  Then Final Draft automatically moves the actual pages around just the way you did your drag and drop.  Final Draft has three variations of this feature – Scene View, Index Cards and Scene Navigator. 

For the first two versions you see both the scene heading and the first line or two of description or dialog.  Scene Navigator is much more Spartan in the info on display.  Although this is being touted as a new feature in FD 8, something very similar has been in Scriptware for over a decade.  Still, FD’s version is well executed and a very useful and welcome tool.

Unlike Scriptware, the Index Card feature does enable you to write a scene summary – much the same as you’d do on physical 3×5 cards. The Summary View allows you to enter ideas directly into the index card such as your basic outline, notes, sequence or act markers, comments, locations, blocking… anything you need to build and organize your story.  You can also color your Index Cards to help organize themes, character arcs, A and B stories, etc.

Another cool feature is FD’s Scene Properties Inspector which lets you track data specific to each scene in this new floating pallet such as the scene’s story beats that will eventually make up the action, characters and dialog of the scene.  Add and edit your scene’s title such as ‘Villain introduced’, and add color to the scene to help you track elements like storylines, character arcs, and material you need to get back to later.

Here’s the part I’m peeved about, though it’s not ultimately a deal breaker.  On earlier versions of FD, there was usually a button on the toolbar that in a single click enabled you to toggle from upper to lower case and vice versa.  I use this feature a lot because there are many times in the writing process when I change my mind about what I do and don’t want to emphasize in the script.

That button is missing from FD 8.  How could they?  I emailed FD tech support. Here’s their response:

“Due to an oversight, there is no Toggle Case icon in v.8. This will be remedied in the first update, scheduled for late summer 2009.

Despite missing the icon, the function actually does exist. On Windows, go to View > Toolbars and click on the Format toolbar. This will add a few formatting icons to your toolbar; the Strikethrough icon is actually the Toggle Case icon. If you choose to show the icon labels, you’ll find that the Strikethrough icon is even labeled Toggle Case.”

So the button can actually be installed, but it’s mislabeled and won’t be fixed until almost a year from now.  That’s a pretty sloppy snafu and slow fix in an otherwise really solid product if you ask me.  Still, since it gives me the functionality I want, as I said before, it’s not a deal breaker.   But I frankly expected better from Final Draft.

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By Gordon Meyer

P3GizmoGuy@gmail.com

The TV 3.0 Summit was one of the more interesting conferences I’ve attended recently.  Held strictly as a business conference, and a deliberately intimate one at that with probably less than 200 people in attendance, here the focus was on how technology affects content and vice versa. 

“TV Everywhere” was an oft repeated theme as panelists frequently talked about the evolution of traditional broadcast TV and how that content is increasingly available on more and more non-TV devices, especially computers, game consoles and smart phones and how this trend will continue to grow. 

I kept thinking about the recent WGA and SAG contract negotiations and both unions’ concerns about how soon “new media” will be the primary delivery conduit for first run content.  These technical discussions about the growing reality that viewers can more and more often watch their favorite TV shows wherever and whenever they want using mobile devices underscores the need to re-define how residuals are paid.

It was also interesting to note the projection that smartphone sales (Blackberry and iPhone type devices) are likely to exceed conventional cell phone sales within the next two years.  This is important because there’s going to be an equally exponentially growing market for content that you can watch on these video-enabled phones, whether it’s something re-purposed from other content or material made specifically for the wireless video market. 

Knowing that something you produce is going to be seen mostly on 3” handheld screens by people with short attention spans should most definitely influence how this content is produced.

Not surprisingly, 3D was also a big topic of discussion at the Summit and specifically the challenge of recreating the theatrical 3D experience in the home.  The current wave of interest in 3D in theatres and the success of movies like Disney/Pixar’s “UP” and the anticipated success of James Cameron’s “Avatar” have the industry drooling over potential increased profits from exploiting this technology.

Earlier this year when I interviewed director Peter Hyams for P3 Update, he told me he anticipated that Cameron’s film would do for 3D what “Star Wars” did for Dolby surround sound in making that technology the next “must have” part of the audience experience. 

Certainly the technology itself has come a long way over the decades.  But even on the theatrical side, there are still multiple 3D standards in both digital and film-based exhibition, which is confusing and expensive for exhibitors.  And when it comes to really good quality 3D in the home, the standards war is just as fractious.

Come January, several consumer electronics companies will be showcasing 3D ready plasma and LCD displays at the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show.  But as we still lack industry standards for how to execute 3D images, it’s likely to take years before 3D becomes a common feature in home theatre systems.  Just like the high definition format wars, it will all come down to a combination of which gets the widest studio (and adult video) support even more than who delivers the most natural quality picture.

At the end of the two day conference, after all the talk about things like product integration, immersive technologies, digital delivery systems, new advertising and business models, it still came down to what smart people have known all along – it’s all about creating quality content that consumers become emotionally invested in watching.  Without that, everything else is academic.

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By Gordon Meyer

P3GizmoGuy@gmail.com

Since part of getting gigs in town is based on knowing what’s going on and who’s doing what, there are several online databases that any working professional should subscribe to.

Baseline Studio Systems’ (www.blssi.com) showbiz databases Film Tracker (www.filmtracker.com) and Studio System (www.studiosystem.com), are the Rolls Royces of showbiz databases both in terms of depth of content and pricing.

Studio System continuously tracks the status of thousands of projects in development, includes exceptionally comprehensive company and talent representation directories.  While much of this info is available on the less pricey Hollywood Creative Directory (www.HCDOnline.com) and IMDb Pro (http://pro.imdb.com) databases, you’ll often find info here not available on either of the other two, though to be fair, the reverse is also true.

A buddy of mine is a researcher for a major entertainment news organization who’s been using Studio System for years and he swears by it.  I’m just getting into it myself and like its depth of info, though am also a bit overwhelmed by some of the choices.  Fortunately Baseline is very good about providing both online tutorials and a real person to walk you through the system’s features so you can get the most out of what they offer.

Frankly as the Studio System is aimed at high level studio and network executives, the amount of info available there may be overkill for most below the line talent and indie producers.  Fortunately, their Film Tracker database will probably do the trick for a lot less moolah.  Film Tracker is basically a more streamlined version of the Studio System database with a focus on screen credits, representation info, feature and television project status and company rosters.

So if Film Tracker and Studio System are so comprehensive, why would you want to also subscribe to HCD Online and IMDb Pro?  Simple.  Because there’s always going to be info, especially contact info, that one of these databases will have that one or both of the others don’t.  Plus, on any given listing, one database may be more current than the others.  BTW, one of the things you pay for with Studio System/Film Tracker is the fact that each listing tells you at the bottom of the page when it was last updated. 

What can I tell you?  Knowledge is power.  Strategically used, these services can help you figure out who to pitch yourself and your projects to, what your pitching targets have done and often who to send flowers and chocolates to (their assistants, often listed by name) before or after the pitch.  Priceless.

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By Gordon Meyer
P3GizmoGuy@gmail.com

Here’s a quickie on a very cool product category I’m checking out – the new breed of pocket camcorders.  A company called Pure Digital Products came out with one of the first models in this product category – a camera roughly the size of a pack of cigarettes.  And here’s one of the best features.  You can buy these puppies for under $200.

I’ve been playing with their Flip Ultra HD (www.theflip.com/) and like much of what I see.  This camera shoots a native 720p picture and can store up to 2 hours worth of footage in its internal storage.  It comes with its own editing and distribution software called FlipShare, which is preloaded onto the camera in both PC and Mac versions.  

The camera itself is tripod compatible and has HDMI and USB connectors along with a built-in mic and digital zoom lens.  The bundled software also does a great job of pulling individual frames to use as still photos.  The video files it generates are in the MP4 format so you should be able to drop the footage into any number of industry standard editing programs if you don’t want to use their bundled software (and for professional applications you probably won’t since this is a very consumer and YouTube oriented product).

Here’s the thing.  Cameras like the Flip Ultra HD will never replace professional gear or even pro-sumer gear as a tool for any kind of principle photography.   There’s no place to plug in an external microphone; the lens is small and has a very limited zoom range; and, as stated above, the only ports on the camera are an HDMI connector so you can plug the camera directly into an HDTV (or HD editing system) and a USB connector. Be aware than on a PC, the bundled FlipShare software requires a couple of gig of RAM and a very fast processor.  If you’re running an older computer, although the software will load, the video will be WAY out of sync with the sound, making editing a major chore.

The Flip Ultra HD and its counterparts were made specifically for the consumer market as an easy way to shoot edit and post videos to places like YouTube.   But because of their ultra compact size (you can easily fit one onside your shirt pocket), they’re great for location managers, screen tests and B-roll footage.  Savvy publicists and marketing execs can use these puppies to create on-set publicity footage that can be posted online with a minimum of fuss.  All in all a useful tool.

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By Gordon Meyer
P3GizmoGuy@gmail.com

I’ve always been fond of trade shows like DV Expo.  They’re good places to get up to date on new technology and industry trends, not to mention an interesting place to do some networking.  In fact, I met the esteemed Sally Kemper at last year’s DV Expo, leading to my current association with P3 Update.

I attended this year’s Expo anticipating a good deal of productivity both for my editorial and production agendas.  I couldn’t tell you if this year’s change of venue from the Burbank Marriott to the Pasadena Convention Center influenced attendance and exhibitor participation, but it did appear to me that this year’s Expo was smaller than in years past.

There were two things that really stood out for me about this year’s Expo.  One was the growing emphasis by camera manufacturers on the new breed of (relatively) low cost HD cameras.  Sony, Panasonic and JVC were all there in force showing off lines of HD cameras with pretty damn good picture quality and pricing starting well under $10,000.

What I find especially useful about these cameras over the HDV cameras that started coming out just a few years ago is the way so many of them now employ solid state memory technology like SD cards or P2 modules and record their video on QuickTime files, ready to drop right into edit systems like Final Cut Pro.  Just a few years ago when I produced a DVD launch event for Think Film, just rendering all those hours of video into my editor’s Avid system took the better part of a day at a fairly hefty hourly rate.  I love being able to save all that time (and money) by being able to just drop the files directly into an editing program.

Now I’m involved in a production where the line producer wants to use studio-grade HD cameras instead of these much less expensive ones.  Based on the output I’ve seen so far, I think it would be hard, if not impossible, for most consumers to be able to tell the difference on a simple interview show between the kind of footage shot on something like a JVC GY-HM100 and a studio grade camera.

Of course for the show I’m consulting on, there’s more involved in selecting a camera than just price and resolution.   We need something that will both generate network-caliber picture quality and enable us to sync up for a multi-camera shoot with live switching, a line cut and ISO footage.  That quest continues and I’ll keep you up to speed on what we find in our research.

The other thing that stood out for me was the increased visibility of 3D technology, especially in the conference sections.  As one of the guest speakers pointed out, 3D technology has actually been around since the late 19th century and the stereoscope.  While there were highly visible revivals of 3D motion pictures in the 1950’s and 1980’s, these turned out to be short-lived fads.  Yet hundreds of millions of dollars are being invested in digital 3D technology from the production and exhibition side.  Panasonic is expected to showcase a line of 3D-ready flat screen TVs at the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show featuring footage from James Cameron’s “Avatar,” a film that many in the industry think will do for 3D what “Star Wars” did for Dolby Surround Sound 30 years ago and what a half century earlier “The Jazz Singer” did for synchronized sound.

All I know is that it’s an intriguing technology and if used well can dramatically contribute to the art of cinematic storytelling.  I also know that, for now, the added costs of equipment rental and post make 3D an unlikely part of any of the projects I currently have on my production slate.  But that could easily change over the next few years.

Meanwhile, I saw a few intriguing products at DV Expo that I plan to check out and report on here.  Stay tuned.

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• Light the green or blue chromo screen backdrop and the foreground talent separately.
• Before you begin lighting a green or blue chromo screen sequence, you need to know exactly what the backdrop will become. If possible, have an editing system on set so that you can simulate your composites, so that you are able to see if your foreground lighting fits in with the backdrop image that will replace the chromo background.
• Make sure the shadows of the key light fall in the same direction as the backdrop, and that the quality of the lighting, color temperature and the angle of the lighting are in harmony. If your chromo will eventually be replaced with a muted soft landscape, your foreground subject needs soft lighting. If your backdrop will become a harsh desert, you foreground subjects need hard lighting. There is no bigger give away that the backdrop was fake, then if your foreground subject shadows and background subject shadows are moving in polar opposite directions to each other.
• Green or blue chromo screens are not exactly conducive to motivating actor imagination that they are on an exotic location, so do try show talent the intended backdrop image, so that their performance is motivated to the intended location.
• Use a green or blue chromo screen location with the largest backdrop surface your budget allows. I understand you may not have the “Iron Man” green screen budget, but remember that small chromo screens equal big problems, as small chromo screen restrict lensing options, ie how wide you can shot before your talent is not juxtaposed against a chromo backdrop, and as a result you end up shooting off your set.
• The green or blue chromo backdrop should be lit with a shadow-less, even as possible quality.
• Do not over light the green or blue screen. The more light you have on the chromo, the more chance you have for the green or blue color of the backdrop reflecting spill light onto the actors, thus compromising a clean composite.
• It is preferable to underexpose your green screen up to one stop darker to avoid green spill light. With blue screen you have to be carefull as underexposed blue goes black. So rule of thumb for me is green screen 1 stop under the camera exposure, blue screen at camera exposure.
• Keep the talent as far away from the green or blue screen backdrop as possible, this again will help ensure that you have the least amount of unnecessary chromo spill light seeping onto the reflection angles of the talents faces or bodies.
• I either use space lights or tungsten nine lights through 1/4 grid cloth to light green screens evenly.
• I primarily use four -point lighting approach for the foreground talent for chroma screen work, key light, fill light, and two back light cross keys to ensure the cleanest composites and separation from the chroma screen. I position the cross key back lights at 45% angle from both sides. I keep the backlights anywhere from a 1/2 a stop under exposure to a 1/2 a stop over exposure.
• Another great trick is to use 1/8 magenta gels on your backlight for green screen and 1/8 yellow gel for blue screens, as these are the respective complementary colors of the potential chroma color spill.
• Another good reason to keep talent as far away from the chromo screen backdrop as possible, is to avoid the talent casting shadows on the chromo screen.
• If you have to paint your chroma color on the floor, keep it as spotless as possible by not having crew walking on the floor unnecessarily, or if they have to, provide surgical socks for crew to walk in.
• Is green or blue better for composites? Because green has a brighter color channel then blue, and blue when underexposed tends to have more noise then green, green is the color of my chose if possible for green/blue screen work. That being said, blonde hair is easier to key against blue screen backdrops. However, with today’s software composite packages, either green or blue will do the job. Therefore, a second important criteria to consider in your decision is wardrobe. If you are dealing with primarily blue wardrobe the of course a green screen backdrop makes more sense and visa versa.
• If you’re shooting in a 16:9 aspect ratio, you could set the camera to a 4:3 aspect ratio for chromo screen work, unless your framing something that will fill the entire frame horizontally. This will ensure you have the most resolution possible. Also feel free to crop in a little tighter then the final frame will be, as you will always benefit in resolution if you gather more information and are able to reduce the size in the composite.
• Another trick to squeeze the maximum amount of resolution into your cameras gathering of information process, is to tilt the camera 90 degrees for shots of standing people, thus utilizing a lot more horizontal information into your subject, that you will later be able to reduce in size in the composite.
• Color temperature i.e. shooting green screen with Tungsten or HMI is not a huge consideration. Again what is of most important is to treat the background and subject separately.
• Do not forget to add some effects and texture to sell the trick. If the background is garden, have for example a cucalorous which is organic wooden shaped cut-out in front of your key light source, to simulate the effect of the sun moving through branches and leaves.
• A good green paint for excellent composites is Rosco’s Ultimate Chroma Key, but today’s software is so sophisticated you will be able to extract good composites with almost any chromo paint.
• Ensure that you do not have reflective and shiny props like jewelry or earrings when you doing chromo screen work, or you will need to become a rotoscope export in post.

·       With compositing, shoot progressive [frames] rather than interlaced [fields] to get the cleanest edge and highest resolution.Weather you go green or blue, I trust these tips will get you though your chromo day very successfully. If you have further questions please don’t hesitate to contact me personally through my site at www.daronkeet.com

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By Gordon Meyer

P3GizmoGuy@gmail.com

Phone expenses, especially when you’re on location, can quickly become a big expense.  I found a very cool way of dealing with this through of all things an infomercial.   But it’s one that really delivers on its promises.  Meet the MagicJack (www.magicjack.com).

This is a palm-sized gizmo that attaches to the USB 2.0 port of any Windows PC or Intel-based Mac.  As long as your computer is online with a high speed Internet connection, you can plug any standard land line phone into the MagicJack and you’re off and running with unlimited local and domestic long distance calls, directory assistance, voice mail, call waiting and caller ID.   They even offer a free conference call service, which is way cool in my book.

As for voice mail, they don’t just email you a notification that you’ve got a voice mail in your in-box, they email you a WAV file with the voice message itself.  Nice!

$40 buys you the MagicJack itself and your first year of unlimited service.  After that, it’s only $20 a year.  Want international calling? They offer very competitive rates like France (where my brother lives) for about 2 cents a minute calling to land lines.

It gets better though.  Because the MagicJack is such a compact little gizmo, you can take it on the road with you and use it anywhere in the world that you can get a broadband signal.  I selected a Beverly Hills phone number for my MagicJack. 

Windows and Mac software are already pre-loaded on the MagicJack and self-install on your computer the first time you use it.  This took several minutes on my computer, but it’s pretty much a one time operation.  Once it’s set up, including the selection of a phone number in what ever major city and state in the US that you want, it’s pretty transparent to use.  Plus you can use it anywhere in the world that has high speed Internet.

The next time I go visit my brother in Paris, I can take my MagicJack with me and either attach it to the USB port of his computer or to my own laptop and make free phone calls back to the US.  The people I call will see my Beverly Hills phone number on their caller ID and can call me at that number, even though I’m halfway around the world.  If the computer is off, it just goes to voice mail.  There’s even an option to automatically forward incoming calls to the phone number of your choice, like your cell or office.

Sound quality is clean and comparable to what I used to experience with Vonage, which uses a similar VoIP (Voice over IP) technology.

You do have to connect a regular telephone to the MagicJack, which is potentially cumbersome on location.  And it will only work when the computer it’s connected to is on and online.  But for $20 a year, it’s a great way to take your phone with you without worrying about per minute charges or lost cell signals. 

And if you’re someone who travels abroad, it can save you a huge amount of money compared to the price of international roaming on your cell or even pre-paid international phone cards.

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By Gordon Meyer

P3GizmoGuy@gmail.com

It was just a few weeks ago when I wrote about the ClickFree automated backup system.   Little did I realize that I would soon have to use it to actually restore key data on my hard drive. 

Here’s a bit of advice I failed to follow myself.  It’s a really good idea to wipe off your hard drive every two or three years and do a clean install of both Windows and your applications.  Why?  Because over the years, all sorts of extraneous crap builds up that you don’t even know about and it can slow down your computer to an absolute crawl.

I know better and still didn’t get around to doing that because frankly it’s a cumbersome, time consuming operation.  Re-installing Windows alone takes close to two hours, assuming the install goes smoothly.  But with my computer (and no, I have not yet gotten around to getting that new system I wrote about), all that junk on my drive was not only slowing things down to a snail’s pace, it was actually preventing some of my programs from running properly.

So over the weekend, I broke down and wiped my hard drive.  Fortunately, I also did one more pass with ClickFree before doing my clean install.  The restore process from ClickFree worked very well for me and in the background so I could use my computer for other tasks while the restoration was in progress.

ClickFree lets gives you a choice of either a complete or select restoration.  Since one of the reasons I was doing this operation was to clear out all sorts of no longer needed files, I elected for the latter, choosing mainly to restore the files I had on my desktop itself as well as everything in the My Documents folder. 

Although I expected ClickFree to restore all those files to the appropriate folders on the “new” drive, it put everything in a dedicated folder instead, with the contents of that folder simulating the original file structure of the original hard drive configuration.  I like that.  It’s certainly easy enough to move files over to reconstructed folders if I want them, but truthfully I plan to delete many of the files and folders that had been restored.  And many of the restored files are corrupted in some way.  This way I can segregate the older, possibly corrupt files from the clean, fresh ones.

In the end, although a new computer is still very much in the near future for me, until I make that plunge, wiping my hard drive and doing clean installs of both Windows and my key applications gives a big performance boost to my computer.

Onward and upward!

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By Gordon Meyer

P3GizmoGuy@gmail.com

I’m reluctantly dating myself when I concede that I wrote my very first screenplay using the original Microsoft Word for DOS and printed the thing out on a 19 CPS daisy wheel printer.  That 124 page masterpiece took over 5 hours to print and I had to babysit the entire process in order to make sure the form-feed paper didn’t jam up my printer.

Although setting the standard screenplay margins within Word for DOS wasn’t a big deal, every time I revised the script, I had to manually go through the script and adjust each and every one of those 120 + page breaks. And then came dedicated script writing software and writers everywhere bowed to the techno-geniuses who made their lives so much easier.

As far as I’m concerned, in the professional world, there are basically three choices for dedicated screenwriting programs: Final Draft (www.finaldraft.com), Movie Magic Screenwriter (www.screenplay.com) and Scriptware (www.scriptware.com), all three of which are available for both Windows and Mac.  All three programs boast A-List writers in both features and television as their users.  Final Draft and Movie Magic Screenwriter recently released new versions.

The core idea behind pretty much every screenwriting program worth considering is to make the mechanical part of writing (i.e. correct formatting and pagination) as much of a no-brainer as possible.  The early DOS based programs, while easier than adding custom templates to Word, Word Perfect or WordStar (the reigning word processors of the day), they still were pretty cumbersome with their heavy use of function keys for thinks like dialog formatting.

Then came Scriptware.  Here, you only needed to learn to use two keys – Tab and Enter.  Want to insert a piece of dialog?  Just hit the Tab key (as if you’re on an old fashioned typewriter) and Scriptware would automatically put your cursor where it needed to be for a character name, even remembering to put the name in all caps.  Hit Enter after the character name and you’re in the correct position and formatting for the dialog itself.  Every major screenwriting program since has adopted this user interface.

I have to admit up front a certain bias in that I started with Scriptware.  Right now, I’m using Final Draft for the re-writes of my swashbuckling fantasy adventure saga (agent and producer inquiries welcome).

But Movie Magic Screenwriter’s latest addition not only includes what they call “educational templates” to coach you through the creative process for a variety of formats, they recently created a template from author Michael Hauge, the author of “Writing Screenplays That Sell.”  I’ve known Michael for years and taken several of his classes, so this addition intrigued me.

Over the next few weeks, I’m going to be putting each of these programs through their paces with as open a mind as I can muster.  Each program boasts a fairly easy learning curve for the basics and lots of useful tools to make the writer’s job easier.  It will be interesting to see which I like best by the time I finish my testing.

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By Gordon Meyer (P3GizmoGuy@gmail.com)

I thought I’d narrowed my quest for a new computer down to a Windows-based laptop with a Blu-ray R/W drive, because I want the flexibility of being able to easily take my work with me on the road.  But I’m frankly having second thoughts.

One of the laptops I’m looking at is a $3,600 HP portable workstation with the latest generation of super-fast Intel Core Duo processors (2.8 GHz), 4GB of RAM, 17” display and the option of using a docking station. 

What’s a docking station, you ask?  It’s a device you connect a notebook computer to that lets you connect an external keyboard, mouse, monitor and, depending on the model, expansion cards, internal hard drives and all sorts of other goodies that can give your laptop the expandability and functionality of a desktop. 

You simply attach your laptop to the docking station when you’re at your “home base,” and detach it when you want to take it on the road.  Depending on the feature base though, docking stations can cost $200 or more.  HP’s highest end unit has a $349 price tag.  So with a really good docking station, the price tag is now approaching $4,000 (plus tax).

Now if I was doing a lot of heavy duty graphics work, editing and disc authoring on the road, I could easily justify that level of investment.  But truthfully, if I’m going to edit video, author discs or do any number of other tasks that require a lot of computing horsepower, I’m most likely going to be doing that at my office and not on the road.

While there are a lot of online stores where I can custom configure a desktop system, since I was talking about an HP mobile workstation, just to be consistent, I went back to www.hp.com to configure a high-end desktop system.  Here’s what I was able to come up with for well under $2500.

I started with a base e9180t desktop system and tricked it out with a 3 GHz Intel Core i7-950 CPU, 9GB of RAM (more than double what’s on that laptop), a 1TB (that’s 1,000 GB) hard drive, an ATI Radeon HD 4850 graphics board with DVI, HDMI and VGA adapters and a full GB of dedicated graphics RAM, a 21.5” HD-compatible widescreen monitor with VGA, DVI-D and HDMI connectors,  Blu-ray R/W drive that doubles as a DVD R/W drive, 7.1 channel sound card, and Logitech 5.1 channel speakers.

And I can easily add another 3GB of RAM and another terabyte or so of internal drive space.  Pardon me for a minute while I wipe the drool off my keyboard.

As I said in my last blog entry, for what I do, my mobile computing will primarily consist of writing either in Word or my screenplay software, perhaps update an Excel spreadsheet or PowerPoint presentation, surf the web, check email or watch a movie.

If it’s still a priority for me to have a Blu-ray drive on my laptop, there are Blu-ray equipped models starting at just under a grand.  Even if I go with a MacBook Air, which to me is the ultimate balance between portability and functionality (base price of $1500), this means that for about the same price as my uber tricked out mobile workstation with docking station, I can have both a kick ass desktop system for my primary work and a very cool laptop for when I’m on the road. 

In fact, to save even more money,  I can get a brand name basic laptop with wireless networking, a 15” screen, 250GB hard drive and built-in DVD burner for around $500, which means I can have my best of both worlds solution for about a grand less than getting the high end laptop alone.

Food for thought, eh?

This of course is the solution that meets my specific usage patterns and needs.  Your mileage may vary.

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