iPod Issues

It has come to our attention that a few viewers are having issues viewing the show on their iPods. We are doing what we can to get the issue sorted out. I do know have an iPod or a computer that can even use one; all of my stuff is Linux based.

I have tried to put the videos in a format that would play on an iPod but apparently that is not working. When we do get the issue sorted out we do not plan to update the old videos, sorry. This would reek havoc on every subscriber of the show and cause everyone to download the episodes all over again. When we get it sorted out we will make sure all new videos work with the iPod and post a separate link on the old episodes for an iPod ready version.

We are truly sorry for the issues. It is my fault and I am doing what I can to get it sorted out. Please let us know if you have experienced any issues with the videos or the site. You telling us is the only way that we can get them fixed.

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How We Produce the Show

I almost forgot to mention that I recently wrote an article on how we put the show together. Ryan and I are both open source software (OSS) users, developers, and advocates so it is only fitting that we use Linux and OSS from start to finish to do the show.

So if your curious, bounce on over to Linux.com and read up on how we do it.

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Episode 11 - Get Physical, Show Notes

This episode is one that I have been wanting to do for a while. I recently ran a marathon and wanted to shoot this while I was still in running shape. The weather here in Arkansas did not cooperate for this shoot. We have had severe weather almost constantly for the last three weeks. I literally shot most of my footage between thunderstorms. As it goes, right after I finished filming the clouds parted and the sun came out, go figure.

I also got to use my new shotgun microphone for this shoot. I think the quality was way better than the wireless mic I have been using. It is by no means a high-end piece of equipment but it gets the job done. On the outdoor shots with me in-front of the camera it did a really good job of removing the background noise. The very flooded Arkansas River was rolling on right behind the camera.

This was a fun one to shoot, to spite the weather; next time we get to talk about food!

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Episode 10 - Spike Tail Review, Show Notes

Wow folks, I should have done this a week ago. Sorry about not getting the show notes up as soon as the episode was ready.

This was my first episode to go it alone and I have to say that it was an interesting experience. The episode that you see is actually the second complete one that I filmed. I had originally filmed episode 10 a full week beforehand, but it turned into one long lecture. The more I watched and edited it, the more I disliked it. So, at the last minute (literally) I was blessed with some great weather and I headed out to the beach and recorded the version that you see here. I did an experiment in the other version, but it was much more boring. Filming at the beach allowed me to do it more ad-hoc and in a style more true to life (i.e. trudging around in water, therefore saturating the material as best I could).

We continued to use Amazon’s S3 service for transferring the files between each other and it has made working with them much easier.

As always, head on over to the wiki to see what we are currently working on and to get involved. We always interested in seeing what others think of our show topics and their contents. Please don’t hesitate to let us know what you would like to see in future shows.

We hope you enjoyed the show!

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Episode 9 - Tarpe Diem, Show Notes

Over all, the making of this episode was rather uneventful. The biggest thing was the time crunch; as usual Ryan and I waited until the bitter end to pull it all together. I was still editing yesterday morning.

If you wonder why my camera work was so shaky it was because I had to hand cam most of my footage. I got out on location and realized that I left the tripod’s camera attachment at home. All of the straight away shots were easy enough, I just propped the camera on the tripod. The rest of it I had to do by hand.

For the third episode in a row we had serious issues with blip.tv, our video host. The upload of the high-res version failed three times before it finally posted. The flash encoding also failed for the third straight time. All of these issues have us contemplating a move to a new video platform.

We solved one of our “distance apart” issue making this episode. I signed up for Amazon’s S3, a storage solution built around web services. We were easily able to transfer the large DV files from Seattle to Arkansas without too much issue. This is where we are looking to move the video hosting. It does cost money though, so we are just thinking about right now.

As always, it was fun putting the episode together. We hope you enjoyed it.

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Gossamer Gear “The One” arrives

I was just informed that a package from Gossamer Gear has arrived at my apartment. It undoubtedly is “The One” tent we covered earlier on the News site. I will be spending some time this weekend and next week filming, so I will be sure to get some pictures and footage of it.

If you would like us to mention and/or cover The One in our upcoming episode about Tarp Tents, please give us your thoughts in the Wiki page.

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Donations

If you notice, there is a new block in the side bar for donations. We put it there encase some of you liked the show so much you wanted to give us money

There are four options for donating: reoccurring (monthly) donation in the amounts of $10, $5, and $2 and a one time flat amount. The entire donation process is being handled through PayPal.

In all sincerity, we would love it if you feel compelled to donate but please do not feel obligated. If the donations cover the costs of operations we plan on dropping the few small ads that we have running.

As I decreed before, we will also provide full disclosure of all donations that we receive. Please let us know what you think.

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Episode 8 - Jetboil Gear Review, Show Notes

Finally, our first gear review! Ryan and I have talked about doing one for a while now and we finally sat down, figured it out, and did it.

For the review we (me mostly ) chose the Jetboil PCS. One of the big reasons I wanted to do the Jetboil was because I have already used it in three of the previous episodes. That and I absolutely love the thing.

This episode was also the first one that Ryan and I did where we were not in the same location; thankfully it was not too big of a deal. We had a little fuss getting the video files passed back and forth, but not too much. Everything should be a little easier next time.

The only real technical issue we had was with my microphone. If you noticed, and I am sure most people did, the audio gets a little choppy half way through the video (around the coffee bit). It was because the batteries in my mic were going out. I salvaged what I could, then went back out to the location and re-filmed everything else.

This episode also marks the first time that we had some involvement from the community, thanks you guys. We are glad that you like the show enough to make suggestions…keep them coming!

Oh and Ryan has a brand new camera to film with now, woo-hoo!

From Ryan: Wow, what a rush. I literally got my camera in two days before the episode was supposed to go live. As you can tell, I have a lot to learn when filming, but that will come with time I hope. I had a blast making this episode, for my part — I only wish I would have had a little more time so that I could have shot outside. I think for you, the viewer, it would have made for a better video…if for nothing else, then to have the scene(s) a little better lit.

Now that the equipment is in order, we’ll be able to start work on each each video earlier. This will allow us to more fine tune the episodes to what we want and hopefully make it so Chad isn’t waiting around for me to get my part(s) done to finish things up.

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Advertising and Sponsorship Thoughts and Ideas

Almost every podcast/blog/website/whatever has to address the issue of paying for things at some point or another; this is my address.

Hike it all is and always will be freely available. When I started the show that was one of my first pillars. However, as you can guess, creating the content and hosting everything costs money; money I am more than glad to spend :). To help things along though we are adding a few small advertisements to the site. They are in the bottom of the sidebar on the pages. If you really do not want to see them you can always use Firefox and install the Customize Google extension; that works for us.

We are also looking for some sponsors. And by sponsors we mean people/companies that would like to advertise with us on the site and sponsor episodes of the show. With that said, we will not force any sponsors products down the throats of our viewers. We will also use full disclosure of everything we receive from any sponsor.

Since I am throwing all of this out there I need to state that the website does not cost much to operate. All of my camera equipment is stuff that I already own. All of the stuff that we have shown in the episodes, so far, is stuff that we already have. All of the video content is currently hosted for free by Blip.tv (thank you guys, you rock). The only real cost is hosting the site and the investment of time that Ryan and I make. Hosting only costs us $10/per month, thank goodness. Time is another issue all together. Ryan and I have no delusions of grandeur when it comes to making a living doing this. We would love to, but for now our time is freely given without complaint.

Now that all of that is out there I am going to propose something a little revolutionary. Every dollar we spend and receive is going to be logged in the wiki. This will serve several purposes…

1. Ryan and I can track things.
2. Provides a level of disclosure that is rarely seen.
3. Shows anybody interested in creating a podcast how much it costs.
4. Informs our viewers of the effort we are putting in.
5. Create a bidding war between sponsors (just kidding)

We will see how this little experiment goes. As always, please let us know if you have any thoughts, comments, etc. on this topic; good or bad, we want to hear them. We can be contacted by email at advertise@hikeitall.com, or you can make a comment on this post.

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Episode 7 - Light My Fire, Show Notes

This episode was one for the ages. We had tons of issues, logistics, and other various things to over come just to get it out there.

Ryan and I first starting talking about him joining me in early December. Over the course of the next few weeks we came up with several ideas and ways for him to join me as a co-host. Oh did I mention he lives in Washington state and I live in Arkansas? Yeah, that was why we discussed it so much.

For this episode we knew we could film it together because he was going to be in Arkansas for Christmas. So that is what we did, one random day we went out and filmed the entire episode and all was good. That is until I went to edit the film two weeks later. When I pulled the video over to my computer the first bit of it was ruined. I will spare you the details but it was basically a bad spot in the tape. So off to re-film the lead in!

After that issue was diverted I went back to finish editing, only to find that the last half of the video Ryan and I shot was inaudible because of the wind. When we filmed, the wind was blowing so hard that you could not hear a word that Ryan was saying. I guess that is what we get for filming right next to the banks of the Arkansas River. No big deal here we just had to narrate that section. That takes time and a lot of patients though…so that pushed the release off a week.

We finally got the video all put together and published. Then our video host had an issue making the Flash (web version) of the video. It soon became obvious that the issue on their server was not going to be fixed so I took matters into my own hands and made the Flash version myself. An upload, a blog post edit, and a little grief later the episode was in the books.

Through it all, I think we created a really good and very informative video. Ryan and I had a blast making it together; it is going to be interesting making the next episode with him back in Washington.

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