10/27/2015 - Good morning gang. Just a quick note. A number of followers on Twitter and Facebook have suggest we create either a weekly podcast or a YouTube channel. The purpose would be simply to discuss (with more than 140 characters + more time) many of the same key issues we all chat about on Twitter. These topics include, LODD's, Fire-Fighter Health Initiative 2015; tactics, strains on ourselves, our families, PTSD, etc.
Either way requires a significant time commitment. I know. Back in 2001-2004, I was invited to join the then, PIO for Boca Raton Fire-Rescue, Frank Correggio, on his live radio show, "Burning Issues," every Sunday evening from 5:00PM - 7:00 PM ET. We had a blast, with listeners around the world and interesting and well-know guest speakers either calling in or sitting with us in our studio. Each show was archived so that listeners could listen to it later if they missed the live broadcast. YES! We were doing this long before the word, "podcast" was even thought.
So, if you would like us to provide some sort of forum on one of these media, please let us know. Just leave a comment here and let us know what you would like and would listen to.
And please. subscribe to this blog. It means a great deal to us.
Stay Safe - Every One Goes Home
Steve Greene
Dalmatian Productions, Inc.
Showing posts with label video. Show all posts
Showing posts with label video. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 27, 2015
Saturday, October 13, 2012
Television - Is It the "Great Wasteland" for the Fire Service?
For many years, there were several occupations that were/are depicted on television and , for the most part, were pretty safe bets for shows, i.e. cops, doctors, and attorneys. So, who's missing from this picture? How about firefighters?
Sure, there have been a few shows about firefighters, such as, "EMERGENCY," from NBC, back in the 1970's. Though Johnny Gage was occasionally set-up to look like a womanizer, its original executive producer, Jack Webb, of "DRAGNET" fame, was dedicated to representing the profession, plus the new vocation of, "paramedics," accurately. Sure, there was some dramatic license taken, but for the most part, it never insulted the intelligence of most firefighters who watched the show, and it actually contributed to many people choosing to become firefighters, paramedics, and/or EMT's. To me, that is a contribution to society.
There were a few others dramas as well, including, "Firehouse" and "Code Red," neither of which had a major impact on their ratings or the industry. Most recently, there was, "Rescue Me," by Denis Leary. In the beginning, the show was decent, but somewhere in the first or second season when Leary's character raped his ex-wife, the show's credibility dropped dramatically.
And now comes, "Chicago Fire," produced by Dick Wolf, of the various, "Law & Order" franchises. As noted above, shows about cops and lawyers have proved a good formula, on the most part. And Wolf certainly brought a great deal of "street cred" to this production. Unfortunately, he must have left his credibility back in the office when he arrived on-set to producer, "Chicago Fire."
I recorded the premiere of "Chicago Fire," the other evening and just watched the first twenty minutes. Now I am the first to admit that I've been out of the active service since 1985, thus I'm not sure if what I saw on this show are new SOP's (standard operating procedures) for most departments today, or were just Hollywood "make-believe."
Here are three major weaknesses to the fire service credibility that I saw in these first 20 minutes:
1. Working House Fire-White smoke showing from the first floor, with a strong orange glow being seen from the cab of the first arrival apparatus in the first floor interior. Fire had not vented yet. Chief's size-up report to Central is as he exits his vehicle, with no 360 assessment. First crew approaches front door and without any looking, checking, etc., punches in the door with a Halligan, enters without a hose. When the Chief is told that a victim's brother is upstairs & had not exited the building, the aerial is raised and two firefighters approach the window. The closest one takes his Halligan and punches in the window without knowing if the fire has been vented. The firefighter behind him tried to stop him. The window breaks and the first firefighter says, "See, it must be vented," and enters the room. Suddenly, the firefighter on the 1st floor says there's no vent and the upper room backdrafts, killing the firefighter in that room.
2. At an MVC, (Motor Vehicle Collision) they find a couple of victims in the car, but no driver. Then, one firefighter looks at the river and declares the driver was ejected, over the railing of the bridge, into the river, below. Two rescue firefighters suit-up and as they're making their way into the river, someone else yells that one of the people looking on is the driver, and another firefighter runs over and tackles him.
3. In the firehouse, one of the EMT's passes one of the lead character firefighters and hands him a vial of some medication. He moves to a private area and shoots up. At that point, I hit the stop button. So, I ask you, is this a fairly true representation of the CFD (Chicago Fire Department) and/or where firefighting in general, has gone since I retired?
In my mind, while I understand the drama and the need for conflict, whether it be on-the-job or through-the-job, I believe that my brave and dedicated colleagues of the Chicago Fire Department are some of the best in the business and even with a well-experienced, Deputy Chief as the technical advisor, these three scenes did an injustice to the men and women of CFD. Why is it that most shows about doctors, cops, and attorneys are fairly true to the profession and its only us, firefighters, who are thrown under the proverbial bus?
On the off-chance that you may agree with me and believe that it is time for a program to present and accurate and true representation of America's fire service, by the men and women who actually serve every day, please visit Dalmatian Productions, Inc.
Be safe and let's make sure everyone comes home!
Sure, there have been a few shows about firefighters, such as, "EMERGENCY," from NBC, back in the 1970's. Though Johnny Gage was occasionally set-up to look like a womanizer, its original executive producer, Jack Webb, of "DRAGNET" fame, was dedicated to representing the profession, plus the new vocation of, "paramedics," accurately. Sure, there was some dramatic license taken, but for the most part, it never insulted the intelligence of most firefighters who watched the show, and it actually contributed to many people choosing to become firefighters, paramedics, and/or EMT's. To me, that is a contribution to society.
There were a few others dramas as well, including, "Firehouse" and "Code Red," neither of which had a major impact on their ratings or the industry. Most recently, there was, "Rescue Me," by Denis Leary. In the beginning, the show was decent, but somewhere in the first or second season when Leary's character raped his ex-wife, the show's credibility dropped dramatically.
And now comes, "Chicago Fire," produced by Dick Wolf, of the various, "Law & Order" franchises. As noted above, shows about cops and lawyers have proved a good formula, on the most part. And Wolf certainly brought a great deal of "street cred" to this production. Unfortunately, he must have left his credibility back in the office when he arrived on-set to producer, "Chicago Fire."
I recorded the premiere of "Chicago Fire," the other evening and just watched the first twenty minutes. Now I am the first to admit that I've been out of the active service since 1985, thus I'm not sure if what I saw on this show are new SOP's (standard operating procedures) for most departments today, or were just Hollywood "make-believe."
1. Working House Fire-White smoke showing from the first floor, with a strong orange glow being seen from the cab of the first arrival apparatus in the first floor interior. Fire had not vented yet. Chief's size-up report to Central is as he exits his vehicle, with no 360 assessment. First crew approaches front door and without any looking, checking, etc., punches in the door with a Halligan, enters without a hose. When the Chief is told that a victim's brother is upstairs & had not exited the building, the aerial is raised and two firefighters approach the window. The closest one takes his Halligan and punches in the window without knowing if the fire has been vented. The firefighter behind him tried to stop him. The window breaks and the first firefighter says, "See, it must be vented," and enters the room. Suddenly, the firefighter on the 1st floor says there's no vent and the upper room backdrafts, killing the firefighter in that room.
2. At an MVC, (Motor Vehicle Collision) they find a couple of victims in the car, but no driver. Then, one firefighter looks at the river and declares the driver was ejected, over the railing of the bridge, into the river, below. Two rescue firefighters suit-up and as they're making their way into the river, someone else yells that one of the people looking on is the driver, and another firefighter runs over and tackles him.
3. In the firehouse, one of the EMT's passes one of the lead character firefighters and hands him a vial of some medication. He moves to a private area and shoots up. At that point, I hit the stop button. So, I ask you, is this a fairly true representation of the CFD (Chicago Fire Department) and/or where firefighting in general, has gone since I retired?
In my mind, while I understand the drama and the need for conflict, whether it be on-the-job or through-the-job, I believe that my brave and dedicated colleagues of the Chicago Fire Department are some of the best in the business and even with a well-experienced, Deputy Chief as the technical advisor, these three scenes did an injustice to the men and women of CFD. Why is it that most shows about doctors, cops, and attorneys are fairly true to the profession and its only us, firefighters, who are thrown under the proverbial bus?
On the off-chance that you may agree with me and believe that it is time for a program to present and accurate and true representation of America's fire service, by the men and women who actually serve every day, please visit Dalmatian Productions, Inc.
Be safe and let's make sure everyone comes home!
Friday, September 9, 2011
Where Were You...?
The summer of 2001 was turning out to be a very successful one, both on a professional and personal level. My wife had qualified for for a teacher's scholarship for a trip to Israel and we decided if she was going to go, well, I had to find a way to do so, as well. We have family that live outside of the city of Haifa, as well as friends living in the greater Tel Aviv area, and this would be the perfect opportunity to see them all. From a professional standpoint, we had just released the pilot episode of "America's Heroes: The Men & Women of Fire Rescue," which was being marketed internationally.
With a few phone calls, I was in touch with the office for the American Magen David office in Illinois, which pulled some strings and booked me an interview with the Director General of Israel's EMS service, Magen David Adom, as well as permission to ride with several units from Jerusalem south to Ashkelon, on Israel western coast on the Mediterranean. Additionally, my dearly departed friend, Todd Miller, made arrangements for me to speak with a major producer on one of Israel's national networks.After spending about five days with our relatives in the northern part of the country, my wife and I went our separate ways, her to her teacher's program and me to my ride-alongs.
My meeting with the Israeli producer went very well. He loved the framework of our show and asked me if I could return to Israel after the High Holidays of 2001, to help him produce an Israeli version of our show. We set-up some tentative dates and programming ideas and left our meeting, both looking forward to the following Fall.
Upon my return to our office in August, I received a phone call from a good friend explaining that a leading talk show based in New York City, wanted to produce a segment for National Fire Prevention Month in October, that would feature young children and a quick fire education, yet fun, TV spot, as the host of the show was deeply enamored with the fire-rescue service both in New York City and nationally. I tried backing off, but he wouldn't hear of it, since he knew of my background in education, plus he was a very important supporter of our show and web site.
I wrote up a quick treatment for a segment with children 8-10, plus a national fire-prevention mascot, fire-equipment and several firefighters. I sent if off to my contact who was brokering the deal to see what would come of my ideas.We shot a few faxes and email back and forth, fine-tuning the segment, until we both felt it was as good as it could be. I sat back and waited to see what might happen.
On Friday, September 7, 2001, I received a phone call from the broker, ho advised me that the segment had been reviewed by several of the show's producers and they liked it a lot. They too, had a couple of ideas, but felt it was clear enough to meet the host's desires. They would be presenting to her at the following Tuesday's staff meeting at 9:00AM at the studio and would get back to me.
I was on "pins and needles" that weekend, because this would give both our company and our show a big push for the domestic, US television markets. But life rolled on, past the weekend, past Monday, then into Tuesday.
A close friend and I shared our office space in Ft. Lauderdale. He had seen many of the video submissions we had received from dozens of fire departments around the country and as we watched them together, I would teach him some of the signs that firefighters look for at an incident scene. One of those was the color of smoke. Dark, black smoke indicated strong fire and burning; colored smoke often indicated chemical or hazardous materials involvement, and grayish smoke was often a mixture of smoke and steam and was a sign that firefighters were putting water on whatever was burning.
On Tuesday morning, I was sitting at my desk going through my email, with my scanner running in the background. Suddenly, I heard a Ft. Lauderdale Fire Department unit mention that something had happened in Manhattan, a "10-75, All Hands" alarm. Turning to the Internet, I tried to get on to a great web site (www.thebravest.com) that broadcast the FDNY radio channels. But each time I tried to log in, up popped a message saying the site could not be accessed. And the chatter on the scanner had been kicked up a couple of notches as more details became available.
I went into my editing room and rolled one of our 25-inch monitors out to the main office area, hooked up a jury-rigged antenna and tuned to the first station I could find. That's when we saw the beginning of the worst terrorist attack in the history of the United States. As we watched, we saw, live, as the second plane hit the South Tower. We l,looked at each other, both realizing what was happening on our soil, not some unknown locale in the Middle East. My friend asked me how did I think the fire service would douse the fires burning in the two buildings. I told him, "They can't." Then, of course, we heard about the Pentagon and Shanksville.I
We watched for a while, then I had to start answering phone calls from around the country. I was back in the editing room a few minutes later when he yelled out to me, "Steve, come here and look! They're getting water or foam or something on the flames, because the smoke is turning from black to gray!"
Riveted, I sat there watching the scenes unfold before us. I let the telephone ring and go to voicemail. We didn't utter a word to each other. We just sat there silently, letting the tears stream down our faces.And I knew right then and there that fate was not taking me to New York or to Israel. It would keep me in Ft. Lauderdale, doing what I could, in my own small way, to help our country come together in mourning and grief.
Shortly after the North Tower fell, I left the office and headed over to the local blood bank office in my home community, not only to donate my blood, but I felt certain that I was the first of hundreds who would arrive that day. As life would have it, I worked at that blood bank for three straight days, until it was announced that there was absolutely no hope for, or need of blood, for survivors.
Where were you?
With a few phone calls, I was in touch with the office for the American Magen David office in Illinois, which pulled some strings and booked me an interview with the Director General of Israel's EMS service, Magen David Adom, as well as permission to ride with several units from Jerusalem south to Ashkelon, on Israel western coast on the Mediterranean. Additionally, my dearly departed friend, Todd Miller, made arrangements for me to speak with a major producer on one of Israel's national networks.After spending about five days with our relatives in the northern part of the country, my wife and I went our separate ways, her to her teacher's program and me to my ride-alongs.
My meeting with the Israeli producer went very well. He loved the framework of our show and asked me if I could return to Israel after the High Holidays of 2001, to help him produce an Israeli version of our show. We set-up some tentative dates and programming ideas and left our meeting, both looking forward to the following Fall.
Upon my return to our office in August, I received a phone call from a good friend explaining that a leading talk show based in New York City, wanted to produce a segment for National Fire Prevention Month in October, that would feature young children and a quick fire education, yet fun, TV spot, as the host of the show was deeply enamored with the fire-rescue service both in New York City and nationally. I tried backing off, but he wouldn't hear of it, since he knew of my background in education, plus he was a very important supporter of our show and web site.
I wrote up a quick treatment for a segment with children 8-10, plus a national fire-prevention mascot, fire-equipment and several firefighters. I sent if off to my contact who was brokering the deal to see what would come of my ideas.We shot a few faxes and email back and forth, fine-tuning the segment, until we both felt it was as good as it could be. I sat back and waited to see what might happen.
On Friday, September 7, 2001, I received a phone call from the broker, ho advised me that the segment had been reviewed by several of the show's producers and they liked it a lot. They too, had a couple of ideas, but felt it was clear enough to meet the host's desires. They would be presenting to her at the following Tuesday's staff meeting at 9:00AM at the studio and would get back to me.
I was on "pins and needles" that weekend, because this would give both our company and our show a big push for the domestic, US television markets. But life rolled on, past the weekend, past Monday, then into Tuesday.
A close friend and I shared our office space in Ft. Lauderdale. He had seen many of the video submissions we had received from dozens of fire departments around the country and as we watched them together, I would teach him some of the signs that firefighters look for at an incident scene. One of those was the color of smoke. Dark, black smoke indicated strong fire and burning; colored smoke often indicated chemical or hazardous materials involvement, and grayish smoke was often a mixture of smoke and steam and was a sign that firefighters were putting water on whatever was burning.
On Tuesday morning, I was sitting at my desk going through my email, with my scanner running in the background. Suddenly, I heard a Ft. Lauderdale Fire Department unit mention that something had happened in Manhattan, a "10-75, All Hands" alarm. Turning to the Internet, I tried to get on to a great web site (www.thebravest.com) that broadcast the FDNY radio channels. But each time I tried to log in, up popped a message saying the site could not be accessed. And the chatter on the scanner had been kicked up a couple of notches as more details became available.
I went into my editing room and rolled one of our 25-inch monitors out to the main office area, hooked up a jury-rigged antenna and tuned to the first station I could find. That's when we saw the beginning of the worst terrorist attack in the history of the United States. As we watched, we saw, live, as the second plane hit the South Tower. We l,looked at each other, both realizing what was happening on our soil, not some unknown locale in the Middle East. My friend asked me how did I think the fire service would douse the fires burning in the two buildings. I told him, "They can't." Then, of course, we heard about the Pentagon and Shanksville.I
We watched for a while, then I had to start answering phone calls from around the country. I was back in the editing room a few minutes later when he yelled out to me, "Steve, come here and look! They're getting water or foam or something on the flames, because the smoke is turning from black to gray!"
Riveted, I sat there watching the scenes unfold before us. I let the telephone ring and go to voicemail. We didn't utter a word to each other. We just sat there silently, letting the tears stream down our faces.And I knew right then and there that fate was not taking me to New York or to Israel. It would keep me in Ft. Lauderdale, doing what I could, in my own small way, to help our country come together in mourning and grief.
Shortly after the North Tower fell, I left the office and headed over to the local blood bank office in my home community, not only to donate my blood, but I felt certain that I was the first of hundreds who would arrive that day. As life would have it, I worked at that blood bank for three straight days, until it was announced that there was absolutely no hope for, or need of blood, for survivors.
Where were you?
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
The Big, Bad Magnet and Basic Post-Production
To tell you the truth, the MRI wasn't that bad. And it's not like I've never had one before. Truthfully, I've had so many that I think I get "frequent tubing" miles for them and I'm a member of the "million miler" club, after the last eighteen years!
The strange thing about this one was the fact that it was in one of those traveling MRI trailer. The center I went to is under renovation and upgrading all their equipment. But to do so, they had to shut one machine down to take it out and until the new replacement comes in and is installed, they have to use this "portable" MRI. It had no sonic music system. So your only option is to take these two small, disposable ear plug and stick 'em in. Didn't make any difference. The noise was still about "first row at a KISS concert-right in front of the amplifiers" loudness. And, due to the fact that it was only my right knee, I was placed in the tube feet-first and only up to my waist. I'll see the doc tomorrow with the MRI images and get the verdict then. So be it.
Enough about me. Let's get back to the show. Today I finally had the chance to review and "edit" the agreement sent to me on the day before we were leaving for San Francisco, by company that is supposed to work with us to co-produce the "pitch video" and get the show sold to a major satellite/cable network. "What does that entail?" you ask. And I'll tell you.
We shot about 14 hours of video on two camera, plus a little more on a third, all in HD. The first thing that has to be done is called "logging" the video. On almost all video today, there are usually two "clocks;" the one you're used to when shooting the kids' birthday party with the time of day. The second clock, which you usually have to manually select on a consumer video camera, is called the "time code." This is a digital clock that has five places, beginning from the right would be:
00:00:00:00:Frames
00:00:00:Seconds:Frames
00:00:Minutes:Seconds:Frames
00:Hours:Minutes:Seconds:Frames
Days:Hours:Minutes:Seconds: Frames
Every video that you shoot has a "begin" point and an "end" point; basically when you press the "RECORD" button to start shooting a scene and when you press it a second time to pause your shooting. So the production assistant has to review ALL the video and log the following:
1. Start Time Code
2. End Time Code
3. Scene Description
4. Audio Description
5. Any other pertinent information the producer requests.
Now imagine doing that for fourteen hours of video! It's probably a 2-day, 10 hours per day job. Hah! And you thought TV production was glamorous!
Once the logging is done, the producer(s) sits with the editor to review the log chart and to start out some of the scenes he/she wants to see for possible inclusion in the final product. Bear in mind that most of those 14 hours were recorded with just the "pitch video" in mind. Yes, we'll use a lot of it in the episode featuring the San Francisco Fire Department, too. But for now, we'll be picking out the best 3-5 minutes of video from all of those 14 hours. Sound like fun, yet?
Well, that's it for now. Need to go and get my leg elevated to alleviate the throbbing!
Be good to each other!
Enough about me. Let's get back to the show. Today I finally had the chance to review and "edit" the agreement sent to me on the day before we were leaving for San Francisco, by company that is supposed to work with us to co-produce the "pitch video" and get the show sold to a major satellite/cable network. "What does that entail?" you ask. And I'll tell you.
We shot about 14 hours of video on two camera, plus a little more on a third, all in HD. The first thing that has to be done is called "logging" the video. On almost all video today, there are usually two "clocks;" the one you're used to when shooting the kids' birthday party with the time of day. The second clock, which you usually have to manually select on a consumer video camera, is called the "time code." This is a digital clock that has five places, beginning from the right would be:
00:00:00:00:Frames
00:00:00:Seconds:Frames
00:00:Minutes:Seconds:Frames
00:Hours:Minutes:Seconds:Frames
Days:Hours:Minutes:Seconds: Frames
Every video that you shoot has a "begin" point and an "end" point; basically when you press the "RECORD" button to start shooting a scene and when you press it a second time to pause your shooting. So the production assistant has to review ALL the video and log the following:
1. Start Time Code
2. End Time Code
3. Scene Description
4. Audio Description
5. Any other pertinent information the producer requests.
Now imagine doing that for fourteen hours of video! It's probably a 2-day, 10 hours per day job. Hah! And you thought TV production was glamorous!
Once the logging is done, the producer(s) sits with the editor to review the log chart and to start out some of the scenes he/she wants to see for possible inclusion in the final product. Bear in mind that most of those 14 hours were recorded with just the "pitch video" in mind. Yes, we'll use a lot of it in the episode featuring the San Francisco Fire Department, too. But for now, we'll be picking out the best 3-5 minutes of video from all of those 14 hours. Sound like fun, yet?
Well, that's it for now. Need to go and get my leg elevated to alleviate the throbbing!
Be good to each other!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)