Old Enough

Old enough to be different, and make an example for my King.

I've always looked like I'm about 2/3 my age. So, at 22, to most people I look like I'm just now turning 15, and hitting puberty. :)

When Laura and I got married it was definitely a personal little jump in manhood for me, but I still look very young of course.

When I take her to nice dinners, which sadly I have to admit is not as often as I would like, the places we go are typically very nice places, where typically a couple would order wine or something like it with their meal.

Now that we both look 15, but are wearing wedding rings, people do a sympathy assumption and push our ages to 21. And, at 21, we get offered alcoholic beverages when we are seated.

Finally.

But, finally, for different reasons. Christ has called us to a higher purpose for our time here. We are called to be different, truly aliens in a place that is not our home. We are called to be so separate from the affairs of the world that the people around us would notice those differences, and ask us what in the world we are doing.

What in the world, why would you not order a drink, you're old enough? Before it was just, "oh we'll you're just a 20 year old kid you can't yet." Now, we are proud card-carrying legal adults with drivers license mugshots to prove it. So, "what in the world, why would you not __________?" It is in these opportunities where doors are open to conversations about being a part of something bigger than ourselves and lives only lived once here on earth.

These conversations are such rare beasts in 2012 that it is critical to realize and capitalize on them when they arise. If we were bombarded by friendly folks asking us all the time, "hey partner, why don't you talk me into something? I want to stop serving myself and fulfilling the natural desires of my sinful flesh and start disciplining myself daily to live for others, and to serve a man I've never seen," that would be one thing. However, it's 2012, I'm sitting in a restaurant full of lonely people eating alone and every one of us is on our phone, trying not to make eye contact. The truth is that the world we live in is so connected to the people we like who aren't around us that there's no need to speak with a total stranger just to be kind and have conversation. I'm not talking to anyone I'm having a text message conversation with my wife the woman I love why would I talk to some person in the booth across from me?

This of course is just one small way to serve, I don't mean "whew I'm 22, better START serving my king now that I have this one thing I can do." It has been a long journey. :D

In a world full of people all doing the same things, the things that are broadcast to be normal, when you do something different you are a rebel, and people ask questions. God give me opportunity after opportunity, that I may be used by you to spread your gospel of living for something greater. I love you Lord, hold me like a fetter and bind my wandering heart to thee that I may be used as a vessel carrying the saving cure for this world I sail amongst.

FW800 and eSATA

I'm pretty happy with using FW800 and eSATA I have to say.

The speeds are great.

eSATA obviously is very fast. It is about 2x as fast as FW800 from my personal experience, although of course it is listed as technically being much faster. However, to use eSATA on my MacBook Pro, I am using this eSATA Thunderbolt Hub from LaCie:

LaCie eSATA Hub

My drives are a wonderful form factor for travel, the are the same size and shape as the Hub from LaCie. Here is a link:

LaCie 1TB 7200rpm (very recently discontinued, sadly)

I wish LaCie would not have discontinued the drives, but I am not worried because our friends over at OWC (MacSales) have excellent little drives they call the:

Elite Pro Dual Mini

I'll just have to begin purchasing those drives as we expand instead of LaCie's to match my triple 1TB friends.

However, eSATA is not bus powered. So, to use this setup, I power the Hub to do its job, but then also have to power both the attached drives. That's 3 wall warts. :/

So, when I travel with the drives I utilize their FW800 connectivity option. It's not quite as fast as eSATA, but plenty fast in my opinion for doing almost anything I put them through. Even large 95GB folder transfers in the field don't take unreasonably long.

At my desk I don't mind the extra power supplies and cables, so I get the speed of eSATA.

In the field I don't mind the "less-than-turbo" speed of FW800, so I get the portability of bus-powered drives off of a single FW800 cable.

Which is super nice, just like you, for reading all this nerdy information that I put on this blog. :)

thanks for reading!
-Cameron

Setting up the H4n

I love teaching, and sometimes when I get a specific question, I'll just make it a video for the blog. :)

This was requested by and made for Kole, but hopefully it helps anyone using a Zoom H4n.

thanks for watching!

Sprint to the Bus

The next week or so ahead is quite blessed with opportunities.

Monday
GPC - I'm going out to shooting solo for Grace Point Church's local Day Camp. I'll spend most of a full day out in the field with the campers gathering most of my footage for the edit and getting a feel for the story of the camp. After a long day in the field I'll need to log the footage and begin a rough edit to have a plan going into the next day.

Tuesday
GPC - I will finish getting any shots to fill holes in the story, and begin the edit. This edit has to be mostly done by bedtime, so today will not have a lot of time to shoot excess footage.

Wednesday
Vista - Proud to be working on a Vista event this day, doing Audio, which is always a much-appreciated opportunity for them to trust me with. I love these guys.
Band Camp - The next three days are Band Camp Session II, which we will be sending Chetley down to capture. I've got to get Chetley briefed and equipped ready for him to leave out of NWA at sunrise the next morning.

Thursday
Vista - Day 2 of this show
Band Camp - Chetley shoots all day
GPC - last few hours of edit time late this night, video is due the next day.

Friday
Vista - Doing an even more cool position on a smaller Vista meeting in a very cool but challenging location here in NWA.
Band Camp - Chetley gets his last shots and begins logging footage.

Saturday
Wedding - Laura and I are with Alyx and Tyler doing video for their big day which we are very much looking forward to.
Band Camp - Chetley is joined by Cayla and Kole for the end-of-camp Concerts when the parents place their DVD orders as they pick up their campers.

Sunday
Day Off - This is technically the day "off" because there isn't any shows or shooting scheduled, but...
Turnaround - Most of the day will be spent getting gear back in from Chetley, prepped and packed away. Same for Laura and I bringing in all the gear from the wedding. All the footage from Chetley's week shooting and concert shooting will get transferred, as well as both of mine and Laura's cameras from the wedding. Then I'll re-pack to head to a week of camp and try to get some rest.

Monday
Camp - I hop on the bus first thing in the morning to head to church camp with FBC Bentonville. They have given me the opportunity to serve the worship team using my live audio abilities all week. Looking forward to the camp, and looking forward with great hope to possibly catching some rest at some point.
Edit - I have to get some editing in while I'm at camp from all these projects. I'll have last week's Band Camp concerts and wedding photography, as well as this week's Band Camp footage, Band Camp concerts, and wedding video. Hopefully between serving for the worship services and catching some rest, this work can happen, because some of these projects are due the moment I get back into town, and some are due WHILE I'm out of town. :)

Hopefully the camp has a strong internet connection and a FedEx pickup location where I can send off some fruits of my labor back to NWA. :)

THANKFUL for the life I have been given, and blessed to be filled with a calendar so beautiful.

NOT looking forward to this much time away from my beautiful bride. Her in the ER and me out in the field isn't quite the same as living the dream in college and seeing each other every afternoon. We're strong though. :)

Worship Guitar: Forever Reign

My guitar is tuned to Eb here, making my Capo be on fret 3. If your guitar is in standard tuning, you would not need the extra bump to get you out of the flat, so you would do Capo 2.

Hopefully that doesn't affect things too badly in the video. Also, this lesson and Christ is Risen I shot with Photo Booth on my Mac, making the image a "mirror". I'm hoping this adds a new element of simplicity, so it is as if you are being taught "straight on" instead of your brain having to reverse all the chords. I don't know, may have been a bad idea I go back and forth with it. We'll see how it goes and maybe do this moving forward, or revert back to the standard view.

Here is the PDF: Forever Reign

thanks for watching!