24 January 2007
I promise that this won’t be all about video. It’s just that I’ve been doing a lot of video conversion recently and I’m going to post stuff that I think about, in no particular order.
The best source of video is of course, DVD. iTunes currently has a limitation on 2.0 audio, so I make it a policy to only rip video that has 2.0 sound, not 5.1. You don’t want to sacrifice that rich audio experience for the convenience of playing video through iTunes. I do rip music videos that I might want to carry with me on the ’Pod, however, regardless of their audio. That’s the exception.
So why bother to put DVD video into iTunes? It’s so convenient. You can select and start playing a video in seconds. No waiting for DVDs to load, then waiting for legal notices to display for agonising seconds. This is very bad with TV shows. Watch a couple of Seinfelds, then shut down your DVD player and walk away. Come back to watch the next one or two half-hour shows, and you have to sit through all that crap again.
Secondly, you can watch it on an iPod or Apple TV. It’s a lovely experience to sync through iTunes and the iPod organises video marvellously. You need to tag music videos and TV shows specially, though, in order for the iPod, Apple TV or even Front Row to recognise them properly. This is one of the coolest things about ripping on a Mac. I have a gem of an app that tags these things which I’ll cover later.
Thirdly, for those who get annoyed when they buy a complete series of a TV show only to find out that the stupid publisher decided to randomise the episodes across the various discs, you can reorder them in just the way they aired in history.
So DVD is a prime target for content. I’ve become hooked on TV-on-DVD, which I think is one of the best forms of content to have been provided in this format. It’s so easy to rip and watch a show or two. It’s one of the best things I’ve done with a computer.
By the way, if you’re wondering, I did scan that SpongeBob cover, and all those screenshots came from the episodes I ripped from the DVD. I’m an artwork fanatic, so you’ll read about album art almost all the time.
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DVD, Ripping, Video | Tagged: SpongeBob SquarePants | 
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Posted by tunegardener
24 January 2007
I’m an Australian who is somewhat overly proud of his just-turned-800 music title collection (music DVDs count). I’m a bit of a collector. Well, a lot of a collector actually. Part of the pride comes from only having started collecting CDs in 1998. That means my rate of accumulation is very high.
Why did I mention that I’m an Australian? Apart from placing me on the map, I’m proud to be Australian, but to get on topic, if you realise that we’re talking iTunes and you remember that I said I had movies, and even more significantly, TV shows, in my library, you may scratch your head. For the Australian iTunes Store, like every country in this world other than the US, does not sell full-length movies and TV shows. How can this be? Am I some sort of magician? Well, the answer is yes, through the copious use of mystical black arts.
Why do I bother? I’m a big iPod fan. I’ve had 9 in total. I’ve still got three, one each representing the major classes: Shuffle, Nano and 5.5th Gen. They’re all current generation, as is my policy. I watch a fair bit of video on my 5.5th Gen. I’m currently watching Family Guy on my way home from work. I am using it as my iTunes-on-TV player while I anxiously await my Apple TV, ordered early on the morning of its release. Apple TV adds a whole new layer of usefulness. If you want to replicate what I did to bring video to iTunes, stick wit’ me, and you’ll go places.
Also, I’ve got a bit of an attitude. I’m a Mac-Mac and I’m too tired to adjust to people who want to do it some other way, who, for example, want to use the ridiculously named Ogg-Vorbis format or an Archos (stupid name–I had to look it up to spell it) video player. If you’re not into iTunes and the iPod, then go away. I don’t care. I consider iTunes and the iPod to be by far the most superior technologies to use. They have flaws, but few.
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Posted by tunegardener
24 January 2007
What is a “tune gardener”?
Recently I’ve been telling people that my number one hobby is “tending my iTunes garden”. iTunes is my number one application. It’s open all the time and I add something every day, even if it’s only a podcast. Current stats are as follows:
Songs: 11085
Music Videos: 378
Movies: 123
TV Episodes: 314
Podcasts: 549
Audiobooks: 498
iPod Games: 2
Total: 12949 items.
I’m a bit of a collector. You can see that a library of this size requires some maintenance. I’ve developed a large array of policies that define how items are to be organised. Because it’s not always obvious, I’ve had to think up ways to solve problems, all in the direction of making the library as usable and efficient as possible. It’s this information that I want to pass on to others.
Recently I’ve been making vast inroads into the arcane art of video conversion. All those music videos, movies and TV episodes didn’t come from nowhere–I had to rip almost all of them myself. If you’re interested in doing this for yourself, you’ve come to the right place.
I’m an expert, yes, but only an empirical one. Nonetheless, I have a characteristic that has enabled me to achieve results, and that is perfectionism. It’s a curse, but it can get results.
Anything very technical discussed in this blog will most likely be mac-focussed, as that’s what I use. I can’t be bothered trying to figure it out on Windows, so you may be disappointed. Don’t leave, however, as you will find very basic organisational concepts peppered throughout this blog’s history. It’s not all nuts and bolts.
I hope you glean some information useful to you. It’s going to be somewhat dry but I hope you stick with me.
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Posted by tunegardener
