Tuesday, July 28, 2020

Retro Video Revival!

Hello Blog!  It has been waaaaaay too long this time around!  I've missed you, but I've been just so much about the Twitter-verse.  But whereas Twitter is fleeting and brief, the good old blog has longevity and room to expand!  So, what brings me to the blog on this extremely hot summer day?  It's my...

Retro Video Revival Project

The Backstory:

Earlier today, a customer had written in asking to directly purchase an older video from our catalogue.  It was a video from 2012, so, really, not that "old" a video, but it was a Standard Definition video that I'd shot using my original wrestling-videography camera (aka a still camera that also shot video).  And so, it is considered on the older side.  But anyway...

When I went to look up the video in the DoomMaidens.com catalogue, for my own reference, I discovered that the older section of our website was in quite a state of disarray.  Several older video pages were missing elements, had incorrect or out-of-date to-purchase links, had other wonky links, or were just missing altogether.

And I thought to myself:  That's not good at all.  There was a lot of good material filmed prior to 2012, and it just isn't right that the pre-2012 section of our site is in such a state.

And then I started trying to clean up that section of the site....

... and I discovered that the way the videos were being made available was also a bit of a mess.  Allow me to explain:

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Prior to 2012, we used to produce "final" videos that were actually a collection of several files.  This would allow for the video files to be stored and uploaded more easily, since the various files were fairly small.  For instance:  If a competitive match had 4 rounds, I would make each round into a separate file.  So, if you were to get that match video, you would receive 4 separate small-ish files.

That was all well and good for its time.  But it did create a problem for distributing via C4S, where each file must be sold individually and Zip files are not permitted.  And when the files needed to be listed individually on C4S, sometimes the minimum price of a single round's file would be as much as I wanted to charge for the entire 4-round match. (ex: a 6-minute round would need to be $5.99 as a minimum, and if there were four 6-minute rounds to list for an entire match.... that creates some pricing awkwardness).

Life was hectic and busy, I got my first HD camera in mid-2012, and everything just went full speed ahead from there.  The pre-HD videos took a back seat... and they got left further and further behind...

Sure, I'd occasionally grab one of the older videos and string the files together into a single MP4 file.  But I never thought much about it, and I just kept going forward with new filming.

Fast forward to mid-2020.

As many of you know, we are in the midst of a global pandemic, and so, video production in our realm has been greatly reduced.  And while I definitely do not have a TON of free time, I do have some more time available.  And so...

The Retro Video Revival Begins!

My goal is to collect as much of our old Doom Maidens video files and string matches and video together into the single "large" files that today's video-uploading world can easily accommodate.

And so, we begin!

I wanted to do a "Today's Feature" on the 2011 competitive match with VeVe vs fitness competitor Ginger Martin, but -- gah! -- the match was only available in 3 separate files.  I then thought, "How about featuring the 2008 match with VeVe vs Kim of Italy?"  ... but -- of course -- the match only existed as 5 separate files.

This has to be addressed.

These matches have to have all of their rounds put together into single files.  And so, here we go!

I've already started with VeVe vs Kim of Italy, which I filmed in December of 2008.  It was a very popular match video at its time, but, because I never combined the 5 round files together at the time, it never made the complete jump with us over to C4S.

And that's such a shame!  It was such a pure and exciting match at a very early time in our wrestling realm adventures.  And it was one of VeVe's earliest video matches (not the earliest, since there were quite a few beforehand, but it is one of the earliest we still have available).

But anyway, whew, just writing about this is getting me anxious to get back to work on this project!

Away we go.  I hope to catch you later, blog friends!

And, as always, you can reach me by e-mail at:  orders@doommaidens.com