The Margins of Error

Julia

2010-06-29T08:12:00.001+10:00

Julia
Originally uploaded by hmatkin

Tony Soprano is a Wild Thing

2010-01-29T03:22:00.002+11:00

Here's my newest video - a combination of Where the Wild Things Are and The Sopranos:

Tracking down all of the audio from the different Sopranos episodes really made me want to go back and watch the whole series again!

Counter Notice

2009-06-21T12:31:00.003+10:00

I know that I said that this post would be my last word on the subject, but (largely due to the persistence/badgering of some YouTube subscribers) I've now decided to file a counter notice with YouTube disputing Sony's copyright complaint in relation to my Barack Roll videos (at least for the purposes of Australian jurisdiction/law).

It might not have been the smartest thing to do, but I worked damn hard on those videos, I'm proud of them and Google even used one of them to promote one of their gadgets.

Thanks again to everyone who has sent messages in support. Hopefully I'll get my audio back, but, if not, at least I'll have given it a try.

While I used to get a bit frustrated that people were uploading my videos to Funny or Die and College Humor without asking me, at least it keeps the videos alive for the moment.

John McCain Gets Barack Roll - watch more funny videos

Being Pinocchio

2009-06-14T02:55:00.002+10:00

I was watching Disney movies with one of my housemates a few days ago and thought about doing some kind of edit of Being John Malkovich and Pinocchio.

The video turned out considerably more bizarre (and somewhat less funny) than I'd originally contemplated, but I still quite like it.

Last Word on the Subject

2009-04-11T18:28:00.004+10:00

Put this together while home sick yesterday.

Just a way of showing the disjunct between Astley's comments about "Barack Roll" and YouTube/Sony's response.

I'm not too fussed really. The McCain getting Barackroll'd video is the stronger of the two and is still up. In any case, rickrollin' has more or less had its day.

I've got an idea for a new video in the same style. Might try to put it together to mark the first 100 days of the administration.

Thanks to everyone who's been in touch.

Still Silent

2009-04-09T10:51:00.002+10:00

Heard back from YouTube. Doesn't seem as though the muting of the Barack Roll videos is going to be lifted. Seems pretty funny given that Rick Astley himself has commented on the video and that Google itself has used the video in promoting its Elections Video Search gadget. Pretty sure YouTube used it as a featured video last year as well.

A few people have asked me to reupload the video. I don't think it's really appropriate to aggravate the matter in that way. The video isn't hard to find online for those who really want to do so.

Anyhow, the follow up video of John McCain being Barackroll'd is still nice and noisy. I brought to the attention of YouTube that the video used substantially the same audio, but they don't seem to have taken any action so far.

A Muted Response

2009-04-08T11:20:00.005+10:00

YouTube has, at least for the moment, muted the audio on my Barack Roll video.

[EDIT] Someone pointed out that the audio is not muted when the video is embedded in another site, but only when it is played throught the YouTube site. That strikes me as bizarre.

I've received a number of copyright notifications in the past in relation to different videos. Most (if not all) of these have seemed to be spurious and have been removed by YouTube. The present notification and muting, on the other hand, is on the basis that the videos may use audio content owned or licensed by Sony ATV Publishing, which (assuming Sony has the rights to Never Gonna Give You Up) they definitely do.

I've always considered that the use constitutes a fair use for the purposes of copyright law. I'm not a specialist in intellectual property law, and certainly not the law outside of Australia.

I figure that the video was probably picked up by some audio scanning software, rather than the notification being made specifically. I've made contact with YouTube, and am pretty happy at this stage to live by whatever their determination is, rather than getting involved in formal counter-notification procedures. I've got a fair amount of sympathy for Google in this regard - I understand the complex issues copyright claims give rise to and the practical difficulties in dealing with notifications on a case by case basis.

Would be interested to know what people think.

ps. Further apologies for continued lack of videos. Work in the court has been excellent fun, but also very time consuming.

Happy

2009-02-24T09:16:00.002+11:00

Sorry for the lack of posts and new videos. My new computer blew up a little while back, so I've been largely incommunicado.

Anyway, a kind soul forwarded me this video of Rick Astley commenting on Rickrolling in general and the Barack Roll video in particular.

I can die happy now.

Not notable

2008-11-28T13:59:00.002+11:00

I'm in love with Wikipedia and use it for resarching the backstories of the Planeteers, trying to teach myself particle physics and the occasional piece of dubious legal research.

I was surprised and bemused a few months ago when a mate pointed out that someone had set up a wikipedia page about me. I've avoided the temptation to edit some of the inaccuracies (no longer a student, and no longer at Mallesons), because I assume that infringes a wikipedia policy as to neutrality.

Anyhow, it now appears that the page may not be long for this world as someone has realised that "His accomplishment is only somewhat notable, and he himself is not." I'm not sure I'm in a position to disagree with that, so I thought I'd take the opportunity, while it lasts, to say thanks to whoever started the page and studiously updated Barack Roll's number of views.

Awesome photos

2008-11-06T23:53:00.004+11:00

These photos are pretty great.

By the by, it seems that the Chaser Annual is being released at the moment. This year it's "The Little Rudd Book" and I got to do the cover art. When I got to hang around with The Chaser guys last year during the election, they were incredibly generous with their time, so I was glad to be able to do something in return. Let me know what you think!

Obama

2008-11-05T23:53:00.006+11:00

I too would like Nate Silver advising on all of my life decisions.

I first heard Obama's speech at the 2004 convention some time in 2005. I was moved by it, forced it upon a dozen or so friends, and subscribed to his endearingly mundane and frustratingly irregular podcast.

I have read President-Elect Obama's books, I have been cheering for him for the last two years, and now I can't really believe that he's actually won.

It's a happy day...

McCain vs. Palin

2008-11-05T08:52:00.003+11:00

Here is another idea I wish I'd had:

Really very well done.

I'm sorry about the lack of videos since John McCain got Barackroll'd. I had intended to put out more, and in particular had contemplated a John McCain / Souljah Boy video in line with the apparently effective formula: US Politics + Internet meme = lotsa views (h/t to someone - can't remember where I read that, but it's true). Sadly, working at the court is taking up a good deal more time than I'd really anticipated.

Anyhow, I hope that everyone has an awesome election day! I'll be frantically checking coverage online between breaks from court.

Take On Me

2008-10-11T15:55:00.002+11:00

This is also very nice work...

Pipe wrench fight!

The Dark Bailout

2008-09-26T11:17:00.001+10:00

I wish I'd had this idea. It's very nice work...

Last Day... again

2008-09-19T08:27:00.002+10:00

Thank you to everyone for your comments on the latest John McCain BarackRoll’d video. It certainly made a weekend of trying to teach myself how to blue screen worthwhile.

I’m not sure when my next video will be. I’ve got a few ideas I’ve been sitting on, but I may have to wait and see what sort of footage the first debate provides. Also, I’m finishing up at Mallesons today to spend a year working as a tipstaff, and learning the ins and outs of NSW Supreme Court procedure may disrupt video production somewhat.

Turning back to Australian politics for a moment, I was a month off in my prediction of Nelson’s demise, but it seemed like as good an excuse as any to repost my Corey video:

John McCain Gets BarackRoll'd

2008-09-07T23:41:00.003+10:00

This seemed to get cut from the coverage of John McCain's acceptance speech:

This is a bit of a return to the well, but after McCain delivered his acceptance speech in front of an alternately green and blue screen, it was too good an opportunity to pass up.

Sadly, being an Australian, I don't seem to be eligible for Colbert's green screen challenge, but this would certainly be my entry.

Big thanks to my house mate for coming up with the idea to BarackRoll the GOP Convention. It would be kinda awesome if John McCain does get BarackRoll'd at some point before the end of the campaign...

McCain / Gunderson '08

2008-09-03T07:38:00.000+10:00

Here's my new video. It was put together on the spur of the moment after work:

I'd vote for Marge...

Paris Hilton - Passed Over

2008-08-30T23:24:00.002+10:00

Here's my new video:

It's not fantastic, and I was a little apprehensive about following up Barack Roll, but the original McCain ad, which I've embedded below, really deserved to be parodied.

And for those of you who haven't experienced the glory, here's the Paris Hilton Celebrity ad from Funny or Die:

See more Paris Hilton videos at Funny or Die

Let me know what you think...

Barack Roll - How I made it

2008-08-12T17:07:00.004+10:00

Again, a big thank you to everyone for commenting on the blog and posting the videos. This thing keeps spreading much further and faster than I would have thought possible.

A number of people have asked how I tracked down the source words for my Barack Roll video, and one or two have correctly guessed that I used Google's new Elections Video Search gadget.

For the two earlier videos in the same style, "Changes" and "I'm F*cking Obama", I had compiled a very large text file containing transcripts of all of the Presidential Debates and simply searched for the words I needed.

This was a pretty slow and inefficient process - it would take a lot of jumping around in the video to get to the right spot.

I'd been thinking about doing a Barack Rolling video for a couple of months, but it just wasn't feasible to do by that method - it would have taken too long and the right words just weren't there. Luckily, I chanced upon a post about the Elections Video Search gadget on the official Google blog. Essentially, it uses word recognition software to make political youtube videos searchable. It's not perfect and it still took a number of days of work, but it's a huge improvement over trawling through debate transcripts.

Side by Side

2008-08-10T17:47:00.002+10:00

Wow. That was incredibly fast.

Big thanks to everybody who has commented and who has helped Barack Roll spread. It makes the hours of trawling through videos and editing worthwhile.

Forgot to post this version last night.

The dancing really is quite similar.

Barack Roll

2008-08-10T00:16:00.002+10:00

Not that clever, and might be better executed, but it needed to be done. Hope you like it.

Apologies for the watermark, I just got sick of collegehumor et al posting my video without accreditation.

The Dark Black Knight - Monty Python feat. Batman

2008-08-04T07:48:00.003+10:00

Here's a video I put together over the weekend.

The video was somewhat limited by the source audio, and probably starts stronger than it ends, but it still makes me smile.

Let me know what you think...

Barack Obama - Word Association Gone Wrong

2008-07-29T00:11:00.003+10:00

**Updated - now with even less typos - thanks Peter**

I'd been meaning to put together a mock interview with one or more of the candidates for a while now, and when I saw this interview, it seemed like too good an opportunity to pass up.

Makeshift blue screen isn't fantastic here, but thankfully I've got a handle on the audio issues that have plagued the last few videos.

For those who are interested, I've embedded the original interview below:

Hotly Uncontested: Zimbabwe "Votes"

2008-07-28T07:07:00.003+10:00

Here's a video we did based around the Zimbabwean non-election.

This was shot at the same time as Henson, and so shares some of the same audio issues. Still, I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out.

Hope you like it...

Muppet Porn Outrage

2008-07-18T01:25:00.002+10:00

Here's a video I did with a group of mates dealing with the Bill Henson controversy - a few audio issues, but I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out.

Hope you like it.

World Youth Day - Behind the Masses

2008-07-14T07:55:00.003+10:00

World Youth Day is upon us and I'm approaching it with a strange mixture of interest and dread.

Anyhow, I've started making some videos with a group of friends that I've been writing with and our first target is World Youth Day. Hope you like it.

The Obama Blend

2008-07-11T12:23:00.002+10:00

I saw this new blend in at Campos a couple of weeks ago and the blurb made me smile:

"Great depth of character, strong, and eloquent. This very appealing blend unites coffees from Africa and the Americas to produce a cup which has gotten us excited. Formidable middle palate flavours, syrupy with an uplifting finish. Excellent drink for going forward."

Favourite

2008-07-06T09:38:00.002+10:00

Someone who commented on my McBain video pointed this out to me.

I've been a bit surprised by how many McCain supporters have responded well to the McBain video. I'm glad the campaign has a sense of humour.

Solid Awesome

2008-07-05T13:13:00.001+10:00

Was checking out the number of views that the reposts of I'm F*cking Obama have got and came across this, which makes me unspeakably happy:

Jimmy Barnes Leggo's Parody

2008-07-05T12:41:00.001+10:00

Here's a pretty simple parody of the Jimmy Barnes Leggo ad which I made with a couple of mates.

Russert

2008-06-17T23:29:00.000+10:00

I was tremendously saddened to hear about the death of Tim Russert. As an Australian with a strong interest in American politics, I have spent a lot of time listening to various podcasts of US news programs over the last few years.

In the in-between times, whether that be sitting on a bus or walking to the shops, I've been able to hear about America and its politics, in a depth far greater than can be provided by the Australian media. I really value that.

There was nothing I enjoyed more than waking up on a Monday morning (Sydney time) to find a new Meet the Press. Sure, I'd download This Week, Face the Nation, and Fox News Sunday, but Meet the Press would always come first.

For me, if it was Monday, it would be Meet the Press.

While people apparently characturised Russert by his distinctive image, I knew his voice well before I ever saw him. Indeed, the first time I saw video of Meet the Press, it formed quite a disjunct.

But it was Russert's sheer love of politics and of journalism which carried through his voice. It was that which I found so compelling.

I haven't and normally wouldn't write something like this, but someone commented on my F*cking Obama video to note Russert's cameo. It stuck with me.

I'll miss him.

Obama & McCain

2008-06-11T23:41:00.002+10:00

Really happy that it has come down to these two candidates. A bit sad to see Hillary go, simply because she was such a great source of comedy.

Anyway, a look back at my first (but certainly not my last) video for the final two:

Chairman Rudd on Q&A

2008-05-24T14:15:00.002+10:00

Internet drought looks to be coming to an end. Should be reconnected in the next few days, which should mean more regular videos.

Here's the video I put together for Q&A. I really wish I could have been in the audience to see his reaction.

Apologies...

2008-05-20T13:08:00.002+10:00

... for the continued silence. I remain sans internet at home, which situation will hopefully be resolved within the week. I've got a couple of US Election ideas which I'm eager to get to work on when I'm reconnected with the outside world.

In the meanwhile, I've been doing some work on a third Chairman Rudd video for the new ABC show Q&A which goes to air this coming Thursday. Sadly, I won't actually be able to see the show live as I'll be catching a late session of Indiana Jones.

If anyone watches the show, let me now how it goes.

Disaster

2008-05-09T19:55:00.002+10:00

Gah... first week at MSJ... no internet at new place... youtube and gmail blocked at work... no way to make videos.

Sorry for silence. I see that someone has made a wildly successful Obama / New Hope video. Entirely frustrating as I'd been planning on doing exactly that. Still, primaries were very happy and I'm planning on getting back to videos within the week if technology doesn't continue to fight with me.

O'Reilly vs. Godwin's Law

2008-05-02T22:08:00.002+10:00

Sorry for the sporadic posting... I've been busy moving house and constructing furniture...

I was watching Senator Clinton on the O'Reilly Factor today and realised that I hadn't posted this video I made a month ago. I confess to being quite a fan of the O'Reilly Factor - it's so over the top as to render the Colbert Report almost redundant at times.

Anyhow, this video came together quite easily and I am very fond of it. Thanks to Andrew Sullivan, and the folks at Crooks and Liars who really helped this video spread.

Ikea

2008-04-28T23:25:00.002+10:00

A little quiet on the video front for the next couple of days as I am moving house and have just discovered the world of Ikea, which is entirely new to me.

The self-serve warehouse was pretty awesome, if only because it made me feel like I'd entered the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark. Actually putting stuff together is less awesome - like Lego but boring. On the upside I now have a wardrobe.

Anyway, speaking of Ikea, I love this ad:

A subset of my broader love for Spike Jonze...

Surprised

2008-04-26T09:35:00.004+10:00

So, several days after uploading "McBain for America" it occurred to me that it would be a decent idea to post it as a response to McCain's original "624787" ad, on the off chance that some McCain campaign moderator would let it through or at least get a laugh out of it.

To my surprise, McCain seems to be allowing video responses to be posted automatically, without any pre-approval. For those not au fait with the intracacies of YouTube, when you upload a video, you can choose whether or not to allow video responses and also whether or not you need to approve the response before it shows up on the original video's YouTube page.

I'm not sure if this is by policy or oversight, but it's good nonetheless. Both Obama and Hillary "Let's Start a Conversation" Clinton are considerably more censorious. I'm curious to see how long it lasts.

While on the subject of surprises, I'm still pretty shocked that the McCain campaign is getting Powers Boothe to do his V/Os, given that he has almost uniformly played nasty characters in films and TV. I've played around with a couple of video ideas using audio from Sin City and Deadwood, but I'm not sure that the whole thing is well enough known at this stage.

Last Day

2008-04-24T13:53:00.005+10:00

So, today is my last day working for the ABC. I still think it's pretty amazing that something that was basically a hobby a couple of months ago actually became a full-time job. That said, I am really looking forward to starting at Mallesons and getting back to law.

The flipside of this is that my production of videos might become a little less consistent. I'm planning on continuing to make stuff on the weekends, when the right ideas strike, but that will likely be less frequent than my current output.

Anyway, I just want to say thanks to everyone who has subscribed on YouTube and to those who have helped to spread the videos through their blogs and websites. I'm nearing in on 2 million total views, which is more than I ever would have imagined possible.

For those interested, here's a list of the videos I've made for Unleashed.

And a giant YouTube playlist (I recommend skipping Rudd Plays the Blame Game):

Q&A Promo - Bloopers

2008-04-23T14:05:00.002+10:00

I recently did some editing on a promo for a new ABC show called "Q&A". The original footage wasn't that interesting, so I decided to make something out of the bloopers instead.

"Q&A" is a show hosted by Tony Jones where members of the studio and television audience get to ask questions of various politicians. Sounds like it could be quite interesting. If you live near Sydney and want to be in the audience, you can register here.

Here's hoping that the politicians are good sports about the video...

McBAIN FOR AMERICA - (John McCain Ad Parody)

2008-04-22T15:00:00.004+10:00

Here's the new John McCain video:

Monty had the idea to do something using McCain / McBain months ago and I'm really glad that we've finally managed to put this together. For those who haven't seen the original, our video is a take on this John McCain ad:

The visual style of McCain's ads is relatively distinctive, but also very easy to mimic. I've included a few different comparisons below. More of the images used can be found in this Flickr set.

If you look closely, you can see that there's a bit of variance between some of the images I've posted and the ones used in the video. We went back and forth on a couple of different lines. I'll upload some of the final images shortly.

If you're interested in seeing a slight different version, head over to ABC Unleashed.

Anyway, I'm really happy with it as a follow up to "I'm F*cking Obama" and am curious to see how it spreads. Let me know what you think...

McBain For America - ABC Draft

2008-04-21T15:25:00.005+10:00

EDIT: The ABC Unleashed draft is below. I've moved the rest of the content of post this post dealing with the final version so as to minimise duplication.

Corey Delaney's Other Party

2008-04-21T10:05:00.004+10:00

Okay. Not so much on the McCain video hints over the weekend. I realised that any hint would really give away the conceit of the video. It is almost done and will be up on ABC Unleashed today and on YouTube shortly thereafter.

In the meanwhile, here's a video I made back in January. This interview with a Melbourne kid who threw a crazy party was the most popular thing on the internet for a short while. I mixed it together with a few different political interviews with Barrie Cassidy.

A few more things:

Making this video led to the important discovery that lounge music makes everything great.

A few weeks after I made this, Barrie Cassidy actually showed the video on Insiders, which made me feel like the world was folding in on itself, but which was incredibly cool.

It actually looks quite possible that Nelson will go in August, in which case I fully expect my other videos to start coming true also: Fidel Castro will start giving crazy interviews, Kevin Rudd will become a spy and Hillary Clinton will reveal that she's a robot.

McCain in Progress

2008-04-18T14:58:00.004+10:00

I'm currently working on two McCain videos, which I'm pretty excited about - I don't want to give away too much, lest someone beats me to the punch. If all goes right, they should be done towards the beginning of next week.

Speaking of being beaten to the punch, I'd been planning to use the trailer for The Dark Knight, to do a serious trailer for the very campy 1966 Batman (for which I'd just ordered the DVD). To my great disappointment, a friend pointed this video out to me:

That's pretty much what I had planned to do. It's strange (but I guess not that surprising) how often I've found that ideas that I think are very original have been done before. The same thing happened with my Changes video, which is uncannily similar to this video. In that case, I didn't find out about the similarity until after I'd made and posted my video:

Oh well... I'll drop some McCain hints over the weekend...

A Rudd & Nelson Adventure

2008-04-17T14:14:00.003+10:00

My new video has just gone up at ABC Unleashed. It's a silent film and won't make much sense to those not familiar with Australian politics, I'm afraid.

I happened across the music used a couple of months ago, and have thought about doing a silent film ever since. Nelson and Rudd's respective "listening" and world tours seemed pretty suited to it.

My main annoyance was that I couldn't find a better ending to the video, but aside from that I'm pretty happy with it.

Hope you like it.

George Bush - My Way

2008-04-16T15:08:00.002+10:00

Here's a video from the 2007 Sydney Uni Law Revue. In the show, these visuals played as the George Bush character sang My Way - the images for the last verse make more sense if you think about it as a duet with Cheney :)

Let me know what you think...

I wish I were this patient

2008-04-15T21:39:00.002+10:00

I've been meaning to mess around with some stop motion ideas for a while now. I could only ever aspire to this...

Online Satire - Walkley Magazine Article

2008-04-14T16:56:00.003+10:00

The following is a slightly edited version of a piece I wrote for the Walkley Magazine. I was meant to be writing about my own experience for an audience unfamiliar with the subject matter, so please forgive any apparent hubris, or statements of the obvious.

On March 5 last year, like thousands of others, ParkRidge47 posted a video on YouTube. “Vote Different”, which placed Hillary Clinton as the Big Brother figure in Apple’s famous “1984” commercial, would soon receive worldwide attention heralding the birth of a new type of political campaign. Philip de Vellis, the man behind the ParkRidge47 alias, had taken footage from a Clinton video, inviting viewers to be part of an online conversation, and had composited it into Ridley Scott’s original ad. “Vote Different” did indeed start a conversation, but certainly not the one the Clinton campaign would have wanted. The very advances in personal computing, typified by the original Apple ad, had enabled anyone with basic editing software to take part in this new dialogue of online, user-generated satire.

Six months later, on a lazy Saturday, hungover and with nothing better to do, I sat myself in front of my 2-year-old PC. Having jotted down phrases like “similar difference”, “earnestness offensive” and “lustrous glass jaw” while bored in a Theories of Legal Reasoning Class, I set about piecing together “Chairman Rudd’s Propaganda Philosophies”. I’d taught myself some basic editing a couple of years earlier, enough to play around with home videos and to produce an unsuccessful Tropfest entry. Using a Chinese history film I’d found in Hong Kong and whatever footage I could scrounge from the internet, the video was done within the day. On the Sunday morning, I uploaded it to YouTube, emailed it to a few friends, posted it on Facebook and didn’t think too much more of it. A week later, the video had been seen 50,000 times, Michael Brissenden had actually said “earnestness offensive” and my voting intentions had been splashed across the front page of the Sydney Morning Herald.

“Chairman Rudd” was seized upon as a reflection of the nascent guerilla campaign being waged on YouTube. The online political efforts of citizen satirists and bloggers far outstripped those of the political parties throughout the 2007 campaign. The YouTube channels of the Liberals and the ALP provided an array of videos ranging from the mediocre to the ludicrous. There was something compellingly weird and desperate in the sight of John Howard announcing funding for orangutans or Wayne Swan offering stunningly banal advice on grocery prices (items on sale are cheaper). Mainly, though, the parties used YouTube as a mere repository for television advertisements. In the meanwhile, user-generated videos like “Bennelong Time”, an anti-Howard screed set to Led Zeppelin’s “Rock and Roll”, and other videos too feral, too unpolished or just too weird to be seen on television were spreading organically through blogs, emails and social networking sites. The very amateurish and irreverent nature of these videos provided a great part of their appeal, a fact which the political parties failed to grasp.

Some of the more hyperbolic accounts of this phenomenon suggest that the internet is enervating a previously apathetic generation, re-engaging young people with the politics. The reality, I suspect, is more nuanced. It is worth remembering that the internet user who seeks out political satire is likely to be politically active and have relatively strong convictions already. The greater value of the internet lies in its ability to overcome the tyranny of geography, the physical boundaries which separate the politically engaged. The sheer speed with which videos leap from blog to blog, country to country, is breathtaking.

Again, though, it is possible to overstate the reach of the internet. I find it both bemusing and sobering to think that one of my most viewed videos is one of my worst. A few weeks before I made the Chairman Rudd video, someone at Endemol Southern Star inexplicably decided that another of my videos, “NetAlert Ad Parody – The Treasurer”, ought to be shown on Channel Ten’s thankfully short-lived Friday Night Download. In that one airing on a failing TV show, the video received hundreds of thousands more views than will ever be received by much more deserving online satire. Aside from those relatively few videos, like “Vote Different”, which receive wide coverage in the mainstream media, most videos will only go out only to a few hundred or a few thousand people online. It is still the case that the political satire seen on shows like The Chaser’s War on Everything in Australia, or The Colbert Report in the U.S. has a reach and a quality which dwarfs that of online satire. This is not to say that user-generated satire can’t achieve a similar power, it is simply to recognise that the form is still in its infancy.

While online satire will undoubtedly continue to grow, I suspect that an equally significant though less well recognised revolution is occurring in the availability and popularity of raw news material. It is not really that surprising that a well-produced video like Will.i.am’s pro-Obama “Yes We Can” music video, or brilliant satire like “Vote Different” races around the online community. What is more impressive is that Barack Obama’s thirty four minute speech at a church in Atlanta can become the most popular video on YouTube. Internet users no longer need to settle for the 15 second grabs of television news. Online debate reflects this new reality. Not long ago, a claim, however true, that a news report had taken a statement out of context would likely sound carping and be difficult to substantiate. In a world of hyperlinks, however, bloggers are constantly referring to full transcripts and videos to debate the rights and wrongs of media coverage. The availability and popularity of this raw news material is at least as significant as the production of satirical content by the online community. Both phenomena reflect an unwillingness for political parties or large media organisations to dictate political discourse.

It is now over a year since “Vote Different” emerged and the Clinton campaign has long since abandoned its conversation conceit (EDIT: apparently not), censoring or blocking comments on its videos. Now, though, the release of a new campaign commercial is inevitably followed by a cascade of online parodies of varying quality. In Australia, the realm of online satire has quietened a little, a respite following the intensity of the election campaign. Yet, with editing software becoming more widespread and easy-to-use every day, it remains to be seen how the Australian political parties will be able to deal with the brave new world of citizen satire and online debate.

Ice Ice Baby - Redux

2008-04-14T16:45:00.003+10:00

Here's a video I made late one night midway through last year. It's pretty experimental - but seemed like a fun way to play with the crazy lyrics to Ice Ice Baby. For some reason the timing is a little off in the YouTube version.

The connection between the images and the lyrics gets more complicated as it goes on - props to those who get the orange...

Obama and Clinton - An Excerpt from The Audacity of Hope

2008-04-12T16:43:00.002+10:00

Not so much funny as just negative. Anyhow...

Clinton Campaign Strategy

2008-04-10T22:49:00.001+10:00

Killed me...

Nelson in Bourke

2008-04-10T18:06:00.001+10:00

Well, Brendan seems to be well and truly back into writing mode, but sadly his prose has gone from amusingly semi-literate to stultifyingly dull.

The new entry is only remarkable for the fact that he manages to write "Bourke" 9 times in 250 odd words, and for this statement:

"Again, as for many parts of remote Australia, getting young people to university if that’s what they choose to do is a real financial struggle in need of further policy development."

But surely no one would have the time or the resources for that sort of policy development... not unless you were... say... Education Minister for... I don't know... over four years?

Sorry. Less on the funny and more on the outraged today...

Nelson and the Battle of Trafalgar

2008-04-10T17:44:00.004+10:00

Given that I seem to be writing about Nelson at the moment, here's a little plug and a few thoughts for this video, which I made late last year in the two weeks I spent at the ABC.

The video is essentially the Liberal leadership ballot done as the Battle of Trafalgar, with Nelson winning a Pyrrhic victory - emerging fatally wounded. I tried to draw as many parallels as I could, and there is a lot of detail there which is not that apparent without a good knowledge of both the machinations of the Liberal ballot and of the battle itself.

It is certainly the least accessible video I've made so far, but I'm pretty fond of it. If for nothing else, it allowed me to play around with things like production music and sound effects, which I'd never really done before and it contains some of my better photoshopping I think. It was exceedingly cool to be able to record the V/O in an actual studio - a very long way from people speaking into the crappy microphone attached to my computer.

But yeah... it is very esoteric and the pacing doesn't quite work. Bonus points to anyone who picks the oblique Austen reference.

Pedantry

2008-04-08T17:10:00.001+10:00

Ho hum, so Dr Nelson seems to have given up on his tour diary. Hardly an auspicious start to the Liberal Party's supposed online blitz. His most recent entry (from late last week) isn't really that noteworthy, but does begin with this gem.

"I started the day at the Adelaide Central Markets and saw my becoming good friend now, Ross Savos, who runs the Central Deli at the markets, and then went on to have the opportunity to speak to a number of the stallholders."

I guess it's better than being unbecoming.

While I'm being pedantic, this article in The Australian surprised me.

"But while Australia is the second most likely country to witness a shark attack, after the United States, most attacks remain rare and not fatal."

Most attacks are rare... but some are very common?

An Afterthought

2008-04-07T16:17:00.003+10:00

One thing I meant to say about Clinton 2.0 - there has to be way to make an awesome Leeroy Jenkins / Iraq war video. I tried to figure one out, but couldn't make it work. If anyone's got a good idea, I'm all ears.

Speaking of Clinton 2.0, this amused me.

The obsessive focus on viewcount is uncomfortably accurate...

Japanese Whaling - The Science of Whales

2008-04-06T10:55:00.005+10:00

I came up with the idea for this video sometime around Christmas, a fairly easy way to satirize the bogus science that used to justify Japan's whaling program.

I wasn't entirely sure where I'd get the needed footage, but happily came across a 1945 film called "Fish from Hell", which contained plenty of useful shots. The original film is pretty hilarious just for the severely dated V/O and I thoroughly recommend checking it out.

The other graphics (whale meat / natural predator) I put together using Photoshop and Premiere. I then used the "Old Cinema Filter" for VirtualDub to age the footage (I also used this on the Rudd Propaganda videos). It's a good free way of achieving this effect for anyone who's interested.

The V/O I took from a Japanese news report on the whaling controversy, but it obviously in no way matches the subtitles. I was a little worried that the video would be too similar to the Rudd Propaganda videos, and so deliberately avoided using broken English subtitles. I'm not sure of the meaning of the Japanese symbols used - if you look closely you can see that some are repeated, inverted, mirrored or rotated.

In retrospect, I'm not entirely sure that the V/O and music really work that well. The video doesn't really build to an ending, so much as just end. Sometimes it just feels a little unfinished or short to me. Anyway, in a strange coincidence, the day after the video was posted, whaling was the top story of the day in Australia and the ABC had a striking image of two dead whales at the top of its front page, with a link to my video below.

A little disappointingly, the comments on YouTube have descended into some fairly crazy racist rants. A surprising number of people don't seem to have realised that it's not a genuine video, my favourite comment being: "The translation from Japanese to English is totally wrong. I doubt about author's purpose."

An Interview with Tom Cruise

2008-04-04T20:59:00.002+11:00

So, to the second Cruise video. I did this with Monty, who deserves the lion's share of the credit for starring and for writing the bulk of the script.

I had planned to post a few different images to show and to explain the digital manipulation it took to make the background behind Monty look even vaguely similar to the background behind Cruise. However, I seem to have deleted all of the source files. Suffice it to say that it's a very different colour.

Anyway, I really love this video, and it's been spreading pretty consistently, though it's never really taken off. Hope you like it. Let me know what you think...

Chairman Rudd

2008-04-04T11:56:00.003+11:00

Hey. Every now and then I get emails or YouTube messages from people asking for copies of the images used in the Chairman Rudd videos: first, second. Rather than email them out individually, I've posted most of them in a set on flickr, for those who are interested.

Some of the ones from the Horatio / Brendan Nelson video are also up there in a set.

Flickr is all very new to me, so apologies if this doesn't work...

Clinton and Cruise - On the Campaign Trail

2008-04-03T17:04:00.003+11:00

Keeping away from the "F*cking Obama" madness for a moment, I thought I'd talk a bit about the two Cruise Scientology parodies that I made a while back. One of these you might have seen already, the other you probably haven't.

Clinton and Cruise - On the Campaign Trail

This one I did in my first week at the ABC this year, and it ended up getting a bit of press here and in the US. The Cruise Scientology video and the footage of Clinton "crying" in New Hampshire had been two of the most viral videos online over the week or two before that. I was looking to do something with one video or the other, when I realised how similar the two were - sharing not only common phrases but also a mutual, over-the-top and self-important sincerity.

To make it, I took transcripts of the two videos, read through them and pieced together similar words and phrases. Happily, there were a lot more similarities than I ever would have hoped for. The video took a while to make, but came together pretty easily. The "Thanks El" at the end of the video relates to my little sister who stayed up with me working on a draft and commenting on what worked and what didn't.

The most difficult decision in the whole thing was whether or not to include a laughter montage at the end - one of the most obvious similarities between Clinton and Cruise is their crazy laughter. It was funny, but it made the video more of an all out attack than it really needed to be. I might still find a way of posting it. I've toyed with doing a dance remix of the video, because there are so many awesome Mission Impossible dance tunes. It would probably fit in better with that. Anyway, if that's something people are interested in seeing, I'll probably put it together when I finish up at the ABC in a couple of weeks, assuming that Clinton is still in the race.

Anyway, enough for now. I'll post a few words about the Cruise Interview I did with Monty tomorrow...

Wow

2008-04-03T09:26:00.002+11:00

Well I certainly didn't expect this.

I'd hoped that the video would spread, but I never imagined that it would go so fast or so wide. Thanks to everyone who's been commenting on the video and on the blog. I've particularly appreciated hearing where people have found the video and where they've posted it. It's pretty amazing how quickly something can leap from page to page.

The other weird thing is how many duplicates have popped up in the day and a half that the video has been up. There are already a handful on YouTube. And it seems that as many people have seen the video through College Humor, Break, or Funny or Die as through my original YouTube posting. I was pretty surprised as I didn't upload it to any of those sites.

Not entirely sure how I feel about all that. Overall, I'm really glad that so many people are seeing my video. It's just a bit rough not being able to keep track of how many people have seen it. I guess it's just the flipside of a video going viral. As long as people aren't directly profiting from my work, I'm not likely to do anything about it - anyhow the copyright in the video belongs to the ABC under my contract. If anyone's got a more solid understanding of the internet etiquette concerning all of this, I'd be interested to hear what you've got to say.

Anyway, thanks again for all the comments. And, once again, massive props to my brother Jez, who came up with the idea a couple of months ago when the original Silverman/Damon video first took off online. He said back then that a Clinton/Obama video could go viral and he was certainly right.

Now just a random plug for a video I did a month or so ago. I'm really proud of it, but never really found an audience.

Let me know what you think...

I'm F*cking Obama

2008-04-01T22:46:00.002+11:00

Here it is. Feel free to spam everyone you know.

Let me know what you think...

Huh

2008-04-01T13:44:00.002+11:00

Came across this College Humor video. Kinda similar to my Clinton 2.0 video, but with a very different tone, and evidently a lot more money. Strange coincidence that they both came out at pretty much the same time.

An Update

2008-03-31T17:47:00.002+11:00

So, I'm currently waiting for the full "I'm F*cking Obama" video to render. And, by "full" I mean a minute and a half (doing the entires original song would have been boring for all involved). It took a little longer than expected, but I'm happy with how it has turned out.

It will go up on the ABC Unleashed site tomorrow morning (Australian time) and then I'll put it up on YouTube a day after that. In the meantime, I thought I'd talk a little about Changes - Presidential Candidates Feat. Bowie, which in many ways is very similar to "I'm F*cking Obama".

I put this video together over a couple of days in January, which seems like a long time ago now, in the week before I started my second contract with the ABC. It spread much further and faster than I ever would have thought and is now by far my most watched video.

Putting together the video was pretty arduous, but worked much better than I'd every hoped. Within half an hour of posting the video, though, a friend sent me a link to this UK video. It's really uncannily similar, and it was a bit disappointing to see, because I thought my idea was really original. I've been accused a few times of having ripped it off. I honestly have no memory of having seen it before I made my video, but it is so similar that it's conceivable that I'd seen it but completely forgot about it. Anyway, it's an awesome video and worth checking out. When I first started thinking of doing something along those lines, I'd actually been thinking of this awesome Red Symons video.

In a strange coincidence, a month or so ago I was thinking of doing a "Should I Stay" video with Clinton and Huckabee, but then came across this.

Anyway, the video's finished rendering. Let me know what you think of it when it goes up...

Obama & McCain - The Art of Speech

2008-03-28T16:05:00.003+11:00

Still working on the expanded "I'm F*&%ing Obama" video. It'll be done over the weekend, but will go up at ABC Unleashed a little before it goes up on YouTube.

In the interim, a plug and a few words for this video I did a month or so ago: Obama and McCain - The Art of Speech.

A few people have asked whether the V/O was recorded for this video. It wasn't, the source of both the video and the audio is Speech: The Function of Gestures. The original film may well be funnier than my re-edit. Composing the V/O did require a good deal of work though. If you look at the original video, you'll see that "John" was actually the eloquent character.

Always interested in thoughts...

A Nice Awakening

2008-03-28T09:17:00.002+11:00

It was a very pleasant surprise to wake up this morning and see that Clinton 2.0 had taken off overnight. Thanks to everyone who's spreading the video and those who've sent messages on YouTube and on the blog.

To answer the most common question, I am indeed working on a longer version of "I'm F*#!ing Obama". Props again to my brother Jez for his awesome idea.

It's pretty painstaking work - there are over 300,000 words in all of the Democratic Debates. I should have it done in a day or two. I'll link to it from here when it's done.

Thanks again...

AAMI Ad Parody

2008-03-26T13:22:00.002+11:00

A pretty simple idea and joke.

If only all videos were this fast and easy to do.

Multiple Choice Question Time

2008-03-26T09:34:00.001+11:00

QT video is now up on YouTube. Not exactly sure that lame wordplay justifies a whole video, but it was good to play around with DIY blue screen.

Clinton 2.0 - Final Version

2008-03-24T22:34:00.002+11:00

I'm not really sure if this will spread or not. I certainly hope that it does.

Props to my brother, Jez, for the "I'm fucking Obama" idea. I will probably turn that into a stand alone video if it's workable.

Let me know what you think.

Thanks to everyone who commented on drafts of this, especially Damo and Monty.

Clinton 2.0 - ABC Draft

2008-03-20T07:43:00.003+11:00

A SLEDGE VIDEO

This is going to be a little redone before I post it on YouTube.

AAMI Ad Parody

2008-03-19T17:22:00.002+11:00

A SLEDGE VIDEO

Just for kicks.

Multiple Choice Question Time

2008-03-19T13:59:00.000+11:00

A SLEDGE VIDEO
Thanks to Jez, Mum and Dad.