Rhuematiod Arthritis - The Beggining

Warning this is only being published as my record of my road to recovery.

Today I am in hospital after being diagnosed with Rheumatoid Arthritis. I jokingly called it my "rigor mortise disease". It happened rather quickly over three weeks I went from being mobile to almost totally immobilized. Not only were my joints shoulders,elbows, hands, hips, knees and feet sore all muscles had also locked up to stop the pain. I had fluid on my right knee and the following activities were almost impossible:

• walking
• stand up straight
• turn head without pain with very limited movement couldn't look left and right while driving without turning body. Couldn't look up above me 15 degrees above vertical
• sleeping and rolling over took thought
• lifting a coffee cup
• moving toes
• bending ankles
• bending fingers more than 20 degrees - couldn't make a fist.
•  sitting in a chair with knees bent 90 degrees with feet flat on floor
•  Lying on my back with knees straight was not possible
• Lying on my back on a hard surface with knees bent couldn't place feet flat on surface

Physical descriptions:

• Feet swollen no gaps between toes, no veins or ligament visible
• Nodes on elbows and forearms 

 I had been regularly taking voltren before this episode to control pain but in a health drive to improve my health I had reduced voltaren and alcohol to almost nil.
Although I had been to a emergency clinic and prescribed 75mg Voltaren - Tramadol the pain was still intense after 5 days of medication. All drugs were stopped when in hospital with only panadol to ease the pain (it didn't work). I had two ulcers one on my right foot on the second biggest toe the other on my left lower leg which was 5cmx4cm and 0.5cm proud flesh, but no infection. After being discharged from hospital I was taking 40mg Prednisone for two weeks then 20mg for two weeks then down to 10mg and Ibuprofen 200mg for pain.

V-Bloggers a begginers guide

As I edit video clips all day I get sick of watching vlogs with bad sound and bad editing. There is no excuse for either these days with the technology available, so I will give you a few tips.

1. If you are recording a piece to camera set the camera on full wide or pull out. Then frame your shot this will get the camera as close to you as possible so the sound will be clear as possible. If you are doing this regularly I suggest you buy and external bug mike. It would be a good investment, this is one downside to the Flip range of products no ability to plug in an external microphone

2. Think about your shoot before you start filming. Plan what you want to say then think about what shots you need to cover the dialogue. Doesn't matter how pretty you are after 5mins talking about topic you will become boring. So plan those cutaways

3. Don't wave the camera around willy nilly! Either get a tripod, mono pod or a grip mount so you can get nice stable shots.

4. Edit edit edit. Please don't just clip the start and the end of the clip in Your flip software or iphone! You can tell so much more if you put in cut aways of what you are talking about and close up so the viewer can see the product detail for themselves. You can never explain anything 100% for everyone but if you show some detail you may answer some questions the viewer has. MOVAVI is a good edit tool for the home. In the more pro end is Avid, Final Cut Pro, Adobe Premier and Media 100

5. Good practice is to actually right your script down with an audio and video column

6. when record live audio think about your location small stark rooms cause alot of echo like a mobile phone in a toilet. Outside equates to no echo.

Well I had hoped to get to 10 pointer but I will do more later. Last comment is always enjoy your filming

Corporate Video

After many years of making corporate videos, which I think should be renamed to communication videos. I am beginning to think some skills are being lost. Videos used to be watchable, but these days with advent of digital cameras and computers anyone can publish a video. I don't really have a problem with this until the watch ability of the video is effected! Sorry I don't think you can make a retail training video on your iphone, with imovie or with final cut pro. Video editing is like writing a book and takes a certain talent and when you start you think you have the skills, but if you have the guts and you watch your efforts 5yrs later you will go oh my god did I do that! I think I was lucky I started editing in the analogue age and learnt the lesson to watch things multiple times. In this new digital age it is so simple to chuck things together and publish without ever watching your final product. This is what seems to create the problems. There are so many simple techniques from establishers to cutaways these things involve the viewer showing them the location and the environment. So when you visit these places you will feel familar with the environment. If you simply film a clip with no thought you can confuse the viewer and therefore lose your message. Also with more experience you can see mistakes before they happen a common mistake from the client side is to include too much information. Also with the new mediums like the net and social media there becomes more confusion as in video media is static and pricing data dynamic. Take for example http://www.powershop.co.nz This video clip claims 30% saving but the online data shows less than 5% saving. I have watched many video promotional clips and gone gee did the client really want that published on the web! My answer has always been I guess so but I am beginning to think no they haven't thought.

Great Lunch

Since we edit fishing programmes we quite often have BBQ fish lunches and todays fare was Blue Cod and Crayfish what A lovely meal it was. Although truth be said the crayfish were on the small side, as they are the farmed variety of crayfish not the natural ones from the sea. Actually I must learn how they farm them is must be a big secret as there seems little info on the web about it

Had a family conference today

Well today was another milestone in my life. After 40 years of being solo I was asked today to be the care giver for a 6yr boy. What should I do?

What to do

Okay I am single but sometimes this is difficult I have friends and I support them they maybe past partners. Today I have been asked to go to a family group meeting I am not the father but I do want to do the best for the boy. What to do ..... thinking.....
I think I should go
But what will I say?

Lost in thought more soon

What a day

I awoke very tired! when I got to work I did some work and decided to close the eyelids well during that 5min okay maybe 10min power nap the world turned against me, why I am not sure but it did. A new 5min quick as job came in and consumed the rest of the day! It was however interrupted by another job with a friday deadline being move forward to thursday. Yes this was written on a thursday I don't care what the blog date says *lol*. Well high winds hit Auckland and rain warnings went out will still await the worst of it, will it be as bad as they say? I was out doing the normal beer shop and when opening the boot of the car the wind picked up the boot and hit me in the chin oouuch! Traffic was shite on the way home, I left the trip till 8pm