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Free software of the week: Handbrake

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I’m always on the lookout for good, free utilities and applications – I’m going to try to make this a regular feature, where I share a handful of useful apps that I use on a regular basis. Most of these will be in the realm of audio/video editing and transcoding, but I’ll post anything interesting. Some of these are very well known, others are more obscure.

There’s a distinction between software that’s “free as in beer” and “free as in speech”. I will be focusing on the “beer” type (i.e. costs nothing to use), but if it’s of the open source variety as well, so much the better.

This week’s pick is…

Handbrake

Handbrake is a nifty little app for Windows, Mac, and Linux that will allow you to take your DVDs and convert them into iPod-compatible MP4 video files. It’s been around for a couple of years, but until recently development had slowed considerably. Handbrake relatively simple to use and fairly quick, depending on your hardware. It’s still beta software, and has a few quirks here and there – the deinterlacing feature, for example, is terrible for animation (but is slated to be improved in future builds). But overall Handbrake is an excellent free app.

http://handbrake.fr

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EMI to offer DRM-free music through iTunes

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In what is hopefully the first of many, the EMI record label announced that they will be offering their catalog of music free of DRM (Digital Rights Management) through the iTunes Store. In a nutshell, DRM is technology meant to stop people from copying digital content. On one hand it makes sense because artists should be able to protect their work from wholesale copying and distribution and benefit financially from the fruits of their labor. On the other hand, US copyright law does allow for “fair use”, which means being able to make backup copies for your own personal use – something DRM schemes are meant to limit.

One caveat is that the price of admission has gone up slightly – $1.29 per track as opposed to the previous $.99 per track standard. To dull the sting somewhat, the bitrate of these unprotected tracks has been increased from 128kbps to 256kbps AAC – which is virtually CD quality.

Hopefully the rest of the major labels will get the hint and follow suit. While there will always be people who want to get something for nothing, I think most people would be willing to pay for what they use as long as they aren’t subject to unfair restrictions.

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Peppercorn Denson

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I wondered whether or not to write about this, since it’s such a personal and private matter. But I felt weird writing about anything else until it was addressed – as if I was downplaying the situation and focusing on more superficial topics. So this will probably be a bit disjointed.

As I alluded to a couple of posts back, Emily was pregnant – we called our baby “Peppercorn” because a pregnancy book said at a certain point it was the size of one, and it’s a cute name. Unfortunately, as tends to happen more often than I realized, the baby didn’t make it past 8 weeks. Just one of those situations where you do everything right and things still don’t work out. It’s been a pretty miserable week – the initial shock and grief has passed, but it’s still sad. Our family and friends have been incredibly supportive, which always helps and is greatly appreciated. We’ll keep trying – nothing has come particularly easy for either of us, but it eventually turns out for the best. Before too long there will be a couple of little ones running around the house, of that I have no doubt 🙂

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Rocky LXXVIII: Adrian’s Revenge

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The first movie I ever saw was Rocky – it’s one of those memories that are very fuzzy, but there are specific elements that stand out regardless – the smell of the popcorn, the blue carpet in the lobby, the colored lights running down the side of the aisle.

I remember very little about the movie itself, other than thinking it was black and white (it is rather monochrome…) But I have watched it and it’s sequels many times over the years – it ranks up there as one of my favorite movies ever. Except for the last entry in the series – Rocky V. At the time it was obviously meant to be the last one, taking Rocky back to his roots, etc. But it just felt far too contrived; it tried too hard to be contemporary with the hippin’ and the hoppin’ and the bippin’ and the boppin’. Not to mention Sage Stallone’s horrible acting (yack) It was a disappointing end to an otherwise great franchise.

After 15 years and a truckload of rumors and speculation, and we have Rocky Balboa – finally, a fitting finale for Rocky. It is everything Rocky V needed to be, but wasn’t. It definitely has a greatest hits feel to it, and there’s one too many trademark inspirational speeches, but overall it’s a much more authentic return to the first couple of movies. It doesn’t try too hard to be relevant or cutting edge, there’s no Survivor cheese rock or hip-hop remixes of the Rocky theme (Bill Conti for the win), and most of all the movie ends the series as it started. It’s not a matter of winning a championship or obtaining glory – it’s about the internal struggle with oneself and “going the distance” despite everyone else saying you can’t – the thing that made Rocky such a compelling character 30 years ago.

But do we really need another sequel to Rambo?