tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-125194342008-07-14T10:01:09.011-07:00The Family Legacy Video Cafe is the Blog related to Family Legacy Video's commercial Web site. The Cafe is here to foster and build an online community for those of us dedicated to preserving personal and family stories on video. Please, pull up a virtual chair and join in!Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comBlogger59125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-65341076501147894202008-07-14T09:55:00.003-07:002008-07-14T10:01:09.074-07:00

Tucson’s Family Legacy Video, Inc., a pioneer in the personal video biography field, is holding two unique video biography workshops in Tucson in October, 2008. From October 17 to 19, a three-day workshop entitled “Create Your Own Video Biography” ushers attendees through the process of creating their own family history video projects. Participants will learn how to draft questions, light, shoot

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-66142018564210785712008-07-14T09:46:00.002-07:002008-07-14T09:52:52.094-07:00

I'd like to put my parents' stories on a DVD, but what happens when DVDs become obsolete? How will future generations of my family play the video? I hear variations of this question all the time. My short answer is always, "Don't worry, preserve your family history using the technology available to you now. Don't let fear of future technologies keep you from capturing your family stories today."

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-56592607138196757432008-06-26T10:01:00.002-07:002008-06-26T10:12:17.710-07:00

Whether you're setting out on a cross country driving tour or wondering how to visually "navigate" through your next video biography, a good map can be a real asset. You can use maps to establish the locations important to your subject's story and also use them to impart a sense of movement to illustrate someone's travels. For example, I recently used maps to help tell the story of a married

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-3536030835429093272008-05-12T10:02:00.004-07:002008-05-12T10:08:26.805-07:00

"I want to get started in the video biography business, but I need experience. Where do I get it?" It's a common refrain and one I hear often from Family Legacy Video readers and customers. I usually suggest starting out by practicing on family and friends. But here's another option, one that will help preserve the stories of U.S. veterans and give you valuable interviewing experience. It's the

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-20782770871553457642008-02-19T09:36:00.004-07:002008-02-19T09:44:27.338-07:00

Tucson’s Family Legacy Video, Inc., a pioneer in the personal video biography field, is holding two unique video biography workshops in Tucson in April, 2008. From April 25 to 27, a three-day workshop entitled “Create Your Own Video Biography” ushers attendees through the process of creating their own family history video projects. Participants will learn how to draft questions, light, shoot and

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-40118518558871405352008-02-12T09:36:00.000-07:002008-02-12T09:40:18.064-07:00

Music can lend emotion and a sense of time and place to any video biography. And if any of the subjects of your video biographies are musicians, you may be able to use some of the music of their lives to lend a very personal touch to their video life stories. Here are two examples: A Family Legacy Video Workshop veteran recently finished a video biography that featured her father. Her dad had

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-78554455181580336152008-01-08T13:18:00.000-07:002008-01-08T13:34:33.814-07:00

On December 21, 2007, I took to the radio airwaves to speak about video biographies. The experience was great fun - and I've archived the segment on the Family Legacy Video Web site so you can listen in! I was a guest on "Arizona Spotlight," a show broadcast every Friday morning and evening on Tucson's NPR stations KUAZ AM/FM. I actually visited the radio studio on December 5 and spent about a

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-67481824717177660382007-11-19T09:31:00.000-07:002007-11-19T09:44:29.813-07:00

Shortly after Labor Day, a reporter and photographer from the Explorer, Tucson's weekly newspaper, visited with we to talk about preserving personal history on video. The announcement of my workshops at the annual conference of the Association of Personal Historians kindled the interest of reporter Ty Bowers, who explored the subject of video biographies with me for a couple of hours. The

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-8569178553868860672007-09-24T09:02:00.000-07:002007-09-24T09:11:43.858-07:00

If video biography and personal history is your cup of tea, you'll want to be in Tennessee this November. Author and award-winning video biographer Steve Pender of Tucson's Family Legacy Video will present two workshops (Preparing & Conducting a Video Biography Interview & Transcripts With Time Code: The Video Biographer’s Friend) at the Association of Personal Historians (APH) annual conference

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-88638460202358909922007-08-02T13:07:00.000-07:002007-08-02T13:10:37.975-07:00

Let's say you've decided to videotape an interview with two family members. In order to give yourself some options when you edit, you want to shoot them using two cameras. So how do you capture audio? And how do you synch up the tapes from your two cameras during editing? RECORDING AUDIO Option 1: You can mount a lapel microphone on each subject, run the mics into a mixer, and feed the outputs

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-13471944555915256642007-07-03T11:50:00.000-07:002007-07-03T11:54:35.186-07:00

Drop a pebble in the water; just a splash and it is gone; But there's a half-a-hundred ripples circling on and on, Spreading, spreading, from the center, flowing on out to the sea And there's no way of telling where the end is going to be... - Anonymous On October 5, 2006, during the opening session of the annual

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-13473883999999380642007-06-21T16:38:00.000-07:002007-06-21T16:42:00.083-07:00

"Two cameras! Why would I want to shoot an interview using two cameras? I can barely manage one." Okay, I hear you. And, for the most part, one camera is all you're ever going to really need to videotape your family interviews. BUT, if you're feeling adventurous, there are times when two cameras can really come in handy. Situation 1: Let's say you're doing an interview with a subject who has

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-12657618794649593752007-05-04T12:44:00.000-07:002007-05-04T12:47:33.528-07:00

It was June 28, a few minutes past 2 PM on a hot Tucson afternoon, when I received a call from a gentleman in Wisconsin. It seems his dad, an avid amateur pianist, was hosting a house concert in Green Valley (south of Tucson) on July 1. The caller had never seen his father present a concert and was anxious to have it preserved on video. "Can you videotape the concert?" he asked. Long story short

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-1175349944400233032007-03-31T07:59:00.000-07:002007-04-02T05:05:21.396-07:00

Have you ever gone back to visit the home where you grew up? Your first school? Or any other buildings or places that figured prominently in your childhood? I bet your visits prompted a flood of memories. You can harness that power of place to help the subject of your next video biography recall memories and stories from his or her life. A while ago I took a walk through my old New Jersey

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-1169741620807614062007-01-25T09:11:00.000-07:002007-03-27T09:19:44.576-07:00

The process of creating your family history video begins with a vision. Your vision. Now, don't be intimidated by the word "vision." All it means is the way you imagine your video is going to look and sound. The clearer your vision, the easier it will be for you to pull together the resources you'll need to make your video. For example, your vision may be for a simple, on-camera interview. Or you

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-1166027653019308642006-12-13T09:21:00.000-07:002007-03-02T19:34:24.693-07:00

November's "Create Your Own Video Biography" workshop was fun and informative for all! And now that the 2006 workshop season is a wrap, we'd like to hear how to make our 2007 workshops even more beneficial for you. Please take a moment to fill out our online workshop survey. It's an easy way to get your name on our waiting list - AND your answers will help Family Legacy Video design a workshop

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-1166026858507523602006-12-13T09:18:00.000-07:002006-12-13T09:20:58.520-07:00

An interview with my mom - it's been something I've been wanting to do for a long time. And this year I finally did it. Mom came out from New Jersey to celebrate two November milestone birthdays (I turned 50 and she reached 70) as well as Thanksgiving, which was sandwiched in between. We had a great visit, and on the day after we celebrated her birthday, we sat down for an interview that

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-1162141178205700282006-10-29T09:55:00.000-07:002006-10-29T09:59:38.223-07:00

They're white satin bags, fringed with lace and dotted with pearl-like beads. They're bridal bags, designed to hold the cards given to a bride on her wedding day. Even though they've been emptied of the cards, cash and checks that once filled them, the bags are still filled with the love of their maker and are cherished by the brides who own them. My wife and I hopped a flight from Arizona to

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-1158701904782883092006-09-19T14:36:00.000-07:002006-09-19T14:40:29.530-07:00

"Create Your Own Video Biography" workshops from Family Legacy Video offer three jam-packed days filled with inspiration, learning and fun - and leave you with the tools you need to preserve your own precious family stories on video. Our next workshop takes place in Tucson, Arizona this November. The Tucson workshop runs from November 10 to 12 (Friday to Sunday). The venue is the meeting room at

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-1158701550817818132006-09-19T14:29:00.000-07:002006-09-19T14:32:30.836-07:00

Stock historical footage. We've all seen it used in the movies and on TV. Thanks to early documentary film makers and newsreel cameramen, long ago events, from the major to the mundane, still live on in grainy, black and white moving images. Most of those clips are owned by stock footage libraries. These companies license the rights to various clips to video and film producers - and the rights

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-1152989839543209172006-07-15T11:53:00.000-07:002006-07-20T09:04:09.576-07:00

You've decided to create a video biography chronicling your life, or the life of one of your family members. That's great! You're sure to capture lots of great personal stories. But as you go about planning your interview, don't forget to include some questions that put your subject's personal history in the context of national and/or world history. We all know how quickly times change. Asking

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-1152988622451209742006-07-15T11:32:00.000-07:002006-07-15T11:51:17.693-07:00

"Create Your Own Video Biography" workshops from Family Legacy Video offer three jam-packed days filled with inspiration, learning and fun - and leave you with the tools you need to preserve your own precious family stories on video. Our next workshop takes place this September - and you're invited! The workshop will run from September 8 to 10 (Friday to Sunday). And this time we're holding the

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-1150645436595771232006-06-18T08:38:00.000-07:002007-01-27T00:47:23.776-07:00

It's too much work. I don't look good on camera. I don't have much to say. I already have lots of photo albums - why should I make a video? If you've tried to convince a reticent parent or grandparent to sit for a video biography interview, you've probably heard excuses like these. Than again, maybe you're the parent or grandparent offering up the excuses. So why is a video biography an

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-1144269344938934532006-04-05T13:24:00.000-07:002006-06-24T14:26:15.673-07:00

Family Legacy Video's mission is helping folks just like you preserve your stories and family history on video. While you can certainly hire Family Legacy Video to create your video biography, you may be a do-it-yourselfer who'd like to learn how to produce the video yourself. Well, you're in luck. Family Legacy Video is holding two "Create Your Own Video Biography" workshops in the coming months

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12519434.post-1142192305124830362006-03-12T12:33:00.000-07:002006-03-12T12:42:56.410-07:00

Imagine you're in a theatre, waiting to see the latest hit musical. The house lights dim. Audience chatter ceases. Then, from the orchestra pit, comes the first notes of the overture. During the next few minutes you enjoy a sampling of the musical delights to come. Your excitement builds, your anticipation grows, and, by the time the curtain rises, you're totally focused on the show. Think of

Steve Penderhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18367028136098903915noreply@blogger.com