The Nintendo Boy Project

As I sit at a booth in my dining hall finishing my breakfast, I have much on my mind that I want you to know. I don't know if I'll get everything down I want to say without having this blog post not too long, but I'll give it my best shot... here we go! Today, right now... summer 2010, is a great time to be a fan of The Nintendo Boy Project! The most amazing thing that could ever happen to us, happened: we upgraded. The news I have to tell you is so exciting, that I'm constantly dancing like Conan O'Brien on a day-to-day basis... it's the best! (; If you're on a time crunch and can't read this rather lengthy entry, I suggest at least skipping to end where everything is capitalized... that will give you the gist!

So, what did we upgrade, specifically? Well, I'm actually not gonna tell you, because it will ruin the MAGIC! Hah, just kidding, I'll tell you. Or, actually, I've already told you. But I'll say it again for this entry... MY BRAND NEW MACBOOK PRO! I'm typing on it right now, actually, and it's a dream come true. Guys, Apple computers really as awesome as we all think they are. The interface, the features, everything. I could go on with a lengthy scroll on what I like about my Pro, but maybe another time! Although I must mention the incredible power it carries, the HD graphics, the beauty, the operating system, the outstanding battery life (8-9 hours... unbelievable, I know), and just... ahhh, I am so lucky to have this, and I owe a huge HUGE THANK YOU to my parents who got this for my birthday. A bunch of people asked me about the specifications of my MacBook Pro (okay, just two... thanks Adam & Brett! teehee), and I promise I shall in an upcoming entry, I just don't want to get too distracted as I write this post. But anyway, let's talk about my new MacBook Pro... after all, it is the title of this blog post! (;

Don't mistake me for bragging, that's not what I want to get across here, believe me. If I just happen to emphasis how much I LOVE LOVE LOVE my new laptop and what it is capable of, it's because I want you to truly understand what it means to me and how it's upgraded our project here. Sip on some orange juice (or another drink of your choice), kick back, and relax as I serenade you with even more words about how excited I am.

Let me start off with something in our FAQ, that I will end up having to update soon. It's about our editing process, pasted below. The question was: What editing software do you use? Your editing is fantastic!

• My answer was this: Why thank you, imaginary person! I edit using the Sony Vegas Movie Studio Platinum 9.0, although it's not as great as it sounds. Okay wait, I take that back. It's not great... for my computer. You see, the software is specifically for AVCHD files, which is the format, which is the format my camera shoots in, which is great and all, but my little laptop isn't powerful enough to playback the AVCHD clips in real time, so I can't watch it which basically means it's impossible to edit.

Pretty crazy huh? I then followed up the topic with one another question: Wait... so if it's impossible to edit, how do you do it? 

• My answer was this: Good question, sir/ma'am. As I stated in the question above, with the simple laptop I have as of now, it is impossible to playback the AVCHD files to edit. So what I have to do is watch the beautiful HD clips playback on the actual camera, write down the ties where I need to trim and clean up, and manually do it on the software without being to watch my edits in real time. Once I'm satisfied with the editing project I basically just completed blind, I then render the movie (which takes hours) and cross my fingers hoping that I got everything right so that I don't have to go back to square one... so in reality, it's not impossible, but it's certainly a tedious process.

Now that you understand how pretty much every video from Hiatus (June 5th, 2009) up until now has been to produce... wow... talk about giving me a pat on the back, huh? ... and not to continue polishing my own trophy, but I certainly think I did pretty well with the editing considering it was BLIND EDITING (I just now made up that phrase for my situation). But alas, I'm here to tell you that that era, is over. That's right, I think you've figured it out by now. Let me confirm your speculation with some numbers... everyone loves stats, right?

On my brand new Macbook Pro with Final Cut Express HD pre-installed, I was able to create a week's worth of editing in just 20 minutes. 20 MINUTES. In my book, 20 minutes > 1 week, any day. But I must mention that learning FCE was pretty rough to start out with, but it helped that I'm not new when it comes to editing & editing interfaces, as well as watching all the tutorials on the Apple site as well as some on YouTube. Alright, so the next paragraph (and hopefully last, I realize this is becoming lengthy) must utilize caps to show my excitement...

OH MY GOSH. WHEN I CONNECTED MY CAMERA TO THE PRO AND WAS ABLE TO SELECT, IMPORT, AND PLAYBACK MY AVCHD CLIPS IN BEAUTIFUL HD REAL TIME IN THE FINAL CUT EXPRESS EDITOR, I SCREAMED AND CRIED OF JOY. I LITERALLY CRIED OF HAPPINESS. I AM SO EXCITED, BECAUSE NOW MAKING VIDEOS WILL BE SO MUCH EASIER AND THEREFORE, EVEN MORE FUN TO DO. THIS IS A DREAM COME TRUE, NOW THAT I HAVE A POWERFUL MACHINE TO PRODUCE VIDEOS AND COMPLEMENT THE AMAZING HIGH DEFINITION CAMERA I HAVE! THIS IS LITERALLY IS THE BEST THING TO HAPPEN TO THE NINTENDO BOY PROJECT EVER. AHHHHHH. YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW HAPPY AND EXCITED I AM. WELL, ACTUALLY, YOU PROBABLY DO, SINCE YOU'VE IMAGINED ME SCREAMING THIS WHOLE THING. WHICH I AM, IN MY HEAD. WOOHOO, I'M SO HAPPY!!! :]]]]]]]]]]]

Before you go, let me just say that the all-caps paragraph you just read... it doesn't even scratch the surface of what I'm feeling right now. The Nintendo Boy Project and I... we're on cloud nine. (:

P.S. Stay tuned for the long-delayed video "Trumpet Lessons," tomorrow, Wednesday, July 14th! A blog post will be posted with the respective bloopers at the end of the month. Hope you enjoy it!!

Do you ever read blogs and think to yourself "Who the heck reads this?". I can also safely say that Nintendo Boy will read this and say "Hey, that's not true! I 100% of the people who visit the site will read this!" And you, Nintendo boy, would be correct! You are the only one who will read this, and you will also have been the only one who will have realized this has been posted. The Ironic truth is that the more popular the site is doing, the less it gets read. This may seem like a problem to you Nintendo Boy, but I have two easy methods to improve your situation! They are:

1) The drastic method would be to make it so no one ever reads anything ever anymore. The solution would be to make video blogs from now on. But to be realistic about it, nothing over 5 minutes gets watched, we all know that; using the same point, if it takes more than 5 minutes to read, no one will read it. That brings us to point 2.

2) No one ever reads blog posts from head to toe ever, not the long ones anyway. Instead, just give a spark notes version that people will want to read. Face it, us Americans are big and lazy slobs. We also like shiny things like watches... But thats beside the point. So instead of having a post like the one I just wrote, spark note it and highlight/underline/make in a different color the most important things. For example... this post could be reedited as follows:

"Do you ever read blogs and think to yourself "Who the heck reads this?". I can also safely say that Nintendo Boy will read this and say "Hey, that's not true! I 100% of the people who visit the site will read this!" And you, Nintendo boy, would be correct! You are the only one who will read this, and you will also have been the only one who will have realized this has been posted. The Ironic truth is that the more popular the site is doing, the less it gets read. This may seem like a problem to you Nintendo Boy, but I have two easy methods to improve your situation! They are:

1) The drastic method would be to make it so no one ever reads anything ever anymore. The solution would be to make video blogs from now on. But to be realistic about it, nothing over 5 minutes gets watched, we all know that; using the same point, if it takes more than 5 minutes to read, no one will read it. That brings us to point 2.

2) No one ever reads blog posts from head to toe ever, not the long ones anyway. Instead, just give a spark notes version that people will want to read. Face it, us Americans are big and lazy slobs. We also like shiny things like watches... But thats beside the point. So instead of having a post like the one I just wrote, spark note it and highlight/underline/make in a different color the most important things. For example... this post could be reedited as follows:"

See, now this site will become slightly more popular because I didn't make people read a LONG boring post. This is Andrew once again saying Stay Classy internet!

Okay, so right off the bat, I know this is going to be a long post (but I'll do my best to keep it short) because I want to take a look back at the past year. I think this is good for a number of reasons, but it's a secret for now (err yeah I have no idea why I'm doing this honestly). I'll do my best to cover what so far has been our best year for the site, and give justice to the videos in a somewhat laid back blog post that hopefully won't be TOO long. So, with that being said, let's take a look back on how 2009 was a spicyyy fun year for us, video-wise! (yes, I only said 'spicy' so I could justify my image choice for today...haha!)

Let's begin. 2009. Our best year yet... but really things didn't get rolling until the summer... sooo, our best half-year yet? After Rock Band Documentary at the very end of 2008, we took a long hiatus... and not by choice either, it's just the way it happened. I received a veryyyyy nice Sony HD Handycam as a high school graduation present from from my parents mid-May, and it caused me to blog with excitement! With the summer, there's a lot of people busy with different things, so we weren't able to get together until early June. From there, we created Hiatus, an appropriate name, we thought. Not the best video ever, but it was definitely a start!

The team and I (mostly me) were so excited about the new top-notch HD quality for YouTube viewing but we didn't realize how subpar the video was. It was too long, really random, and you could tell we were just showing off the camera. We were so young then, tear. After this, we spent a lot of time planning but never got anything done. This was also during the time that the site had no activity and sparked a scare of closing the site. After much thought, we decided to keep going. We jumped off the hype of the closing of the site with The End, a sort of fictional extension to real events on the site. This was again, really random, and I was really only in love with the ending of The End (ha), where I show off my editing skills... one of my favorite NB moments for sure! This took place right at the end of July, almost making a release date of August 1st because of editing problems. Then we realized that it was August and Josh and I were heading to college, and Andrew to finish his senior year.

About a week later, we did not disappoint with perhaps one of my favorite videos of the three NintendoBoy guys (really, this is one where we are all together and in scenes, so..fun, haha), Wishful Thinking. I love this video because of the various colorful different kinds of settings that took place over the three-and-a-half minute video, and I think it was a legit video. The only problem I had with it was the Rock Band Documentary reference, which was my idea actually, but Andrew was against it because some people (really, a lot actually) wouldn't get it... I wish I had taken his advice but we really didn't have any else of an idea for a replacement sketch. xD Oh well, nevertheless, it was a great video and was a perfect farewell video as we left for college just days after it was released.

Since we were all busy with school, it really hurt the site as we didn't have new content to push out, except for the occasional blog post here and there. That's why it was awesome when I planned a comeback in October with a friend who was visiting me at school. It was almost November when I released probably my favorite video to date, Hardly Working, just because of how well it was done and really the emphasis on legit comedy: ADD... but honestly I don't really act like that, HAHA. Ironically, I had to do little-to-no editing (except for the trimming the beginning/endings for when I start/stop the camera), yet this was a favorite and I've received great feedback on it! It was a sad because it was the first video I'd done without my NB team, but it spawned the idea of a "Special Guests" series where I can invite interested people to particiapte in the project and help it grow and become more successful!

Winding down to the end of the year, we got together over Thanksgiving break and filmed Facebook Fans, but many problems with editing arose and I wasn't able to release it until perhaps two weeks later, which I was unhappy about, but ah what can you do? But, it was a special video because it was our first try at pop culture, and I really like (and still do) the idea of it, so I might turn it into a series, so don't be surprised if you see a "FBF 2," etc... it's all ideas for now! Coming back to school for about a last regular week and a week of finals, we headed back home again and meet very frequently, thanks to the help of Ellie for driving the crew around as well as Josh for letting us come to his house at the most craziest times.

I had the idea to use the entire winter break to create a two-part suspense episode to end the year and we managed to do it in what I called Takeover (I ended up not liking the name... it seemed like a good idea at the time but then I was like... eh)! Yeah, it wasn't perfect, but it was a lot of fun to make, and it made me want to explore more different types of genres instead of just sketchy comedy. But don't worry, we're not getting carried away just yet. Despite it being my idea to create a two-part video, with the ending of the story in Takeover Part 2, I had reservations about how both videos might not be seen, etc... but oh well, I guess it worked out since I did received a good amount of feedback on facebook on both videos.

WELL. THERE IT IS. 2009 in a very small nutshell, and really only talking about the videos... ha. Hmm, it seems as though I made a big deal about the success of this year at the beginning of this post, but as I write it all down, it's not THAT great. HA, just kidding, that's kinda depressing. But really though, it was DEF a fun year and a great site to the further fueling of this project. We have sooo many things planned for 2010, and I'd like to make it known that not only will we be improving our films a lot in many different ways, the site is getting moved up to the top of the list. I mean, it's the most important thing or you wouldn't be reading this! It has so much potential, and I will be doing some heavy re-constructing and organizing of the site, so I will update you when things change and blah blah. A sneak peak for the site is a re-vamp of the forums. It's the best app ever and we never use it! So look out for that soon, as well as more videos! Perhaps maybe with a theme song or ending chime? Hmm. I guess you'll just have to stick around and find out!

Thanks for reading, and thank you for supporting us. We're nothing without you.

Hey nintendoboy fans! I never ever thought I would be writing a blog post for nintendoboy.com (much less be in a video xD), but here I am! So, I am happy to inform you that part two to Takeover is up today! I had TONS of fun making this little set of videos with everybody, but I honestly had no idea that the making of these videos involved so much time! I mean, when you're watching nintendoboy videos, they are only three minutes long so you're probably thinking, "HAHA! What a funny nintendoboy video, I bet that took no time at all!" ... Okay, so you probably weren't thinking that at all (except for the HAHA part, right?), in fact, you probably haven't thought at all about how long it takes to film and edit a video. Well neither did I until recently! First there has to be a plan of some sort of what the video is supposed to be about. And for the first time EVER (I'm pretty sure...), someone -Jeffrey Vega- actually wrote out a rough sketch before filming *GASP*! I know, I know, it's crazy... Second, you actually have to film the scenes in the video (Who would have thought?). You would not believe how many times it takes for one scene to be filmed sometimes! Luckily, there is a lot of laughing and silliness involved when this happens, so I think everyone secretly enjoys the 117th take... As for editing, I still don't really know that much about the mechanics of it. But I do know that Jeff does ALL the editing, and that it takes hours and hours, and that he does an awesome job  and probably doesn't get the credit he deserves here because who thinks about the editing of a video while you are watching it? Usually no one. But now perhaps you will!

Anyways, now that you know a little bit of what goes on behind the scenes, I hope you enjoy part two even more now that you know how much time, effort, and TLC goes into these videos, along with the fact that the videos are being put up on a weekly basis currently. Whether they will be in the future weeks remains a mystery! I don't know of any videos in the near future, but hopefully I am wrong and there are more ideas to be filmed during the winter break! I would love love love to be involved in more videos now that I've experienced what its like once already (Wait, twice if you include part one... wait, thrice if you include the failed Halloween video!)! All right, well, go watch the video, LOL (literally), and comment on the video (here... or on youtube... or on facebook... or on all three! The choice is yours :D). OH! And happy holidays!!!

 Click here to watch it in our video theater! |  Click here to watch it in HD on YouTube! |

 Click here to watch it on Facebook in case you would rather "Like" it than comment... haha!

~Got a funny story from ANY camp with no one to share it with? We all want to hear it!!! Just send in the story to thisonetime@nintendoboy.com with you name (optional) and a picture (also optional) and I will pick the best 5 and post them weekly! (Don't post them In the comments because I will most likely miss them!)~

This one time, at band camp...

... I wore a wedding dress to band rehearsal not realizing that it was a TOTAL mistake. Forget the dress, the MAKEUP was the worst.

-Joshua Indech

 ... the Euphonium skit was starting to get inappropriate... like Peter Fugate cross-dressing! So G rang the gong to stop the skit 50 times and the Euphoniums refused to stop the skit.

- Michelle C. Parkos

...  the year before my last I spent the night before the first rehearsal with instrumnets cleaning my horn, and then after breakfast I accidently left my case open and it fell out when I picked it up and the thrid valve got bent. D'OH!

-Richard Sponholz

... My 8th grade band camp (Encore) a few guys stole my bed and literally hid it in the closet which locked from the inside. I didn't realize this till late after free time. By the time I got my mattress out, I realized they also accidently broken one of the legs of my bed which I then had to pay $54 for.

-Andrew Shain

... someone tried to curl another girl's hair with one of those round brushes right before lights out one night and it got stuck in her hair and the chaperones were up for an extra hour untangling it from her hair.

-Christine 'Steen' Krause

~If you didn't see your story here, don't worry! We have plenty of time to post them, just send them in!~