On the way back from the shoot, our gracious Lions hosts/travel guides gave us a tour of the local beaches as well as the downtown area of the city.

Below are a few of the photos, the rest are on Flickr.

I slept here and there on the flight, but probably not more than 7 hours. Of that I’m sure it was not really quality sleep. My butt was so numb I had to keep getting up to walk.

But all in all it was a good trip and I’m glad to be here. I’ll be here 13 nights before I head back home.

This time next week I’ll be on a plane heading to Sydney Australia. I’ll be home on July 3rd just in time for the holiday.

It goes without saying that I’ll be posting some updates during my travels. You can also find my travel itinerary on the blog.

On this trip I’ll be doing the usual editing for Lions Clubs International, but I’ll also be taking some behind the scenes production stills that may be used on the Lions website or newsletter.

Except for it being a 20+ hour trip, I’m looking forward to going. I’m not so sure Brenda is as excited though.

One for the plane, one for the RedCarpet Club. I’m out the door at 6am sharp tomorrow.

It’s going to be rough to leave this cold Chicago winter, but next week I am booked on a job in Anaheim CA. I have a 7-Day gig at the Anaheim Convention Center for the NAMM show. This is a good start to the new year and is hopefully a good sign of things to come.

I’ll be posting updates during the trip and hope to have time to take some photos of the event itself. You can find my travel details on this site by clicking here.

This video pretty much sums up what the week was like, for those who got out of their hotel room. It was the final video that played tonight just before the band started playing. 

We head to the airport at 10am tomorrow, and I should be home no later then 7pm if all goes as scheduled. This is my last trip for the year, and that’s just fine with me. It’s been a great year for travel jobs but a little break for the rest of the year sounds good.

It’s not all that interesting, but this is the only photo I’ve had time to take since I got here since I have not been able to leave my room. Like most of these travel jobs, it’s been long days. 

Today is the last day of editing, and I have one more video to get done before the trip is over. The last video needs to be done and out the door by 7pm tonight, but there is still shooting going on today that needs to be included. So it will be one of those down to the wire situations. 

Tomorrow I get to sleep in (a little) and then we have a 1pm flight to head back home. I’m wishing I had added one extra day to just hang out on the beach here before I left!

Click on the photo to see a larger version – it is a stitch of 16 different photos that I took from left to right looking off of the balcony. 

All checked in and setup in the room. Being in warm weather like this just has a way of relaxing you.  Now time for some sleep after a long hectic day.

A window seat in a exit row, with the seat next to me empty. What’s not to like!

I’m back from Indiana, and off early tomorrow for Cancun Mexico. Given how cold it’s become in recent days, the timing couldn’t be better!

Nothing much to report. I’m here Thursday and Friday and have 5-6 videos to do before leaving late on Friday. I expect to be home around midnight tomorrow. 

The room that was reserve for the edit suite is probably the nicest room yet. It’s a 2-room conference room complete with 2 flat screen TV’s, huge conference room table and private bathroom. I took the liberty of completely changing the conference room to fit my needs.

US Democratic presidential candidate Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY) speaks during a campaign stop at the Merrillville Fire Department Station #2 in Merrillville, Indiana, May 5, 2008.

I have two more work related trips for the year. 

Starting Wednesday I’ll be in beautiful Merrillville Indiana doing an conference for IGA. Although it’s only about 50 miles from home, I’ll be there Wednesday through late Friday or early Saturday morning. 

The beautiful Fiesta Americana Grand Coral Beach.

Early Sunday I leave for Cancun Mexico (by far the better of the two trips) and come back from that on Friday the 14th. The job in Cancun is for FICP and there are several videos for that job that will be shot and edited on-site. We’re staying at the Fiesta Americana Grand Coral Beach which looks to be a very nice hotel. 

So this year is a record for travel jobs, in both quantity and quality of locations. From as close as Indiana and as far as Bangkok Thailand, and ending up the year in Cancun Mexico… it’s hard to complain. 

As you might expect, I’ll be doing posts from my travel locations.

Once again, Brian the snooty world traveler, was able to get “back of the bus Tom” into a nice lounge. My personal opinion is it’s not as good as the one in Chicago, but who am I to complain. Free food and drinks, and free wireless internet. 

Our flight leaves in about an hour and there’s not reason to think it will be delayed at this time. 

Apparently not too many people know this spacious lounge is here. There were more staff members then travelers. This is just ONE section that I didn’t realize was there until we were ready to leave. 

Today will probably be another long edit day, but it is the last day here so no matter what we’re done after today. I’ve been gone on trips longer then this, but for some reason this one just seems a lot longer. I’m pretty home sick and looking forward to returning to Chicago tomorrow. 

You can find the most recent photos added to SmugMug. The guy second from the left seriously thinks you need to check them out. Don’t make him mad. 

Does Jim actually do it?  You’ll have to find out for yourself.  

I actually was not part of this little excursion, but Brian went along and recorded it with his little digital camera. The quality is a bit low, but it’s still good enough to make your stomach turn. 

Blizzard.

How do you write “Take me to the Apple Store” in Chinese? Well, I can’t tell you how but I can show you. The card was prepared by the front desk of the hotel so that I could just give it to the cab driver and he would know where to take me. None of the cab drivers here have spoken even the most basic english, so this was very helpful.

Then, I found this helpful iPhone app that lets you do the same thing with your iPhone. It’s called “Beijing Taxi Guide” This is the exact same message, but create by the iPhone. Pretty cool!

Once there, I picked up the few things I needed for the job and headed back. It was about a 15 minute cab ride form the hotel, so I was able to get a nice view of some other neighborhoods. Where we are staying is clearly the more expensive part of town. 

This photo was created from 20 different photos, moving from left to right as I was shooting. They were then stitched together in Photoshop CS3. You can see the full size version on Flickr. 

This is the view from the edit suite where I’m working. The edit suite is just a dedicated hotel room.

Today is the first seriously busy day of the job. The show has officially started and the tapes are starting to come in fast. Our job is to take about 6-8 hours of a recorded conference and boil it down to a 10 minute “best of” highlights video. As soon as it’s done it gets uploaded to a web server so that people who could not attend the conference are able to see at least some of what they missed. 

Since there was a chance of dealing with clients more today (which has not actually happened) I decided to dress up. Dressing up involved wearing exactly the same thing as the last 2 days (jeans and a t-shirt) and adding a jacket to the mix. So kind of a fake dress up. 

Going up.

Coming down.

Today was an all day event to get to and from the Great Wall. It is about 50 miles outside the city, but it was a 2 hour cab ride each way (in part because our cab driver kept getting lost) and we spent about 3 hours walking the Great Wall, taking photos and having lunch. 

More photos can be found on Flickr.

Walking the great wall right now.

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This is our hotel, although the photo was taken several hours after we arrived (it was about 4pm when we actually checked in. 

The hotel is very nice, the rooms are nice and the bathroom is awesome! All marble floor and counter, as well as a standalone marble shower.

Landed in Beijing China.

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We made it through checkin and security very fast (total time was probably 20 minutes). My cases were not opened by security and ravaged like they normally are, so that was nice. That’s the part that normally stresses me out is watching them unpack my cases and man-handle everything. 

Because I’m traveling with Brian (a snooty global multi-country traveler) he was able to get me into the fancy “Red Carpet Club” that’s kind of like a high end, exclusive coffee shop where everything is free. The seats are very comfortable and cushy, and every seat has it’s own power outlet for using your computer. Oh, and there’s free wireless internet too. 

So, not a bad start to the trip! Our flight is scheduled to depart at 12:30 and even though there is a lot of rain still it’s on time without any delays. 

Being the nerd that I am, I have my 20 pocket vest on, which includes a digital camera, 2 ipods, iphone, extra battery for iphone, magazines, amazon kindle, and headphones – all charged and loaded with many selections. So should be more then set to kill the time. 

Photo courtesy of Lucy in London. You can see more of her work on flickr.

At this time next week I’ll be in the air on my way to Beijing China for an 8 day trip. The flight is 18 hours (not so good) but it is a direct flight, so at least that’s on our side. 

This week I’ll be in high gear to prepare for the trip. I have not really thought much about it until now, knowing I had blocked out time this week to take care of everything. It’s not just preparing for the trip itself, but also making sure the edit system is in tip-top shape. As with every trip I do, the system will be setup and taken through a test run at the office to make sure everything is running well, as well as to make sure I have all of the various adaptors, cables and other small pieces needed. 

Unlike most trips, I’m also limited on what I can take, and how many bags. Between the edit system and my personal suitcase, I can only bring 3 cases. So I have slim down and only take what I need without leaving anything important behind. 

It’s hard to imagine I can go over 40 years of my life not visiting Asia, and then go twice in the same year. Although it’s been in the works for at least a week, I have officially been given my flight information so I am indeed going to Beijing China for a job. I leave September 14th and return on the 23rd.

This trip will be to work on a job for ATKearney. I’m still waiting for the details of the job but from what I know there is the need to turn things around very fast and get them posted to the web.  

We’ll be showing up just after the Olympics end, so unfortunately there’s no chance of going to any events while there. But I’ll be sure to visit The Great Wall at the very least!

More details to follow in the coming weeks. 

The last video that we edited turned out OK, and we made our deadline with plenty of time to spare. The last 30 seconds are so is always a rush to cut, and you have to make sure you leave just enough room for the last shots, but not too much space that you have hoes to cover in the video. This is my 3rd year doing this job and it’s one that I really enjoy.

Overhead shot of the show from the catwalk. 

The last day is always the stressful day. I have 2 days to edit most of this 4 minute video, but the last 30 seconds of the video is shot only minutes before the video plays. At the very end, once the very last events are shot by the photographer, I have about 12 minutes to get the footage, import it, edit the shots in, create a beta master and get it back to the control room behind stage. 

To add to the tension, last year we missed the deadline because of a problem with the edit computer in the very last minutes. So they ended up playing a safety tape that I had made hours earlier (so the last several hours of work didn’t even count). To this day, that is still the lowest point in my career. Letting people down on a job is not something I’m used to or comfortable with.

So I’m in that holding window now where I’m done except for the shots of things that have not started yet. The final deadline for delivery is around 11:45 pm tonight. I’m feeling confident that it will go better then last year. 

Same time of year, same people, same basement with no phone reception, and same exact room as the last 2 years. It feels like I never left. 

The big difference this year is that I didn’t bring the big tower system that I normally have. Why you ask? Because laptops are now so powerful that the laptop I’m using this year is faster then the full size tower I had the last 2 years. It’s also about 100 lbs lighter and easier to pack. 

The other big difference is that we’re shooting tapeless. Everything is being recorded on P2 cards and dumped to a hard drive, that I just import from. I still have to create beta masters though. 

Setup, complete with client table, monitor and speaker. 

Another travel job, this time in the fine city of Minneapolis Minnesota. I’ll be there until Monday. The amount of equipment I take on this job requires the rental of a truck, so I’m really going to enjoy it while I have it. 

We made much better time coming home then we did going to MI. Traveling at night seems to be the key, and I think we’ll be doing a lot more of it. They normally go to bed around 7pm, which is a great time to travel. No traffic, and no delays through the many constructions zones on I-94 right now.

Here are a few photos, and  you can find more on Flickr. I should have some video posted later this week.

Since we were unable to make the trip last weekend for the family reunion, we made a last minute decision to visit the family this weekend instead. We’re here until Sunday night when we’ll drive back starting at 8pm in hopes of making better time then we did coming into Detroit. Due to traffic and non-stop construction, it took us 8 hours to make it here. That’s the longest it has taken, with the only exception being a snow storm trip that took 12.

On the up side, we got some great mileage. We averaged over 50 miles per gallon over 300 miles, a new personal best! Normally it’s in the low to mid 40’s. So it took less then a half tank of gas to get here with a 12 gallon tank. Not to bad!

Photos later, as well as some video of Madison.

Photo by Creativity+ Timothy K Hamilton

I’m happy to be back at home. The trip was pretty uneventful and smooth so I can’t complain. More in a few days.

We got our 12 bags checked and finally made it through customs and security. Next stop, California.

We’re off to the airport for our long trip back. The next update will probably come from the US once we land at LAX. Let’s hope that the trip back is not as problematic as the trip out here was!

Yesterday I did nothing. I woke up at 11:30 and ordered room service. After taking 2 hours to relax and eat, I went to the health club and worked out. Came back and took a shower, then went down to the pool for a few hours. Came back to the room and ordered room service again, took a little nap, and then spent the evening in the hotel lobby listening to live music and drinking Scotch. All in all, not a bad way to wrap up a trip.

Today is mostly packing and working out travel details. We don’t actually leave for the airport until around 3:30 pm since our flight doesn’t leave until 7:30pm. Our flight is about 18 hours to LA California, and we have a 5 hour layover in LA. We leave LA around midnight and have a 5 hour flight back to Chicago, arriving around 5:30am on Monday (Chicago time) if all goes well.

Had I known how awesome the view was going to be I would have brought a camera, but as it turned out all I had was my iPhone, which is no real camera. So, these few crappy photos are what I have (the exterior shot was taken a few days ago with my good camera). Once I get photos from everybody else (after the trip is complete) I’ll have some better ones for sure (and a few that I’m in as well).

It was the perfect evening to celebrate. As bad as these photos look, they actually look much better on Flickr.

Tomorrow morning I’m planning on getting up early (instead of sleeping late again) and going to the convention center to see the last few played on the big screen, as well as take some behind the scenes stills. I’m excited because most of the time I’m still editing and can’t make it to the convention center before the job is over.

I have to edit 6 videos total before the end of the week.