>I'm going to get into this a little, and then work up some steam when
>I get home.
>What sells to bonehead middle America? Demo Derbys. Ya know, sort
>of a merger of equals. :^) Consider this is the best of what was
>sent in.
That is a truly frightening thought, but true enough.
>I haven't seen the show, so I really can't be a "creep"
>about it (more on that soon). I have spoken to the guy who produced
>it. He's a good guy. He understands what is right and wrong about
>showing an autorace on TV. The show originally was to be a hour in
Don't get me wrong, Matt -- this isn't about the production values, and I
don't think for an instant that the guy who had to cut all this stuff
together was the ultimate decision maker here... someone up in the food
chain said "this thing has to air, make it so!" and the producer set up the
decks and the Avid and went to it.
>length. There was so little usable material, it was cut to a half. He
>struggled to make it "entertaining" (my term, not his). FWIW, this
>contest languished for about a year, and was dumped into his lap.
Yikes. Okay, that pretty much confirms my thoughts -- and, again, it's not
the producer that I take issue with, but the executive who made the call to
air the iffy material.
>Hard to make lemonade out of bricks. :^)
True enough. I guess the high road might've been to air some of the better
bits during "Speedvision News" on a slow news day or two, announce the
winner, and can the rest of it -- maybe with a Varsha statement along the
lines of "We would have liked to show you more viewer entries, but our
commitment to responsible motorsports coverage prevents us from airing
material of dubious safety and blatantly illegal actions on public roads."
>That's not to say Alan should not have been the winner. We all know
>*how* exciting Solo is on TV (had I really known they were finishing
Dripping with sarcasm again, Matt? :) A well-cut Solo video, like the ones
that Joe Goeke and Alan have produced for the Nationals Talent Show over
the past several years, can certainly capture a viewer's attention -- but
you never lose sight of it being a *controlled* environment (ie, closed to
"civilian" access, helmets and safety equipment in view, numbers on the
cars, etc.). The SRF rainy-track pinball video was fine, too -- again,
controlled environment, safety equipment visible, etc. That's quite a bit
different from a guy on a ZX-11 doing a minute-long burnout donut in the
middle of a 2-lane road while oncoming traffic has to stop and wait for him
to finish showing off for his camcorder-toting pals, another guy jumping
his dirt bike over a 4-lane road, or a guy jumping a Pinto over a dirt ramp
in his backyard.
>Okay, so I worked up steam now. Jim, don't watch Speedvision any more.
>That includes F1 and Legends of Motorsport. :^) I won't either.
Oh, come on... :) I think it's perfectly reasonable to express concern
over a lapse in good judgment on the part of some decision-maker at SV --
it tends to help prevent re-occurrence of that lapse. For the most part,
SV does a fantastic job (hey, I even watched the half-hour of Import Drag
Racing that aired after the Viewer Videos -- the show had great production
and a couple of announcers trying to make the best of a bad situation (the
final of the 2nd fastest class was a single, and even THAT car sputtered
and idled down the track), but what they were covering was, well, not ready
for prime-time yet.) filling their airtime with stuff that appeals to
someone -- I'll admit to watching an episode or two of "Ship Shape" on a
Sunday morning just to see what it was all about.
>I may or may not forward your message to him. It depends how he feels
>about the show now that it is completed. Just to show you he does care,
>he reposted it because he wasn't happy with the music's relationship
>to the voice-over.
Fair enough -- although I'd prefer it if you forwarded the message to one
of the programming execs, not the producer assigned to turn a sow's
hindquarters into a silk purse (if you think it's hard to turn a sow's
ear...).
Jim Crider
autojim@att.net
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