I’ve been having an interesting conversation with school instructor Dylan Bennett over a blog post I made on Monday about a viral video on YouTube.

The video is a well choreographed piece by film students in Montreal using a popular song.

Mr. Bennett was commenting about how, as a video production instructor, he strives to teach his students not only the video producing skills and techniques but also the rules and ethics that go along with being a video producer.

We often write in Videomaker about how legally and ethically one shouldn’t use copyright music without permission,  and how, even recently, YouTube has taken down people’s fun videos because they used 10-seconds of a song without permission from the copyright holder.  But, apparently, the rules are changing.

Mr. Bennett sent me this blog post that Google put up this week, saying it’s OK to use copyright music, TV shows, or other approved media on YouTube… “if”… and it’s a big IF.  If the record company/TV network/copyright holder sees a financial benefit to them.

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Adobe announces its latest additions to the Adobe Elements and Photoshop family today with it release of its consumer video editing program – Premiere Elements 8 and Photoshop 8. Adobe created Elements with the intent of reaching the consumer and hobbyist market with it’s low priced video editing software, but has moved the editing program along into a robust application that can keep pace with the big boys.

Rather than throwing in more effects you don’t need, this latest update has a lot more under the hood and has added some better tools to organize your video and photos.

What’s new? There’s an auto analyzer that you can use to tag your images for fast and easy searches. You can also sync your video and photos across several computers and the program has face recognition, helping to zone in on just the images you want from, say, “Carsen’s Birthday,” and it will learn who your subjects are and can find all images of them across the files.
Here’s some advance copy from our First Look review, to be uploaded Wednesday morning:
Premiere Elements 8 adds additional automated tools: Smart Trim removes the least interesting, lowest quality footage; SmartFix corrects shaky footage and color and lighting problems; and SmartMix balances music and sound effects without overpowering dialog or background audio. Plus, the new Motion Tracking feature finds moving subjects in your footage so that you can add graphics, text, and even video effects that automatically move with them.

Read the rest of our advance review of Adobe Elements 8.0 online here  http://www.videomaker.com/article/14751/

More From Adobe’s Press Release:
Adobe Photoshop Elements 8 & Adobe Premiere Elements 8 software gives you power and ease of use so you can create extraordinary photos and incredible movies, easily manage and protect your photos and video clips with automatic online backup, and access them anywhere you are. And now, Adobe Photoshop Elements 8 & Adobe Premiere Elements 8 Plus includes everything in the award-winning software and more:
• 20GB of online storage—enough for up to 15,000 photos or four hours of DVD-quality video
• Ongoing delivery of new, easy-to-use tutorials
• Ongoing delivery of fresh seasonal artwork, inspiring templates, movie themes, video effects, and all-new Online Albums

It’s all accessible with your Adobe ID. For more details, visit www.adobe.com/go/membership_elements. Adobe Photoshop Elements 8 & Adobe Premiere Elements 8 Plus, $179.99 (Available on Adobe.com, U.S. only) A savings of $20 off the first year of Plus, if purchased with the software bundle.
Already have Photoshop Elements 8 & Adobe Premiere Elements 8? Upgrade to Plus via the product for $49.99 a year.

Where are all the shooting gigs? How do you find them? Craigslist? Your local newspaper want ads? Some other vague work-for-hire site?

I just got back last night from shooting a 3-day gig with my brother down in central California. His specialty has been architectural, environmental, lighting and product images, my specialty has been all about people: interviews and sound recording. Together we made a pretty good team and wondered how we’d shop ourselves around better.

Serendipity made a visit to my email this morning, with the announcement of the WorldofShooters.com site. It’s very easy to zero in on your expertise and gear type, and easy for others looking to hire you to zone in on their needs, too.

With more and more companies downsizing, the freelance producers that can grab their gear and go are going to get the gigs when companies send out their plea for work. World of Shooters has you register by the type of still camera or video camera that you use, so everyone can easily sift through the first question: What do you shoot with?

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Canon has announced multiple new digital cameras today that combine elements of video and photography together to create some very impressive cameras. The new Canon EOS 7D is the start of a new series of DSLR cameras, perfect for amateurs and professionals alike. We had the pleasure of looking at the model and we feel it is a very impressive addition to Canon’s already successful line of digital cameras. Already leading the forefront when it comes to blurring the lines between still photography and video. The camera’s features include an 18MPX CMOS APS-C size sensor, a 94-shot burst mode, Full HD at 30p/24p/25p and more. It will be available late September and will run $1,699 for the body alone, with the full kit 28-135 at $1,899.

Also hitting the shelves in late September will be the ES100 Macro at $1,049 and the EFS 18-135 at $499. Coming in late October will be the EFS 15-85  at $799 and the WFT-E5 A will drop in early November at $699.99.