Mar 25 2007
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Q and BA Episode 7.5: Suspended Animation
I hate to have to do this, but Q & BA is going on hiatus for a while. My schedule is out of control, with many projects coming to a head, and I simply don’t have the time to devote to these videos. It’s killing me, but the decision had to be made.
I’m not cancelling it or stopping altogether; I’m just putting it on hold for a few months until things calm down. I’m hoping to restart it this summer if I can.
I apologize for having to do this, but… well, I’ll just say that some of the projects I’m working on will be very cool, and well worth the effort. You’ll see. 
Viewing options:
Download it directly from LibSyn.
Download the audio only version from LibSyn.
NOTE: If you are already a subscriber through iTunes, you may be getting both the video and the audio-only versions in your feed. This is because both versions were in one feed until last week. If you want to get only one or want to download both separately, then unsubscribe first and then click on the link(s) below.
Maybe once you get it going again you can solicit volunteers to help out with editing, distributing, etc.
I’m a bit sad to see this put on hiatus, but I totally understand your reasoning. “real life” has to come first before you can indulge the web!
I look forward to Q&BAs in the future when things have settled down for you.
That’s depressing, but understandable. It really was a neat idea and I hope it’ll be easier for you to do sometime in the future.
My 2 cents idea for time management: maybe you could solicit help from Bad Wife and Bad Daughter (for takes, script, research and editing), do a Bad Family activity with it. Who knows, it could even be quicker and you’d spend some fun quality time with the Bad Family as well as doing something productive and helpful.
That’s a nice idea, but in reality it’s not workable. There’s no script, just ideas I get from looking into the questions, and it would take longer for me to explain what I need than it would be to simply find it. Plus, my wife doesn’t have time for it either!
oh no! that sucks! I love Q and BA. It’s a lot of fun.
I don’t really have any suggestions or anything… Just wanted to say I really like Q and BA
I understand perfectly, and hope you enjoy your work. I wish I could recommend good movie editing software on the cheap for when you get back to doing it (or free, some Open/GPL projects are really good). Oh well, till then I guess I’ll have to content myself with alternatives.
Ug, how sad such time is needed for these nice presentations. All the more reason to say THANKS for all of them!
Perhaps you can join Fraser and Pam a time or two.
My hope was that enough of the three of you would build up enough topics to allow for an online astronomy class. I will still hold that hope, too.
Enjoy the hiatus, you’ve earned it.
Oh, no! No more Q and BA! One of my favorite things to do on the Net (besides BAUT). But you’ve certainly earned it, Phil! THANK YOU!!
How rude of me, I did forget to say thanks! Thanks for all the previous hard work!
In your own words, Phil: no sweat. I, like so many others, enjoy Q&BA, but there’s only so much time in the day, or weekend.
Whenever you get the leisure to do another session, it will be appreciated. In the meantime, we will still have your informative and entertaining blogging.
That makes a sad panda. Thanks for all the hard work you’ve done. And FWIW, I use Vegas Movie Studio for making video. It’s about a million times better than Microsoft Movie Maker and it’s pretty cheap.
Bummer. I looked forward to these on Mondays - they were funny. I didn’t realize you were putting that much time into them. Heck, just YouTube, no script, and paper pictures of the Sun and Moon (and marshmallows) were fine by me. Yeah, I guess no point in spending that much time on them. They were fun while they lasted! But ~sniffle~ )-8~
Bad, bad, bad Astronomer! Dangle the bait for a few weeks to set the hook, then poof, take it away.
Seriously, thanks for an enjoyable series, looking forward to the sequel.
Phil,
Would you consider doing flash animations instead? Would those take less time than the videos?
Aw, that is too bad. I’ve been really enjoying these, you’ve been doing a good job with them. But thank you for the 7 nifty episodes we did get so far.
Also, is that a Falcon 9 cap, Phil? That one is supposed to go up for the first time next year, right?
NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! Now I have no reason to live!!! Seriously, I don’t think any of us want you to overextend yourself too much. Plus, it’s your website, you can do whatever you want, and nuts to anyone else.
Thank you so much for your tremendous efforts in preparing Q&BAs. Seeing some of the data you provided, I figured it was quite time consuming. We’ ve been lucky that you already gave us seven neat presentations. Don’t push yourself too hard, the blog itself is already very imformative and entertaining. Thank you again.
Don’t be disappointed BA. Life gets busy sometimes and reaches a point where some things take priority over others.
Dare I hope that you might be involved in a Myth Buster’s show? Considering that you’re both located in the same general area of California, and that you met and discussed some possible future projects with Adam Savage.
Well, that’s life. Nothing goes the way you think it will! But as everyone said before: Thank you VERY much for these fantastic videos, you did a very great job! But the hope does not fade away that there will be a future for Q&BA! I will stay here and wait for it!
“some of the projects I’m working on will be very cool”
Well, I hope you will tell us about them!
Phil: I just wanted to say thank you for what you’ve already done. I only found your pod casts a few weeks ago and showed them to my 10 year old son. He & I loved them. We started watching you together each Monday morning as we ate breakfast before school/work (just 3 weeks ago). This morning I announced “Another Bad Astronomer episode is out!” and then are hearts saddened as we listened to you.
However, this gave me an opportunity to talk to him about putting the most important things first and that when we choose to do something new, we must create margin in our life for it. Thanks for your astronomy lessons as well as setting up a life lesson for all of us!
We look forward to seeing you return but understand (and respect) your stepping away. Best of luck to you.
For a minute I thought BABlog was going on hiatus. Whew!
Best of luck with the other projects, Phil!
Sorry to see this come to an end for now, but “all good things must come to an end.”
I just found your blog / vidcasts about a week or so ago. When I found the Q&BA’s, I watched all of them one after another.
Hope your other projects turn out great!
Tu quoque, Philip?
First Penn Jillette, now you, what is this world coming to?
But well, We rather have a healthy and happy bad astronomer than a stressed out one, and we know we love your work.
can I at least try to bribe you offering a new logo design?
C’est domage Phil!
Enjoyed watching them very much. Best of luck with the other stuff and look forward to your Vid-returns later. Hmmm…now where did I put that parallel Universe where Phil continues with the Q&BA…ahhh…there it is.
As above, so below (true only for the thead) :-). It was a very nice thing to watch, but it’s very understandable that when life hits the fan, you gotta cut something, and if it was the people around you or your work obligations, well, I’m sure we’d all like that even less ‘cos we actually like you.
Try not to feel guilty about this, perhaps you don’t but you sorta sound like it. These things are a gift (from you to us) and not an obligation. I hope you have the time and inclination to do more, but who are we to demand. As mentioned, the sheer gruntwork of uploading might be possible to offload on someone if there’s anyone you trust, but I get that even the most minor aspects of something one puts ones name on are hard to let go of (editing and “making nice” for sure, but even something so mundane as getting it up in due time and in working order).
Good luck with the other projects and we hope so see you (as opposed to just read you) soon.
Thank you, Phil Plait for this wonderful first season of Q & BA.
I know that everyone here as well as those who don’t post are looking forward with baited breath for the next season this summer!
First Penn Jillette, now you…… where is all going to end now?
At least the streets will be a bit more safe Monday morning here in London, when I’m no longer watching your video podcast in my car on my way to work….
Maybe you could farm it out to a volunteer replacement for a while, you know, like Joan Rivers used to sub for Johnny Carson…
Phill: If your busy-ness involves any travel to the east coast/new york city area, then please let me know and I shall buy you a drink of your choosing… or if you don’t drink then maybe some sort of cold gourmet soda or a smoothie or something…
Hey Phil! I know you don’t want to hear this but maybe production on Q&BA would be faster with a Mac? iMovie’s really easy to use and you could use the built-in webcam to do the video recording straight into iMovie.
Anyway, I look forward to Q&BA’s eventual return.
Jason Says:
March 26th, 2007 at 12:53 pm
> Hey Phil! I know you don’t want to hear this but maybe production on Q&BA would be faster with a Mac? iMovie’s really easy to use and you could use the built-in webcam to do the video recording straight into iMovie.
I agree. I use my iMac* to do VideoEMail. iMovie does transitions, captioningiMage insert, and can export to iPod. From there, one can podcast it, uplopad it to YouTube.Com, et cetera. If you want a backgroundmusic, you can import it into GarageBand and when you talk, GarageBand will automagically cut the valume of the backgroundmusic so that we can here your every word.
* - HTTP://Apple.Com/imac
I go away for a few days and this happens. Jeeeez. Seriously though, I was thinking just the other day, “Where does he find the time?” Hey!!! Maybe I’m psychic, or psyco or pablanormoal or something. But really seriously, go and do your job.
Jeez. first Penn and now this. What… OMIGOD>>>> VOICE RECOGNITION SYTEM OFF!!!
Folks-
I really appreciate all these great comments! Like I said, things are hectic now, but I have no plans on dropping this altogether. It’s too much fun! Well, Windows Movie Maker is teh suxk, but I have other software I’m looking into for the future. I’m hoping that by summer my schedule will clear up.
Silly me, I was so busy responding to Jason that I forgot to write the most important thing:
¡Thanks!
Gee, that Mac thingy sounds so much better than DOS 6, maybe I’ll give it a go. Does it have one of those mouse devices that you hear so much about too?
Why not just do audio only? You don’t need a script or photos. I am surely not alone in not minding a few “err’s” as the fact that you are answering in your own words, and with a bad joke thrown in - is why people listen?
Of course, there’s no need to do a show weekly, or even at a fixed schedule, once it’s back. That’s why God created RSS and iTunes.
But there must be a video version. I’m not sure how useful the moon-rotation episode would have been audio-only, for example. Plus Phil just makes so many cute faces.
Bummer.
Phil, buy a Mac, you’ll spend less time editing the video with iMovie… You may even suck less in front of the camera…
(sorry, couldn’t resist)
lol, I hadn’t seen the suggestion had already been made. ROTFL. Anyway, I apologize.
Enter “Phil Plait” in YouTube’s search engine and you’ll find a few videos not posted on this blog. They are television interviews and a conference presentation.
Dude! get a MAC! all the built in software will make the thing go ten times faster. just use the program called Garageband. it is MADE for making a podcast and is super intuitive.
Keep up the good work.
PS-Haha, just noticed that im not the only one to make that suggestion.
Let me second the suggestion of doing audio only. That would cut the production time down to a fraction (and I would hope you’re good at fractions…).
Just want to add my thanks.
And OBTW, the sound quality has been fine for the last several Q&BAs.
hmmm, When I first watched this I only read the title and thought that it was actually about suspended animation. It played with my curiosity, maybe in the future when you have more time you can do one about suspended animation.
I’ve appreciated these segments, and I can understand how if you are putting 12 hours into something every weekend you’re going to have trouble keeping up that pace. I used to have weekly committments on the weekends of extra-curricular activities more in line with 8 hours… which got axed down to 4… and then every other weekend, and my wife was still frustrated. I had to Hiatus all that stuff too.
Take care of your self and always remember to focus on whats most important.
Cheers!