EXCITING NEWS! New classes in the Los Angeles area focusing on video production, editing, sound, and lighting to be offered by Alessandro Machi.

I am pleased to announce a series of 1/2 day classes that will focus on foundational issues related to the world of video media creation.

Hands on work stations will complement the instruction and knowledge that I will be sharing.

What will make these classes unique is that they will be from a prospective of low budget, hi yield production / education that has resulted in several dozen filmmaking awards along with a regional emmy win.

In the coming weeks I will be reformatting my slingshotpro.com website to give more details.

1/2 day classes will be available any day of the week, including weekends or evenings.

Please bookmark this site for updates.

Caught between the Corporate Shenanigans of Chase Bank, APPLE and Canon Cameras, feeling like a fool.

So I decided to write a book about Chase Bank and the way they handled their low interest rate credit card loan deals with over a million of their never late paying customers. The book idea has since expanded to cover additional areas regarding Chase Bank shenanigans.

Then along comes APPLE and Canon Camera. Even as I sit here writing this article Nov. 7th, 2009, both APPLE and Canon are selling products to consumers in Costco's and elsewhere that don't work with each others software.

In the middle of September of 2009 I decided to upgrade my Apple computer to snow leopard. The result was my canon camera would no longer upload photos to the Canon Image Browser program that I was using.

While I contemplated trying to work around this huge obstacle, I determined that because my book would also have a lot of photos in it, and that the photos were going to be interwoven with the text, I cannot really write the book the way that I know would be the most effective way.

Cannon and Costco have communicated with me that they are both concerned about this known problem and are working to fix it. Apple meanwhile enjoys healthy stock gains and an arrogant swagger that is rivaling the one that Microsoft has been known to carry in the past.

I don't think what Apple did was ethical. Releasing a new platform that will NOT WORK with existing software and hardware that worked perfectly on Tiger is not a good business practice, and they should be fined for not putting forth a better effort to work with Canon Camera and getting this matter resolved.

I have been shut down for six weeks, however the problem existed from moment Snow Leopard was launched, so we are basically talking at least 9 WEEKS, going on ten, in which Apple Computer rendered canon cameras and canon's own proprietary software called Image Browser, worthless on the Snow Leopard platform.

I know that canon cameras can upload to i-Photo, but isn't this the EXACT SAME THING that Microsoft was known to do to eliminate competition? New releases only worked on their platform with their own software. I hate to see Apple go down the same path microsoft went down in the past and hope they issue a public apology. To be clear, I WANT TO CHOOSE WHICH SOFTWARE I USE WHEN IT COMES TO PROCESSING MY PHOTOS ON MY COMPUTER, I DON'T WANT THE CHOICE TAKEN AWAY BY APPLE.

So to recap, I am trying to write a book about Chase Bank, pay money to both Canon and Apple so I can write my book, but the canon camera and software is incompatible with Apple's Snow Leopard operating system. Looks like the corporations win again.

Apple has basically screwed me out of me keeping my word on a release date for my book, and what hurts even more is this has happened as a direct result of me paying APPLE and their affiliate stores around 600 dollars in upgrades to my computer.

Welcome to Alex LOGIC, where CREATIVITY meets FUTILITY, and then something happens.

Hi, this is my blog where I post about different projects that I have either made, am making, or will make in the future. It's sort of where the rubber meets the road. Two upcoming projects that both mean a lot to me are books that I am writing.

One book is called "The Cat Who Ate Chase Bank", and is due out in December, although the date keeps changing because my computer upgrade resulted in my digital camera no longer being able to upload my photos (for the book) to Apple Snow Leopard.

The second book is called "What My Dad Left Behind" and explores all the wonderful surprises my recently passed dad left behind. Included are some amazing shots from the very garden he worked and toiled over for 30 years in between his day job and being there for mom.

My dad, Carmelo Machi, lived in Italy, in the Midwest of the United States, and finally in California. He lived in all three places for about the same amount of time, and each time he moved he had to basically start over, yet he did so happily and with renewed enthusiasm each and every time he moved.