Avid Technology has a terrific app that was first developed for Pro Tools but works exceedingly well with Media Composer: Avid Control.

Avid Control connects an external device to your editing workstation, where you run the companion application EuControl. EuControl connects Media Composer to either a mix panel like the Avid Artist Mix, an 8-channel flying fader mixer (no longer available … but I have a couple in my garage if you need one), or the current 8-channel Avid S1 mixer. It can also connect wirelessly to an iPad. The iPad is more flexible because, well, it can also be an iPad. And S1 is stuck being only an S1.

I happen to have a spare iPad Pro from my spouse’s job that didn’t work out. Bad for her, good for me. With a simple holder it sits in landscape mode just under my main editing monitor.

EuControl software can be found in the Avid downloads on the MY ACCOUNT page. You can locate that through the program Avid Link (um, anyone actually use Avid Link?). Once installed and running, within Media Composer go to Settings: User: Controller Settings and select EUCON Controller. Next, make sure the workstation and iPad are on the same Wi-Fi network. Finally, there is an icon for the EuControl software in the top menu bar. Open the Settings, and make sure that under All Surfaces Avid Control is added to My Surfaces.

Avid Control has several ‘pages’ of controls, including Mixer, Tracks, Channel, Meters, Softkeys and Monitoring. Softkeys is a panel of many Avid commands that you activate with a touch. It has eight pages of Softkeys, which you can page through by swiping left or right. It is a bit more work to toggle between the mixer panel and the Softkeys. And the pages don’t seem configurable, i.e. you can’t reorder the buttons. In any event, I generally use another external device for that functionality, such as Touch Portal, Stream Deck or XKeys keyboards.

As a mixer is where this setup shines. It can show up to 12 tracks at once, and you swipe to reveal more channels. It works generally in Clip mode, where your timeline is parked on a clip of sound, and the fader or pan can be adjusted. You can make volume adjustments while playing the timeline, but Media Composer’s response isn’t immediate. There are also solo and mute buttons on each track.

Another excellent use case: Switching Media Composer’s Audio Mixer to Auto allows you to record sound levels in real time on one or several tracks. I’ve often used this to balance a music track against dialogue and sound effects. It will record keyframes on the active track(s) until you hit Stop.

My biggest complaint about this mixer setup is occasionally it will stop working. Out of nowhere. What happens in those cases is one of the apps, probably the iOS version, updates and gets out of sync with the other app. I end up deleting and reinstalling both, which seems to work. Why isn’t there awarning that they’re out of sync? The iPad connects through Wi-Fi. I had to turn Wi-Fi off because of Evercast. Strangely for me, the mixer is still working. It has me completely baffled.

Vivaldi is an 18th century baroque composer, perhaps most famous for his “Four Seasons” violin concertos. And it is a computer browser that you need to try.

It is a free browser based on the Chromium source code (like Google’s Chrome browser), and works on macOS, Windows and Android. It is fast, clean looking and highly configurable. One of its best features is a built-in ad blocker. Some websites are next to impossible to view without getting hit with unending videos, pop-up ads, side ads that squeeze the content (I’m looking at you, Deadline Hollywood!) It has a Do Not Track feature. And an automatic translation function.

In the lower right corner are two additional nice features: capture page and size. Capture can turn the web page, a section or the entire page, into a .png or other graphic format.  The second control can enlarge or shrink all text and images.Nice for older eyes.

Vivaldi, unlike Chrome, doesn’t automatically update pages. This may save on computer resources. Chrome is infamous for hogging computer memory when you have multiple tabs open, regardless of which tab is active. This causes the computer to slow up and the battery to drain. Looking at the macOS utility Activity Monitor it isn’t clear which browser has the lightest footprint.

I’ve only encountered a handful of websites that recognize the ad blocker and ask you to whitelist them (i.e. allow ads) You can’t really complain when a website wants/needs to monetize its content. But some sites are so intrusive with ads they’re nearly impossible to navigate (Deadline!). Especially annoying are sites where you pay for the subscription, and you still are inundated with ads. Vivaldi turns them all off.

What does Chromium-based mean for a browser? The underlying technology is from Google Chrome. It means that Vivaldi can use the extensions built for Chrome, from the Chrome web store. So, my favorite Chrome extensions like LastPass and Pocket work perfectly. And my favorite new browser is an 18th century baroque composer.

FIDO is the acronym for Fast ID Online Alliance. It recently made an announcement that Google, Apple and Microsoft have agreed to certain standards for passwordless authentication. Waitwhat? No more passwords? That, theoretically, will be the result. But we are far away from that goal.

The three tech companies made the joint announcement on May 5, World Password Day. (Passwords have their own day? How exactly should I celebrate?). What is making it easier for these companies to dump passwords is increased cloud accessibility and smartphones. Your smartphone, iPhone, Galaxy S22, Motorola Moto G, Pixel 6 or whatever has become the most important possession you own. It has your credit cards, bank information, immunization record, logins for all your websites, grocery coupons and discounts, access to transportation (Uber, Lyft), food delivery, calendar, contacts and resume (IMDB). The Los Angeles Times reports that the state of California is going to test digital driver’s licenses (5/25/2022). The American Express catchphrase was “don’t leave home without it.” Now you literally can’t leave home without it (your cell phone).

Over the past few years, I’ve gotten work that has taken me to Budapest and Melbourne for extended stays. Both cities/countries are much more advanced in using smartphone technology. Prague in 2000, incidentally, was the first place I found where seemingly everyone had a cell phone, and few had land lines. In Australia, every restaurant and store accepted Apple Pay. My phone paid for nearly everything. My local L.A. Ralphs hasn’t caught up, so has pasted “NO APPLE PAY” on each of its credit card terminals.

And every AUS store/restaurant had a QR code posted on the front door, which you needed to scan as part of their Covid tracking. If you’re worried about the Covid vaccine planting a chip in your head, don’t. Your phone tracks you better.

Every day for work I have to use the execrable PIX desktop app to share cuts with directors and producers. How does one log in? Type in a username and password. Then open the Google Authenticator app on my iPhone, find the code for PIX and type that in. Curiously, Google never asks me for an Authenticator code for their own apps.

The adoption of the FIDO standards by these major companies is a big shift. The weight of these three companies together could actually make something positive happen. According to a study by NordPass, a VPN provider, the average person has 100 passwords. The FIDO Alliance’s website states that up to 51% of passwords are reused. A great way to remember all those passwords is a password manager, such as iCloud, LastPass or 1Password. Except then your security hinges on only one password, the one that unlocks your password manager. Incidentally, my LastPass account reports I have 431 passwords. Yikes!

The expectations are that, eventually, you’ll be able to log in to websites using your smartphone exclusively. All the sites you log in to now will have to adopt the new method, which will take time. Google Mail and Microsoft Outlook have to some extent adopted this system. Sometimes when you log in to your laptop’s Gmail account, it will prompt you to open the Gmail app on your smartphone to verify your identity.

What makes this verification system infinitely safer is the authentication on your phone. Your fingerprint is unique, as is your face, voice or a PIN, all of which are methods to unlock your phone. Unlike my other destinations, the American
implementation of Apple Pay requires your PIN number after the pay terminal accepts your phone input, which I find amazingly stupid after you’ve just verified your ID on the phone. An additional security feature of FIDO is that Bluetooth is used as part of the verification. Bluetooth is a very short-range wireless system. You must have your phone in hand, opened by your fingerprint/face/etc., and be a short distance from the computer, in Bluetooth range, when you want to log in to a website.

Presumably all this will prevent data leaks and phishing attempts from compromising your Ralphs Club Card. Or even your bank account. That would be amazing.

The hitch, of course, is what if you lose your phone, orit is stolen? Hopefully the biometric login keeps the device secure. But you then need a second way to log in. There isn’t a great solution to this problem. Maybe have multiple devices registered? Or, have a, um …. password? Ouch.

Your cell phone is now your ID, more so than your social security number, name, address, passport number or any other identifier. Don’t leave home without it. Really. Don’t. And take a spare battery.