Show Notes for the Billy Newman Photo Podcast

View links at wnp.app

Episode Overview Billy Newman discusses professional video rendering on a 2013 Mac Pro, tackles file format conversion challenges, and shares his camping experience during an intense thunderstorm in the Fremont National Forest. The episode covers technical workflows, public land exploration, photography equipment insights, and wedding photography challenges with the Sony A7R.

Key Topics & Timestamps

Mac Pro Performance and Video Processing

•2013 Mac Pro still delivers $2,000 worth of computing power despite being ancient in computer years

•Xeon processor and professional graphics cards justify the investment for video rendering

•Converting various file formats (.mov, .mkv, .mp4, AVI, MPG) to standardized high-definition MP4

•Using HandBrake, Final Cut Pro, or FFmpeg for batch video conversion

•360-degree video stitching projects benefit significantly from Mac Pro processing power

Public Land Navigation and Mapping

•Learning distinctions between National Forest, BLM, National Park, State Park, Wilderness Areas, and National Wildlife Refuge lands

•Map accuracy issues in remote areas – ground truth often differs from published maps

•Washboard road effects from natural erosion creating driving challenges

•OnX Off-Road app ($29.99/year) for detailed offline backcountry maps

•Great American Outdoors Act providing $3 billion annually for public land maintenance

Photography Equipment and Techniques

•Canon 17-40mm wide-angle lens performance for real estate, Airbnb, and landscape work

•Moving away from shooting wide-open apertures (f/1.8-2.8) toward more controlled settings

•Binocular harness system for carrying mirrorless cameras during hiking

•Lightning photography techniques using long exposure cycling on tripods

•Film camera integration with modern Canon L-series lenses

Sony A7R Wedding Photography Experience

•Excellent low-light sensor performance and image quality

•Autofocus struggles in low light compared to older Canon/Nikon contrast-detection systems

•Battery consumption issues during intensive shooting (48GB of data written)

•Battery grip necessity for professional wedding work

•Phase detection autofocus advantages in newer Sony models

Fremont National Forest Camping

•Thunderstorm experience at 5,100 feet elevation with continuous lightning activity

•Summer weather patterns and mountain thunderhead formation

•Dispersed camping opportunities and scouting new locations

•Bird watching integration with photography workflow

Technical Insights

Video File Management

•Standardizing formats prevents long-term compatibility issues

•Mac Pro justification for intensive rendering workflows

•File conversion strategy for archival purposes

Photography Workflow Evolution

•Wide-angle lens versatility beyond real estate applications

•Binocular harness as camera carrying solution for hikers

•Integration of film and digital systems using same lens ecosystem

Public Land Access

•Understanding land designation impacts usage permissions

•Map reliability challenges in remote areas

•Technology solutions for backcountry navigation

Equipment Mentioned

Computing

•2013 Mac Pro with Xeon processor

•HandBrake video conversion software

•Final Cut Pro

•FFmpeg terminal application

Photography Gear

•Canon 17-40mm f/4L wide-angle lens

•Sony A7R mirrorless camera

•Canon L-series lenses

•Vintage Canon film camera from KEH

•Binocular harness carrying system

•Nikon 50mm f/1.8 (“Nifty Fifty”)

Navigation & Apps

•OnX Off-Road mapping application

•Various paper map books with topographic detail

Locations

•Fremont National Forest, Oregon

•Eastern Oregon near Nevada border

•Drew’s Reservoir area

•Gear Heart Mountain region

Explore outdoor photography, technical media projects, stories from backcountry expeditions, and insights from the creative process with Billy Newman—photographer, author, and podcast producer. Connect, learn, and follow along.

Quick Links:
Portfolio: billynewmanphoto.com/photographs
Studio: wphoto.co
Posts: billynewmanphoto.com/posts
Photo Books: billynewmanphoto.com/books
Amazon Author: amazon.com/author/billynewman

Podcast Episodes:
Billy Newman Photo Podcast: Listen here
Relax with Rain: Listen here
Night Sky Podcast: Listen here

Connect With Billy Newman:
Email: billy@billynewmanphoto.com
Instagram: @billynewman
LinkedIn: billynewmanphoto
X (Twitter): @billynewman

Recommended Books:
Landscape Portfolio (PDF): Download
Black and White Photography (PDF): Download
Working With Film (PDF): Download
Western Overland Excursion (PDF): Download

Support the Podcast & Photography Projects:
Make a sustaining financial donation: Visit Support Page

Podcast Forward:
The Billy Newman Photo Podcast blends real-world outdoor adventure, technical insight, and practical photography tips.

[Music] Hello and thank you very much for listening to this episode of the Billy Newman Photo Podcast. I appreciate you guys tuning into these echo audio files that I’m putting out there and it’s kind of interesting putting out some content for the echo devices. I really appreciate it. I like audio editing and rendering stuff and I’ve been doing a lot of that. I’m trying to do more of it on a Mac Pro and the Mac Pro right now is one of the Mac attached computers that has come out years ago. Really, it’s still quite expensive and it’s really servicing what I need out of it quite well and I’m happy about that because the price has gone down a bit. But if you buy it straight from Apple, it’s still really quite expensive. The computer of the Mac Pro, I think came out in 2013 and computer years, 2013 to 2018, is really nearly ancient. But kind of my lucky start is I just got a Mac Pro. I think it’s still priced around $2,000 to purchase even a used one, which originally I guess spec’d out as it was would have been around $4,000 or $5,000. So you’re still getting $2,000 worth of computing out of it. I suppose. I hope, I think maybe in some cases the iMac, when it’s more fully spec’d out, the more modern like 2017 iMac, I think was outspecking some of the things that the Mac Pro was doing. But really with the, I think the Xeon processor and the graphics cards that you’re working with, at least on the Mac and Touch Side, that’s really one of your only options to work with higher level graphics cards and higher level. Well, I think your only option to work with the Xeon processor. But it’s been really interesting trying to do some professional rendering and editing. What I’m trying to go through right now and do is, is I have a ton of .mov files, 10 of .mkvm4vmks files. I don’t know. Also, AVI files, all these different file formats, these MPaG containers that I don’t really understand that came with that with some other version or some raw file from a camera, something like that. But that’s all to say that these are pretty big video files that are maybe sometimes uncompressed or compressed poorly or maybe not compressed to a version of something that is useful for me to use and definitely not 10 years, 20 years down the line. So what I’m going to try and do is work with some program, maybe handbrake, maybe final cut, maybe I’ll go crazy and use a terminal program called ffmpag. We’ll talk more about that later. But I want to try and go through and take all of these video files and convert them over to an MP4, like some more standard high-def MP4 that’s correct for that type of video that it is. And I want to try and get rid of all these 3GP video files from a cell phone. I want to convert all that video out to some more native MPaG format. And so I’m going to try and use one of these programs to do it. But to do that on my laptop, even a pretty modern laptop, it’s quite a bit of rendering to get all those frames out in HD. And so what I’m going to try and do is crunch all of that stuff out by using this Mac Pro. And I hope that I can save a lot of time by trying to render it all out through there. I saved a ton of time rendering out video while I was trying to stitch together my 360 video. Oh my gosh, it was enormously slow on my Mac laptop. And really it blew through it with consuming quite a bit of time. It still took me a week to render ou