I have a lot of projects I’d like to get done. And even more that I’d like to start. But first things first, right? The current items on the agenda are:

• Backups
• Compression
• Archives

My hard drives are all very messy. Filled with half-finished videos, random files from the ‘net and who knows what else. I’ve decided that, before I can seriously commit to anything new in the creative department, I’ve got to get this situation under control. The first item to tackle was to find a reliable system for backing up the data I already have. I recently decided to upgrade the Mini to Mac OS 10.5 Leopard. That gave me access to Apple’s new Time Machine backup software. I’ve also found a relatively simple way to backup Jen’s computer, thanks in part to the Leopard upgrade. But I’ll be writing more about that in the future. So that takes care of backups. Next up on the list: compression. I’ve started going through all of my videos and making high-quality renders of each one, from the original project files. This’ll allow me to keep a high-quality finished version of the videos and then delete the bulky project files associated with each one. Coincidentally, I’d love to do this with audio projects, as well. But the file sizes are too big. For example, a completed episode of Hyper Nonsense, before mp3 encoding, can yield a file that’s easily 1 GB+ in size. But again, I’ll be writing more about that in the future. So that brings me to the last entry on today’s list: archives. Whenever possible, I’ll be burning archival items to disc. Some things (like those pesky audio files) will just have to live on hard drives until those drives get full. And then they’ll likely have to be sent to the trash. But who knows? I’ve got 750 GB in external storage to burn through. Maybe by the time that happens, Apple will have developed some amazing new archive software. To keep with the Time Machine theme, it’ll be called something like “Transporter” or “iBlack Hole.” Anyway, once I’ve got all of this tedium out of the way, I should be able to focus more time on creative things for this site (and elsewhere). At least until I let it all go again, and have to start over with the backups, compression and archives.