This week I bring the Punch Gran Cru #2 (Maduro). This Gran Cru is from the year 2000 and is part of the Certified Vintage line available thru the Luxury Cigars section at JR Cigars.
Video runs 16 minutes and I talk about this Certified Vintage 2000 and the current Punch Gran Cru. I also talk about the Luxury Cigar section of JR Cigars and in the final segment of the video review I answer a YouTube question about what I do during my production breaks when recording my video reviews.
Until next week, as always, Long Ashes!
Awesome review, and thanks for giving Ed and I props!
Jerry –
That cigar looks as delicious as the chicken.
Thanks for exposing that price info about JR’s luxury line. Someone needs to keep these retailers honest.
Nice new video feature “Full Screen Toggle”. It makes a huge difference, bringing the video to life.
Would be nice to have all future reviews use this feature.
great review! Thanks for the pricing warning and the full screen video is cool too.
Loved the ending and adding a personal touch to the video. I love that about your reviews.
Did you take that picture? If so what kind of camera do you have?
Nice video Jerry! I don’t think I’ve tried the Gran Cru but now I know not to spend the extra $ on the Certified Vintage stuff. Guess JR’s won’t be advertising here anytime soon…but hey, it is what it is. Everyone appreciates your honesty.
Video and sound are back to good quality. Back to using your DV camera? I love the still shot of the cigar to open the video over the usual text.
Paul – I love the fullscreen myself! I need to start uploading bigger resolution videos so it looks a bit better in full screen.
Josh & Vic – Yup I’m back to the DV camera. I’ve misplaced my tri-pod so I need to purchase a new one. I used an assortment of cigar boxes as a makeshift tri-pod. I also picked up a new microphone that just rocks!
When we had JJ I got my wife a “pushing present” in the form of a DSLR – Canon XTi. Tooks some great shots of JJ and now I’m playing with it for my cigars.
The still shot was just me being lazy. I don’t like typing or messing with uploading and resizing a photo for the site so I thought it would be cool to just display it in the opening. Glad you like it. Another instance of me being lazy paying off.
Jerry –
The full screen resolution could be better, but the way it is now is a far cry from bad.
I don’t have a problem w/ it.
Nice review Jerry! Loved the last part a lot! It was great to start my week off with one of your videos, it made my Monday a little less painful.
No cigar magazines?
nice camera Jerry! What other hardware do you use to make your videos? Does it take a lot of time?
Ever think of adding what cigars are similar to your reviews? Kind of like Cigar Jack does?
Are you on any IM clients like Yahoo?
Keep the comment love coming! Me love comments! Now if I can only get the YouTube peeps over here instead of sending me messages…
Kirk – I use to subscribe to CA and Cigar magazine but the content always seems out of date by the time I get to it. I can find the same content thru the various cigar blogs and podcasts for free and at the same time, support my new media cigar brothers (and sisters).
Josh – I do have some IM accounts but the easiest, most efficient way to get a hold of me is by following me on Twitter – http://twitter.com/jcruz
I really want to upgrade my camcorder to a hard drive based one that does HD. Currently I’m using an entry level mini-DV Canon ZR-500 that I connect to my macbook via firewire. I also have this USB microphone called the Snowball:
http://www.bluemic.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=Products&file=index&prod_id=18
I bring everything into iMovie08 (working on learning Final Cut Express 4 but it has a big learning curve). The recording doesn’t take long usually a little over an hour depending on the cigar. What takes the time is rendering, encoding and uploading to blip.tv, YouTube and Viddler.
As for the similar cigar feature. we’llsee. Every now and then a cigar will make me think of a similar cigar but most of the time during my reviews I focus on that cigar (I can only concentrate on one thing at a time). LOL
Jerry!
I can give you a quick tutorial on how to use Final Cut Express 4. You can import from iMovie 08 into FCE. There are some great tools and they are very intuitive. Give me a call or email me.
Justin
Jerry,
I’m using this for our vid reviews, a decent consumer Hi-def camera: http://camcorder.jvc.com/product.jsp?modelId=MODL028148&pathId=141&page=10
One disadvantage is, you cannot feed live video into your PC. Gotta film first, then import. Also, the files are quite large. A 25 minute cigar review runs 3 or more gigs. But the hi-def video does look quite nice.
Awesome job Jerry! Very informative and interesting.
I also liked the clean presentation, with the intro visuals, and great SQ, as well as the nice video. Keep it up!
Jerry,
Great review and excellent tip about JR’s. I am interested in trying that cigar though but need to find someone who is carrying it at a decent price. Any suggestions?
Great review Jerry! That microphone you have is pretty wild and sounds nice!
What do you for lighting?
Justin – I may have to take you up on that offer. I always get an error message when importing a project saying its a bad file type.
Tom – Is that 3GB raw or after you encode it? Right now my stuff is about 200MB after being encoded.
Joel – I think JR usually has the best pricing on lines owned by Altadis and General Cigars. Its gonna be hard to find a better price.
Mitch – Lighting consists of the four 60w energy smart bulbs in the ceiling fan above my kitchen table plus one of those old school adjustable desktop lamps with a 100w bulb shining in my face.
You guys rock! Great comments and questions…keep em coming!
Jerry-
The cam records in 1080i, and I dumb it down to 720p. So the raw data would be around 3GB. For example, the Camacho Liberty review is 2.4G after being converted to 720p, but is over 3GB in raw footage. I bring the resolution down quite a bit for streaming on the web of course, to around 100 megs or so.
If I can offer any more info, let me know.
Jerry I just subscribed via iTunes and I’m not sure if you knew this or not but your video looks really good in Full Screen when watching in iTunes. Great job!
Kudos on the review Jerry!
Great video. Keep em coming.
I guess I should use the contact form but is there a reason why not all the videos are on iTunes?
Jerry I hope you and Michelle are doing well! Haven’t seen you on MySpace. With all you’ve been thru its great to see you smiling and enjoying life again (although I know its not as enjoyable as it us to be). You’re a great dad!
I’ll let Derrick know you’re back to reviewing cigars! Next time you’re in Baltimore let me know.
Thanks Mike & Carlos…all the regulars have commented and I can stop nag’n people to always comment. LOL
Mitch – There is an extra process to get videos on iTunes and sometimes it doesn’t work out so well but I just watched this review via iTunes and you’re right, it looks great if I do say so myself.
Samantha – Thanks! On behalf of the site give Derrick our best and tell him to stay safe in Afghanistan.
Nice review Jerry! I’m a big fan of the Gran Cru and the Champion from Punch. I thought JR’s Vintage Certified sounded too gimmicky and your video proves it to me.
Can I offer one suggestion? Maybe have some brief notes or an outline of what you want to talk about so that way you won’t repeat yourself. Just my little nugget of wisdom.
Great review. The full screen feature is a nice improvement. I appreciate the candor regarding JR’s marketing. Thanks.
Another cool review, Jerry. I have to agree with you on the vintage and limited hype. It is getting out of control and we just keep falling for it.
Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions Jerry! This place is great. Again, great review!
Blair – I’ll see what I can do. I’ve tried it with notes before and it just didn’t feel right and then I would forget anyway and would repeat myself anyway. LOL.
gusto1 – Seems like the full screen feature is a big hit. Now I know that so many like it I will have to do more to make sure the quality shines thru in full screen.
capnpfff – I agree…we keep falling for it and the cigar manufacturers keep them coming…its a vicious circle.
Mitch – No no, thank you for taking the time to comment. The site is much better when folks comment and ask questions.
Jerry,
I just smoked a regular Punch Gran Cru Britania size, 6.2″ x 50. Wow, what a smoke. I’ve a few complaints on the construction being the cap was unwinding and is part of the wrapper. So a little annoying but eh, no biggie 🙂 Baring construction, was a tasty cigar. Spicy and at about as full as I like them. So good cigar and the price is fantastic!! Added it to another cigar purchase so was $3 a cigar.
So definitely a good cigar heh.
Hey, what’s your twitter name? I’m not part of twitter but what the heck, I’ll figure it out and add you to my list being a West Coast guy and when I’m on and your up late, I’ll say hi.
Dave
Hi Jerry,
What’s the name of that box of cigars you went through like water? As always, very informative review.
Thank you.
– Sydney