Zuna Vision

February 11th, 2009 — jozua malherbe | 0 comments
Distribution and Technology

This little piece of technology is fantastic. Scenario: You shoot a music video, complete it, and post it. After a while a corporate wants it or you see a great opportunity to make some money and include the brand in your video. Instead of having to re-shoot, you simply go to Zunavision and use their tech to upload and place the desired brand logo inside your completed video.

Now don’t imagine a badly pasted Windows Paint looking job, the technology allows the logo/pic to really blend with the video.
The company invoices job-to-job basis as every job has different needs.I cant imagine that it’s too costly as they are aiming this product at people who cant afford big post costs and want to make it a user base program. They want people to integrate their technology with websites and businesses.

Besides being able to stick labels on walls and surfaces you can also include videos inside your video. Zunavision also do clickable ads but say that their focus is logo overlays.
If any of this appeals to you visit ZunaVision

Oblong Industries

February 11th, 2009 — jozua malherbe | 0 comments
Filmmaker and Technology

I went to a panel at Sundance where one of the founders of Oblong participated. These guys are techno film making futurists. The big thing they are trying to create is a complete interactive space for video editing. You watch your footage in front of you, then you stop, cut, drag and drop the footage you want to a screen below you all using your hands. Oh yes, your hands!

It is Minority Report in real life. What was great about John Underkoffler was that his instincts are guerrilla film making but on a whole new level of digital and technical understanding. With hedge fund money they are building this tech piece by piece. Some of it is already in use in government organizations (read military) or very big corporations.

Here’s what Oblong had to say at Sundance.

For us, what’s important is the style of work: real-time manipulation of media elements at a finer granularity than has previously been customary or, for the most part, possible; and a distinctly visceral, dynamic, and geometric mode of interaction that’s hugely intuitive because the incorporeal suddenly now reacts just like bits of the corporeal world always have. Also, it’s glasses-foggingly fun.

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OBLONG


oblong’s tamper system 1801011309 from john underkoffler on Vimeo.

Novel Movie Deals

February 10th, 2009 | 1 comment
Writing

With more novels being turned into films here’s a great article on what novelists have to say and what publishers are doing.

Chuck Palahniuk also says he’s happy just to sit back while the filmmakers do their work. Palahniuk was working as a mechanic when his 1996 novel “Fight Club” was made into a film directed by David Fincher. “I only quit my job … because my phone rang with personal calls all day, and I couldn’t get my real work done,” he said in an e-mail message. “On the day ‘Fight Club’ started filming, my agent sent dozens of white roses to the garage where I worked — that kind of botched my standing among the other mechanics.” In August, he traveled to New York to watch Clark Gregg shoot a film based on his novel “Choke.” “It was interesting to see everyone’s interpretation,” Palahniuk said. “Beyond that, I ate my weight in location catering and ogled during the nude scenes.”

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On Creative Commons

February 10th, 2009 — jozua malherbe | 34 comments
Distribution, OpenSource and Technology

In a world in the future we will make a film using digital technology and upload it to our virtual platform. The Film will automagically be distributed to agreed cinemas, sites, networks and festivals on the agreed dates. The idea of a hard copy may dissapear completely. Your marketing will be 70% digital, and will seep into every digital social space your marketer can lay his grubby fingers on. Imagine….

With the advent of You-tube and since then multiple other video streaming apps, the idea of digital distribution for films, using digital technology in actually making films, P2P sharing, video mash-ups, social networks and finally making money I am finding myself looking more to Creative Commons. For those of you who have not heard of it or think its gone away, think again. Just to refresh your memory:

Creative Commons (CC) is a non-profit organization devoted to expanding the range of creative works available for others to build upon legally and to share. The organization has released several copyright licenses known as Creative Commons licenses. These licenses allow creators to communicate which rights they reserve, and which rights they waive for the benefit of other creators.

Now I know these commons don’t directly cross paths with what is known to be film rights. They also don’s contribute the same way that existing laws do regarding sales and distribution activities. However, this is a tool to get your film out there without anyone having to become a law breaking citizen. Imagine you have a scene in your film being mashed up by 20 different people who all post it, flog it on Facebook etc. These mash-ups and content grabbing vid’s retain the status of the originator but is accessible to many more eyes. You’ve just broadened your possible audience and created an alternative marketing tool by doing, well, nothing.

There is power in a digital community because there are numbers. With millions on the net daily and video content a big hitter you must consider that we cant keep the current way of making and distributing our films. If the way we do it changes so will the laws and business models have to change. The economics will remain because try as I may I seem to have to eat and then consequently sleep. I feel though that CC is an inroad into getting our films to an audience effortlessly through the digital medium.

Although I have not seen the CC license actually help get a film sold over the net, I think the digital revolution will need new rules.Liberté, égalité, fraternité is just another way of saying Creative Commons.

For more info:
Wikipedia
Creative Commons South Africa
DeProductions

Now Hollywood seems a safe investment

February 10th, 2009 | 0 comments
Finance

Is it not strange how being an independent film maker is always tough, regardless of what is going on in the world, like wheres the freekin break man! When the economy is up, there are other investing opportunities that are more likely to get investment, when you have a film made it’s a struggle to get it sold and so on and so on. When I read this it was finally a bit of good news.

More recently, the likes of Goldman Sachs, along with giant hedge funds, poured billions of dollars into groups of movies called slates. The idea was that investing in a dozen or more movies at once, with the return calculated in aggregate after all had been released, was a sure-fire way to invest wisely. In many cases, though, it wasn’t.

Now that the economic crisis has washed away much of that money, a new pickup line is starting to waft through the air in deal-making hot spots like the Sundance Film Festival, The New York Times’s Brooks Barnes writes. The new line is this: Wall Street, real estate, the art market — all of those other supposedly stable investment areas — are now such a mess that Hollywood is one of the safer places you can park money. Although the movie business has been hurt along with nearly every other industry, it’s proving far more resilient to recession than most.

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Fahrenheit, Fries, Fox, & Fairness: The New Political Documentary

February 10th, 2009 | 2 comments
Documentary, Filmmaker and Interviews

A small piece from a great conversation between great film makers on the topic of documentary. Take your time as its quite a lengthy piece but it has great insights and stories about getting films made and more importantly getting them out!

This interest has really brought to the fore what people expect of documentary. And it’s triggered a conversation that I’ve been having more and more, and that I believe we’re going to have today: What is it that we expect from a documentary and of documentarians? What do we think that is? What a great place this is now to ask these four different people to think about that with us: Julia Bacha, who edited Control Room, Jeff Gibbs, producer and composer of Fahrenheit 9/11, Robert Greenwald, the director and producer of Outfoxed, Morgan Spurlock, the director of Super Size Me.

Read Full Panel

Political Documentary. Stick it to THE MAN.

February 10th, 2009 | 0 comments
Documentary and Finance

Excerpt from article regrading the trend of the Political Documentary. Focused on the success of Micheal Moore, the article touches on the trend of this genre. Although written a couple of years ago it gives some statistics and views that may keep you inspired to make that movie that pisses off “The Man”!

Given its reception, “Fahrenheit” will redefine further the unwritten rules about the boxoffice potential of nonfiction films that long have governed documentaries. But bucking the system is nothing if not expected from Moore, who drew fire from conservatives in March 2003 for blasting President Bush during his Oscar acceptance speech for “Bowling for Columbine.” Some distribution executives say “Bowling,” formerly the highest-grossing nonfiction film with a $21.2 million domestic boxoffice take, paved the way for the politically themed docus now flooding theaters.

“Maybe ‘Bowling for Columbine’ started it, but I think filmmakers are making films that are meant to make a political statement,” Roadside co-president Howard Cohen says. “I think (Moore) may have started a trend where people believe that if you have a point of view, you can make a documentary and air the argument — (and) if you make it in a way that also includes entertainment, you may even get further.”

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BBC Storyville Editor, Nick Fraser.

February 10th, 2009 | 2 comments
Documentary and Interviews

An excerpt of an interview with BBC’s Storyville Editor Nick Fraser. I have attached a link to the full interview and also to the top 50 Documentary earners.Nick is an insightful exec and has introduced many new directors onto the documentary scene. Always looking for something fresh and entertaining he was part of the Why? Democracy series and many other very successful documentaries.
He also has been to South Africa a couple of times and loves Swazi Land.

BBC Four: Is this explosion of documentaries that are getting into cinemas a trend you think will continue, and is it something that the BBC and Storyville can be part of?

Nick Fraser: Opinion is divided over whether this is a blip in popular entertainment or something that is likely to continue. I’m cautiously saying that it’s a long-term trend. Like I said, it started in America. Documentaries are shown in European cinemas, but they are heavily subsidised and, with some exceptions, they haven’t got large audiences. The breakthroughs come with films like Michael Moore’s, which have started to perform very well outside America.

You’re starting to find more and more people interested in the possibility of showing documentaries in cinemas. I don’t think you’ll necessarily have as many high-scorers in American cinemas as there have been this year, but I think you can expect a more steady flow of more moderate successes.



Instead of taking $60 or $120 million they may take $10 or $15 million, or even over $5 million. In Britain it’s slower, but you’re already starting to see cinema chains getting used to the fact that among all the homogenised offerings in the multiplex it’s good to have a documentary here and there. And the documentaries can be quite odd because that’s what people like to go and see.

As far as the BBC goes, I think the BBC has always been a patron of documentaries. It commissions its own documentaries and has a huge archive of its past successes. I think the BBC should not only come to terms with this development but embrace it and encourage the production of ambitious documentaries that go first into cinemas, or indeed are shown in cinemas at the same time as they appear on the BBC. It seems to me that the BBC is prepared to do this and I’m very happy about that.

Read Full Interview
Top 50

14 Steps to Social Media Plan

February 10th, 2009 | 0 comments
Distribution and Technology

This post is focused for business people but with a little imagination you can use these steps for your own film. Have a look, bookmark it and read it again when you actually have a film project going.

Many folks ask how to go about creating social media for their company. As a service to the industry, find here an open source version of a draft social media content development process.

This process is general enough to guide development of specific initiatives. It does not recommend blogging or video, per say. Rather the process allows content creation to move towards the market’s needs, and within the company’s resources. There are 14 steps in all:

1) Clearly articulate who your stakeholders are before you begin.

2) Clearly articulate the key issues these stakeholders care about as it relates to your offering. Use a bulleted list with no more than three or four words per item.

3) Begin by researching which, if any, top bloggers are discussing these issues. Use your bulleted list to search. The following are good places to start:

  • Technorati
  • Del.icio.us
  • Google Blogsearch
  • Ask.com Blogsearch

4) Inevitably, any substantial subject matter area has a back channel where top bloggers and influencers chat. For example, PR and marketing bloggers and tend to connect on Facebook, Twitter, and to some extent, LinkedIn. This back channel can yield powerful connections to highly influential minds who may not have blogs with top statistical ranking.

Read all Steps

Found link on Trulyfreefilm

How Hedge Funds Are Remaking Hollywood

February 10th, 2009 | 0 comments
Finance

Hedge funds are not always a place film makers look for money, plainly because its difficult to project the return of a film so why would someone bet on it if they have property (not so much any more!). However, if you are able to get your projections and equations just right then hedge-funders will look at it. As I found out reading about these two New Yorkians who got more than a little petty cash!

The flow of Wall Street cash into Hollywood in recent years, particularly the cash that comes from hedge funds, is “all too fast,” a veteran talent agent told The New York Observer. So fast that it is changing the culture of moviemaking, an article in the Observer’s new issue suggests. The story is the latest look at how hedge funds, which get most of their money from institutions and the wealthy, and other investment firms have moved deeper into film financing.

The Observer hangs its story on two 29-year-old producers who got their start in the movie business not by working their way up, but by raising money:

Rather than working the phones for a boss-zilla such as Scott Rudin, or in an agency mailroom, they went looking for money to fund a new company, Fortress Entertainment, the idea being that potential investors would invest relatively modest amounts into a fund that would support the development of multiple movie projects.

So they collected $20,000 to $30,000 from each of their individual investors and created American Film Capital Fund, which has raised more than $6 million. They financed the development of a new film, “Pride,” hiring writers and a director before bringing the movie to Lion’s Gate.

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THE BIZ Art meets crafty in the indie market

February 10th, 2009 | 0 comments
Distribution, Filmmaker and Finance

This is a creative industry and so when we’re in a tight spot we either use gaffer tape or get creative. Finding money creatively -

As banks increasingly opt out of funding, directors are using new ways to raise revenue to make movies.

Wanted: 1,700 brave investors each willing to shell out $30 for a credit as a co-executive producer on an independent movie about New York’s illegal graffiti street-art scene. The reward: striking a “blow for artistic freedom.”

That’s the pitch espoused by tyro filmmaker Alice.ia Carin in a full-page ad that ran recently in the Nation magazine, a fundraising attempt for her film “Don’t See This.” Carin also promised to send profits from the currently unproduced soundtrack, book and film to “help fund [New York City] public school programs in music and fine arts.”

By Rachel Abramowitz
November 23, 2008 in print edition E-1

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1000 True Fans

February 10th, 2009 | 153 comments
Filmmaker, Finance and Technology

This post is for musicians and film makers alike. If you want to quit your job at the video store and live off the people that love your art here is a (relatively) simple equation to do so. The theory of a 1000 True Fans is fantastic. It gives us motivation to pay more attention to those people coming to our gigs and viewings and fostering a strong relationship with them. Ultimately they are the reason you can do what you do and they will be the reason that you do it. Hmmm, I should get those Thank You cards out and start writing!

The long tail is famously good news for two classes of people; a few lucky aggregators, such as Amazon and Netflix, and 6 billion consumers. Of those two, I think consumers earn the greater reward from the wealth hidden in infinite niches.

But the long tail is a decidedly mixed blessing for creators. Individual artists, producers, inventors and makers are overlooked in the equation. The long tail does not raise the sales of creators much, but it does add massive competition and endless downward pressure on prices. Unless artists become a large aggregator of other artist’s works, the long tail offers no path out of the quiet doldrums of minuscule sales.

Other than aim for a blockbuster hit, what can an artist do to escape the long tail?

One solution is to find 1,000 True Fans. While some artists have discovered this path without calling it that, I think it is worth trying to formalize. The gist of 1,000 True Fans can be stated simply:

A creator, such as an artist, musician, photographer, craftsperson, performer, animator, designer, videomaker, or author - in other words, anyone producing works of art - needs to acquire only 1,000 True Fans to make a living.

By: Kevin Kelly Home Page

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