Category Archives: Coming Soon

Snapchat: live, stock and hype

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Today, to millennials, many new media celebrities are bigger than old media celebrities.

So what do you do when you have over 2.5 million Youtube subscribers?

If you’re Andrea Russett you partner with Indigenous Media and make a horror feature over five days using Snapchat, in 10 second ‘broadcasts’.

The story concerns the hunted Sickhouse, its urban legends, Russett and her friends — invoking a nod to The Blair Witch Project, one of the first word-of-mouth found footage success stories and the most successful one by box office.

Then, in true Snapchat fashion, the clips started disappearing from view 24 hours after being posted.

Don’t dispair, though. The director’s cut will be available for everyone on Vimeo on June 2. You can pre-order now.

Read more here.

My take: this is another example of ‘the medium is the message’ —  a creative exploration of Snapchat’s technological limitations by a Youtuber leveraging her online fans to create something potentially lucrative. The Tribeca Film Festival even had a 200 second Tribeca Snapchat Stories competition this year. What I think is revolutionary about the Sickhouse project is that it launched into the world as a ‘live’ five-day experience for Russet’s followers first, before being packaged into a traditional (playback only) movie format. (If they keep the vertical video format, they’ve definitely decided their target audience is strictly mobile.)

Is the Internet making it easier to tell stories? Or harder?

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Scott Beggs of FilmSchoolRejects recently wrote an interesting piece about storytelling in our digital age.

In it he holds:

“Going behind the scenes has become the scene. Trailers have become the true first act of any movie. Casting announcements introduce us to characters now.”

Our digital age means almost all information is at hand, which implies, “We’re now fully an anti-shock culture.”

He goes on to discuss Batman v Superman and — spoiler alert — the Man of Steel’s demise. Apparently director Christopher Nolan wanted to hold on the casket shot and then cut to the credits, without any dirt floating up, the idea being to leave the audience thinking he’s gone, bit the dirt, so to speak. (Disclosure — I have not seen this film.)

Scott then points out that actor Henry Cavill has been announced for The Justice League (2017) — thereby resurrecting the Last Son of Krypton.

My take: I think this is can only be true. The sheer amount of information and the myriad ways we have available to access it mean we can’t help but be exposed to official and fan-provided media around any project. In the past, only big companies could feed us a steady diet of advertising and PR — now we gorge non-stop at the Information Super-Highway All-You-Can-Eat Buffet. See also, Scott’s post on Every Movie is a TV Show is a Book is a Broadway Play is a Video Game. More and more, a Producer’s job is to manage IP rights and not necessarily just to produce a feature or a TV show.

Avi Delivers!

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Within the next week, Avi Federgreen and IndieCan will unspool five new Canadian feature films in theatres in Toronto, Vancouver, Saskatoon, Regina, Halifax and Moncton.

The films are:

They are some of the results of Federgreen’s IndieCan10K project. Along with executive producers in each province, Avi mentored emerging filmmakers as they created their first features — as long as they kept the budgets under $10,000.

As quoted on First Weekend Club, Federgreen says:

“I believe initiatives like INDIECAN10K are imperative to the success and survival of the Canadian film industry, which is facing increasingly difficult parameters for young filmmakers. We need to encourage emerging filmmakers in Canada to get out there and make their first feature, and we need to show them they can make a great film for a very low budget. The filmmakers that participated in the INDIECAN10K initiative are all amazing, passionate and creative people who deserved a chance to make their first feature and I think they all deserve all the success in the world not only for their INDIECAN10K films but their next films moving forward. I am super proud of all of them!”

My take: Telefilm take note! I love your microbudget initiative, but I firmly believe $100K is too much for first-time feature filmmakers. Ingrid Veninger ($1K) and Avi Federgreen ($10K) prove it. My modest suggestion: reserve the $100K money for second-time feature filmmakers. I guarantee the results will warrant it — let emerging filmmakers scrape up just enough cash to make their first features and, more importantly, make all their mistakes making their first features. Their second features (if they survive to do it again) are where you want to invest.

Get a job and then give your films away

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Following up on job strategies to support your independent filmmaking habit from last week, Christian Stella writes in Filmmaker Magazine:

“I feel it is best to branch out. Hedge your bets with the stability of a career that may not be glitzy but is less cutthroat than film.”

For instance, he’s a successful food photographer and cookbook author.

This freelance career allows him the freedom to invest time into his craft. Plus, he’s able to free up his schedule for future productions.

“A flexible career outside of film may be the best foundation to assure that your films can ever get made. Most people can scrape together enough time, money, and favors to make their first film, but you’ll need stability to make the second, third, and so on.”

Stella is one half of a filmmaking duo. He and Jeremy Gardner have made two films: The Battery and Tex Montana Will Survive!. Profiting only a pittance on their first movie, they decided to try something different with their latest project.

Rather than stretch the economic life of the movie out over many years, they decided to sell it only once. On Kickstarter. For $50,000. The plan was to raise the money and then release the film for free, to the world, under Creative Commons.

“This campaign is in part an effort to address the countless messages we received from amazing film fans across the globe, who were understandably frustrated with how long it took for our previous film, The Battery, to be made available in their countries. It is also a reaction, to a very sobering—and demoralizing—reality we were made painfully aware of by the end of The Battery’s incredible journey: It is incredibly difficult to make a living as an independent filmmaker. A dramatic influx of films on the market—coupled with the rise of peer-to-peer sharing through torrent sites—has resulted in a drastic decrease in compensation for filmmakers across the board. Minimum Guarantees (MGs) are small and residuals trickle in over the course of years.”

Did they make it?

Yes! 759 backers pledged $53,889 — around $60 each (disregarding the top half dozen backers.) Watch the comedy here.

My take: I love this strategy! You make a film. You give it a realistic price. Your fans support you. You give the film to the world. This totally cuts out the friction between the creator and the audience. Gone are the middlemen and the market. (But remember to reserve the intellectual rights so you can protect your brand and do the remake. Just ask George Romero.)

The disconnect between Hollywood prizes and profits

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There seems to be a disconnect between Hollywood’s fascination with comic book superheroes, their international box office performance, and the Oscars.

Over two dozen superhero movies will be released between now and 2020. (See the list at the end of this post.)

At the Oscars, although dystopian sci-fi ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’ scooped six statues, almost all the awards went to ‘smaller’ films: ‘Spotlight’ won Best Picture and ‘The Revenant’ scored Best Director, Actor and Cinematography.

Consulting Box Office Mojo‘s 2015 international rankings, we see ‘The Revenant’ is in 16th position and ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’ is in 20th. Superhero flicks ‘Avengers: Age of Ultron’ in 6th place and ‘Ant-Man’ in 13th have made more money.

For 2016, ‘Deadpool‘ tops this year’s take so far.  It’s currently the 10th most successful comic book adaptation, and still climbing!

See how lucrative franchises and brands are. The 65 Marvel and DC Comics movies have made over $11 billion at the international box office to date.

My take: I don’t quite understand the fascination with fantasy films. Is it simply that reality is too depressing and people want escape? Or, is it just age at work — so many more young viewers go to the movies and they prefer action pictures? Or, is the advanced average age of the Academy voters revealing their preference for dramas?

The coming comic book movies and their release dates:

‘Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice’ March 25, 2016
‘Captain America: Civil War’ May 6, 2016
‘X-Men: Apocalypse’ May 27, 2016
‘Suicide Squad’ August 5, 2016
‘Doctor Strange’ November 4, 2016
‘Untitled LEGO Batman Movie’ February 20, 2017
‘Untitled Wolverine Movie’ March 3, 2017
‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2’ May 5, 2017
‘Wonder Woman’ June 23, 2017
‘Untitled Spider-Man Reboot’ July 7, 2017
‘Untitled Fox/Marvel Film’ October 6, 2017
‘Thor: Ragnarok’ November 3, 2017
‘Untitled Fox/Marvel Film’ January 12, 2018
‘Justice League Part One’ November 17, 2017
‘Black Panther’ February 16, 2018
‘The Flash’ March 16, 2018
‘Avengers: Infinity War – Part 1’ May 4, 2018
‘Ant-Man and the Wasp’ July 6, 2018
‘Untitled Fox/Marvel Film’ July 13, 2018
‘Animated Spider-Man Film’ July 20, 2018
‘Aquaman’ July 27, 2018
‘Captain Marvel’ March 8, 2019
‘Shazam’ April 5, 2019
‘Avengers: Infinity War – Part 2’ May 3, 2019
‘Justice League Part Two’ June 14, 2019
‘Inhumans’ July 12, 2019
‘Cyborg’ April 3, 2020
‘Green Lantern Corps.’ June 19, 2020
‘Gambit’ TBD

Scoping out a transmedia campaign

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“How Gaming Director Keith Arem Developed His First ‘Transmedia’ Film” reveals all the elements in a well-rounded transmedia project.

These include:

  • an April 8 debut for the UFO conspiracy docudrama film, Phoenix Incident
  • festival screenings in February and March
  • viral marketing that began four years ago
  • an interactive app version of the film for Apple TV
  • gamification elements in the app that reward more active users
  • corporate partnerships

Arem, a video game industry veteran, says:

“With companies like Steam and Apple, the idea is to move away from traditional distribution, and turn the model around to get creators involved in changing the way people experience entertainment.”

The article concludes:

“Arem is planning Phoenix Incident spin-offs, including a virtual reality experience, a television series, and prequel films inspired by other unexplained incidents.”

My take: I think the smartest move here is the choice of subject and genre: UFO sci-fi/cover-up conspiracy/documentary. This guarantees a dedicated niche audience. One thing that surprises me is how long the viral campaign has been active. For the transmedia bible, see Gary Hayes’ “How to Write a Transmedia Production Bible”.

News from the Blockchain

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You’ve probably heard of BitCoin. But have you heard of the Blockchain, the system that makes it, and potentially many more things, possible?

At its simplest, the Blockchain is a frictionless, global, secure online ledger. It promises to radically overhaul banking in general and payment systems in particular.

Earlier this month the British music industry heard from PledgeMusic founder Benji Rogers and musician Imogen Heap about “an all-new, uber-transparent system of tracking music rights and paying for usage” based on the Blockchain.

Rogers believes that “the music industry could make use of the blockchain for its own new music format: something he’s dubbed .bc, or ‘dot Blockchain’.”

“Such a format would start with the ‘minimum viable data’ (MVD for short): details of the recording ownership, an ISRC/ISWC/ISNI code; publishing information; mechanical rights information, performer data; global licensing rules; usage rights; lyrics and images; payment details; and contact information.”

According to Heap:

“It’s a way of enabling those services to use the music under the terms of the artists, the rights-owners. We need to set the ethical, technological and commercial standards around how our music is used… At the moment, artists, we’re first in and last out: first in with our work, and right at the end, if we’re lucky, we get some cash back.”

Rogers concluded with an aggressive timeline for the new format:

“My goal is to have it by the end of the first quarter of this year. It’s gonna be name of song, name of artist, ISRC… I’m optimistic that we can come up with a suggested minimum viable dataset relatively quickly. I think it needs someone to really take this by the scruff of the neck in terms of doing it… If we can’t agree what five or six pieces of information constitute fair trade, we should all quit, because it shouldn’t be that hard.”

Wait, there’s more! CB Insights claims twelve industries will be remade by the Blockchain:

  1. Banking
  2. Payments and money transfers
  3. Cybersecurity
  4. Academic records and academia
  5. Voting
  6. Car leasing and sales
  7. Networking and IoT
  8. Smart contracts
  9. Forecasting
  10. Online music
  11. Ride sharing
  12. Stock trading

My take: if this can work for music, it can work for visual media too. Imagine releasing your work into the wild and compensation following back from viewers directly to you. When this comes to pass, whole industries of intermediators will disappear and artists will speak directly with their audiences.

Kodak announces a new Super 8 camera

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At CES 2016 in Las Vegas last week, Kodak stunned the world by announcing it is making a new Super 8 camera for release this fall.

After emerging from bankruptcy two years ago, Kodak decided to go all in on film, even though film represents only 10% of its business.

Hollywood filmmakers, many who grew up shooting Super 8, convinced Kodak to bring back the narrow-gauge format.

Kodak believes Super 8 can join the Maker Movement and ride the analogue trend.

Check out the camera specs.

My take: I’m also one of the filmmakers who got their start shooting Super 8. I have two concerns with Kodak’s new camera. While the viewfinder and SD card are appreciated, what were they thinking with the microphone? Super 8 cameras are typically noisy! My other concern is with the jitter inherent in Super 8. Logmar of Denmark has solved this — but their camera costs ten times as much. What I do think is brilliant is Kodak getting back into the film processing business and combining it with film scanning. That combination is the real news here and could make more people consider shooting on Super 8. But only if your pockets are very deep or your shot list is (super) short.

Short film is dead. Long live web series!

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I have made over 40 short films.

Today, to me, making a short is like painting a picture in the park on a Sunday afternoon. Pleasant, but unchallenging.

With this in mind, I recently read an old posting by Mike Jones at No Film School.

In it he argues that the short film is dead.

“There are two ways of looking at how a Short Film serves the emerging and aspiring filmmaker. The first is as a Learning Exercise, the second is as a Calling Card.”

He then proceeds to debunk both beliefs and concludes:

“As with many long-entrenched elements of filmmaking, the tradition of the short film needs to be let go of and seen as the antiquated anomaly it is; a tool of a bygone era. A good short film can be great work of art but emerging and aspiring filmmakers need much more than a short work of art to build a career. The short-format, online, episodic webseries is the most dynamic, audience-driven, self-publicising, learning vehicle indie filmmakers (in film school or not) have ever had access to.“

My take: I’m warming up to this idea. I’ve been toying with a concept that could be realized as a dozen episodes. 2016 will be a great year for me to launch it! Stay tuned!

The improv branch of the new media tree

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Nick Fortugno, CCO & Co-Founder at Playmatics, and Lance Weiler, Director at Columbia University Digital Storytelling Lab, recently presented at Power to the Pixel, in London, England.

Nick began by reading a manifesto of sorts that concluded with:

“I stand here with the resolve that this is an amazing time to be a storyteller and we collectively hold a unique opportunity to innovate the industry we would like to see.”

They reiterated the necessity of story at the heart of innovation and then led the audience/collaborators in a story/creation of Sherlock Holmes & the Internet of Things.

The session was recorded: the pair present for the first half of the video and then launch into the simulation/group activity at 16:30.

Read about it on Hackpad.

My take: this seems to me to be an elaborate improv game. More of a parlour entertainment than a sit-back experience. I think that’s their point — the definition of media and audience is expanding.