2014 is here!
My goal this year is to write another feature film screenplay. (I have an excellent concept. That’s what drives me — I need a great idea to hang the story on.) If it goes well, I might even shoot it!
Happy New Year, everyone!
Another year is almost complete.
The highlight of 2013 for me was creating ‘A Pocket Full of Spiders’ for CineVic’s Film Slam. I had a great script and a fantastic crew. Now that the sound is cleaned up, I have very high hopes for it.
Wishing Peace on Earth to All!
Cheers,
Michael
If you’re in Victoria and looking for something to do on Saturday night, come on down to the Victoria Event Centre on Broad Street for CineVic’s SOULstice.
The first half of the evening is the Film Festivus: Silent Night screening.
“The challenge: Filmmakers make an under-6 minute film in 5 weeks in the spirit of the holidays. This year the screening will be called Film Festivus: Silent Night, and you guessed it—we’re challenging you to make a silent film. No dialogue, no sound effects, no foley. Just your winter story and an instrumental soundtrack. You can go for the classic black & white look or dazzle us with full-on technicolour. Title cards are permitted for traditionalists. The theme for the films is: ‘The Longest Night of the Year.'”
Music and dancing to the The Garden City Soul Club rounds out the evening.
My take: the films are usually top-notch. I made one a couple of years ago; see Sad Santa, Glad Santa.
Disclaimer: I sit on the board of CineVic.
Does crowdfunding belong in your producing arsenal?
For sure.
Can you raise your whole budget?
Probably not. But maybe.
The Canada Media Fund has an excellent mini-site dedicated to crowdfunding in a Canadian context. From statistics and figures to best practices and an extensive directory, they’ve done the research for you.
My take: you owe it to yourself to spend some time here before you jump into your first crowdfunding venture.
Microsoft is getting into Reality TV. Sort of.
The huge computer company has greenlit its first unscripted series for its Xbox platform, called Every Street Reunited, from Mandalay Sports Media, the US indie set up by Rain Man producer and La Dodgers owner Peter Guber, Smallville co-creator Mike Tollin and talent agency CAA.
“The show will focus on street soccer, with each half-hour episode shot in a different country — the U.S., Spain, Holland, France, Argentina, Brazil, Ghana, South Korea — featuring local, undiscovered soccer players across the globe.”
It is expected that the series will feature some type of global interactive component.
My take: the line between the TV and the console continues to blur as the boundary between passive content and live experience continues to shift.
Blue Ant Media, owners of Bite TV, and Mondo Media have teamed with YouTube to announce Bite on Mondo – an animated comedy shorts pitch for content targeted at teens and young adults.
“Combining Mondo’s sizable audience on YouTube as well as Blue Ant Media’s television and digital reach in Canada, the program is designed to discover breakout animated content using a unique pipeline to source, finance, test, and grow properties that will resonate both on and off YouTube.”
Bite on Mondo has created a rich pitch site with 11 Scribd slides spelling out exactly what they’re looking for.
The deadline is January 15, 2014.
My take: if you have a concept for some edgy, adult-oriented animation, you should check this out!
Cinemas in Sweden have begun rating films on the Bechdel Test.
Those that pass get the ‘A rate’ stamp of approval.
The Bechdel Test was created in 1985 by Alison Bechdel. There are three, simple, rules:
Not surprisingly, given the action-figure-orientation of Hollywood today, the majority of films fail.
My take: Thank you, Sweden, for, once again, leading the way and shining a light on the underrepresentation of women in film.
Kellie Ann Benz of the National Screen Institute has updated their list of funding sources for short films in Canada.
“In our third year of updating this funding list, we note an extraordinary amount of Canadian films getting made and programmed into festivals around the world. This is thrilling.”
She lists national and provincial sources of money, marketing, training and cash prizes for shorts and their makers.
See the list here.
My take: join your local media co-op, learn everything you can and make your first short for coffee money, because you can. Then graduate to these programs so you can step up your game and actually pay your collaborators.
CineVic recently invited Maureen Bradley to speak about her micro-budget feature project, Two 4 One.
She’s cobbling the $250,000 budget together from a number of sources: the Telefilm Micro-Budget Program, the BC Arts Council, the Jim Murphy Filmmkakers Bursary, an IndieGoGo campaign and private sources, for a February 2014 shoot.
She’s blogging about the experience at microbudget.org where she gives a more detailed answer to one of my questions on Saturday.
Regarding this year’s Telefilm Micro-Budget Feature competiton, Maureen’s advice was: have a great story and really think through an innovative digital platform strategy.
My take: Thank you, Maureen, for sharing your knowledge and experience and — your insights! It occurs to me that Telefilm is in the business of making million-dollar movies, so they’re really taking a flyer with eight to ten projects for one million, and hoping that one breaks out. In the old model, a film’s profile was amassed through festival exposure, critical reviews and box office, to be augmented by media coverage as it worked its way through the standard windows. Today, a project’s profile starts with the first online exposure, carries on through the pre-production, crowd-funding, production and post-production stages and hopefully snowballs when more people can actually pay for it. The old model was mediated by distributors, whereas with the new model, the producer does it all. I foresee more creative cooperatives coming together: teams of producers, each specialized in different parts of the new paradigm — concept, marketing, social media, production, exploitation.
The Washington Post reports that Disney is working on a touchscreen that lets you feel textures.
“The technology is called ‘tactile rendering of 3D features,’ and an early version of a rendering algorithm has already been developed by engineers at Disney Research in Pittsburgh. The process behind it is, predictably, both technical and confusing, but the basic premise is that small, electronic pulses can trick your fingers into perceiving bumps and texture, even if the surface is actually flat.”
The right amount of voltage makes you feel ridges, edges, protrusions or bumps!
Check out the video.
My take: This reminds me of the feelies in Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. Science fact catches up to science fiction!