Kickstarter comes to Canada!

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Leading crowd-funding platform Kickstarter is coming to Canada.

They say new projects will go live on September 9, 2013.

It’s taken three years but it looks like Canadian filmmakers and other creative folk have no more excuses. It used to be that you needed a bank account and address in the States to list on Kickstarter. Now Canada joins the US and the UK.

Need help with your campaign? See Kickstarter and crowd-funding advice from someone who work(s/ed) for one of their competitors.

My take: sure you can raise funds on Kickstarter but more valuable is the audience you’re building. In a sense, you’re pre-selling your film to hundreds, maybe thousands, of viewers. Just remember to budget enough time!

DIY DCP

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If, after reading last week’s post about exhibition formats, you really want a DCP but lack the budget to get one professionally made, you’re in luck.

Danny Lacey has created a tutorial for OpenDCP, open software to create Digital Cinema Packages.

Danny says,

I’ll tell you what, this is going to open a lot of doors for Indie film makers too, I believe it’s going to be incredibly helpful for those going down the self distribution route. It’s quite simply chopping down the prices and expense of delivering your movie.

The 27-minute video has all the details but in a nutshell:

  1. Export your film as a 16-bit TIFF sequence.
  2. Use free, open source DCP software to convert the TIFF sequence into JPEG 2000
  3. The DCP software then wraps the video (JPEG2000) and audio (WAV) in to MXF files.
  4. The final stage is creating the DCP which generates 6 files that will be recognised by a DCP server.

My take: well worth the watch!

Exhibition Formats 2013

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You’ve written a killer script.

You’ve cast an excellent cast.

You’re shooting with an HD camera.

But have you planned out your full workflow? For instance, how are you going to show your film to your audience?

If your answer is, “On the Internet,” then carry on and use whatever compression format Youtube or Vimeo recommends.

However, if your answer is, “In theatres and at film festivals,” carry on reading.

Keep your digital intermediate (your DI) at a sufficiently high quality so that you don’t sacrifice anything as you edit.

When it’s time to deliver for exhibition, things can get tricky fast. Do you need a DCP? Can you get by with one Blu-ray disk?

Luckily, The Independent’s Guide to Film Exhibition & Delivery 2013 has is all figured out.

Their conclusion:

“Given the volatility of the current delivery landscape, it may be actually best to NOT commit to any particular exhibition format, and instead finish your film in a digital (hard-drive) format that you can keep as a master at a trusted lab for future needs down the road. It is advisable to have your film in the most flexible format possible, until you are forced by circumstance to deliver a specific format for a specific purpose. The most flexible and useful format to initiate most exhibition/delivery formats at the moment is the Apple ProRes 422 digital file.”

My take: Well worth the read, if only for the assertion that, “DCPs were invented to put independents out of business.”

Sacha Baron Cohen leaves Freddie Mercury biopic

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I have a soft spot for Sacha Baron Cohen.

I think he’s brilliant; especially in his mockumentary work, like ‘Ali G Indahouse’, ‘Borat’ and ‘Bruno’. ‘The Dictator’ was so-so. But his acting in ‘Talladega Nights’ and ‘Hugo’ hint at his dramatic range.

So I was quite happy to hear he was cast as Queen frontman Freddie Mercury.

Now comes sad news that Cohen has dropped out. Apparently, the band wants a ‘family-friendly’ film, whereas he wanted ‘a gritty R-rated tell-all’.

I’m with Sacha Baron Cohen on this one.

Why not shoot two films at the same time? One could be the public-facing, successful singer story with lots of music. The other could be the private man, his sexuality and his decline with AIDS. One PG, the other R-rated. And Sacha Baron Cohen can star in both!

My take: I’m available to write and direct. I still remember when ‘Killer Queen’ came out on the radio and how electric and different it sounded; I think it might have been the first time I heard flanging.

Infographic: The History of Film

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From HistoryShots comes this fantastic infographic of 2,000 films from the last 100 years categorized into 20 genres.

“Films are organized by genre represented by streams that grow and shrink over time. The starting point is the early 1900s when the first feature-length films were released in the drama genre. The number and sizes of streams quickly grow as filmmakers expand their creativity by moving into such genres as action/adventure, westerns, war and comedy.”

How did they choose 2,000 films from approximately 60,000? These were the criteria:

  • Critical acclaim
  • Was it a key film
  • Awards
  • Box office success

Click on the infographic to zoom in.

My take: this is a fascinating visualization of the history of feature films and their genres over the last century.

Google Glass: everyone is a cinematographer now

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According to VentureBeat, the first arrest has been witnessed by Google Glass.

Documentary filmmaker Chris Barrett glassed it in Atlantic City on July 4.

“I picked up my Google Glass explorer edition last week. I wanted to test Glass out, so I filmed some fireworks, getting a very cool first-person perspective. About 10 minutes after the fireworks, we were walking back to our car, and I just decided to try it out on the boardwalk.”

Watch the footage.

My take: welcome to the voyeur world, where everyone is a cinematographer. Right now, the public is unaware and continues to “act natural”. But will behaviour change? Has it changed with CCTV and cellphone video? Very soon, documentaries will look very different when everyone has their own Glass. Editing may be replaced with web-based crowd-sourced Glass-fueled media streams, like Switchcam.

Hyperaudio Pad: cut and paste transcript video editing

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One of the problems with digital film is that it’s too damn easy to just shoot and shoot and shoot.

Great! But then, when it’s time to edit, you’re faced with hours and hours and hours of footage.

Just logging it can take days.

A new technology promises to revolutionize this and more: Hyperaudio Pad.

Twenty-two final round winners in the Mozilla Ignite Challenge were just announced. One of them is Hyperaudio Pad by Mark Boas et al.

The creators think they’ve built a language learning tool. I think it’s a whole new way to edit video.

What’s so cool about it?

  • It transcribes footage and automatically makes transcripts.
  • You can cut and paste the words to create visual sequences.

See the web page and the pitch video.

Most importantly, see the application they made for Al Jazeera English. Search for ‘nuclear’ and then click on each of the 35 tiny red and blue squares.

My take: imagine letting Hyperaudio Pad loose on your footage. How great would your next documentary be?

Note: AVID has something similar called ScriptSync.

Proof that movie trailers are getting faster

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Whether or not movie trailers give away too much, or that they’re too long, it does seem that they’re getting faster.

Wired.com has plotted the number of cuts per minute in over 150 trailers and the upward trend is undeniable, from  slightly more than 10 in the Fifties to almost 40 cuts per minute today. In other words, shot length has fallen from 5 seconds to approximately 1.5 seconds.

They suggest technology is to blame. Or decreased attention spans. Or both.

And yet the trailer for 1963’s Dr. Strangelove has 136 cuts per minute, or an average shot length of under half a second.

See the chart with links to each trailer.

My take: I think, when it comes to trailers, the shorter, the better. I despise trailers that contain spoilers and cheat audiences out of satisfying plot points or even endings.

Bonus: 15 Overused Movie Poster Themes

Lucas and Spielberg predict the future is on the Internet

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At a recent panel at the University of Southern California’s Interactive Media Department, George Lucas (Star Wars) and Steven Spielberg (Indiana Jones) said they believe “Internet-based services may become the dominant medium when movie-going as we know it crashes and burns.”

They cite two main reasons: viewers’s lack of time and the vast number of entertainment choices they face.

Lucas sees opportunity in today’s market: “All you need is a million people, which in the aggregate of the world is not very many people. And you can actually make a living at this. Where before you couldn’t.”

Spielberg believes the multiplex will change: “There’s going to be a price variance. You’re going to have to pay $25 to see the next Iron Man. And you’re probably only going to have to pay $7 to see Lincoln.”

Lucas thinks the mediascape is changing:

“Now is the best time we can possibly have. It’s a mess. It’s total chaos. But out of that chaos will come some really amazing things. And right now there are amazing opportunities for young people coming into the industry to say, ‘Hey, I think I’m going to do this and there’s nobody to stop me.’ It’s because all the gatekeepers have been killed!”

See more coverage on The Verge.

My take: I realized awhile ago that movie theatres were destined to become the ‘Opera’ of our era. As an alternative to your devices and your home theatre, going out to the movies might even be seen as an ‘elitist’ activity one day.

‘Additional Funding Guide for Documentary Film’ released

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The Canada Media Fund has released the second edition of the 170-page Additional Funding Guide for Documentary Film.

“…a practical tool enabling Canadian and European producers and filmmakers to identify the different resources available for their own productions or co-productions: private funds dedicated to audiovisual content, including broadcaster funds, awards, grants, financial guidance and calls for projects by festivals, independent production cooperatives, provincial arts councils, crowd-funding platforms, help with distribution, marketing and audience development….”

Download the free PDF.

My take: If you make docs, get this! You can’t argue with the price. Just don’t take all the info as gospel; I found numerous errors glancing through.