Filmmaking
Filmmaking
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Distributing Films In The Internet Age: Interviews with Pivotshare and Fandor
The Film, TV & Digital Session at the recent Hacking Arts event focused on film distribution, with panelists Richard Matson from Gathr Films, Adam Mosam from Pivotshare and Albert Reinhardt from Fandor. The panel was moderated by Elle Schneider of Digital Bolex. All three firms are involved with distribution. Pivotshare offers tools to help the filmmaker sell their videos online. Fandor is an online subscription platform that pays its filmmakers a share of its subscription fees. Gathr Films provides an on-demand theatrical experience; a screening of a film can be requested at a local theater, and if enough people buy […]
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“Making a Film is Like Climbing a Mountain”: Director Nick Ryan on the Staggering Logistics of Making K2 Documentary The Summit
Plenty of documentaries share stories worth telling, and play just fine resting on the strengths of those stories, incorporating requisite elements like talking-head interviews, news headlines, and archival footage. Filmmaker Nick Ryan’s The Summit, which meticulously explores the 2008 K2 disaster that claimed 11 lives, has all of these elements. But what it also has is a stunning abundance of visceral reenactments, which placed Ryan and his crew on an actual mountainside, where the intimate (and tragic) moments that the climbers’ own cameras missed were recreated. A veteran director of short films like The German and A Lonely Sky, for which he also served […]
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The Interactive Mic: Etienne Paquette & Alexandre Lupien on Mégaphone
Mégaphone, an interactive project currently running in Montreal, is designed for a world that’s forgetting that the word social doesn’t necessarily have to precede media. The project seeks to remove the fiber optic interface that currently connects so many of us and move public discourse back into a public space–that is, somewhere outdoors with plenty of foot traffic. Thus it’s built around a pre-Industrial Era public speaking model like Hyde Park’s Speaker’s Corner in London: anyone can take to the mic to discuss any topic they like (though there is an MC and suggested time slots for certain subjects to […]
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On James Schamus and Focus Features
Yesterday’s sad news that James Schamus is leaving Focus Features, the company he co-founded 11 years ago, and that the New York office is being shut down is a blow — a blow to not only the filmmakers supported by Focus and the company’s employees but also our broader independent film community. Schamus is unique and irreplaceable, and his particular strengths are ones we have needed and relied upon. These strengths include his defining concept of what a 21st-century specialty distributor could be, one that demonstrated smart-minded business practices while cracking its door open to allow outsider voices, subversive points […]
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“I Don’t Have to Pick Up a Gun, I Can Just Pick Up a Camera:” Jia Zhangke on A Touch Of Sin
“I really want to say that we are all connected,” Jia Zhangke said Monday night. “This is our issue.” If that makes his latest film, A Touch Of Sin, sound like some sort of Chinese Crash redux, it’s just a quirk of phrasing: the connection Zhangke’s thinking of is an epidemic of violence in China, which he describes as a response of the economically dispossessed trying to reclaim some form of dignity. Viewed as isolated actions, the four violent incidents dramatized in A Touch Of Sin might seem like singular occurrences; stitched together, they’re obviously connected symptoms of Chinese society […]
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On Growing Up with the Mumblecore Generation
The mumblecore mumblecorp is growing up, a reality certain to impact American independent film for years to come. And we, their generation, are aging with them. Some of us are their peers, some their audience, some their collaborators. Others, like me, have a more indirect tether. If “fan” is not the correct word then we are those who, because of our interest in and pursuit of film over the last decade, have come of age in their shadow. The mumblecorp — that tenacious group of filmmakers who, by blurring narrative and autobiography, cinema and home video, pioneered ultra-low-budget filmmaking — […]
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Listen Up Philip at The Edit Center
With the official launch of the Made in New York Media Center by IFP this week, news of its imminent offerings was not far behind. One particular course that’s setting up shop at 30 John Street already boasts an impressive track record. The Edit Center, which is housed around the corner on Jay Street, will bring their hands-on framework to the nascent Media Center beginning this November. An intensive six-week course, The Edit Center offers students the unique opportunity of cutting their teeth (pun intended) on a real, live independent film currently in post-production. Guided by a professional instructor and […]
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Mayor Bloomberg, Joana Vicente and Questlove Open Made in NY Media Center by IFP
This morning, Mayor Bloomberg and IFP’s Executive Director Joana Vicente kicked off the launch of the Made in NY Media Center by IFP alongside the Center’s Founding Artist in Residence, Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson. At the event, Mayor Bloomberg said, “The Made in NY Media Center by IFP continues the work this administration has done to diversify New York City’s economy and provide access to affordable work space. New technologies and distribution platforms are appearing every day, and entrepreneurs, growing businesses and creative individuals will have the chance to harness their skills with the educational resources provided by the Media Center […]
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Hacking Arts – Using Technology To Connect With Your Audience
Hacking Arts, a two-day event to “explore the intersection of arts and entertainment, technology and entrepreneurship” was held this last weekend at MIT’s Media Lab. The first day consisted of panels and product demos, while the rest of the event was devoted to participants working together to come up with new ideas in various topic areas, from mobile to art education. The panel sessions of the first day had a strong tilt towards art distribution and finding and interacting with your audience in the connected world. The music panel, titled “Social Sound: Music Fans Get Involved,” featured Kristen Bender from […]
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Digital Bolex Report: An Interview with Creative Director Elle Schneider
Elle Schneider, Creative Director at Digital Bolex, spoke about the project at this weekend’s Hacking Arts conference held at MIT’s Media Lab. The Digital Bolex project, the creation of a digital camera that is operated and styled like a 16mm camera, was funded through a Kickstarter Project. Held in March of 2012, the campaign raised twice the $100,000 goal and pre-sold 93 cameras. Schneider announced that they expect the camera will be available to order in six weeks, and they will ship the original orders even sooner. Schneider, who had an early beta version of the camera with her, talked […]
