Category Archives: Coming Soon

A brave new world envisioned by — Disney

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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!

Saul Bass: posters and title sequences

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Saul Bass is one name I remember noticing when I first got into films.

Probably because he did cool titles and his name was usually right in those titles.

Check out the first 10 and a half minutes in this documentary to see some of Saul Bass’s famous title sequences.

Saul Bass was also a graphic designer and made some very iconic posters.

He was also an Academy-awarded filmmaker. See his 1968 winning short film.

My take: when it comes to opening and closing credits, Saul Bass was a trailblazer. Have you seen any great title sequences lately?

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!

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.

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

Congratulations to the first finalists of Telefilm’s Micro-Budget Production Program

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Finally Telefilm is trying something new.

Recognizing that the current system is tilted against up-and-coming talent, last year they announced the Micro-Budget Production Program.

Each of 25 partners across the country nominated one of their recent students or new members for funding to produce their first features.

Eight finalists have just been announced.

“Telefilm will contribute $120,000 in funding per project. Finalists must use this contribution to produce, distribute and promote a feature-length film for release to the general public within 15 months of signature of the Telefilm contract, via one or more distribution platforms, with special emphasis on digital media.”

Congratulations to all and especially to Maureen Bradley of Victoria. In 2008, I worked with Maureen on an application to the NSI’s Features First program for her project Dry.

You can see all the winners here.

My take: I’m extremely excited by this development. I’m looking forward to at least one of these projects becoming a runaway success. Wouldn’t that upset the apple cart!

Argo: Ben Affleck and Hollywood Diplomacy

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The trailer for ‘Argo’ piqued my interest because I remember the drama of the 1979 Iran Hostage Crisis and the later revelation of the Canadian ambassador’s actions to smuggle out six Americans.

Kudos to Ben Affleck for stepping up and rewriting the closing postscript after complaints by Ken Taylor, as reported in Macleans. What do they say about history being written by the victors? Here’s a case of history being rewritten by Hollywood (and then corrected by the real actors).