6 Tips For Writing A (Money-Making) Script From A Billion Dollar Screenwriting Duo | Co.Create: Creativity \ Culture \ Commerce

BY: JOE BERKOWITZ (excerpt)

You may recognize Thomas Lennon and Robert Ben Garant from “Reno 911,” which they created and starred in. What you probably don’t know is that their movies have grossed over a billion dollars at the box office. Here, their tips for writing a movie that sells.

Every day dozens of novice screenwriters are born, ideals fully intact. They carry visions of the ultimate cinematic experience, along with their laptops, into Starbucks to pour ideas onto the page. Almost all of them are doomed to fail. Not for the reasons you might think, though....

FORMULA IS YOUR FRIEND

Garant: "You have to be incredibly original in your idea for the movie, but the formula needs to be a movie formula. You have to think of a movie that the trailer will explain in 30 seconds, and movies like that all have the same structure."

Lennon: "Ben came up with a pretty simple way to express it: You take a guy and put him up in a tree, then you throw rocks at him, and then you get him down from the tree. Die Hard, The Matrix, Casablanca: all of these movies have heroes pulled into a situation against their will, who then end up winning. That’s structure. It can be liberating, though, because following structure gives you less to have to worry about."...

full article here:

http://www.fastcocreate.com/1681393/6-tips-for-writing-a-money-making-script-...

Nice post from Eva Dominguez: ‘Newsgames’: playing with the news - The Fourth BitThe Fourth Bit

Eva Domínguez | 31/07/2012
Two Pulitzer Prizewinners are preparing a game in order to make the world aware of the conditions of inequality in which women and children are suffering in many parts of the world. It will be released in the autumn and it’s another example of the use of ludic strategies in journalism, a tendency known as newsgaming.

The journalistic partnership made up of Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, who won the Pulitzer for their coverage of the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989, are preparing a FarmVille-type game in which actions will also have a real effect through donations, as Kristof explains to FastCompany.com. Apart from the game, which is based on the book Half the Sky, they are working on a documentary.

Three classics, a decade later
Using a game as a narrative resource in journalism is nothing new, although it is a minority pursuit. In The Fourth Bit in January, 2003, entitled The Game is the message, I discussed three notable examples of this formula, all published in 2002: The Enron Blame Game, Can You Spot the Threats? and Find the Terrorist. Ten years on, The Enron Blame Game, created by Slate.com based on the scandal at that corporation, is the only that cannot be consulted.

The other two were published as a result of the consequences of the attacks on the Twin Towers. In the middle of the debate on airport security, MSNBC.com launched Can you Spot the Threats?, in which the user has two minutes to detect guns, knives or explosives through the use of the airport baggage control device....

full post here:

http://blogs.lavanguardia.com/thefourthbit/newsgames-playing-with-the-news/

Wow! Versailles 3D, Created by Google, Gives You an Impressive Tour of Louis XIV’s Famous Palace | Open Culture

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Excerpt:

'With 3D scale models, music, and video, Google’s Versailles 3D brings the best of 21st century web arts to 18th century art history. The palace was built by Louis XIV, the “Sun King,” who exemplified all of the authoritarian excesses of the French monarchy. Fortunately for posterity, he was also a patron of the arts, to whom we owe much of the work of Moliere, Racine and painters such as Charles Le Brun. And then there is his architectural legacy, the palace of Versailles, which started out as a humble hunting lodge, built by his father Louis XIII in 1624. In the next several decades, father, then son, commissioned the elaborate set of buildings that constitute Europe’s largest chateau and the seat of French government from Louis XIV’s ascension until the Revolution of 1789. If you’re thinking of visiting, the official chateau de Versailles website has slideshows of grounds and galleries, a boutique, and some worthwhile interactive features. But Google, as usual, has tried to outdo its competition, this time by partnering with it. In connection with the Versailles curators, The Google Cultural Institute has created a multimedia almost-substitute for a real life excursion to the gargantuan and enduring symbol of Ancien Regime France....'

Comic-Con and the Transmedia Future: 'Comic-Con and the Business of Pop Culture' < PopMatters

By Jeremy Estes 1 August 2012 (Excerpt)

'By the time you read this, the 2012 San Diego Comic Con will be over and preparation will have begun anew for next year’s event. “The Con” now operates in a cycle comparable to the perpetual campaigning of American politics. There are badge numbers, online sales and hotel reservations to secure, not to mention getting to the actual event itself, where endless lines and throngs of assorted humans and aliens occupy San Diego every July.

Rob Salkowitz’s book, Comic-Con and the Business of Pop Culture, is a fascinating look at this experience. In it he explores his own personal encounters with the Con (he and his wife have regularly attended since the late ‘90s) but also the event’s ascendance as the epicenter of entertainment business and culture. Being a comic fan, Salkowitz avoids the pitfalls of the “ZAP! POW! Comics Aren’t Just for Kids!” stories which annually announce the arrival of the Con. Despite the event’s recorded attendance of 130,000 in 2011, actual comic books—the staid monthly print magazines sometimes obnoxiously referred to as “floppies”—aren’t exactly doing a booming business. Comics-related properties generate billions of dollars in licensing revenue, covering everything from movies and games to socks and breakfast cereal. Best-selling comics however,, Salkowitz writes, rarely sell more than a few 100,000 copies....'

read more here:

http://www.popmatters.com/pm/review/161060-comic-con-and-the-business-of-pop-...