"Touching Stories" App Offers Four Interactive Short Films, Designed Specifically for the iPad | InteractiveTV Today

(Source: itvit.com)

Interactive production company, Tool of North America (note: for more on Tool, see the interview with its digital executive producer, Dustin Callif, that was published on itvt.com, June 9th, 2009), has teamed with "technology-infused" creative agency, Domani Studios, to develop an application, dubbed "Touching Stories," that contains four interactive live-action short films shot by five Tool of North America directors and designed specifically for the Apple iPad. According to the companies, the app allows viewers to "navigate, unlock and reveal unexpected variations" in each of the films by "touching, shaking and turning" their iPad. The app is available in the App Store, free of charge.

More details re. the films here:

http://itvt.com/story/6961/touching-stories-app-offers-four-interactive-short...

Space Nazi Trailers Draw Crowd Funding for Iron Sky|Now 90% funded - wow!

(source: Wired.com)

Thanks to a pair of knockout fake trailers, a team of Finnish filmmakers will soon start shooting an outlandish sci-fi Nazi movie financed in part by fans who flipped over the clips.

The first teaser for Iron Sky, embedded below, has pulled more than 1.3 million YouTube views since its release two years ago. The follow-up clip (above), released last month, continued the momentum as the project’s website harvested micro-investments from 52 fans enticed by the spooky-sleek visuals.

The trailers also generated buzz on the strength of the bizarrely original Iron Sky premise: During the closing days of World War II, Nazis in flying saucers escaped to the moon. In 2018, they plan a victorious return to Earth.

With 90 percent of the feature-length project’s $8.5 million budget now funded, casting for Iron Sky is nearly complete, with filming set to begin in Australia and Germany this fall.

Read More

http://www.wired.com/underwire/2010/06/iron-sky-space-nazis/#ixzz0sKunNthe

CALL FOR Transmedia Projects Round 2 now open: The Pixel Pitch

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(source:
http://workbookproject.com/culturehacker/2010/06/30/call-for-entry-the-pixel-...

Power to the Pixel has just opened calls for it’s annual Pixel Pitch. Now in its second year the Pixel Pitch offers transmedia projects an opportunity to present their work to an international panel of judges consisting of producers, funders, sales agents and distributors. This year’s top project will be award a cash prize thanks to support from ARTE. To find out more read below or visit www.powertothepixel.com

The Pixel Market – How Does It Work?

Power to the Pixel will select up to 20 cross-media projects to be presented to potential international financiers, investors and partners at The Pixel Market, part of Power to the Pixel’s annual Cross-Media Forum held in association with The BFI London Film Festival. Selected participants will also gain free accreditation to Power to the Pixel’s Conference Summit on the first day of the Forum.

The Pixel Pitch, 13 October 2010
Up to half of the selected projects will be presented In Competition at The Pixel Pitch, a public event on the first day of the market on 13 October 2010 at NFT1, BFI Southbank. These project teams will compete for the £6,000 ARTE Pixel Pitch Cash Prize.

Producer-led teams will present to a hand-picked roundtable jury made up of financiers, commissioners, tech companies, online portals and media & entertainment companies.

Each team will have 10 minutes to pitch their project (including visual presentations) with a further 20 minutes for comments and feedback from the roundtable.

more details on website

Great Keynote by Mark Gill on Indie Film Crisis and Strategies for the Future

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Excerpts (but read the whole speech!)

The bad news:

"...Here’s how bad the odds are: of the 5000 films submitted to Sundance each year— generally with budgets under $10 million—maybe 100 of them got a US theatrical release three years ago. And it used to be that 20 of those would make money. Now maybe five do. That’s one-tenth of one percent.

Put another way, if you decide to make a movie budgeted under $10 million on your own tomorrow, you have a 99.9% chance of failure.

OK, so now that I’ve battered you into severe depression, let’s move on to the hopeful part of these proceedings."

Slightly better news:

"...The sky may be falling, but in the end, it isn’t going to hit the ground. We will be left with a little breathing room. And the question will become: what will succeed in this much narrower space?

I believe that a fair number of people—call them what’s left of the theatrical audience if you like—will always need to get out of the house: in part because they enjoy the benefits of a communal experience.

Clearly, only the better films will succeed in the theaters of the future. Certainly the number of releases will drop—by half or more. Probably everyone other than the folks who work on tentpoles will be paid less. The words “theatrical necessity” will take on greater and greater meaning. Probably a lot of theaters will close. But I think the best theaters showing the best films will always have an audience. And the rest of the films will have their premiere in Walmart, or on your cell phone.

Interestingly enough, in this Darwinian new future, there will absolutely be a premium for good films on tv, pay per view, on-demand, internet—or whatever that large pipe that goes to all of our houses will be called.

Why do I know this? Because one of the big research companies conducted a study recently which gave viewers on-demand everything. No more schedules. No more appointment television. Just tune in anything—any movie, any TV show—at any time. And guess what: the best stuff won out. Hands down."

Slightly better:

"...*Traditionally specialized films accounted for 5-6% of tickets sold. In the last few summers, it’s been over 10% on average. And that’s the season when Hollywood is supposed to dominate and indies are supposed to cower in the corners, waiting for the arrival of fall.

*And to back that up, for the first time in the roughly 20 years I’ve been looking at this data, more than 10% of the audience now is telling pollsters they prefer independent films...."

read full article:

http://weblogs.variety.com/thompsononhollywood/2008/06/laff-mark-gill.html

Philip's Parallel Lines film 'The Gift' Wins Film Craft Grand Prix

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Well deserved!

CANNES, France (AdAge.com) -- "The Gift," a visually stunning online film for Philips from DDB, London, RSA Films and director Carl Erik Rinsch, won the inaugural Grand Prix in the film-craft category at Cannes.

WHAT IT IS: "The Gift" is part of the "Parallel Lines" campaign touting Philips' cinema-scale TVs. DDB challenged RSA directors to create a series of short films, each around the same six lines of dialogue. From 45 treatments, the agency commissioned five films that could be viewed on Philips' site, enhanced with the "Ambilight" technology used in the TV sets, and elsewhere online.

"The Gift" is a futuristic, visual effects-driven story set in Moscow and features an android butler involved in a spectacular chase scene. The film's slick look earned Mr. Rinsch plaudits from viewers and attention from the entertainment world -- talk of a feature-length version of the "The Gift" swirled after its online launch, and Mr. Rinsch was also tapped to direct the remake of "Logan's Run."

WHY IT WON: Film-craft jury chair Jon Kamen, president and co-founder of Radical Media, said judges were "completely blown away by the entry in terms of craftsmanship in every category" and that the pick was unanimous. The film won the Grand Prix in the directing category and also won Gold in the visual-effects category.