Wanted: Idiot Producer

Idiot producer wanted to produce low budget feature. Producer should have little to no experience producing major feature films. Low cost and high efficiency are the name of the game here, so if you have any qualms about putting the thumbscrews to a crew please don't apply.

-- via Art Adams.

Art Adams is a kickass DoP based in SF* who is a regular contributor on CML. He's a really nice guy [he's provided me with plenty of advice], who does does really nice soft-light portrait work and, even more importantly, also has a great sense of humour, probably because he watches British comedy.

After reading one to many calls/posts from "producers" (I use the term loosely) looking for crew to work for SFA he decided to make his own retaliatory post on Craiglist. The responses are highly amusing - particularly for those who have any experience on low budget film sets.

Its well worth a read and gives a kind of beautiful insight into the shitness of trying to crack the indie scene. I don't think the people who responded to his posts are actually idiots, they're just trying to "give it a go" (as lawyers say). I respect how hard that is, cause I'm still there. FWIW, Art's article on "How to Break Into Cinematography" is also a fun and insightful read.

NB: Art doesn't think the producers he actually works for are idiots. There is a world of difference between those who actually are producers (ie actually get stuff made on a regular basis and, gasp, make a living from it) and those who think they are (ie don't get stuff made or, if they do, only by cheating everyone).

It kind of reminds me of a post I saw somewhere about a wedding videographer who was trying to make his first feature by SELLING the parts in the film. I kid you not. It got me, jokingly, wondering if I could auction the parts in a film on eBay and use the money to hire a good lead (like Tony Martin) and fund the film. The scary thing is I'm sure there would be some actors who'd give it a go and I could actually make a film that way.

*I mention SF because I ran into a woman at the Canon service centre yesterday who used to be a production co-ordinator and facilities manager in SF. She said that the Australia film industry suffers the same problems as the SF film industry. I thought it was an interesting comment.

P.S. Thanks for e-mailing me the link, Art.

Cutting off your face to spite your nose (aka funding weird science at the expense of useful ones)

More than 700 scientists sent a petition on Monday to the director of the National Institutes of Health protesting what they said was the shift of tens of millions of dollars in federal research money since 2001 away from pathogens that cause major public health problems to obscure germs the government fears might be used in a bioterrorist attack.

-- excerpt from Defense Tech.

Commentary: I think its fairly obvious. Part of problem with a perpetual war on terror is that it diverts political, military and social 'might' (for a lack of a better word) away from actual tangible threats to the potential threat of terrorism. That distraction is, imnsho, part of the modus operandi of fourth wave of terrorism: infrastructure disruption.

FWIW, I think 'superbugs' pose more of a threat, bodycount wise, than does terrorism or global warming or even asteroids. The whole paradigm is wrong. We stuff our bodies full of antibiotics consequently weakening our immune system and strengthening the bugs. Seems the wrong way around to me.

FCP XML to Shake Conversion Script. Called FCP2SHK, it was written by Zachary Cole, a Shake Op, who wanted to do a digital intermediate on his Mac with, well, Shake. There are a number of limitations but hey, its free! Thankfully, Zachary goes into lots of depth about workflow approaches with this script.

Good stuff, can't wait to give it a whirl on my next video clip.

The weakness of the U.S. dollar is no accident,

The weakness of the U.S. dollar is no accident, billionaire George Soros says - it's the result of Russian and Middle East oil exporters switching some of their oil transactions from dollars to euros. 

Where's the tipping point on this?

-- in Newsmax, via John Robb

Back when I was at 2SER FM, I remember being involved in some discussions pre the Iraq occupation that perhaps part of the reason for the invasion was to stablise the American currency in face of the euro (and EU) threat. The treat was that Iraq amongst other oil exporters was going to switch to the euro for oil trading.

For most of the Bush presidency the US dollar has been sliding downward, while the Euro has only been gaining in strength. By anchoring the US dollar in a tangible commodity like oil, there is a limit on its downward slide... a real value attached to it. It literally becomes a black goal standard. Something which may help the US in the impeding economic collapse (okay, that's pushing it)... the irony is, of course, that it didn't work. In fact, there seems to be a 'conspiracy' to weaken the US dollar. Which, ironically, reduces America's foreign debt in real terms.

Another aspect to the situation is the battle of legitimacy between the EU and the US. Since the collapse of the USSR, Europe and the US have been needing each other less & less. In the Cold War, it was a relationship of co-dependency. Now its a competitive relationship to win the moral civil war in the West. The EU is emerging as a single supernational (or transnational) entity to challenge the US' hyperpower. The Old World vs. the New. Add the rising power of China, and we're going to see a tense geopolitical triangle between the EU vs the US vs the New Asian Trading Block (I've forgotten its name, but its effectively becoming an Asian Union, the AU) emerge over the next say, 20 years. How that geopolitical relationship interoperates with other emergent trends, like global guerillas, the greenhouse effect, over-population, remain to be seen. I can't say I think it'll be good either. Though, I must say I think the fundamental commodity of international trade will shift from fuel resources like oil to basic foodstuffs like grain. "No War for Food" doesn't quite have the same ring to it, does it? No wonder some large TNCs are trying to own the food chain via an unholy mix of law and genetic modification.

We live in interesting times indeed.

To anyone who tried to send me e-mail in the last 12 hours, it seems as if biki.net was taken down because of some confusion between the billing and tech departments of my hosts (powersurge.net). Originally biki.net was a subdomain of dumphuck.com, but I moved from dumphuck to be a fully fledged site - however, when dumpHuck was cancelled, I got deleted. They quickly restored me from backup, which was nice.

Point is, if you sent me e-mail recently and it bounced - PLEASE re-send it.

If you ever need to contact me urgently and biki.net is down, try my work address - willis@bpproductions.com.au

Thanks

Stu.

Clip Go the Years

To those of us of the Countdown generation, a culture-defining event took place exactly 30 years ago this week. Literally overnight, on March 1, 1975, like a scene out of The Wizard of Oz, Australian television went colour.

Suddenly, for better or worse, we could see the rainbow of satins in Skyhooks' stage costumes. Young girls across the nation felt as if they could reach through the screen and touch the near life-like tones of Daryl Braithwaite's exposed chest as he crooned: "Summer love, it's like no other love, oooh yeah ..."

-- From Dino Scatena 'Clip Go the Years' an article in the Sydney Morning Herald about the birth of the Australian Music Video and our role, basically via Russell Mulcahy, in the birth of MTV.

Good read.

much blood and treasure

Al-Hayat has a long interview with an "informed Iraqi source" who is close to US officials in Iraq. He maintains that the US officials there were astounded that the United Iraqi Alliance did so well, and that they felt helpless and resigned as the process unfolded. He says that they are now asking privately if the US shed so much blood and treasure in Iraq to help fundamentalist Shiite allies of Iran take over Baghdad.

-- via Juan Cole's Informed Comment

Clients & Raw Footage

Jeff writes:

But now, the client wants my raw footage for another project to be posted in-house (i.e. not by me).

[snip]

Is there a more or less standard procedure for this?

Ultimately, this should come down to your contract with the client. Specifically, who owns (a) the copyright and (b) the property title in the raw footage. (The property title is the ownership of the physical tapes.)

Honestly, I generally just let the clients have access to the raw footage if they ask. Yes, I could charge them a tax to use it but I think the client relationship is more important in the longer term. It costs me nothing to provide them the footage and if it encourages them to continue using us over our competitor, then its worth it in the longer term. Yes, I understand they're cutting it in house... BUT by providing the footage as 'value added', you are (at the very least) encouraging them to continue using you for acquisition. OTH, If you charge them then that could generate a negative feeling to you as a provider - because most corporate clients believe (often correctly) that they *own* the raw footage.

Thats why I say contracts are important because you can clarify all this. If you want to charge them less but retain the ownership in the raw footage, then it can be specified. If you want to charge them more but transfer all ownership to them, then it can be specified. You can also attach 'scheduled charges' for additional services, like access to raw footage, and make sure the client knows from the outside what it'll cost. A lot of people find contracts rather onerous, but I've had enough difficult production experiences to really appreciate the clarity. It means clients *know* you're not going to give them a bait-and-switch and you know the client can't screw you.

If you still want to charge them, then I think you need to work out a rate for them 'using' the footage (non-exclusive) and another rate for them 'owning' the footage (exclusive). Give them both options and explains what the difference is.

Just my 5c (and I'd love to hear how others approach this situation).

Stu.

(cross posted from CML-Production)