PlanetOut Inc. , the leading media and entertainment company exclusively focused on the gay and lesbian market, is seeking entries for the 9th Annual PlanetOut Short Movie Awards (POSMA) 2008, sponsored by Scion in association with the Miami Gay and Lesbian Film Festival (MGLFF).

The PlanetOut Short Movie Awards, the largest online awards honoring film and video shorts by, about, and of interest to LGBT audiences, is an acclaimed international platform for top gay and lesbian filmmakers. Noted winners include Angela Robinson (“D.E.B.S.,” “Herbie Fully Loaded,” and “The L Word”); Jamie Babbitt (“But I’m a Cheerleader!,” “Ugly Betty,” “Alias,” “Malcolm in the Middle,” “Gilmore Girls,” and “Nip/Tuck”); and Q. Allan Brocka (“Eating Out,” “Boy Culture,” and “Rick and Steve the Happiest Gay Couple in all the World”).

Deadline for entries is Dec. 7, 2007 and information may be found on PlanetOut.com and Gay.com: http://www.planetout.com/entertainment/shortmovieawards and http://www.gay.com/entertainment/shortmovieawards.

Up to 20 finalists will be selected from all eligible submissions. Judging will be based on an equally weighted criteria consisting of the following: cleverness and originality; quality of writing, acting, and production values; innovative use of the medium; relevance of subject matter; and entertainment value.

Winners will be announced in January 2008 at PlanetOut’s annual event during the Sundance Film Festival, and the Grand Prize Winner and four runners-up will be screened at a special ceremony and program in Miami as part of the Miami Gay & Lesbian Film Festival on Sunday, April 27, 2008. The Grand Prize winner will receive a $10,000 cash prize and will be exhibited on PlanetOut.com and Gay.com, along with the runners up, who will each receive cash prizes ranging from $1,500 to $500.

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Here’s a great article from Mac Filmmaking on why film is dying and paving the way for digital filmmaking! 4 Reasons why film is dying:

Act 1: It’s time to change
I think we really just need a change. The same kind of change that we need, has occurred in the music industry, so why can’t it happen with movies. The answer to this question finds itself entangled in the hierarchy of the Film Industry. The Film Industry has built up a workflow for pumping out movies fast and efficiently and they don’t want to change this workflow anytime soon. They have figured everything out, so that they can write and produce a film for a few million and make four times as much back. The only hope for change can be found in independent production. If companies have a format that is cost effective and doesn’t jeopardize the quality of production (such as Red), indie filmmakers will support it.

Act 2: New Ideas
We also need some new ideas. For years we have been simply working upon a dead format. We all know it’s on its way out, so why do we continue to pump our money into it. That comes back to what I said about the Film Industry. They have their money invested in the film workflow and would rather not change.
One example of a new idea coming to the market is the Red Camera. Red has built a new workflow system for producing films, and many indie filmmakers are eager to get their hands on it. Red seems like a really good solution to these problems that we face and in the future I believe we will either see the Film Industry adopting Red, or creating their own digital format.

Act 3: Conversion
Ever since computerized (non-linear) editing stations entered the market in the late 1970’s, the filmmakers workflow has been compromised. When shooting on film you must have a lab convert your footage to a data file to be edited on a computer. This has become a hassle for many filmmakers when digital filmmakers can simply import their footage right into their personal computers. Until a data format is adopted, the mainstream (film) workflow will be compromised and filmmakers will continue to convert and out convert their footage though labs. This is just one more reason why film is dead, (or at least dying).

Act 4: “Data” enters the dictionary
Many camcorders are now using data chips (usually flash or HD), to store footage. This dramatically decreases the time it takes to import footage and start editing. This principle has also been implemented in the new Red Camera. Now, more then ever, film seems like an inconvenience to send to a lab to be processed.

The Venice film festival marked its 75th anniversary Wednesday with a sparkling opening gala and world premiere of British psychological drama “Atonement” starring Keira Knightley.

An evening of pomp and fireworks saw Knightley take to the red carpet along with co-stars James McAvoy and Vanessa Redgrave, plus their youthful director Joe White.

Also on hand were compatriot Kenneth Branagh and the stars of his detective thriller “Sleuth,” Michael Caine and Jude Law.

Tony Gilroy, director of the legal drama “Michael Clayton” starring George Clooney, was there, but Clooney himself was not expected to make his entrance until Thursday.

“Atonement,” based on the best-selling novel by Ian McEwan, follows the consequences of an impressionable girl’s tragic misreading of events at an upper-class English home in the years leading up to World War II.

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It’s common knowledge that iMovie has fullscreen playback capabilities, but what about Final Cut Pro. This Tip will show you, (in 3 easy steps) how to go into fullscreen playback in FCP.

Step 1: First of all you will want to make sure that you’re selected on the timeline.

Step 2: Then go to View, Video Playback, and click on your designated display, (either a camera, internal or external display).

Step 3: Next, go back up to View, External Video, and click on All Frames (?F12). That’s it. You should now automatically be launched into fullscreen mode. To get out of fullscreen, just press the escape key.

Source: Mac Filmmaking

We know our video editing applications for Windows (read Adobe Premiere, AVID, Ulead Video studio etc) and Mac (Final Cut Pro!), but what about video editing on a Linux powered system? Well here’s a list of video editing applications for your Linux PC:

1. Kdenlive: Kdenlive is a non linear video editor for the KDE environment running on Linux. It is based on the MLT video framework which relies on the FFMPEG project.

   The project was initially started by Jason Wood in 2002, and is now maintained by a small team of developers. Kdenlive is available in English, French, German, Dutch, Turkish, Brazilian Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, Hungarian and Catalan.

2. OpenMovieEditor: Open Movie Editor is designed to be a simple video editor, that provides basic movie making capabilities. It aims to be powerful enough for the amateur movie artist, yet easy to use. The downside with OpenMovieEditor is that it only supports PAL at this point.
3. Blender: Blender is an all-in-one 3D modelling and animation suite. It can be used to produce computer-generated images and movies. It is open source freeware, so it costs nothing to use. It is available for all major operating systems under the GNU General Public License.
4. Cinelerra: Cinelerra does primarily 3 main things: capturing, compositing, and editing audio and video with sample level accuracy. It’s a seamless integration of audio, video, and still photos rarely experienced on a web server.

   Its crash prone, resource hungry, and really weirdly put together, but if when it works, it does a good job.

5. Pitivi: PiTIVi provides several ways of creating and modifying a timeline. Ranging from a simple synopsis view (a-la iMovie) to the full-blown editing view (aka Complex View) which puts you in complete control of your editing.

   Other interfaces can be added via the plugin system, aimed at more specific uses like a SlideShow creator or a subtitling editor. It is even possible to use pitivi without a user interface in order to do batch rendering.

But open source video editing software still have a long way to go when compared with their Windows and Mac counterparts in terms of video resolution, additional features and program crashes.

Film School by Phone – Next class Tuesday August 28th at 7:00pmPST.

Back in Session!

Hope you all had a nice summer break. Well, it’s time to go back to school. The next series of calls will be primarily interviews with film Industry Pros. From Directors to DP’s, Art Directors to Make Up Artists, Writers to Producers. We’ll learn what they do and how they do it.

If you have signed up before you are on the invite list and willl get all the call information. If you want to get on the calls and haven’t signed up, please fill out the form below. Once you sign up, you will get all the info you need to get on these calls.

Hope to see (hear) you on the call.

Pinnacle Systems Inc, a wholly owned subsidiary of Avid Technology Inc and video editing solutions provider, is set to launch an educational tool for schools in India. The company will introduce a customized programme in video editing and filmmaking called the Studio Academic Programme.

With technology including mobiles and cameras becoming an increasing part of kids lives, the programme will teach students to capture videos or still photographs and edit them to make their own home movies and albums.

In the first phase of its launch, the Academic programme will be introduced to schools in Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata, Hyderabad and Bangalore and will be launched in other cities in phase II. A special curriculum has been formulated to help students learn all nuances and become proficient in the art of video editing and filmmaking, informs an official release.

Using the Pinnacle Studio editing software, students can now add sound effects, put labels and re-arrange the order of the pictures or video to make their own Harry Potter movies or special birthday videos and upload them on the net to share with their friends and relatives.

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Buying a digital camera to get started in the world of digital photography or to replace your old camera? Read tips on getting the best digital camera for your money.

#1: Set a Budget Before Buying
Budget yourself when purchasing a digital camera.

#2: Ignore Digital Zoom
When buying digital cameras, concentrate on optical zoom, not digital zoom.

#3: Small Doesn’t Mean Underpowered
Small digital cameras may be exactly what you need. Small cameras may not have as many features as digital SLRs and high-end prosumer digital cameras, but their megapixel resolutions are matching, and sometimes beating, their higher-priced alternatives! Plus, they are easier to transport long distances, less bulky to carry with you on trips, and less conspicuous.

#4: Be Careful When Buying Package Deals
Digital camera package deals may be too good to be true – or a real bargain!

#5: Get a Camera with Magnified Photo Previews
Magnified photo previews can help determine the sharpness of a digital photo.

#6: Don’t Expect a Camera to Come with Enough Media
When you purchase a digital camera, unless it happens to be a package deal, don’t expect the camera to come with enough media to handle your photography needs. Nowadays, most digital cameras, if they come with any media at all, will only be packaged with a 32MB 128 MB card. Though that used to be enough memory for a couple dozen pictures, high megapixel photos in fine, very fine, or raw detail can eat up that memory in just one or two photos. Prepare to spend money on at least one extra media card.

#7: What to Look for to Take Night Photography
Helpful features some digital cameras provide to take better night photos.

#8: Don’t Get Caught Up in Megapixels
More megapixels do not always equal clearer photos. Not just the number of megapixels, but the quality of the megapixels matter as well. For example, most digital camera image sensor pixels can only detect just a particular area’s redness, blueness, or greenness, but not all three.

#9: Consider the Total Cost of Ownership
You won’t just be purchasing a digital camera – you may need to buy accessories.

#10: Pre-Programmed Scene Modes May Help
Scene modes make it easier to take digital camera photos in tough lighting conditions.

#11: Does Flash Come with an SLR?
Consider the total cost of ownership when purchasing a digital SLR.

#12: How Much Optical Zoom is Needed?
Do you require a digital camera with 6x optical zoom, or is 2x or 3x enough?

#13: Where is the Tripod Socket?
Make sure when purchasing a digital camera that it fits well on a tripod.

#14: Digital Camera Reviews
Links to websites offering reviews of specific digital cameras. You might want to compare between a Canon PowerShot A530 and a Nikon COOLPIX L4. You can easily read reviews online and compare between the two.

#15: More Control May Cost You
To set manual exposure, you might need a more-expensive camera.

#16: Look for ISO 50 Support
Look for digital cameras with ISO 50 support for crisper, cleaner images.

Legendary film-maker Ingmar Bergman, one of the key figures in modern cinema, has died at the age of 89.

His 60-year career spanned intense classics like Cries & Whispers, The Seventh Seal and Wild Strawberries. He was personally nominated for nine Oscars between 1960 and 1984, while three of his productions won Oscars for best foreign film. Bergman died at his home in Faro, Sweden. No details about the cause of death have been released.

INGMAR BERGMAN: PROFILE
For most cinemagoers, Ingmar Bergman is Swedish cinema. Certainly, few other directors have assumed Bergman’s burden of representing an entire nation for international audiences. His austere appraisals of familial strife and spiritual angst may have worked against the grain of the Swedish Tourist Board, but Bergman has nevertheless single-handedly put his homeland on the cinematic map. His sombre canon, encompassing more than 40 feature films shot with complete artistic control, has earned him auteurship and helped raise cinema’s stature to that enjoyed by other art forms.

As a director, Bergman favored intuition over intellect, and chose to be unaggressive in dealing with actors. Bergman saw himself as having a great responsibility toward them, viewing them as collaborators often in a psychologically vulnerable position. He stated that a director must be both honest and supportive in order to allow others their best work.

His films usually deal with existential questions of mortality, loneliness, and faith; they also tend to be direct and not overtly stylized. Persona, one of Bergman’s most famous films, is unusual among Bergman’s work in being both existentialist and avant-garde.

While his themes could be cerebral, sexual desire found its way to the foreground of most of his movies, whether the setting was the era of the plague (“The Seventh Seal”), upper-class family life in early 20th century Uppsala (“Fanny and Alexander”) or contemporary times in a strange city (“The Silence”). The female characters were usually more in touch with their sexuality than their men. In an interview with Playboy magazine in 1964, he said: “…the manifestation of sex is very important, and particularly to me, for above all, I don’t want to make merely intellectual films. I want audiences to feel, to sense my films. This to me is much more important than their understanding them.” Film, Bergman said, was his demanding mistress. Some of his major actresses became his real-life mistresses.

Bergman usually wrote his own scripts, thinking about them for months or years before starting the actual process of writing, which he viewed as somewhat tedious. His earlier films are carefully structured, and are either based on his plays or written in collabortion with other authors. Bergman stated that in his later works, when on occasion his actors would want to do things differently from his own intentions, he would let them, noting that the results were often “disastrous” when he did not do so. As his career progressed, Bergman increasingly let his actors improvise their dialogue. In his latest films, he wrote just the ideas informing the scene and allowed his actors to determine exact dialogue.

Bergman died at his home in Sweden. No details about the cause of death have been released.

According to the TT news agency, Bergman died peacefully on Faro Island – or Sheep Island – in the Baltic Sea. The director had settled there after using it as a location for several films.

Source: BBC, Wikipedia

Are you aged 8-14 and interested in film-making? If the answer is yes the ‘CBBC me and my movie’ summer roadshow is just for you!

CBBC are offering budding young film-makers the opportunity to take part in a fun and practical based filmmaking workshop run by Cinemagic from 8th-10 August, in Craigavon and Belfast. From scriptwriting and storyboarding, to filming and editing, participants will learn all the skills needed to make a short film in a day!

As well as participating in the workshop, young people will be in with the chance to win the ‘CBBC me and my movie award’, – in association with BAFTA’- which is a special new award for films made by children at the annual Children’s BAFTAs.

The workshops which are taking place in Northern Ireland are part of a unique children’s film-making initiative- ‘CBBC me and my movie’ which inspires and enables children to make their own films and tell their own stories. ‘CBBC me and my movie’ is also providing an original 3D online space (www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/meandmymovie) where children can engage with the experience of film-making.

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