dvd

This week, YouTube launched The Screening Room, an area of the site that will showcase eight new short films every month, and the occasional full-length feature. In the first crop are films written by Miranda July, directed by cinematographer Newton Thomas Sigel, and starring Kevin Pollak.From the press release:People will be able to communicate directly with filmmakers to share thoughts, exchange opinions with fans, and provide honest feedback using YouTube's features to comment, rate, and share films. The YouTube Screening Room will also include a "Buy Now" button, allowing filmmakers to link to websites selling DVDs and digital downloads of their films, as well as a High Quality player, which offers users the best viewing experience possible.YouTube is sharing ad revenue with filmmakers based on how many people watch their work, explains Sara Pollack, who manages the company's filmmaker relationships.

re:frame launches today - an effort to digitize important and rare movies and make them available as DVDs or digital downloads. It's an initiative of the Tribeca Film Institute, and the partner for delivering the downloads and DVDs is Amazon.com.The NY Times writes:The approximately 500 works initially available range from the works of the filmmaker Sally Potter, beginning with her 1979 short “Thriller,” to collections of little-known documentaries from various archives. Some of those will be available to purchase only on DVD, because rights are controlled by commercial distributors.

BusinessWeek Online has a nifty piece about documentary filmmakers taking control of their own distribution. The lead example is a film called 'What's Your Point, Honey?', which I hadn't heard of...but apparently has been doing well in New York.John Tozzi writes:...[L]ike musicians who shun record labels to sell their music themselves, anecdotal evidence suggests documentary filmmakers—already an entrepreneurial bunch—are foregoing the conventional path of shopping their films to a distributor. They're skipping such deals and using the Internet to get their stories in front of people who want to hear them."Indie filmmakers are getting a little bit less afraid to say no to somebody with all that power, because other new channels are opening up," says Amy Sewell, co-director of What's Your Point, Honey?

- The NY Times has an interesting piece today that suggests that piracy is moving from NYC street corners to the Internet. (This may be in part due to a big enforcement initiative by NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg.) Eric Taub writes:Since December 2003, when Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg started an initiative to stem the trade in bootlegged and counterfeit goods, [NYC enforcement agent Shari] Hyman has “seen a huge decrease in illegal DVDs being sold in buildings.” In a February sweep, the organization checked out three buildings and 32 storefronts for bootlegged DVDs, and found none.But New York may not be the best barometer of piracy. Worldwide and on the Internet, video piracy remains rampant.

Great piece in Variety from Anne Thompson on new ways of marketing and distributing niche documentaries. She focuses mainly on two sports docs, 'In the Crease' and 'Kicking It.' From the piece:In March 2005, Matt Gannon and Michael Sarner, former acquisition and marketing execs at Fox Searchlight and United Artists, respectively, put their passion for ice hockey into financing and shooting their first film, "In the Crease." The digital video doc is an underdog story of the California Wave Bantam AAA travel hockey team's two-year quest to win a national championship."We set out to do 'Spellbound' for sports fans," says Gannon.

If like me you prefer to leave certain things to the imagination, favouring the erotic rather than the pornographic, then Destination Sex City is a DVD to check out.

A compilation of nine short erotic films that fuse animation, art, graphic design and pornography into a visual indulgence unlike any other. Stylishly designed and packaged to please the most discerning buyer/collector of haute pornography.

If like me you prefer to leave certain things to the imagination, favouring the erotic rather than the pornographic, then Destination Sex City is a DVD to check out.

A compilation of nine short erotic films that fuse animation, art, graphic design and pornography into a visual indulgence unlike any other. Stylishly designed and packaged to please the most discerning buyer/collector of haute pornography.

- The NY Times offers some interesting data about how people consume video online: the 20 percent of viewers who watch the most video view more than 140 times as much of it as the 50 percent who watch the least. With data from comScore and Media Contacts, the Times found that the top 20 percent of viewers see 841 minutes (or 14 hours) of video every month, on average. The bottom 50 percent watch just six minutes a month.

- The Times also has a very smart examination of how studios are trying to sustain their DVD sales -- both high-def and standard-def. Brooks Barnes and Matt Richtel write:

- NY Times columnist David Pogue evaluates four leading Internet-connected set-top boxes, and gives the $300 Vudu the highest overall grade. (Others included in his survey include Xbox 360, Apple TV, and TiVo.) Pogue also makes some good points about the limitations imposed on all of the boxes by studios:

...[N]o matter which movie-download service you choose, you’ll find yourself facing the same confusing, ridiculous time limits for viewing. You have to start watching the movie you’ve rented within 30 days, and once you start, you have to finish it within 24 hours.

The final nails were hammered into HD DVD's coffin this week, with Netflix, Best Buy, and Wal-Mart deciding to stock only Blu-ray discs and players.

Here's an obituary from today's NY Times.

From the Times piece:

Thus far, consumers have purchased about one million Blu-ray players, though there are another three million in the market that are integrated into the PlayStation 3 consoles of Sony, said Richard Doherty, research director of Envisioneering, a technology assessment firm. About one million HD DVD players have been sold.

Longtime Protein colourlover, Matt Pkye has just launched the Advanced Beauty blog to coincide with the imminent launch of the awesome DVD of the same name.

Word on the street is that Amazon is set to become LoveFilm's largest shareholder in a deal that includes rebranding its UK and German DVD rental business under the LoveFilm banner has got to be a good thing.

Amazon Europe will also make a cash investment in LoveFilm to become the largest shareholder in LoveFilm International and the two companies will also enter an agreement in which Amazon will promote LoveFilm's services on its sites for UK and German customers. Following completion of the deal, the LoveFilm subscriber base will expand to over 900,000 customers, predominantly in the UK and Germany, but also in Sweden, Norway and Denmark.

Awesome.

In our increasingly digital/download age I am already beginning to miss the textures and tactile nature of past media formats. Thankfully I've just found Hard Format which has collected a fine selection of vinyl, DVD and CD covers for us all to be inspired, reminisce and enjoy. Via ywft blog

Old time friend of the feed Matt Pyke has just mailed out a preview of his upcoming DVD project entitled Advanced Beauty. I saw some work-in-progress QT's a few months back and it is a truly stunning collection of moving image films. We'll be posting more previews as and when Matt sends them over.

Our friends over at onedotzero want you to know about their new onedotzero_select dvd4 which is due out in a couple of weeks and features new work from Joji Koyama [aka Woof Wan Bau] Airside, Intro, Pleix, Daniel Askill, and Nakd, with rising stars Hendrick Dusollier, 12foot6, and DominicHailstone.