Or at least this is the wonderfully provocative headline to an email I’ve just had from the London Short Film Festival’s Phil Ilson. Phil’s email continues… “In a time of major arts cuts and a period of recession, short films are not high on the agenda in the general scheme of things. Because of this, the traditional career paths in the film industry are no longer sustainable. It’s year zero, but it’s also a creative time for UK film; a…

The backlash has started! For everyone grinding their teeth over the over exuberance surrounding DSLRs (for the ungeeks these are digital stills cameras that shoot HD video which have in many quarters been hailed as the future of low budget filmmaking) here’s something that should bring a smile… In today’s Filmmaker’s bulletin the expertly knowledgable Andrew Doughty describes the DSLR as “…an abomination. They are a mistake…” and he was arguing with the equally sage Karel Bata who’d just called…

Tonight filmmaker Jim Owen is screening his short film “Can We Talk” in South London’s finest tucked away cinema, the Shortwave. I’ve managed to double book myself and so can’t make it however my newly bald brother is going and you should too because “Can We Talk” is an exceptionally funny movie that showcases Jim’s deliciously dry style… If you are going to go then here’s a link to Jim’s blog about his adventures in Sundance where the film received…

Combining two of the themes of my blog for March, here’s Dom’s Canon 7D view of the European Independent Film Festival… If you can’t see the video click here http://shootingpeople.org/blog/category/bensblog/2010/03/faces-of-ecu/

OK if you’re interested in the new DSLR revolution then you’ve probably already seen this, but just in case – click on this link to see some pretty astounding evidence of how these little cameras hold up against film… http://www.zacuto.com/shootout

Really good article in creative cow, thanks to Zahra for bringing it to my attention… (and yes I will argue with you about Fish Tank soon…) http://magazine.creativecow.net/article/hdslrs-for-video-beyond-the-hype

This is the follow on of the previous entry which, because of the way the internet works, is of course published below. I split them up to make it easier to digest and because they are clearly two halves of a single point so it’s up to you, you can either scroll drown and read the first one first or start here and do your own private version of Memento… Perhaps now the vanilla version of the NPA has crumbled…

Having stuck around a day more in Paris after the end of The European Independent Film Festival so that I could mooch around Le Jardin Luxembourg and find out that Lucien Freud is just as much of a fan of dogs as I am, I arrived home yesterday to find a small cross over in film culture had occurred. Tuesday marked the release by Canon of a firmware update enabling the 5D Mark II to shoot in both 24 and…

Geeks click on the link to read prolost… Developed following feedback from photographers and cinematographers, Firmware 2.0.3 further enhances the EOS 5D Mark II’s excellent video performance. The addition of new frame rates expands the camera’s video potential, providing filmmakers with the ability to shoot 1080p Full HD footage at 24fps (actual 23.976fps)—the optimum frame rate for cinematic video. 25fps support at both 1920×1080 and 640×480 resolutions will allow users to film at the frame rate required for the PAL…