Another new post is up on TOOLS, this time about The Conversation “a two-day conversation — definitely not a conference — about the future of cinema, video, games, and telling stories with new media” coming up in Berkeley, CA later this year and bought to you by Ken Goldberg, Scott Kirsner, Tiffany Shlain and Lance Weiler.

I definitely plan to attend this because I know many of the people involved and I’m sure it will be a really useful and inspirational couple of days. Plus I’m determined to be looking forward, not back, as we figure out how to live digitally as artists (who need to eat and pay rent!)

The 2008 SXSWclick! finalists have been announced and you can watch all fifteen online and vote for your favorites. I’m really pleased to be a juror in the Really Real Shorts category along with Ambulante Documentary Film Festival’s Elena Fortes Acosta and Frownland DoP Sean Williams. Check the films out online now.

I have just published a post on our TOOLS blog about the current discussions over Mark Gill’s talk at the Los Angeles Film Festival’s Financing Conference.

I am consumed with how to get from here (between past and future models, looming recession, endless noise, very little signal, embattled communities) to there (is there a there there?) I know this is all terribly obtuse but I’m figuring this stuff out too! Bottom line: I know that organizations like Shooting People are going to have to be at the forefront of experimentation, community building and innovation. It’s daunting but I know so many amazing people working hard to figure this out and we have tools and resources like never before. As William Gibson said: “The future has already happened, it is just unequally distributed.”

The BRITDOC festival is coming up later this month in the UK: July 23-25 at Keble College, Oxford. I should declare my allegiances straight away because I am good friends with the BRITDOC gang and have helped out at the fest since its inception but, blatant bias aside, it really is a wonderful event and does all the things a good festival should by showing great films, creating genuine community and giving filmmakers useful resources going forward (from strategic knowledge and contacts to cold hard cash). BRITDOC’s themes this year are comedy and music, and events include pitching forums, speed networking with composers, talking sessions (including Larry Charles in conversation) and the Handlebar Moustache Disco!

I’m producing the Surgeries again this year which gives filmmakers the chance to get one-on-one meetings with experts including Cara Mertes (Sundance Institute), Debra Zimmerman (Women Make Movies), Cynthia Kane (ITVS) and Matt Dentler (Cinetic). If you are coming to BRITDOC make sure you apply to see one of our good Doctors!

With so much attention on the hardships faced by some sectors of the independent film community at the moment, an event like BRITDOC is a real tonic. We may be a ship of fools but it is a ship I am happy to be sailing on!

I know this has been around for a while but I often play this clip from the South Park “Canada on Strike” episode when I’m talking to people about digital distribution so I thought it was about time I put it up on my blog!

And I just gotta throw in this clip too. All the internet stars waiting to collect their money. Priceless!

The Intelligent Factual Televisual Festival starts tomorrow at The Arts Club in London - 2 days of televisual education with panels allowing you to hear from lots of different commissioning editors. Topics include Alternative Sources of Funding and Where Next for Factual and feature loads of big names in British telly like Peter Bazalgette, Roger Graef, and Stephen Lambert - plus some great doc filmmakers including Kim Longinotto, Brian Woods and Leo Regan.

I’m at Silverdocs till Thursday so shall be going to some panels of my own (including this frightening sounding trio: Does Public TV Have a Future? Future of Non-Fiction Storytelling, U.S. Factual Budgets Forecast). I only wish I could beam myself between the two events to take the televisual temperature on both sides of the Atlantic!

We had a fantastic evening of panels at Rooftop Films on Saturday night - and the rain was no match for the incredible folk at Rooftop Films and their magical Brooklyn Can Factory! My favorite quote from the evening has to be this from Esther Robinson during the Cinema and Social Justice panel: “Make your life good, don’t get in a lot of debt and do something meaningful.” Amen Sister!

Photo: Copyright Sarah Palmer 2008
Cinema and Social Justice: Simon Kilmurry (P.O.V.), Ryan Harrington (Gucci Tribeca Fund), Esther Robinson (Director, A Walk Into The Sea: Danny Williams and the Warhol Factory), Katy Chevigny (Arts Engine and Director, Election Day) and moderator Danielle DiGiacomo (IndiePix)

Photo: Copyright Sarah Palmer 2008
The Art of Short Film: Casimir Nozkowski, Signe Baumane, Benh Zeitlin, Duana Butler and moderator Mark Rosenberg (Rooftop Films)

Photo: Copyright Sarah Palmer 2008
The rain didn’t stop us!

I went to see Captured (Ben Solomon, Dan Levin and Jenner Furst) at Rooftop Films last night - on the Open Road Rooftop in the Lower East Side. It was an incredible night - feeling so plugged into the neighborhood, looking out over the ever changing skyline, and watching a film about a man, Clayton Patterson, who has tirelessly documented the LES for 30 years. Clayton’s photographs and videos tell a fascinating story of a neighborhood in constant flux - from the drugs and graffiti, the homeless and the squatters, the Puerto Ricans and old-time Jews, to the drag queens at the Pyramid Club and the hardcore boys who watched over them, and on to the encroaching gentrification of the late 80s and 90s. The film peaks in 1988 with the Tompkins Square Riots when the fight against gentrification was fought in the streets in pitch battles with police. The deal is sealed with the closing of CBGBs, celebrated and mourned with a final Bad Brains show, Clayton snapping away in the front row as he is moshed from all sides. Clayton was always there, constantly getting arrested and beaten up, working in tandem with his quietly powerful wife, losing teeth to tell the story of the neighborhood he loved and the people who lived there.

Still from Clayton’s footage of the 1988 Tompkins Square Riots.

The roof of the Open Road Rooftop has some amazing graffiti murals and sitting up there with Clayton in his signature embroidered cap, snapping photos of the audience (gentrifiers though we may be!), felt electric. A.R.E. Weapons provided much of the music for the film and they played a great set before it started, including my cheesy favorite Don’t Be Scared. If you live in NYC, or any city for that matter, and you care about what happens to communities and local histories you should see this film (and if you’re one of those people who keep moving into the horrible new chrome and glass buildings in my neighborhood you should definitely see this film!)

A.R.E. Weapons performing before the Rooftop Films screening of Captured with some of Clayton’s photographs projected behind them.

From XKCD.

Reframe, an online film distribution website from the Tribeca Film Institute in partnership with Amazon, launched today. According to their website, Reframe aims to solve the problem of rare or important works that end up without any means of centralized, convenient distribution:

Substantial amounts of film, video and media arts remain “stuck on the shelf,” inaccessible to large segments of the public. Sometimes this is due to rights-clearance issues, but more often it is because of the high cost to convert to digital formats that would allow for broad circulation. Even media that is available for distribution can be difficult to find because it is held and catalogued in many places, and in less than ideal databases.

Films are available to rent or to own - as downloads or as DVD-on-demand - to both institutions in the educational market and to individuals (depending on the film from the looks of it). The Hollywood Reporter describes the deal structures as follows:

The nonprofit TFI and copyright holders will split the profit on digital download rentals and purchases (distributed in Windows Media Player format) evenly. DVD sales will operate under a tiered system, with 40% of $50 and under titles, 85% of $51-$200 titles and 90% of more than $200 titles going to rights holders. More expensive titles will be aimed at the educational market looking for classroom materials, though rentals in the $4 range, lasting anywhere from 36 hours-30 days, are accessible to all visitors. Buyers must have an Amazon account to make purchases.

I haven’t had a chance to really check out the site yet but I’m excited to see how it develops and what sort of collections it builds. Have a gander - I’m very pleased that they’ve launched with Thriller, a rare 1979 film from Sally Potter who is one of our wonderful Shooting People patrons!