They’ve excelled at spreading the word with bewildering vagary, but what exactly is Moblogic, the brand-new brain-child of Wallstrip producers, host, and CBS? Well, I’m not sure I can describe it succinctly just yet, but I dig it, and not just because I met host Lindsay Campbell yesterday…
First things first, the page design is right on: a clearly labeled headline video beside easy-access tools for those of us who wish to promulgate and, below, more ways to explore and interact. ###
But design is design. How’s the show, you ask? Moblogic doesn’t reshape the wheel, but it does smooth its edges with well researched and written, fun-lovin’ and (kinda) funny non-news. Instead of regurgitating the same ceaseless headlines, Moblogic digs behind them on a daily basis. Today’s topic? What’s the real story behind Florida’s non-primary. Informative, relevant and provocative. Good stuff.
The hand of Wallstrip‘s creators is ever apparent. Moblogic‘s charm is in Wallstrip’s ingredients: a tight, well-researched topic — delivered by a chummy, self-effacing and pretty face — intermixed with wise-cracks sometimes aided by non-relevant pictures.
There are as many unique new ways of getting at Richard Linklater’s “big communication” as there are phrasings to this sentence. Somebody went and told this group of artists in Austin that the music industry was dead (as in dead), see, and we are all the big winners: they went all übergenius in the spot. Check out KUT 90.5‘s Retread Sessions.
The auteur behind Retread Sessions is Austin artist Paige Maguire, who recently told me that the project was created “for the local NPR affiliate public radio station here in Austin — we wanted to create high quality web content for the station by utilizing Austin’s unique landscapes and spaces, all while working along this path that many creatives are paving together… Our hope is to create high quality (they’re shot on handhelds, yes, but we are shooting in HD and using a production company to professionally mix each song) videos that can live on the radio and on the web.”
They’ve certainly done all of that. The recording quality of these sessions is fabulous: clean, crisp, well-balanced. This is studio-level fidelity, in particular the Do Make Say Think and Jose Gonzalez sessions. There is a decided preference in these sessions for musical quality as opposed to the sorts of spontaneous crowd infiltrations and awkward behind-the-scenes gyrations found in La Blogoteque’s Takeaway Shows.
These Austin creatives certainly have a taste for variant forms: Yacht’s See a Penny Pick It Up is a welcome reprieve from Retread‘s preference for precision; the video pulsates with sexual magic, though it has little do to with the faux metro-soft hipster doofushness of the singers and everything to do with the driving beat and gorgeously captured images of some sunlit Austin streets. There is a deep, crafted notion of fine detail in each video; clearly these musicians are some of the creators’ personal favorites.
The unique craft of Retread Sessions is that the performance environments truly compliment and extend the music. Session #4 finds Do Make Say Think sequestered in some kind of lost meadow, all of the place suffused in an eerie orange fluorescence, the artists patterned into a fan-shaped mass, mics and drums and people all surrounded by a lush grove. Technically, Do Make Say Think present a significant recording challenge. There are a total of nine musicians (including two drum sets) in this Canadian instrumental band to properly mic; all but three of these sing at some point during this performance of “A With Living.”
Austin being Austin, many of the musicians and bands featured on Retread are on their way some place else, but the project as a whole is truly an Austin thing.
Jose Gonzalez solemnly enters what appears to be the courtyard of a rundown house. The chipped, overrun walls form a beautiful contrast to the skin of Gonzalez female interlocutor. Rusty, smashed in coffee cans and broken slabs of cement dot the ground as the pair stand quickly up and stroll outside into a desolate Texas mirage. All of this somehow meshes correctly with the vibrations of Gonzalez as an artist: his reverent tone and the thick sound of his fingers against the guitar strings.
As the camera shot fades on Do Make Say Think, an unseen man says: “That doesn’t feel awkward at all” – an apt commentary on the Retread Sessions ever-evolving body of work.
The palette is extended by watching these short films. Emergent from this new and vibrant form is a different sort of art, and a glimpse at how good it can get, when there isn’t a Wharton graduate in a cheap-smelling Italian suit with his finger on the big red button.
Here’s a little SAT word problem for you. Movies are to Books as Web Shows are to ________? Pamphlets? Magazines? eBooks?
How about Pulp? Besides being the main pole in the Tarantino tent, Pulp Fiction is a genre famous for hot action on cheap paper. Well, web shows are printed on cheap digital paper. And because of that there are lots of them. And because of THAT it’s hard for them to stand out. So if you want someone to look at your little corner of the net, what are you gonna do? One way: salaciousness (which, I was surprised to discover, is an actual word). To use a horrible term that I would never use, you gotta put some tits on it.
Cue Ninja Babes from Space. Much like Snakes on a Plane, this show delivers exactly what the title promises. Ninjas. Babes. From. Space. If you are looking for more than that in a web show (or in life in general) you might want to go elsewhere, but if you’re a heterosexual, post-pubescent male, you also might want to ask yourself why you’re being such a d-bag.
The series is a showcase piece for the 3D digital rendering and production company, Impulse-FX and each episode seems to be made up of one part ninja fighting, one part Carrie-esque pun liners, and one part leather fetish exploration. Mix briskly with computer generated back drops add a pinch of plot and you got yourself a recipe for what I have dubbed ironography – like pornography with all of the sex replaced by irony.
Over e-mail, Dan Lantz of Impulse-FX explains how the show came to be:
###"The show came about as a joke that wouldn’t go away. We wanted to make a web series. We were joking that anything with hot girls, ninjas and science fiction was a big hit, so let’s just call it Ninja Babes from Space. We laughed about how absurd it was and forgot about it. BUT THE IDEA WOULD NEVER GO AWAY…. the more we thought about it we realized, ‘This is so stupid, it may actually be a hit.’ So we made it and the series has been a hit ever since.
I’d say the influence is the ‘Amazon Women’ Mythos and the ‘token femme fatale’ that is in seemingly every action movie since the beginning of time. There was always ONE hot girl who kicked butt, but never more than just token. So we decided, to make a whole TEAM of Femme Fatales – a sort of promotion for the forefront of a story… a funny idea unto itself."
Ninja Babes from Space centers around Sky, Ruby, Tara and Raven (whose name’s all correspond to their color uniform where appropriate), four bad ass babes from the cosmos who are on a mission to save their home planet and to dress like Comic Con booth chicks while doing it.
Things go wrong for the vixens when Raven, the dark and brooding babe, stabs her cohorts in the back ("What, did the black costume give it away?") and the foursome finds themselves a threesome facing a friend turned rival, which, and correct me if I am wrong, is pretty much the plot of Charlie’s Angels 2.
This show definitely has some McG to it. It’s fast (kinda), it’s furious (eh) and there are actual, real weapons in the show, much like the ones I dreamed of owning when I was 13. "We’re too low budget to use ‘stunt swords,’ Dan tells me, "so everything is real. Rest assured, no Ninja Babes were harmed in the making of this film.
But there are more to these ninjas than just samurai swords and sais. Each episode has a moment when you get to take a break from all of the <sarcasm> intense </sarcasm> fighting and just sit back and watch the babes. My favorite episode by far is Episode One: Temple for its depiction of a 1/2 sacred ritual, 1/2 lap dance Sky must do for a statue so it will give up its valuable jewel (which Freud would say represents…?).
There are only 4 episodes on the site thus far, each one encompasses half of an adventure. So after two adventures we have learned that the babes’ planet is in trouble and… well that’s about as much of the story as has been revealed. There is also a teaser (don’t worry, they didn’t miss the pun) which is pretty cool and a Valentine’s episode that bites a little too hard off Ask a Ninja for my taste, but again: Leather-clad ninja babes, so it’s totally worth watching.
Like any good Pulp, it would be wrong to call Ninja Babes good. The fighting is slow and predictable just a step down from Power Rangers, the bad guys are doofuses in Halloween masks, the stories are so cliche you can almost say the lines along with the actors.
But come on! These are babes! Babes who are ninjas! Babes who are ninjas in space! Even Tarantino doesn’t have any of those.
User-generated content contests may or may not be losing their cache, but regardless of success or backfire, their numbers appear to be increasing, and they’re definitely here to stay.
For brands and marketers, the online video events are a helluva lot easier to produce, provide more content and, most importantly, cost significantly less than dropping a few million at your local, fancypants, ad house on a 30- or 60-second spot. For filmmakers, they provide a means of motivation and create an opportunity for some unbeatable exposure. They also have some sick prizes.
“I entered a video contest that Converse was having a couple years ago, and even though I didn’t win, they still sent me a free pair of Chucks…My friend David Lehre (of Myspace: The Movie fame) won a couple of cars in a contest, and actually just appeared on Kimmel for winning another one. My friend Brad just won his second vacation (this time to Greece) from travel site Contiki.”
Justin always prefers the contests judged by panels as opposed to the online popularity events that measure how many friends you can get to vote for your video. They’re a better measure of quality and talent and offer “a great way for struggling freelancers and young upstarts to prove they kick ass.” Problem is, how do you find them?
Along with the talented, Southern Californian coder, Aaron Pollock (who you should e-mail at aaronpATthezipperDOTorg if you need a programmer/css guy) Justin started up Online Video Contests in late 2006. At the time, he had just started to dabble in the space and was ready to dig deeper to see what pieces of possible gold he could find for himself and his filmmaking friends. Plus, he was doing a URL search one day and saw the domain was available and figured he had to start something before someone else did (I totally know the feeling – why do you think we jumped on Tilzy.TV!?!).
He and Aaron came up with a streamlined information site, offering aspiring filmmakers only the essentials. The sleek, tumblr-like design informs would-be winners of what the contest is all about, how many days they have left, and how much they can win. For instance, in the next 11 days, there’s at least $80,000 up for grabs between seven competitions, including a shot at a $57,000 check from Heinz.
Justin tells me that he’s updating the list constantly and the site has developed enough online recognition to where he no longer has to do that much exploring. Many brands, marketers, advertisers, and other sites contact him whenever a new contest is launched. He’s also been able to get some sponsorship from eBillme, who runs a monthly Shopping Confessions contest with a $1,000 prize.
“These things are popping up all over now more than ever…They spread good will to the future of the industry, and toss mad bank to the lucky, and deserving winner. It’s a win for the brand, and a win for creativity.”
Before now, there wasn’t really any way to be sure. YouTube would announce the temporary bestowal of their editorial privileges and visitors to the homepage would have to guess if Michael Gondry actually likes that Hot For Words chick, or if her etymology and assets were appealing to someone else behind the scenes.
Right now, Billy Reid’s Very Tasteful is calling the shots, and true to his CBC ties, many of the picks feature Canadian talent. Though, aside from the Louis CK animation, I’d spend my entertainment time just watching Reid’s own creations (the electo-pop, synth-happy White Chicks & Gang Signs is always fun).
Not a huge update, but definitely a cool community tool that can give lesser-known artists (and the videos they like) another avenue of discovery and keep viewers in the know about wtf is getting prime placement on a page visited by tens of millions worldwide.
I don’t know how to say this, so I’ll just put it out there in the most straightforward way possible: There is a show called Retarded Policeman. And it’s funny.
Written and directed by husband-and-wife team Kim Evey and Greg Benson of Mediocre Films (one of the most subscribed to content producers on YouTube), the basic premise of the series is pretty much laid out in the show’s theme song: “He is a cop and he’s learning-impaired. He’s the retarded policeman.”
But, believe me, it’s so much more. Well, sort of.
Retarded Policeman, which is, incidentally, also the name of the main character in the show played by Josh “The Ponceman” Perry, is a scripted series about a delightful, adorable, completely corrupt, coked-up and cuddly LAPD officer with Down syndrome.
At this point, you should be either totally intrigued, incredibly disgusted, or both.
###In each of the six episodes currently streaming on YouTube, the Retarded Policeman pulls over an assortment of non-offenders for various reasons – he just wants to say hi, he has an itch that he can’t reach, he has a bag of apples that he wants to show off. Or, as is the case in episode four, he pulls over a guy just because the guy is black, and the Retarded Policeman, ever-innocent in his explanation, has learned that black people should be pulled over just because. Is this satire? Not really. Just very offensive. In fact, this particular installment should be problematic for anyone for a number of reasons.
Still, some of the funniest jokes ever told are offensive. And while there are those who maintain that the abhorrent, no matter how hilarious, always has a tinge of hatred, the trend in recent mainstream comedy (most notably with Farrelly Brothers movies, Curb Your Enthusiam and Family Guy) is to test that theory.
But we’ll get back to that in a moment.
In a statement on their YouTube page, Mediocre Films says of Retarded Policeman, “Before you leave mean comments, just know that our friend Ponce (the Cop) is an awesome and talented young dude who loves performing and making light of his Down syndrome. He’s a smart and funny guy, and has complete awareness of his actions and decisions. And we all had an awesome time shooting Retarded Policeman!”
Truth be told, Perry (who was recently cast in American Cowslip with Val Kilmer and Peter Falk) does seem to be having a good time with his character – there is no question that he he’s talented and gets into the role (aside: His MySpace profile reads, “I’m the #&$%n’ master!”). And it makes for more comfortable viewing when you come to terms with the fact that his character always has the upper hand in any given situation.
The really interesting thing about this series, however, is how we (and YouTube commentors) react to it.
Isn’t it wrong to portray the mentally disabled as drugged-up, racist and horny simpletons with a fondness for peeing in refrigerators? Isn’t it incredibly insensitive to allow Josh Perry to seemingly betray himself and others with his syndrome by playing a completely id-driven and absurd character, whose sole purpose is to amuse and shock us? Isn’t it unfair to give mean people just another reason to snicker at the mentally-challenged? Isn’t it uncouth to say ‘retarded’ in this day and age? In other words, isn’t it horrible to laugh at Retarded Policeman?
The humor in Retarded Policeman, and other popular comedies that challenge societal norms and political correctness, has a clever way of turning the focus of the viewer inward. A powerful device, if you get it.
Of course, there will also be people who will laugh just because of the way the Retarded Policeman says, ‘Byeeeeeeee,’ when a car drives off.
For the fully-independent sitdotcom, Life From The Inside, Kathy Harmening, Tanya Ihnen and Robb Padgett pull triple duty as producers, actors and off-set friends and significant others. A couple since college, Robb and Tanya met future co-producer Kathy as all three struggled in the often brutal Los Angeles acting scene, searching for a creative outlet that wouldn’t involve “background artistry.”
As series head writer and lead actor, Robb created his role of Mason, an agoraphobic novelty songwriter, who hasn’t left his one-bedroom apartment in five years. “We formed Katr Pictures and shot a short film together that I wrote and directed. We had a good time, so we decided to branch out into something more ambitious. A full-length web sitcom seemed like something new and different,” Robb explained via e-mail.
Mason achieves his dream of retirement at age 25, courtesy of several foreign language “hits.” However, in the first episode, he finds his bank account depleted by his ditsy manager Kate, who invested his funds in a crash diet plan. In spite of his isolationist beliefs, Mason finds his apartment continuously invaded by uninvited friends: the dimwitted, unemployed Guy and the snarky sommelier Ashleigh. There’s also the matter of his crush on the cute building superintendent Jennifer, a dark-eyed beauty from Washington State adjusting to life in Los Angeles and clogged toilets on every floor.
After losing his monetary cushion, Mason returns to work as a jingle writer and again contends with daily avoidance of the outside world. Check out the trailer for a breezy two-minute introduction and you’ll be caught up.
###With the standard webisode hovering at the three minute mark, Life dares to match the running time of a network broadcast sitcom. “We felt that the web community would find respite in a longer show. Everything else online is bite-sized and we thought that we might be able to set ourselves apart. The feeling being that hors d’ouvres are nice, but 50 crab cakes don’t make a meal. What we’ve found is that a lot of web viewers really like crab cakes. But the idea of the longer format is starting to catch on.”
With that length, Life shares more in common with old-school sitcoms like Three’s Company or Fawlty Towers than the new wave of doc-style web shows like Wainy Days or Derek and Simon. “Our biggest influences I would say were News Radio and Arrested Development. We were drawn from the beginning towards a more farcical type show. The concept of broad farce in a realistic setting was something we wanted to do.”
As with any farce, Mason’s problems involve evading compromising situations. His agoraphobia conveniently confines the budget-conscious show to the apartment, with rare excursions to a carport or driveway. In episode three, Mason ducks an amorous Norwegian reporter by hiding in his car, where a homeless man has taken up permanent residence. Even in the face of poisonous fumigation, Mason avoids vacating his apartment by cleverly manipulating feminine fascination with Guy’s motorcycle helmet.
Unfortunately, sometimes Life can feel like a throwback in more ways than one. Excessive dialogue and theatrical staging can seem downright anachronistic compared to the improv-heavy fare dominating internet comedy. The relative inexperience of the cast and crew is evident, but the achievement is still notable, and the characters have room to grow.
“Our expectations for the show have grown a lot. Not necessarily in the way of sponsorship or having someone pull a truckload of money up to the set, but we’re really starting to see what our show can be. Since Internet content has seen such a boon lately we have more viewers. And having more viewers inspires us to make the show bigger and better. Of course, we won’t turn down the truckload.”
To start, FastCompany.TV consists of two shows: ScobleizerTV, which covers the people and events around new media and technology…and anything else that interests its eager host, and Fast Company Live, which promises to use live streaming and mobile video recorders to create a truly interactive experience. (Mobile seems to be Scoble’s forte. Check out this video with the YouTube founders.)
Let Mr. Scoble himself explain the concept…
Fast Company and Scoble have done everything right, from user-interface to audience-interaction, and they make a point to create specifically for the new medium. There’s no question that this content appeals directly to the audience of Fast Company; I’m excited to see interesting application of live and mobile video technology that have just become to come into their own.
You don’t have to be a gaming freak to enjoy Play Value, ON Networks’ super-snazzy series about the history of the video game, which posted its twelfth episode last week. In fact, while hard-core gamers are sure to love Play Value, the show isn’t necessarily made for them, but rather for casual gamers, history buffs, or folks like me, who enjoy the trip down memory lane. (Truth be told, I haven’t purchased a gaming system since the early 90s, back when it was still cool to play “Super No-Friendo.”)
Each episode covers a unique topic–such as “The Fall of Atari ” or “Tetris: Splitting the Iron Curtain”– but the show’s creator and producer, Jeremiah Black, says that the best viewing experience is to watch the series from the beginning, as the narrative gradually moves from general topics to the more specific analysis of various gaming companies and certain key individuals.
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“The goal,” Black said of Play Value’s season one, “is to present the stories that only the hardcore fans know and bring the average Joe and Jill up to speed. Then we can get really in-depth. If you sit down and watch the shows in order, you’ll be totally caught up and by the end, feel as through you just watched a two-hour documentary.”
Don’t think, however, that just because Play Value aims to present a comprehensive history of the video game industry that it has the same allure (or snooze factor, as the case may be) as a PBS mini-series. Play Value is more along the lines of “ infotainment,” with a breezy, VH1 style evocative of I Love the 80s or Best Week Ever.
Over the weekend, I did some early, digital spring-cleaning and rediscovered this little filmic find. It’s two months old by now, but when your subject matter is an 85-year-old’s use of digital media, and that 85-year-old happens to be the “godfather of American avant-garde cinema,” it’s better late than never.
On January 1, 2007, Jonas Mekas’ Lithuanian-accented voice rang out in Williamsburg, Brooklyn’s Zebulon café, declaring the filmmaker’s intent to shoot a video a day for the following 364 and dedicating the effort to Francesco Petrarca – a Renaissance humanist with a love interested that, for a year, he just couldn’t shake. Twelve months later, on December 30, 2007, we see Jonas smiling to the camera, noting that even he had some doubts about the project, and thanking those friends that stuck with him along the way.
Between those two vids, there’s one for every calendar day in 2007.
### Jonas’ bio could double as the history of “New American Cinema,” but he’s probably most well known for his work with Any Warhol and a variety of Factory friends (aside: If you read POPism – and you should if you want a pleasant escape to 1960s New York’s gritty art-cum-party scene – you’ll find that although Jonas’ name doesn’t come up often, Andy regarded him with an incredible amount of respect and admiration). While Lou Reed exemplified the sound of the Factory scene, Jonas got it on film. For that reason, Day 361, when Jonas goes to New York City’s Union Square and splices decades old Warholian footage with b-roll from the present-day, is one of the best.
Despite the $1.99 download fees (you can’t expect an octogenarian to get all this new media stuff right), you can catch a preview for every day’s video. I’m not sure if it’s because the revered name of “Jonas Mekas” is attached, or that an 85-year-old filmed them (the media seems to like it when that kinda thing happens), or that the footage is just plain good, or if it matters, but the videos are worth skimming through. Evanescence captured for posterity through the trained eye of a master.
So, what’s next? Jonas is taking a break until July, 2008. At that point he’s starting 1,001 Nights. I’m sure Jonas could spend three consecutive years documenting his daily, nighttime adventures, but this time he’s asking for help. More details will appear on JonasMekas.com about how filmmakers across the globe can contribute their own footage to the project.
Marshall Herskovitz’s first glitter of stardom came with the creation of thirtysomething – a dramatic television series revolving around the angst-ridden lives of restless tercegenarians. Three years after that hit show ended, he would follow it up My So-Called Life – a dramatic television series revolving around the angst-ridden lives of restless teenagers. Last November, nearly 15 years after that cult show ended, he launchedquarterlife – a dramatic television series revolving around the angst-ridden lives of restless twentysomethings.
Keeping consistent with the dissatisfied theme and simply changing the age group (septuagenarians, you could be next!) seems to have been a marginally successful entertainment tactic, or at least it appeared that way until Tuesday night.
When the series was just a pilot, ABC let quarterlife fly by. With much fanfare, Herskovitz then retooled the show and launched it on the web. The high production value is an eye-pleaser, but I found the subject matter to be stale, tired and pretentious. It tried so hard to speak to me that it missed the mark. But others liked it and it did okay online. After its modestly good showing on teh internets, NBC scooped up the rights and premiered the series earlier this week on good ole’ fashioned TV.
Turns out, it bombed. Turns out, Herskovitz says it shouldn’t have ever really been on TV. Turns out, NBC proper dropped the series a day after its first episode and is moving it to Bravo. Turns out, I don’t care.
###I probably should care (perhaps I’m suffering from some kind of transposed Oscarbacklash). The fact that a show went from web to prime time, national TV is kinda a big deal, especially since it’s never happened before. In some ways, it displays the power of the new medium as a distribution tool and shows the evaporating line between broadcast television and internet-TV.
But Seth McFarlane’s cartooned, “cutaway-gag” goodness got a second chance because it had a lot of fans. Quarterlife had no such following. It got a new life because its creator is hooked up in Hollywood. He’s the president of the Producers Guild of America, has been a member of the industry’s elite for over 20 years, and has the means and contacts necessary to throw a bunch of marketing dollars at a mediocre product to find it a home.
The idea that a big budget show originally conceived for television took at pitstop on the web before actually being aired on television doesn’t turn me on. This is not a rags to riches story. What’s much more exciting are the Cinderellas of online video that are in some stage of transitioning from web to TV. The Lonely Island, We Need Girlfriends, God, Inc., and (to a certain extent) Sanctuary are much better examples of this “new era” of entertainment.
Now if 2/8 Life got some sort of TV deal, that’d be something to get excited about.
There are as many unique new ways of getting at Richard Linklater’s “
Here’s a little SAT word problem for you. Movies are to Books as Web Shows are to ________? Pamphlets? Magazines? eBooks? 
User-generated content contests 
I don’t know how to say this, so I’ll just put it out there in the most straightforward way possible: There is a show called 
For the fully-independent sitdotcom, 
Despite the $1.99 download fees (you can’t expect an octogenarian to get all this new media stuff right), you can catch a preview for 
