headbin

Post production - next steps

Alrighty folks, a large amount of housekeeping sorted, it's time to re-commence post-production and finish this baby.

RE-MIXABLE FILM DEMO (budget £5000)

Thanks to Westfocus there is a small budget available to package the work to-date. I need to put together a project team to make a 30-60sec AV demo.

Brainstorm and planning page

FILM EDITOR, Avid Media Composer (budget £500)

To fine cut the film asap, currently at 12min rough stage. Needs to be sci-fi savvy, understand the overall concept, and not be phased by all the VFX work in the mix. Probably 4-5 days work. To work out of edit suite at NATS, Soho Square.

Big hand to Richard and Charlie at NATS who are fully behind the project and very kindly donating facilities for offline and online. However, we need to supply the Editor and the search continues...

All leads and recommendations needed.

West Focus grant

MOD Films has been awarded a £10K business development grant from West Focus to refine the proposition into a 30 second demo and update our market research. Thanks to John Howkins for recommending the project and making the case for funding.

Laetitia leaving

Laetitia is leaving to take up a Producer job at The Mill. On behalf of everyone I'd like to thank her for her work on the project and wish her all the best in what will no doubt be an exciting gig.

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > AUGUST 02 > 2005

DRINKS NEXT WEEK

Take a break from the virtual and meet us for drinks at 9 Wyndham Street. Next Friday 12th at 6pm. Time to re-group and see who is still around. RSVP to Michela on 07775 840 950

http://thequality.com/contact.html

STOP PRESS!

West London investment group, West Focus, think Sanctuary is “way too ambitious” but they liked the preliminary demo (Michela’s jetlag notwithstanding) and have just offered us a small grant to refine the business plan. A show of support like this is just what the project needed. Thank you!

http://www.brunel.ac.uk/business/working/ventures/westfocus/

POSTCARD FROM LONDON

What a week. Michela writes up being back in London (after SEVEN months away) with 13Kg of film negative, about 85% of an offline edit, a stack of DV tapes, miscellaneous props including very grenade-like nanobats (pictured) which somehow made it through Customs, and a whole lotta admin still going on... *groan*

http://thequality.com/flics/10weeks/blog/archives/002170.html#002170

WILL LEAVES PROJECT

Thanks to Will Newton for a sterling effort in developing the demo over the last six months. It hasn't been an easy gig, working remotely and largely unassisted, in parallel with the shoot. He's now off to do further graphics wrangling in Leeds. We wish you all the best.

VIDEO TRACKING

Even with delays to post, the Sanctuary asset library is taking shape. Here is an album tracking individual plate shots (35mm and miniDV) used in the edit.

http://thequality.com/flics/10weeks/gallery/album61

MOD #1

It is not strictly a MOD but make some noise for team member Roger Bolton who has released a cool little CC-licensed VJ app called Quartonian. Exploring how this can work to demo Sanctuary’s Switch mode is going to be fun. And we’re working hard to distract Roger from his day job on small-fry flicks like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and some Harry Potter thing...

http://modfilms.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=145

URGENT HELP WANTED

Contact Michela direct if you can help with any of these urgent areas. No/low budget.

Linux Sysadmin

One day on-site needed for repairs or remote guidance

Pre-viz Art

Need help with tweaking info graphics placeholders for the offline.

Editing (in central London)

Need some fresh eyes on the offline and help setting up the edit over here (Avid OMFs/EDLs from Sydney) to re-work the beginning and insert some additional infographics.

HOLLYWOOD SPECIFIES THE DIGITAL CINEMA EXPERIENCE

The Hollywood movie studios have agreed on Version 1 of the Digital Cinema Initiatives specification for an all digital movie experience. No real surprises. Certainly no mention of sampling culture and no shortage of issues which are going to need help sorting out.

http://thequality.com/massive/weblog/archives/002172.html#002172

NESTA FINAL MILESTONE

Last week Michela submitted the documentation for the final NESTA Milestone - Finalised Design Document and Commercials Plan. On receipt of the final funding instalment, the investment will convert from a loan to an equity stake in the project.

Site design forum

More thoughts into the site design process would be welcomed around now in the forums.
http://modfilms.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=140

One thing I've picked up in my travels recently is that the simplest part of the project is also the hardest - how do we get across the concept of a re-mixable film in the shortest amount of time? So far, the best way has been to starting re-mixing Sanctuary on the fly with my little two-octave keyboard.

Another is how far we've got to go to make this SIMPLE and FUN for people.

How is this for a site design aspiration?

Get the idea within 30 seconds of looking at the modfilms.net home page.

Also on the cards, a call for pitches for all kinds of design goodies -

* information graphics for Sanctuary (both State and Activist)
* Sanctuary The Film web site
* modfilms.net phase one site

And that's just the beginning.

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > JUNE 01 > 2005

ANU PILOTS VIRTUAL EDITING PROCESS
Yesterday the Australian National University demonstrated a pilot project to make a multimedia work available on-line using XML technology. Essentially they took a published disk-based multimedia work and deconstructed it into the component images, text and audio. The relationships between the components were then documented using an RDF-like language and finally everything got stored in the ANU's DSPACE digital archive. Cocoon software was then used to reconstruct on demand several versions of the original work for on-screen and print use. Perhaps the ANU's approach could be used for a film like 'Sanctuary', especially since editing the metadata would create a new 'virtual edit' of the film.

BIT TORRENT SEARCH
The man behind the popular BitTorrent file-sharing program has set up a way of searching for torrent files. The search tool on Bram Cohen's website makes it easier to find links which can then be used to download large files. t was launched as US authorities shut down a prominent BitTorrent site, Elite Torrents, which had links to download the new Star Wars movie. BitTorrent has become linked to online piracy due its widespread use to distribute copyrighted material. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4587371.stm

iTUNES FOR FILMS
Sony is to make its top 500 films available digitally in the next year. Michael Arrieta, senior vice president of Sony Pictures, said at a US Digital Hollywood conference that it wanted to create an 'iTunes for films'. Films will be put onto Flash Memory for mobiles over the next year, said Mr Arrieta, and it will develop its digital download services for films.

iPOD VS ART
About six months ago, artist Francis Hwang was blocked from selling an unauthorized Special-Edition Negativland vs. U2 IPod on eBay's auction site after Apple complained it violated its copyrights. Sometime later Hwang decided to ditch eBay and sell the iPod on his own website with the intention of turning a statement about Pop Culture into a Free Speech issue, even if Apple should launch a legal challenge. To this day Hwang still hasn't heard a peep from the folks at Apple, which is really rather odd considering how eager Apple were to embrace the customization of their iPod by a series of notorious Artist/Illustators about a year before Hwang embarked on his Redesign Project. You can check out those iPod Skins Apple went gaga over right here: http://www.macskinz.com/MACSKINZ/artist_series.html

COPYRIGHT FREEDOM FIGHTERS QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"It's about time that the obvious esthetic validity of appropriation begins to be raised in opposition to the assumed preeminence of copyright laws prohibiting the free reuse of cultural material. Has it occurred to anyone that the private ownership of mass culture is a bit of a contradiction in terms?" - Negativland

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > MAY 25 > 2005

DVD TAGGING
Researchers in Los Angeles are developing a new form of Piracy Protection for DVD's that could make common practices like loaning a movie to a friend impossible. University of California at Los Angeles engineering professor Rajit Gadh is leading research to turn radio frequency identification, or RFID, tags into an extremely restrictive form of digital rights management to protect DVD movies. http://www.wired.com/news/digiwood/0,1412,67556,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_1

NEW MOD TOOL FROM SOFTIMAGE
Softimage, the leading developer of high-end software for all areas of professional visual content production (including tools for both 2D and 3D animation) has just released a nifty little tool to allow gamers to MOD their favourite titles if they are modelled/animated in XSI. http://www.softimage.com/products/Mod/v4

SPOOKY REMIXES THE REMIXERS
DJ Spooky, (alias Paul D. Miller), relies heavily on sampling in his work as a DJ and musician. So it shouldn't be a surprise that his new book and CD 'Rhythm Science' sample audio recordings of some of literature's most prominent Remixers like James Joyce and Gertrude Stein: writers whose work essentially 'sampled' other people's material. http://www.wired.com/news/digiwood/0,1412,67261,00.html?tw=rss.ENT

STORE WARS
If you wanna see an er... alternative and 100% Sith-free 'take' (as opposed to Remix) on the Star Wars saga by the Organic Trade Association, check out their groovy and horticulturally-aware remake of George Lucas' most renewable Meal Ticket here: http://www.storewars.org/flash/index.html

EXTRA SEN-SONY PERCEPTION
Imagine a movie or video game in which you can feel the bass, taste a flower, and with any luck.. even smell the coffee. Hey wait, that didn't sound right! Anyway I think you got the general idea, but sad to say guys.. Sony had the idea before you, and what's more.. they bloody patented it! http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=mg18624944.600

FEATURE FUTURE QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"If 3-D lasts, it will survive as a medium of its own, not as an add-on to a typical motion picture." - Petro Valhos

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > MAY 18 > 2005

BACKSTAGE WITH THE BBC
The BBC's latest project Backstage.bbc.co.uk is aimed at giving people who create computer programs, applications or graphics the chance to put their stamp on BBC digital content by offering a collection of feeds, and plans to offer APIs, and other tools for remixing and re-purposing the BBC's offerings in more flexible ways.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4538111.stm

MPAA IS DOWN ON TV DOWNLOADS
Continuing its war on Internet file-swapping sites, the Motion Picture Association of America claims that it has filed lawsuits against a half-dozen hubs for TV show trading. The trade association said that piracy of TV programming is growing quickly online, and that shows are as important to protect as big-budget films. This is the first legal action from the group that has focused most heavily on TV content. http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9588_22-5705142.html

RINGTONES FOR REMIXING
The new CD single 'Baby' from rapper Fabolous allows U.K. consumers to choose which part of the song they want to use as a mobile phone ringtone. Until now, the 30-second ringtone clips packaged with singles have been pre-determined by record companies. The Fabolous single from Warner's Atlantic Records includes built-in software that lets listeners isolate any part of the song and load it onto their phones. http://broadcastengineering.com/newsletters/audiotech/Ringtone-audio-remix-20050517

FEEDING FRENZY
If you're interested in a couple of very well designed and non Geeker-friendly (ie: easy enough for me and your mum to use) Newsreaders and RSS Feed Aggregators, may I recommend two that I've been using quite a bit lately.. especially to gather some of the articles you've been reading in our Newsletter. Feedmarker is a fast, funky and free Web based RSS/ATOM aggregator and bookmarks manager: http://feedmarker.com/index.php

Rojo goes the extra mile by not only giving readers the ability to flag stories they find important or interesting, but also by enabling them to draw on the insights of friends, family, colleagues, and others in their social networks, as well as its own in-house Online Community: http://rojo.com

POETIC SEMANTIC WEB QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"All the goods of the Information Age - All of the expressions once contained in books or film strips or records or newsletters - will exist either as pure thought or something very much like thought: voltage conditions darting around the Net at the speed of light, in conditions that one might behold in effect, as glowing pixels or transmitted sounds, but never touch or claim to 'own' in the old sense of the word." - John Perry Barlow

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > MAY 11 > 2005

LADIES & GENTLEMEN.. IT'S A WRAP!
"It is with great pleasure that I announce that Sanctuary wrapped principal photography on Saturday. It's been an incredible couple of months fraught with all kinds of political and technical mayhem but we made it, and the rushes look great. Thank you thank you thank you. Looking forward to working through the next phase of the project. It's all been worth it. Stay tuned for pics. Best.." .M.

AUSTRALIA'S DIGITAL MEDIA FUTURE
Brendan Harkin, the executive director of the X|Media|Lab, talks about how his international digital collaboration projects (including a new one shortly at 'Broadcast Asia' in Singapore next month) help Australia's digitial media industry by fostering both skills and relationships, as well as the creative, conceptual and technological issues that the creative industries face in the lead up to digital projects actually getting made. You can see a QuickTime Mac version of an interview with Harkin here: http://homepage.mac.com/jason_romney/NetvideoMOVBrendanHarkin040505.htm
or alternatively a Flash Video version for PC here: http://homepage.mac.com/jason_romney/NetvideoFLVBrendanHarkin040505.htm

STAR WARS 3 - REVENGE OF THE CENSORS
Star Wars' long-awaited Episode III 'Revenge of the Sith' will premiere tomorrow in 10 cities across the United States, but not without a 'generous helping' of controversy."The new Star Wars film is a 'bloodbath' which deserves its parental guidance PG-13 rating" a critic claimed after an early screening of the movie. 'Revenge of the Sith' is in fact the first Star Wars movie to receive a cautionary PG-13 rating in the United States. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/film/4513837.stm

STAR WARS GAME PRECEDES MOVIE RELEASE
In a bold move LucasArts decided to unleash their colossal Console Game for Episode III 'Revenge of the Sith' for both the Xbox and PS2 platforms weeks before the worldwide release of the film. If you can handle a Death Star's worth of spoilers, read on: http://ps2.ign.com/articles/608/608359p1.html

INTERGALACTIC BADASS QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"Don't be too proud of this technological terror you've constructed. The ability to destroy a planet is insignificant next to the power of the Force." - Darth Vader

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > MAY 4 > 2005

VIDEO SEARCH WARS
In recent weeks, Yahoo, Google and MSN have each rolled out services designed to make it easier to upload or locate video online. The portals' rollouts come as a handful of startups and independent film sites are creating tools to make putting video online nearly as simple as publishing text. Read article here: http://wired.com/news/digiwood/0,1412,67302,00.html

HURLUBERLU
Hurluberlu Films has been set up to bring to public attention a huge array of international short films, which, up until now have been unavailable outside their country of origin. As well as providing a bevy of engaging short films with comprehensive content descriptions and subtitles in English, German, Spanish, French, Italian and Portuguese, the site also aims to be entirely 'user-centric', allowing visitors to charter its progress. http://www.hurluberlu.com

CONCRETE TV
Concrete TV is the brainchild of Concrete Ron, a skilful video editor with a penchant for splicing up Cartoons, Cult Movies, Schlocky (and frankly quite shocking) ads, as well all manner of TV & Video footage in a veritable Megamix-style pastiche. http://www.concretetv.com

RESFEST FINAL CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS
Resfest is an international Digital Film Festival which aims to entertain, educate and inspire its global audience as the 'touring companion' of the bimonthly lifestyle magazine RES (which includes a 90-minute RES DVD in every issue). The Final Deadline for submissions to this year's Resfest are on May 13 so you better hurry up and put those final touches to your film by next week! http://www.resfest.com

UBERLORD OF SUSPENSE CINEMA QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"In feature films the director is God; in documentary films God is the director." - Alfred Hitchcock

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > APRIL 27 > 2005

CHINA TAKES ON THE PIRATES
China's music piracy rate is 90%, (or close to US$600 million), and reports would indicate that only a fraction of all music downloads from the world wide web are actually legitimate. In an innovative move, the Chinese government and Universal Music Publishing have partnered with R2G, a Chinese licensing and distribution company, to address digital music piracy. See full article here: http://research.yale.edu/lawmeme

ITALIAN DJ RECEIVES RECORD FINE FOR MP3 PIRACY
Italian authorities have shown their commitment to fighting the violation of copyright after the Italian Fiscal Police carried out a raid and seized a large quantity of material without the SIAE watermark (the identification tag used to recognise authorised copies of copyrighted material). An investigation leading up to the raid had discovered that a DJ from Rome (not from Sydney.. *wink*) was using around 500 video clips and more than 2000 mp3 files during his performances in a club in Rieti. Subsequently, an administrative fine of €1.4m was imposed on him. The fine is the largest recorded penalty to be imposed on an individual for music piracy in an European jurisdiction. The decision shows that the Italian legislature has chosen to adopt a stricter approach to the issue of illegal downloading and copying of musical content, and peer to peer related prosecutions against individuals are now an established reality not only in the US but also in Europe.

FRENCH COURT BANS DRM FOR DVD'S
And to conclude the unapologetically 'legal' theme of this week's Newsletter, here's how our French cousins dispense their justice. The French Appeal Court just issued a ruling preventing the inclusion of all anti-copying devices on DVD's. This decision follows an incident where a man was not able to copy a DVD he purchased onto a VHS cassette so he could watch it later at his mum's place. Allegedly this form of 'private copying' is considered a Consumer Right in France, so the man, with considerable help from a consumer protection group, was actually able to sue the Film Studio that produced the DVD. As it stands Film studios now have exactly one month to unprotect all DVDs. Sacre Bleu.. I certainly hope that this doesn't apply to the DVD's that we already own!

THE TIGER IS OUT OF THE CAGE
Mac's long-awaited all-new-better-improved Operating System Mac OS X Tiger will be available to customers all over the globe from 6:00 pm this Friday at a series of special events held at the company's retail locations and authorized retailers. PC users.. read'em and weep: http://www.macworld.com/news/2005/04/12/tiger/index.php

CELEBRITY LEGAL PROCESSOR QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"My grandmother always told me; beauty fades, but dumb is forever!" - Judge Judy

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > APRIL 20 > 2005

ADOBE ACQUIRES MACROMEDIA
In what is undoubtedly the biggest ever deal in the content creation and Web development sector, Adobe Systems Incorporated announced on Monday a definitive agreement to acquire Macromedia in an all-stock transaction valued at approximately $3.4 billion. The acquisition is intended to extend the company's lead in the market for creating and distributing digital documents. Adobe, best known for its Acrobat document-sharing software, said the deal would help it meet rising customer demand for audio and video documents and images that are compatible with handheld devices.

CREATIVE ARCHIVE FOR UK ONLY
After the massive build-up given to the BBC Creative Archive project, (a consortium of the BBC, Channel 4, BFI, and Open University), it's a bit of a disappointment to see that they've decided to spin-off their own license rather than endorse Creative Commons. It would seem that while the BBC has vehemently endorsed the exploration of free-for-non-commercial-use licensing for its content, it has simultaneously denied its benefits to the rest of the world since the license (as it stands) is explicitly for "use within the UK". http://creativearchive.bbc.co.uk

NIN GOES GARAGE
In a bold move to spread their Industrial Music even further afield, Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails has decided to release the new single from NIN's upcoming album as a GarageBand file to facilitate remixes by a legion of technologically omnivorous fans. Though by no means the first time a major-label artist has released a track to the public for remix, this is certainly the first time such a project has been as open to the common user. The repercussions to 'traditional' IP views in music could be beneficial to us all.

DIY FEATURE ANIMATION REDEFINED
Rustboy is a short film project that started out as a hobby but has evolved over time into an ambitious animated (not-so-short) film and several side-projects thanks to the lateral approach and dogged perseverance of its creator Brian Taylor. Interest generated by Taylor's elegantly designed and beautifully detailed website led to the creation of a book and assorted merchandise whose sales will ultimately help to fund the film. If you want to see a prime example of how the DIY approach can work across a variety of spectrums check out: http://www.rustboy.com

ANIMATION BIGWIG QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"You can design and create, and build the most wonderful place in the world. But it takes people to make the dream a reality." - Walt Disney

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > APRIL 13 > 2005

AND IN YESTERDAY'S HEADLINES..
Better late than never, the mainstream press have decided to report on our little drama with MEAA. Yeah.. and what's more we even made the front page of the Technology section of yesterday's Sydney Morning Herald: http://smh.com.au/articles/2005/04/11/1113071894581.html

PIXAR SKETCHES ON
The facility of being able to sketch on top of video is being used to good effect at Pixar where 'The Review Sketch tool' is emerging as a powerful communication device. http://millimeter.com/mag/video_tool_time_pixar/index.html

INDIE BAND PIONEERS BIT TORRENT DISTRIBUTION
The Decemberists claim to be the first band to be distributing a music video by Bit Torrent with the release of their clip for '16 Military Wives'. http://decemberists.com/16mw-torrent.html

OPEN SOURCE MEDIA PROJECT
Open-Media.org is an open source media project that seeks to expose, preserve, and advance works of grassroots creativity (chiefly, but not limited to, amateur video). http://www.newmediamusings.com/blog/2004/08/open_media_the_.html

BEAT PROPHET QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"Whoever controls the media, the images.. controls the culture." - Allen Ginsberg

Old news

Better late than never, the mainstream press write up our little drama with MEAA - front page of the Technology section of today's Sydney Morning Herald - http://smh.com.au/articles/2005/04/11/1113071894581.html

Nice picture of Simon Whipp, if anyone was wondering who's been trying so hard to kill the production here in Sydney.

Lucky the journalists seem to be on our side. The article was going to be more on Simon's more sensational media release quotes (donkey sex anyone?) but I seem to have convinced them to lay off till we get our shoot in the can. We've got enough of a job to do without someone seizing on this as a union-bashing opportunity. Enough politics, let's get back to making the film.

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > APRIL 06 > 2005

A FEW MORE WORDS FROM OUR LEADER
It’s been one of those weeks. For every setback, there’s been an exciting development. For every grindingly painful issue, there’s been joyful discovery. The worst news of the week is that the MEAA and supposedly SAG are trying really hard behind the scenes to scare people away from the project. And the best news? People are coming out of the woodwork to lend their quiet and not-so-quiet support.

The Australian Film Commission will not be endorsing the film, simply investing AU$50,000 for post and interactive work. But don’t believe everything you read in print. I read this week in a MEAA news bulletin that the Creative Commons Australia team are re-writing the Aus licenses to include performers moral rights (not a bad thing in itself). I rang them personally this week and found out that they’d said no such thing. Who’s zooming who you might ask… Information warfare is not science fiction.

I don’t know about you but I’m learning a lot about modern film-making that isn’t on the tin and that the bleeding edge still bleeds - one way of knowing you’re still alive they say! I’d be lying if I didn’t say it’s been a hard couple of weeks. But for those who’ve been pitching in for the last few weeks, months, and in some cases years, hang in there. It’s only a movie after all, but one that’s well and truly on the map now, before camera roll, without a penny or cent spent on marketing, and that can only mean we’re onto something. What exactly that something is, remains to be seen. Your contribution may be more important than you may realize. It’s a re-mixable film after all. And in the refrain of NBC President, Herb Schlosser, renowned for his caring sharing approach to producers pitching their wares - “Who cares?” Respect, .M.

YAHOO TRIALS CREATIVE COMMONS SEARCH FACILITY
Yahoo has become the first mainstream search engine to allow users to restrict their search to material that has only Some Rights Reserved. All rights reserved protection is a good thing for many authors and artists, but what about those who want you to use their work freely, without permission but on certain conditions? Yahoo's Creative Commons Search engine helps you quickly find those authors and the work they have marked as free to use with only some rights reserved: http://search.yahoo.com/cc

MAPPED OUT
Google has come up trumps once again by launching a new set of interactive maps that are draggable, in other words - no clicking and waiting for graphics to reload each time you want to view the adjacent parts of a map. If you wanna see something really mind-blowing, click on the 'Satellite' function. Who needs VFX when you've got Google Maps! http://maps.google.com

MEAA VS MOD FILMS
MEAA is up in arms over growing support for Sanctuary, but obviously not everyone is all that impressed with them right now! Film-maker, Playwright and respected blogger Brian Flemming writes: http://www.slumdance.com/blogs/brian_flemming/archives/001540.html

DEARLY DEPARTED RELIGIOUS LEADER QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"An excuse is worse and more terrible than a lie, for an excuse is a lie guarded." - Pope John Paul II (1920-2005)

Yahoo Creative Commons search facility

Massive: Yahoo trials Creative Commons search facility

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > MARCH 30 > 2005

IS HOME THEATRE THE NEW THEATRE?
On the eve of Hollywood's 'Golden Age' moviegoers would flock to a theatre's opening weekend to see new arrivals on the big screen. These days however, sales figures indicate that films gross considerably more during the first week of their DVD release as opposed to their first week in the theatres: http://www.usatoday.com/life/movies/news/2005-03-21-dvd-sales_x.htm

FUTURE CAST
FutureCast is a real-time face-scan technology being used to capture information from the faces of visitors to Nagoya's Mitsui-Toshiba Pavilion, and transporting them to the future world of Space Child Adventure 'Grand Odyssey'. http://www.mt-expo.com/index_e.html

FREE BATCH EXPORT UTILITY SOFTWARE
The Livid Batch Export Utility v1.2 is a simple program for recompressing and resizing a folder of quicktime media to a different format. It can also be used to compress movies for internet delivery and streaming, enhancing clips by adjusting the brightness and contrast, upsampling and resizing clips for use in a video editing program, or exporting the first frame as a still image thumbnail. Download it now for free here: http://www.lividinstruments.com/software_batch.php

EVEN MORE INSPIRATIONAL QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams." - Eleanor Roosevelt

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > MARCH 23 > 2005

EXTRA FUNDS
We are pleased to annouce the AFC has made the decision to give us extra funding of $50 000 to ensure that we stay and finish the Oz leg of the project. The crew would like to thank everyone who put in their efforts in making this happen.

SHOOTING DELAYS
With storms hitting Sydney left right and centre over the past few days, let's just be thankful that our team wasn't actually out in the bush (as scheduled) for the beginning of the shooting week. Well I guess everything probably happens for a reason so here we are back in development with a tighter leaner script, a bit more funding and a wad more experience under our collective belts: http://thequality.com/flics/10weeks/blog/archives/002047.html#002047

BBC CREATIVE ARCHIVE LAUNCHES IN AUTUMN
Thousands of clips from BBC radio and TV factual programmes will be free to download from the internet from this autumn, the BBC has announced. The clips, of up to three minutes, will be available for downloading exclusively on the BBC website: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/tv_and_radio/3525455.stm

CHANNEL FIVE BREAKS THE ICE FOR TV DOWNLOADS
Legal music download sites have become hugely popular but TV companies have so far not used the same technology to put programmes online. TV channel Five has said it will be the first UK broadcaster to offer parts of its shows for sale as legal downloads: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/tv_and_radio/4368435.stm

HEADS UP QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"The script definitely works.. so all that has to be done is to... make it on a shoe string. So make it!" - Jack Feldstein

BBC Creative Archive launches in Autumn

Clips will be three minutes maximum in length. No news on what formats and sizes will be available. Coming soon - the biggest player in the re-mixable film space...

BBC NEWS | Entertainment | TV and Radio | BBC launches online clips archive

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > MARCH 16 > 2005

ANOTHER WORD FROM OUR LEADER
Luke and Zoe are leaving the project at this point so there is a handover in progress. Please bear with me while we sort out the state of play and get a clearer view of what has been produced to-date so that loose ends can be tied up and the production can move forward. The meeting with the AFC went well today. A decision will probably be made tomorrow in Melbourne by the head of Film Development as to whether or not the AFC invests in the project. You'll find the rest of this letter here:
http://thequality.com/flics/10weeks/blog/archives/002023.html#002023

THE NERDS ARE TALKING ABOUT US
Even Slashdot have picked up on our project's recent run-ins with the MEAA. Read all about it here:
http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/05/03/15/2145245.shtml?tid=155&tid=153

HOLLYWOOD'S HOPES FOR BITTORRENT
The Washington Post notes that while the Motion Picture Association of America is waging war against illegal P2P file sharing, there has been no moves against BitTorrent developers and users directly. The paper suggests optimistically that this may be the key to legal distribution in the future. BitTorrent does have its issues, particularly when it comes to distributing content for which there is a markedly smaller audience, than say Harry Potter films, but it is definitely the one to watch and what other programs will evolve from.

DICK GETS RE-ANIMATED
Richard Linklater's faithful adaptation of Philip K. Dick's novel 'A Scanner Darkly' is being brought to full paranoid life via Bob Sabiston's gloriously surreal software abilities, which, as in the team's previous 'Waking Life', utilizes hi-def filmmaking overlayed with a rich, rotoscope-inspired animation. This time out, however, Linklater is eschewing the dreamy, existentialist look of that previous film in favour of a more realistic approach. The final look of the film resembles the most sophisticated animé (a la Ghost in the Shell/Innocence) drenched in a sort of hyperrealistic, painterly scheme that rests atop the talents of bankable Hollywood bigwigs such as Keanu Reeves, Winona Ryder, Robert Downey Jr and Woody Harrelson. Judging by the nature of the content, something tells me that Linklater wouldn't be opposed to someone taking on a remix of this little baby! Read the article here:
http://www.austinchronicle.com/issues/dispatch/2005-01-21/screens_string_all.html
and see the teaser here:
http://www.apple.com/trailers/warner_independent_pictures/a_scanner_darkly.html

SCIENCE FICTION GURU QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"The basic tool for the manipulation of reality is the manipulation of words. If you can control the meaning of words, you can control the people who must use the words." - Philip K. Dick

MOD Films Slashdotted

The geek grapevine is talking.

http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/05/03/15/2145245.shtml?tid=155&tid=153

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > MAR 09 > 2005

A WORD FROM OUR LEADER
Cheers Luke and thanks to everyone else who has put in time and effort over the last six months. This next week in particular is crucial. We’re attempting something that is a world first and this can never be taken away no matter what difficulties are ahead. This is not just a short film and we’re not just a film crew – this is an online community project of which you are the active members to-date. Respect... .M.

THE FINAL ROUND
Today was D-Day, the day the Media Entertainment Arts Alliance Board decided what they were going to do, or not do, for Sanctuary. "I don't know what it's like to be punched in the guts but today was a little like that I imagine.." explains Michela. For a full account of the Board's response go here:
http://thequality.com/flics/10weeks/blog/archives/002016.html#002016

WEB TV FOR NERDS
Robert X. Cringely, author of the best-selling book 'Accidental Empires: How the Boys of Silicon Valley Make Their Millions' is about to embark in an Open Source television program called 'NerdsTV.' It will be available on the web and playable on pretty much any system in three different video formats: one geared at techies, one for suits, and one with all the raw footage so you can edit your own version to your heart's content. There will also be audio-only versions in Ogg and Mp3. All of this is freely redistributable of course!

RANDOM MOTIVATIONAL QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete." - Buckminster Fuller

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > MARCH 01 > 2005

AND THE WINNER IS..
While our American friends are out toasting Clint's 'Million Dollar Baby'-blitz, the rest of us more down-to-earth film-making folks wish to congratulate Luke and the team for their winning Tropfest 2005 entry 'Australian Summer'. See details here: http://thequality.com/people/michela/weblog/archives/002004.html#002004

REMIX READING MATERIAL
Remix Reading is an artistic project based in Reading, UK. Its aim is to get local, national and global artists (working with music, video, paint, wood or any other medium that can conceivably be represented on a web site) to come together and share their work, be inspired by each others' work, and ultimately to create (you guessed it!) 'Remixes'. For more information check out their website: http://www.remixreading.org/learn

TRAILER TRASH
You know how a lot of Movie Trailers these days are nothing more than a 30-second summary of a film's pivotal scenes, well the folks at Angry Alien.com have taken this idea, added some Flash Animation (as well as a few bunnies) and ran a mile with it!! Though MOD'ers might argue that they've produced nothing more than highly entertaining trailer-style 'remixes' of popular films like 'Jaws', 'Alien', 'The Exorcist' and 'Scream', the creators themselves prefer to refer to their animations as 're-enactments'. You can view a few prime examples of Angry Aliens handiwork here: http://www.starz.com/se/features/hareraising/template.html?fname=index.html

BUGGING OUT
If you regularly use any of the web systems or software applications in development on this project, please take a moment to refresh yourself with the process for reporting bugs. If still in doubt.. just email us! http://modfilms.com/twiki/bin/view/Sanctuary/BugTrackerProcess

OSCAR QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"When the Academy called, I panicked. I thought they might want their Oscars back and the pawn shop has been out of business for a while." - Woody Allen (at the 2002 Oscars)

ANOTHER TYPE OF OSCAR QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"It is a very sad thing that nowadays there is so little useless information." - Oscar Wilde

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > FEB 23 > 2005

MISSED ON TV TONIGHT
The film 'Missed', written and produced by Dan Foster and directed by our own Divine Miss .M. will be screened on the Community Channel (21/2 and 23/2) at 9pm (Sky 585 and Telewest 233) as part of a shortened 'Night of Many Stars' film and music festival screening. Check channel listings for other times throughout the week. NTL and Freeview screenings will also follow shortly, but if you're peachy keen to see it without delay, the film can also be viewed online here: http://www.danfoster.org.uk

GOOD WEED
There's a revolutionary new music distribution system out there called Weed which uses Social Networking as a way of distributing music rather than relying on the age-old corporate sell. Anyone who buys a 'Weedified' song can share it - and if someone else buys it, the sharer gets paid and the artist gets paid. More specifically, the rightsholder receives 50% of each sale, you get 20%, the person who shared the file with you gets 10%, and the person who shared the file with that person gets 5% of the sale price. Weed collects 15% for processing. I'm keeping my eyes on these guys to see what potential the Weed Business Model might provide for sharing film & video content, if you wanna know more about them go here: http://www.weedshare.com

AUSSIES PIONEER NEO PORN DOWNLOAD SITE
Australian Neo Porn-producers 'Beautiful Agony' have come up with a ground-breaking concept for displaying their downloadable Porn Videos on the Internet. Apart from adopting a sophisticated and fairly minimal design style, (unusual to traditional porn sites), it is inherently their content which is unprecedented - imagine hundreds of head & shoulder shots of ordinary men and women lying down and having an orgasm, with no titties or genitalia on show whatsoever!! See article here: http://www.eros.com.au/journal.php?id=253

MOD FILMS - WHO'S WHO DOING WHAT
If like me you are often overwhelmed by the vastness of our team and can't get your head around the various tasks at hand and who is supposed to be handling which task and in what department, you may find the following chart of some use:
http://thequality.com/flics/10weeks/blog/archives/images/20050220_team_structure.swf

PROLIFIC 21ST CENTURY AUTHOR & GONZO JOURNALIST QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"The Edge... there is no honest way to explain it because the only people who really know where it is are the ones who have gone over." - Hunter S. Thompson (1937-2005)

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > FEB 16 > 2005

SEX-BOX
While many game-makers are perfectly happy for customers to play with released titles and circulate MODs in their communities, Tecmo have decided to put their virtual foot down! A lawsuit under the US DMCA has been issued against the now defunct website ninjahacker.net because users were swapping their characters' 'skins' with er.. presumably a lot less skin!! 'Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball' is a prime example, though ironically the original release has probably enough T&A in it to class as soft porn as it is! If a hearty combo of Sex, Sport and bloody Violence rocks your world read on:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/02/10/tecmo_sues_xbox_game_hackers

GOOGLE VIDEO SEARCH
Google is beta-testing an indexed video service on US television broadcasts. You can try a search using the ever-popular interface and call up what's on the box right here and now: http://video.google.com

EMAIL ALERTS
Want to keep up with team updates without necessarily having to post discussions.. or even visit the web? No shame. You’re a bonafide 'lurker' in Net-speak. Free email news alert services like http://www.bloglet.com are appearing all the time. Contact Michela for setup details!

2ND FILM UNIT ANYONE?
Nicola and Michela are exploring how a volunteer 2nd film unit might work and Michela is keen to see this tied in with plans to let the MOD'ers cut away at the er... 'guts' of the film: http://modfilms.com/twiki/bin/view/Sanctuary/DemoDesign?topic=ProjectMarketing

MARKETING LEADS
MOD Films would dearly appreciate any marketing leads you guys may have at the moment to help us get a feel for who knows 'what' about the project now and who needs to know 'what' at what stage later. This is important not just for the 'buzz' and general sponsorship leading up to the shoot, but also for the online community aspect of MOD Films.

SPONSORSHIP LEADS
Deep pockets? Rich friends? Benevolent employers? Our sponsorship package for the film will soon be ready (well I should know, I'm designing the bloody thing! Oh and thanks for the feedback on Draft #3 by the way Luke!) Anyway... once again all leads are welcome people!

ALMOST 'CULT' MOVIE QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone when you're uncool." - Lester (Almost Famous)

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > FEB 09 > 2005

TROPFEST FINALIST
Heartfelt congrats to Luke, Nicola and James whose film 'Australian Summer' is a finalist in the 2005 Tropfest Short Film Festival. Tropfest is the world’s largest short film festival and there was a record number of entries this year - a whopping 792 shorts!! Blimey... I can still remember when the films (usually about a dozen or so) were shown on two monitors in the Tropicana Café on Victoria Street, coz that's just how old I AM!! For a full program of this year's event to be held in Sydney's Domain on Sunday 27 February, check out the official site: http://www.tropfest.com

MP3TUNES
People will pay for convenience, not access. Online businesses are finally starting to wake up to this! Michael Robertson, former MP3.com chief, speaks out about online music sites on the eve of launching MP3tunes which imposes no DRM restrictions on subscribers, see article here: http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1558,1758970,00.asp

IS MOD FILMS FRIENDLY ENOUGH?
Michela and I have been discussing at some length the 'look' of MOD Films to outsiders who may be approaching us for the first time, as well as ways of communicating not just what our product DOES, but where we're going with it in general, via a separate style of branding for both MOD Films.com and MOD Films.net. If you would like to add your input in this discussion (regardless of what department and area you're working in) please feel free to have your say in this forum thread: http://modfilms.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=54

REGARDING AUTO ANNOUNCEMENTS
Since a few of you have been asking.. this is the status of 'Auto Announcements' as it stands in MOD Films:
* We send out a weekly newsletter each Wed.
* Every 30 mins the headlines are updated across all systems here:
http://modfilms.com/teamsanctuary/news.html
* To set up a newsfeed to your own systems to track specific areas, contact Michela for tech support.
* If you post to a discussion forum, by default, you will receive an email when someone replies to it.

UBER-GEEK QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"Be nice to nerds. Chances are you'll end up working for one." - Bill Gates

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > FEB 02 > 2005

SO THE INTERACTIVE STORY GOES
Another interactive story-telling consortium has been unveiled, this time with a call for people to join an 'Open Community' to help define the project's software authoring tools for interactive storytelling. The ultimate aim of the project is to release commercial software.. so only time will tell how this pans out! For more details check out the Inscape site: http://www.inscapers.com/

BOJOU BREAKTHROUGH
2D3, makers of professional camera tracking and matchmoving software, have decided to make their flagship product Boujou available to the production! We're thrilled to bits (or bytes even) because 2D3 are presently at the fore-front of augmented reality research. See: http://www.2d3.com/jsp/company/press-article.jsp?id=469

TO TEST OR NOT TO TEST
We are currently looking for 20 brave souls within the team to test our first demo – 'The Complete (ly Re-mixable) Works Of Shakespeare'. So what (thou might ask) does this entail? Well... only about fifteen minutes of your time actually!
* Reply to this email. If you're too busy or not interested, no problem.
* If you want to test a specific play, let us know (we've got 37 of Bill's finest to choose from).
* We're looking for 20 testers. All you need to take part is a PC and permission to install software on it.
* Wait for your download details.
* We'll send you back a download link and simple instructions how to install and run it
* Play with the demo
* Answer a few survey questions provided

EVEN MORE TESTING
Testing the first code milestone got off to a shaky start when it emerged that the RIG was not responding to 'key-presses' on certain machines. Hmmmmmm.. *followed by copious amounts of swearing* it would seem that you really can't cut corners when it comes to testing!! http://modfilms.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=102

UNLUCKY WITH LUKE
If like me you've been er... a tad unlucky in trying to get hold of Luke Eve lately, well the man just asked me to let all ye faithful Sanctuary Newsletter-readers know his new contact details... and they are: lukeeve@moresauce.com.au

SHOOT DATES
A quick reminder for all concerned (and the rest of us living on the edge of virtual reality) that the Shoot Dates have been locked down from March 22nd to March 28th. Yes you've got just enough time to order a really 'brill' meat pie from that bakery down near Manly Wharf..

DINKUM AUSSIE WISDOM QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"Australia is an outdoor country. People only go inside to use the toilet. And that's only a recent development." - Barry Humphries

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > JAN 26 > 2005

WELCOME ABOARD..
Renae, Alexandra, Rob, Ben and lastly Maria.. our 100th member!! Currently head of IT, Maria Ingold has an extremely diverse background which spans technology, writing, art, and even modelling. To find out more about her go to: http://www.mireality.co.uk

MOD JOB NOTICE
We are currently seeking a Corporate Lawyer - fundamentally someone who can set up our equity (shares) structure for MOD Films investors. We are also looking for a media accountant. If you know anyone suitable for either of these positions, please don't hesitate to contact: la@modfilms.com

REMIXABLE FILMS IN SOCIAL NETWORKS
Over the past few months Michela and I have been busy putting our 'cyber-feelers' out in various Social Networks all over the web to garner interest in Remixable Film Technology. At present you can see either of us moderating away in the following Online Communities and under the following names..

Tribe: 'Re-mixable Films': http://remixablefilms.tribe.net
Gonobo: 'Remixable Films': http://www.gonobo.com/grps/remixablefilms
Orkut: 'Remixable Film Technology': http://www.orkut.com/Community.aspx?cmm=1161618
MySpace: 'Remixable Films': http://groups.myspace.com/RemixableFilms

NEW SCHOOL SWORD & SANDAL EPIC QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"Fortune favors the bold" - Alexander (Oliver Stone, 2004)

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > JAN 19 > 2005

WELCOME ABOARD..
Mariai, Mim, James, Nicola, Leeanet, Tiare, Luke and Shaun!! Dave Newman, from Faith Martin & Associates, has also just joined us as Casting Director. Faith Martin & Assoc. is a leading Sydney Film and TV casting agency which has worked with many leading actors (e.g. Mel Gibson, Russell Crowe, Hugh Jackman, Rachel Ward) and directors such as Baz Lurhman, Bruce Beresford, Fred Schepisi, and Rolf de Heer.

DIGITAL EVENT IN LONDON NEXT WEEK
The UK Film Council is organising an event on the 27th of January to look at how digital technologies are impacting on the ways film content is made, marketed, accessed and enjoyed. Particularly aimed at those with diverse stories and different-from-the-mainstream voices, it will consist of hands-on workshops, sharing ideas with innovators and peers and panel discussions with pioneers and experts. For more info and a copy of the brochure go here: http://www.ukfilmcouncil.org.uk/filmindustry/digiconf/

TSUNAMI RELIEF FUNDRAISER THIS FRIDAY
Aidasia have put together a fabulous line up of DJ's and Live Acts to raise funds for victims of the recent Asian Tsunami devastation this Friday night Januray 21st at Wild (Mumbai Rouge) - 4 Wild Court Holborn, WC2 London from 9.30-3am. For the full line up and Guest List details go to: http://www.aidasia.org.uk/

GOT A QUESTION
Just a quick reminder that there is a forum set up for General Enquiries, help, support and what-have-you that no one seems to be using. You're all tending to email Michela directly for problems, finding things etc. when there's a more useful place to stick general questions, no matter how trivial: http://modfilms.com/forums/viewforum.php?f=10

B-GRADE SCI-FI QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"The world needs a wake up call gentlemen... we're gonna phone it in!" - Gilbert 'They Live'

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > JAN 12 > 2005

MILESTONE HAT TRICK
We hit our milestone on time and NESTA have approved the next funding installment. Well done everyone who helped get us there.. that's three in a row... HOWZAT!!!

PLUGGING A PLUGGER
Plugincinema.com was founded by Ana Kronschnabl just over 5 years ago. Over that time Ana has put such a huge amount of effort into the site, and promoting web film-making in general, that we figured a little recognition for her efforts was way overdue. If you wish to support us (in supporting her) we ask that you nominate Ana for the Electronic Freedom's 2005 Pioneer Awards. If you wish to do so, then simply send an email to: eff@pioneer@eff.org - state who you wish to nominate (Ana Kronschnabl of plugincinema.com) and why (for her work in advancing the ideas and practice of internet film-making and by furthering the democratisation of the media.) For more information on the Awards see: http://www.eff.org/awards/pioneer/

BIT TORRENT WARS
Two of the largest Bit Torrent tracker sites have gone down, Supernova.org and TorrentsBits.com, with commentators suggesting that the Motion Picture Association of America is behind this. The end of file sharing as we know it? See article at: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/12/19/suprnova_stops_torrents/

MASS-EMAIL MADNESS
My apologies to any (or ALL) who got the previous Newsletter about a gazillion times. Michela and I have been testing the phpBB Mass email function (and design layout) in the MOD Films Forums but er.... it's still a little rusty! Better luck THIS time heh...

INSPIRATIONAL AUTHOR & CRITIC QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"Interpretation is the revenge of the intellect upon art.." - Susan Sontag (1933-2004)

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > DEC 22 > 2004

OPEN SOURCE TV TUNER
Mark Pesce, author of 'The Playful World: How Technology Is Transforming Our Imagination' and Digital Media Programme Lecturer at the Australian Film Television and Radio School, has published a very interesting talk on how Open Source TV Tuner technology could be combined with DRM Micropayment Systems and P2P Networks to open the floodgates on internet distribution. Read all about it here: http://www.disinfo.com/site/displayarticle4565.html

RE-MIXABLE OR REMIXABLE??!?
To hyphenate or not hyphenate.. that is the question! MOD Films features rather prominently in any Google-search for 're-mixable films', but will this segmentation of the words effect the shelf-life of remixable films? Hmmmm.. let me check my tea leaves!!

PASSWORD? WHAT PASSWORD??!?
If you've forgetton your password but are too chicken to say so.. I'm just gonna turn the lights off, and while I do that you can follow the next link... and NOBODY will ever ever know ok!! *turns off overhead light and waits patiently in silence.. trying desperately to remember the words to that stupid Dire Straits song about Romeo and Juliet* http://modfilms.com/forums/profile.php?mode=sendpassword

ANYBODY REMEMBER VIRTUAL REALITY?
Here's a pretty decent overview of where virtual reality fits into the 'money game' from 1980 to the present day. So did Will Gibson get his just desserts.. or JUST a steak and kidney pie?? hmmmm, I wonder!!
http://boxofficemojo.com/genres/chart/?id=virtualreality.htm

HO.. HO.. HUM
While Michela is working around the clock on the fliq (and her computer tan) Santa wanted all you Sanctuarians to know that you've all been very good this year, so he won't be bringing you yet another bloody Aromatherapy Candle this Christmas!!

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > DEC 15 > 2004

MICHELA WRITES
"I’ve been running around like a maniac for a week over here, meeting producers, co-conspirators and generally get the low-down on how and where to shoot this thing. Fluctuating between searing heat, windy overcast patches and torrential downpours, Sydney is a different kind of beast and that’s the idea after all. We can make the bush stand out as a character and capture something of its essence.."

NEW SUPERMAN MOVIE BEING SHOT IN OZ
Superman V, is currently revving up for production behind closed doors. Guess we're all keeping our collective EAR to the ground to see what remix potential might be in store! I wonder if they'll super-impose Chris Reeve in it in the same way the 'Sky Captain' people digitally resurrected Sir Laurence Olivier!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/arts/3926465.stm

BLAKE PROFILED
Get a full specs profile of our heroine (and cool-ass pic) here:
http://thequality.com/flics/10weeks/blog/archives/000191.html#000191

PROLIFIC AUSSIE ROCKSTAR QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"It’s just as difficult to live in a self-made hell of privacy as it is to live in a self-made hell of publicity." - Michael Hutchence

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > DEC 01 > 2004

FREE FOR ALL COMMUNICATION TOOLS
Looking to cut down bills? MOD Films is trying to put as much of the
funding on-screen as possible! So we recommend you try this FREE
web-to-SMS service for up to 8 texts a day: http://www.sms.ac

OR how about a FREE Internet telephone at: http://www.skype.com

OR maybe a FREE IM.. guaranteed to function across MOST networks:
http://www.trillian.cc

And yes... it's ALL ABSOLUTELY FREE... *or your money back!*

SYDNEY-BOUND
Michela is jetting off to Sydney on Friday to set up camp for the
production and secure us the services of a line producer. Laetitia
will be managing the London office in her absence.
http://thequality.com/flics/10weeks/blog/archives/001865.html#001865

ART DIRECTOR
Damon O'Connell has been appointed Art Director for the overall
project (taking over from Michela) in order to steer the development
of Concept Art in a forward path. Yep folks... we have our first Head
of Department!! *crowd roars... well sort of!*

CONSOLE TEAM DOUBLES IN SIZE
Will Newton will be coming on board this Monday to begin work on the
prototyping of The Rig and other cool re-mixable film tools. The first
project code was checked by Robin earlier this week as work on Demo
Milestone1 gets underway.

GLOBAL JOB NOTICE
We're currently seeking a post house and character animator in
either the UK, US or OZ so if anyone from the Team has any 'good friends'
they'd like to recommend, please email Laetitia: la@modfilms.com

70'S KILLER ANIMAL SCREENPLAY QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"Lifeless eyes, black eyes... Like a doll's eyes" - Quint

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > NOV 24 > 2004

WELCOME.. to our second new-better-improved edition of the Sanctuary Newsletter. My name is Alex Zinzi and I'm your MOD Films Community Host, but until our community is certifiably up and running, I will be editing news items & general info relating to our project in a simplified format and post it to all the team members in the middle of each week.

AT LONG LAST... AN ANIMATIC!
To kick things off with a mighty left foot, we finally have a 1st draft animatic of our MOVIE!! *waits for applause to finish* Obviously it's a bit crude for the time being, but do bare in mind that this is the first full run-through we've had. So if you wanna see Blake & co in action you can stream the animatic directly from our Headbin Site:
http://thequality.com/flics/10weeks/blog/archives/001841.html#001841

LINGUABOT EXPERT JOINS TEAM
Linguabot expert Phil Hall has joined the team this week to look at ways in which a CD can function as a film character, online community bot, and dev knowledgebase personality.

MICHELA PITCHES AT SCIENCE MUSEUM
NESTA gave us the opportunity to pitch our projects to an attentive audience at the Science Museum. You can hear Michela's pitch here: http://thequality.com/flics/10weeks/blog/

OZ JOB NOTICE
MOD Films is still looking for a Line producer from Australia to start ASAP. If anyone you know would be suitable for the role please send us an email... Cheers! http://modfilms.com/archives/20040615_wanted_line_pro.html

SILLY SCI-FI QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"No matter where you go... there you are!" - Buckaroo Bonzai

SANCTUARY NEWSLETTER > DEC 01 > 2004

FREE FOR ALL COMMUNICATION TOOLS
Looking to cut down bills? MOD Films is trying to put as much of the
funding on-screen as possible! So we recommend you try this FREE
web-to-SMS service for up to 8 texts a day: http://www.sms.ac

OR how about a FREE Internet telephone at: http://www.skype.com

OR maybe a FREE IM.. guaranteed to function across MOST networks:
http://www.trillian.cc

And yes... it's ALL ABSOLUTELY FREE... *or your money back!*

SYDNEY-BOUND
Michela is jetting off to Sydney on Friday to set up camp for the
production and secure us the services of a line producer. Laetitia
will be managing the London office in her absence.
http://thequality.com/flics/10weeks/blog/archives/001865.html#001865

ART DIRECTOR
Damon O'Connell has been appointed Art Director for the overall
project (taking over from Michela) in order to steer the development
of Concept Art in a forward path. Yep folks... we have our first Head
of Department!! *crowd roars... well sort of!*

CONSOLE TEAM DOUBLES IN SIZE
Will Newton will be coming on board this Monday to begin work on the
prototyping of The Rig and other cool re-mixable film tools. The first
project code was checked by Robin earlier this week as work on Demo
Milestone1 gets underway.

GLOBAL JOB NOTICE
We're currently seeking a post house and character animator in
either the UK, US or OZ so if anyone from the Team has any 'good friends'
they'd like to recommend, please email Laetitia: la@modfilms.com

70'S KILLER ANIMAL SCREENPLAY QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"Lifeless eyes, black eyes... Like a doll's eyes" - Quint

Update on Phillip Noyce

The good news is I'm keeping in regular contact with Phillip Noyce's assistant Beatriz in LA and as of last night, the word was "Phillip has read the material and is making notes".

The bad news is that I still haven't managed to make direct contact with him to get a sense of how he can be involved in any sense. He's now busy editing a pilot now and no-one will confirm when he'll get back to me.

We can't afford to wait anymore so it's time to press on in terms of sourcing a producer or line producer.

The WIRED CD: Rip. Sample. Mash. Share

http://creativecommons.org/wired/

Beastie Boys, David Byrne and others give away sampling rights to help kickstart the new CC licenses.

Review of interactive fiction book

Slashdot review of "Interactive Storytelling: Techniques for 21st Century Fiction"by Andrew Glassner:

http://books.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/10/01/1736200&tid=192&tid=186&tid=127&tid=6

Team Sanctuary homepage

Thanks to all your feedback, the virtual team has a new home.

http://modfilms.com/teamsanctuary

You are all invited to use the Wiki as a starting point, but if that means goobledigook to you, or comes across as far too intimidating, then simply bookmark this address.

Thanks for bearing with me as we build a logical structure around a new paradigm. It'll be worth it. Promise! {:-)

First re-mixable feature

It's off and rolling... film will never be the same.

Outfoxed - first re-mixable major motion picture

NESTA Milestone 2 passed

Good news mid-week. NESTA have green lighted the next stage of funding. We hit the second project milestone last week (Interactive Design Document) on schedule.

Here is my report on the last stage. The red (tracked changes in Word) is simply to indicate where things changed from last milestone (it might be easier to read if you Accept them all).
http://thequality.com/flics/10weeks/blog/archives/docs/20040906_nesta.doc

As described in the report, we've tried to slow down the cash-flow to the absolute minimum to give us more time to get the right people onboard and plan properly for the work ahead. Still looking for in particular for developers and designers across the console and community departments.

This is the fun part now, doing the design, and where we can be most flexible. The revised plan is to move into pre-production (with a solid two months of concept visualisation done) by end of October at the latest.

Re-casting the project as a MOD team has already started to pay off in terms of interest and contributions. Special note to Basil Kinghorn (fashion designer) and Simon Duric (illustrator) who've broken the ice on the concept art phase. Simon showed up with ELEVEN sketches for our first meeting this morning. I'm (almost) speechless.

We're working hard to ensure that the line between volunteer and comissioned contributor is clear and that all the work is captured for prosterity. Thanks to Ken for his constant attention to Sanctuary secret HQ and helping me prioritise the issues of the day. Thanks to Archie for taking weight off my shoulders re. our legal wrangling around licensing. Thanks to Christine for guiding us through the State's growing mountain of paperwork. Thanks to Alex for his work on the modfilms.net community design, the blueprint for how we find an audience.

Warm welcome to the newest members of the headbin - Frank Tiddeman, (tech architect), Marcus Gillezeau (film-maker), Ross Howden (film-maker) and Christian Hogue (vfx artist).

Feel free to chat amoungst yourself. Until modfilms.net launches that's what the Yahoo Group is for.

Off we flee to level three!

.M.

Oddworld endorse real-time movie-making

Massive: Oddworld Inhabitants talk Stranger

First NESTA milestone passed

We hit the first project milestone today (Business Set-up) scheduled for the end of the month. Great start!

I'm going to need all the time to spare to get the first cut of the design documentation done by the end of Aug. That's the point at which HOW this gets done gets written down in detail and cut back to a scope that's achievable. I'll be looking to you all for the help you can muster.

As alluded to in the report to NESTA below, it has been a hard month in terms of sourcing people for the next phases. I'm still looking for a python programmer to assist me in tools creation and only two film producers (both very promising) have been interviewed.

Warm welcome to new members of the team Kate Griffiths-Lambeth (HR advisor to the stars), Tim Donlevy (biz dev advisor extrordinaire), and Alex Zinzi (globe-trotting community curator of all that's cool, kitch and new).

Big thanks to everyone who's chipped in this month especially ChristineC on the finance side, ArchieM on the contracts, MikeE (for virtual set work on the short film MISSED I'm directing - good food for thought re. SANCTUARY's Bush Bash sequence), RobB for unwittingly throwing my entire online distribution plan into welcome disarray, PaulM for yet more list server capability and MattP lending a hand with that most glamorous of chores, sysadmin and many more for bits and bobs that make all the difference.

Game on!

My report to NESTA.

xxx

WB blocks fan films from ComicCon this year

After the critical success of Batman: Dead End at last year's ComicCon convention, Warner Bros have had a word with the organisers to ensure that there is no competition this year with the official product on offer.

http://www.comics2film.com/StoryFrame.php?f_id=8019&f_sec=16

Union Entertainment

Thanks to Stephen for spotting the Wired Magazine piece on Union Entertainment, Hollywood's supposed first company for developing film/game titles as one. On their slate is an action/rhythm title called Johnny Whatever ("1984 meets Parappa the Rapper"). Gitaroo Man anyone? {:-)

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.07/play_pr.html

An interview with one of the company founders:
http://www.homelanfed.com/index.php?id=22862

Day 1 of the NESTA funded phase

We're off and running. Finally...

Michela and her bucking flog

G'day folks. Time for another update.

It is with considerable pleasure and no small amount of relief that I can announce finally that the deal for year one funding of MOD Films has been concluded. I've got a signed contract back from NESTA and a seven stage project to deliver cinema, console demo and community dimensions of SANCTUARY is about to get underway.

More details on the plan as evolved from the proposal will be unveiled soon. It's crunch-time for a lot of decisions and I'm doing my best to get the balance right.

In response to your feedback, we are going to make a short video which can act as a more independent induction tool for new members of the project and help communicate the overall idea. I'll be soliciting feedback on this shortly.

We aim to shoot the film sometime between December 2004 and March 2005 and go into production of a PC-based re-mixable film demo immediately afterwards.

To get us to that is going to require a huge amount of effort, world-class creative and business leads, no shortage of good karma, and considerable good will. Hope you're up for it.

Talk to you soon.

.M.

PS. Anyone lurking who feels they should no longer be receiving this due to conflicts of interest, etc... now would be a good time to let me know and exit gracefully.

NESTA application put back

Just had a long call with Ian @ NESTA. Bottom line, the project is recommended to go to the board but with several reservations and there’s 18 applications (normally around 5) lined up for this committee…

So I’ve agreed to take his advice and not put the application forward till the March 25th board meeting (papers sent out on the 12th). The assessment to-date is that NESTA should fund this but that there is some work to do to make the application more palatable.

The areas we’re going to work on uptil then (with Ian’s help) are:
• identify interest and names for film producer and game producer roles
• get in touch with Sony and Microsoft for expressions of interest
• reduce the vision somewhat so that NESTA re-couping their investment is not primarily based on 10weeks being greenlit (identify other opportunities with other films)
• gather more market evidence (“harder nuggets”) as to why the target market will like this

Slightly painful news but not bad news. As it was just put to me, if they didn’t feel that this was worth funding then the proposal would have simply been put to the board with a recommendation not to fund, end of story.

Any leads or thoughts relating to above please let me know.

Otherwise stay tuned…