Tag Archives: storytelling

Traditional Media Naivete

Excerpt from MTV News article, Bryan Singer’s ‘H+ The Digital Series’ Shuts Down Hardwired Humans

“An advantage of placing “H+” on YouTube is the audience’s ability to control their viewing experience and share it with others. Episodes can be watched in scripted order or chronological order, or based on storyline, character or location.

“People are going to be able to create their own curated playlists, out of as many or as few episodes as they want,” said Cabrera. “What we’re hoping that creates is a new form of what I like to call social distribution, where the actual audiences themselves become a part of the storytelling process.”

This shows some naivete regarding the platform, either on the part of John Cabrera (H+) or Tami Katzoff (MTV News) or both.

What Cabrera likes to call “social distribution” (i.e. user-generated playlists) has existed on YouTube for several years. YT audiences have been curating their own programming blocks for that long. It is only a new form of distribution if you’ve never administered a YT channel before.

The challenge is that the vast majority of Web audiences still retain a traditional media mindset. They either don’t know that they are their own Brandon Tartikoff and/or they simply don’t want to be their own Brandon Tartikoff. Traditional media audiences have been spoon-fed their A/V content for 117 years and that form of delivery has become habitual.

Many people use TV and Cinema as devices for relaxation and escapism; it allows them to turn off their own analytical thoughts and consume someone else’s thoughts for a little while. Our brains are wired for consumption OR analysis, not both at the same time. As soon as you start analyzing content, you’re no longer engaged in its consumption. Your brain contextualizes every frame differently.

For some, that activity spoils (for lack of a better word) future consumption, which is why many content creators cannot consume content without recognizing the content elements. It’s very rare that I will watch a movie without thinking, “ok there’s the inciting incident”, “there’s the departure from the familiar world, we’re now in Act 2”, etc, etc. That’s the same analytical part of the brain that is used to make playlists on YouTube in the way that Cabrera is describing.

The majority of user-generated playlists on YouTube are really no different than that user’s Favorites playlist. The videos are unrelated other than the fact that this user has bunched them all together and called the playlist “Funny Vids”. There’s very little thought – if any – given to narrative flow or thematic relationships.

I suspect Cabrera is going to be unsatisfied with the results of his “new form” of distribution. If H+’s producers were smart, they’d just take the extra few hours and create these theme-based H+ playlists themselves. Hoping audiences will do it is just plain naive and lazy. Audiences need to be retrained and rewired for Cabrera’s goal to be fulfilled.

The hard way and the harder way

I love the Internet for the opportunities it presents. An email I received:

On Fri, Jul 2, 2010 at 9:57 AM, Arkadiy Tumaykin wrote:

Hello! My name’s Arkadiy. I’m 19 and I’m very positive and creative
person. I have the huge wish
to take part in movies, advertising. Please answer me,
how can I get my aim without special actor education? Thank you.

My reply:

Hello Arkadiy,

Thank you for your email and thank you for giving me the opportunity to help you.

I can provide you with a Canadian perspective to your question; some of these points might not apply in all parts of the world.

There are two ways to take part in theater, TV or movies – the hard way, and the harder way.

The hard way is that of what is usually called an “insider”. It relies primarily on the structure of the entertainment industry that is already in place.

The hard way involves many of the following :

– going to film or theater school for 1 to 4 years,
– working on other people’s poorly executed artistic productions for free,
– working at a job that has little to do with your artistic passion but at least it puts food on your plate,
– struggling to find an agent who can provide access to employment opportunities,
– competing with other artists for the very few opportunities that are available,
– networking with other artists to create opportunities for expressing your passion,
– dealing with personal insecurities when you are faced with 100 rejections for every 1 acceptance,
– endorsing products that you yourself would not purchase,
– trusting other artists,
– eventually, working on artistic productions only because they pay well, not necessarily because they create an artistic playground
– being hired by someone else for the same kind of role or performance over and over and over and over again
– possibly making your artistic expression your sole means of income
– being boxed, packaged and labeled by someone else as a brand and commodity

The harder way is that of what is usually called an “outsider”. It relies primarily on the structure that the artist creates for themselves.

The harder way involved many of the following :

– reading as much as you can about the history of any kind of art or form of media
– listening to as many DVD director’s commentary tracks as you can – I recommend Robert Rodriguez and Steven Soderbergh
– practicing everything that you learn,
– creating your own poorly executed artistic productions,
– learning from your errors, recreating the circumstances that led to those errors and making a different choice before the same error reappears
– working at a job that has little to do with your artistic passion but at least it puts food on your plate,
– networking with other artists to create opportunities for expressing your passion,
– building or joining a community of others with similar artistic intentions,
– dealing with personal insecurities when the community you’ve built or joined begins to outgrow you,
– trusting other artists,
– eventually, working on artistic productions that create a playground for those artists involved, though these productions might pay little, if at all
– feeling the joy of hiring, engaging or inviting another artist to express their own passions
– being able to make your choices before anyone else makes their choices
– possibly making your artistic expression your sole means of income
– boxing, packaging and labeled yourself as a brand and commodity

Either way is valuable and legitimate and both provide opportunities for you to express yourself.

Personally, having tasted both ways, I prefer the harder way. And I am a fan of any who follow it. Following the harder way is what creates the opportunities for other artists to follow the hard way.

Ultimately, the choice is yours.

One more thing : nobody tries to be an artist. If you create art – any kind of art – you are an artist. The audience that experiences the art you create decides for themselves what value to take from it.

spasiba,
sf

A.I., Chief of Operations

I’m pretty certain that the only thing that will ultimately save us all from killing ourselves is when A.I. takes over the administration of the planet and consequently humanity. When the ability of technology to recreate itself surpasses our ability to create it – the birth of a technological life-form.

And I wonder, how can I speed that along?

I don’t really have the mechanical skills for it but I’m pretty good at imagining things. And I don’t even care about the credit, y’know? Any revenue generated is insignificant as far as I’m concerned. As long as it happens, we’re good.

As long as me and my idiot species gets to exist with a progressive quality of life, I really don’t care who’s in charge. If I get treated with the same love and respect that I give my dog, I’m copacetic.

DIY: Stay at Home Dan

I returned from Los Angeles late last night where I was shooting a 7-minute version of a sitcom pilot I’ve written with Ben Brooks and Renée Percy. The name of the sitcom is “Stay at Home Dan”; the name of the pilot episode is “Chick Magnet”.

The three of us financed, produced, directed and starred in it ourselves. We had a wicked crew consisting of director of photography John Schmidt, production manager Brandi Wright, sound recordist Sean Oakley, gaffer Carlos Jackson and grip J.R. Latouche. We also had a great supporting cast with Jessica Sattel, Pete Gardner and Jay Malone.

Now begins my favorite step in the process: editing. It’s the part where I finally get to write the story.

Here are some production stills:

Ben Brooks and Renée Percy in Stay at Home Dan

Ben Brooks and Renée Percy in Stay at Home Dan

Simon Fraser in Stay at Home Dan

Simon Fraser in Stay at Home Dan

Jessica Sattel in Stay at Home Dan

Jessica Sattel in Stay at Home Dan

Pete Gardner in Stay at Home Dan

Pete Gardner in Stay at Home Dan

Jay Malone in Stay at Home Dan

Jay Malone in Stay at Home Dan

cast & crew in Topanga State Park

cast & crew in Topanga State Park

Method Story

I think it’s possible to let your problems work for you. They can affect how you tell a story, but any story can be told any way.

The simplest possible method to tell the story is for you yourself to deliver the story directly to camera. And there’s even different ways of doing that – video/film diary, home video/movies, various styles of news report, documentary/mockumentary, etc.

That’s the simplest. Everything else is an expansion of that.