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Mike Rohde’s sketch of Gary Vaynerchuk’s talk

Recently at the SEED 3 conference in Chicago, Gary Vaynerchuk, host of Wine Library TV, a daily internet webcast on the subject of wine with a “unpretentious, gonzo approach”, spoke about the importance of fostering community with online networks. Mike Rohde, a designer and writer in Wisconsin, sketched his notes and posted them online:

COMMUNITY
Get outside and spend time with people in your space and outside your space.

That’s exactly what we did last Friday. (Minus the likes of Gary and Mike, at least for the time being.)

The latest FWD:labs salon gathering, taking up the outside patio lounge at the Wilshire on a luke-warm Santa Monica evening, was another success. The event brought together a mix of cinema-savvy creatives along with their afficionados and audiences. Several were repeat attendees of a previous salon, enthusiastic about coming again.

Unique to these gatherings, we fast-forward past the networking and shop talk and instead hit the slow-mo for embracing conversation and fostering community. Being a small invite-only group, most know someone who knows someone, but there’s still a lot of outspoken energy and enthusiasm about reinvigorating creativity and building friendships.

Nobody has to collaborate, but they all could, many have, and some just might in the future. But for these cocktails and coffees, it’s about celebrating community outside your bubble.

In two weeks, the next meet-up is on Saturday, July 12th. The coffee’s on me.

Bridge by Hillman Curtis

Hillman Curtis, resourceful trailblazer and playful maestro of online film and online design, has a new short film you have to experience.

Bridge, embedded below, “follows two friends as they move toward a discovery.” Blow Up, Roof and Embrace (2008 Webby nominee for online video) are just a few of his several other short films. Each beautifully photographed film explores a similar structure: you’re in the middle of a moment, observing the relationship, expression, and voice of the actors.

Curtis also has “artist series” films, whose subjects include filmmaker Mark Romanek and designer David Carson. His commercial clients include SVA (School of Visual Arts) and Adobe. Curtis’ environmental portrait works to provide a more intimate, authentic narrative.

When he’s not leading the creative direction of his Brooklyn-based company with sites like Metropolitain Opera and Yahoo, or cinema-savvy gigs like FoxSearchlight Pictures and Paramount Vantage Films, he also writes about design. His four books are all about new media and are quite highly regarded.

Asked in a 2002 interview on Sitepoint.com of the key message in one of his books, “MTIV: Process, Inspiration and Practice for the New Media Designer,” Curtis touches upon the creativity of a collective mindset:

“I wanted to consider the inclusivity of inspiration… the way we as creatives share and borrow and build upon the ideas of those around us, and those who came before us.”

In 2005, “Hillman Curtis on Creating Short Films for the Web” offered inspiration, instruction and personal touch to the early birds dabbling in online film. Since all have changed in the last three years, the evergreen quality is his approach, noted simply on the book jacket:

“Hillman explains how his flexible, often spontaneous filmmaking style is guided by certain principles–the value of leaving room for serendipity, the freedom found within self-imposed limitations, the importance of collaborating with others, and the possibilities for discovery and revision when reacting to unforeseen accidents.”

(via Motionographer)

Matt Smithson is the director behind the new viral video calling for social change, “The Girl Effect.” The spot was created for Wieden+Kennedy and is part of the $100 million-backed effort from Nike Foundation and NoVo Foundation to the cause, which is about being “the powerful social and economic change brought about when girls have the opportunity to participate in their society.”

The high contrast, upper-case and sans-serif type, along with the quick tempo and elegant strings, serve to communicate the issue clearly and quickly in the 2:23 video. It works as an introduction to the web site, but also stands alone:

By using two elements — such as typography and music — the message resonates. Simon Robson’s 2003 video, What Barry Says, combined the voiceover by Barry McNamara with computer-generated visual metaphors to make its point on social change. Pangea Day’s trailer, What If, which was posted here earlier, elaborated upon iconic video and realistic voice-over as focal points. Even Nike is known for this style, merging jump-cut edits and playful piano for their anthem spot during the 2002 Olympics.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=LyPgHwB82xY

But what message is this type treatment saying? Nike has been criticized in the past for associations with third-world sweatshops. This efforts with this campaign positions Nike as supporter, not exploiter, which helps appeal their image.

And why the girl effect — wouldn’t this theory work with anyone? The fact sheet for the effort notes that women reinvest 90% of their income into her family but a man will reinvest 30 to 40%.

Related, Matt and Sean Pecknold started “a small art and film collective called Pickles (link no longer available) to showcase the work of [their] friends.” From one collective to another, hello!

(via Motionographer)

IMDb has a new gimmick for independent filmmakers. The legitimizer of film and television project and professionals alike figured out what to do with their new acquisition, Withoutabox, the all-in-one dashboard of film festival deadlines. They’re introducing IMDb Theaters, the latest late bloomer to join the social video network bandwagon with its cheap bandwidth and wait-for-it monitization.

Just this week, an unknown handful of users with films on both IMDb and Withoutabox were invited by e-mail to upload a trailer or the entire short film, check off a non-exclusive agreement, and soon enough see video grace their project’s IMDb Title Page. Previously, video would be a dull hyperlink away or reserved for studio clips and trailers.

Missing in IMDb Theaters are the social standards of like video networks, the so-called nuts and bolts like comments and ratings. It’s also void of any buzz, like Vimeo’s venture with high-def, which raised the bar for free video hosts for artists that care about quality.

What’s working is the backbone credibility of the IMDb listing itself. But that’s where it ends for now. Reaction might be best explained by the survey accompanying the e-mail announcement tailored to non-participants: “I think the Conditions of Use are too hard to understand,” “I only like to license my work in deals where I get paid something,” and the straight-forward, “IMDb is not a place that I want to exhibit my film.”

An example film on IMDb.com, The Green Faerie

Being listed on IMDb has been essential street cred for years. But with a hundred and one options of social video networks, why use IMDb Theaters? Their current offering isn’t innovative, but it’s also hardly noteworthy except for one thing. It’s progress. Short of studio projects, where IMDb fast-tracks your changes, additions and edits to the database require a lot of the hurdles. Since you’re going through all the hoops anyway, their one-form process — the new sync of IMDb and Withoutabox — is a good first step.

Unless you’re using IMDb as a top destination for your work, their offerings can be much more competitive. Greater quality of resolution or exposure to traffic could separate IMDb from the rest and, through a catalog of video-included projects, be a route for added exposure for being a forerunner in trying out Theaters.