As I posted about previously, I’m excited about the potential for Second Life to enhance the movie and television-watching experience by adding more social interaction. It looks like the Sundance Channel is going to be the first television channel to experiment with showing their programming in-world. This Tuesday, January 9, at 8PM EST, the Sundance Channel is sponsoring an in-world showing of the independent film "Four-eyed Monsters" on their new "Sundance Channel" island sim (teleport SLURL). The film will be simulcast on several other sims in case the Sundance sim fills up, which is quite likely.
Meanwhile, this week’s New Yorker features a fascinating article on the future of film production and distribution in the digital age called "Big Pictures" by David Denby. Denby asks how, in the era of video iPods and movies-on-demand and HD televisions, do you preserve the magic of the movie-watching experience?
One answer is to look to virtual worlds to enter that space between more solitary television or small-device viewing and the communal experience of going to a movie theater.
Virtual worlds have some clear advantages over other forms of video viewing. For example, "Four-eyed Monsters" filmmakers Arin Crumley
and Susan Buice will appear in-world to introduce their film and answer
questions from the audience. This I think demonstrates a clear
"value-added" of virtual worlds to the movie-watching experience —
opening up a new channel of communication between artist and audience.
More importantly, the immersiveness and interactivity of virtual spaces creates a more communal experience than simply watching a DVD or video-on-demand. Nothing will replace the experience of watching a blockbuster film in a packed audience of enthusiastic filmgoers. But the future of films I hope is not millions of us sitting alone on the train straining at tiny screens on our iPods.
The Sundance sim has potential, with several viewing screens
and a cafe for the film-geeks to socialize in. There’s interesting
possibilities for the future, such as audience feedback viewings of
works-in-progress, panels on the future of independent film-making,
machinima showings, and workshops on becoming a film-maker. And there are lots of other niche channels and production companies out there that I hope see the opportunities of virtual world viewing.
To sum up, here’s a little chart that compares the virtues and limitations of the various viewing / distribution models out there:
|
Video Distribution System |
Time Limitations |
Space Limitations |
Solitary or Communal |
|
Portable Video Device |
anytime |
anywhere |
solitary |
|
Video-on-Demand |
anytime |
anywhere |
solitary |
| Broadcast/CableTelevision |
scheduled |
anywhere |
solitary |
|
Internet Viewing |
anytime |
anywhere |
solitary |
|
Virtual World Viewing |
scheduled (or not) |
anywhere (limited locations virtually) |
communal |
|
Movie Theater |
scheduled |
limited locations |
communal |
So I’ll be there on Tuesday evening, throwing popcorn, wooting and applauding the credits with lots of other wacky avatars. And then on December 1st I’ll head over to the real-world theatrical showing of the film in New York City to do it all over again in meatspace. That’s really the best of all worlds.
Rik, check out the badass machinima invite for Four Eyed Monsters in SL that Arin and Susan made: http://foureyedmonsters.com/secondlife . Their first machinima. Dems kids is good.
Daaaaaaamn! They MADE that, after only a few weeks in SL? Wow.
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Launched in 2006, MyMovieNetwork is a unique online community that provides tools for filmmakers to showcase their work around the world by posting their films and portfolios as well as, learn from, network and collaborate with fellow movie makers. All members and visitors can watch, critique and rate submitted content based on its quality while at the same time enjoy the entertainment provided to them for free. MyMovieNetwork runs contests to find the best filmmakers, provides tools for scouting, blogging and linking to personal film archives. We provide affiliations for film schools and film clubs so all their members and work can congregate in one place. In addition each user can create a studio where all their films, cast and crew are associated with the studio. MyMovieNetwork community is growing so drop by and if you have a story to tell we’d love to hear from you and see your work.
Independent film Four Eyed Monsters being shown at 5pm SL time at Sundance Island tonight
The Sundance Second Life page indicates that tonight, January 9, at 5pm Second Life time (PST), the Sundance Channel will be showing an independent film called Four-eyed Monsters on their Sundance Channel island sim (SLurl):
and …
As the de facto administrator of the Security Fix blog, I’ve spent many an hour deleting spammy links left in the comments section –
– comments that usually lead back to the same kinds of Web sites you most commonly see advertised in junk e-mail.