NEWSLETTER N°8

EDITORIAL

DIAGONALS OF THE DOC

As we make clear in this Newsletter dedicated to the development of documentaries on new networks, our future is Transmedia. The digital revolution is clearly with us and we have not yet gauged the full extent of the changes it heralds. Acronyms and neologisms are flooding into our glossary - only obvious for the digitally raised, certainly less evident for those who grew up in a world of film and chemical labs. However, the (epistemological?) transformation is clearly underway.

Because of this observation and the need for radical reform of production, we have developed a new,    customised tool: "SUNNY LAB". The Resource, Research and Training Centre will open in April on new premises in La Rochelle, France. First and foremost, at Sunny Lab, we will be providing a better grasp of 3D-relief and Transmedia, with basic and advanced training courses, and assisting with the development of projects that explore these new byways, which are not as yet clearly signposted.

As always, we compare and swap experiences and achievements from the four corners of the globe. So far, no-one has acquired an established "business model" - and so much the better! Imagination, creativity and innovation can operate more freely than in standardised television production. We only need to understand that our content and skills are needed to supply distribution networks with intelligent programming. For us, the aim is to learn how to develop projects that call on new, non-linear narrative approaches. This means putting together creative teams combining new skills (technology, graphics, etc.) with the talents of storytellers, investigators and scriptwriters, and also putting these projects into production and making sure they are distributed by operators who are no longer necessarily television channels.

The examples presented here are from the second generation of Transmedia projects, following "Gaza/Sderot" and "Voyage au bout du charbon" (Journey to the End of Coal), which we welcomed last year. From the 22nd to the 25th June 2010, at the 21st SUNNY SIDE, we will be able to compare them with other projects from America, Asia and different European countries.

A new BIPS - Best International Projects Showcase - will be devoted to these projects and the best 5 will be pitched. The winner will be awarded €2,000 in development aid.

Producers and distributors of intelligent content of every possible nature - documentaries, serious games, etc. - will be asked to present their work in the Innovations area and the "Sunny Lab" Agora. There, they will have a chance to meet financial backers and distributors for these new media. This decompartmentalisation has become crucial: we have to engage in dialogue with those who are addressing the same problems in adapting to a changing fiction and animation environment. We must listen to those people who are developing ARGs and ERGs, and inventing applications. They will help us break with habit and enable innovative concepts. This raises a number of new issues for writers and directors, and distributors too. Our work is changing, like the missions of public-service and private broadcasting, and this will affect the nature of the sector’s economy in the short term. Willingly or not, we will have to adapt to this development.


In this Newsletter, we stress the work of certain broadcasters and webcasters - ARTE, France5, Canal+, VODEO, etc. - who have audaciously partnered these new documentary forms, and the incentive role of the CNC. Other systems of assistance (particularly MEDIA) are now accessible and calls for projects are competing in the wake of the “Appel d'Air” launched this summer by the Orange Vallée Transmedia Lab.

It is up to us to seize these opportunities by changing our (sometimes bad) habits.

We have the responsibility of devising the new diagonals of the doc.

Yves Jeanneau

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SSD NEWS

Best International Projects Showcase (aka the BIPS)

For the 2nd year, together with a board of commissioning editors, Sunny Side is organising six thematic Pitch Sessions (6 projects per session): History, Science & Environment, Politics & Social issues, Arts & Culture, and for the first time this year, The Under 30’s Pitch and Cross-media content.

N.B.: The deadline is the 20th April 2010 - Send your projects to: international@sunnysideofthedoc.com





We are pleased to announce the launch of Sunny Lab, Resource and Training Centre.

On the 25th February, the first training session organised by Sunny Lab was held in La Rochelle.

“Journée d’Initiation au Transmedia” (Transmedia Introduction Day): The aim of this day of training was to provide a better understanding of issues linked to the use of new media and examine keys to producing and distributing programmes in a new context related to new methods of distribution.

Yves Jeanneau (independent producer, general manager of Sunny Side of the Doc) and Marc Guidoni (independent producer, member of the Producer’s Network and consultant) were responsible for this seminar.

Read more about Sunny Lab: http://www.sunnysideofthedoc.com/uk/sunnylab.php

Next co-production meeting organised by Sunny Side of the Doc and Sinapses Asia.

22-24 March 2010 in Hong Kong

You can see the list of participants on our Internet site:

http://www.sunnysideofthedoc.com/uk/asd_participants.php

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DOSSIER

The (web) documentary spins its… web

Is it just a trend or are documentaries genuinely taking off on the Internet and in new media? In any case, the genre is adopting new approaches and exploring different styles. The growth in the number of web documentaries is reflected in the appearance of “window” sites showcasing them, as their economic model gradually develops according to a more conventional rationale.

Any impending revolution will involve the web documentary. The media are more interested than ever in this hybrid genre, thus far a more or less experimental field, but one which is gradually finding a place in the sun on the Internet and in new media. There are some extremely ambitious projects under development, increasing numbers of sites dedicated to the genre, and festivals to celebrate its talents. We are witnessing the birth of the web documentary, in the sense that it is winning general recognition and approval.

The way is open for every stylistic approach and all creative professionals

Cross a “free” medium (the Internet) with a distinctive genre (the documentary) and you get the ideal framework for expressing reality in its most varied forms. Documentaries have decided to express themselves on the Internet, but not only there. Today, the most successful projects are developed according to Transmedia principles. “Writers, directors and producers are discovering new sources of audience and new tools, rolling back creative frontiers and beginning to explore the documentary in new social areas, going far beyond the linear concept of the genre, the one devised for television,” enthuses Peter Wintonick, writer, director and producer of documentary films, and one of the founders of Canadian community site Docagora, a portal that aims to play a role as an open, participatory forum, “where we examine new forms, new platforms, new tools and new methods of funding for creative, socially-committed documentaries - what we now call docmedia, because we’ll be able to enjoy these productions on any screen, anytime, anywhere.”

“The web documentary is a tremendous playing field for all documentary makers and writers,” adds Alexandre Brachet, manager of Upian, a French web production company set up in 1998. “All options are still open because every kind of skill can be brought together in this area: sound, video, photography, graphics, etc.” “The very definition of the documentary is becoming broader, more exciting and encouraging,” adds Peter Wintonick. “There are openings for “cyberdocumentaries”, interactive documentaries, productions made for mobile phones, “docugames” and even “documation” - a combination of real life and animation.” So the Internet and new media are radically revolutionising the ways in which we devise, produce and direct content to such an extent that no rules can yet be established, no foundations have been laid and no theory has been formulated. Everything is evolving.

A good, participatory, interactive story, designed to last


Even so, for Nicolas Bry, who runs an Orange Vallée organisation responsible for providing creative professionals and distributors with assistance related to new distribution possibilities (TV, mobile, web, etc.), a good Transmedia project is “first and foremost a good story”. This is a fundamental criterion and the only way of holding the viewer’s attention. In other words, the days of enhanced slide shows are over. Web documentaries have to be written. “Then,” Nicolas Bry continues, “it’s a project that uses the media to fill out the story: television for a linear, collective approach; the Internet for narrative enrichment, freedom of tone and interaction with net users; and mobile phones for regular contact with the story. Lastly, it’s a participatory, community project” that draws on the imagination, viewpoint and knowledge of the person interested in the content.

The impact and power of Transmedia-tailored documentaries will be all the greater if their content is interactive and participatory, able to position the net user at the heart of the story. In Le challenge (The Challenge) (What’s Up Films and Honkytonk), currently online at canalplus.fr, the net user plays the role of an independent inquirer appointed by the European Union and sets out to look for information and witnesses to throw light on an ecological scandal in Ecuador. In Prison Valley (Upian), coming soon on arte.tv (see the case study), “the net user will have to involve themselves in the documentary to join in the discussions, give their opinion and question the people appearing in the film. They will also be able to identify with the director, setting up their base camp in a hotel room, much as in the world of a video game,” explains Alexandre Brachet.

Finally, since projects are far more refined and accomplished and better funded today, they are designed to last - like Portraits d’un nouveau monde (Portraits of a New World), a collection of web documentaries that will be shown over nearly a year on the France 5 site (see the case study). “More today than a year ago, distributors want content that lasts, perennial projects constructed over the long term. That gives productions better visibility,” says Laurence Bagot, producer at Narrative, which launched the series. “Moreover, it’s a wonderful opportunity for us to make headway in a constantly changing world. Because next September, there’s no doubt that we’ll have explored new possibilities, such as 3D, better sound, etc.”

An economic model similar to the traditional one

Since the documentary is becoming a creative work in its own right on the Internet, regularly coupled with a television version, its economic model is converging more and more with the standard television model. In France, Canal+, co-producer of Le challenge (The Challenge), is an example. TV5 Monde is working in this area too, partnering Arte for a project on Africa. The Arte and France 5 channels are now ready to invest tens of thousands of euros in crossmedia projects. “Our 2009 budget came to €500,000. I expect the same sum for 2010,” says Aurélie Hamelin, responsible for global media content at France Télévisions’ programme department. “Arte’s web division has an overall budget of €2m for 2010, including €350,000 for production and €40,000 in writing grants, which will allow us to co-produce 6 to 10 web documentaries a year,” explains Joël Ronez, head of the Arte Web Division.

One day, we may even see Transmedia projects broadcast by two channels. “For one of the five fiction projects chosen following the call for tenders launched by the Orange Transmedia Lab last October,” Nicolas Bry remarks, “the possibility is being examined of additional broadcast by Orange Cinéma séries and a public channel. The start of the series could be on Orange, and the end - as well as a summary of the series - on a free-to-air channel. It’s a win-win agreement: OCS gets first-broadcast content and the free-to-air channel builds on the viewer base constructed by OCS and on the Internet.”

Moreover, since documentaries are an international genre, producers are banking on the growth of co-production. In fact, for the first time, TSR (Télévision Suisse Romande) intends to pre-purchase a web documentary, Havana-Miami (see the case study) “This is our first experience of multimedia distribution, funded by two units - documentary and web,” explains Catherine Kammermann from the channel’s documentary unit. “Agreement is imminent, we just need authorisation from our supervisory authority, because Swiss legislation does not yet allow us to invest in a multimedia programme that will be shown on the Internet before it’s broadcast on air.”

For Amit Breuer, documentary producer and co-founder of Docagora, traditional sources of funding “are still cautious about backing Transmedia projects, because productions of that kind can be very expensive and because it’s very difficult to precisely define them. Even so, there are some exceptions today, such as ITVS in the United States, the ONF in Canada, Channel 4 in the United Kingdom, VPRO and Submarine in the Netherlands, Babelgum, etc.”

Institutional investors are increasing their involvement in this new form of content. In Denmark, the Danish Film Institute is offering new possibilities of funding, while Canada is working on new regulations for the distribution of content on multimedia platforms. In France, the CNC has been making great efforts in favour of multi-platform production for three years now. “Since September 2007 and the launch of aid for new-media projects, we’ve assisted around a hundred projects, representing an overall budget of nearly €3.7m, with very few projects failing,” says Guillaume Blanchot, multimedia manager at the CNC. Documentaries are by far the dominant genre. In 2009, 47% of applications received for multi-platform projects (television, Internet, mobile) were made for documentary projects or magazines. The percentage was 65% for applications for Internet/mobile production assistance. Finally, documentary magazines represented 25% ofaid granted for multi-platform projects and 84% of aid for Internet/mobile production. The reasons for this predominance? “The documentary is the genre that has the most difficulty in finding its place on traditional screens, but which, as a result, is best able to bring together creative professionals on other media. It is also the genre that lends itself best to interactivity and the community aspect of the Internet. Finally, itrequires smaller budgets than animation or fiction,” explains Guillaume Blanchot. In the near future, the CNC will even open the COSIP up to Internet-content projects, to consolidate the funding of web documentaries. The decree should be published soon. “We will apply the COSIP’s rules to the letter, especially keeping to the requirement for 25% distributor pre-funding so as to encourage channels to fund works upstream,” Guillaume Blanchot adds.

Guillaume Blanchot -
CNC - Director of multimedia and technical industries


In search of new sources of funding

However, while Transmedia documentary projects first look for money where it is to be found - i.e. television channels, regions and institutional partners - new (although so far limited) sources of funding are appearing. Press sites can be useful partners - “not because they invest cash, but because they greatly increase the programme’s visibility,” judges Alexandre Brachet (Upian). For instance, producer Serge Gordey (Havana-Miami) has formed a partnership with lemonde.fr, which provides the production with additional content. Brands and sponsors are also looking for quality content to enhance their sites. “For example, we made a documentary collection on women for the women’s magazine Grazia. We also produced Exil-Exit?, a photo documentary by Olivier Jobard, with Médecins du monde [Doctors of the World],” Laurence Bagot of Narrative tells us.

In Canada, another form of funding is appearing: donations. “It’s the most popular approach to fund new projects today,” reflects Amit Breuer. “Of course, it’s easy to argue that this isn’t a new source of funding, just a new way of finding money - using the Internet, rather than traditional networks. But non-standard sources of funding - such as NGOs - also want to work with directors to explore ways of using crossmedia platforms to develop awareness-enhancement projects that focus on their respective centres of interest.”

Broader, recognised distribution

Recognition of the documentary as a Transmedia genre in its own right will necessarily help to facilitate funding. This recognition firstly requires improved visibility. Progress has been made in this area. Today, web documentaries win prizes at festivals dedicated to multimedia content, such as November’s Festival des 4 écrans (4-screen Festival) in Paris, which gave an award to Camera War, a French-American web documentary by Lech Kowalski (Extinkt Films / Capricci Films), as well as more traditional festivals - Corps incarcéré (Incarcerated Body - Lemonde.fr) won the France 24-RFI prize at the Visa festival for its photography, and Gaza/Sderot: la vie malgré tout (Gaza/Sderot: life goes on) (Bo Travail !) has won the Prix Europa among other distinctions, and been nominated for the Emmy Awards.

Finally, dedicated sites also enhance visibility, and in this respect, France has gained a lead. Arte and France 5 have both just launched their own platform. The first, Arte webdocs (webdocs.arte.tv), which went online on the 22nd February, was developed to bring together web-documentary viewers and enhance their loyalty. “Since we now produce web documentaries regularly,” explains Joël Ronez, “we thought it was important to put them together on the same platform to showcase them more effectively.” So each webdoc has its own dedicated area, bonuses, affiliated network and I-Phone application if there is one. On the homepage, the site promotes the most recent productions, as well as the latest “episodes” of current collections and those to come. Themed access is also available. “Today, the platform only includes Arte productions. But in two years’ time, we’d like to have an offer of content that’s fifty percent internal productions and fifty percent purchases.” France 5’s aims are a little different, since the brand-new documentary portal - opened on the 15th February to accompany the first collection of the group’s web documentaries, Portraits d’un nouveau monde (Portraits of a New World) - handles the channel’s entire documentary content. “In fact, it’s Wiki V2, which we launched in January 2007,” explains Sophie Benoît, web programme manager. “It’s been improved with a new technology: Drupal, a contribution tool that enables increased, more educational, simpler, faster participation. We’ve also revamped the graphics and ergonomics.” The new portal is primarily the reflection of the channel’s television programming, presenting the last four documentaries broadcast. It lets users catch up with recent TV programmes or watch content on pay VOD, and see extracts and bonuses. An exchange and discussion forum is dedicated to appeals for contributions and personal stories. Finally, interactive, scripted animation entertainment is also available for net users.

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Focus

Vodeo.tv launches its V2

The documentary and report download site vodeo.tv, which went online in 2004, is to launch its V2 in March.

Its chairman and managing director, Frédéric Sitterlé, describes the new version as “accessible, easy and inexpensive”. He had in mind the misfortunes of music, plagued by illegal sharing, when he developed this new version. “We looked at how ITunes successfully built up an economic model for music, which had been stifled by piracy, and so we applied more or less the same recipes for version 2 of vodeo.tv.” What recipes? “First of all, our content is streamed, so it can be watched on any platform. Then the payment system is simplified as much as possible - “in one click” - making purchasing virtually painless. Finally, we offer unlimited access to our whole catalogue for the modest sum of €7.99 a month.” Everything is presented in a simpler, cleaner form, with the homepage showcasing only the content. The ambition of vodeo.tv, which now has a catalogue of 10,000 titles, is to provide quick, cheap access to documentaries. “But we don’t want to be simply a database,” stresses Frédéric Sitterlé. “We’re applying a policy of site editorialisation, which is why we only have 4,500 titles online, with ten or so themes periodically updated. Each month, we offer 30 to 100 new titles.”

Over the six years since the site went online, vodeo.tv has signed agreements with 300 producers and distributors (including the BBC, France Télévisions and Arte) based on an economic model of revenue sharing. However, Frédéric Sitterlé will not expand on this. Nor will he give any details about the site’s visitor numbers or income. He will only say that the new version, currently in beta testing, has already increased revenue per user by a factor of six or seven. In March, the growth of vodeo.tv V2 will be backed by a major communication campaign waged with the Le Figaro group, a shareholder in the site. “This is a key period in pay content on the Internet. Net users have understood that they have to pay to get quality content and the emergence of pay sites such as Libération’s and Le Figaro’s proves that the cash is flowing,” concludes Frédéric Sitterlé, who also tells us that vodeo.tv reached the break-even point at the end of 2009. 

Frédéric Sitterlé -
CEO at Vodeo.tv
(Photo François Lebel)

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Producers from every background for an emergent genre

All producers are interested in producing multimedia documentaries - or almost! Among the hundred or so projects backed by the CNC, Guillaume Blanchot has noted an appropriate balance between productions presented by “traditional” television producers (such as Capa, Zadig Productions, Les Films d’ici, Alegria, Bô Travail ! and Gédéon Programmes) and productions from dedicated web companies (Narrative, Honkytonk Films, Upian, What’s Up Films). Sometimes, these two types of company co-produce a project. However, none of them yet work exclusively on content, with some of them continuing to focus mainly on television, while the others generate a clear majority of their turnover with services such as web graphics or Internet-site development. Only one group still seems very wary of multimedia content. “It’s film producers,” reveals Guillaume Blanchot. “To date, we have not received any projects from a film-production company.” While he cannot really explain why the film industry is so pointedly turning its back on the genre, the CNC’s multimedia manager hazards a guess: “They mainly see the Internet as a fantastic marketing tool.” Have they not yet found the time to study this remarkable distribution network properly?

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Case studies: three documentaries designed for transmedia

Havana/Miami, Portraits of a new world, Prison Valley

Havana/Miami

Production: Alegria (Serge Gordey, picture opposite and Christine Camdessus) and Arte France, with Tamouz Media (USA)

Format: six videos a week for three months on the Internet + one 52-minute documentary for Arte television

Budget: €430,000

Funding: Arte (€90,000 - documentary programme unit + €40,000 - web division), CNC (€95,000 - aid for new media + €25 000 - Cosip), TSR (to be confirmed).

Pitch: A documentary web serial that shows the everyday lives of twelve young people from Miami’s Cuban community and Havana - people who have remained at home and others who have settled in the United States. For three months, every two days, the documentary follows the stories of twelve people, six on each side of the border.

Distribution: Online on webdocs.arte.tv since the 22nd February (10,000 hits from the first day).

Languages: French, English, German, Spanish.

Portraits of a new world

Production: Narrative (Laurence Bagot and Cécile Cros, picture opposite) and France Télévisions, France 5 division.

Writers: Elsa Fayner, Axelle de Russé, Marina de Russé, Serge Michel, Paolo Woods, Benoît Aquin, Patrick Alleyn, Gilles Sabrié, etc

Format: 24 web documentaries divided into six themes on the Internet + 24 short films of 7’ for television (in development).

Budget: €480,000

Funding: France 5 (€360,000), CNC (€100,000 - aid for new media), + €20,000 of contributions in kind

Pitch: From Beijing to Rio, 24 independent multimedia documentaries that tell the individual stories of men, women and places, and explain the major issues of the 21st century. The themes examined are China: a superpower… at any cost (in March); Emigration: a melting pot or a divided world? (in April); Urban development: maximum city (in June); Economics: capitalism, and then? (in August); Ecology: a broken planet(in October); Living together: solidarity or me first? (in December).

Distribution: exclusively on france5.fr/PNM since the 15th February

Language: French

Prison Valley

Production: Upian (Alexandre Brachet, picture opposite) and Arte France.

Writers: Philippe Brault and David Dufresne.

Format: one 1-hour film in HD and around a hundred pieces of additional content on the Internet + a photo version forIPhone + the television programme + a book.

Budget: €220,000

Funding: Arte (€60,000), CNC (€90,000 - aid for new media), Upian (€70,000)

Pitch: In Colorado, two towns - Canon City and Florence - have a total population of 36,000, 14 prisons, 7,731 prisoners and as many jobs directly linked to what is known as the “prison industry”. This web documentary is an interactive photo and video road movie through these Western towns, where we discover different characters’ everyday lives and jobs, and their boredom and pleasures - living cameos in rather lifeless towns.

Distribution: on arte.tv from mid-April.

Languages: French, English, German.

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PIXEL TRANSMEDIA at the FORUM BLANC

Two events in the space of a few weeks show that certain subjects are deeply rooted in the zeitgeist...

This is true of Transmedia, which has just (shortly before and after Christmas) found two new and promising platforms in France. To begin with, the first PIXEL, organised at the Forum des Images in early December by Michel REILHAC of ARTE and Britain’s lively Liz ROSENTHAL of Power to the Pixel (www.powertothepixel.com). Then the first FORUM BLANC (www.forumblanc.org), dreamt up in January in the snows of Le Grand Bornand by Patrick EVENO’s team at the Annecy CITIA, also to thank for some memorable months of June at the MIFA and Annecy Festival.

In both cases, what mainly strikes us is the breaking down (in terms of both participants and subjects examined) of traditional, conventionally hermetic divides between genres, media, formats and so on. At PIXEL and the FORUM BLANC, there was a merging of documentaries (or ‘factuals’), fiction, real images, animation, one-offs, series, collections and even traditional forms of funding and new sponsorship and brand-content networks. It was as if we clearly sensed we were in the new-world reactor core of a content industry on the march.

It is difficult to report on these two events in detail, because their dynamics were actually based on the energy flowing there and their spontaneous meetings. This also makes it difficult to “render unto Caesar” the references and examples mentioned during the discussions. So we will present a freeform anthology of important ideas noted in passing, beginning with a definition of transmedia that for once is not technocentric, but rather behavioural: Transmedia is the name given to the phenomenon that occurs in the mind of a content consumer immersed in a flow of media.

To get an idea of this, we strongly recommend a brilliant video:
‘Did you know 4.0’ (www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ILQrUrEWe8).

THE 10 MAIN POINTS OF FEEDBACK FROM PLAYERS IN THE TRANSMEDIA WORLD:

• More than ever, directors and scriptwriters are playing a central role and need the help of technology experts. You have to be willing to take on the challenge of putting together teams with writers from different backgrounds and considerably increase the resources devoted to project development.

• You need a very strong creative lead, both in the creative process and in production: leading directors believe their job description will change over the next 5 years to ‘polymedia super-artistic director’, subsequently leading to a team of directors per medium. At the same time, to create a world of content, ‘super-producers’ will be needed, ensuring a homogeneous image.

• You have to go out and talk to gamers, even if you are not a player yourself. In fact, the games world is ahead of the established audiovisual world with its experience in handling communities and rewards for ‘user-participants’. With the new generations of video game, you can experience real emotions, sometimes as powerful as those you feel at the cinema.

• The world is changing even faster than we imagine. For the very young, YouTube is becoming the standard engine, ahead of Google. They go directly to the video.

• In terms of transmedia programme funding, even if we have to accept that traditional TV is the cornerstone - because that’s where the money is for now - we can’t just stick to the editorial line of a single partner, we have to play on ‘co-opetition’…

• The difference between the United States and France is harsh: HBO has a team of 15 people working upstream on different forms of narration. In France, we can see a terrifying lack of an overall, transversal view among contacts for producers at French TV channels.

• We have to advise producers whose assets include Transmedia intellectual-property components to carefully choose their international distributor/sales agent, because pitching Transmedia content properly is an extremely complex task.

• Avoid the mistake of believing you can make cheap TV for mobile screens. You have to study and comply with each medium’s specificities of use.

• You have to be honest and sincere with your audience and its communities. The Internet is pitiless. If you want to offer content that combines reality and fiction, announce the rules of the game from the start.

• We have gone from a world of scarcity to a world of overabundance. When copies are free, you have to develop and sell things that won’t be copied. This includes Transmedia experiments.

By Marc Guidoni (independent producer, member of the Producer’s Network, and consultant).  

Marc Guidoni -
(Photo Olivier Godest)

TEN REFERENCES FROM THE WORLD OF TRANSMEDIA TO WATCH AND LEARN FROM:

• The truth about Marika. Unlimited participatory fiction. The paradigm...
www.youtube.com/watch?v=iX_ZJkwvKR8

• Le challenge: web documentary
http://lechallenge.canalplus.fr

• ‘The gap year’: A documentary adventure based on 6 young people on a gap year
www.bebo.com/thegapyear

• Project Blinklife: a series of one-minute videos on the subject of “how it works”
www.blinklife.tv/how-to-help-social-network-addicts.html

•A new form of programme distribution: Loko TV:
www.loko.tv

• ‘Peter and Jaydee’, a multi-platform series
www.dailymotion.com/video/x3jvcf_petey-jaydee-microwave_fun

• ‘Green up tour Life’, an example of brand content sponsored by British Gas
www.generationgreen.co.uk/GamesRoom/GUYL

• ‘KateModern’
http://katemodern.bebo.com

• Lego, another example of brand content based on a universal name
http://universe.lego.com/en-us/splash/Default.aspx

• Kirill (Endemol digital studio UK)
http://kirill.uk.msn.com

• Cell (Endemol), a series co-produced by telecom operator O2
www.o2.com/media/press_releases/press_release_14136.asp

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INFORMATION / TRAINING

Crossover is an international programme designed to explore the creative and commercial challenges of developing content and services for digital media.

The lab process brings together creative professionals from diverse disciplines – including film and TV production, animation, games, theatre, web design and new media – to share their understanding of a rapidly changing mediascape, form new interdisciplinary collaborations and generate ideas for projects. Crossover differs from other lab models which work with existing teams on preconceived proposals. We bring together people with a range of creative skills, at different stages in their careers and from diverse cultural backgrounds. Participants are selected as individuals, to create new partnerships and explore new collaborative interdisciplinary approaches to cross-platform development.

Crossover is an intensive, immersive, residential laboratory normally held over a five-day period with up to twenty-five participants and a team of expert mentors, designed to enable professionals from different sectors of the audiovisual industries to acquire the knowledge and skills needed to develop concepts and build prototypes and pilots for new media.

For more information: http://www.crossoverlabs.org

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IN MEMORIAM

Marcel Simard has left us. Those who knew him know how big a loss his passing represents. In Quebec, he was the heart of Productions Virage and one of the leading advocates of the documentary. He was sincere, committed and talented, a good man. Not long ago, I saw him move mountain and earth to try and help a young Argentinean director get his project off the ground with unbridled enthusiasm. Monique Simard, their daughters and all his co-workers are in our thoughts.

At the behest of the familly, it is possible to make a donation – in memory of Marcel Simard to: la Fondation de l'Institut universitaire en santé mentale Douglas -
http://www.douglas.qc.ca/accueil.asp?l=f

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International News

LA VIDA LOCA - DVD release on the 2nd March 2010 of Christian Poveda’s latest film. (Editions Bac Films) -
http://www.lafemme-endormie.com/vidaloca/index_2.html

- 12th Thessaloniki Documentary Festival  - Thessaloniki Doc Market, March 12-21, 2010 - Thessaloniki (Greece): http://www.filmfestival.gr/

- FIFA - Festival International of Films on Art, March 18 to 28, 2010 - Montréal (Québec). http://www.artfifa.com/

- FIGRA – International Current Affairs and Social Documentary Film Festival, March 24 to 28, 2010 – Le Touquet (France) - http://figra.toofik.com/

- HOT DOCS, North America’s largest documentary festival, conference and market, April 29 to May 9, 2010 - Toronto (Canada) - http://www.hotdocs.ca/

- Input 2010, May 8 to 12, 2010 - Budapest (Hongrie) & Input 2011 at Séoul -

http://www.input-tv.org/home/

- Banff World Television Festival, June 13 to 16, 2010 (Canada). http://www.banff2010.com/index.php