Unica Dortmund

More than 240 enthusiasts attended the UNICA Congress 2017 in Dortmund. Each will have her or his own favourite memory. The venue, an industrial museum created from the headquarters of the Zollern Coal Mining company, was a star in itself.

The best bits were:
the choir at the opening ceremony
climbing the mine’s winding tower to look out over the city
eating curry-wurst on the grass with friends
visiting the stadium where Borussia play
when the fire-alarm went off and we thought it was part of the film.

Striptease & Spy: Mata Hari

On the cold morning of October 15, 1917, Mata Hari was executed in the Parisian suburb of Vincennes, President Raymond Poincare having refused her request for clemency.

Witnesses wrote that she wore a long, black velvet cloak with fur trimmings and a large square fur collar.

She is said to have declined a blindfold and blew kisses to her executors.

Asked by a military clerk whether she had any last revelations, she replied: "None, and if I had, I would keep them to myself."

The ultimate femme fatale, she has inspired a dozen films, numerous books, historical works, exhibitions and even a ballet by the Dutch National Ballet.

Her iconic status was cemented in 1931 when Swedish-born actress Greta Garbo played her in a film entitled "Mata Hari".

The nature and extent of her espionage activities remain, however, uncertain, and her guilt is still widely contested today.

"She never provided the least valid information, neither to the Germans, nor to the French," according to the French magazine Le Point in 2016, echoing a view expressed in other media.

Super 8 Lab

Frank Bruinsma:
I gave a short interview to Stichting Amateurfilm. This foundation has an aim to create interest for amateur film in past, present and tense. Many thanks to Ronald and Hans who made this video. There are no English subtitles, it is spoken in Dutch language only, sorry.

Camargue animals

Filmmaking is in a very strange place right now.

While traditional filmmakers focus on witty scripts and clever cinematography, technology such as smartphones have revamped how we tell stories; how quickly we can tell them, and how many get access to see them (hint: everyone).

Now we have 360 videos. Game changer.

The ripple effect this has had on both filmmakers and film festivals is quite astounding. While the latter was once seen as a traditional, formal event for the elite filmmakers of the world has now opened up to let anyone with a good idea and a phone create award winning films.

Loving Vincent a review

On 27th July 1890 a gaunt figure stumbled down a drowsy high street at twilight in the small French country town of Auvers.
The man was carrying nothing; his hands clasped to a fresh bullet wound leaking blood from his belly.
This was Vincent van Gogh, then a little known artist; now the most famous artist in the world.
His tragic death has long been known, what has remained a mystery is how and why he came to be shot.
Loving Vincent tells that story.

Tour du Gard

Communicators are filmmakers and content providers who have something to say using the power of moving images with excellent sound, well crafted stories and good sound tracks. Communicators will also consider a host of different mediums including short two and three minute episodes for mobiles (mobisodes) or internet (webisodes). Gaming and phone apps also provide interesting storytelling possibilities with a host of different strategies for monetizing current content being debated around the world.

Graceful Montpellier

The Palme d'Or is the highest prize awarded at the Cannes Film Festival. It was introduced in 1955 by the organising committee. From 1939 to 1954, the highest prize was the Grand Prix du Festival International du Film.

In 1964, it was replaced again by the Grand Prix du Festival before being reintroduced in 1974 as the Palme d'Or.

Romans' Way

Vienne is a commune in southeastern France, located 32 kilometres (20 mi) south of Lyon, on the river Rhône. It is only the fourth largest city in the Isère department, of which it is a subprefecture, but was a major center of the Roman empire.

Before the arrival of the Roman armies, Vienne was the capital city of the Allobroges, a Gallic people. Transformed into a Roman colony in 47 BCE under Julius Caesar, Vienne became a major urban center, ideally located along the Rhône, then a major axis of communication. It was to Vienne in 7 CE that Augustus banished King Herod Archelaus, so the Herodian family may have had land there. The town later became a Roman provincial capital. Numerous remains of Roman constructions are still visible in modern Vienne

Raining Cats and Dogs

His Master's Voice (HMV) is a famous trademark in the recording industry and was the unofficial name of a major British record label. The phrase was coined in the 1890s as the title of a painting of a terrier mix dog named Nipper, listening to a wind-up disc gramophone. In the original painting, the dog was listening to a cylinder phonograph. In the 1970s, the statue of the dog and gramophone, His Master's Voice, were cloaked in bronze and was awarded by the record company (EMI) to artists or music producers or composers as a music award and often only after selling more than 100.000 sound carriers such as LPs.

Montpellier, the old city

Video production is the process of creating video by capturing moving images (videography), and creating combinations and reductions of parts of this video in live production and post-production (video editing). In most cases the captured video will be recorded on the most current electronic media such as SD cards. In the past footage was captured on video tape, hard disk, or solid state storage. Video tape capture is now obsolete and solid state storage is reserved for just that, storage. It is now distributed digitally in formats such as the Moving Picture Experts Group format (.mpeg, .mpg, .mp4), QuickTime (.mov), Audio Video Interleave (.avi), Windows Media Video[1] (.wmv), and DivX (.avi, .divx). It is the equivalent of filmmaking, but with images recorded digitally instead of on film stock.

Entree of the Ardeche (valley)

Shooting in the round refers to a style in cinematography in which the 180-degree rule is broken and the actors are filmed from all sides.

During TV show panel discussions, shooting in the round can help the guests feel like all the panelists are equal and create a feeling of greater intimacy.

The name of the style is originally brought from the theater, called theatre in the round.

 

La Petite Camargue

A natural history film or wildlife film is a documentary film about animals, plants, or other non-human living creatures, usually concentrating on film taken in their natural habitat but also often including footage of trained and captive animals. Sometimes they are about wild animals, plants, or ecosystems in relationship to human beings. Such programmes are most frequently made for television, particularly for public broadcasting channels, but some are also made for the cinema medium. The proliferation of this genre occurred almost simultaneously alongside the production of similar television series.

 

La Grande Motte

A step outline (more commonly called a beat sheet) is a detailed telling of a story with the intention of turning the story into a screenplay for a motion picture.

The step outline briefly details every scene of the screenplay's story, and often has indications for dialog and character interactions. The scenes are often numbered for convenience.

It can also be an extremely useful tool for a writer working on a spec script.

Finding Film Ideas

Backlight (Dutch: Tegenlicht) is a documentary television series by Dutch public broadcasting organisation VPRO. The first episode of Backlight was broadcast on 8 September 2002.

The series "aims to grasp the quintessence of prominent trends and developments" in the practice of critical journalism, and tries to improve understanding of the intricate inner workings of our modern society.

Wijnegem mall near Antwerp

The first camera using digital electronics to capture and store images was developed by Kodak engineer Steven Sasson in 1975. He used a charge-coupled device (CCD) provided by Fairchild Semiconductor, which provided only 0.01 megapixels to capture images. Sasson combined the CCD device with movie camera parts to create a digital camera that saved black and white images onto a cassette tape. The images were then read from the cassette and viewed on a TV monitor.  Later, cassette tapes were replaced by flash memory.

Fleur de sel

Each year, Aigues-Mortes produces 500,000 tons of salt, making it a worldwide benchmark.
In the Camargue, salt can be found widely in the soil, and the nature of the flat and clayey land, dotted with ponds, lends itself well to the extraction of sea salt. It is also a region where evaporation is the most intense and rainfall the weakest.

The salt production in Aigues-Mortes goes back to Antiquity. Peccius, a Roman engineer at the start of the Christian Era, was put in charge of organising salt production.
In 1856, the different salt marsh owners united to found the Salins du Midi (Saltworks of the South).

 

NRA - Sunday with Lubach

An anti-war movement (also antiwar) is a social movement, usually in opposition to a particular nation's decision to start or carry on an armed conflict, unconditional of a maybe-existing just cause. The term can also refer to pacifism, which is the opposition to all use of military force during conflicts. Many activists distinguish between anti-war movements and peace movements. Anti-war activists work through protest and other grassroots means to attempt to pressure a government (or governments) to put an end to a particular war or conflict.

Grand Causses

The Causses and the Cévennes, Mediterranean agro-pastoral Cultural Landscape located in the southern part of central France with over three millennia of agro-pastoral history.
The region is mountainous with numerous narrow valleys, making conditions poorly suited to host cities, but well-suited for pastoralism. Consequently, the landscape of Causses and Cévennes evolved over time to reflect all types of Mediterranean agro-pastoral systems. The Causses and the Cévennes retain numerous testimonies of this evolution of pastoralism over time. Mont Lozère is one of the last places where summer transhumance is still practiced in the traditional way.

 

Reunion de Aigues-Mortes

Time and technology have not only changed the techniques of filmmaking but have also made giving the “first take” a more comfortable affair. There are some huge changes in terms of filmmaking techniques (in the last couple of decades). Digital (technology) has changed a lot of things. Things are done a lot faster now… In a way, that’s good.

Stop worrying about the first take though, because it’s so easy to do one more now, earlier there was a lot more attention on getting it right on the first attempt itself.

Cirque de Navacelles

Good news: we're all for a visual treat. The BBC has announced nature series Planet Earth II, a follow-up to the original ratings winner, aired ten years ago
As gear has got smaller, lighter and more sophisticated, aerial filming no longer always has to involve expensive helicopters and static cranes. Production companies are increasingly using drones to nail those shots that require dramatic panoramas, adrenalin-filled action sequences, 360-degree views of subjects or literal birds’ eye views.

Above Ardeche

Observational documentaries attempt to simply and spontaneously observe lived life with a minimum of intervention. Filmmakers who worked in this subgenre often saw the poetic mode as too abstract and the expository mode as too didactic. The first observational docs date back to the 1960s; the technological developments which made them possible include mobile lighweight cameras and portable sound recording equipment for synchronized sound. Often, this mode of film eschewed voice-over commentary, post-synchronized dialogue and music, or re-enactments. The films aimed for immediacy, intimacy, and revelation of individual human character in ordinary life situations.

Future Food

 

A film essay (or "cinematic essay") consists of the evolution of a theme or an idea rather than a plot per se, or the film literally being a cinematic accompaniment to a narrator reading an essay. From another perspective, an essay film could be defined as a documentary film visual basis combined with a form of commentary that contains elements of self-portrait (rather than autobiography), where the signature (rather than the life story) of the filmmaker is apparent. The cinematic essay often blends documentary, fiction, and experimental film making using tones and editing styles.

 

Uzes

The Super 8 film format, introduced in 1965,[1] was marketed for making home movies but it also boosted the popularity of show-at-home films. Eventually, longer, edited-down versions of feature films were issued, increasingly with a magnetic soundtrack and in color. But, these were quite expensive and served only a small niche market of very dedicated or affluent film lovers.

Goudargues in the Gard dept

Shooting Your Movie

Focus on telling your story or idea visually. ...
Make a storyboard of your film. ...
Use an external mic instead of the camera microphone. ...
Shoot in short bursts, not long single takes, when getting lots of footage. ...
Stay in one place if you are filming yourself.

(High Noon)

High Noon is a 1952 American Western film produced by Stanley Kramer from a screenplay by Carl Foreman, directed by Fred Zinnemann, and starring Gary Cooper. The plot, depicted in real time, centers around a town marshal, torn between his sense of duty and love for his new bride, who must face a gang of killers alone.

Though mired in controversy with political overtones at the time of its release, the film was nominated for seven Academy Awards, and won four (Actor, Editing, Music-Score, and Music-Song) as well as four Golden Globe Awards (Actor, Supporting Actress, Score, and Cinematography-Black and White). The award-winning score was written by Russian-born composer Dimitri Tiomkin.

High Noon was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" in 1989, the NFR's first year of existence.

The Art of Slow Motion in Film

Slow motion is ubiquitous in modern filmmaking. It is used by a diverse range of directors to achieve diverse effects. Some classic subjects of slow motion include:

Athletic activities of all kinds, to demonstrate skill and style.
To recapture a key moment in an athletic game, typically shown as a replay.
Natural phenomena, such as a drop of water hitting a glass.
Slow motion can also be used for artistic effect, to create a romantic or suspenseful aura or to stress a moment in time.

Ardeche & Gard

A cult film or cult movie, also commonly referred to as a cult classic, is a film that has acquired a cult following. Cult films are known for their dedicated, passionate fanbase, an elaborate subculture that engage in repeated viewings, quoting dialogue, and audience participation. Inclusive definitions allow for major studio productions, especially box office bombs, while exclusive definitions focus more on obscure, transgressive films shunned by the mainstream. The difficulty in defining the term and subjectivity of what qualifies as a cult film mirror classificatory disputes about art. The term cult film itself was first used in the 1970s to describe the culture that surrounded underground films and midnight movies, though cult was in common use in film analysis for decades prior to that.

Belfort

Films can also be classified by the setting, theme, topic, mood, format, target audience or budget. The setting is the environment where the story and action take place (e.g., a war film, a Western film, or a space opera film). The theme or topic refers to the issues or concepts that the film revolves around (e.g., science fiction film, sports film, or crime film). The mood is the emotional tone of the film (e.g., comedy film, horror film, or tearjerker film). Format refers to the way the film was shot (e.g., anamorphic widescreen) or the manner of presentation (e.g.: 35 mm, 16 mm or 8 mm).

NEW :Made in France

Cinema of France refers to the film industry based in France. The French cinema comprises the art of film and creative movies made within the nation of France or by French filmmakers abroad.France is the birthplace of cinema and was responsible for many of its significant contributions to the art form and the film-making process itself. Several important cinematic movements, including the Nouvelle Vague, began in the country. It is noted for having a particularly strong film industry, due in part to protections afforded by the French government.

Spa water

Audiography ("writing sound") within Indian-style filmmaking, is the audio engineering performed by the sound department of a film or TV production; this includes sound recording, editing, mixing and sound design but excludes musical composition, songwriting and choreography.

An audiographer is responsible for more aspects of sound in film production than their more specialised Western world counterpart. The responsibilities include production sound recording, dialogue editing, sound design, sound effects editing, ADR editing, Foley editing and sound mixing (dubbing). 

Musee Gallo Romain

 "a culture" is the set of customs, traditions, and values of a society or community, such as an ethnic group or nation. Culture is the set of knowledge acquired over time. In this sense, multiculturalism values the peaceful coexistence and mutual respect between different cultures inhabiting the same planet. Sometimes "culture" is also used to describe specific practices within a subgroup of a society, a subculture (e.g. "bro culture"), or a counterculture. Within cultural anthropology, the ideology and analytical stance of cultural relativism holds that cultures cannot easily be objectively ranked or evaluated because any evaluation is necessarily situated within the value system of a given culture. Yet within philosophy, this stance of cultural relativism is undermined and made inapplicable since such value judgement is itself a product of a given culture.

Saint Romains de Gal

For 3D animations, objects (models) are built on the computer monitor (modeled) and 3D figures are rigged with a virtual skeleton. For 2D figure animations, separate objects (illustrations) and separate transparent layers are used with or without that virtual skeleton. Then the limbs, eyes, mouth, clothes, etc. of the figure are moved by the animator on key frames. The differences in appearance between key frames are automatically calculated by the computer in a process known as tweening or morphing. Finally, the animation is rendered.

Glassholes

Five years ago, Google (GOOGL, Tech30) unveiled Google Glass, a futuristic gadget with the promise of changing how consumers take pictures and get information on the go.
The pricey product (initially sold for $1,500) was worn by celebrities and featured in a fashion show. But then came a wave of privacy concerns, harsh reviews of its limited functionality and a growing sense that it was simply not cool.
Now Google's parent company, Alphabet, is focusing on a different audience for its smartglasses: workers.

Cornillon (Gard)

A home movie is a short amateur film or video typically made just to preserve a visual record of family activities, a vacation, or a special event, and intended for viewing at home by family and friends. Originally, home movies were made on photographic film in formats that usually limited the movie-maker to about three minutes per roll of costly camera film. The advent of camcorders that could record an hour or two of video on one relatively inexpensive videocassette, followed by digital video cameras that recorded to flash memory, and most recently smartphones with video recording capability, made the creation of home movies easier and much more affordable to the average person.

Our hotels in France

Because of the movies I make, they get nervous, because they think of me as difficult and angry. I AM difficult and angry [laughs], but they don't expect a sense of humor. And the only thing that gets me through is a sense of humor.

— Martin Scorsese

Corniche des Cevennes

A cliffhanger, or cliffhanger ending, is a plot device in fiction which features a main character in a precarious or difficult dilemma, or confronted with a shocking revelation at the end of an episode of serialized fiction. A cliffhanger is hoped to ensure the audience will return to see how the characters resolve the dilemma.

Some serials end with the caveat "To Be Continued…" or "The End?" In movie serials and television series the following episode sometimes begins with a recap sequence.

Vienne (Isoire)

 Filmmaking is like a marriage: it's messy and crazy and chaotic until one day you die. But being open and willing to compromise is not only super mature of you, it's also a necessity if you're going to be working and collaborating with others who also have opinions and expertise and experience.

Autour du Ballon

Film title design is a term describing the craft and design of motion picture title sequences. Since the beginning of the film form, it has been an essential part of any motion picture. Originally a motionless piece of artwork called title art, it slowly evolved into an artform of its own.

In the beginning, main title design consisted of the movie studio's name and/or logo and the presentation of the main characters along with the actor’s names, generally using that same artwork presented on title cards. Most independent or major studio had their own title art logo used as the background for their screen credits and they used it almost exclusively on every movie that they produced.

Then, early in the 1930s, the more progressive motion picture studios started to change their approach in presenting their screen credits. The major studios took on the challenge of improving the way they introduced their movies. They made the decision to present a more complete list of credits to go with a higher quality of artwork to be used in their screen credits.

Tournus

The church of St Philibert (early 11th century), is the main surviving building of the former Benedictine abbey of Tournus, suppressed in 1785. It is in the Burgundian Romanesque style. The façade lacks one of the two flanking towers originally designed for it. The nave is roofed with barrel vaulting, supported on tall cylindrical columns. Both the choir and the 11th century crypt beneath it have an ambulatory and side chapels.

Post-industrial Eindhoven

Public history describes the broad range of activities undertaken by people with some training in the discipline of history who are generally working outside of specialized academic settings. Public history practice has quite deep roots in the areas of historic preservation, archival science, oral history, museum curatorship, and other related fields. The term itself began to be used in the U.S. and Canada in the late 1970s, and the field has become increasingly professionalized since that time. Some of the most common settings for public history are museums, historic homes and historic sites, parks, battlefields, archives, film and television companies, and all levels of government.

Light by Rembrandt

This is one of the five basic lighting setups used in studio portrait photography; the others being Broad, Short, Split Portrait and Butterfly. There are two things that make up Rembrandt lighting: a light on one half the subject’s face and a triangle of light on the shadowed side of the face. Technically, the triangle shadow should be no wider than the eye and no longer than the nose. The thing that distinguishes Rembrandt lighting from simple short lighting is the triangle of light.

This method can be considered simply a variation of short lighting. When the lighting is such that the shadow of the nose reaches the shadow side of the face and forms a triangle on the short side of the face, it is referred to as Rembrandt lighting.

Berlin '35

Public history describes the broad range of activities undertaken by people with some training in the discipline of history who are generally working outside of specialized academic settings. Public history practice has quite deep roots in the areas of historic preservation, archival science, oral history, museum curatorship, and other related fields. The term itself began to be used in the U.S. and Canada in the late 1970s, and the field has become increasingly professionalized since that time. Some of the most common settings for public history are museums, historic homes and historic sites, parks, battlefields, archives, film and television companies, and all levels of government.

The new cinema-theater

A great variety of films are shown at cinemas, ranging from animated films for children, blockbusters for general audiences and documentaries for patrons who are interested in non-fiction topics. The smallest movie theaters have a single viewing room with a single screen. In the 2010s, most movie theaters have multiple screens. The largest theater complexes, which are called multiplexes—a design developed in the U.S. in the 1960s—have up to 25 screens. The audience members typically sit on padded seats which in most theaters are set up on a sloped floor, with the highest part at the rear of the theater. Movie theaters typically sell soft drinks, popcorn and candy

Midsummer fest

Trollywood is the informal name for a film production facility in Trollhättan Municipality, Sweden. Movies shot there include Fucking Åmål (distributed in English-speaking countries as Show Me Love), Dancer in the Dark, Manderlay and Dogville. The movie studio Film i Väst centered there produces about half of the Swedish full-length films.

Fantascope

The phénakisticope (better known as 'phenakistiscope' or the later misspelling 'phenakistoscope') was the first widespread animation device that created a fluent illusion of motion. The phenakistiscope is regarded as one of the first forms of moving media entertainment that paved the way for the future motion picture and film industry. It is sometimes compared to GIF animation since both show a short continuous loop.

Little Red App/ Rood-Appje

Let the images of this parody speak for themselves, very difficult to translate even with google translate.

A modern fairytale about the sometimes ridiculous use of internet and social media.

Barca

A remake is a film or television series that is based on an earlier work and tells the same, or a very similar, story.
The term "remake" is generally used in reference to a movie which uses an earlier movie as the main source material, rather than in reference to a second, later movie based on the same source. For example, 2001's Ocean's Eleven is a remake of Ocean's 11, while 1989's Batman is a re-interpretation of the comic book source material which also inspired 1966's Batman. In 1998, Gus Van Sant produced an almost shot-for-shot remake of Alfred Hitchcock's 1960 film Psycho.

Stranded

Location shooting is the practice of filming in an actual setting rather than on a sound stage or back lot. In filmmaking a location is any place where a film crew will be filming actors and recording their dialog. A location where dialog is not recorded may be considered as a second unit photography site. Often filmmakers choose to shoot on location because they believe that greater realism can be achieved in a "real" place, however location shooting is also often motivated by the film's budget. Many films shoot interior scenes on a sound stage and exterior scenes on location.Before filming on location its generally wise to conduct a recce. A word used in media production, derived from "reconnoiter". It is a pre-filming visit to a location to work out its suitability for shooting, including access to necessary facilities and assessment of any potential lighting or sound issues.

 

Making of an animation

A little peek behind the scenes at what went into the making of the music video for Michael Andrew's "Bubble In Space." Hint: There was A LOT of drawing and A LOT of scanning...

In cinema, a making-of, also known as behind-the-scenes, the set or on the set is a documentary film that features the production of a film or television program. This is often referred to as the EPK (electronic press kit) video, due to its main usage as a promotional tool, either concurrent with theatrical release or as a bonus feature for the film's DVD.

 

 

Home Movie Day

Home Movie Day (established 2002) is an annual event that celebrates amateur films and filmmaking. It is a worldwide event, held at local venues all over the world and organized locally by volunteers. Home Movie Day events provide the opportunity for individuals and families to have their films inspected and to see and share their own home movies with an audience of their community. The event is an opportunity to discover the personal, historical, and social importance of home movies and for individuals to learn how to best care for them.

Castle and cats

Cat is a symbol for spiritual power, freedom, love of liberty and bad
luck in Japan. On the contrary the black cat is linked to evil cunning
in the Celtic world and with harmful djins in Islamic world.

In Europe, the cat is honored as an exalted soul and at other times it
is associated with witches and the occult (especially the black cat). It
is therefore seen as a symbol of superstition and bad luck.