Category Archives: News

June, Adrift: Female Indie Kickstarter Ribs Zach Braff (Indie Press Release)

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Following in Zach Braff’s footsteps, the June, Adrift Kickstarter video begins with Moore making a humorous appeal to “her” Scrubs fans (she was a featured extra in a season 9 episode) and directing them to check out her own project. The women go on to offer Braff a special incentive in exchange for supporting some like-minded independent filmmakers. With a successful Kickstarter campaign, the Crafty Shoddmanship team will be able to pay cast and crew and send them to location in Maryland.

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Adobe Unveils Major Update to Creative Cloud (Press Release)

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Adobe Unveils Their CC Line

Adobe today announced a significant update to Adobe® Creative Cloud™, the company’s flagship offering for creatives. Available in June and packed with new features, Creative Cloud reimagines the creative process through a stunning set of “CC” desktop applications and sophisticated cross-device collaboration and publishing capabilities. Creative files can be stored, synced and shared, via Creative Cloud, on Mac OS, Windows, iOS and Android; and Behance…

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NAB 2013: AJ Wedding’s Recap (News)

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The latest trend is to reach out with the same cutting edge technology to both consumers and pros alike, offering near or exact versions to both target markets. No more highly publicized example of this is Apple’s move with Final Cut X.

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Best of Show Feature Winner Shares Itself Free of Charge (News)

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Long time readers of MicroFilmmaker doubtless remember Best of Show Winner “Behind the Scenes of ‘Total Hell’”, which received an 8.8 score from Kari Ann Morgan in her critique. To celebrate the release of the Collector’s Edition and give love to fans of Indie films everywhere, the filmmakers are streaming the Behind the Scenes of ‘Total Hell’ Mockumentary free of charge starting on Sunday, April 21st! To find out more….

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NAB 2013 Coverage, Day 2 (News)

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BlackMagic NAB Cover

Blackmagic proves they are interested in the microfilmmaker market with a $1k cinema quality camera. Another exciting day of NAB sent even more great news for Microfilmmakers everywhere, with both production and post-production related gear hitting the block. This year is as crowded as ever, with a bevy of interesting people and their cameras both purchased and on loan from the various companies fighting for exposure (no pun intended) crossing the floor to test, shoot vlogs, and hope to purchase at some date within the year.

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Alloy 2 (Review)

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Alloy 2 gives filmmakers and sound designers seven stellar tools to shape and form audio, arguably one of the most important and yet most ignored parts of a film. Assuming a basic knowledge of mixing, users will love Alloy’s user-friendly interface, wallet-friendly price tag and reliable performance. If you take Alloy 2 for a test run, be sure to pair it with a trial of Ozone 5 and let these products speak for themselves.

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Photoshop Elements 11 (Review)

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Instead of a magical “instant fix” in the Quick path where there are few choices, or an overwhelming list of options in Expert, the new Guided Edits path lets the creative side of the user flow as you do things like add depth of field or a high key effect to a photo. In the Guided area, you are led step-by-step through each phase of adjustment, using your eye and goal for the project. What you get is rather impressive, even if you are an amateur photographer using a point and shoot camera.

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Balance (Review)

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Balance Cover

When Propellerhead announced the release of Balance, I knew this audio interface would push the bounds of innovation, and, indeed, they have created a noteworthy and easy-to-use product with some vital features like Clip Safe. As you do your research on your next audio interface, give Balance some attention, understanding that the extra money you will pay over and above the competition goes towards special features like Clip Safe and the reliability associated with Propellerhead.

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Premiere Elements 11 (Review)

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However, PRE11 seems to be much cleaner and faster. There is very little lag in response time and my old problems of dropped frames, uneven pans, and errors have vanished. To get an accurate preview of the edited video you have to render the Timeline, which used to be a slow process and not always successful. Now the Render tab is on the top of the Timeline and is much more responsive and effective. The preview plays accurately and there are no unpleasant surprises by the final product during publication.

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Chris Folino’s ‘Sparks’ to Premiere in Silicon Valley… (News)

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Long time readers of MFM doubtless remember Chris Folino and his hysterical comedy, Gamers, which won a 9.0 in our Special Critique Category (for those who are technically over the $50,000 budget cap, but whose ingenuity pushes the creativity of Independent films). Well, Folino’s new film, Sparks, is about to premiere in Silicon Valley and he let me know about it so that I could pass on the info…

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Tweeting & Crowdfunding Success: Ed Burns Explains How He Used these new Technologies (Interview)

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Ed Burns (Sundance 2013)

Sheri Candler interviews Writer/Director Edward Burns discusses the value of using Twitter to connect with his fans and collaborate with them on his projects…to a point. His next project, Winter Spring Summer Fall, is now in production with a Kickstarter campaign…

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Bringing ‘Weed to the Dance: Shaka King at the 2013 Sundance Festival (Interview)

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Shaka King (Photo by Paris Whittingham)

Sheri Candler interviews director Shaka King during Sundance 2013. King’s film, Newlyweeds, was included in the NEXT category for ultra low budget films and secured distribution through Phase 4 Films. King discusses the value of film labs like those from the IFP, making short films, and using Kickstarter to successfully fund the film’s…

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The Magic of the MicroBudget: Sheri Candler talks with Edward Burns (Interview)

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Writer/Director Edward Burns sat down with us at the Sundance Film Festival 2013 to discuss why he loves the freedom that comes with microbudget filmmaking, the compromises that are involved when working with less money, why digital distribution interests him more than conventional theatrical, using social media (primarily Twitter) to reach his audience and why he enjoys it.

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Sundance Chat with Nicolas Gonda: Using Tugg for your theatrical release (Interview)

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One company has sprung up in the last year to provide both distributors and filmmakers who are self releasing with a way to take the financial risk out of public screenings. Tugg.com is a web-platform that allows the audience bring movies they want to see to a local theater. A person in the community can search through Tugg’s library of available titles and choose one, provide details such as screening date and preferred location, set up the event with the help of a Tugg representative, spread the word to their friends in the local community encouraging them to buy tickets and, if enough people reserve their tickets to meet the minimum ticket threshold, the screening…

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Interview with Director J.R. Hughto at Diamond on Vinyl premiere, Slamdance 2013 (Interview)

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JR Hughto Interview

Director J.R. Hughto discusses his entry into filmmaking from being a photographer and graphic novelist starting with making short films, his new microbudget feature Diamond on Vinyl, and how he views the sacrifices filmmakers have to make in order to work within…

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Sundance Video Interview with mumblecore director, Andrew Bujalski (Interview)

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Andrew Bujalski Interview

Director Andrew Bujalski on the red carpet for the premiere of Computer Chess at the Sundance Film Festival 2013. He is one of the leading figures of micro-budget filmmaking known as mumblecore. Bujalski used a 1969 Sony AVC-3260 tube video camera to give the film its period feel (and to show that video definitely doesn’t look like film!). Computer Chess centers around a weekend computer chess tournament in the early 1980s at the dawning of the age of personal computers and well before technology was in the palm of our hands…

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$70K Micro-Budget Film becomes First 3D Indie film to Premiere In Dallas (News/Industry)

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Zero One, a science fiction thriller written and produced by Kareem Gray, will be the basis for a TV series now in development, The Zero One Mandate. The film, which revolves around a man who discovers a computer program that has the power to save or destroy humanity, has been screened at film festivals around the world. It won the Best Screenplay and Best Original Music awards at the Boston Sci-Fi Festival, and was named Best Film at this year’s Dallas Black Film Festival. Ticket Stubs Entertainment called it ‘hugely enjoyable for all ages.’ Now the original 2-D version has been converted into a 3-D movie experience by P3DHD, a Dallas company that is pioneering quick, high quality, cost effective conversions of conventional film and video into 3-D.

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