:: SITES

WHAT: Where music goes film follows. The music industry has been ahead of the film industry for years – in terms of technology, failed business models, and musicians going direct to audiences. In recent years, discovery has become a major focus (LastFM, Pandora). The Sixty One takes discovery a step further by combining gaming and community to create an addictive social discovery mechanism for music.

WHY: With so much content vying for audience attention – the music, film, and gaming industry are all in a similar position when it comes to discovery. The new discovery models for film could very well come from other industries.

http://www.thesixtyone.com

:: TOOLS

WHAT: Movavi’s online video converter is a free way to convert your short form videos to a number of formats (AVI, mp4, mpeg-2, 3gp, mov, flv, mp3, wma).

WHY: It can be a hassle to convert video to various video formats. Movavi Online Convert is free and enables simple conversions of various formats for online playback and mobile devices.

http://online.movavi.com

:: EVENTS

WHAT: Much has been written about the erosion of the independent film business over the last year. We have seen the shuttering of various distribution companies, poor box office for specialty films, a reduction of shelf space – not to mention the complete saturation of films in the market due to the democratization of the tools. We all know the problems, but where are the evasive new business models? THE CONVERSATION (San Francisco 10.17 & 10.18) and POWER TO THE PIXEL (London 10.22 to 10.24) are two gatherings that will attempt to address these very issues.

WHY: THE CONVERSATION and POWER TO THE PIXEL bring together innovators and filmmakers from all over the world for discussion and debate about the future of the industry.

http://powertothepixel.com For those in London

htttp://theconversationspot.com For those in San Francisco

RELATED: Interview with Conversation founder Scott Kirsner
Download Adobe Flash Player.

:: WATCH

WHAT: Ballast synopsis: In the cold, winter light of a rural Mississippi Delta township, a man’s suicide radically transforms three characters’ lives and throws off-balance what has long been a static arrangement among them. Marlee is a single mother struggling to scratch a living for herself and James, her 12-year-old son, who has begun to stumble under drug and violence pressures. So when the opportunity to seek safe harbor at a new home arises, she grabs it, though the property is shared by Lawrence, a man with whom Marlee has feuded bitterly since James’s birth. With circumstances thrusting them into proximity, a subtle interdependence and common purpose emerge for Marlee and Lawrence as they navigate grief, test new waters, and tentatively move forward.

WHY: Ballast is a powerful film that needs to be seen in a theater. Not to mention that the film’s self distribution efforts need your support.

http://www.ballastfilm.com

::PROJECT Wreck a Movie – As the internet continues to connect people, filmmakers are looking for new ways to improve the funding, production and distribution process. The folks behind the internet phenomenon Star Wreck have established a social community around the creation of a number of film projects. The site describes the community as something that – “…helps get films done faster and at a considerably lower cost through crowd-sourced work on production tasks and online resourcing of expertise and corporate funding. The communities developed in production will also create a viral social marketing force that will get films seen through the hundreds of existing online and standard channels.”

WHY: Projects like Wreck a Movie and A Swarm of Angels are at the forefront of a new movement in collaborative filmmaking. These projects are experimenting with processes that could dramatically change how filmmakers approach their work.

::TOOLS Website Grader If you’re looking for a way to improve the traffic to your site or blog then you should take the test. Websitegrader.com offers an extensive free test that will evaluate the discoverability of your site. This is a great resource that breaks down the SEO issues surrounding your own site or blog.

WHY: An excellent FREE comprehensive evaluation of your site or blog that grades readability of content, number of inbound links, google page rank, google indexed pages, traffic rank, blog rank and number times you’ve been bookmarked.

::FESTIVAL MyFestival For those looking for a festival experience without having leaving the comfort of your own home then indieflix and there new offering MyFestival might be the perfect fit. MyFestival showcases features and shorts vying for a theatrical slot at film festivals around the world. Stop by and support the films and choose the one that you think should close out the fest.

WHY: IndieFlix is a champion of true independent cinema and MyFestival like From Here to Awesome are experiments that look to expand and change the current festival model.

::TOOLS Tangler takes the concept of forums and gives them a media boost by allowing them to accept rich media like audio and video thanks to a simple wysiwyg editor. Tangler also has a nice embeddable version that allows you to bring a media rich forum into your own site or blog.

WHY: Forums are an important audience building tool when used effectively. Tangler improves the functionality thanks to rich media and RSS feed integration which makes user contribution and notification easier

::TOOLS WetPaint is a wiki solution that enables you to easily create wikis around a subject. Wiki’s are very strong audience building tools when used effectively. It takes effort to grow them but when you strike the right balance between user contribution and devotion they can explode – a perfect example is the rapid growth of wikipedia.

WHY: A Wiki is an interesting way to grow a community around a topic organically. WetPaint also offers a new embed versions for publishers so that they can easily bring a wiki into their own sites.

:: PROJECT -Nerdcore Rising is a fun glimpse into the world of the nerd hi-hop movement. Negin Farsad’s doc follows the trials and tribulations of MC Frontalot as he embarks on his first national tour; complete with strange opening acts, missing gear, and a single groupie that follows them from the Florida panhandle to New Orleans.

WHY: An entertaining look at a subculture that has legions of dedicated fans. What’s interesting about the self funded flick is the strong following the film has created by identifying its audience and turning to them to help spread the word.

::TOOLS -Friendfeed – for those looking to find an easy way to aggregate their social feeds into a single outlet – Friendfeed might be for you. One of a number of services that is offering to help make discovery easier. Keep up-to-date with your friends and share links, music, photos, blog entries, and video.

WHY: Lifestreaming is an interesting emerging trend that promises to ease discovery. Friendfeed is a simple services that allows for a wide variety of feed importing so you can snag blog, youTube, flickr, twitter, and bookmark feeds.

:: SITES -indiegogo – an interesting crowdsourced funding site that enables filmmakers to raise money for their projects. Filmmakers create pitches and provide a variety of perks that allow contributors behind the scenes of the process. Interested parties can make a contribution to a project to help support it.

WHY: Since the site’s launch in mid January three projects have raised 10k in contributions. And some filmmakers are even using the site to raise money to promote and distribute an existing project.

*WEB 2.0 -Plugoo is a service that allows you to bring IM to a site or blog. By embedding the chat client you can easily communicate with visitors to your site or blog in real-time.

WHY: For those looking to extend a personal touch to a project it is a simple and free way to engage your audience. The only downside is a conversation limit of five people. Other solutions like meebo rooms allow for more participants to a chat but have become the target of IM spam.

:: TOOLS -Sprout Builder is a service that lets you construct robust widgets within minutes. You can add video, audio, photos, news feeds, and bookmarks. The interface enables you to construct a flash based widget that can be embedded in a blog, social networking profile and / or site.

WHY: Widgets are a good way to help promote a project and to keep audiences update. But since widgets can be embedded within sites your audience can help to amplify your reach.