So, dear readers and subscribers, I’m sure you’ve noticed things have been a bit thin around Titicut lately. This is not due to my lack of interest in documentary, or because there is nothing to post about, but rather because I’ve been working on my own little film! Documentary film that is.
It’s due for completion by March, so you can expect more derisive or obsequious reviews and news very soon.
As for my doco, I’m still working on the trailer and proper outline (amongst other things). Rest assured I’ll be posting details on Titicut as things move along.
More soon…
IMDB
Documentary Filmmaking
documentary
Remember Martin Scorsese’s American Prince? That’s the documentary where he profiles actor Steven Prince in a seemingly cocaine-assisted recollection of Prince’s colourful past. The film achieved a famously cult following after being bootlegged and cycled around for the last 30 years.
Now, a follow up from A Scanner Darkly producer Tommy Pallotta has been completed and in a statement of sorts, the director has released the film for free on the BitTorrent network. Interestingly, the 2009 film features clips from the orginal, but instead of using the degrading master tapes (provided by Steven Prince himself), Pallotta used clips from the version he downloaded off BitTorrent, as according to the director, the digitized copy was of superior quality.
Oh, the irony of such an epic win.
Get the torrent here.
Documentary Filmmaking
bittorrent, copyright, filmmaking, Martin Scorsese, Steven Prince
Congratulations to James Marsh and Philippe Petit for taking out the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature for the fantastic Man on Wire.
The winner of the Documentary Shorts category was Smile Pinki, directed by Megan Mylan.
Documentary Filmmaking
Academy Awards, James Marsh, Man on Wire, Megan Mylan, Oscar Awards, Oscars, Philippe Petit, Smile Pinki
The IDA’S made a few posts recently about the anti-piracy Content Scrambling System (CSS) technology found on commercial DVDs. Apparently the system is preventing documentary filmmakers from accessing content on discs which is either public domain or subject to ‘fair use’.
Firstly, if something is public domain, I’m not sure how the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA) comes into it. DMCA is also an American law which I believe has little jurisdiction outside the US. Of course, I’m no lawyer so I may be way off, but the whole subject seems to revolve around some filmmaker’s difficulties in circumventing CSS on DVDs. They either go without, or record footage via analogue capture. Enterprising directors could also go for a ghetto telecine.
As we all know, CSS was cracked in a matter of hours by a 14 year old Norwegian hacker who packaged the hack for all to use. It’s known as DeCSS and is widely implemented in a number of DVD ripping programs.
Anyway, all this got me thinking about the nature of DVDs themselves, which use a compressed MPEG-2 video stream. Even if you do DeCSS some video, it’s still compressed and is of lesser quality than even standard def DV.
While most of us would agree in challenging archaic copyright laws in general, surely the MPAA’s stopgap anti-piracy measures can’t be that much of a deterrant to filmmakers?
Documentary Filmmaking
copyright, css, dmca, dvd, MPAA, mpeg-2
Additional Details
Recent Comments