Club Showreel Exchange

[GtBFilms]

Hello,

I've been a lurker on these boards for a while now, but this is my first post - so please be gentle!

I know quite a lot of people aren't keen on lots of club nights spent just sitting around watching films, and prefer more hands-on events, and to be honest, I tend to agree with them, however with a weekly programme of September - April to fill, there are inevitably a few nights where an arranged speaker falls through, or a night needs to be rearranged at short notice, and on these occassions, the 'Showreel from another club' DVD can save the day.

In the past, Edinburgh Cine and Video Society (ECVS) have arranged showreel exchanges with other clubs on a 1:1 basis, however these arrangements always seem to peter out after a couple of years.

I am wondering whether other clubs regularly produce showreels and whether a more organised method of exchange might be worth trying to set up?

My suggestion would be something like the old 'shareware' distribution method, clubs could send their showreel DVD to some central repository, with an agreement that it can be copied and distributed to other clubs, and in exchange, could select to have a showreel from another club sent back (probably in a supplied stamped addressed envelope). A catalogue of available showreels could be maintained online, with the running time and description of the contents of each. Hopefully the admin/cost of something like that would be minimal.

Would something like that work/be useful/has been tried before?

I'd be interested in hearing what people think.

[col lamb]

Hi and welcome, we will be gentle no need to be bashful

We have exchanged our movies between our respected clubs a couple of times before, Preston Movie Makers.

What I do for PMM is that at the end of our season in April I compile into one DVD/Bluray project all the movies we have had entered into our competitions and those placed 1, 2 or 3.

We therefore always have a new fresh set of DVD's available each year.

When I am in the mood I also compile other DVD/Bluray projects for disc production such as PMM Club movies or our War inspired series. The completed projects are now Image files and reside on the club's WD media unit and so a disc or two is very easily burned.

Not exactly kosher as the saying goes but we also download movies off the likes of Vimeo onto our media player and so always have a batch of fresh movies to watch to fill a night or part of one.

A fairly popular club meet and competition in our region is the Trivention, Club A hosts visitors from Clubs B and C, where B and C each supply a 40 minute programme and Club A decides on the winning programme and the best movie from the second placed programme. A few years ago I suggested in these very forums that we hold remote Triventions and we at PMM usually do this at least once per year as the name suggests the competing clubs do not necessarily have to be in attendance for a social.

[Dave Watterson]

Looking at club websites for the annual competition, I know that many do have screenings of showreels from other clubs.

It seems to me that it can be valuable now and then, in that the range of work is likely to be similar to the range of work produced by your own members ... but everyone can comment and discuss the films freely without worrying about hurting the feelings of a fellow member.

As a practical step: is anyone willing to act as the central "post office" for such a service? For the moment we would be talking about DVDs going to and fro ... or maybe memory sticks. In the near future it might be possible to do it all electronically through DropBox or WeSendIt ... but I suspect many clubs lack experience with such systems as yet.

[GtBFilms]

Thanks for the comments, good to know that other clubs are also producing showreels.

Of course, I should have mentioned, as I've suggested it, I volunteer to receive/distribute showreels if there are no objections.

I'd probably make it an ECVS thing - using the Edinburgh Cine and Video Society as the contact address so if I'm on holiday, another member of the club could administer it in my absence.

Alan

[TimStannard]

At Staines we also compile an annual DVD which is basically our competition winners, everything from our annual public show and anything which we think might not totally bore the pants of the audience! We have an swap every season with Huddersfield then another (sometimes two) with other clubs which we try to vary.

I can see the benefit of a repository - however it might be worth getting an idea from John at videolibrary@theiac.org.uk as to how popular the existing extensive library is. We always take a BIAFF compilation but have never (in my time) hired anything else. And Dave is quite right - we would need a volunteer to run it.

But my preference is dealing with clubs directly as this tends to create a bit more of an incentive for the host club to return comments. This is what really interests me as a film maker. It's fine to know my film has been shown at (say) ECVS, but what I really want to know is how it was received.

Even better is to have someone from the club who produces the showreel,come and present and talk about the films, but this is often not very practical.

[col lamb]

There is another way to store and distribute movies, online!

When we held an evening looking at BIAFF movies we did not hire the DVD, we downloaded them off the web and used our media player to view them.

The big job is digitising and uploading them, but once done the only Admin is paying the subscription to say Vimeo, and monitoring the statistics of usage.

Clubs then can download the movies they want to see, the downloads go on a memory card and then a cheap Raspberry PI can be used as a media player at a club that does not want to spend much, a PI is less than £30.

Online is by far the better way as there is also more chance of potential members or contributors to BIAFF.

[Dave Watterson]

I am sure online is the way to go ... but many of my own efforts to present movies downloaded from sites like Vimeo and YouTube result in soft, low quality images. As so often in life you have to choose carefully ...

And not worry too much about copyright ...

Are you really suggesting that an entire showreel of 60 to 90 minutes is uploaded as a single unit and downloaded as such? Or do you mean that each movie on a showreel is separately uploaded and so the receiving club/s can be selective? Isn't part of the point of showreels to show the entire collection to get an idea of the range of styles and qualities another club produces?

We present as many BIAFF entries as we can on the IAC website ... but only those already uploaded to various video hosts by their makers. We have no rights to put up work we do not own. The catch is that many longer movies are not online.

The publicity angle is potentially useful. I noted the suggestion in FVM magazine that an IAC and/or club trailer could be added to the front or back of an online movie to encourage casual viewers to join. (They used to sell a 16mm leader which did that!)

Tiny detail ... it costs nothing to upload and use Vimeo unless you want to upload more than 500Mb a week. I add that to reassure any newcomers. Of course uploading a whole showreel would require a higher limit and that costs $60 a year for Vimeo Plus or Vimeo Po at $199 a year.

Another approach would be to send material through DropBox or WeSendIt and similar bulk services ...

P.S.
Is there a simple way of sending the appropriate file from a BluRay up to Vimeo? Such a file should already be coded H.264 ... or is that somehow too easy?

[TimStannard]

An email to John and a DVD arrives. Simple. I've got my whole evening at Staines set up for very little effort. It is similar with exchange nights.

Downloading a whole programme in one go would not be particularly onerous for me as I'm IT literate and also benefit from a 60Mbps Virgin service, but I'd still have to, check it, transfer it to some other media etc. This is not a big deal, but a DVD through the post is preferable. It's a night off for me from worrying about checking the speaker will arrive, has directions and can park as well as organizing their expenses, buying a bottle of wine, OR coming up with a script that we can use in order to run a filming workshop night or any of the other straightforward but time consuming things that running a club entails.

I'm not anti download - far from it: I've run a very successful night simply showing videos that I've found inspiring that I've downloaded (having obtained the makers' permissions, of course) - but a physical exchange has a more personal touch about it and thus helps forge links between film makers in different parts of the land.