By Wesley Wong
As someone who owns a digital video camera, and put together a couple
short films of my own, I am naturally excited by a site that addresses
such a topic. Thenewvenue.com is a site dedicated to showcasing the
latest amateur digital video shorts, and disseminating technical information
to empower the aspiring director. The site was founded in 1996 when
Jason Wishnow, who worked at Woody Allen's production office, received
a grant from Stanford University to create a "virtual theatre"
on the Internet. The site began showing films in 1998, and eventually
partnered with Apple (developers of Quicktime) and D.FILM. The site
has received a warm press response, and has been mentioned in Newsweek,
the New York Times, and WIRED.
The sites layout is simple, directing the user to check out the films
immediately. When you first load the page, it immediately detects
whether you have Quicktime installed, and if not, it alerts you. This
is useful for the less tech-savvy user, who may not otherwise know
why they can't view the video properly. On the main menu, there are
five choices: Current Feature, FlickTips, Submit, Archives and Takeout.
The films featured on the site are extremely diverse both in terms
of quality and style. Some films are done entirely in Flash, while
others are pure video exercises. Some are of tip-notch resolution,
while others are clearly compressed incorrectly. This is expected
though, as most of the films are user submitted. One of the current
features, title "The Conversion", is truly innovative. The
film begins with a French couple sitting in a restaurant having a
conversation. Just below the viewing window, there are three buttons
in the shape of an eye. By clicking on each button, you can change
the viewpoint of the camera. The first button is a medium shot of
the couple talking. The second button takes you to a point-of-view
shot of the waiter serving the couple, and you follow him through
the restaurant as he picks up their food, and serves coffee to other
customers, while you can faintly hear the couple's conversation in
the background. The third button takes you to a shot of the soundman,
holding a microphone beneath the table. The transition is done in
real time, such that you can switch back and forth between these viewpoints
while the conversation continues. Very interesting. I also checked
out the sites flagship film, "The Qui-Gon Show". This is
again a very novel film. It follows the travels of an Obi-Wan action
figure, who returns home and gets drunk with Yoda. The film pokes
fun at the commercialization of Star Wars. Then the film drifts
out of its action-figure animation and into an illustrated animation
style, where George Lucas appears in a sequence that parodies the
film The Matrix. It is hard to describe, so check it out yourself.
FlickTips is another section worth exploring. It contains a wealth
of practical, hands-on information for the aspiring digital director.
It covers everything from pre-production through post-production,
including codecs, editing hardware and software, and embedding interactivity.
I wish I had known about this when I was making my films. Finally,
I checked out the Submit section. They require that your videos be
no longer than fifteen minutes or larger than 5MB. Since I had a film
that met those requirements, I submitted it. The process was simple,
and I encountered no problems.
Overall, thenewvenue.com is a very encouraging site for the future
of digital cinema. The films it showcases, although not always very
professional, all highlight new directions which cinema can take over
the Internet, particularly with regards to interactivity. The site
would benefit from several additional features. First, they should
categorize the video, so that users can browse by type (video, flash,
etc.). Also, they should implement a discussion board within the FlickTips
area to allow newcomers to ask questions and get answers. Finally,
they should create a rating system for the films, so that visitors
can go directly to the most popular films rather than browsing through
numerous sub-par films until they find a good one.