Is there a distribution divide between black filmmakers and those from the ‘mainstream’ when it comes to getting work seen by large audiences? Could fresh avenues in digital distribution provide a viable new platform for ownership and wider marketing and promotion?
Mobile streaming, iPods, PSPs and PDAs may represent new and vibrant ways to showcase your film or create global audiences and forums, and can be especially attractive if you are an independent filmmaker with little or no funds for distribution. You may choose these routes to cut out the ‘middle men’, but what are the rights and protection issues involved in creating films and videos that are downloaded or freely distributed by you as a filmmaker?
Do these digital mediums present new ways of thinking about protecting your work in terms of its content and context if it is presented on a smaller screen to an international audience, and can this type of self-publication create a good enough platform for you to take an entrepreneurial and creative stance as a filmmaker?
This event will cover issues of intellectual property rights and distribution for black filmmakers, and whether or not new digital platforms have any more commercial value than other networks.
Speakers
Marc Boothe (B3Media) – Chair http://www.b3media.net
Marketing and distribution expert Marc Boothe is the founder B3media. He has created a number of innovative projects, such as the UK-wide digital shorts film scheme, Blank Slate, which unearths new talent and explores fresh and practical approaches to showcasing film created by black and minority ethnic artists and film-makers. Together with Ruth Caleb, he produced director Saul Dibb’s acclaimed feature film, Bullet Boy, for BBC Films and the UK Film Council.
He was recently nominated for best British Producer by the London Film Critics Circle and is the recipient of a National Endowment of Science, Technology and the Arts (NESTA) fellowship to connect new media and digital cinema through alternative digital distribution networks.
Marc, who holds an MBA, previously worked as Senior Executive at the UK Film Council’s New Cinema Fund.
Lee Gage (Harbottle & Lewis LLP) http://www.harbottle.com
Lee is a solicitor in the Intellectual Property Law Practice Harbottle & Lewis, who provide high quality legal services to organisations and individuals, in particular those working in the media and entertainment industries. An IP specialist, Lee has worked with creative businesses of all sizes and types, with a particular specialism in design law. He is co-author of ‘Design Law: Protecting and Enforcing Rights’, published by the Law Society (2004).
Karen Alexander
Karen has recently started working freelance on artist-led projects but was for many years the UK-wide Communications Manager for Film Distribution and Cultural Planning at the BFI (British Film Institute).
Keith Shiri http://www.africaatthepictures.co.uk
Keith Shiri is a founder/director of Africa at the Pictures, which programmes events on African cinema in the UK, Europe and Africa. He teaches African cinema and has served on a number of international film festival juries. He is the Africa programme advisor for the Times London Film Festival and until 2005 the Venice Film Festival. He is also a member of the Jury of the Berlinale World Cinema Fund, which supports film projects from Africa, Asia and Latin America.
During the last three years he has produced seminars on African Cinema for the International Forum for New Cinema in Berlin.
Ishmahil Blagrove, Jr http://www.ricenpeas.com
Ishmahil is a Producer/Director at Rice N Peas Films, the London based Independent production company. Specialising in producing evocative, thought-provoking programmes, Rice N Peas Films have earned a reputation for producing hard-hitting social documentaries.
Location map: http://www.streetmap.co.uk/newmap.srf?x=529708&y=179154&z=1&sv
Partners
Film London
FilmFour
B3Media
Fresh Shoots – New Platforms in Film (Own-It Black Filmmakers Event)
6:00 to 9:00 pm (including drinks and networking)
Location:
Channel 4 Drum Cinema
Channel 4
Horseferry Road
London SW1