The Reel Newsletter: 05/07/2009

More news for the Reel faithful. If you’ve got anything you want us to shout about here, throw an email in our direction – editor@thereel.net.

…if you’re one of the Sixteens

OK, if you weren’t put off by the Sweet referencing headline (it’s on brand – honest!), you’ll be excited to hear about an excellent new 16MM initiative from the lovely folk at Kodak, Soho Film Lab and Rushes. sweet16 (see the reference now!) is a new offering of packaged services, consisting of stock, lab processing and grading aimed at stimulating the use of 16mm film for commercials, virals and music promos.

The unique package is tailored two ways to suit the differing workflows for commercials and music videos. The sweet16 commercials package comes with 2000ft of stock, processing and one light SD transfers, plus three hours of telecine, whilst the sweet16 promos package has 3200ft’ of stock, processing and five hours of telecine. Both include SD or HD machine time but exclude tape stock. The package is available through Kodak re-sellers Arri Media and Take 2 in conjunction with their camera equipment rental, and is a snip at £1600.

More information about sweet16 can be found at: www.sweet-16mm.com

Don’t all Rush at once

More from Rushes!! The Rushes Soho Shorts Festival, celebrating its 11th year, has now announced the Official Festival Program for 2009. As regular readers will know, we bloody love the Soho Shorts fest, so this announcement has us filling our diaries faster than a whippet.

Films include Sadie Frost’s Directorial Debut, Danny Boyles End Credit Sequence for Slumdog Millionaire, actors such as Michael Bryne (Gangs of New York), Juliet Stevenson (Bend It Like Beckham), Nick Nolte (Hotel Rwanda, 48 Hours), Connie Fischer (Sound Of Music), Russel Tovey (Being Human), Chris Hehir (Green Street), Danny Cunningham (24 Hour Party People), Jack O’Connell (This is England), and comedians such as Adam Buxton Lulu McClatchy and Alexei Sayle. That’s right, Dr Buckles and Nick Nolte on the same bill. Immense.

For all the info on the festivities, check out the official site – www.sohoshorts.com – and for more info on the shortlisted films, fly to our previous feature here.

Block my spam, fire my wall

This week The Reel were invited along to a special screening Seth Gordon’s (he of King of Kong) new McAfee funded doc H*COMMERCE – and subsequently wrapped their PCsa in cotton wool and waited for the E-mageddon. The film (a collection of 6 docu-shorts hosted on the bespoke www.stophcommerce.com site) basically tells us that there are clever, malicious people out there who know more about computers than you, and there fore know more about you than you. However, the frankly dry, techie subject is smartly injected with Gordon’s uncanny ability to find a human tale to tell – this time focussing on a kindly former-vicar’s staggering loss of $400,000. Tense, humourous and compelling this smart piece of, dare we say it, branded content oozes credibility. Cheers to Moxie Pictures for the invite.

Grey-t new appointment in Amsterdam

Grey has completed the reorganisation of its Amsterdam agency with the appointment of Hazelle Klønhammer to the role of Managing Director. Formerly at 180, Wieden+Kennedy and Modernista! Amsterdam, Australian-born Klønhammer has an established track-record in successfully managing international business for creatively-led clients.

Working closely with Executive Creative Directors Colin Lamberton and Seyoan Vela (with whom The Reel spent several pleasurable moments in Cannes), Klønhammer will be responsible for building Dutch business as well as extending the strengthened Grey offering to international clients.

Klønhammer’s strong track record for winning new business and re-positioning global brands is evidenced in her work as group account director at
Wieden+Kennedy. Over a 10 year period she worked on numerous brands such as Electronic Arts, Nike, Heineken, Microsoft, Carlsberg, and the global launch of Vodafone. She was instrumental in setting up the agency’s digital offering and was responsible for securing and running their first digital client, Electronic Arts. Since leaving W+K 18 months ago, her senior management skills have been in play at Modernista! and 180. Prior to this, Klønhammer has also worked at Amirati Puris Lintas, Sydney, and TBWA Campaign Company.

http://www.grey.com/netherlands/

New fingers on the Pulse

Top production company Pulse Films have added further directing talent to their books, as well as an appointment to their advertising team. Acclaimed commercials director and photographer Jack Cole has joined Pulse, along with award-winning writer-director Ben Woolf. They have also appointed Verity Casey as the company’s Directors’ Representative.

Jack Cole has been a freelance director and photographer since he ended his time as one half of director’s duo LIFF. His commercial work has won major awards, including a Cannes Lions Festival award nomination and he has worked in the UK, Belgium and Germany on campaigns for Panasonic, Tesco, and the Coca Cola group among others. Jack started his career on the international film festival circuit, receiving acclaim for films like Practice Makes Perfect which won the TCM Classic Shorts Award at the London Film Festival. Jack has had a number of big photography commissions and work published; his freelance work has been featured at the London Design Festival and in publications such as Damn and Plastique.

Jack is joined at Pulse by writer-director Ben Woolf, whose work spans theatre, film, TV and online production. Ben’s television credits include Children of the Tsunami (BBC), and a viral musical commercial (Unexpected Performance) for Lastminute.com which won a Young Directors Award at the 2009 Cannes Lion Festival. Ben is highly successful within the theatrical world, and his plays have been produced in the UK, USA, Australia and the Czech Republic. His comedy about immigration, Angry Young Men - which he wrote and directed - has won numerous plaudits including a TimeOut Critics Choice Award. Ben was Associate Director of plays including the Olivier Award-nominated Sunset Boulevard and Ivanov with Kenneth Branagh. He is also the Artistic Director of the MahWaff Theatre Company, which looks to produce innovative new writing work internationally.

Verity Casey, who will be responsible for securing commercial commissions for Pulse’s roster of directors, was previously Director’s Representative at Rogue Films. Verity has a background of working for a range of media and advertising agencies such as Fallon, AIS and M&C Saatchi.

http://www.pulsefilms.co.uk/

Walter Campbell gets Serious

In another new signing, multi - award winning Walter Campbell has joined Serious Pictures. Walter has written and art directed some of the most iconic and influential advertising in the world, and has now started Directing through Serious Pictures. Check out his showreel here - http://www.seriouspictures.com/directors/walter-campbell.go.

Square snares Steph

Not one to be outdone by their production brothers, Golden Square has announced the signing of an extremely experienced producer – Steph Thompson – who brings 16 years of agency, production company and post experience to Golden Square’s production department. Thompson’s extensive experience boasts some of the most respected agencies and brands in the commercials industry: BBH, Fallon, Stella Artois and Coca Cola.

Thompson started her career at The Moving Picture Company in 1993 and left in 1995 to become a Production Assistant for Lowe Howard Spink where she worked for two years on brands ranging from Stella Artois to Tesco. In 1997 she decided to travel and worked for JWT Sydney as a TV producer. Upon returning to the UK in 1998, she went to Rainey Kelly Cambell Roalfe until 2001 when she began freelancing for agencies such as BBH, Fallon and VCCP, working on major campaigns including the launch TV campaign for Coca Cola Zero. Thompson’s most recent position was as head of sales for Feel Films.

http://www.goldensq.com/news

WE WANTS YOUR WORKS!!!

Right, let’s cut to the chase. The July Issue of The Reel is being complied now and it’s got a *insert your company’s name* sized gap in it!! So send us your latest and greatest or we’ll sulk. Any questions on how to do so can be answered through pre-written words here – www.thereel.net/Common/Submit.aspx - through bespoke words here – editor@thereel.net – or through your ears here - +44 (0) 20 7575 1985.

Global entertainment megabrand MTV has recently undertaken a massive rebrand of its 64 ex-US channels rejuvenating everything from colour palette to typography, program guide to on screen editorial – its all had a lick of digital paint. Aiming to cross borders, cultures and the huge hurdle of language – the new MTV international identity ‘reboot’ is chock full of beautiful.

Tackling a re-brand of a channel that has over two decades of cutting edge cool under its belt not to mention a mainline into youth culture the world over is no mean feat. MTV have historically set the trend of quirky and controversial idents.

On August 1, 1981, at 12:01 a.m., MTV launched with the words "Ladies and gentlemen, rock and roll," followed by the original MTV theme song playing over a montage of the Apollo 11 moon landing and showed an fluoro MTV logo replacing the stars and stripes of the American flag.

MTV producers Alan Goodman and Fred Seibert used this public domain footage as a conceit, associating MTV with the most famous moment in world television history. Ironically at the moment of its launch, only a few thousand people on a single cable system in northern New Jersey could see it. Not bad for a kick off.

20 years on, MTV define themselves as ‘so much more than a music (channel)’ and they still remain the number one entertainment destination for young people around the world.

The new look launched on the 1st of July over a whopping 160 territories and tongue tying 31 languages and was a collaboration between MTVNI’s recently established World Design Studio based in Milan and UK-based multidisciplinary studio Universal Everything.

The snazzy new identity was designed to embody MTV’s signature world class design and production values and further solidify the channel’s position as a meeting point for music, creativity, youth culture and the premier place to get annoyed at rich bratty kids (Paris we are looking at you).

The team worked on three keywords; Love, Joy and Desire in the hope that the themes would resonate across borders, cultures and languages around the world – and became the project’s common threads and inspiration.

The new swathe of idents reflect the international status of MTV, and feature a clutch of top tier directors from all over the globe:

The new 6 idents came from:

‘Choc Gold’ – Tronic - USA