The Launch Of The Home Movie Legacy Project Radio Show

Radio Show #1 Jan 9 2013

Show Title:  The Launch Of The Home Movie Legacy Project

Host:  Rhonda Vigeant

Guest:  Phil Vigeant, Owner of Pro8mm;

Author of The Power of Super 8 Film:  Insider Secrets Every Filmmaker Should Know

Summary:  The debut episode of The Home Movie LegacyProject was a content rich hour that addressed why home movies are such a vital part of our culture. They are the most organic form of physical evidence that we have about our families.  Home movies help us to shift our focus and transform our understanding of how our families lived.  They help us to access our memories in such a powerful way, often giving us huge breakthroughs so we can shift our focus and transform our understanding so we can move forward in our life.  They help us heal and connect with our departed loved ones. They create a legacy of story that we can hand down so our descendants will know how we lived.

The episode covered the evolution of the home movie, including formats such as 16mm film, regular 8 film, super 8 film, and the many formats of digital video. We talked about the digital dilemma we have in trying to bring all these many formats into our modern lives, so we can have access and share them in a modern platform, including sharing them on social media.

Guest Phil Vigeant is the business partner and husband of host Rhonda Vigeant.  Phil shared how his company, Pro8mm of Burbank, CA evolved, and the Super 8 film format being used by consumers to shoot home movies or a format widely used by students in film school, to one that provided solutions for the professional use of Super 8 film as a production format widely used in Hollywood.  The company was originally called Super8 Sound.  Founded in Cambridge, MA by Bob Doyle in 1973, Phil talks about the companies early professional jobs, including the famous commercial shot for Nike using the Beatles song  “Revolution” in the early 80’s, to Paula Abdul’s “Straight Up” Music Video in 1988,  and Mariah Carey’s “All I Want For Christmas as You” in 1994.

This began the evolution of Super 8 to be used professionally for thousands of jobs in main stream media jobs, including major motions pictures such as Argo, Super 8 and JFK, hundreds of jobs for MTV and VHI, commercials for major brands, and dozens of television shows.

For more information about Pro8mm, go to www.pro8mm.com 

 The episode concludes with how all the studio work inspired their clients to go back to their own families home movies and first films often shot on Super 8 (people such as Steve Spielberg, George Lucas, Steven Soderbergh, Christopher Nolan, J.J. Abrams, Sam Rami, and Spike Lee) and why they wanted Pro8mm to handle their personal media assets the same way they have had their professional media assets handled, with the same level of integrity and on the same professional equipment.

 Rhonda and Phil wrap by sharing that this service is not just for the moguls, but for the masses, and that through the weekly radio show their goal is to teach and inspire people how to be head of their own studio, to give their home movie legacy the same red carpet treatment that famous people do and do it with urgency...before it’s too late!

 For more information to see related post, go to www.homemovielegacy.com

 The radio show airs every Wednesday at 4:00pm PST (6pm CST / 7pm EST) on the RockStar Radio Network 

What makes the Super GR8 Film Festival Awesome!

What makes the Super GR8 Film Festival Awesome!

-by Rhonda Vigeant, Pro8mm

When you think about hubs for independent filmmaking, it is unlikely   Harrisonburg, Virginia would come to mind as a place where extraordinary film projects are being born by the dozens, but this is precisely what happens every fall when two local residents, AKA festival directors Paul Somers and Tim Estep announce that it is time again for the annual Super GR8 Film Festival.

The idea is to make a complete film on one 50-foot roll of Super 8 film with all the edits done in the camera. Filmmakers see their film for the first time on screening night, so the excitement and anticipation is intense, for not only the filmmaker, but the actors and audience as well.

While single roll super 8 film festivals have been around for a number of years, and have a popular following, what happens in Harrisonburg during October and November is a transformation of community rallying around the arts and creative process unlike anything I have ever seen or experienced before in my 30 years of working with the Super 8 medium. 

The awesomeness and uniqueness of Super GR8 is that the entire community gets involved with it.  As a small college town, home to James Madison University, as well as other near-by colleges, beautifully seated around a plethora of Civil War history, the sense of community in Harrisonburg extends well beyond the campus. The vibrant historic down town area is filled with unique non-commercial shopping, art galleries, hand made items and one of a kind eateries.  It is a very special place with very special people, and as one resident says, it is like “CHEERS” – a place where everyone really does know your name.

The elevated sense of community Paul and Tim have created with Super GR8 is a natural fit to a town that already has a sense of creative spirit and identity. A feeling of pride and cooperative, not competitive mindset touches every aspect of this amazingly successful festival, which has a tag line by the way “LIFE IS SUPER GR8”!

Super Gr8 entries are only solicited from local residents during an annual sign up night.  There are a coveted 48 spots, which are quickly spoken for every year.   24 films are made on Super 8 Tri-X Film, and 24 are made on Super 8 Color Negative. Each film type has its own screening night in the beautiful, historic down town Court Square Theatre.

The actors and crew are all local residents.  People in the community open up their homes and businesses to let the filmmakers use their locations.  Dozens of local businesses participate as sponsors.  Local artists design logos, t-shirts and posters for the publicity – which is prominently, displayed everywhere you go.  Innkeepers donate rooms to host festival judges and some of the invited out of town guests.  Even the amazing trophies (which are the only prizes) are amazingly hand crafted from “throw away” broken super 8 cameras, reels and super 8 projectors.  These in themselves are unique relics that rival the beauty of any cookie cutter Hollywood Emmy or Oscar! 

On the night prior to the screenings – the town is a buzz.  Everyone you meet knows about the festival, has either made a film, is in a film, crewed a film, wrote a music score for a film, or knows someone directly involved in some way. 

Paul and Tim prepare for the festival all year by looking for super 8 cameras that are in working condition.  A local camera shop fixes many, but Paul confesses he is learning more about the process himself so that all participants will have good working equipment.  Cameras are lent to anyone who needs one. You just stop by Tim or Paul’s’ house and check one out.  A majority of the people who enter the festival have never made a film before – or have only made one for a previous Super GR8 festival.  So the task falls on the shoulders of the festival directors to work with the newbie’s, sometimes for hours on end, teaching them how to use the camera, and always making themselves available, day or night to answer and questions.

The Festival was founded is 2010 with the first years films shot only on black and white film.  In 2011, Pro8mm was asked if they would like to jump on as a sponsor, so for the past two years, we have provided at cost both the black and white and color negative film, the processing and HD scanning. 

When we told Tim and Paul back in 2011 that we wanted to come to the festival, they were surprised but happy to have their efforts validated in this way.  This year, we returned again, and were asked to be judges.  When residents ask us why we have come all the way to Harrisonburg, Virginia from Burbank,CA, we tell them it is an extension of our love of super 8 and we want to be part of the love fest.  To be part of the magic created by this outrageously fun, grass roots Super 8 Spectacular, complete with after parties at local venues is for us, amazing!

So with our involvement, Super GR8 has added on a night before the festival where we present to the newbie’s and predominately non-filmmakers to help them to begin to understand some of the basic filmmaking process, and think where else they might want to use the medium in their life.

 

The amount of people giving time, effort and commitment that goes into not only the films, but also the sound tracks, the posters that each filmmaker made for their own film is immeasurable.   As the audience began to come in and settle in their seats, I looked around at the hundreds of people who attended this sold out event and it was extremely emotional for Phil and I on many levels. The house was packed. I thought to myself, when was the last time you could fill a room on a Tuesday night with 300 people who paid the price of admission to see something that is a complete unknown, just to support their friends, their community, and be part of something bigger than themselves?

Super 8 has been our life’s work for 30 years.  And here it is, the end of 2012. The future of film origination from where we sit in Hollywood is changing so fast.  And yet, as I looked around the room of predominately 20-30 something’s, it was clear to me that Super 8 has indeed come full circle and is going to have a new life, in the loving hands from where it came.  Some in the hands of aspiring filmmakers, but mostly in the hands of regular people. People who want to create art. People who want to collaborate, not compete.    People who are a bit counter culture, and thrive in that environment.

One event can change a community.  Two people, Paul Somers and Tim Estep through the Super GR8 Film Festival changed the way their community looks at themselves and as a result changed Harrisonburg in so many ways. Creating a sense of community is what most people want, but don’t always know how to create.  Yet, a 3 and a half-minute cartridge of 50 feet of Super 8 film had the power to move an entire town to have an abundant amount of  fun this fall and create an experience that is not just Super Gr8 but Super awesome!

As I felt the energy of the audience explode during the sold out two  screening nights, and found myself “all in” as both a judge and a “wannabe “Harrisonburg Groupie, I found myself wondering if everyone over at the multiplex down the road was having as much fun as we were. But I already knew the answer!

Shooting National Brands with Super 8 Teleseminar

Today more than ever big national brands are forced to recreate their image and reconnect with their customers in more intimate, engaging and organic ways. Modern society tends to be very isolated and spread out as the internet makes it easy to connect facelessness through sites like Facebook and apps like Twitter.

Many companies are now focusing on personal story telling to re-focus on individual contributors as opposed to corporate culture. What better way to do this than with Super 8 film? 

On Wednesday, August 3rd, 2011 at 4:30pm pacific, Phil Vigeant, super 8 expert and author, along with special guest, Laura Merians, who tells personal stories about Whole Foods products through Super 8 film, will be taking an in-depth look at Shooting National Brands with Super 8.

Laura and Phil will be talking about how and why some very hip campaigns for companies such as Roxy, Billabong, Whole Foods, Swiffer, Ford Automobiles and hundreds of other national brands for food, beverage, clothing, sports teams, fast food resturants and more use Super 8 in their campaigns.

 Laura Merians is a cinematographer and director based in Los Angeles and New York City. She started her career in lighting after receiving a degree in Philosophy from UC Berkeley. Laura has worked on projects for Discovery, MTV, VH1, Fox and Sony well as shooting music videos and short films. Her work has been featured in American Cinematographer, Studio Monthly Magazine, Videography Magazine and Digital Cinematography.  She recently finished shooting and directing a series of shorts for Whole foods on urban farming called GROW and a new series for the Style Network titled Tia and Tamera; she used Super 8 on both projects.

http://www.lauramerians.com

Laura's Whole Food's Campaign: GROW

Register Now for this FREE teleseminar! Wednesday, August 3, 2011 4:30pm to 5:30pm pacific (7:30pm to 8:30pm eastern)

Click Here to Register! 

Why People Use Super 8 Film To Create Hip Campaigns for National Brands

Recently, various members of the press who have been curious about who uses Super 8 in 2011 have interviewed me. Their curiosity has been sparked by the release of the recent J.J. Abrams Film, Super 8. The press usually starts their inquiry about Super 8 with people at Kodak, or some college professors who may have taught a super 8 class “in the day.” They may have spoken to an archivist who works with home movies and historical collections that represent a fabulous montage of our history and culture from the 40’s, 50’s 60’s and 70’s. But then, invariably, the get referred to me, a director of marketing for a company that has specialized in Super 8 film for over 35 years and who has had the privilege of knowing first hand that thousands of projects of all kinds, from various industries, are shot on Super 8 film every year.

A few days after the Super 8 movie came out, I was called by MSNBC who wanted to do a segment at a real Super 8 camera store. They were hoping to see an enormous collection of vintage camera models, both obscure and common. When I told the person that called that we didn’t have any cameras like that or any projectors– she said, ok then, we will have to get back to you. Which they didn’t. They didn’t get it.

Unless the interview is being done by one of the film industry trade magazines, (which has a little more understanding for the desire to work with a variety of mediums), the conversation usually goes something like this.

Interviewer: “So, is Super 8 back?”

Me: “Back? Where did it go?”

Interviewer: “Well, who shoots this stuff? A few people who want to create a sense of nostalgia, right?”

Me: “Well no, actually it is being used in some very hip campaigns for companies such as Roxy, Billabong, Whole Foods, Swiffer, Ford Automobiles and hundreds of other national brands for food, beverage, clothing, sports teams, fast food restaurants, and more. You can see it in TV shows such as American Idol and True Blood, and Music Videos for some of today’s hottest artists such as Katy Perry and Beyonce, as well industrials, independent projects and political campaigns.”

Interviewer: To create a sense of nostalgia, right?

So instead of feeling frustrated and defensive for the umpteenth time that “they just don’t get it” or offended that no matter how much time I spend explaining about how we upgrade the cameras with things that modern filmmakers would want, state of the art negative film stocks which we reformat, 16 x 9 aspect ratios, native 1080 scanning and Pro Res files off our state of the art scanner, I started thinking about it. What is nostalgia from more if an intellectual perspective? And I decided, maybe these interviewers are more intuitive then I thought.

Nostalgia is by definition as a sense of longing. I decided to embrace this possibility. What is it that makes me nostalgic? What is it that I long for? For me it is a wish or desire to connect with people in a way that is engaging, organic, and intimate. To get away from the Facelessness of Facebook and the 500 people in my network, many who I really don’t know that well, or in some cases, at all.

I think that purveyors of National Brands get this. Modern society tends to be very isolated and spread out. Many people are looking for a simple way to communicate their product or brand. This perhaps may be the fall out from all the corruption we have seen in recent years in the finance industry, bailouts, and sex scandals among the politicians.

I think there is a movement happening. A shift toward taking back our power in small ways individually. It’s an awakening that does make us feel nostalgic for the corner store or a place like “Cheers Bar,” where everybody knows your name. The needs and wants that have been created by a corporate-driven culture that feed our egos are being replaced with a need to feed our souls. 


Community. Connectivity. Individuality.

Big brands are caught up in this, and now have to re-brand themselves to fit in with this movement and economic cycle. They want to embrace the local farmer; small bank and many in the face of unemployment are themselves cultivating entrepreneurship. They want people to see them as committed to sustainability and protectors of the environment.

So how does a company like Wal-Mart portray themselves as the local hardware store? Personal story telling. Focusing on individual contributors as opposed to corporate culture. What better way to do this then with Super 8 film?

So yes, bring on the nostalgia. Everyone loves a good story and that “feel good” feeling especially shot on Super 8 film!

8 Tips for Shooting modern Super 8

I read allot about Super 8 in chat rooms and forums and I am always amazed how much misinformation there is. There seems to always be an on going battle between people trying to jockey themselves as the most informed expert. This wrong information and half truths hurts filmmakers. I checked on AMAZON.com and there is nothing on MODERN SUPER 8. The last book I found was written in 1981. So I though it would be helpful to have some tips for shooting modern Super 8.

Instead of giving you all 8 tips at once, I'll give them to you one at a time so that hopefully you will keep coming back and read my Super 8 blog! While some of the tips I am going to give you are “old school” common sense that any film maker working with super 8 or 16mm film should do/should have done at any time in their shooting career , some have to do directly with the new modern negative film stocks, our Max 8, 16 x 9 super 8 cameras and native 1080 HD scanning.


A Few tips can go a long way, by Phil Vigeant, owner and senior colorist at Pro8mm

“Parts of my job as senior colorist at Pro8mm, is that I get to scan about a million feet of super8 film each year. In doing so I get to see what is happening in the super8 world with some vantage point based on volume. I look at my work as a two-part job. One, as a creative colorist, trying to get the most information off of the frames for our customers, and second, as an inspector looking for bugs in the over all super8 process. When I see something that needs improving, I try to see what I can do with the technology at hand to facilitate a positive change. Internally, I can talk to my employees who are the people most responsible for each area and together we try to attack the issue. Externally, it is much more difficult. You have competitive concerns to address, and some companies just do not see these problems as issues the way I might. In addition, there are things that are totally beyond my control that can play a major roll in great looking super8 footage. These things are up to the filmmaker. Each year the technology for scanning film to digital seems to improve, resulting in more things that I can fix. Native 1080 HD film scanning now provides me with tremendous processing power to do many things that were impossible just a year ago. There are new things on the horizon as well, which will give us even greater ability to improve an imperfect image. However, there are a few things that if the filmmaker does not get right, there is very little that can be done to remedy the problem, no matter how much technology you have at hand.

As the years progress the problems seem to change and evolve with each new generation. For those who grew up with film as the main picture-taking medium some things were learned at every juncture of the photographic process. Things such as focus were so common knowledge of that generation that we often forget that this is knowledge that you have to learn. A colleague of mine who teaches film making here in California said that he has to spend days of the semester going over some of this basic stuff. Therefore, here is my short list 2009 of the 8 most common areas of concern I see every day in transferring film. I hope that a few quick tips and expatiation can help you create better images with your super8 camera.” – Phil Vigeant(c) 2009

TIP #1 HAIR IN THE GATE

Nothing is more aggravating for us and to you when we get absolutely gorgeous footage up on the scanner and there is a big yucky piece of dirt or hair in the frame. Just a small effort on your part will make your footage sparkle! BRUSH YOUR CAMERA GATE!

“Because of the nature of film and the way it travels through a camera and exposes each frame, the system will build up debris in the gate. If it is allowed to accumulate, this will block some of the image. The metal gate frames the film with what should be a smooth black border. Because you are running film over metal, it tends to leaves tiny deposits on the gate as the film passes over it. This emulsion residue is a gummy substance that is barely visible to the naked eye. If this is not cleaned from your camera, from time to time you can have several problems. First, the gummy glue can trap foreign substances like hair, lint, and dust and hold it firmly, often where the image is taken in a camera. This results in these ugly black globs which start around the boarder that blocks some of your image usually on the edges, but sometimes big enough to block a lot of picture. Depending on the size of these foreign obstacles, a hair in the gate can ruin a shot. In addition, the build up of emulsion can get so bad that your camera can physically scratch the film. The fix for these problems is very simple. Go to the store and purchase a child’s toothbrush. Gently brush a few strokes between every cartridge. Every, single, cartridge! It is amazingly simple but incredibly effective. Do not use compressed air as all that will do is blow dirt around, and it might blow debris into somewhere you cannot get it out. In addition, compressed air does not often have the force to move the object because remember, it is stuck in place. Do not use a Q-tip, as the chance of leaving a fiber of cotton is greater then the good you will do by performing the cleaning. If your camera has never been cleaned, you might need to do some more extensive work. Once it is clean, the brush trick is all that should be need to keep you hair free.

Pro8mm includes a free camera gate brush with every rental or purchase. They are also available for sale on our website for $5.00 at www.pro8mm.com. A nifty little tool that folds up small and has an attached cover, so you don’t have to worry about loosing it. Once you use it on your camera, we do not advise using it as a substitute for gum or mints when you have been on the set all day, or for that matter, the other way around! www.pro8mm.com

Amazing New Super 8 Film Stock, Pro8/47 500T

Pro8mm Announces Super 8 Fuji Eterna Vivid 500T Film





It's here! The amazing new Pro8/47 500T!
From night sky fireworks to sun reflecting on the open ocean, we absolutely LOVE the versatility of this amazing new Fuji filmstock. Available in Super8 exclusively from Pro8mm, Fuji states "ETERNA Vivid 500 expands the expressive range of high-speed film, producing sharp, color-intensive images under various challenging shooting conditions, including night scenes. New ETERNA Vivid 500 inherits its saturated color, high contrast and superior sharpness from the acclaimed ETERNA Vivid 160. Offering excellent matching with Vivid 160, this E.I. 500 color negative film expands the parameters for shooting sharp, intense color into the realm of night scenes, producing distinctive images under a range of shooting conditions.Exceptional image quality is maintained even during telecine transfer for TV work or digital processing of motion picture footage.Exhibiting superior high-speed performance, ETERNA Vivid 500 ushers in a new era in cinematic expression."

8 stops of latitude, extremely versatile in daylight or night sky, use outdoors or indoors. Add an 85 and neutraul density filter to your camera for best outdoor results. Seeing is believing.
Order at www.pro8mm.com $30 stock and processing. All inclusive packages with HD scanning to Pro Res starting at $108.00. Cut and past into your browser http://www.vimeo.com/5823843

Home Movie Collection Event For Jewish Homegrown History

For Immediate Release: July 13, 2009



The Labyrinth Project, with support from Pro8mm invite you to participate in a screening and collection event of home movies shot on regular 8, super 8 and 16mm film for a new project, JEWISH HOMEGROWN HISTORY.

What is Jewish Homegrown History?
Jewish Homegrown History is the latest multimedia project from USC’s pioneering research initiative, The Labyrinth Project, which has been producing award-winning installations, websites and DVDs for the past ten years.

What is the screening event?
Home Movie Collection Day for Jewish Homegrown History
is a community celebration of amateur cinema. Selected works will be considered for inclusion in Jewish Homegrown History, an exhibition opening at the Skirball Cultural Center in September 2010.

Where is the screening/collection event?
DATE: Sunday, July 19, 2009
TIME: 11:00AM - 5:00PM (drop in any time)
LOCATION: USC School of Cinematic Arts, SCA110



What are we looking for?

Jewish Homegrown History creates an interactive narrative of the American Jewish experience on a global and local scale. Starting with California, the team at Labyrinth has been collecting images, text and video to build a historical foundation for our online database and upcoming museum installation. There are three central themes we hope to explore: Immigration, Identity, and Intermarriage. Although archival material and published histories have been key in our research, what we really want are the personal accounts and homegrown details that bring these themes to life. We are interested in your home movies to help us tell these stories.

Your footage will be screened alongside passages from relevant literature, photos from digital archives, and interviews we have conducted with scholars, entrepreneurs and historians across California. The goal of this project is to create a productive dialogue between official history and personal narrative. We want to see how events publicized in traditional sources relate to the people who actually lived through them. We want to see the faces of the men and women who worked so hard and fought so bravely when the country went to war. We want to see the houses with picket fences and big backyards when families moved to the suburbs. We want to see the bride and groom together in love when larger forces conspired to keep them apart. Ordinary people doing ordinary things.

At the Home Movie Screening and Collection event, we will be looking for these kinds of images that enrich and contextualize the broader stories we are telling with our research. However, we also welcome divergent points of view. We expect what we see to both reinforce and challenge our own experiences and theories. We are less concerned with telling you how history happened, but rather how you can share your perspective with us. At Labyrinth, we believe that there are many paths to a destination, so for this story we encourage contributions from as many voices as possible.

We are currently focused on representing Jewish life in California, with special emphasis on Jewish neighborhoods like Boyle Heights, the Fairfax District, the Pico-Robertson Area, Hancock Park, and the Valley. We are also featuring Riverside County resorts like Murietta Hot Springs, Lake Elsinore, and Highland Hot Springs. We are especially interested in older films or videos but will look at anything up through the1980s. Additionally, we are seeking almost anything that represents Jewish life in California including:

• Worship at synagogues
• Holiday celebrations
• Dinner parties
• Recreational activities
• Places of business
• Portraits of neighborhoods and people
• Interfaith and interethnic relationships
• Political and social events


For additional information, contact:
By email: mkinder@usc.edu
By telephone, call: 213-740-5112
By postcard or letter, write:
The Labyrinth Project
School of Cinematic Arts, LPB 118,
University of Southern California
Los Angeles, CA 90089-2211
Attention: Marsha Kinder

Feel free to visit our website at http://college.usc.edu/labyrinth/



FIVE GREAT REASONS TO PARTICIPATE:

1. Come and screen your old films.
In case you do not have a working projector for your 8mm/Super8/16mm films, we’ve got you covered. If you have been curious to see what is on those old reels, this is your chance!

2. Rediscover memories of your favorite people and places.
-Want to remind your husband how stunning you looked in your wedding dress?
-Want to go back to the house you grew up in?
-Want to honor the memory of a relative no longer with us?
Come share your significant moments with an audience of family and friends. Show us the things you care about.


3. Be part of history!
Participate in a nationally recognized historical research project! Your home movies could become part of our traveling museum installation, Jewish Homegrown History, which is scheduled for the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles, the New Americans Museum in San Diego, and the Judah Magnes Museum in Berkeley.

4. Transfer your home movies to HD digital video with Pro8mm and get a significant discount off their list price for broadcast quality archiving. Representatives from Pro8mm will be on hand to examine your films and give advice on how best to care for the original reels. Pro8mm has been archiving the world’s most famous faces and events for over 30 years.

5. Learn how to post your home movies to social networking sites such as Facebook, put them on your iphone, or email clips. Sharing your favorite memories with your loved ones is easy when your digitize your footage.

*BONUS*

6. Get a tax write-off!
Contribute your digitized footage to the installation or to the USC Digital Archive and get a tax write-off for the cost of the transfer.

Above all, we want to encourage people to come out and have fun. Come anytime between 11:00 AM and 5:00 PM. Bring your films, no matter the format, and we will screen them. Bring friends and family too. Cinema is a shared experience and we would love for you to share yours with us. See you July 19th!