Oz Magazine June/July 2012

film & tv • print • new media • lifestyle june/july 2012

A PREVIEW TO A KILL, p. 24 All systems are go: digital dashboards, p. 22

HAVE YOUR PEOPLE CALL OUR PEOPLE* *please The Georgia Film & Television Sourcebook is filled with highly skilled entertainment industry personnel and scores of local vendors, so for cryin’ out loud, at least give them a call.** **thanks

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june/july 2012

in t h i s i s s u e 18

FE AT UR E S Cover Story - All Systems Are Go:

Digital Dashboards for Business

p. 22

Feature Story - The House That Prop Built

p. 18

Feature Story - A Preview to a Kill

p. 24

Feature Story - As Seen on TV: Music Made in GA

p. 27

p. 32 Feature Story - No Trouble with the

Learning Curve: An Interview w/ Tim Moore

Feature Story - Mom! Dad! I’m Going to Work in

the Movies! - A Brief History of GSU’s Film Program

p. 44

24

C O L UM N S Ozcetera

p. 8

Behind the Camera w/ Drewprops - The Time

Drew Lost Reese Witherspoon’s Wedding Ring

p. 30

Voices - Simplificationism

p. 36

Oz Scene - S.T.E.A.M.fest 2012 & Print Big!

p. 38

How I Got into the Business

p. 42

Let Me Give You My Card

p. 49

Unconventional Art - Costume Design

p. 50

O Z M A G A Z I N E S TA F F Publishers: Tia Powell - Group Publisher, Gary Wayne Powell - Publisher

CO V ER A RT ©Dave Clegg www.cleggo.com dave@cleggo.com

Dave Clegg is an illustrator living in North Georgia. His clients include Scholastic, Ranger Rick Magazine and Jelly Belly.

Editorial: Gary Powell - Ozcetera Editor Allison Williams - Research Contributors: Nichole Bazemore, Andrew Duncan, Curt Holman, Tammy Hurt, Erin Greer, Keith Fletcher, Bobby Hickman, Diane Lasek Sales: Diane Lasek, Mukari Butler, Monique McGlockton IT/Database Administrator: John Cleveland Sherman, III Design: Christina Wingfield - Art Director & Designer Sarah Medina - Production Artist & Designer Ted Fabella, Logo Design

Visit us on the web at www.ozmagazine.com, www.ozonline.tv, www.facebook.com/ozpublishing Oz Magazine is published bi-monthly by Oz Publishing, Inc • 2566 Shallowford Road • #302, Suite 104 • Atlanta, GA 30345 • (404) 633-1779 Copyright 2012 Oz Publishing Incorporated, all rights reserved. Reproductions in whole or in part without express written permission of the publisher is strictly prohibited.

This magazine is printed on recyclable paper.

c o n t r ib u to r s Erin Greer Erin is pursuing her Master’s in film at Georgia State University. A journalist by trade, Erin has written for numerous local and national publications, and writes, directs and acts locally. To contact or commission Erin, erinlgreer@ gmail.com.

Feature Story, p. 44

Nichole Bazemore is a freelance writer and blogger. She is also the host of the show, “Say It With Style,” on Blog Talk Radio. Her company, Simply Stated Solutions, provides marketing materials for coaches, consultants, and small businesses. Learn more about Nichole and her company via her website, www.simplystatedsolutions.com, or connect with her on Facebook or Twitter @nicholebazemore.

Cover Story, p. 22

Keith Fletcher leads Fletch Creative, a branding and marketing communication pro with 25 years of design strategy and execution experience. His love for hands-on design is complemented by his in-depth knowledge of all the moving parts of creative campaigns on the leading edge of technology. Over Keith’s career, he has worked with some of the world’s top advertising brands including Best Buy, Bristol-Meyers Squib, Chevrolet, The Coca-Cola Company, Dell Computers, The Home Depot, and Kimberly-Clark. www.simplificationism.com, www.fletchcreative.com Voices, p. 36 Andrew Duncan, known in the motion picture industry as “Drewprops”, has been writing about the craft of filmmaking from the inside out since the mid-1990’s.

His confusing and often embarrassing stories from behind the scenes provide a unique insight into the craft of filmmaking from the perspective of the shooting crew, artists, and designers who bring your favorite films to life on the big screen. www.drewprops.com.

Behind the Camera w/ Drewprops, p. 30 Diane Lasek has been involved in the film and television industry for 20+ years, most of that time as a marketing and salesperson. She is currently working as a sales consultant on the Oz Publishing team and enjoys getting to know all of the hard-working creative folks working across Georgia. In her spare time she is a bee keeper, master gardener and has a little organic soil amendment company for your gardening needs. That can be found at www.smartdirtorganics.com.

Features, p. 18 & 32 Curt Holman is an award-winning Atlanta-based freelance writer who writes about film and the arts for such publications as Atlanta Magazine, Paste, ArtsATL and Creative Loafing.

Find Curt on Twitter @Curt_Holman.

Feature, p. 24

Tammy Hurt is the Founding Partner at Placement Music, Trustee, The Recording Academy® Atlanta Chapter, Co-President, Georgia Music Partners (GMP) and a member of Georgia Production Partnership (GPP), NARIP and the Guild of Music Supervisors. www.placementmusic.com Feature, p. 27

And out of fi

There are sometime sticks aro

Oz Publishing, Inc. PRESENTS:

The

INDUSTRY Yearbook 40 years of Georgia’s FILM, VIDEO

& DIGITAL ENTERTAINMENT history... and the people that made it happen.

Remember your school yearbooks? Oz Publishing will publish an exclusive look at the Georgia film and television industry’s past 40 years, The Industry Yearbook. Everyone is in the spotlight in this onetime, limited edition, hardbound book. The “Student Section” will feature headshots and info about any crew member or person that has worked in the industry. “Drama Club” features talent.

Be a part of history; be a part of The Industry Yearbook. To get in, all you need is a digital headshot and $10. Other options include “shout outs” where you can tell the world how great your mentors and co-workers have been. You can also reserve a copy of the Yearbook. And if you feel like leaving a bigger imprint, call Oz for ad rates! Let’s make history together.

TRY S U IND BOOK R YE A DLINE: DE A Y 28, JUL 2!

201

DID YOU WORK ON ANY OF THese productions?

Then you don’t want to miss being included in Georgia’s only Film & Television history book!

2012

Flight Joyful Noise Neighborhood Watch Marriage Counselor Parental Guidance The Three Stooges Contagion The Odd Life of Timothy Green American Reunion The Goats Jayne Mansfield’s Car The Collection What To Expect When You’re Expecting Good Deeds The Wettest County Papa The Reluctant Fundamentalist Savannah Crackerjack The Trials and Tribulations of a Trailer Trash Housewife Soul Ties When The Bough Breaks Echo at 11 Oak Drive Footloose The Change Up Hall Pass Fast 5 Wanderlust X Men: First Class For Colored Girls Big Momma’s: Like Father, Like Son Terminal Madea’s Big Happy Family Mean Girls 2 My Super Psycho Sweet 16 2 Courageous 96 Minutes Panama City Fishers of Men Eye of the Hurricane The Ivy League The Last Song Zombieland Get Low The Crazies The Conspirator Stomp The Yard 2 Killers Life As We Know It Due Date Lottery Ticket Halloween 2 The Blind Side I Can Do Bad All by Myself My Super Psycho Sweet 16 Why Did I Get Married Too? The Greening of Whitney Brown Delgo The Preacher’s Kid The Joneses Road Trip II The Way Home Van Wilder III Fireproof Living Is Winning The Family That Preys Pastor Brown Madea Goes to Jail Why Did I Get Married?

Meet the Browns Conjurer Mrs. Hobbes’ House The Lena Baker Story

The Hill Good Intentions Dance of the Dead Three Can Play That Game Facing the Giants The Signal We Are Marshall One Missed Call Daddy’s Little Girls Stomp the Yard Revenge of the Nerds Motives 2 Megahertz The Yellow Wallpaper Baby Blues Dirty Laundry Charlie And The Chocolate Factory Crystal River Madea’s Family Reunion Randy and the Mob Shiver The Derby Stallion The Gospel The Last Adam ATL Dark Remains First Offense Beauty Shop Delgo The Unseen Heavens Fall Diary of a Mad Black Woman A Complex Occupation The Lady from Sockholm Stroke of Genius 2001 Maniacs The Undertow Motive Say Yes The Last Goodbye Dumb & Dumber 2 The Clearing The Adventures of Ociee Nash The Fighting Temptations Drumline Sweet Home Alabama We Were Soldiers Tara Delivery Boy Chronicles Honeybee Losing Grace The Gift Run Ronnie Run Unshackled Good Neighbor Brass Tacks The Accountant (Short) The Legend of Bagger Vance Road Trip Remember the Titans Forces of Nature The Initiate False River Letters From A Wayward Son The General’s Daughter Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil Scream II In the Flesh Raney The Gingerbread Man Claudine’s Return The Real Reason That Darn Cat

How I Spent My Summer Vacation Black Dog Wild America Something to Talk About Now and Then Beat Daddies The Neon Bible Electric Tribe Cobb Fluke A Simple Twist of Fate Forrest Gump Deadly Run The War Drop Squad Camilla Gordy Kleptomania Midnight Edition The Real McCoy Boxing Helena Kalifornia Consenting Adults Pet Sematary II Trespass Hot House Fried Green Tomatoes Basket Case 3 My Cousin Vinny Robo Cop 3 Free Jack Dutch The Three Muscatels Livin’ Large Love Potion #9 Paris Trout Love Crimes Golden Boy Not Without My Daughter Career Opportunities Flight of the Intruder Blue Plate Special Driving Miss Daisy Glory Fast Food Blood Salvage The Return of Swamp Thing No Holds Barred The Judas Project 1969 Sleepaway Camp III Sleepaway Camp II Now I Know Now Blindside School Daze Stars and Bars Leader of the Band Dead Aim Mosquito Coast Made in Heaven Friday l3th: Jason Lives Funland Manhunter Impure Thoughts From a Whisper to a Scream The Local Stigmatic Summer Rental Annihilators A Killing Affair Tomorrow Invasion Doorman The Heavenly Kid Something Special

The Slugger’s Wife The Bear Blast Fighter Door to Door Blue Heaven Mutant Tank The Long Ride Marvin and Tige The Big Chill Byline (American Snitch) Stroker Ace Tennessee Stallion The Sender Six Pack Sharky’s Machine Tales of Ordinary Madness Heartaches If You Could See What I Hear The Slayer Baker County Hard Feelings White Death Scared to Death The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia Escape from New York City Four Seasons Cannonball Run Fear National The Sheriff and Satellite Kid II Smokey and the Bandit II Tough City Phobia Never Trust an Honest Thief Hopscotch Edie and Ely Long Riders Carny Little Darlings The Prize Fighter Wise Blood The Sheriff and the Satellite Kid GORP The Visitor Swan They Went Thataway and Thataway The Double McGuffin Our Winning Season The Lincoln Conspiracy Smokey and the Bandit Greased Lightning The Great Georgia Bank Hoax The Grasshopper Whiskey Mountain Grizzley Squirm False Face Gator Kiss of the Tarantula The Farmer Bingo Long Let’s Do It Again Return to Macon County Line The Night They Robbed Big Bertha’s UFO Target Earth The Longest Yard Cockfighter Poor Pretty Eddie House on Skull Mountain Moonrunners Distance Conrack Buster and Billie The Fantasy World of Charlie Moon The Last Stop Deliverance 1972

Crew & Talent from television series, documentaries, commercials & on-air talent are included as well.

For an entire list of productions shot in Georgia, visit www.ozmagazine.com/shotingeorgia.

Get signed up @ www.ozmagazine.com/yearbook Or for more information, call 404.633.1779.

cetera Crawford Media Welcomes Joe Huggins Joe Huggins is the newest addition to the Crawford sales team.

Huggins’ background includes over 15 years as a producer, director and writer in Nashville, Los Angeles, and Atlanta. His sales background began in Atlanta and focused on Avid Products in the Southeast, followed by post production services. He was the business manager at CineFilm for the past six years and now brings his long history of production and sales in television and film to Crawford, where he will concentrate on entertainment and the on-set dailies market. When Joe is not traveling the country selling for Crawford, he will be planning for his widely-known annual Oscar Party, and event that has been written up in the Atlanta JournalConstitution.

Dalton Agency Atlanta Adds Staff The Atlanta office of the Dalton Agency hired Scott Nichols as vice president, account director and Angelica Ahumada as account coordinator.

Nichols will lead the Manheim account. Manheim is the world’s largest provider of vehicle remarketing services. This is Nichols’ second stint at the agency.

He was part of Kilgannon (now Dalton Agency) from 2001 until 2009. Most recently, Nichols was brand manager at Red House.

He also has held marketing positions at UPS and Hyosung Motors America/S&T Motors Co. Ltd. Nichols earned a degree in journalism from the University of Missouri and completed additional coursework in B2B marketing strategy at Northwestern University’s Kellogg Graduate School of Management.

Ahumada is a recent graduate of Kennesaw State University. While earning a degree in marketing, Ahumada interned at Kilgannon.

She is a member of the Atlanta Ad Club, Beta Gamma Sigma and the Kennesaw Marketing Association.

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Riot Atlanta and Company 3 Welcome Suzanne Morris

Suzanne Morris, vice president of operations, Riot Atlanta, Company 3 and Method Studios.

Welcome to Atlanta, Suzanne Morris. As the new vice president of operations, Morris will be responsible for the daily management of Riot, Company 3 and Method Studios in Atlanta. Morris was at HBO where she spent 11+ years working on both the distribution and creative sides of the cable programming business. Most recently, she was vice president - media & production operations for the West Coast, responsible for managing the in-house post production of HBO’s original programming. Prior to that, she held positions in private equity and corporate finance. Morris earned her law degree from the University of Pennsylvania and BA in radio, TV and film from Howard University.

Parent company, Deluxe Entertainment Services Group Inc., has a strong commitment to expanding its presence in Atlanta and to offering best-in-class creative services for commercials, television and film. Morris will work to deepen and broaden their capabilities in creative concept development, design, content creation, audio, editorial, vfx, color grading and other finishing services with the goal of creating a one-stop creative house. They are also leveraging their renowned creative talent and technology to facilitate real-time, collaborative studio sessions so clients can connect live with colleagues in Los Angeles, New York and London, all while keeping the work local, allowing clients to take full advantage of Georgia’s tax incentives.

Pitch and Shoot Women in Film and Television/Atlanta (WIFTA) hosted major movie studio executive Kathie Fong Yoneda and ground breaking female director and cinematographer, Jessie Maple. The event was entitled “Pitch and Shoot.” Kathie Fong Yoneda has over 25 years of industry experience, and has worked for such prestigious studios as Paramount, Columbia, MGM, Universal, 20th Century Fox, and Disney, specializing in story analysis and development of live action and animated projects. Her career includes executive positions with Walt Disney, Touchstone, Island Pictures and Walt Disney TV Animation where she has evaluated more than 18,000 submissions. Jessie Maple is considered to be the first African-American woman to direct an independent feature-length film, “Will.” She worked and trained at Channel 13 and Third World Cinema, and apprenticed as an editor on films like “Shaft’s Big Score” (1972), as well as handling camerawork and editing for New York’s ABC, CBS and NBC affiliate TV stations. Maple also sued to become the first Black woman to join the filmmakers union.

The 3-day weekend event started with a screening of the documentary “Shooting Women” by Alexis Krasilovsky, followed

by Q&A with Yoneda and Maple. The women shared their experiences and the lessons learned during their journey in the business of film and television. The next day, Yoneda held two sessions, “The Not So Easy Art of Pitching” and “Networking.”

Filmmakers will gained valuable insight, learning the best approaches to selling ideas to a network or studio executive.

Attendees were also taught nuanced strategies to help make their networking efforts a success. The cost to attend both Saturday sessions is $75 (members), and $125 (non-members). On the last day, Yoneda gave one-on-one individual project consultations to 18 aspiring production professionals.

Snow On Tha Bluff Snow On Tha Bluff, which was shot in Atlanta’s poverty and crime stricken Westside neighborhood, The Bluff, is set for release in June. The indie film was purchased by Screen Media Films. Suzanne Blech of Screen Media told Variety, “2012 will be a year where we focus on quality niche films including festival darlings, documentaries, foreign, urban and Latino - basically what we see as underserved demographics in the US,” she said. “We plan to release a minimum of 12 films theatrically and an additional 30 movies direct to the marketplace.” The filmmakers Damon Russell, Curtis Snow, and Chris Knittel are all Atlanta natives. It will be released on DVD in places like Wal-Mart, Best Buy and on Amazon, iTunes, Netflix, Redbox, and other retailers. It will be released theatrically in a few major cities.

OZ MAGAZINE www.ozmagazine.com

The Flora and Fauna of Bill Mayer In a unique collaboration between filmmaker and artist, Atlanta director Robert Persons and illustrator Bill Mayer partnered with Gallery 515 to present “What Should the New Map Look Like?,” an exhibit of art created and collected for Persons’ film, GENERAL ORDERS NO. 9. Featuring a series of original drawings by Mayer, the exhibit will also include art and photography created for the film as well as limited edition books and prints.

Central to the collection will be a series of ten drawings by award-winning Decatur illustrator Bill Mayer. Persons engaged Mayer to create a series of flora and fauna drawings to populate the world of the film and to act as contemporary analogues of the early American field drawings of William Bartram and Mark Catesby. Recognizable among these is his pipe-smoking rabbit, the mysterious mascot of the film whose likeness has appeared on the film’s movie poster at festivals and theaters.

In addition to images central to the mythology of the film, the exhibit also presented a collection of rare Georgia maps that trace its progression from expansive territory to its current state. Persons, a lifelong collector of Southern cartography and ephemera, was inspired by these maps to make the film and describes his work as a type of “spiritual geography.”

Tube’s Big Dance in The Big Easy Tube worked with Atlanta agency Melt on the show “Coke Zero Presents: The Big Dance in the Big Easy.” The show was hosted by Greg Gumbel and aired on CBS just an hour before the NCAA basketball tournament Final Four tip-off. Tube worked on both the production and the post production end of the show. Chris Downs, Tube’s owner and creative director, was the show’s post production supervisor and motion graphic designer. Tube’s senior editor, Greg Partridge, edited the bulk of the show’s features, which included interviews with James Worthy, Jim Boeheim, Roy Williams, John Thompson and others. Partridge worked one-on-one with producer David Goldstein, along with associate producers Adam Hirsch and Rob Wein, to meld excerpts from the interviews with footage from past Final Four finishes.

While the rest of the team was at work on the edits, Downs set to the task of developing the graphic look and feel of show. He started with developing the logo, combining elements from Coke Zero and the NCAA’s already established

brands with some New Orleans flavor and basketball tradition. The logo paved the way for the rest of the show’s transitional elements, bumpers, and lower thirds.

The team also had the opportunity to work with Melt on the production side of things. Downs accompanied Melt’s production crew to New Orleans in early March to assist in filming scenics, time lapses and b-roll of the city. The footage was later incorporated into the bumpers and show teases. While they were there, the team had the opportunity to film Jazz legend Kermit Ruffins and talk to him a bit about March Madness in the Big Easy. Tube returned to New Orleans with Melt in the week prior to the show’s debut. There they helped film the backstage happenings and performances of musical guests Blondie and The Black Keys, as well as setting up shop to make the final edits of the show on-location, incorporating the final interviews and segments with hosts Greg Gumbel and Clark Kellogg.

1745 Peachtree Street samf laxsouth.com • 404-352-7200 www.ozmagazine.com OZ MAGAZINE

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cetera

Picturing Georgia

Adams Just Hanging

Atlanta Celebrates Photography and the City of Atlanta Department of Aviation Art Program partnered on a special temporary exhibition of fine art photography showcasing Georgia’s natural landscape. The exhibition, featuring the work of 21 photographers, has been installed in the new Maynard H. Jackson International Terminal. The exhibition graces the corridors leading arriving passengers to the immigrations processing area and will be exhibited for at least one year.

Georgia boasts one of the most diverse ecosystems in the country, with five distinct natural regions. To capture the beauty and diversity of these regions, ACP and the Airport Art Program have assembled a collection of 44 photographs that provide a view of our State through the eyes of a select group of artists: Jerry Atnip, Hazel Berger, Reis Birdwhistell, Lucinda Bunnen, Richard Ediger, David Foster, Karekin Goekjian, Paul Hagedorn, Wanda Hopkins, Jan Kapoor, Diane Kirkland, Kathryn Kolb, Judy Lampert, Mark Malloy, Kevin Nickell, Donna Rosser, Anderson Scott, Marilyn Suriani, Meryl Truett and Phil Winter. The exhibition was curated by Corinne Adams, an Atlanta based photographer and co-founder of Atlanta Celebrates Photography and Amy Miller, Executive Director of Atlanta Celebrates Photography; in association with the Airport Art Program.

Food, Wine & Mountain View Mountain View Group was a platinum sponsor and media production partner of the 2012 Atlanta Food & Wine Festival! For the second year, MVG was on location mingling with renowned chefs, getting attendee reactions in “Cast Iron Confessionals,” and indulging our senses - sight and taste - as they covered Atlanta’s premiere food and wine event. In addition, MVG’s sizzle reel for the festival aired on TV spots promoting the festival.

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Keith Adams of SPINVFX has been hanging around. “Firelight,” a Hallmark Hall of Fame movie starring Cuba Gooding, Jr. premiered on ABC. Adams was involved in over a hundred visual effects shots in just three weeks. Shots included lots of fire and actors hanging from a 300 ft. cliff. In reality, the actors were safe on the ground in front of a green screen . . . Adams was on the hanging off the cliff shooting the backplate. He also added tons of butterflies in post. The movie was scripted by Ligiah Villalobos and directed by Darnell Martin. Gooding portrays a counselor at a women’s prison. Dedicated to helping the women regain their self-respect through service to others, he encourages them to join a team that fights forest fires and assists victims of natural disasters.

Chicks Roost at Ground Floor

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Ground Floor Video (GFV) has added a new sound stage. Already in use shooting national commercials and web-based shows, full-scale office and talk shows sets utilize the new space. Excellent sound quality and a large lighting grid provide ample tools to produce a winning project.

Ground Floor owner Luke Livingston wrapped production on his second feature length documentary. Set for a mulit-city theatrical release in June, the hard-hitting film examines the rise of conservatism in the black community.

Rev C. L Bryant, former NAACP leader, travels the country asking the question, “Are we truly free at last?” Economist Thomas Sowell, Rep. Allen West, Dr. Alveda King, Herman Cain and others offer serious insights into the race issue in modern American politics. Watch for it in a theater near you!

A new talk show is on the national scene. Airing twice weekly on Politichicks.tv, four conservative ladies banter about the current political climate. But this is no hen party! Guests include Herman Cain, Tea Party Leader Jenny-Beth Martin, Bill Whittle, Morgan Brittany, AlfonZo Rachel and others. Eight episodes are shot each month in the Ground Floor studio and post production and graphics are done by GFV as well.

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OZ MAGAZINE www.ozmagazine.com

Doin’ Good Encyclomedia is giving away a video production worth up to $50,000 to the nonprofit organization with the best video concept. “We’ve had the opportunity to work with so many great nonprofits, and we’ve been able to see firsthand the good that they do,” says Lance Holland, Encyclomedia’s Managing Partner.

“This is a way that we can use our skills to give back and to give a nonprofit something that they need.”

Encyclomedia is giving one nonprofit a video that will help them do their important work, whether it’s a video that raises awareness for a cause, helps to raise funds, or trains volunteers. The video package includes full HD production and delivery, 5 days of shooting with an 8-person crew, 10 days of editing, 3 days of finishing on the Autodesk Smoke System, and 5 days of motion graphic design. Until June 30th, 2012, Encyclomedia will accept entries from nonprofit organizations around the US. In July 2012, all entries will be posted to the Encyclomedia website, and voting will determine 3 finalists. The Encyclomedia team will pick the winner from the 3 finalists based on the concept that will make the most effective video. The winner will be announced in August 2012 at a shindig at Encyclomedia where they will also be celebrating 15 years in their current studio.

Speaking of 15 year celebrations, they went from occupying 3800 sq. ft. of the building in 1997 to 10,500 sq. ft. in 2012. Their soundstage expanded from 400 sq ft to 2250 sq ft and now includes a corner cyc wall. When they moved into the space, 4 companies joined together to form a collaborative media collective. The studio is now home to 15 companies, including several video production companies, a video game developer, photographers and the art gallery, Gallery1526. Burt Holland, Encyclomedia’s Creative Partner, remembers, “When we first moved in, the complex was a much different place than it is today. The building that holds Radial was missing a roof and home to many a bum. The parking lot was gravel, and our studio was just an open warehouse. It’s been quite a ride watching the area and Encyclomedia grow.”

Their gear and edit systems have gone from a Media100 system in ‘97 to 4 HD edit and graphics suites offering Autodesk Smoke, Final Cut Pro, Adobe After Effects, and Adobe Premiere Pro. Their media has gone from Hi8 to RED, and their coffee has gone from instant to Keurig. It’s been a good run, and they can’t wait to see what another 15 years brings. Join Encyclomedia on August 25th, 2012, for an anniversary party at their studio.

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www.ozmagazine.com OZ MAGAZINE

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OZ MAGAZINE www.ozmagazine.com

Brett Player

For a shot at a $10,000 grand prize, one of Atlanta’s own interior designers, Tami Bowen (TamiB), will compete on HGTV’s new television series, “The White Room Challenge.” A diverse group of designers and artists are handpicked to transform 10 x 10 white rooms using such outrageous elements as candy treats, dumpster-dived treasures or more than 1,500 flowers. Hosted

by HGTV “Design Star” champion and “Color Splash” star, David Bromstad, “The White Room Challenge” premiered in April. TamiB will fight amongst three other successful designers to impress an expert panel of judges that features HGTV’s Bromstad, Jamie Durie, and a guest judge.

Jackson Spalding Adds Three

Jackson Spalding continues its growth trend with three new team members. The full-service public relations and marketing firm has added seven new hires in 2012, bringing the staff count to 83.

Brett Player is Jackson Spalding’s new creative director, leading the 20-member creative team that generates graphic design, advertising, multimedia, digital and photography services for clients. He succeeds Mart Martin, who previously led the team and is now focusing primarily on JS Excavation® strategic work, including brand messaging and account planning.

Player joins Jackson Spalding after nine years as Creative Director and co-founder of Play/VTA, an Atlanta-based brand communication agency within a multi-media company, whose clients included BMG Music, CNN, Coca-Cola, Dell and Spanx.

He began his career with branding giant Landor and Associates in 1998 and his packaging, product and digital design experience has taken him from New York to Hong Kong and points beyond. Player earned his B.S. in Studio Art from Florida State University and recently became a member of the Dean’s Advisory Board for FSU’s College of Visual Arts, Theatre and Dance. He also completed graduate studies in design and art direction at The Portfolio Center, where he remains an adjunct professor.

Colin Owens joins the firm as marketing & business development manager, assuming the role previously handled by Caroline Duffy, who is returning to a strategic counseling role on the client side. Owens spent the last four years as a marketing manager for Hay Group, Inc., working with leadership to raise brand awareness and build external relationships in targeted US industries and in the Southeast region. Owens earned a B.A. in newspaper journalism from the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Georgia.

Aimée Reif rounds out the expanded team, coming on board to support social media and digital campaigns for Jackson Spalding’s clients. Reif was most recently the marketing manager for User Experience Alliance of Chicago, a global network of 24 leading user research consulting firms that test functionality for digital devices such as mobile phones and GPS devices. Reif earned a B.A. in journalism, with a concentration in advertising, from Indiana University.

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Neumeier Family Leadership Award The PRSA Foundation (Public Relation Society of America) and Arketi Group principal Mike Neumeier, APR and his wife, Kelly, today announced the establishment of “The Neumeier Family Leadership Award” for Public Relations Student Society of America (PRSSA) members in Georgia and Florida. “As a PRSSA alum and past national president, I was honored to be inducted into the PRSSA Hall of Fame in 2010,” said Neumeier. “The leadership skills I developed during my time at the University of Florida as a PRSSA leader helped prepare me for my career. The experiences have been truly instrumental in my growth as a PR professional, and I am eager to promote those opportunities for the next generation of public relations leadership.” This award recognizes PRSSA students (undergraduate or graduate) who demonstrate leadership in PRSSA, on campus or in their community.

Students must be PRSSA members at an accredited college or university in Florida or Georgia. The recipient will be selected by a committee from the PRSA Counselors Academy and will be honored with the $1,000 award at the PRSSA National Conference.

In other Arketi news, Ann Revell-Pechar, vice president and general manager of Carolinas for Arketi, has been selected for the North Carolina Technology Association (NCTA) Board of Advisors. NCTA is the statewide membership association for the high-tech sector, serving organizations and their people through events, advocacy, virtual networks and resources.

The Board of Advisors serves as a resource to NCTA by providing advice and feedback, outreach to grow the organization, and other assistance to raise NCTA’s profile as the primary voice for North Carolina’s tech sector.

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PRSA Champions

PRSA/GA Chapter Champions, Laura Dudebout and Natalie Tindall.

Natalie Tindall and Laura Dudebout earned Chapter Champion Awards from the Georgia Chapter of the Public Relations Society of America in recognition of outstanding volunteer work for the chapter.

Tindall is an assistant professor in the Department of Communication at Georgia State University and a graduate of Florida A&M University, University of South Florida and the University of Maryland. In the Georgia Chapter, Tindall was co-chair of the Diversity Committee last year and is continuing as co-chair during the committee’s transition to become the new Multicultural Communications Special Interest Group. In addition, she has participated on the College Relations Committee Real World Committee for two years, serving as the liaison to PRSSA faculty and professional advisers. In the national organization, Tindall is the chair of the Public Relations Society of America’s Diversity Committee, member of the PRSA Work, Life & Gender Task Force and vice chairelect for the Public Relations Division of the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication.

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Dudebout is a communications specialist at Novelis where she coordinates internal and external communications for the company’s North American business. Previously, she served as an account executive for Wilbert News Strategies and a public relations coordinator for Sustainable Atlanta. She graduated from Miami University with a degree in strategic communications and minor in business management.

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Scan the code or visit HitTheLoop.com to start finding exactly who you need from within Georgia’s visual media industry.

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cetera

Big Move to Big Space for TLC TLC Rents has moved to a new facility in the West Midtown Design District. For 18 years, TLC has welcomed art directors, production coordinators and event professionals to their 14th Street location in Midtown Atlanta. A larger range of products and services prompted the move from the midtown storefront, making room for additional inventory and enhancing the customer’s event planning experience.

The new warehouse is at 1570 Southland Circle NW, Atlanta GA 30318 and weighs in at 40,000 sq. ft. Recent movie and TV credits include, “Parental Guidance,” “Joyful Noise,” “What to Expect When You’re Expecting,” “Flight,” “Neighborhood Watch,” “Tyler Perry’s I Can Do Bad All

By Myself,”“Drop Dead Diva,”“Necessary Roughness” and “Single Ladies.”

APRIL/MAY Correction

have news for ozmagazine?

In the Apr/May issue cover story, we misspelled the name of Pattillo Industrial Real Estate. We regret the mistake.

Send your PR to ozcetera@ozonline.tv, along with relevant photos! (please only send High-Resolution photos at 300 dpi minimum.)

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the

house that

prop

built. by: Diane Lasek

Atlanta is home to numerous prop makers who build great ideas. You’ve most likely seen some

of their work. They have created and produced innovative props for film, television, museums, attractions, print ads and hotels. They work with fabrication equipment, woodworking tools, 3D printers and metalsmithing. By hand they create props out of plaster, foam, fiberglass, metal, ceramic, wood, rubber, plastic, acrylics and urethanes.

And with new technologies being introduced all the time, they have to stay up-to-date on the latest techniques, like for instance, the amazing rapid prototyping machines that can print their parts out of almost any material that they need!

These prop makers have wide-ranging artistic backgrounds and a wealth of resources. Doing work for a large variety of industries and businesses keeps them busy. Working with Georgia’s film and television production industry helps their business soar.

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Andre Freitas

15,000 Sq. Ft. of Exotic Electronics, RJR Prop Shop

”Start small, don’t get in over your head and never say no to jobs.”

Andre Freitas with full size sculpture for front plaza at Fernbank Museum of Natural History, Atlanta, GA

Being self-taught and beginning prop fabrication at the age of 15 certainly makes Andre Freitas one of the youngest self-starters in the prop making field. He started small with no help from his parents and no loans or financing and has stayed busy for over 20 years. “The difference between me and my competitor’s is that I don’t stay idle in one discipline. I can aid a production in numerous ways, from prop mastering, to making armor and weapons to special effects make-up, to being a costumer. I do it all. I had a guy the other day ask me to make his coffin for him. The highest end work that I do is making the jewelry for the World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE). So I am a metal and silversmith too, and I work with large scale jewelry in silver, gold and gemstones, and I incorporate computer modeling to accomplish this.”

Freitas recently scored a cool gig working on a “Got Milk” print ad, where he was hired by an agency in Los Angeles calling for a quick turn around. “The guys looked at our website and they literally called me on a Wednesday where we had a phone meeting and they said ‘we’ll be there Thursday morning to approve the sculptures.’ I created props for their print ads that featured a tie-in with one of the girls from “The Vampire Diaries.” I had to make a fake splash of milk, fake streams of milk, and have milk suspended in containers. If the photographer couldn’t capture the image that they wanted, then they could composite elements from the things that I made into the real images to get the shot that they wanted. So, essentially I was an insurance policy for the milk commercial. We killed ourselves making all of this stuff for two days!”

Freitas also just finished working on an untitled Kevin Williamson project being shot in Atlanta. Starring Kevin Bacon, who plays an FBI agent hunting a serial killer, scenes needed interior and exterior damage caused by the killer. “So one day I’m sculpting lotus flowers for an entryway at a Self Realization Fellowship building and the next day I’m killing people, and then after that I’m creating medical models that will be used to teach people how to examine a patient. We’re currently making a breast vest that looks like a female body in silicone that will be used to teach people how to give breast exams.” Adds Freitas, “It’s definitely an interesting job and never a boring job by far!”

Freitas is now working with KNB EFX group for “The Walking Dead” season three. And like other prop makers who are ready to branch out, he has formed a production company with the Brothers Young called Bug Bag Productions. Freitas will direct and produce a feature that is currently in development.

His advice for would be prop makers is: “start small, don’t get in over your head and never say no to jobs.” After working many years, Freitas notes, “Now I have people asking me to produce entire projects where I am responsible for hiring the camera crew, prop people and more because I have a pretty concise creative vision and can turn it into reality.”

article continues on p. 20

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”The most ridiculous, crazy ideas that I came up with for the props in terms of wild colors and shapes,they liked. So this was a blast to create.”

Rip Potter Rip Potter working on props for “Galactic Perry.”

Rip Potter owns The Artisan Resource Center (TARC), a 43,000 square foot edifice that he bought in 1986. For the last 20+ years it has housed the workshops and studios of some of Atlanta’s top creative talents, including himself.

Known for his concepts more than just being a fabricator, Potter got into prop making back in the heyday of Landsdown Investments’ “Limelight” nightclub properties. He created and built out the fantastical interiors and exteriors for these venues in Atlanta, New York City, Chicago and London. He then went on to create interiors for another Atlanta venue, The Excelsior Mill, which has since been turned into The Masquerade. Potter also worked on LeBam, an events locale in midtown known for it’s magical, other worldly interiors. Along the way, he created numerous exhibitions for museums across America. His most recent work was creating the sets and props for “Galactic Perry,” a children’s television series produced by the Young Brothers, whose production company is also housed at TARC. “I really liked doing this project because there was no restraint. The most ridiculous, crazy ideas that I came up with for the props in terms of wild colors and shapes, they liked. So this was a blast to create.”

And out of his work at the 2011 Next Cool Event, Potter formed Little Bucket Productions with Lisa Duncan of Archen and Jay Marsh of Legendary Designs. All of the props and sets that they created for this year’s Next Cool Event were bought on the spot

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by prop houses in Atlanta; a testament to the skill that Potter and the Little Bucket team puts into their work.

Like so many successful prop makers, he has used his varied skill-set to craft whatever is needed, be it for a television series, commercial work or custom residential. Something that all of these prop makers share is the ability to work in many disciplines.

And if they don’t know how to make something they learn and figure it out.

”When I started doing mold making for props on this series, it was like I hit the ground running.

It was like I had been doing it all along.”

William Gantt William Gantt hard at work in his studio.

William Gantt started his life’s work making jewelry. For the past 15 years he’s been a journeyman jeweler, the level of expertise between an apprentice and a master jeweler. A few years ago, a friend of his who was working for Tyler Perry Studios (TPS) asked Gantt if he could fabricate a pair of eyeglasses for Tyler Perry’s “Madea” character. Gantt got to work collaborating with an optometrist in Texas, who with his Cad/Cam machine produced the frames, while Gantt produced the metalwork for the temples. The folks at TPS were pleased with his work.

Gantt was then introduced to a man who would turn out to be a mentor, Joe Connolly, the prop master for “The Vampire Diaries.”

After a few months of working with Connolly fabricating metal items, Connolly told Gantt that he should learn resin casting. After researching it and buying some trial materials, Gantt states, “I’ve been doing something like this for the last 15 years because it’s essentially the same thing as mold making for jewelry, just on a larger scale. One of my specialties in jewelry was doing a lot of casting and mold making. But when I started doing mold making for props on this series, it was like I hit the ground running. It was like I had been doing it all along.”

He keeps “Vampire Diaries” happy by putting the same level of attention into prop making as he does into jewelry making. And even though a prop may only be on screen sometimes less than a couple of seconds, he makes sure that every detail looks like

it could be used as a still shot. The specific types of props he’s been making on “Vampire Diaries” are specialized safety and action props, such as a machete or a knife. He takes an original and makes plastic and rubber copies of it so that the actors who use them don’t get hurt. If there is any kind of fight scene, a rubber safety knife is used. It’s kept him busy now for three years, and he’s very content with it.

He’s heard from prop masters on “The Vampire Diaries” and “The Walking Dead” that his work is better than anything else they’ve seen in Georgia and at least as good as what is in L.A. Having the added benefit of being right here when somebody wants something, Gantt has the ability to have it in their hands the next day. He makes a mold, then makes the rubber and plastic props, and gets it to them in no time flat. Getting props from L.A. could potentially take a week. So instead of sending it out there, and having to deal with somebody over the phone, Gantt can see what the scene requires and then have the item engineered in a day. “When producers come to Georgia to make movies or television shows, they bring everyone that they can with them to get the job done. But once they see the work of local talent, and then hire them, not only is it more convenient for them, but they want to do this because it’s good for the local economy and they can utilize the tax incentives. So they want to use local talent. But you have to know what you’re doing and give them what they need.”

H

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All Systems Are Go: Digital Dashboards for Business

by: Nichole Bazemore

I

magine cruising along on the interstate, focused only on your favorite tunes and arriving at your destination, when you glance down and realize that your vehicle’s dashboard is blank. Although the car is driving just fine, you’re alarmed, because suddenly you have no clue how fast you’re driving, how much fuel you have, or whether your engine is in the process of overheating. What would you do? You’d likely panic and pull off onto the nearest exit, because driving along a busy highway without functional gauges is dangerous, right? Now, if you’re a business owner, think about your company: what tools do you have in place to gauge whether it’s running as efficiently as it could? You wouldn’t drive a car without clear indicators that it was functioning properly, so why would you try to steer a company without similar indicators? Unfortunately, many business owners chug along without a clear understanding of where they are or where they’re going. In effect, many operate without knowing for sure if they’re cruising or headed for a ditch.

To a degree, this is understandable. After all, for most businesspeople, financial forecasts and analyses are daunting and tedious.

What’s more, the sheer volume of data can be overwhelming— pages and pages of reports with complicated graphs, charts and percentages—and not only hard to decipher, but extremely timeconsuming, an instant liability for small business owners who often don’t have time to spare. Fortunately, there’s a solution. It’s called a digital dashboard, and just as your vehicle’s dashboard tracks your automobile’s metrics, this business tool tracks the health—or lack thereof—of your business.

Digital Dashboards, a Visual Snapshot of Your Business A digital dashboard is a business management tool that gives you real-time, visual displays of Key Performance Indicators, or KPI’s.

The dashboard pulls important business data from a wide range of sources and combines it into a single interface, giving decision

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makers and even employees, a concrete picture of how their business is performing. Steve Deckert is marketing manager for Sweet Tooth, Inc., an Ontario, Canada-based company that creates online and in-store customer loyalty and retention programs for merchants. The 27-employee company monitors its Web traffic, website status, newsletter subscribers, sales and more on a 42-inch plasma digital dashboard in its sales and marketing office. “The dashboard is always displayed for everyone within eyesight,” Deckert explains.

“It creates a mentality that these metrics are the things that really matter. It makes all our horses “pull in one direction,” so to speak. It’s instrumental in the daily monitoring of our business but also a good motivator.” Deckert says that before management began using digital dashboards, their approach to measuring the success of Sweet Tooth’s marketing campaigns was sporadic and less targeted. Now, the company tracks a few, key metrics that are always top of mind for management, because they see them every day.

What’s more, the dashboard’s visual display is fully customizable, allowing company decision makers to get a bird’s eye view of the health and functionality of the entire organization, or to zero in on specific areas or departments, to see how they’re performing at any given time. Some companies, like Sweet Tooth, use the information contained in dashboards to motivate employees to do their best work, and later tie those results to employee compensation. Even Federal Express uses digital dashboards to motivate employees, placing monitors throughout their facilities to display metrics such as package sort times, jet turnaround times, percentage of packages damaged and stock price.

Perhaps most important, this real-time business intelligence allows managers to spot existing or potential problems and take corrective action or make immediate business decisions. No more waiting for reports or wading through complex documents, whose data will most likely be outdated or irrelevant by the time decision

makers get around to analyzing it. Even the graphics are customizable; companies can quantify and display information in a way that makes sense to them—colored lights, pie charts, bullet graphs, bar charts—and even gauges, are popular markers. “We have dark red colors when things aren’t going well and bright green colors for when we are doing well,” Deckert says.

Google Analytics vs.

Digital Dashboards For business owners who abhor any type of business intelligence or reporting, adopting a digital dashboard to track KPI’s might not seem prudent, especially if they’re already using tools like Google Analytics. But although both tools share similarities, they’re actually quite different. For instance, Google Analytics allows you to identify problems or negative trends within your business, but its limited focus can make it difficult for you to get a true, bird’s eye view of your business. Additionally, Google Analytics provides detailed statistics specifically about the number of visitors to your website, while digital dashboards provide information on a wide variety of areas within your company, such as sales, customer relations and HR. Andrew Schrage is the owner and operator of the personal finance site, Money Crashers.

He says his company used Google Analytics by itself in the past, but recently partnered it with a digital dashboard. “I can choose to view from different angles, whether it be revenue, income, traffic, or repeat visitors. This system works well for us because we received highly-detailed information about the traffic coming to our site, as well as other areas within our company that might be difficult to analyze through just traffic numbers,” he adds.

Dan Cassidy, CEO and Founder of Inspiyr.com, a lifestyle website for men, agrees. He says the ability to “drill down” to specific areas of his business make digital dashboards an indispensible tool for his firm.

The company, which markets itself using Google Search and social media platforms, like Facebook and Twitter, tracks KPI’s that are critical to its success, such as site visitation, audience metrics and social interaction. “Nearly everything we do is measurable through digital dashboards, which is a blessing and a curse,” he says. “And the customization is really important for us—we need to look at the data from many different angles, including daily, weekly and monthly.”

That ability to view metrics at any time is critical, as it means business owners can spot problems when they arise and course correct pretty quickly. “Because we follow these dashboards pretty closely, nothing has really taken us by surprise,” Schrage says. “The one exception might be when traffic is surprisingly high or low on a given day or given week. Or another exception might be when we didn’t realize quite how high expenses were for writers until we analyzed it via a dashboard and realized we needed to control costs better to ensure cash flow,” he adds.

Getting Started With Digital Dashboards So, you know you need to keep tabs on how your company is performing and you want to avert problems before they arise. But how do you get started with digital dashboards? The good news is, no company is too small to use them. Robert Miller is Lead Web Analyst at Nebo Agency, an Atlanta-based interactive marketing firm that not only uses dashboards to monitor the performance of their clients’ websites, but also designs and builds them based on client needs. “Assuming the company has sufficient data to recognize trends and make valid insights, companies of practically any size can benefit from using dashboards,” he explains. “I would even argue that the smaller the company, in terms of employee size, the greater the benefit. This is because employees of smaller companies typically wear several hats and help run multiple areas of the business. The use of dashboards allows these employees to focus more on implementing the insights learned from data, and less on the ad hoc reporting or data collection that dashboards accomplish for them.”

And although some dashboards can be quite large and technically elaborate, designing one doesn’t have to be a major challenge. You can create your own using Microsoft Excel, or purchase a template through a software company. But because the type and complexity of dashboards can vary widely, there is no one-size-fits-all solution. “Businesses that have Google Analytics installed on their site can access default and easily customizable dashboards within the Google Analytics interface. This option tends to be the most cost-effective route for stakeholders that want quick access to their web analytics trends, but it also has a limit to the amount of customization that can be done,” says Miller.

“For dashboards that involve multiple data sources, such as sales reports from Salesforce, email marketing reports from MailChimp, and online ad spend from Google AdWords, custom dashboards that interact with each service’s API need to be custom built within some type of online interface.”

But whether your digital dashboard is basic or elaborate, it should be clear, easy to read and easy to use. And, experts say, the key is to only track those metrics that are most important to your company’s success. Otherwise, you could be distracted and overwhelmed— the very things a digital dashboard is designed to avoid. “Make sure the dashboard is capable of reporting on the metrics and key performance indicators (KPI’s) that correspond to the company’s business objectives. It is very easy to get caught up in new metrics that can be reported on, but if these new metrics don’t align with the company’s objectives they can quickly mislead the decision making process,” says Miller.

Cassidy agrees. “We have to remember that just because something is measurable, that doesn’t mean it matters. So, we always start with the question, ‘What are the most critical metrics for our business?’ and then figure out how we can measure and monitor those.

For more information on digital dashboards, or to view literally hundreds of samples, visit: www.enterprise-dashboard.com/business-intelligence-dashboard-examples.

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feature

A Preview to a Kill Are advance film screenings movie hell or Cinema Paradiso?

By Curt Holman

photo credit: Graham Kolbeins

Movie critics Alonso Duralde and Dave White.

Recently, I attended the screening of “Sound of My Voice,” an indie psychological thriller about two would-be documentary filmmakers trying to infiltrate a mysterious cult in suburban California. Just before ten in the morning, ten days before the film’s local opening, I visited the screening room of a small film production studio in an Atlanta suburb. This particular venue features an old-fashioned popcorn machine, and the cup holders on the screening room seats always contain unopened, 12-oz. bottles of water. The room can seat about 30, but only about ten other people saw “Sound of My Voice” with me. The film started promptly at 10 a.m. and featured excellent sound and picture quality.

I thought “Sound of My Voice” was pretty good, but it certainly didn’t hurt to see it in such a calm, comfortable setting. Reviewing movies can be a sweet gig, especially at a time when film criticism seems to be disappearing as a career path. Seeing movies before anyone else is undeniably fun. Who wouldn’t want to swan into a comics store and ask “Guess who saw ‘The Avengers’

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a week before opening?” Free screenings represent a significant cost savings. I estimate that I saw 80 movies at screenings last year, which would’ve saved me at least $800 at the box office.

And that’s not even counting the upsell from the 3D and IMAX shows.

Movie studios may not be able to guarantee that critics will like their work, but a quiet, high-quality screening can ensure an attentive, receptive critical audience. Those screenings are also the minority. More often, the only advance screenings available involve noise, hassle and other annoyances that diminish the viewing experience. The kind of screening a movie receives can signal whether the movie studios seeks to cultivate the press or would rather neglect them.

For decades, advance screenings were necessary for critics and studios both to do their jobs. Writers, especially ones for print publications, need to review a film early enough to meet their deadline ahead of the film’s opening day. Studios may not al-

ways want reviews, and seem increasingly ambivalent about them in the internet age. But they still use screenings to generate word of mouth among potential ticket-buyers.

Critics can see movies at two kinds of advance screenings. The private ones can be held at screening rooms, like the place I saw “Sound of My Voice,” or at the local cineplex, usually in the midmorning or afternoon. And sometimes they can make critics feel privileged indeed. I still have my invitation for New Line’s Oct. 17, 2001 screening of 20 minutes of “The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring” about two months before its December release. After enjoying a continental breakfast, we filed in to get an early glimpse of Peter Jackson’s Middle-Earth, including most of the thrilling Mines of Moria sequence with marauding cave trolls and Gandalf booming ‘You shall not pass!’” Given the ecstatic notices that followed, New Line’s investment in the sneak peeks paid off.

Such events only seldom come to Atlanta. Alonso Duralde, who reviews for The Wrap.com and What the Flick?, lives in West Hollywood and gets far more opportunities for that sort of thing, but seldom pursues them. He says, “Around awards season, I get invited to a lot of screenings that involve dinner, cocktails and schmoozing with the stars and directors, but I try to skip them because it feels like they’re trying to buy me. I don’t mind the occasional post-premiere buffet, but those small-group exercises in intimacy give me the heebie-jeebies. I mean, how do you escape afterward if it turns out the movie sucks?”

Perhaps the most conspicuous recent example of reviewer manipulation came in 1998 when Michael Bay and Touchstone Pictures courted Harry Knowles, founder of the then two-year old Ain’t It Cool News site for movie gossip and reviews. The filmmakers flew Knowles to a set tour in Houston, the premiere at the NASA Space Center and introduced him to Bruce Willis.

While the vast majority of critics loathed “Armageddon,” Knowles raved about it and admitted to crying at the end.

Most reviewers never get the royal treatment. Usually, critics see movies at public screenings, sharing a theater filled to capacity with audiences from outside journalism or the movie industry.

The picture and sound quality can be a crapshoot, depending on how carefully the management trains its employees and maintains its equipment.

Sometimes, a celebrity appearance can turn these into a special occasion. I remember loving “Shaun of the Dead,” and then enjoying the post-movie discussion with director Edgar Wright and actors Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, with an undeniable sense of community between artists and audience.

But public screenings nearly always require crowd control, security procedures and other headaches. Radio stations sponsor them so often that critics frequently call them “radio screenings.” Anyone who sponsors a film screening, not unreasonably, wants to promote themselves, frequently in the form of quick trivia quizzes and merchandise giveaways. Too loud to ignore, the pre-movie stunts can drag on forever and involve ridiculous contests. For everyone who cheers, there’s at least one person silently begging him or her to shut up and start the movie already.

“I saw the 1987 screening of “Fatal Attraction” in Nashville, and they stopped the movie because they forgot to shove someone’s face in a pie for $25,” says Duralde.

“I do love a tacky radio promotional screening,” admits Dave White, film critic for Movies.com. “I’ve seen hip-hop dance contests and t-shirt cannons. There was a Salsa dance contest at “Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights” and essentially a free-for-all food fight at “Scary Movie 4.” These screenings are awful, but it’s really interesting to see how desperate studios can be on a street level. You can see what studios will do to get the audience in a good enough mood to say ‘That was great!’ afterward, even though a week later, they won’t remember what they saw.”

Apart from the critics in their roped-off row, the studio can draw audiences from several possible places. Sometimes they extend invitations to groups that have some connection to the content of a movie, like the anti-bullying activists at the respectful screening of the documentary “Bully.” Duralde adds, “There are also people simply dedicated to see anything for free if they see ads for passes in the free weekly paper.

I’ve heard them called ‘passholes’ in the industry.” (I’m not judgmental about them. I was a big passhole myself before becoming a movie reviewer.)

Just as filmmakers always want to see how their finished product plays to an audience, they inevitably want critics to see a movie with ordinary moviegoers. “The whole thing about radio screenings is ‘We’re gonna surround you heartless bastards who don’t like anything with people who laugh at everything,’” says Duralde. “I don’t know who they recruited for the “Gigli” screening, but there was a woman sitting directly behind us who laughed at everything, even Ben Affleck saying ‘Shit happens.’”

I think it’s a myth that a critic won’t enjoy a comedy without an audience to provide the laughter. I remember seeing “The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle” as one of about a dozen critics at a private screening, and my guffaws rang out in the otherwise silent theater. The most acclaimed TV comedies of past decade dispensed with studio audiences and laugh tracks all together.

“The Office” and “Modern Family” are just two popular shows that prove that people will laugh without someone else’s cue. www.ozmagazine.com OZ MAGAZINE

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feature There was probably never a Golden Age of Movie Screenings, but if there was, it ended with the advent of the cell phones and the internet. The entrance to public screenings, at least for would-be Hollywood blockbusters, invariably becomes a logjam of people surrendering their phones and being wanded by security guards. Occasionally audiences will even be policed by men in night-vision goggles on the lookout for pirates with video cameras. It’s extremely distracting to watch the finale of “Hulk” when a guy in weird headgear glares in your direction. White recalls being watched by a guard when he was one of only two people in a screening.

Anti-piracy security may involve treating viewers like potential criminals, but it has an expected benefit. When a mountainous fellow announces before a movie that he’ll happily kick out anyone who takes out a cell phone, people tend to behave themselves. Generally a public screening at capacity features less texting and other rudeness than a sold-out show at the mall movie theater, although all critics have stories of exceptions.

Critics can use crowded screenings as a barometer for how much the audience likes them, especially when young ones are involved. “When it’s a rotten kid’s movie, it’s very telling to see it with kids who are bored. If it’s good, they’ll shut up and get lost in it. If it sucks, it’s ‘Momma momma momma!’” says Duralde.

White says, “I saw one of the “Chipmunks” movies with about 300 little children, and they were hypnotized by it. For a movie like that, you have to admit ‘This is a highly effective children’s movie.

Some studios and distributors, especially ones with less money, can circumvent the screening process entirely with advance screeners: prerelease DVDs sent to critics. These DVDs sometimes have “propery of . . .” visible for some or all of the running time. Sometimes friends ask me, “Did you get a screener of “Some Big Hollywood Movie?” Invariably, if you’ve heard of a movie and it’s not yet in theaters, I haven’t gotten a screener for it. Generally screeners are used to support arthouse fare.

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They’re going to sit with their mouth open for the whole thing.’”

The scheduling of a screening can also be a leading indicator for whether it’s any good. You probably know already that if a studio doesn’t pre-screen a film for critics, they have no confidence that critics will like it, so it’s probably lousy. Often the publicist will offer an unconvincing justification, such as “We want the critics and audiences to discover this film together.”

Of course, sometimes studios lack confidence in films that might actually be good. 20th Century Fox barely even released “Idiocracy,” but plenty of viewers find Mike Judge’s satire hilarious. If a film only screens the night before, that’s almost as dire a warning as no screening at all.

Hollywood premiere screenings can magnify the glamour, but also increase the annoyance exponentially. “First, the parking is a nightmare because they block the street off for the red carpet event,” says Duralde. “We’ll have assigned seats, often to the far left side, next to or even behind a column. And they start 15 to 30 minutes late, and that’s not counting the possibility of having a speech by the producer ahead of time.”

Still, most critics would prefer to spend a bad night at a movie screening than a good day digging ditches or cleaning toilets.

In general, movie screenings qualify as a perk because they usually provide reviewers for free what the audience spending at least $10 per ticket has a right to expect, and is often denied: a good sound system, adequate film projection, enforcement of the rules for audience behavior and generally the chance to see a movie in the best possible light. If there’s a scandal, it’s not what the critics get, it’s what the audience so often doesn’t get.

As Seen on

TV

music made in georgia Georgia’s music industry gets a big “win” in the film and television production industry.

By Tammy Hurt

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arly in May, Governor Nathan Deal signed HB 1027 assuring music production as an attributable expense for qualified film and television productions. The “Georgia Entertainment Industry Investment Act,” gets credit for attracting nearly 300 productions with an overall economic impact to the state of more than $2 billion last year. article continues on p. 28

The state boasts a rich, diverse music talent in the U.S., consider: • Hip-hop/R&B – Usher, Dallas Austin (producer), Outkast, Ludacris, Janelle Monae, Anthony David, Akon, Lil Jon, Ne Yo. • Rock – R.E.M., B-52’s, The Black Crowes, Allman Brothers, Collective Soul, Indigo Girls, Mastadon, Butch Walker (performer/producer).

• Gospel/Contemporary Christian – Third Day, GMC (formerly Gospel Music Channel).

• Country – Zac Brown Band, Sugarland, Alan Jackson, Jason Aldean, Trisha Yearwood, Travis Tritt.

(Left to Right) GMP Co-President Simon Horrocks, GMP Executive Director Mala Sharma, GMP Co-President Tammy Hurt, Governor Nathan Deal, The Recording Academy Atlanta Chapter Senior Executive Director Michele Rhea Caplinger, GMP Public Relations Consultant Scott Mills, and GMP Secretary Andrew Schutt.

Georgia has a worldwide music reputation, but many of the

productions filmed here use music created elsewhere. That’s why getting this clarification from the legislature and the Governor was so important. It is expected to have an immediate impact. Now, production companies have a powerful incentive to use local recording studios, musicians, songwriters, engineers, producers and performers.

This music industry “win” started about three years ago as a committee within The Recording Academy® Atlanta Chapter. With a lot of help from Michele Caplinger, senior executive director, and Simon Horrocks, co-founder of AFFIX Music, the chapter created a non-profit advocacy group supporting Georgia’s music industry.

• Classical – Atlanta Symphony Orchestra (27 GRAMMY® Awards) and others.

Not on Stage, But Front & Center In addition to the musical talent, Georgia has award winning producers and engineers. Some of the talent includes:

Phil Tan

Georgia Music Partners (GMP) commissioned a study of the music industry’s economic impact. Often overshadowed by the movie industry, the 2011 study estimated that the music industry here contributed $3.7 billion annually. Additionally, the study credits the industry with creating 19,955 jobs and generating more than $313 million in tax revenues for state and local governments.

Prior to the Governor’s signature of the new law, production companies lacked confidence that music production expenses would count toward the state’s production credit. Music supervisors did not know if the Georgia Department of Revenue would approve the expenditures. Choosing the state to produce the music score was just not worth the risk. Therefore, the clarification makes the decision to record here much easier and provides a marketable credit that lowers the overall cost of the production.

Let the Talent Flow Now that the entertainment tax credit issue is resolved, the production industry should rely more on the state’s influential music scene to create the best sound possible for the movies and TV shows filmed here. According to Discover Magazine, after analyzing more than 11 billion tracks played on social media site Last.fm, “…Atlanta is the trendsetting city.”

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Phil Tan who lives in Atlanta has mixed and/or recorded 25 singles that have reached number one on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart. According to Wikipedia, sales of albums and singles sold in the U.S. with Tan listed in the credits as a mixer, engineer, remixer or producer total over 250 million.

matt still

Matt Still is a Grammy winning producer, engineer, and mixer based in Atlanta, Ga. He started working in studios around Atlanta at the age of 20 and has never looked back. Still’s credits include Elton John, Outkast, Lady Gaga, Rod Stewart, Joss Stone, PNAU, Santana, Alice In Chains, B.B. King, T.I., Nelly, Sevendust, Third Day, Bruce Hornsby, Ann Wilson, Steve Walsh, TLC, Arrested Development, Brandi Carlile, Patti LaBelle, and Stevie Wonder. He is a three-time Grammy nominee and won the Album of the Year Grammy for his work with Outkast on “Speakerboxxx/The Love Below.”

Matt Still On stage at Caesars Palace with Elton & B.B. King

Sean Garrett is a singer-songwriter, rapper and record producer. He has produced fifteen number one singles in only seven years of producing music. That number puts him in fifth place on the Billboard list of producers with the most number one hits. Garrett is the first producer to achieve this measure of success in under a decade since George Martin, who produced 20 #1 hits for The Beatles in 6 1/2 years from 1964 to 1970. He is also the only active hip-hop producer who is mentioned on the Billboard list of producers with the most number one hits.

Sean Garrett

Better Music Made Easier “For everyone on stage, there are 30 people off stage helping to make it possible,” said Simon Horrocks, co-president of GMP. There is an army of service professionals, such as managers, publishers, entertainment attorneys, public relations professionals, finance, educators and more who make a living helping the musical arts.

GMP is working with the Georgia universities and trade schools to provide a ready workforce. One area that is expected to grow jobs and revenue is music technology. Georgia Tech even has a doctoral degree in music technology. Horrocks sees this segment as one that will

drive investment. “The state has the education systems, workforce and quality of life that will encourage companies to locate here, start here or establish U.S. operations in Georgia,” said Horrocks.

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Tapping into Georgia’s talent and tax incentives for music will make a big impact on the state and help movie and TV producers create a great product at a competitive rate.

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behind the camera with drewprops BEHIND THE CAMERA WITH DREWPROPS

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Illustration & Design by Andrew Duncan

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interview

no trouble with the learning curve:

interviewed by: diane lasek Tim Moore is a producer who has worked on set in many capacities. He is known and respected now for his work with several of Clint Eastwood’s recent productions. Moore is in Atlanta filming the new film “Trouble with The Curve,” again working with Eastwood. Oz sat down with him to find out how he got started and what he likes about filming in Georgia.

2011 In the Land of Blood and Honey (producer) • 2011 J. Edgar (executive producer) • 2010 Hereafter (executive producer) 2010 Q (producer) • 2009 Invictus (executive producer) • 2008 Gran Torino (executive producer) • 2008 Changeling (executive producer) 2007 Rails & Ties (co-producer) • 2006 Letters from Iwo Jima (co-producer) • 2006 Flags of Our Fathers (co-producer) 2004 Bobby Jones: Stroke of Genius (line producer - uncredited, producer) • 2002 The Climb (co-producer) 2000 Bullfighter (line producer) • 2000 Stolen from the Heart (TV movie) (producer) • 2000 Animal Factory (line producer) 1999 The White River Kid (co-producer) • 1999 Storm Catcher (line producer) • 1998 A Murder of Crows (line producer) 1998 Progeny (line producer) • 1992 Eye of the Storm (producer) • 1989 Road House (executive producer) • 1988 Jack’s Back (producer)

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Oz: You, along with your UCLA Fraternity brother, John Shepherd, produced four award-winning independent features including: “The Climb,” The Ride,” “Eye of the Storm,” and the ESPY-nominated “Bobby Jones: Stroke of Genius.” What got you interested in becoming a producer and what steps did you take to make that happen?

Amy Adams and Justin Timberlake starring in it. Rob has been with Clint for a long time starting as a 2nd AD, 1st AD and then as a producer. So, it’s the same crew and we’ve followed the same type of production schedule. So far, Rob has been fantastic, shooting everything in shorter days, right on schedule, under budget and hopefully it will all continue that way.

TIM MOORE: Well, what was funny was that the first job that I ever had was as an extra on a film called “1941” that Steven Spielberg directed. That was a Warner Bros. film and I had just graduated from UCLA. A buddy of mine had said, “come on and be an extra.” He was an assistant director. I went on the film thinking that I was going to be there for two days and eventually what happened was, my friend told me that they needed a production assistant. I said “why not?” I stayed there for much longer and it got me hooked. So, instead of going on to law school, I decided that I was going to get involved in the film business. And then I worked as a production assistant and slowly went back and took classes at USC and UCLA through their extension programs in film. I took odd jobs and worked my way up, learning everything there was about being a grip to an electrician to location manager to production manager. And it was a process of doing nonunion films; I got my head into it and just gained experience. Eventually I was able to join the different unions and became a member of the Director’s Guild.

It was a long process but it was very worth it. Other people may decide to take another route in that if they can get to work in a production company and go in and eventually through the production process become a line producer. I just did it this way because I didn’t know any of the technical background and it helped me very much as a production manager to know what was happening on the set. Because the first 5 to 7 years I was on the set everyday before I was ever in an office.

Oz: In your film career, you seem to have had every kind of producer role: line producer, unit production manager, production manager, co-producer, producer and executive producer. Have all of these roles helped you as an executive producer to know what to expect from the people who take on these other production roles under you? Do you find that this was a necessary part of your journey to have worked in all of these roles?

Oz: You were executive producer on four of the last nine Clint Eastwood’s films that you worked on, including “The Hereafter,” “Invictus,” “The Changeling” and “Gran Torino.” How did you become his producer?

TIM MOORE: I started working with Clint on a film called “Mystic River” where I was hired as the production manager. Then I worked on “Million Dollar Baby” as the unit production manager. Clint then gave me a co-producer credit on “Flags of Our Fathers” and “Letters from Iwo Jima.” After that, I became his executive producer. The whole time since 2002, I’ve been in charge of production for all of the Malpaso films [Malpaso Productions], which is Clint’s Company. We are based out of Warner Bros. and the films are usually all Warner Bros. films, but we have done some films with Universal. Two of the films that we did were “The Changeling” which was with Brian Grazer’s company, and then most recently we just finished “J Edgar.” We also did two films with Steven Spielberg, which were “Flags of our Fathers” and “Letters from Iwo Jima.” And then eventually we did “Hereafter” with his company, which was basically a Universal and Warner Bros. deal, but Warner always has the domestic rights.

Oz: What are some of the biggest lessons that you’ve learned from Clint’s particular style of filmmaking that you have taken with you and applied to other film projects?

TIM MOORE: Well, the best thing is that Clint has been in the industry for almost 60 years and he knows everything! One of the things that everyone says about Malpaso is that we’re very lean. We shoot short days; we’re always on schedule or under schedule and under budget. So you learn from his style that he doesn’t waste a lot of time or money. He knows what he wants and you just move forward. It’s the idea that you just have to be good in prep and then during the production period you just want to make sure that you have everything there on the day for him, so that he gets what he wants. In our different departments like grip or electric and set dressing, we do a lot of prep work because we know that when he comes on the day of shooting, he wants to just shoot. A lot of other companies do the same thing, and as long as everything is prepared properly and you know what you want and you don’t have directors changing things all of the time, it usually runs very smoothly. I try to do that on other films. Most recently I did another film that was Angelina Jolie’s directorial debut, “In the Land of Blood and Honey.” Angie was terrific and hopefully some of the things that I learned from Clint I was able to advise her on. She came in on time, on schedule, and on budget. .

Oz: Maybe she picked up a lot of that from her work with Clint on “The Changeling.”

TIM MOORE: She did. And Clint had talked to her, and you know, she’s a quick study, she sees somebody work and she picks up from that. The film we are currently shooting now, Rob Lorenz is directing this with Clint and

TIM MOORE: Well, right now it’s hard to say what you do as an executive producer that’s different from a co-producer or a producer. A lot of it is just in the name and what credits are available. On all of the films that I work on, I am a production manager, which is a member of the DGA and their team. It’s pretty much the same role. Every once in a while, depending on who the other producers are and how much experience they have in the business, I may do more above the line in dealing with actors and talent and all that or not. But as far as the physical production, my role is always the same as far as whether I’m an executive producer, co-producer or producer.

And in addition, with Angie on “In the Land of Blood and Honey,” I had a little bit more responsibility because there really weren’t experienced producers that had both produced before and line produced and production managed, so I had a little bit more responsibility. When I work at Malpaso, I work closely with Rob Lorenz, who is a very creative producer and hands-on and we’ve worked together for so long that I’m really doing more of the physical production.

Oz: How has your work as a producer changed over time? What do you find most compelling (or challenging) about the work that you do?

TIM MOORE: Well, the toughest thing over the years, just because of the times, the economy, and the studios and whose running the studios, is that everybody seems to be more conscious about staying on budget and on schedule. So luckily, knock on wood, since I’ve worked with Malpaso for the last ten years now, I really haven’t had to deal with those problems because the studio stays away from us because they know they’ll have no problems. But I have done a few independent films on the side over the last couple of years, and probably those are the most challenging because they give you a number and say “do this film for that number” and it doesn’t have anything to do with what the film should cost. But it’s just because of how much money they have to do the film; you’re stuck into that. Where it use to be, you would budget a film and then go out and try to raise that amount of money, and that’s what you would make the film for and what it would really cost. But now, because the marketing people are involved they say, “listen, this is all you have because this is the number that this talent can bring.

We’ve done different surveys and tests in this genre with this talent, released in this period in so many markets, and this is what we think it’s going to make, so for us not to lose money….” You know, it’s not really about the creative process or whether this is the greatest picture we can make and we have to make it right.

Now you have to make it for a number.

Oz: Congratulations on receiving the Producers Guild Association’s Stanley Kramer award that is given for humanitarian-themed films, for your work on Angelina Jolie’s film “In the Land of Blood and Honey.” Tell us about some of the more interesting challenges that you faced on this film? What was it like working in Budapest? And did the controversial subject matter add to the challenges?

TIM MOORE: Yes, the subject matter definitely added to the challenges! We, at one time, planned on shooting in Sarajevo quite a bit. But once we realized how it affected the local people there, we switched most of the shooting to the Budapest area. Then once we started shooting, there was even more unrest, and it made it very uncomfortable for Angie to go to Sarajevo. We had scheduled three days at the end of the picture to do that and she wasn’t able to come, so we went with just the 2nd unit and shot in that area because there were protests in Sarajevo and we didn’t want them to affect the shooting. But Budapest was great and it was a great double for Sarajevo.

(Interview continues on next page..)

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interview

Oz: With your latest film project here in Georgia, “Trouble with the Curve,” what have you experienced as our strengths and what do you see that needs improvement to make the production experience more successful here?

TIM MOORE: This is the second time that I’ve filmed here in Georgia. I did a film before called “Bobby Jones: Stroke of Genius” that was shot here in 2003, and I had a great experience then and I always wanted to come back on another film, and have just been waiting for the right project. “Trouble with the Curve” is written for Georgia, so of course we wanted to be here. But even more important to bring us here was the tax incentive. So the whole idea was “does it make sense?” And with the crews and all of the production services available, it certainly makes it worthwhile, because sometimes the tax incentive doesn’t mean much because you have to bring everybody that’s not already here. With Georgia, it’s perfect because there are a lot of strong departments and great locations. I mean we’ve found everything that we wanted. The toughest thing here is looking at our schedule because of the time of year that we wanted to shoot it – with the weather and going to different cover. I think one of the things that you need more of here is to build more stages or proper stages that are really sound stages. And I think that will come with time and you’ll get a lot more productions here to shoot. But as far as all of the departments, the construction and art departments are very deep here. Warner Bros. felt that with the history they’ve had of doing a lot of pictures here that they could recommend a lot of different things to us. One of the things we were able to do was to negotiate with the different groups here. I know where you sometimes go into different towns and it’s somewhat difficult because the people are not used to film companies. They have a lot of other things going on. And the IA’s (IATSE locals) have been very good to us, and you’ve got a very good film commission here with Lee Thomas and her staff. So that was a big plus. Lee was able to put together packages for us to see the locations. Probably the biggest department’s that need to grow are some of the technical departments. I know that you have plenty of electricians and grips. But possibly some of the camera support for some of the specialties in camera. Nowadays, everybody has certain heads and Technocranes and Scorpios. You don’t have that many people here yet, I don’t think, that know those pieces of equipment, but I think in time it will come. But other than that we’ve been very happy with the different departments. The other one might be special effects, but I think that that’s growing. We brought our own special effects and we bring a lot more than most people because of the history of Clint and his long-standing team that normally works together.

Oz: What was one of the most interesting surprises that you’ve discovered about Georgia that you didn’t know?

TIM MOORE: Probably all of the different looks. This time we scouted all over and with this film being about baseball, we were able to see a lot of the different looks and locations, from going down to Macon and even here in Atlanta to up in northern Georgia. In the film we’re playing northern Georgia for North Carolina, so it’s a perfect look, of course because it’s close to there. But with all of the stuff here in Atlanta, I’m just seeing a lot more sites than I’ve ever seen before, and what’s available here to shoot in Georgia.

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Oz: What advice can you give someone who is just starting out in the film business and interested in becoming a film producer?

TIM MOORE: It’s not just here in Georgia but it’s anywhere. If you want to get involved in the film business, know what you want to do. Don’t go in and say “oh, I want to be a makeup person, but I’m going to do props or something else until I can get into that.” If you really know what you want to do and say you want to be a producer, what you should do is find a production company, and they don’t have to be the biggest company, but go in and become an intern or get involved somehow and learn from that. The best thing, if you want to be producer, is to become a great writer, and find writers and find material and then go out and team up with somebody. Michelle Wisener, one of the producer’s of this project develops things. She brought this script into Clint through Rob Lorenz and she’s involved as a producer here. She found the writer and brought the screenplay to us and that’s one of the ways to find the material, get it to the right people and attach yourself as a producer. So you would go and try to be an intern for some young producer who is into development. Or, if you want to be more like myself as a line producer and do the physical thing, then get in and take a job as a PA. Because once you’re there, you’re able to meet people and see how it goes. In most cases, we’re going to hire somebody that we know and promote somebody that we know. It’s very seldom that you hire someone outside the circle, and that’s very unfortunate because there are a lot of good people out there.

Oz: You live with your wife Bobbe and your two dogs in Hermosa Beach, CA. Tell me about your activities outside of filmmaking?

TIM MOORE: I love all sports and going to different events, but at my age I can’t do quite as much as I used to. But I like to ski and play basketball and all that. My wife is very active with animal rescue groups and she puts a lot of time into this.

We try to help out in this area and we have two dogs currently and we had three dogs before. We love animals and do whatever we can to give back.

OZ: Thank you.

TIM MOORE: Oh, you’re very welcome.

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voices

Simplif icationism

by Keith Fletcher

Why does a walk in the park on a spring day excite and invigorate you? When you come through the door at night and your kids yell “daddy’s home!” is there anything better? Why does nothing beat a glass of wine or beer with good friends? Why? All of these are simple feelings that tap into human emotions at the core. From a marketing perspective, people want to use products that allow them to achieve their hopes, dreams and ambitions. People don’t want to be thought of as consumers that use products. People crave simplicity in their lives and marketing.

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hings were simple when we were young. We were oblivious to all of the complicated things that went on in the world. As we age, responsibilities overcome us. We seek an escape back to “simpler times.” People respond best if the messaging they receive is concise and to the point. There is no room for the complex in a world where we are bombarded with thousands of messages a day. Simplificationism, as I call it, is more than an approach or methodology. It’s a results-oriented way of thinking.

Simplificationism resides at the intersection of Business, People and Technology. Our job as marketers is to “master the message” at this junction to allow all three to be their best. If the focus is skewed too much in one category, chances are the message to be conveyed will not hit the target. No one should run a business simply on a feel good message alone, but an over-reliance on technology can be just as risky.

When creating your next campaign, it should be done carefully considering people’s emotions and what motivates them to buy.

Touch them, as people, not consumers.

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Let’s break out all three categories:

Business Businesses want profit. When marketing, businesses feel compelled to tell consumers every single benefit that their product provides. They want to be all things to all people. For example, if a healthcare company sells a feeding tube that provides better protection, better performance, and better results; all of these messages should not be conveyed in the headline. The end benefit must be easily and quickly deciphered by people using your product in a compelling and creative way.

Pe o p l e Plain and simple, people buy things they need and want, and also to feel better about surviving in today’s complex world.

Tapping into the emotions that motivate people to buy your product or service is the key. Professor and psychologist Robert Plutchik identified eight primary human emotions - anger, fear, sadness, disgust, surprise, anticipation, trust, and joy (and their oppositions: joy vs. sadness, anger vs. fear, trust vs. disgust, surprise vs. anticipation). By knowing your audience and simplifying your message, you can stimulate the right motivations to get the reader to buy your product or service.

Te c h n o l og y Technology is moving faster than ever. Changes are coming so quickly that it’s hard to stay current. The smart phone is an amazing device that puts an amazing amount of power in the palm of your hand. It’s a very complicated piece of technology. You can make a call, take a picture, get email, text, get directions and play games just to name a few. But all of this is not what the late Steve Jobs focused on telling people about his amazing invention. Instead, his marketing message motivated people to buy his product to make their lives easier, more enjoyable and to help them achieve their own dreams.

If we use technology to reach people on their own terms and in a very personal way, we are closer to closing the sale.

As an example, consider a re-branding for a global healthcare company. The acquisitions that have taken place over the years have increased the company’s product offerings but have left the company fragmented. Multiple design devices and messages are being utilized. Using Simplificationism, I’m pushing them to seek a pure and uncluttered solution. This helps them convey the passion of their business and ultimately helps their customers understand their brand.

Simplificationism is not easily achieved. Especially when the VP of Marketing, the bean counters and lawyers are all chiming in, as “mandatory” items need to be included. Companies leading the marketing charge have been able to focus and convey a singular message. Some of the best examples I can point to are products we are all familiar with. These all have messages that are engrained in our memory banks and tap human emotion on the most basic level. Coca-Cola…Open Happiness. Fed-Ex…The World on Time.

Nike…Just Do It. American Express…Don’t Leave Home Without It. Apple…Think Different.

When creating your next campaign, it should be done carefully considering people’s emotions and what motivates them to buy.

Touch them, as people, not consumers. Simplificationism can get your business to where it needs to be.

Cheers!

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scene

S.T.E.A.M.fest 2012 For a weekend in April, the creative folks of the Academy Theatre returned to host their 2-day celebration of the artistic ability of those who toy with alternate history and retro-futurism. This year’s S.T.E.A.M.Fest was bigger and better than ever before!

The Artifice Club partnered with the Academy to present this festival with their own brand of dedicated passion - making it an event unlike any you have ever seen. This was not a convention of fellow enthusiasts, it was a communion of artists, performers, entertainers, costumers, propmakers, and much, much more.

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1. (L-R) Patricia Nolde, Spider Kilgore, and Paige Smith 2. Nick Picard (L) and Cameron Cody Hare (R).

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3. Robin & Brian Mead, and Michael & April Cobb.

4. Caricature!

5. Thimblerig Circus juggling act.

6. This Way to the Egress with Joe Black.

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7. Costume Fittings for ‘The Adventure of the Capercallie Bridge: A Mycroft Holmes Mystery’ at S.T.E.A.M.Fest!

8. Part of the Thimblerig Circus act.

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9 9. Group shot of the S.T.E.A.M.fest crowd.

10. Sarah Egress & Joe Black.

11. Matthew Nicholson takes a photo.

12. Arthur Hinds (L), Apparition Abolishers & Chris Lee (R).

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13. Brian Wible and Elizabeth Silverloc Corbet.

14. Mr. Saturday & Sixpence performing “To Whom Doth This Line Pertain To?” 15. Bearded Ladies Melanie Parker & Shawn McConathy welcome guests to the Odditorium.

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scene

Atlanta Printmakers Studio

Print Big! 2012 Building on the success of the first two annual Print Big! steamroller events, the Atlanta Printmakers Studio hosted Print Big! 2012, held on Saturday, April 14, from 10am-4pm.

The fun-filled event was free and open to the public.

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1 1. Volunteers looking at banners.

2. APS members: Gina Reynoso rolling ink in foreground; Jessica Caldas rolling ink in background.

3. An adorable young printmaker.

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4. SCAD Atlanta students inking their block.

5. APS members: Brian Kelly (L); Brian Randall (R).

6. APS Print Big Coordinator Stephanie Smith on steam roller; volunteers lifting banner.

7. APS interns lifting banner: Chelsea Glankler (L); Bre Gobin (R).

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Ten groups participated from Georgia, which featured artists, community organizations, college, university, and high school students, who designed and carved 4’x8’ woodblocks that were printed on the day of the event with a steamroller. The focus of the designs of this year’s prints were books and literature.

The goal of Print Big! reflects the mission of the Atlanta Printmakers Studio -- to support and celebrate the vitality of printmaking and to educate the community about this historic image-making medium. The focus of Print Big! 2012 was fun, creativity, and collaboration. Print Big! festivities included hands-on printmaking activities, tours of the Atlanta Printmakers Studio, food, music, and much more! The event took place outside at the Atlanta Printmakers Studio, located in the Metropolitan Business and Arts District at 675 Metropolitan Parkway in Atlanta.

Atlanta Printmakers Studio was proud to partner with the Literacy Alliance of Metro Atlanta (LAMA) for this event in supporting their efforts to eradicate illiteracy.

Participating groups included: Art of Such & Such Atlanta Printmakers Studio Chamblee High School National Art Honor Society Atlanta University Center (Clark-Atlanta / Spelman / Morehouse) Grady High School Kennesaw State University North Georgia College & State University SCAD-Atlanta University of West Georgia University of Georgia

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how i got into the business

Jim Gilson

Underwater Photographer Cell: 678-849-6145 gilsonjamesj@aol.com

How did you get into the business?

In high school we had a “portable” B&W VTR with camera that was just delivered to our AV dept. Concurrently, I was failing the only class I needed to pass (Government) to graduate. My Professor, Mr. Wieneke suggested I go “Shoot something controversial”. So I went around school and shot everything from lunch to litter, noise to cliques. Then, one spring morning as I was shooting the snow melting off of the roof, one of my friends asked me, “Hey Jim! We’re going to go out in the parking lot and get high! Wanna come?” So, I lugged that camera out to their 66 Ford Falcon, rolled the tape, inserted our alma mater music (Beethoven’s 9th, the Clockwork Orange version), and played it for my Government class including Mr. Wieneke and the Vice Principal, Mr. Spaulding. The class cheered, Mr. Spaulding confiscated the tape and Mr. Wieneke gave me my first “A” in Government.

What are some memorable moments?

In 1987 I took the position of Quality Control Supervisor at what was then Crawford Post Production. Working for Jesse and Steve Carlisle, digitizing “Gone With The Wind”, was a huge honor for me. I remember Charles Eaton’s team making me read the Ampex Video Manual before I was allowed to keep a “greenie” in my pocket. After doing it “right” for so long, it was difficult for me to “just make do” at other companies. The skills I learned there helped me discover that the chief engineer at a competing facility was colorblind and had set up all of his monitors incorrectly.

What’s up with shooting DSLR? Don’t you know some editors HATE them?

The comments I get about DSLR are similar to the complaints I, myself, used to utter concerning Final Cut Pro. Like: “Now just anybody can produce video? “ But, I’ve shot some beautiful footage for PBS, CNN and the U.S. Army and Navy on the surface and underwater with DSLR that proves otherwise. I especially like intercutting video with the awesome stills that 5000 line DSLRs bring to the table.

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Todd Hampson

Founder/CAO, Timbuktoons, LLC 706-854-7704 studio www.timbuktoons.com todd@timbuktoons.com

Paige Johnston Thomas

Co-Owner/Casting Director: C&J Casting cjcasting@gmail.com

How did you get into the Business?

I moved to NY to be an actor after I completed my MFA in Acting and found myself working instead at a Production Company and having no time to actually go out and ‘pound the pavement’ in search of acting gigs. One of my first tasks at the Production Company was to find a kangaroo for a TV commercial and I thought ‘this job is so crazy...and I love it!’ Around the same time I was in contact with my friend Mitzi Corrigan, who had begun casting various projects in the Southeast. At one point she said how great it would be if we could work on those projects together. I picked up the phone, called Mitzi, and said ‘let’s do it!’ We later formed Corrigan & Johnston Casting.

What are some fun/funny moments you have experienced?

We were working recently on a Harris Teeter (Grocery Store) commercial and at the end of the audition I asked talent to sing the HT jingle, which is sung “My Harris Teeter.” There was a girl auditioning and when I said ‘action,’ she swung her hair all around and then held her hair and sang, “My Hair is Teeter.” I also once said “okay, slate please” at the beginning of an audition to a girl (the ‘slate’ is when you state your name and agent, which most actors know) and she very boldly and loudly said: “PLEASE.” What’s one thing you love about your job?

I love working with actors and helping them make their audition the strongest it can be. Because I am no longer acting, it allows me to still be in the ‘acting’ world, without the pressure of actually being an actor! It’s very exciting when you work with the actor during the audition process, and then see their hard work pay off when they get cast!

Latest projects: Go Daddy.com, Hanes, ESPN/Nationwide, Under Armour

OZ MAGAZINE www.ozmagazine.com

How did you get into the Business?

After art school I worked as a designer/illustrator in DC and after a few years wound up with the keys to the shop.

Simultaneously, I fell in love again with all things animation & the artist in me was ready for the next season. Also, I stumbled upon a book called The Purpose Driven Life that had just come out. These events combined, created a perfect storm for a Renaissance and one day I said to my wife, “I think I’m supposed to quit my job and start an animation company.” She supported the decision and has been my biggest cheerleader since! (I love you Tracey!) – What do you love about your job?

Adventure and collaboration. Every project is a new adventure and I love the collaboration. There is a creative synergy that happens when an animation team works together toward a common goal. Each team member brings a different skill set to the table. I develop many of our concepts with our Creative Director, Sean Copley. We work really well together. If one of us gets stuck on story or art direction we can bounce it off of each other which results in major creative break through.

• What’s the smartest business decision you’ve made at Timbuktoons?

Going niche. We used to do everything: websites, logos, etc., but in 2009 decided to offer only animation and illustration. By shedding services and specializing we got better at our craft and are seen as a “go to” animation studio for family friendly productions.

What exactly does your company do?

We produce animation from concept to delivery (or anything in between) and help customers “brand with character”. I’m privileged to lead an amazing team of writers, artists, and animators to bring your concept to life!

Recent Projects?

1. ATC Commercials (Telly, Davey, Addy Award Winner) 2. Character Design Room Illustrations and Animation for three “Extreme Makeover Home Edition” Episodes.

3. Animation production for Phil Vischer/Jellyfish Lab’s “What’s In the Bible?” DVD series.

Curtis Bryant

Curtis Bryant Music/Composer www.curtisbryantmusic.com curtis@curtisbryantmusic.com

How did you get into the business?

A few years after graduate school I came home from vacation to find a message on my phone from a former teacher who was also a classical music critic for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Someone at TBS was looking for a local composer to do music for a documentary in the “Portrait of America” series; he relayed the callback number, and I called the next day to make an appointment with the producer. He had already received a stack of tapes, but I didn’t have a demo tape yet. I asked if I could just see part of the film that needed music and compose something for it specifically. This was back in the early days of consumer VCRs (mid ‘80s), and I didn’t even own a player. So, I ran home and scribbled down a musical idea that matched my recollection of the feel of the video. At the time, I was wine stewarding at the Ritz Carlton, and they had a cocktail pianist who could sight-read anything, so I brought my portable cassette recorder down and gave him my handwritten theme. The next hour I shuttled back to the production studio to drop off the tape. A couple of days later, I got a call from the producer who said that my track seemed to capture the spirit of the story above all the other demos. This first effort of mine, after creating the final product, earned an Emmy nomination for original music.

What is your specialty?

I have always straddled the divide between serious concert music and more popular styles, composing works for the stage as well as film, commercials, and most recently, video games. I try to be a full-service composer.

Most recent project: Music for a new video game titled “StreetKix: Freestyle Challenge” (Hoplite Research), scheduled for release on Sony PSP later this year.

Jeff Weese

CEO UX Design Lead Rival Industries, Inc. jweese@rivalindustries.net www.rivalindustries.net

How did you get into the business?

After receiving a degree in Digital Photography (ACA 1997), I started working as a graphic designer for a small record label. I gradually shifted from the print format into user experience design the field continues to evolve. In 2005, I completed my MS at Georgia Tech, and co-founded Rival Industries with partner Grace Ou. What was a funny moment during your career development?

I had really worked to get this one interview with an Art Director. I sat on the lobby couch and waited. 45 minutes later, in walks this massive hulk-ish man. In a soft spoken voice he said, “Sorry man, I honestly forgot we were meeting”. Instantly, my mind raced backward in time to a show night at Dottie’s, there was this crazy massive bleeding guy on stage dressed in nothing but a pair of fish-nets and an open lab coat. He was belching out some insanity with this gruff heavy voice. This was the same man standing in front of me in the lobby. I’m standing there looking at this guy, thinking, “What was the name of that band ? Gosh I’m terrible with names!

What was it?” Finally, I shook the guy’s hand and just blurted out, “Dude, I’ve seen you naked!” Good thing he had a sense of humor. After the surprise passed, he sat me down and assessed my technical skills. I think his exact words were, “You don’t know squat about computers do you?” Lucky for me, he liked a couple of pieces I had with me. He was interested in having someone comfortable with a camera around for certain projects and I landed my first job in graphic design.

What is most rewarding about User Experience Design?

Every project is different and has unique challenges. I enjoy taking raw information and crafting an engaging media-rich experience. I love working with my team, sharing ideas and techniques.

Deborah Thomas

SillyMonkey LLC sillymonkey@mindspring.com

How did you get into the business?

As a reporter in the 80s I wrote a story for the newspaper about role-playing strategy games. My source showed me a game that he had created and it hit me like a bolt of lightning. I knew that I wanted to create games. Later, I started creating technical training courses and I began sneaking games into the course. I was laid off from a fortune company and started designing my company.

What was your favorite moment?

Checking email late one night I found a message from a linkedIn contact saying I fit the serious game designer profile they needed for a European project. I was excited! I told them I was interested and the next morning a long message was in my inbox describing the project and included links to their previous work. As I viewed those beautiful serious games I couldn’t finish reading the message that stated “I would go on multiple trips to Europe.” I immediately asked how to proceed. During the interview process I discovered it would take me on several extended trips to Spain.

Why do you love your work?

My work is endlessly fascinating, creative, innovative, and challenging. There is never a dull or boring moment to working on a serious game. My website says we cry a single tear when we see poorly constructed training.

We dream of making the world a better place through a single serious game.

What was your favorite project?

My favorite completed project is European Project, which we won a “Best European Simulation Serious Game 2011” award. It is both highly educational and very fun. I had some people demo it at the Game Developer Conference in San Francisco and I wished I had gotten a picture of them laughing and trying to navigate through the sequence of tasks and events using a game controller. They were trying to tend to the avatar’s burn. It was so much fun to watch them use my game!

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BLISHING, INC.

Torey Haas’ Monster

Mom! Dad! I’m Going to Work in the Movies!

A brief history of Georgia State University’s film program.

By Erin Greer

I had been out of work for nearly a year when I pulled into the parking lot at a major network studio. A print journalist by trade, I had been dodging the pink slip since the economic downturn. It had finally caught up with me. In need of work and at my wits’ end, I had arranged a shadow day with a network scriptwriter, somebody I had worked with on a project for the Screen Actor’s Guild about a month before.

Determined that this trip to the studio would be the next step in my professional career, by the end of the day I just knew I would have a job offer, a desk and be on my way to drafting my speech for the Pulitzer Prize.

As if life ever really works that way.

By lunchtime I had learned that the network, like so many at the time, was having cut backs. I was sullen. Maybe even a little pouty. But that’s when I met her.

A young woman, she appeared to be in her early 20s, had been milling around the set providing assistance to the various departments. I asked her what her role was. She said she was a student intern, and then added that she had done so well through the internship that the network was looking to offer her a full-time position.

Interesting.

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I asked her what university she attended. She said Georgia State.

Moments earlier, I hadn’t even realized Georgia State University had a film program. Moments later I’d made up my mind: if I worked hard, I would be just in time to make the deadline for application to Georgia State.

The Beginning: Despite its established and growing reputation, the Georgia State University film program remains one of the best-kept secrets in the industry. Students looking to study typically approach established (and expensive) film staples like NYU, UCLA and USC, often without realizing that Atlanta, a city currently boasting an astonishing influx of feature film and television production, has a local, low-cost, high-value educational alternative.

The program began modestly as an extension of what was, in the 1970s, known as the Department of Urban Life. Kay Beck, a founding member of the Atlanta Film Festival, taught the first film classes offered at GSU. She recalls the beginnings of the program, which included input from current industry names including David Terry (RollingSound), Steve Davis (Senior VP and COO of Media Management at Crawford Media Services), Gary Moss (Ayunini Media), Bill Thompson (former VP at Crawford Post and former Georgia film commissioner), and Gayla Jamison (Lightfoot Films).

“Film was not a new medium, but it was not a course of study in universities. In fact GSU was the first film major available in Georgia,” Beck said.

Funding for what would become the early GSU film program began with a federal grant, which funded public service announcements (PSAs) to promote health issues. Beck, who had an MFA in film from American University and had experience as a filmmaker in Washington, D.C., was at the time a doctoral student in Liberal Arts at Emory University. She was hired to produce the PSAs and administer the grant.

Beck gathered together interested graduate students at GSU and proposed the idea of teaching film classes. The students embraced the new medium, but the university administration was wary of this non-traditional subject matter. Much like the recent digital era, “Film was a ‘young person’s thing’,” Beck said.

“We were the rebels. We were the avant-garde who did this strange thing that wasn’t really respected.”

They may not have garnered respect at the time, but those early members of the GSU film program have gone on to be some of the most prominent names in the industry: Terry is a sought-after sound designer, Davis went on to become vice president of Crawford Communications, and Thompson served as head of Georgia’s film commission. Jamison and Moss are award winning independent filmmakers.

Beck began by teaching a film history class, which ultimately became part of the core curriculum. Film production was added in the mid 70s after Beck pushed the university to purchase cameras. Local companies donated used grip and lighting equipment. Fred Dresch, an assistant director, taught the first film production classes in a traditional classroom where the fluorescent lights could not be turned off. That was quite a challenge, but Dresch turned the classroom into a studio once a week.

One of the beneficiaries of this new equipment was Tom Luse, now line producer on the Atlanta-based hit television show, “The Walking Dead.” One of the first graduates of the fledgling film studies program, Luse was originally pursuing a master’s degree in psychology when he heard through the student grapevine that Beck was beginning a film program. After speaking with Beck, Luse accepted a GSU graduate assistantship in educational media and produced a film, “Who’s Killing the Cities,” for his master’s thesis. The film, funded by grants from GSU, garnered Luse an American Film Institute Director’s Internship, which put him at Paramount Pictures under Martha Coolidge. Not bad for a student with a school-issued Super 8 camera.

was able to make films everyday and got to make a film as my Master’s thesis. I had excellent advisors and landed a great internship. I was a lucky winner. But I think you make your own luck in this business and Georgia State gave me that springboard.”

Since garnering success in the business, Luse said he has worked with several GSU students and, as in every industry, getting the job can be about who you know. “If I get a resume from someone in Atlanta, there’s usually only two degrees of separation from the GSU film department,” Luse said.

Classes continued to build throughout the late 70s and 80s.

At present the film program enrolls 600 plus undergraduate and 60 graduate students. Besides its international recognition and technological innovation, perhaps most important to the growing film department was the establishment of additional degree programs, including the establishment of the Ph.D. in Film Studies (now Moving Image Studies). Today, the GSU film program offers film degrees in multiple disciplines at the undergraduate and graduate levels.

Gary Moss and Beck later secured state financial support to build a multi-million dollar new media complex, the Digital Arts Entertainment Lab (DAEL). It was a welcoming center for the 1996 Olympics, and GSU became one of the only institutions to receive a Kodak Cineon as part of a training partnership with Kodak. One of the first systems to use digitized film, the Cineon was cutting-edge technology at the time. DAEL continued its cutting edge trajectory and was one of the first universities to have HD cameras available to students. DAEL currently houses the graduate production program, while partnering with the local industry to create, test and research digital media. DAEL has incubated businesses, one of which was acquired by Sony, and has several established media projects including The Window Project and IndieATL music show, under the associate directors, Elizabeth Strickler and Matt Rowles.

Torey Haas, editor and owner/ manager of MonsterBuster Entertainment and 2009 GSU film program graduate.

“Georgia State gave me the opportunity to find my own path,” Luse said. “I had an unbelievably great graduate experience. I

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Line producing for “The Walking Dead” is GSU film program alum Tom Luse, seen here with unnamed undead on the set.

Jack Boozer, professor of Moving Image Studies, assisted in building the film program. “We based our planning around the importance of students being prepared in film studies, film production and producing. “We are currently a very strong digital production and moving image studies faculty, which has grown quickly and continued to hire steadily, including most recently in the new media area,” Boozer said. “As a very large research institution, we offer students both diversity and depth at all three degree levels considerably beyond what most universities in the Southeast offer. One can, for example, graduate with a regular bachelor’s or honors degree in film production, screenwriting, and film and television, as well as do a creative project or a traditional thesis in research for the master’s degree,” said Boozer. The department is considering a unique plan to offer a production component to the doctoral degree and a certificate in producing for film, television, and digital media.

The Present:

With Georgia’s production tax incentives in place and Hollywood projects flocking to Atlanta in droves, opportunities abound for students seeking local avenues for professional experience.

But to land those positions, an aspiring pro must come with the appropriate skill set, which, according to Luse includes “dedication, common sense, talent and communications skills.”

Boozer agreed, saying the key to success in the industry lies in preparation. “It’s not impossible to do this on your own through rigorous study and application, but it’s more efficient to use

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the resources of a big university like GSU, where you have the technical and scholarly means and dedicated faculty for a full and rounded preparation for what you may encounter in your career path.”

Among the faculty available to film students at GSU are filmmakers and associate professors Sheldon Schiffer, who taught at UCLA before coming to GSU, and Ly Bolia, from NYU. Each teaches various aspects of filmmaking, from screenwriting and sound design to visual effects, cinematography and editing. San Francisco filmmaker, Daniel Robin, joined GSU in 2007 after winning the Sundance Film Festival Jury Prize for Short Filmmaking.

Schiffer said the breadth of course offerings is the strength of the GSU program. The cost is another. GSU offers the broadest approach in preparing for a media career, because it includes theory, creative production and the financial/legal aspects of producing. Schiffer stated, “For the price of the education, it is an extraordinary bargain. A similar program in a private school will cost three to nine times more.”

For Bolia, the strength of the GSU film program lies in its diversity and flexibility, two factors not often associated with a traditional film education. “I think the diversity and talents of the faculty are strong points. Because it is a small program it is nimble and has the ability to change and modify. I don’t believe that traditional film education best serves today’s students,” Bolia said. “As the industry, technology, channels, art, distribution outlets and formats change, we are able to alter our curriculum to adapt

Randy Hill, 2007 graduate of the GSU film program, editor on the DIY network series “Mega Dens.”

these changes. The first-year curriculum allows students a period of self-discovery where they experiment narratively and nonnarratively to find their interests.”

Among the students who found their interests through the GSU program are alums Torey Haas (class of 2009) and Randy Hill (class of 2007). Haas works as a freelance editor and compositor and manages his own production company, MonsterBuster Entertainment. Hill is an editor on the DIY network series “Mega Dens.” The pair cite their experiences at GSU as a launching pad for their successes. Haas, who filmed “Troll Picnic” in his second year, continues to work with the student production crew he assembled through GSU, and Hill filmed his script, “Dumpster Baby,” with equipment from DAEL on the GSU campus.

“Gary Moss, who was my advisor, allowed me to create the film as an independent study project,” Hill recalled. “This gave me access to equipment (lights, grip equipment, etc.), and we hired another GSU grad, Bill Burton, to be DP. In fact, I think most of the crew were GSU students.” “Dumpster Baby” is currently distributed by Troma Entertainment.

Lee Thomas, GSU grad and current director of the state film office noted, “You will find a GSU graduate working on almost every project shooting in Georgia.” Other GSU graduates have garnered major national recognition. Vasco Nunes, a GSU cinematography student, shot the Sundance-winning feature documentary “Dig!”. In 2008, Micah Stansell was nominated for a Student Academy Award in the experimental category for his thesis film, and this year GSU graduate, Ryan Prows, won a Student Academy Award in the narrative category.

Like Schiffer, Haas said the strength of the GSU film program lies in the all-encompassing education offered. “The biggest

strength of the GSU program is that it teaches its students some of everything, from script writing to sound editing to distribution. This jack-of-all-trades approach definitely helped me when I graduated (and today) since, although I’m primarily an editing and visual effects guy, I can work proficiently in a variety of different areas, which is invaluable to a freelance artist like myself,” Haas said.

The Future:

From its humble beginnings with a few courses using donated cameras to its current status as an accredited program producing creative graduates whose work has been internationally recognized. The GSU film program continues to grow and change as Hollywood increasingly brings work to the state and the digital revolution opens uncharted opportunities to a new generation of media makers. “It’s fun”, said Dr. Beck “to see former students like Lee Thomas working with famous industry professionals.” This year the Atlanta Film Festival moved its offices into the GSU Film Department; many of the original founders who were also at GSU said they smiled at this ironic turn of events.

That’s A Wrap:

Since beginning my film studies almost two years ago, the experiences and programs have prepared me for a life in production. At GSU, I have written a feature-length screenplay, filmed and edited a 16-minute short, worked on-air with the Ryan Seacrest Foundation, and had the opportunity to interview journalism professionals, incluing John Pruitt and Ted Turner, for the Atlanta Press Club’s Journalism Hall of Fame.

Students go to GSU to garner experience and build relationships. What they find is opportunity. z

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