Screen Africa May 2017

BROADCAST, FILM, TV, COMMERCIALS, NEW MEDIA & TECHNOLOGY NEWS

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VOL 29 – May 2017 R38.00

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| IN THIS ISSUE

5 Zambian actress wins at Festival International du Film PanAfricain in Cannes

37

6 Introducing e.tv’s new daily drama series Broken Vows

All things POST

24

30 Blackmagic Design URSA Mini Pro 4.6K review

NAB 2017… the best of

SPECIAL FEATUREs OTT & IPTV Internet TV: can we all just get along?........................ 32 The future of OTT.................................. 33 The rise of the screens – on-demand causes multi-industry disruption....................... 34

POST-PRODUCTION

All things POST........................................ 37 The changing face of post...................... 38 Outrunning the lion: Future proofing oneself in an ever-changing post-production industry....................... 40 The editor: an engaged voyeur............. 41

News Meet DIFF’s new manager Chipo Zhou.................................3 GREY Group chooses Centrespread as its lead agency in Nigeria.........................................4

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Zambian actress wins at Festival International du Film PanAfricain in Cannes.................5 Introducing e.tv’s new daily drama series Broken Vows........................6

TECHNOLOGY News

Slomo.tv Dominator AT/3G.....................8 Spotlight FresneLED 450..........................8 AJA Ki Pro Ultra Plus................................8 Grass Valley LDX 82 Series cameras.....9 Quicklink Remote Communicator.........9 Imagine Communications Selenio™ Network Processor....................................9 ChamSys MQ500 Stadium Console.......9

ADCETERA Give yourself that first shot to make a short film in Hollywood..... 10 Local trilogy video creates creative buzz internationally.................. 11 Advertising communications trends for 2017........................................ 12 From the producer’s mouth: Adam Thal.................................................. 13

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Television

Cameras & Accessories

Six Top Threats for Television Broadcasters ......................... 14

Blackmagic Design URSA Mini Pro 4.6K review.............................. 30

FILM

TRAINING

A love letter to Chatsworth................. 16 Africa converged...................................... 18 Director Speak : Sunu............................. 19

Wits expands its Film and Television postgraduate offering........... 36

NEW MEDIA

New voices, new media.......................... 20

Marketplace............................................... 43 Upcoming Events..................................... 43

ANIMATION & EFFECTS

Social

You think you know the Triggerfish story? You don’t.

The real one’s much more gory........... 22

NAB SHOW 2017 REPORT

REGULARS

e.tv’s Broken Vows media screening.... 44 Press screenings – Origins: The Journey of Humankind and Genius.......................... 44

NAB 2017… the best of........................ 24

FESTIVALS & MARKETS Capitalising on the demand for TV content at the African Pavilion at MIPTV...................... 28

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From the editor

The Team

Techies and the likes are buzzing with excitement following the 2017 NAB Show, which ran from 22 to 27 April and attracted an impressive 103 433 visitors. Screen Africa contributor Ian Dormer gives us an in depth report back – over three pages – touching on everything from product releases, trends and themes, and his personal favourite gadgets.

It’s no secret that the Durban International Film Festival (DIFF) saw some managerial changes preceding its 2016 edition due to controversial disagreements within the organisational structure. In our News section, we introduce you to the festivals new manager Chipo Zhou. Zhou is a scholar of the Motion Picture Medium and is passionate about elevating the position of women in the film industry. Get to know her on page 3.

In this issue, documentary filmmaker Garth de Bruno Austin gets acquainted with the Blackmagic Design URSA Mini Pro 4.6K. Garth takes us through every feature of the camera, and gives his unbiased opinion on pages 30 and 31.

Our OTT and IPTV feature (pages 32 to 35) carries an honest opinion on the state of internet TV from Showmax head of Communications Richard Boorman. The section also features valuable contributions from MediaGuru’s Anshul Gupta and Discover Digital MD Stephen Watson.

May carries our much loved Postproduction feature, which amongst other stories, presents an exquisitely put together thought leadership piece from Deliverance Post Production editor Anthony Lee Martin as well as a moving contribution on the invisible art of editing by S.A.G.E’s Dr Nikki Comninos.

On a closing note, with this issue we welcome new journalist Gezzy S Sibisi. Gezzy comes from a strong journalistic background having previously contributed to a number of reputable publications including The Times.

We trust she will be a great asset, not just to Screen Africa but to the industry at large.

Till next time!

– Chanelle Ellaya

SCREENAFRICA Publisher & Managing Editor: Simon Robinson: publisher@screenafrica.com Editor: Chanelle Ellaya: editor@screenafrica.com Journalists: Gezzy S Sibisi: news@screenafrica.com

Design: Trevor Ou Tim: design@suncirclegroup.com Website Updates: Tina Tserere: tina@sun-circle.co.za Subscriptions: Tina Tserere: tina@sun-circle.co.za Delight Ngwenya: admin@sun-circle.co.za Accounts: Helen Loots: accounts@sun-circle.co.za Advertisement Sales: Marianne Schafer: marianne@screenafrica.com Graham Grier: graham@sun-circle.co.za

Editor Chanelle Ellaya is a writer and a journalist. She completed her BA Journalism degree at the University of Johannesburg in 2011. While writing is her passion, she has a keen interest in the media in various capacities. Chanelle is an avid social networker and a firm believer in the power of social and online networking. Between writing and tweeting, she finds time to feed her love for live music.

JOURNALISTS Gezzy S Sibisi is a journalist and photographer with experience in print, broadcast and digital media. Her portfolio of work includes working as a lifestyle reporter as well as contributing business and education articles to The Times, Sowetan and Daily Despatch publications. As a freelancer she has worked on content development for corporate newsletters, community newspapers, blogs and educational websites.

Louise Marsland is an editor, journalist and columnist in the media and marketing communications industry in South Africa, who has been writing about the industry for over two decades as a former editor of publications: AdVantage, Marketing Mix and Bizcommunity.com. She currently writes extensively about industry trends and consumer insight. Her website is www.TRENDAFRiCA.co.za.

David Cornwell lives in Cape Town, where he writes fiction, films and features for a variety of publications. His debut novel, Like It Matters (Umuzi, 2016), has been long-listed for the 2017 Sunday Times Fiction Award.

Andy Stead is a broadcast industry professional with over 40 years’ experience in both South Africa and the UK, having worked at a number of leading industry organisations including the BBC and Chroma Television. Now retired, he is based in Cape Town.

Ian Dormer – Born in Zimbabwe, Ian has been in the TV business since the 1980s, having served in various positions at the SABC, M-Net and SuperSport. Ian currently works and resides in New Zealand.

Sales Broker Emmanuel Archambeaud: earchambeaud@defcommunication.com Tel. +331 4730 7180 Mobile. +336 1103 9652 Sun Circle Publishers (Pty) Ltd Tel: 011 025 3180 Physical address: First Floor, Process House Epsom Downs Office Park 13 Sloane Street, Bryanston, Johannesburg South Africa Postal address: PO Box 559, Fourways North, 2086

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Editorial Disclaimer The views, opinions, positions or strategies expressed by the authors and those providing comments are theirs alone, and do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, positions or strategies of Screen Africa or any employee thereof. Sun Circle Publishers makes no representations as to accuracy, completeness, correctness, suitability, or validity of any information and will not be liable for any errors, omissions, or delays in this information or any losses, injuries, or damages arising from its display or use. Sun Circle Publishers reserves the right to delete, edit, or alter in any manner it sees fit comments that it, in its sole discretion, deems to be obscene, offensive, defamatory, threatening, in violation of trademark, copyright or other laws, or is otherwise unacceptable.

All contents of this publication are subject to worldwide copyright protection and reproduction in whole or part, in any form whatsoever, is expressly forbidden without the prior written consent of the Publisher.

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| News

Meet DIFF’s new manager Chipo Zhou “I want to build on the past success of DIFF and bring on board some new collaboration that will see the festival showcase more African productions to a larger international audience.” – Chipo Zhou

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urning the spotlight on women making great strides within the film industry, the Durban International Film Festival (DIFF) recently announced the appointment of Chipo Zhou as the festival’s new manager.

“After such a vigorous search, we are grateful that we finally found a rounded candidate of her calibre, with whom the festival is bound to have a refreshed face. We welcome Chipo to the Centre for Creative Arts (CCA) team and we are confident that she will steer the festival to a better future,” said director of the CCA, David wa Maahlamela in a press statement.

It’s no secret that DIFF has, in the previous year, made headlines within the local film industry for the wrong reasons as much publicised internal disputes led to the resignation of the 2016 DIFF manager, Sarah Dawson.

Despite this, Zimbabwean-born Zhou has boldly accepted her role in the hot seat and is confident in overseeing her vision which includes giving a voice to women within the film industry.

“I started acting in a local soapie and this inevitably led to my involvement with International Images Film Festival for Women (IIFF) and the Women Filmmakers of Zimbabwe (Wofz) which exposed me to a different kind of woman, a voiceless woman. It was in that moment that I decided that no woman should ever be without a voice and if I can help contribute to that in any way, then I would certainly give it my best,” says Zhou.

Zhou has fortunately had a great headstart in being moulded by powerful voices and striving leaders throughout

her life. Her father, who is a teacher of English literature, imparted the narrative seed in her through African folklores and books by sterling female authors such as Tsitsi Dangarembga, Yvonne Vera and Jane Austen. “His love for storytelling inspired my love for literature, which eventually steered me to filmmaking,” she said.

Other positive female influences include her mother’s business acumen as well as her love for education and current affairs which inspired Zhou’s love for film research. Her headmistress from school Miss Dumbuchena, who later held the role of Ambassador for Zimbabwe, played a pivotal role in young Zhou’s school career through her valued leadership and encouragement.

Zhou holds a B.A Honours Motion Picture Medium degree (cum laude) from AFDA, and is currently completing her MFA Motion Picture Medium. She has been passionately involved in woman advocacy through film festivals around the world, including being the assistant festival director of IIFF and steering the gender wheel in her home country as a board member of Wofz for five years.

“A lot has been done to bring women to the fore and that can be seen by the work that organisations like SWIFT and WIFT have done to significantly increase the number of women-led films over the years. As with any system born from traditions that have been cultivated over centuries, the battle is far from being accomplished. What is unique about the film industry is that the platform allows for a global audience and any voice we give to the struggle of

women empowerment in any industry is a strong voice. The importance of our role cannot be undermined and I’m glad to say that this year DIFF has a special focus on women, and some of the stories coming out of this are very powerful and will hopefully inspire and motivate others to action,” said Zhou.

Zhou has also made positive leaps in order to diversify her knowledge by thriving in other complementary roles such as coordinating the South African Communication Association (SACOMM) conference as well as being a media consultant for DERT-SA, an NGO servicing issues of human rights and education within Southern Africa.

“Working with academics who write papers and very often review the work of filmmakers, was an important learning curve for me, in placing what their role is within the industry, something I found very often overlooked and taken for granted. Operating within the human rights community gives you access to the human face of some stories that are made as well as potential audiences for these stories that may not have previously been exposed to the film industry. It has unquestionably expanded my world view and has contributed immensely to my current vision for the future of DIFF,” she says.

DIFF has been a long-standing annual calendar event in the African film industry and this year’s edition is scheduled to take place from 13 to 23 July at venues in and around Durban. Zhou and her team believe that they have a solid team and support system to see to it that the festival becomes a phenomenal

experience and a great success.

“I am a fresh face with a new, creative and industrious young team working with me. That in itself is quite significant in that we are a clean slate. This year will be ‘DIFFerent’, we would like to reinvent what it is to be a film festival within our African context and so it will be interesting to see what this process will bring about over the next few DIFF editions. The advantage is that DIFF is already on the international calendar, the challenge we are enthralled to be tackling is to see it grow beyond being the biggest in Africa and see talent that is coming through our programmes attain international recognition and advancement.”

DIFF is organised by the University of KwaZulu Natal’s Centre for Creative Arts in partnership with the Durban Film Office, eThekwini Municipality, National Film and Video Foundation, KwaZulu-Natal Film Commission and other valued funders and partners.

Zhou’s appointment will also be announced to the international fraternity as she attends the 70th Festival de Cannes in Paris, France next month.

This will be her first international appearance promoting the DIFF brand and she is excited to utilise the opportunity to elevate the image of the festival and enrich her vision.

“I want to build on the past success of DIFF and bring on board some new collaboration that will see the festival showcase more African productions to a larger international audience.

We are fortunate to be placed in an environment with so much potential for further development and as a female in the industry, I hope to contribute to creating a future, in which it will no longer be necessary to point out that I am a woman,” Zhou concluded. – Gezzy S Sibisi

May 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 3

News

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GREY Group chooses Centrespread as its lead agency in Nigeria GREY recently re-entered the Nigerian market, having appointed Centrespread – one of Nigeria’s largest independent advertising communications groups – as its official agency partner in the market.

The Centrespread Group, which operates from offices in Lagos and Abuja, has rebranded as Centrespread GREY, re-establishing the global advertising giant as a leader in providing creative and effective full service marketing solutions across the African continent.

This partnership signals GREY’S growth strategy of developing its networks in fast growing and key markets and sectors in the MEA (Middle East and Africa) region. As a full service, through the line

communications group, Centrespread has been operating since 1982 and employs about 200 staff in its seven business units.

Centrespread is made up of all-inclusive integrated marketing communications units which includes Centrespread Advertising; DKK, providing a full service agency offering in Nigeria and Equatorial Guinea; Interactive Communications, a digital media and online reputation management agency; Pure Activation, a below-the-line agency focused on

presence branding and activations; PR Redline, a Public Relations and Reputation Management agency; KontactPoint, an Out-of-Home channel company; and Mediamore, a media specialist agency.

“We are pleased that the association has been made official with Centrespread as GREY South Africa has been working with the team regularly to meet the needs of our clients with interests in Sub-Saharan Africa. Integration and an effective representation of an

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African footprint is becoming a key requirement when working with both South African and global brand teams.

Africa is a continent of expanding opportunity for our clients and we are proud to be able to offer this opportunity to our clients,” said Peter Jackson, CEO, GREY Africa Network, after attending the Centrespread GREY launch celebrations in Lagos.

Having dedicated partners around Africa allows GREY to offer vital consumer insights, tailored strategies and established relationships with stakeholders, to their clients.

Additionally, it adds expanded value to a company’s marketing execution and ultimately their bottom line.

Kola Ayanwale, CEO, Centrespread says he is enthusiastic about the alliance with an iconic agency such as GREY. “The GREY Group ranks among the world’s top advertising and marketing organisations and their unique positioning of ‘Famously Effective’ resonates with the same values that have shaped Centrespread into one of Nigeria’s most successful integrated marketing communications agencies over the last three decades.”

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Josephine Kachiza as Damyna

Zambian actress wins at Festival International du Film PanAfricain in Cannes Actress, singer and musician Josephine Kachiza has won the Best Female Performance Award at the Festival International du Film PanAfricain in Cannes for her lead role as Damyna in Damyna the Musical.

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he first, African, musical film produced in Zambia, Damyna the Musical, debuted at the festival in the iconic French film hub on 8 April 2017. Additionally, the production was then selected from more than 50 films from over 30 countries as the film to be screened at the week-long event’s gala dinner.

The festival, which pays tribute to African-American Independent Cinema, presented film-lovers with a wide choice of films from Africa, its diaspora and the rest of the world. “The quality of the films winning the Dikalo Awards reflects the excellent work done by the different professionals who have made up the jury and has helped to make our festival a point of reference within its domain. All the films which have gained awards at the festival have gone to have international recognition,” said the festival organisers.

Josephine Kachiza from Chelstone, Lusaka, is a musician with the Zambian Army Orchestra but remained humble at news of the Dikalo award and explained that the film was a team effort. “I’m a down-to-earth personality. I love and fear God. I love what I do and I am so determined to achieve positive and best results. I treasure relationships built on interests and good morals,” said

Award-winning performer Josephine Kachiza with Charity Chisenga in Damyna the Musical Kachiza. “The movie would not have been possible without the dedication of the whole cast and crew, led by Dr Langmead, and musical director Joseph Muyunda. I would also like to especially thank my co-star Mubita Ling’ope, who played Por Phiri.”

Damyna the Musical director and screenwriter Peter Langmead was

delighted with Kachiza’s award.

“Josephine is a very talented actress, singer and performer. She lights up the screen when in front of a camera and has a natural talent combined with a professional approach to her work that makes it a privilege to work with her,” he said.

A romantic drama, Damyna the

| News Musical, weaves a story of family secrets and a witch doctor’s spells that conspire to confuse the life of an orphaned girl whose quest for love brings her traditional African village into conflict with the sophisticated world of international development agencies.

The film was shot on location in Zambia with local cast and crew directed by Langmead, a long-term local resident ,and supported by renowned BBC lighting cameraman Denis Borrow as DOP, with music director Joseph Muyunda and editor Kalenga Mwansa.

“Damyna the Musical captures the essence of African society, both rural and urban, and we believe that this film will also capture the hearts of the African diaspora worldwide,” said Langmead. “It resonates with Africans abroad at many levels and also connects Africans across borders within the continent, as well as breaking down barriers to present a real view of Africa to the West without the stereotypes and misconceptions that are all too often portrayed in the media.”

In addition to Kachiza, the cast includes Mubita Ling’ope as Por Phiri and Tom Chiponge as the witch doctor.

“Producing a musical that reflects the contrasts of African rural and urban life was a challenge that the whole cast took to their hearts,” said Langmead. “The production harnessed that energy to create a vibrant, lighthearted movie with a powerful subtext that explores the changes facing African societies as they grapple with the dualities of global influence.”

The story is based on the operatic stage work written by Langmead and premiered at the Lusaka Playhouse in 2014. Damyna the Musical combines the tale of a rural romance with the subtext of his observation and exploration of African culture, bringing together 40 years of experience of working with rural communities across the continent, viewed with the perspective of an outsider who is equally at home in the worlds of international finance and fine art as in the countryside. In doing so, he communicates the vibrancy of life, chronicles the aspirations of ordinary people and portrays a long overdue positive image of African life.

Where women have no choice or voice, Damyna the Musical reflects on philandering men who neglect and deny their children, resulting in unschooled orphans and second class citizens, often without identity.

Secondary themes are belief in witch doctors, mixed race relationships, human ‘ownership’, adoption issues and responsibilities, and ill-advised donor activity. The film explores the inherent dualities of wealth and poverty, rural and urban spaces, multiculturalism and the educated and uneducated, along with concepts of racism, feminism, inequality, sexism and colonialism.

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Introducing e.tv’s new daily drama series Broken Vows This April, e.tv’s weekday 8pm slot has been refreshed with the introduction of a new daily series, Broken Vows. Filled with mystery, intrigue and drama, the series produced by Clive Morris Productions, is a story about family, love, lust, lies, betrayal and dark secrets. Set against the backdrop of a family-owned wedding planning company Yours Truly Wedding Concepts, Broken Vows follows the lives of Gertrude ‘Mam Gerty’ Moswane, her family and staff.

6 | SCREENAFRICA | May 2017

Behind the scenes of Broken Vows

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t the helm of the business are the dynamic duo, Azania and Thandi, who are equally beautiful and ambitious. Yours Truly Wedding Concepts are renowned for turning couples’ romantic dreams of their big day into a spectacular reality. It becomes apparent that while they create ‘happily ever afters’ for their clients, their personal lives are often falling apart.

The concept for Broken Vows was pitched to e.tv by Clive Morris Productions and approved after meeting the strategy and scheduling requirements for e.tv. Soon after the approval process was complete, the real work began.

Clive Morris Productions, assembled a creative and writing team, began the scripting process, formed a production crew, finalised casting, and finally, production kicked off in February 2017.

Through the collective efforts of e.tv, Clive Morris Productions, the crew and cast, Broken Vows is now on air, offering viewers a high-quality series that is compelling and exciting, with characters viewers will love or hate.

Clive Morris Productions was tasked with bringing great talent to the screen for this series. After an involved and thorough casting process, which featured numerous chemistry tests with actors to ensure the best on screen ensemble, the cast was chosen. Broken Vows boasts a great balance of industry legends, such as Shaleen Surtie-Richards, Thembi MtshaliJones, Sello Sebotsane and Nomsa Nene who made her on screen return after a 16-year hiatus. The show has also bagged gifted and fresh talent with the likes of SAFTA award-winning actors Thapelo Mokoena and Mandla Gaduka,

as well as viewer favourites Emmanuel Castis and Lehasa Moloi. The talented and striking women on the cast include Enhle Mbali Maphumulo, Jo-Anne Reyneke, and Nambitha Ben-Mazwi.

The production crew includes a variety of departments which work together to make the series a compelling final product for viewers to enjoy. Each unit plays a valuable and necessary part in bringing the magic to screen.

The Art Department has ensured that the show’s various worlds are brought to life by creating beautiful sets that are true to the story environments and characters. Broken Vows is filmed on location and features the stylish Yours Truly Wedding Concepts office set which is on the Midrand residential property of the owner and family matriarch, Mam Gerty. The series also features the Tembisa based home of Lydia, Thandi’s mother and Mam Gerty’s estranged friend and business partner, as well as the homes of Thandi and Azania.

During the show’s editing process, the task of assembling shots into a coherent and well-paced sequence has been thrust upon a carefully picked post-production team. The team includes data wranglers, offline and online editors, and sound designers to name a few. Once each episode has been approved by the series’ producers and the e.tv executive producer, the episodes are sent to e.tv to be tested for quality control, ingested and finally, ready for broadcast.

Catch Broken Vows, weekdays at 20h00 on e.tv.

– Bobo Radu, executive producer, e.tv

The new Blackmagic URSA Mini Pro is the first true digital camera that’s combined with the features and controls of a broadcast camera.

The new URSA Mini Pro is a true digital film camera with a 4.6K image sensor, 15 stops of dynamic range and a wide color gamut that delivers amazingly rich skin tones, natural color response and incredible detail. You also get built in ND filters, dual C-Fast and SD card recorders, an interchangeable lens mount and more! URSA Mini Pro works in both film and video modes, so it’s perfect for digital film or broadcast use all while delivering better image quality!

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TECHNOLOGY NEWS

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Spotlight FresneLED 450

Slomo.tv Dominator AT/3G At NAB 2017, Slomo.tv debuted its multi-channel 3G/HD/SD video recording server Dominator AT/3G. The system supports up to ten 3G/HD/SD recording channels, four playback channels and powerful search capabilities on up to ten channels without disrupting the core recording and playback functions. In ‘record for editing mode’ this server system can record up to 12 channels of HD/SD video.

Building on the success of previous models, the new AT/3G line offers enhanced replay capabilities and two operators can work simultaneously on the same unit. Since the system has four independent graphic outputs each operator can work on the main GUI and a separate multi-viewer monitor simultaneously.

In replay mode, the operator can display up to six recording channels and two video playback channels, as well as having access to five channels for clip marking and playlist editing.

Importantly, when operating in SuperMo mode, the new Dominator AT/3G can simultaneously support three Sony, Hitachi or GVG 3X Super Motion and one ISO camera, or alternatively two Panasonic 4X Super Motion AK-H5000 plus two regular ISO cameras.

The new FresneLED 450 from Spotlight’s Green Line is their latest high-intensity fixture. The fixture performs like a 2000w or 2500w halogen lamp, uses only 450w of energy and has a life span that is 30 times longer than the halogen fixture.

The 450 generates white light that has a colour temperature range from 2700 to 6500K. It has smooth and continuous dimming from 0 to 100 per cent without changing the colour temperature. The housing is made from strong, die-cast aluminium with excellent ventilation for the best heat dissipation. Adjustable refresh frequency for use without flickering if used with TV cameras, as well as having an adjustable fan for silent mode.

The FresneLED 450 is low cost to install and maintain. It has smaller general power boards reducing its size on the main lines. No external dimmers. The fixture is directly dimmable through local control panels or DMX. With this fixture, you will enjoy a smaller energy bill and longer life of colour filters.

The FresneLED 450 will be right at home in all professional settings from Theatre and Concerts to TV and Film applications. *Southern Lighting Solutions is the official distributor of Spotlight products in South Africa.

AJA Ki Pro Ultra Plus AJA Video Systems recently announced the Ki Pro Ultra Plus, introducing 1, 2, 3 or 4-channel simultaneous HD recording up to 1080 50/60p, and full HDMI 2.0 (up to 12-bit capture and output) for 4K/UltraHD workflows.

The new Ki Pro Ultra Plus is ideal for recording multi-cam shoots in HD multi-channel mode, and 4K/UltraHD recording and playback in singlechannel mode. Ki Pro Ultra Plus is housed in a compact, easy-to-operate, standalone 2RU half-rack and has broad I/O flexibility and connectivity options including 3G-SDI, HDMI 2.0 and optional fibre connections. Ki Pro Ultra Plus captures pristine 4K/UltraHD and HD video to widely accepted production codecs including Apple ProRes and Avid DNxHD MXF. Four channels of HD can be recorded simultaneously as Apple ProRes files, each with different compression profiles as desired, to robust AJA Pak 1000 SSD media. Ki Pro Ultra Plus includes the proven Ki Protect technology, ensuring that in the event of power failure or inadvertent withdrawal of a Pak Drive, recently recorded footage is always secure. *Touchvision is the official distributor of AJA products in South Africa.

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| TECHNOLOGY NEWS

ChamSys MQ500 Stadium Console

Grass Valley LDX 82 Series cameras The Grass Valley LDX 82 Series includes four upgradable camera models, offering varying levels of operational flexibility to match every production need. Each model of the LDX 82 offers exceptional sensitivity in all HD formats, including 1080p, a wide colour gamut and Grass Valley’s XDR (Extended Dynamic Range) operations with a full 15 F-stops.

The four LDX 82 camera models are designed to suit a broad range of production needs: • LDX 82 Flex is the entry-level model for single format 1080i or 720p acquisition, where minimal artistic modification is required.

• LDX 82 Première can switch between 1080i and 720p, and features the Contour Equalizer which allows for alterations to the crispness in the shadows, mid-tones and highlights independently.

• LDX 82 Elite is an ideal workhorse for live HD production—from live sports to scripted productions.

LDX 82 Elite can switch between 1080i, 720p and 1080PsF. It also features PowerCurves for shooting under challenging conditions and Color Protect to help correct lighting issues.

• LDX 82 WorldCam is ideal for any production, under any condition, incorporating all the features of the LDX 82 Elite plus 1080p.

It enables 1080p productions that used to be impossible to cover without huge investments in additional lighting or major compromise to image quality.

Regardless of the model, the LDX 82 is Grass Valley’s best HD-only camera.

Each LDX 82 camera model leverages the patented Xensium-FT CMOS imager which allows for better sensitivity, higher resolution and extended dynamic range. *Protea Electronics is the official distributor of Grass Valley products in South Africa.

The MQ500 Stadium Console by ChamSys has proven to be the best lighting console in its class after it won the PIPA award for Best Product of the Year in the lighting category at Prolight + Sound 2017 in Frankfurt, Germany.

This innovative console supports up to 200 universes directly from the console without the need for external processing – making it even more user-friendly than its predecessors.

The console runs ChamSys’ MagicHD media server onboard. This allows for pixel-mapping to all 200 universes. It also features dual multi-touch display in full high definition, adjustable viewing angles and gesture support. As well as an intensity wheel and 100mm split crossfaders for theatre control. The MQ500 also has the MagicVis 3D visualiser built in with beam and gobo rendering. *Southern Lighting Solutions is the official distributor of ChamSys products in South Africa.

Quicklink Remote Communicator The Quicklink Remote Communicator allows you to stream video and audio to a web browser and return audio and video or audio only in real-time, full duplex with ultra-low delay. The Remote Communicator can be used to create ad hoc ultra-low delay video/audio contributions from any device using a web browser, easily share high quality return video to a remote user and integrate ultra-low delay audio commentary into your workflow.

The Remote Communicator is controlled and managed by the Quicklink Communicator Portal (QCP), the QCP provides complete management of all remote users and enables administrators to create managers/users and oversee server status and availability.

Imagine Communications Selenio™ Network Processor Imagine Communications’ Selenio™ Network Processor (SNP) is an all-IP-capable processing solution optimised for handling uncompressed UHD signals based on the SMPTE 2110 specification for transporting media over IP networks. Designed to usher in a new era in live production, the SNP enables production companies to optimise both studio and mobile facilities to take full advantage of the performance, agility and efficiency benefits of IT-based infrastructures, while at the same time upgrading operations to support UHD picture quality.

The availability of standards-based IP-to-IP processing capabilities provides media companies with the opportunity to streamline their production facilities, helping to reduce costs and complexity associated with supporting SDI and hybrid SDI-IP workflows, including cabling, power consumption and the need to move signals between IP and SDI domains.

An IP-to-IP signal processing platform, the SNP provides the gamut of capabilities required in today’s evolving mobile production industry, including HD-UHD up-and-down conversion and colour space adjustments, as well as managing the High Dynamic Range (HDR) adaptations and conversions required for integrating UHD and HD signals. Imagine Communications’ SNP also provides important synchronisation and timing functions, overseeing the integration of new signals into the production environment and helping to assure the optimal timing of SMPTE 2110 signals for interoperability with all other compliant equipment. *Concilium Technologies is the official distributor of Imagine Communications products in South Africa.

May 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 9

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Give yourself that first shot to make a short film in

Hollywood For any writer there is nothing worse than staring blankly at the screen, having words kettle like birds in your mind, whilst your inner critic doubts every thought you ever had.

But like most things it takes a bit of grit to get past that first step, taking a leap of faith if you will into your own abilities, your creativity, giving yourself a ‘first shot’ at the task ahead. And if you ever imagined having your words, your script, your directing skills noticed by the über-elite in Hollywood; you should take that leap, be fierce and committed by giving yourself that opportunity and entering the epic Jameson First Shot film competition.

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N

ow into its sixth year, Jameson First Shot has truly established itself as a stellar platform that celebrates aspiring visionaries and filmmakers who have unique stories to tell giving them an opportunity to take their first steps in an industry that is notoriously cut-throat and difficult to break into.

Jameson First Shot Productions has had massive success since its creation, working with talented and versatile actors, such as Maggie Gyllenhaal, Adrian Brody, and Uma Thurman. And with this year’s competition offering three undiscovered creative filmmakers the opportunity to have award-winning British actor and director Dominic West sculpt their words to life, this is truly a first shot not to be missed.

Apart from directing a Hollywood great and having the support of a solid, highly experienced film crew, the winners will also be mentored by a world-class producer, Dana Brunetti. Brunetti who has not only produced multiple awardwinning movies for film and television but been instrumental in innovating and helping to transform the industry from a digital and social networking perspective; will sit alongside each of the winners on set, providing them with support, guidance and input when needed to ensure that they make the most of this incredible opportunity.

This has proved to be a passion project for Brunetti, who enjoys working with aspiring talent: “I see the light in so many emerging talents’ eyes when they’re

given a chance. It’s all the reward I need.”

But in order to get there, you may be sitting staring blankly at the page…don’t.

If there is something that gets reinforced year after year with this remarkable competition, it’s that you need to write about what matters to you. You have to tell the stories that you want to tell, to ultimately make the film that you want to make. Dominic West echoes this advice: “Don’t write thinking that you’ve got what the judges want, don’t write from anything other than your own personal experience and perspective. Don’t leave it until tomorrow, don’t even leave it ‘till half an hour, write it now. It takes courage to get it wrong and to keep going. It doesn’t matter whether you win the competition or not you’ve done something creative. You never regret what you did, you regret what you didn’t do.”

The reality is that there are thousands of great untold stories out there, but your fierce vision and unique voice won’t be heard unless you get creative and put yourself out there. Carter Swan, one of the producers for Jameson First Shot agrees, “There’s always really new, interesting and fascinating artists coming out in this business – it’s part of the great thing about it.” For Dominic West it stems from creativity: “There is always something scary about trying to be creative. There is an impulse to create, and there is an inverse impulse to sit and just think ‘I can’t get out of my chair’ and you’ve got to overcome that.”

And if you are able to overcome it,

you may join the likes of other South African filmmakers who made the most out of this opportunity, such as Alan Shelley, Mark Middlewick, Henco J and Hanneke Schutte to become the part of the privileged few who are alumni of this competition.

“Jameson First Shot is a true blend of the arts. From the enterprising brands of Trigger Street Productions and Jameson Irish Whiskey, from nurturing local and global visionary scriptwriters/filmmakers mastering their craft, to extraordinary visuals and smooth production. It has provided a fresh approach to this cutthroat trade, whilst exploring the future of the industry through maximising digital platforms. At the end of the day the film industry comes down to finding good scripts, the stories that need to be told whether audiences realise it or not,” remarks Nicole Van Zyl, brand manager of Jameson at Pernod Ricard South Africa.

This year Jameson is expanding its catchment area to give more undiscovered talent the chance to enter their work from South Africa, US, UK, Ireland, Canada, Bulgaria, Australia and Israel; so you need to be courageous and tell your story to fearlessly pursue your dream. Don’t let a writer’s block wedge its way in front of your door to Hollywood.

Entries are open until June 1st 2017. For more information visit www. jamesonfirstshot.com. – Robyn David

Local trilogy video creates creative buzz internationally The evolution of a man from the time they discover their purpose, to seeing a visual exhibition being captured through the lens of a camera is an amazing craft. Awardwinning hip hop artist Nasty C gave this challenge to Kyle Lewis and the results were an Apple Music chart-topping video which gained global creative recognition.

“T

he concept comes from personal stories and experiences that Nasty C explained to me about his personal growth and life experiences.

The narrative has a past, present and future and that illustrates Nasty C growing up, figuring things out and ultimately coming to fruition in his career,” says director Kyle Lewis.

The 14-minute music video features three songs from his Bad Hair Extensions album namely, Don’t Do It, Phases and Good Girls and Snapchat Hoes. The video’s unofficial title is Veliswa, and is named after the rapper’s late mother.

However in keeping with the album title, it was later named Bad Hair.

Lewis and his Arcade Content

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Stills from the Bad Hair music video

team previously worked with Nasty C during the shooting of Anatii and Cassper Nyovest’s music video for the song Jump, which the rapper featured on. It was at that shoot that they spoke about collaborating on something totally unique.

“Audiences love to be challenged, and I find the South African audience to be an extremely intelligent and deepthinking crowd. There are so many subtle, nuanced messages and statements scattered throughout and I wanted it to be something that people watched a few times to decipher, but at the same time create their own meaning,” says Lewis.

Lewis remembers that in that brief meeting the rapper spoke about featuring multiple singles but giving him and his team free reign on the narrative and look. “For a filmmaker, it’s amazing to have that kind of trust from an artist.”

Kyle and his team, which included Pierre De Villiers on camera duties, Kaley Meyer as the stylist and Bianca Prinsloo taking over the art direction; worked on conceptualising the brief and finding complementary tools needed in the making of the film. “Life experiences are never the same, so I wanted to illustrate different tones of emotions individually. I wanted dark, surrealistic elements to be juxtaposed with hyperrealism and grit,” explains Lewis.

Furthermore Lewis wanted to treat

each of the three tracks as its own individual film, but still be able to make them co-exist as a 14-minute long music video without losing the viewer. The use of bridges in between the songs provide a smooth transition, which Lewis credits to approaching the filmmaking process as a ‘trilogy’ or ‘anthology’ instead of just a conventional narrative. “Each film has its own style of cinematography and framing. With the help of my incredible DOP, Pierre De Villiers, we were able to innovate with how we lit and composed shots. For example, in the final video, Phases, we locked off the camera and did every set up in the same framing, creating an interesting editing technique,” Lewis comments.

De Villiers shot the video on the Phantom Flex with 2+3 Post handling the edit and grade, helmed by long-time collaborator Stephen Du Plessis. “I love the distinctive look of the camera and playing around with the high-speed function and extreme slow motion and real-time photography,” comments Lewis on the camera choice. “I wanted each shot to look like a Renaissance painting and to be as poignant, and there’s something beautiful and eerie about what that camera can capture.”

While he admits that budget constraints are always a factor in producing a sterling film, Lewis and his team are always up for an opportunity to

“We shot the entire project on the Phantom Flex. I love the distinctive look of the camera and playing around with the high-speed function of the camera and extreme slow motion and real-time photography.” – Kyle Lewis

create an unfiltered and artistically creative product that will be worthwhile for the masses. The team however tried to push as many boundaries as they could through the use of creative special effects with the help of SFX artist, Blake Prinsloo from Static Black Media.

“The most exciting aspect is the face mapping we did of Nasty C. It gave us the perfect impression of his face, which gave us the opportunity to create artistic, statue-like elements,” Lewis remarks.

The music video has since been featured internationally in France, Germany, United Kingdom and the US, with Apple Music describing it as “epic” and “audacious”.

When Lewis was asked if he ever thought that his films would be so highly-received, he responded: “I think South African music and South African aesthetics are some of the most bold and creative in the world. I was just a vehicle for its success; the true impact comes from the people, fashion and collaboration in this piece. I believe we are as a country the next big innovators and it’s finally getting noticed abroad, which is exciting.” – Gezzy S Sibisi

KEY CREW Director: Kyle Lewis Producer: William Nicholson DOP: Pierre De Villiers Styling and make-up: Kaley Meyer Art director: Bianca Prinsloo Editor: Stephen du Plesis VFX: Blake Prinsloo Additional music: Tapiwa Musvosvi DiT and Camera technician: Karl Schmidt

May 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 11

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Advertising communications trends for 2017 The marketing communications landscape globally, has undergone radical change in the last few years, driven by digital marketing, global agency network consolidation and expansion into Africa and other developing regions; as well as the emergence of sci-fi technologies that will challenge the very fabric of communications in the future, such as artificial intelligence and virtual reality.

K

eeping ahead of the trends is a current job description as the speed of change has never been more frenetic, nor more critical for brands to take advantage of the next big opportunity, rather than be swallowed by the next big thing.

These are the current advertising communications trends that brands need to take note of:

1. Business consultants: Probably the biggest trend for South African agencies is the fact that they have to become business consultants in addition to creative consultants.

Agencies also need to help marketers find the opportunities for their brands and reengineer their businesses to meet the future head on. This is what leading agency leadership in South Africa has spent the past few years doing – transforming their business structure to include business strategy. Business strategy and future proofing brands is very much part of the agency domain now.

Omni-channel marketing: Total integration of marketing communications. Because the consumer can interact with brands and services 24/7, wherever they are and wherever you are – bricks and mortar or online – brands need to provide a seamless experience for their customers, from social media to advertising, to experience in store and afterwards, with the product and after sales service.

According to AdWeek, 62 per cent of companies have, or plan to have, an omnichannel marketing strategy.

Additionally, 70 per cent of businesses say that omnichannel strategies are important, very important, or critical to their success (Source: Ted Vrountas Marketing Trends).

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2. Programmatic advertising: Much of online advertising inventory has now been outsourced to specialist digital buying shops to maximise unsold inventory for media clients.

While automated buying tools are chasing users around the world wide web, wherever they may go. This of course has led to the growth of ad blockers and opt-in advertising services which reward users for watching or accepting advertising.

This is a huge trend – having to reward consumers for watching your ads in return for discounts or free services in the future.

3. Messenger apps: This is still relatively unchartered waters in South Africa and part of the ‘dark web’ as chats can’t be tracked like on Instagram or Facebook. But chatbots can aid brands in reaching the billions of users globally using services such as WeChat, Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp. It’s a matter of time before messenger apps relax their rules on advertising to users.

4. Paid entertainment: Like Netflix is leading the charge away from television to paid-for streamed content, thereby displacing traditional broadcast and pay TV channels; so radio is now being threatened by streaming audio programming, according to Forbes: “With Apple, Amazon and Google all entering the market, streaming audio is rapidly displacing real-time radio.”

Artificial intelligence: The currency de jour is data. Everything needs to be measurable and transparent. Artificial intelligence and the internet of things is driving a deeper understanding of consumer behaviour and marketers

Written by Louise Marsland have never had it so good – provided they have the right data analysis tools to interpret all the data available to them. But with everything connecting to everyone, the lines are blurring between content and advertising as we know and content marketing gains in popularity as other advertising channels available start narrowing.

5. Brand activism: Consumers are looking for brands that will stand up for their rights in a world where basic human rights are being challenged. We expect more of our brands than our politicians because brands have integrated themselves into our lives over the years with promises of friendship, lifestyle aspirations and reward. So brands increasingly need to take a stand on issues their consumers care about. After the American Presidential election, the gold standard of advertising – the Superbowl – saw a host of brands standing up for various human rights after a slew of Trump executive orders challenged those rights.

Nando’s is a classic and effective example in South Africa. While not all brands will be comfortable taking a stand on political issues, there are many others such as the environment, poverty and education that need attention in South Africa.

6. Fake news: There’s always a downside and the dark side of the rise of the internet and the freedom of information, has been the rise in fake news and clickbait. We now know the power of fake news to swing elections and influence violence – and it has spawned the rise of dubious and clickbait advertising links too. Authentic advertisers can capitalise on this by upping their game and delivering exceptional advertising and storytelling and services to customers. Much like the ‘real’ media has had to promote journalism excellence to stand head and should above sites peddling fake news.

7. Transparency: Along with authenticity for brands and real storytelling, so too are agencies and media buying shops being urged to be transparent about commissions and where spend is going. This was a major theme in local and international trend pieces this year. As marketer, Chris Hering, of NetSuite explains: “Those transparency demands, as well as pricing pressures, will take the biggest toll on traditional firms that don’t have a differentiated offering. Niche talent will still demand premiums but commoditised work will move to competitive bidding.

Holding companies will buy those assets that are delivering unique from the independent agencies.

Agencies will likely have to choose whether to transition to more specialised work or prepare to compete on price and volume.”

8. Death of traditional media: Print has all but been laid to rest in the developed world and other traditional channels, like television and radio, are under threat globally from paid entertainment channels.

Africa is not immune to these trends if you consider that mobile phone penetration is at 80per cent. The implications for advertisers are huge as advertisers will have to rely more on digital advertising, particularly on social media platforms, to push product. Brands will become content providers, sponsoring original content in these new channels, as well as continuing the content marketing trend of creating unique content to reach and keep loyal consumers.

– Louise Marsland

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From the producer’s mouth:

Adam Thal

Executive producer Adam Thal says he knew he wanted to be in the business of filmmaking at the age of six. Since then Thal has achieved colossal success executive producing commercials in particular. He founded The Star Film Company over 14 years ago and is currently in the process of producing his first feature film through the company.

Describe the moment you knew you wanted to work in film and television?

I know it sounds clichéd but when I was about six I watched E.T. and I immediately fell in love with filmmaking. I took my dad’s handicam and would make home videos of everything. It followed me into primary school and then high school until I found out I could make a career out of it, and then pursued my passion as a business. It was only at AFDA that I found my passion in the production of the 30 second spot.

What exactly does the job of an executive producer entail?

The term executive producer in film is very different to executive producer in commercials, and so at present my role entails representing and marketing my stable of directors to advertising agencies around the country. I am also responsible for making sure the right teams work on the right jobs at the right time. I oversee my line producers on each project and try and put out fires wherever necessary. In this game you are only as good as your last job, so it’s extremely important to keep the quality and service level as high as possible every time.

As someone who produces both film and commercials, which do you prefer and why?

Commercials have taken over my life and the film side has taken a back seat, but with that said, I absolutely love commercial production. Every project is so different to the next one that we are always learning and exploring new things, places and people. Not many careers take you to Russia, Egypt, Kenya and Los Angeles to work.

You founded The Star Film Company, tell us what led to the making of the company?

I was sitting in a producing lecture in my honours year at AFDA, and my late

business partner and I decided that we wanted to open a production house that didn’t follow the normal mould.

We were young, energetic and hungry to turn the commercials industry on its head. We were very naive at the time, but I guess now with a company over 14 years old we did something right!?

What has been the biggest challenge in your career to date?

Probably when my late business partner Ryan Poole sadly passed away in a car accident in 2007. I hit a point where I was contemplating closing down the company or continuing in his honour.

Luckily that’s when Tristan Holmes became my business partner and we decided to push on even harder in Ryan’s honour. It was the hardest time that led to an exciting rollercoaster ride.

What has been your career highlight(s) to date?

Being able to shoot in some of the most interesting places in the world.

Some of our commercials have taken us to Russia, Los Angeles, Egypt, Kenya, Ghana and hopefully many more exciting places to come.

If you could have one filmmaking superpower, what would it be and why?

Hmm, I think filmmaking in general is a superpower. As producers we constantly feel like we are saving the world. Without the latest burger offering or the exciting insurance plan, what would people do?

What is your dream shoot location?

I would normally say an exotic island like Maldives but the logistics of shooting in a place like that would be a HUGE headache so my most ideal place to shoot, that has the infrastructure, would be Prague or somewhere else in Eastern Europe. Hollywood was

a big bucket list location to shoot in and I got the opportunity to shoot there in February this year which was a great dream come true.

If you could remake any Hollywood classic with an African twist, which would it be and why?

I would definitely remake FAME because having gone to AFDA for four years and been on a campus with wannabe filmmakers and performers, I noticed the talent we have in this country that doesn’t get to shine. I am also a HUGE fan of musicals, and FAME with a South African musical twist in a South African setting would be amazing!

Who are your mentors?

Why them?

One of my first mentors in this game was Deon Opperman. As one of the forefathers of AFDA he used to take Ryan and myself aside and give us one on one lectures. He was inspirational and one of the biggest motivations in us going out and doing our own thing.

In life my biggest mentor is my father who has always guided me and in a non-pushing way led me on a track of running a successful business. He also backed me when I decided that I wanted to pursue Film Production as a business.

What advice do you have for young people wanting to follow in your career footsteps?

Follow your dreams and if you have enough passion, devotion and drive to being a success, then nothing will stand in your way. Also enjoy the rollercoaster rides. My wife gave me the best saying in life which sticks with me every day in business, “You have to experience the tough times in order to really appreciate the good times!”

Adam Thal

Three people, dead or alive, that you would love to invite to dinner?

I always wanted to appear on the Oprah Show but then she cancelled the show, so I would definitely have her for dinner. I have had the privilege of having Harry Belafonte over at my house for dinner already, which was an incredible evening and lastly I would invite Steven Spielberg as his films were instrumental in my career path.

If you weren’t working in television what would you be doing?

That’s a hard one. I did drop out of Electrical Engineering to pursue my career in Production, so I would probably be doing something in that field or definitely something in computers, as I love all aspects of computers and programming language.

What next for Adam Thal?

We are currently in talks of producing our first feature film through The Star Film Company. So that’s an exciting new venture. On the sidelines, as a hobby, I’m hoping to complete my Private Pilot’s License this year, so if producing doesn’t work out for me, perhaps Kulula will hire me?!

May 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 13

Television | OPINION

Six Top Threats for Television Broadcasters

Written by Anshul Gupta, head of Marketing, MediaGuru

Streaming services have been threatening to take a bite out of linear TV broadcast viewership for quite some time. However, it is only recently that television broadcasters have begun to feel the threat. According to a study conducted by Michael Nathanson of MoffettNathanson, Netflix’s US subscribers were up six per cent in 2015 from 4.4 per cent in 2014.

A

s the future of television broadcast is threatened, MediaGuru lists six top challenges faced by broadcasters due to the rise of digital and streaming media.

1. The Rise of Alternative Media Channels With the digital revolution gaining momentum, viewers now want to cherry pick their favourite channels, which is why streaming services over the internet are on an all-time rise.

There has been a shift in the viewing habits, posing a threat to the decadeold model built around satellite and cable TV offering ‘bundled’ channels to consumers at a fixed price that offered little choice to viewers.

Now, viewers can access video channels like Amazon video, Netflix, Hulu; choose a subscription of individual channels like Showtime or HBO, or watch programmes streamed on YouTube and other free online channels.

With the rise of alternative media channels, television broadcasters are facing a major threat in the form of what is popularly known as ‘cord cutting.’ According to 2016 research

14 | SCREENAFRICA | May 2017

by Leichtman Research Group, the cord-cutting trend began in 2013 when cable providers lost 100 000 subscribers. The figures went up to 150 000 in 2014 and 385 000 in 2015, thanks to on-demand platforms like Netflix that charge a fraction of what television broadcasters charge to stream programmes.

2. Content and Network Security Missed your favourite prime-time show? Login online to watch it anytime you want. Viewers now have the option to enjoy their favourite programmes on any smart devices anytime they want. With the emergence of TV Everywhere, pay-TV operators are now offering TV Everywhere to provide value add and retain their subscribers.

However, TV Everywhere has its risks for broadcasters. As broadcasters use new media platforms to reach their millenial viewers, they are prone to security threats like hacking, malware, and cyber-attacks. Often, viewers also compromise their security by sharing devices, accounts and personal information to access the content, thereby giving easy access to hackers. Moreover, with the easy availability of network

infrastructures, programmes are being redistributed in real-time over the internet illegally, resulting in loss of estimated billions of euros across the TV industry worldwide.

To address this challenge, broadcasters need proper infrastructure, security policies, and firewall protection to ensure hackers do not have access to the content. Moreover, old content needs to be digitised, archived and stored with proper tagging to ensure long term usage.

3. Changing Viewer Behaviour and Preferences As new digital platforms evolve, there is a distinct shift in consumer behaviour and preferences. Users no longer consume what is being offered to them, but choose from a host of options available to them anywhere, anytime across multiple channels.

Traditional content providers are fighting hard to ride the digital wave and secure their place in the value chain by understanding customers’ interests and upselling the right products to cater to their preferences. TV broadcasters are facing a significant threat due to changing preference of the viewers and need to create and recycle content to cater to the changing behaviour.

4. Content Protection and Piracy In a world where news and videos go viral in minutes, content can travel across geographies fast.

Thanks to the Internet, viewers now have the power to generate the content they like, share it with the world and gain instant popularity.

However, reliability and accuracy of such content remain a concern.

Broadcasters might get into legal hassles like copyright issues or defamation if the authenticity of user-generated content is not verified. Similarly,

illegal commercial distribution of content originally owned and produced by broadcasters may lead to revenue loss.

5. Mismanaged Content Mismanaged content is a major challenge that broadcasters face today. While there is a lot of new content generated both by the user and broadcasters every minute, it might not be organised for future usage. Much of the content is not tagged correctly and does not have metadata, which makes it impossible for broadcasters to compartmentalise for reuse, often leading to content duplication.

With a huge amount of content already being created alongside legacy content, broadcast organisations need to organise and tag content to ensure easy search, access and distribution of existing content.

6. Lack of Quality Content With modern technology and changing of viewers’ preference, there is a huge demand for content. However, to meet the growing need, quality of the content often takes a backseat.

To ensure quality, broadcasters need to utilise the content that is already in use. Recycling legacy content and going regional to cater to different geographies are some of the measures that content creators need to take apart from creating new content.

The television industry is gearing up to meet the digitisation challenge.

As viewers are spoiled for choice, the television ecology is becoming more democratic. Broadcasters are propagating online programmes to catch the viewers’ attention and become accessible to new audiences. – Anshul Gupta

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FILM

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A love letter to Scenes from Keeping Up with the Kandasamys

“Authencity is key in storytelling. We wanted to ensure that the flavours of Chatsworth were captured. This was a unique opportunity to put Chatsworth on the big screen and we had to be true to its vibrant spirit.” – director Jayan Moodley

T

he vibrant lifestyle, authentic mannerisms and colourful textures of one of the oldest South African Indian communities takes centre stage in the film, Keeping Up with the Kandasamys – a witty play on the much-publicised Keeping up with the Kardashians reality series in which the famous family’s dirty laundry seems to keep enthralled viewers glued to their small screens weekly. Much like the Kardashians, the Kandasamys have captured South African audiences on the big screen so much so that the film garnered over R1.6 million in its opening weekend at the Ster-Kinekor box office.

Furthermore, the movie has recently

16 | SCREENAFRICA | May 2017

been reported to have made over R14.7 million in its seventh week on circuit.

“Keeping Up with the Kandasamys is a story about friendship, family, space and identity, and most importantly about love and forgiveness. It centres around two women, Jennifer Kandasamy (Jailoshini Naidoo) and Shanti Naidoo (Maeshni Naicker) who have an immense hatred for each other. Their suspicion turns to shock and then horror as they face the realisation that their children have fallen in love. So they team up with the ‘motherof-all-plans’ to break them up and instead find each other in the process,” explains director Jayan Moodley.

The film is centred on these two

lead actresses who both previously have been residents of Chatsworth.

Much to their delight, the film pays homage to this historic and lively town which rarely gets recognised as a film location of choice. With that in mind the director sees to it that the hidden gems of Chatsworth are captured while also giving the viewer a feel of the warm city of Durban and its outskirts.

“Authencity is key in storytelling. We wanted to ensure that the flavours of

Chatsworth were captured. This was a unique opportunity to put Chatsworth on the big screen and we had to be true to its vibrant spirit,” Moodley says.

Casting for the film took place primarily in Durban over four days before moving to Johannesburg for a further two days of auditions. The young couple Prishen Naidoo (Madhushan Singh) and Jodi Kandasamy (Mishqah Parthiephal) beautifully bring their modern redemption of the romantic

| Film

TECH CHECK

Chatsworth classic, Romeo and Juliet into character, while their disapproving mothers leave no scene unscathed as they give life to the ‘mother-in-law from hell’ phenomenon.

Unlike Moodley’s rather dramatic debut into the film scene with White Gold in 2010, she decided to have some fun in her second take, with co-writer Rory Booth helping her bring the laughing stitches to this well-played slapstick comedy drama. “The story provides a window into one of South Africa’s vibrant and colourful sub-cultures. I truly believe that real nation-building can take place when there is not just an acceptance of each other but an understanding of the different cultures in South Africa; what better medium than that of film, and what better genre than that of comedy to draw in the audiences and achieve this objective,” Moodley remarks.

Filming took place in July and August over a five-week period with African Lotus Productions and the late Junaid Ahmed’s production company. The film also takes time to honour the esteemed producer, as he was very much involved in the production of the film and worked alongside coproducer Helena Spring to ensure that Moodley’s vision became a reality.

During production, the crew and cast noted that they received the most

amazing hospitality from residents of the area. Thereafter the film crew decided to return the favour by visiting Chatsworth school Wingen Heights Secondary and giving the staff and learners an opportunity to take pictures with the cast, who also signed autographs with their endearing fans as a token of their appreciation.

Keeping Up with the Kandasamys was shot on the RED Epic Dragon; a decision which Moodley says was made after a consultative meeting between her, the producers and DOP Justus de Jager. For Moodley, the most important aspect to get right regarding the look and feel of the film was to make the viewer feel as though they were present within an Indian South African home. “The brief was to capture colour, vibrancy and a sense of liveliness that is prevalent. We stuck to our colour palette of cream and ‘kungum’ and kept the shots clean and focused on telling the story,” she comments.

“Overall the film has really struck a chord,” affirms Moodley who attributes the success of the film to its simplicity and authencity. “Every person I speak to tells me about a character they can relate to or about how true that ‘one scene’ was.”

It is no surprise that the film’s reach has stretched over to more than its close-knit Chatsworth community and

even further than its cosmopolitan city of Durban. Beneath all the snotty and hilarious punchlines; a powerful underlying message resonates with everyone regardless of ethnicity, geographic standing and social standard.

“The message of the film is really about forgiveness and the heavy burden we carry within ourselves when we hold onto some sort of grudge. It’s about family, happiness and about a people that band together as a community with such resilience. I think African audiences are in search of comedy and different stories, and it will certainly resonate with both African and international audiences,” Moodley concludes.

Keeping Up with the Kandasamys was produced in association with the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), the KwaZulu-Natal Film Commission (KZNFC), Durban Film Office (DFO) and M-Net. – Gezzy S Sibisi

Keeping Up with the Kandasamys was shot on the RED Epic Dragon.”

KEY CREW

The late Junaid Ahmed played a pivotal role in the making of the film

Jayan Moodley Director: Jayan Moodley Producers: Helena Spring and Junaid Ahmed Associate producers: Suda Sing and Gill Pearson DOP: Justus de Jager Editor: Nicholas Costaras

May 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 17

FILM | OPINION

Africa converged Written by Lara Preston,

owner, Red Flag Content Relations

Convergence has been one of the buzzwords of the industry for a while now. As the world shrinks further and further and all content roads inexorably lead to digital, the various lines between content categories and the means in which this content is produced and consumed begin to blur more and more.

H

ollywood driven categories that separated cinematic (Film) content from TV content have existed for decades, until very recently when the slickly produced TV shows of Netflix and HBO amongst others have become prestige projects for big named actors and directors. Gone are the days when starring in a TV series was the kiss of death for Hollywood box-office stars.

With this change, the world of entertainment has seen the first phase of content convergence – the conflation of so-called cinematic and TV content, with the inclusion of gaming content well on its way. Additionally, there has been a technologically driven change in how content around the world is consumed.

Increasingly all kinds of content, including movies are moving away from the big screens of commercial cinemas in favour of the small screens of televisions and devices.

This convergence of content and consumption has been led globally by players such as Netflix, HBO and now even Amazon Prime and YouTube TV. Thanks to these content producers and distributors, types of content and their means of consumption have blurred traditional categories and thinking, at

18 | SCREENAFRICA | May 2017

least for those producing and distributing content in the so-called developed world.

For these producers, this initial phase of convergence has presented a variety of opportunities to reach wider and more diverse audiences. In the developed world of content, this break-down between formats and delivery mechanisms has transformed the industry. In her book, Television and British Cinema: Convergence and Divergence since 1990, Hannah Andrews points out that up until very recently, academic and economic discussions about cinema and TV were separate and its only in the past decade or so that researchers and experts have realised that “one of the biggest platforms for film is television.”

In Africa however, the impact of this convergence has been minimal in that these so-called divisions amongst content formats and delivery methods have never been a practical reality.

For decades, African consumers have consumed all kinds of content, whether films, series, or soapies predominantly on their TV screens.

The historical conception of movies or films as an innately separate category of content from television makes no

sense in an African context where TV or DVD are, and have been, the only truly mass mechanisms of distribution for producers and consumption for viewers.

Outside of major urban centres in a handful of sub-Saharan African countries, (with Ethiopia being a key exception), there are very few formal or commercial cinemas in operation. Even in countries such as Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa, more often than not, commercial cinemas screen Western content far more than African produced movies.

In a continent where only a tiny fraction of people have ever viewed their entertainment content within the confines of a cinema, content is simply content, and it is viewed wherever possible. For many Africans up until recently content of all kinds has been available only for the small screen and only via free-to air TV (or for a minority, pay TV), retail purchased DVDs, or in many places via pirated VCDs. Many of the films nominated for awards in events such as the Africa Academy Movie Awards have never even seen the inside of a cinema, with some not even being officially screened on TV across the continent.

Consumption of content in Africa then is a very different environment for both audiences and producers.

Additionally, across Africa, broadcast TV has not just been a platform for distribution for most kinds of content, but also television stations have acted as significant commissioners and producers of a variety of content, including film.

Hence, in terms of the content and the delivery mechanism, ‘convergence’ as such has never really been a necessary phenomenon in the world

of African content. Yet, going forward, with the next – and for Africa the more relevant – phase of convergence taking place, that of technology and VOD and streaming to both TV’s and devices, African content producers are now poised to reap the benefits.

With the whole world now abandoning the rigid categories of content and distribution platforms, African producers, having used diverse and often informal platforms for years, are ideally poised to quickly and efficiently create and distribute content via these new mechanisms.

As broadband and Wi-Fi access spread further across the continent, people are choosing more and more to consume content on their devices and phones.

The real value of convergence then, in an African context, will be realised when producers can more readily deliver their products directly to consumers without the middleman of the broadcaster, cinema chain or the legal (or illegal) DVD manufacturer and retailer.

The next phase of convergence will benefit African content producers when this pipeline from producer to consumer is truly open. How this manifests in a way that finally sees royalties and revenue for producers is still however a process that needs to unfold. However, more and more the framework for this to take place is at least falling into place. – Lara Preston

Director Speak

| FILM

Sunu Excellence as sportsman, a degree in Organisational Psychology and a budding career in banking just wasn’t enough for Zimbabwean-born director Sunu, who chose instead to pursue his dreams of becoming a filmmaker. Since then, he has directed commercials for leading brands including Standard Bank, Vodacom, Nike and Coca Cola, had his short film screen at Cannes, directed his first feature film Pride – which stars Terence Howard and Bernie Mac – and that’s just the start…

What is your background and how has this shaped you as a director?

I came through sport, then a long stint in front of the camera while at university, and a few years as a banker. Sport taught me teamwork. Working in front of the camera taught me empathy towards actors and the craft of acting, which I use all the time now as a director. Banking also helped, because directing involves a huge amount of fiscal understanding and savvy. You have to know what you can put on screen and where to make sacrifices.

Which projects are you currently involved in?

Trying to get my passion project Riding with Sugar off the ground and a project on rhino poaching.

What has been your biggest career challenge to date?

Getting my film Riding with Sugar off the ground. It’s been a 14-year journey so far.

Describe the moment, if there is one, when you knew you wanted to become a director?

Watching Schindler’s List when I was at university. It rocked my world.

Where do you find inspiration?

I read a lot. I love photography and finding interesting people who shoot things outside of my sphere. I love shows like Planet Earth. I am amazed at the stories they tell and how they get all that incredible footage. It inspires a passion for authenticity and capturing life as it happens.

Do you have any local mentors?

Michael Middleton is the reason I am doing what I am doing. I owe a great deal of my career to him, Peter Gird and Janet Sender, who took me on with zero experience and nurtured me when I first started.

What has been the highlight of your career thus far?

One Source, the work I did with Native VML and Khuli Chana for Absolut. And of course doing my first feature film, Pride, with Lionsgate – something a lot of people said was impossible.

If you could produce an African version of a Hollywood classic, what would it be?

Schindler’s List.

Top three favourite films of all time?

• Schindler’s List.

• The Godfather.

• Slumdog Millionaire.

What is your dream shoot location?

Jerusalem, Israel.

If you weren’t a filmmaker, you would be…?

A music producer!

Top three favourite directors? Why them?

• Steven Spielberg: Schindler’s list, E.T, Jaws, The Color Purple.

• Francis Ford Coppola: The Godfather and Apocalypse Now. • Frank Budgen: Guinness Snails and PlayStation Mountain.

May 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 19

NEW MEDIA

|

New voices, new media

Sarah Summers and Kelly-Eve Koopman

How Coloured Mentality reveals the potential of the South African web series

Stills from Coloured Mentality web series

S

outh African art has a proud history of social responsibility, with creatives investing their work with ideas aimed towards inspiring conversations around major issues such as race, gender and class. It has been a prevalent trend throughout the development of the modern South African canon – which is unsurprising, given the amount of social inequalities we as a nation still need to redress –and it is assuring to know that the next generation of filmmakers are not shying away from the challenge. In fact, they seem to be utilising new forms of media that are even more fit for the task.

Sarah Summers and Kelly-Eve Koopman are twenty-something creatives based in Cape Town.

Although they juggle a lot of roles and responsibilities (Koopman, for example, also co-directs a feminist NPO), the two have gained serious attention for their recently-released Coloured Mentality, a five-part documentary series comprised of responses to searching questions surrounding various aspects of the coloured experience in South Africa. Released on YouTube in tandem with a coordinated social

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media campaign, the series is not only a fine example of ‘conscious content’, but an exciting glimpse into new media’s ability to provide young filmmakers with both a platform and an interactive audience for their work.

In the duo’s own words, Coloured Mentality was inspired, simultaneously, by a desire “to understand ourselves as Cape Town 20-somethings who grew up as coloured. What did that mean?

How does it relate to our ancestry?

Are we Khoisan? Who are we?”; and an acknowledgement that they “were not the only people struggling to find answers to these questions, and so we shared our search with our community.”

The result is a direct and consistently compelling documentary series that is deceptively simple in its structure. This is because although each episode consists simply of interviewees responding to a particular question that keys into the coloured experience, the questions themselves are truly illuminating – laying bare the political ramifications of our language (and indeed our imaginations) when we seek to talk about that most seemingly ‘natural’

of personal belongings: identity.

The questions – “What is a coloured?”; “Is Afrikaans a white language?”; “Are coloured people black?”; “What is coloured culture?”; “Does coloured privilege exist?” – succeed in eliciting such rich responses from the interviewees (many of whom are prominent media figures) precisely because they touch on ideas that connect the individual’s experience to their own understanding of their community’s experience. As the duo says, “identity is an individual experience as much as it is a group experience” – and it is their sensitivity to this insight that makes the series such a resounding success, creating a form of representing voices where the boundaries of the conversation are set by the voices themselves, a process whereby the filmmakers become “characters within” the documentary as much as its authors.

And, arguably, an even greater part of the success of the series has been its on-going provision of a platform for engaged viewers to continue to debate the issues arising from the interview segments. For Koopman and Summers, “the series ultimately became less about the episodes themselves, and more about the conversation they ignited,” with people sharing their views with one another on the Coloured Mentality Facebook page (which is now approaching 20 000 members). Even a cursory glance at the page reveals keen and impassioned debate, heartfelt personal responses such as poetry inspired by the conversations, and enlivened and engaged suggestions for future episodes and areas of exploration.

The good news for fans of documentary features is that Coloured Mentality was always conceived as a preparatory project leading up to the duo’s next release, a full-length film “about our experiences during a 1000km Liberation Walk led by a group

of eccentric Khoi activists.” Currently in post-production and tentatively titled The Walk Back, the documentary (which, like the series, is being produced by Gambit Films) will delve even deeper into the fraught terrain of personal understandings of identity in the context of South Africa’s diverse social landscape.

Describing the film as “self-reflective” and the process as “very challenging”, the filmmakers have come away from the experience with the conviction that “we live in a fragmented society, and part of acknowledging this is recognising that there are many different types of people who feel relegated and unheard. Just like identity, social consciousness is not homogeneous: we need to address the unique issues different people are facing before we can expect the ‘unity in diversity’ ideal.”

While we wait for the documentary’s release, young South African filmmakers can take enormous encouragement from the success of Coloured Mentality.

Not only has it been well received by the “smart, discerning and interested” internet audience in South Africa, but – through the filmmakers’ strategic cultivation of an online forum where invested viewers can interact with one another – they have also devised a way of achieving what all too few South African works have managed before: a means of continuing (in fact, deepening) the conversation after the fact. Never mind the directness and accessibility of the web series format, it is this feature that may see its popularity spike – the possibility that work may have a lasting and evolving impact, remaining in dialogue with its audience long after the credits have rolled. – David Cornwell

ANIMATION & EFFECTS | OPINION

You think you know the

Triggerfish story? You don’t.

The real one’s much more gory Triggerfish Animation is 21 years old this year. The Cape Town animation studio has established itself as one of the leading feature film exporters in the emerging markets, with nine million cinema tickets sold globally and overall viewership of their feature films in the hundreds of millions. CEO Stuart Forrest looks back on the fairy tale highs and nightmare lows of building one of the world’s most successful platforms for packaging and exporting African creative excellence.

A

t the time I joined in 2003 as a junior stop-frame animator, Triggerfish was a small stop-frame studio run by Jacquie Trowell and Emma Kaye, which had just been awarded two seasons of animation for Sesame Street. The Sesame Street project had given Triggerfish an international credibility unprecedented in the South African animation landscape, so when an opportunity came along for me to become a partner, I jumped at it.

I borrowed money from friends, family and banks, and myself and colleague James Middleton became co-owners of Triggerfish. James brought his technical expertise and helped convert the studio from film-based production to full digital.

But it became clear that the stop-frame

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Written by Stuart Forrest, CEO, Triggerfish Animation

landscape had dried up in SA, and for a year we couldn’t find any work at all.

While waiting for the phone to ring, I started a website called Animation SA to build a database of all the animation professionals in South Africa. In those days there wasn’t much of an animation industry at all, but within months we had over a thousand members, which was much higher than anyone had anticipated.

After a painful year of paying overheads on the studio rental, and getting deeper into personal debt, we were forced to liquidate most of our equipment and cancel our studio lease. The original owners of Triggerfish resigned. I produced a new commission for Sesame Street from my living room and kitchen, but the income could barely support the production costs.

So when I was offered a job working for another animation studio directing a TV special, I grabbed the opportunity and Triggerfish became dormant. The TV special ran into its own problems, and I was fired from my role there, along with the head of production, Mike Buckland.

Mike was an extraordinary computer generated (CG) animator and a genius at problem-solving and building teams.

With another animator, Anthony Silverston, the three of us decided to revive Triggerfish and relaunch it as a CG company. Anthony had recently won a national competition for his feature script, Khumba, and had a deep passion and great instinct for story craft. Most of all,

the four partners (including James) shared a commitment to excellence at all costs.

Feature films The owners of the TV special (which was called Zambezia) wanted to keep working with us to get it produced as a feature film – provided we could raise the money – so we found ourselves with a shell company, and a teaser with a first draft of a feature script but no funding.

Our new CG department started producing a series of commissioned 10 to 30 minute films, which helped us to develop a CG pipeline and earned enough money to support my fulltime job – raising money for Zambezia. Even though the budget we were looking for was miniscule compared to the US animated movies, raising money was hard for a small studio from Africa who had no experience in producing feature-length animation, and even less in international film distribution.

Looking for a partner who could bring credibility, I spoke to Michael Rose, who produced some of my favourite films, including Chicken Run and Wallace and Gromit. Michael was supportive and gave script notes, but wasn’t able to commit to a role on the film.

After about two years of hustle, we found a sales agent, CMG, who agreed to pre-sell the movie to distributors – an

essential part of the funding process, which gives investors comfort that the film can recoup its budget.

We did very well on the presales and CMG introduced us to gap financiers who provided the budget shortfall (at a price!). With the IDC, NFVF, DTI and the gap – plus major fee deferments from us – we were fully funded.

It was an exhilarating time, even as we faced considerable scaling issues – we grew from eight to 80 people in two months. The Animation SA website proved to be a terrific asset – within days we had over six hundred job applications for the film. We hired and hired and hired – technical people, production designers, receptionist, riggers, animators… it was a huge undertaking. We built our dream animation studio, handpicking the best talent in the country.

We had lots of fun making the movie, crafting the story points in endless workshops, designing the sets and characters and working with Hollywood celebrities – living the dream! The team came from all over South Africa and had extraordinary skill despite their very shallow experience levels.

Making an animated feature film is logistically insane. The director had to make 36 000 approvals to move the 1 503 shots through all eight departments – not counting reworking and story changes. Each animator created an

OPINION

| ANIMATION & EFFECTS

Triggerfish recently collaborated on Roald Dahl’s Revolting Rhymes for BBC1

average of 1.3 seconds of final animation per day. At full capacity, we had to line up 680 hours of work every day for the crew to be working optimally.

At times we had people drawing storyboards at night for animation the next day, and the director, Wayne Thornley, had to deal with notes from producers, investors and distributors, as well as a ridiculously low budget and a generally inexperienced crew.

Somehow, the picture was finished and the thrilling finale was mixing the sound and orchestra at Skywalker Sound in San Francisco – spotting Brad Bird and David Fincher in the canteen, and having George Lucas wander around the corridors visiting his Oscars.

Shortly after starting Zambezia, we got our second feature funded.

Khumba was a big improvement technically as the team was more experienced and they were getting better and better. Triggerfish was gaining momentum, attracting the best artists in the country and building a reputation for delivering production value far beyond budget expectations.

After the Los Angeles premier, Zambezia got picked up by Sony in all available English-speaking territories – a first-class distributor. The first cinema release was Russia, where it opened at number two and earned $5.8 million at box office – more than the entire budget. It was dubbed into 25 languages and released theatrically around the world, smashing records for a South African-owned film since The Gods Must Be Crazy! We were thrilled.

Realising we had a financial weakness, and in preparation for the deluge of money we thought we’d be receiving, we signed up a fifth partner with a

financial background, Jean-Michel Koenig, an accountant poet with a film finance background and an ambitious vision for the company.

Khumba finished at last, and our team was up to 107 people, all deeply talented, experienced and tightly efficient after two feature productions together. Khumba premiered in competition at Annecy to a standing ovation. We got press on CNN, BBC, Forbes and all the major media.

William Morris Endeavor (WME) – the Beverly Hills superagency who represent Oprah and Charlize and half of Hollywood – contacted us and we got signed up.

After years of singular, focused effort, we’d achieved international recognition.

WME introduced us to some of the key people in Hollywood. Everything was going to be easier from here.

After Khumba During production of Zambezia and Khumba, we’d been trying to write a third script, but we’d been so busy with the films that it wasn’t ready for production and we hadn’t even begun the process of raising the funding.

So we had to let everyone go. This was the hardest thing in the world to do – not just for the impact on the personal lives of the crew, but for the fact that we would have to start again after everyone had worked so hard to become a super-efficient team.

We borrowed development funding to write the next script and keep the lights on. We were broke again and getting deeper in debt. Again, we had no work for nearly a year, this time while carrying the overheads of keeping the facilities going.

We went out to potential investors,

trying to raise money for Triggerfish so that we could develop more scripts and build out the company’s vision. But despite our success, we discovered that the six-year feature film turnaround time and the high risk made the investment hard to sell.

Khumba finished its release around the world, but despite doing exceptionally well in certain territories, it had to compete with an increasing number of studio animated films and Disney’s smash hit Frozen, which just wouldn’t let go of the cinemas.

Then we had the crushing news that our largest distributor on Khumba went bankrupt, which meant we lost nearly half our expected income.

We also discovered how “Hollywood accounting” works – exorbitant expenses outweigh reported earnings, so that distributors drastically reduce payments to the producer, meaning that, despite both film’s worldwide success, to date we’ve not earned anything from the release of these films.

After a year, we found ourselves back at square one, with mounting debt and no work, and I had to sell my house to survive. I had to decide whether it would be better to shed the overhead of running a company, let go of our expensive lease and aging equipment and move operations back home, or hang in there a while longer.

New Partnerships Just as things were looking at their worst, Michael Rose – who’d seen Khumba at Annecy – asked for Triggerfish to quote on Stick Man – a 26-minute short film for BBC’s Christmas programming, produced by Magic Light Pictures.

We pulled the team back together (with some shiny new recruits) and produced an exquisite short film that went on to win awards around the

world, including best TV production in the world at the Annecy Animation festival. It was nominated for a BAFTA and recently collected four Kidscreen awards – including Best TV special.

After Stick Man, we collaborated with Magic Light Pictures on more BBC Christmas specials, including Roald Dahl’s Revolting Rhymes, and are currently in production on Highway Rat. We still had to deal with our lack of original scripts to put into production, so we put together a programme that partnered with the DTI, DSTV and Disney to find the best animation writers on the continent – which we called The Story Lab. Although the funding later collapsed – which brought considerable challenges and heartache with it – the program has been a huge success and we now have a network of 1 300 writers from 30 different countries on the continent, and we’re in full development on four TV series and four feature films from this group – some of them with high-profile distribution partners already in place.

This year we’re launching Animate Africa, a new programme to find the best directors and animators on the continent, and find ways for them to make their films. I don’t know where it will end up, but I’m excited to take the next journey.

I’ve worked with incredibly talented people, and I’m meeting more talented people all the time. It’s our vision to connect our networks and production experience to the top creators on the continent, to produce films and TV series that will show that our country and continent is bursting with talent and is ready to bring our stories to the world.

Over the next 20 years Triggerfish intends to produce 15 more feature films, each one better than the one before. If we can keep our focus and intent, there’s no reason we can’t one day produce a film that stands shoulderto-shoulder with the best animated feature films, and establish ourselves as the leading independent animation studio in the world. – Stuart Forrest

May 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 23

2017 | REPORT

NAB 2017…

T

he overall theme of NAB 2017 was The M.E.T. Effect – the result of three once distinct fields of media, entertainment and technology, converging and becoming something far greater than the sum of their parts.

The Exhibits and Education Programme at the 2017 NAB Show was specifically tailored to showcase all aspects of The M.E.T. Effect and its impact on the Media and Entertainment industries with great success. This year’s conference sessions

24 | SCREENAFRICA | May 2017

revealed no real surprises, but the content always generates some excitement especially in the ‘Super Sessions’.

In the first-ever live 4K video stream from space during the Super Session: Reaching for the Stars: Connecting to the Future with NASA and Hollywood, NASA astronaut and International Space Station (ISS) commander Dr. Peggy Whitson and NASA astronaut Jack Fischer conversed live from the ISS. The event utilised a RED Epic

Dragon camera and a UHD-capable video encoder opening up a whole new chapter in live broadcasting from the space station, providing a powerful new tool to support science and research.

In the past few years at NAB, Ultra HD was the featured video technology. At this year’s show, high dynamic range (HDR) moved to centre stage. From production, to streaming, to the television, the industry is working to fill the holes in the value chain of delivery. Though there are

many HDR standards, the conversation at NAB seemed to focus on just two: HDR10 and Dolby Vision. There couldn’t have been a better example of the future of HDR with Sony’s display of their new hi-tech display monitor – the Canvas.

The impressive 8K by 2K, 9m x 3m Canvas uses surface-mounted light sources that Sony is calling Ultrafine LEDs, to drive large the high-contrast and HDR-ready display. The picture quality was amazing and this kind of technology

REPORT

the best of

|

2017

In Elvis Presley’s ode to Las Vegas he chanted: “Bright light city gonna set my soul on fire, got a whole lot of money that’s ready to burn, so get those stakes up higher.” The stakes were indeed high at NAB 2017 and 103 433 visitors packed the 1 million square metre exhibition space, which has become familiar territory for those attending the world’s largest event focused on the intersection of technology, media and entertainment.

could well replace the digital projector in cinemas sooner than we think.

The over-the-top video (OTT) trend has been gaining momentum for years, as Netflix, Amazon, Hulu and other companies demonstrate the demand for streaming video. But the trend took on a new dimension this year as internet giants like Google and Facebook used the show to highlight their own work in the broadcasting industry. The growth of social video has had content

creators, media brands, and marketers rethinking production and distribution.

Facebook has emerged as one of the most impactful players in this space – and the platform continues to evolve as publishers learn how to better leverage it.

The 2017 NAB Facebook Boot Camp featured presentations from Facebook staff, as well as creators who have found success on the platform. There were hundreds of practical tips, insightful data and best practices discussed to help

publishers make the most out of this new and exciting global broadcast platform.

Google hosted a number of sessions at NAB to discuss its virtual reality video efforts as well as its web video production and advertising technologies. Is this the future of television unfolding before us?

2017 is shaping up to be a real turning point for media-over-IP standards and practices, with the SMPTE ST 2100 standard inching closer to completion and a growing number of media facilities

building real-time IP production into their infrastructures. A number of major North American and European broadcast companies have indicated that they will commence real-time IP production infrastructure projects this year.

– Continued on page 26

May 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 25

2017 | REPORT

LIGHTING

With over 1 800 companies exhibiting their wares in the vast halls and corridors of the Las Vegas Convention Centre, it was a tough task getting to see everything over four days. There is a lot of new innovation out there, far too much to mention in a single sitting so I have chosen but a few of the items that caught my eye this year.

CAMERAS

360/VIRTUAL REALITY

There weren’t too many products that stopped me in my tracks at NAB, but this one from a burgeoning startup company got me intrigued: Illuminati’s wireless, smartphone-connected light and colour ambient and strobe meter. The meter takes an ambient reading of your location and sends stats straight to your phone.

Unlike traditional light meters, however, it’s not just taking exposure readings; it also measures the colour temperature and even chromaticity of your ambient so you can correct magenta/green shifts. Pretty cool!

This is a little beauty. Sony’s new UMC-S3C 4K camera offers an astonishing 0.004lx, expandable to ISO 50-409600 range on its full-frame 35mm Exmor sensor. The camera is compatible with E-mount lenses and can capture smooth 4K/29.97P/25P colour video in almost pitch-black conditions, from night-time starlight to poorly lit rooms. It’s extremely compact size and on-board recording capability make the camera ideal for remote PoV (Point of View), documentaries, wildlife and live action shooting, plus challenging environments where cabling or space are limited.

Everyone’s favourite action camera company GoPro were showing off Fusion, a 5.2K 30 fps spherical camera. Aimed for virtual reality environments, the Fusion features a new OverCapture creative solution that gives content creators the flexibility to produce conventional non-VR video and photos in HD quality.

HDR

A great addition to the monitor market from Australian innovators Atmos. They have continued their push into HDR monitoring with the super-sized 19-inch Sumo monitor-recorder, rated as a 1200-nit 10+ stop panel on a box offering 4K 12-bit raw or 10-bit ProRes or DNxHR recording. And because of its size, the Sumo is being promoted as a solution for onset workflow as well as an HDR grading monitor.

26 | SCREENAFRICA | May 2017

DRONES Content creators are always looking for fresh perspectives and new angles to propel their projects to new heights. The NAB Aerial Robotics and Drone Pavilion always delivers. Whist GoPro was pushing the reborn Karma in a desperate attempt to save face following its earlier model that kept crashing, it was DJI who stole the show with their drone innovation and their first 100-megapixel integrated drone imaging platform. The DJI M600 Pro drone, the ultra-smooth Ronin-MX gimbal and the Hasselblad H6D-100c camera was demoed as an unprecedented tool for precise, detailed and accurate aerial imaging. You will need to win the lotto to get this one but is just goes to show how the drone industry is changing and there are already murmurs of US news channels replacing their live ‘news copters’ for drones.

360° video has been on the rise of late, with more and more 360° camera rigs from established companies entering the space. Vimeo’s new 360° service launched at NAB does not simply introduce new features for videos on the site, but it also now supports the new content type. With 360° file sizes commonly four times larger than “flat” video, Vimeo’s support of uploads up to 8K and is the no-brainer destination for 360° creators.

DJI is improving that smooth silky look for ground images too. The latest from DJI, the Ronin 2, is a 3-axis camera stabiliser based on the company’s transformative gimbal technology, providing more power and torque to carry larger cameras. With an enlarged camera cage and 50mm extendable arms, its versatility can support everything from DSLRs to full cinematic camera and lenses up to 30 lbs.

REPORT

AUDIO

Sennheiser released its MKE 2 microphone for GoPro. The microphone is completely waterproof up to 1-metre and the included windjammer has been tested at speeds up to 100 kph to help reduce any unwanted ambient noise. It’s quick to install and perfect for HERO4 cameras, a version for the HERO5 is in the making, great for those surfing videos.

2017

STUDIO

Blackmagic wowed the crowds with its first of a kind ATEM Television Studio Pro HD. It’s a hardware control panel with the controls on it, and the inputs on the back of the unit so it’s more of a traditional, table top-type design. It has eight 1920x1080p60 HD-SDI inputs, and four of them can be switched to HDMI. Also, if you’re using Blackmagic cameras, you have controls for secondary colour correction.

It also has tally and talkback. Well done Blackmagic Design for another innovative product.

POST-PRODUCTION

Tiny package, big punch! If you’re a sound recordist, you already know what radio frequency (RF) interference can do to a production track. The ZAXCOM ZFR400 is a standalone device that records professional Broadcast Wave Format (BWF) or MP3 files directly to an internal micro-SD card. Measuring just 55.8mm x 40.6mm x 14mm and weighing 62g with the battery, it’s ideal for wiring talent when wireless transmission is unfavourable or when distance is an issue. The included rechargeable battery provides up to ten hours of runtime. This is a truly innovative device that you need in your sound kit.

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On the software front, there were three industry role players who had big announcements at NAB this year.

Blackmagic’s mission has been to make DaVinci Resolve a one-stop-shop for colour grading, editing and audio – what, did I hear you correctly…audio!

Oh yes indeed, DaVinci Resolve 14 now features a powerful post-production audio tool for film and broadcast. Basic features include sound editing, mixing and routing, professional bussing and multi-format mastering to 3D audio formats like 5.1, 7.1 Dolby and 22.2. Not only that—Blackmagic is dropping the price of the software from $999 to a $299 license and doing away with dongles. I have to make mention too of Blackmagic’s DaVinci Resolve Micro Panel – a high

Avid announced the release of Avid Media Composer®. First, a free version of the industrystandard video editing system. It’s powered by the Avid MediaCentral® Platform, so “First” users can also easily connect and collaborate with other aspiring creative and media professionals through the Avid Artist Community. The free version is limited however with four video tracks, eight audio tracks, and a host of built-in visual effects, transitions, colour correction presets and titling templates.

Not to be upstaged Adobe Systems released a major update for video in Adobe Creative Cloud delivering new features for graphics and titling, animation, polishing audio and sharing assets; support for the latest video formats, such as HDR, VR and 4K; new integrations with Adobe Stock; and advanced artificial intelligence capabilities powered

by Adobe Sensei. From what I have seen this huge upgrade puts Adobe (who are also celebrating their 25th anniversary) into a league of their own.

UNTIL NEXT TIME The NAB organisers wrapped it up perfectly, “Technology is evolving faster than humankind itself and we’re living in a world of our own invention.

Behaviour and business have merged to redefine content, workflows and revenue streams, fuelled by hybrid solutions and boundless connectivity that’s changing the very nature of how we live, work and play.” NAB is an exciting platform that offers an insight to the ways our industry is growing, adapting and transforming in an ever-changing world. In the words of the King himself’ “Viva Las Vegas!”

– Ian Dormer

quality, portable low profile panel that features three high resolution trackballs and 12 precision machined control knobs for accessing all essential primary colour correction tools, perfect for independent editors and colourists that need a truly portable solution.

Whenever I walked past, there were queues of enthusiasts at the Sound Devices stand eyeing out their new MixPre-3 and MixPre-6 multi-function audio devices. The MixPre series give you a mixer, a recorder, and a computer audio interface, all in one rugged box that will fit under your camera at a really reasonable price point and quality that is just unmatched. I’ve never seen a product generate such interest, everybody wanted one!

May 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 27

FESTIVALS & MARKETS | OPINION

Capitalising on the demand for TV content at the African Pavilion at MIPTV MIPTV has been under pressure for the past few years with attendance dropping and more and more companies deciding not to exhibit twice a year and opting to only exhibit at MIPCOM in October. Although this trend may make it seem like an event to be missed, in fact, these attendance figures make MIPTV an important opportunity for African TV content producers.

W

ithin this attendance trend, companies that are still attending MIPTV are reporting more business being done at the April TV market, as the number of sellers has plummeted far more than the number of buyers has, and as a result the ratio of buyers to sellers has increased to the delight of those sellers who have decided to continue to attend the waning market.

African TV content producers had even more opportunities at this past MIPTV with the launch of an African Pavilion entitled “Creative Africa,” that brought all African participants and companies into one space with a 60 per cent discount on accreditation and several branded spaces on offer at very low prices.

The Pavilion was a major highlight of this year’s event and from an exhibitor point of view, definitely created a space for deal-making and networking. With a common use area and well-staffed reception area at the entrance, a number of top African and South African

28 | SCREENAFRICA | May 2017

companies were on hand, with 32 African companies attending MIPTV and 61 participants in the Creative Africa Pavilion.

A host of major announcements relevant to the African market were also made during the event. Annecy International Animated Film Festival & Market/MIFA (Annecy MIFA), DISCOP Markets and the African Animation Network (AAN) announced a partnership to create the first ever panAfrican animation pitching competition called Annecy – MIFA Pitches Animation du Monde. The Annecy – MIFA Pitches Animation du Monde will comprise two rounds of semi-finals; the first at DISCOP Abidjan (30 May to 1 June 2017) and the second at DISCOP Johannesburg (25 to 27 October 2017).

Okuhle Media and Afrokaans Film and Television, both from South Africa, had a solid presence with branded table spaces, while an additional three companies had significant presence within the Pavilion with branded booths; Aforevo TV (Nigeria), AAA and

Written by Pascal Schmitz,

head of Acquisitions, AAA Entertainment Hoplite Entertainment (South Africa), and Stained Glass (South Africa).

The latter, Stained Glass Productions, were certainly the highlight of the African Pavilion, as they are expanding into the global market from their throne as queens of the soap slots. Their booth was beautifully arranged with a collage of their development projects on the walls and their slick presentations running on the LCD screen. They looked very prepared for the market and were offering quality international television projects including a remake of the classic 80’s TV series Shaka Zulu, that they have purchased the remake rights for from the SABC as well as a feature film that looks ripe for the international market right now.

Gugulethu Zuma from Stained Glass elaborated on their experience at MIPTV, “I would encourage South African producers to attend. It was an eye opening experience that gave me some important insights into the international market and current trends.”

South Africa certainly dominated the African Pavilion with four out of the five exhibiting companies hailing from SA. AAA Entertainment was also the only South African sales and distribution company exhibiting at the African Pavilion and representing some of the top independently owned television content like Quizzical Picture’s SAFTA winning Those Who Can’t and feature films such as Keeping Up with the Kandasamys. Mayenzeke Baza, head of Sales for AAA Entertainment had this

to say of the market, “This MIPTV saw buyers mostly enquiring about unscripted formats and content, as well as feature films and scripted series in the action genre. Sadly, we did not have enough local independently owned content in those categories, but our partnership with Hoplite Entertainment allowed us to offer the buyers international versions of what they were looking for.”

As more and more attention becomes focused on African content, African TV content producers need to take advantage of opportunities such as the Africa Pavilion at MIPTV. Although the costs of attending these events may seem prohibitive, South African companies need to take the leap of faith to get into the international content business or they will forever be making content for the broadcasters and not owning any rights to it.

It takes attendance at a few MIP events to get to understand what a specific market wants and how to get into the supply pipeline for that market, how to develop for it, budget for it and package content and projects. There are 218 TV content buying territories in the world and we are only really exploiting one, South Africa, and this is not sustainable in the long run. We have the ability, the skills and the hustle to export our IP and content to the world and we just need to think outside the local box and “maak a plan” like we were born to. – Pascal Schmitz

www.sa123.co.za

SPARK (SA) STAGE EQUIPMENT (PTY) LTD

Cameras & Accessories | CASE STUDY

Blackmagic Design URSA Mini Pro 4.6K review

Written by Garth de Bruno Austin, documentary filmmaker

Garth de Bruno Austin with the Blackmagic Design URSA Mini Pro 4.6K camera

It was February 2016 when I started to look for a cinema camera to use on my first feature documentary. It had to be comfortable on my shoulder, heavy enough for stability, have spectacular image quality, record in 4K and of course film in at least 120 frames per second (fps). It was a tall order, which meant that those requirements combined with an independent films’ budget had me soon purchasing the Blackmagic URSA Mini 4K, and so began my love affair with the URSA Mini cameras.

30 | SCREENAFRICA | May 2017

F

ast forward a year later and I finally had my hands on the new URSA Mini Pro (UMP). It was as if the 4K had grown up and I couldn’t be more excited to use it on my feature documentary here in Southern Africa. So over the past month, I’ve been filming with the UMP all over Southern Africa. I’ve put it through the roughest conditions imaginable; from filming in thick dust directly under Huey helicopter blades, light rain with high humidity, insane heat (45+ degrees Celsius) where the camera was also running constantly for five hours at a time and being dragged around the lowveld through the thorniest of bushes. The ease of use and images that came out of it were simply incredible, all in all I was extremely happy to be the new owner of the UMP. So lets get down to the nitty-gritty of the Blackmagic URSA Mini Pro 4.6K.

Talking Points Internal ND’s: The internal NDs are a huge improvement and an absolute time saver, as well as being cheaper for your hip pocket! With the URSA Mini 4K, I had to attach my R10 000 Lanparte Matte Box and schlep around a case full of NiSi filters which at R3 200 a piece weren’t cheap. With the new UMP, you won’t need to fork out money for any of these extras. The internal ND filters cut the Infra Red (IR) light waves so your greens will stay green, and that beautifully suggestive purple shirt your talent is wearing will remain that bright

shade of purple frustration (It’s a South African joke).

This is what the Blackmagic customers have been asking for and it is great to see a company listening to their end users. Some people, including myself, have experienced an interesting flare that appears in certain lighting conditions. I have spoken to the team at Blackmagic about this issue and they can confirm

CASE STUDY they’re aware of it and are currently working on a solution. From what they’ve told me, it’s only a handful of users who have experienced this type of flare so it may just be a certain batch that was affected.

Menu system:

well. I use the Rode NTG-2 microphone and there is a slight bit of hiss, however the most basic noise removal software removes it easily. I’ve been using Izotope Audio Editor and it effortlessly removes any slight hiss that is recorded. Any decent project will involve audio post processing, so don’t be worried that you have to tweak yours a little to get it sounding crisp.

Smaller Screen:

| Cameras & Accessories

so incredible. Combine it with the DaVinci Resolve software and your film is ready for a cinema screen.

Frame Rates: The UMP is capable of filming up to 120 FPS at 2K resolution on a cropped sensor mode. What is really amazing about this, is its capability to shoot 60 fps at 4.6K 12 Bit lossless RAW. Just to give you and idea of how crazy this is, each RAW frame is between 11 Mb/s and 13 Mb/s – that is about 320 Mb/s at 25 FPS. Now when you shoot that crisp image at 60 fps, lossless 4.6K RAW, that is a whopping 780 Mb/s.

My Lexar C-Fast cards are not quick enough to record this on one card, however there is an option for duel recording in the UMP menu system.

C-Fast & SD Cards:

Menus – they are there to make your life easy, to change and adjust the camera the way you want.

The UMP menu system is simple, yet powerful, giving you access to all the camera settings quickly.

This is essential for the fast paced work I’m currently faced with when filming my documentary.

Buttons: Personally this was not an issue for me as I spend most of my time looking through the viewfinder.

I can however see how some might not enjoy this smaller design, but it is most certainly not a deal breaker. For those who do not appreciate its smaller size, just remember this, size isn’t everything. If you want the bigger screen then you will be without all the bells and whistles such as the external B&W panel, which is great for displaying critical information while also being easy to read in direct sunlight.

There has been a slight issue with a visible grid on the internal screen, however I believe there is a firmware update coming in the future that will remove this.

This is one of the most useful feature updates, especially when you are strapped for card space and have some SD cards lying around. Now you can quickly change between C-Fast and SD cards with the literal switch of a button. However, there are limits with SD cards with one of those being that they are unable to record at 4.6K lossless raw. So to get the most out of the UMP I definitely recommend buying at least 2 C-Fast cards.

Sensor- ISO and Fixed Pattern Noise: Pushing the ISO to 1 600 on some UMP’s has resulted in FPN. Luckily, the camera I received is incredibly clean and from the forums I’ve read other users also have very little to no FPN. The buttons on any cinema camera are completely subjective, depending on what people have previously used and the layout of the buttons on those cameras, it will influence your likeability of the UMP button arrangement. However, once you use the buttons a few times you will find that their placement is intuitive and extremely easy to use.

The team at Blackmagic have really thought about the most used buttons of their users and have now included external controls for the ISO, shutter angle, on/off, white balance, slow motion and frames per second. This makes it much easier to quickly shoot those 120 fps slow motion shots us camera operators love so much. The addition of lock switches for the audio section of the controls also eliminates any accidental gain increase while your busy adjusting other controls.

Preamps:

From my experience so far, the audio signal is noticeably louder which means the preamps are doing their job

Overall User Experience:

Bit Depth:

What is bit depth you ask and does it even matter?

Yes it matters, well at least it does if you are filming for anything other than uploading your daily vlog to YouTube. This is why the portable DSLR and mirrorless cameras are so popular with the YouTube community as YouTube compresses all videos to an 8 bit file regardless of what bit depth you filmed in.

To put it simply, as you increase bit depth, you also increase the number of colours that can be represented. 8-bit colour is equivalent to approximately 16.7 million colours and 12-bit colour is comparable to having 68.7 billion colours to work with in post.

Increasing the bit depth results in better colour rendition. This is why the UMP with 12-bit colour is

It’s been great to upgrade to the Blackmagic URSA Mini Pro and at the price point they are selling it at, it’s hard to find a better cinema camera that comes with all the included features that the UMP has to offer. From my personal experience, it’s held up extremely well in the harsh conditions that Africa can throw at you. The image quality from the UMP is spectacular, the new design looks great and the external layout is intuitive to use. The other thing that sets Blackmagic apart is their support and online forums which is easily accessible to all their customers. – Garth de Bruno Austin

May 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 31

OTT & IPTV | OPINION

Written by Richard Boorman, head of Communications, Showmax

“What’s attracting people to internet TV? Amongst other things, bingewatching is a big deal. 73 per cent of US consumers, and nearly 90 per cent of Millennials and Gen Z say they bingewatch content.”

I

’ve had a few PR roles over the years and have variously been called spin doctor, evil spin doctor, and even Voldemort’s spokesman (yeah, I’m proud of that one). I’m pretty sure a few marketing colleagues also christened me that $#@% from PR after a particularly heartfelt rendition of my patented PR IS NOT FREE ADVERTISING sermon, but that’s another story.

What’s this got to do with internet TV? Journalists typically look for stories with tension and conflict – because that makes for interesting news. I’m often asked “how is Showmax possibly going to survive with X in the market?” or “aren’t you worried about competition from Y?” or “how much share are you stealing from Z?”. I’d love to be able to respond with a juicy headline-worthy quote about the impending blood bath, but the truth is far more boring.

The challenge I’ve got, given the poor reputation of the PR function (there’s irony for you), is selling the answer “I think we’re all going to get along just fine.”

For what it’s worth, the official answer to questions about how Showmax plans to compete with formidable global internet TV services with deep pockets and some damn good shows is: We don’t see this as a binary question – it’s not a winner-takes-all market. The evidence we see from other markets is that people are happy to sign up for more than one service as long as they get value from each.

Or to put it another way, as long as you have something people want to watch, and as long as your apps and delivery network do what’s expected of them, then you’ve got a seat at the table.

Rather than taking the PR guy’s word for it, a recent study by Activate predicted that by 2018, more than half of US subscription video users will have signed up to two or more paid services. Indeed, by 2020 that number will be more than 60 per cent.

Backing this up, GfK has found that the number of US consumers self bundling, or subscribing to more than one

32 | SCREENAFRICA | May 2017

subscription video service, has increased 50 per cent over the last three years.

Another point perhaps more relevant for Africa is that we genuinely do welcome the entrance of more services into our markets. Why? Because one of the biggest challenges we face is introducing an entirely new category and explaining to people what internet TV is, why they’d want it, and how they get it. Every time a new service enters, we actually get a bump up in our customer base thanks to the buzz and media coverage from the new guys.

Clearly it’s a gross oversimplification to say that we’ll be just fine because people are happy to sign up for more than one service. We still have to earn the right to survive and in our case we’re doing that through hyperlocalisation.

What’s that (other than a great PR buzzword)? Showmax’s chief product officer, Barron Ernst defines it as follows: “Hyperlocalisation is all about understanding needs and barriers at the granular local level. It obviously doesn’t make economic sense to build an entirely new service for each country, but we’ve found it’s possible to do more than just light touch localisation while still retaining scale benefits at the back end of the business.”

In practical terms hyperlocalisation involves things like introducing prepaid vouchers into SA retailers when every other service requires a credit card (and not everyone in SA has one). It means deep integration with local telcos – the add-to-bill options we’ve got with Vodacom and Telkom reduce friction and give us a foot in the door with millions more customers than we’d otherwise have access to. In Kenya, it means sorting out M-PESA payment and launching an entirely new tier of Showmax focused on local content at a really affordable price.

The great thing about this approach is the more you do it, the more adept you get at tearing up your product and business and rebuilding them to suit the unique needs of each country.

Over time, that organisational agility

Image credit: Mike Turner Photography

Internet TV: can we all just get along?

Richard Boorman

becomes a key competitive advantage.

A second question I’m often asked is whether internet TV is killing off satellite and cable. Clearly, if true there’s a juicy sibling rivalry story given our position in the Naspers stable alongside MultiChoice. The boring answer is that so far, we’re not seeing it. If anything Showmax appears to be additive rather than a replacement.

The recently published 11th edition of Deloitte’s Digital Democracy Survey had some interesting stats that reinforce this point. First, the good news about the growth of internet TV. Almost half (49 per cent) of US consumers now subscribe to paid streaming video services, up from 31 per cent in 2012. Importantly, the proportion of subscribers rises to around 60 per cent when looking at just Gen Z, Millennials, and Gen X. What’s attracting people to internet TV? Amongst other things, bingewatching is a big deal. 73 per cent of US consumers, and nearly 90 per cent of Millennials and Gen Z say they bingewatch content. Yet despite the popularity of binge-watching and the big increase in subscription video in the last few years, according to Deloitte subscriptions to cable or satellite TV have held pretty much steady in the US over the past few years at around three quarters of households. In other words, internet TV isn’t killing the cable/satellite TV star.

Similarly, the 2016 BARB survey found

the same thing in the UK. Households with Sky Movies (now called Sky Cinema), something that in theory competes directly with internet TV services, are according to BARB actually more likely to have a subscription to an internet TV service than households that don’t have Sky Movies. In the words of the survey: “The picture is clear: SVOD homes are not swapping out their traditional TV for SVOD, they are using SVOD services to get even more of what they already have.”

So what’s my rousing conclusion?

As much as I’d love to tell you a mediafriendly story about a bloody fight to the death, revolution, and the birth of a spanking new golden age of internet TV, in truth things are a little more prosaic.

Internet TV is definitely changing how people consume TV, and it’s even changing the shows themselves as writers and producers embrace the binge and design shows to be consumed in marathon chunks. Should journalists be poised to cover the epic battle between internet TV services until the one true winner emerges? Should they start prepping their obits for satellite and cable TV? Nah, probably not on both counts.

On the upside (or downside if you’re in PR), nothing ever runs to plan and no doubt I’ll be needing my tap dancing shoes soon enough. – Richard Boorman

Thought leadership

| OTT & IPTV

The future of OTT Written by Anshul Gupta, head of Marketing, MediaGuru

Over-the-top content (OTT) service providers like Hulu, Netflix, and Amazon are showing massive uptake by consumers who want to view content as per their choice of time and platform. According to Juniper Research titled Mobile & Online TV & Video: OTT, IPTV & Connected Markets 20152019, OTT subscription is forecasted to generate $31.6 billion in revenue by 2019.

A

s traditional broadcasters face increased competition from OTT service providers, MediaGuru takes a look at the future of OTT.

New providers in the market While countries like the United States have already adopted OTT and are on the verge of saturation, developing countries with high mobile penetration and adoption rates of pay-TV and broadband are witnessing increasing popularity of OTT services. Digital TV Europe Research estimates that developing countries like Eastern Europe, Middle East & Africa will see greater growth in revenues and that of Latin America will nearly triple from 2015.

Driven by rising mobile data usage, mobile is becoming an important medium to deliver OTT service in East European countries, Middle East & Africa.

Pay-TV providers, mobile operators, broadcasters and media companies are expanding their OTT services in these regions either by launching their OTT services or partnering with regional

OTT players. For example, UAE-based mobile operator Etlisat has introduced eLife ON, Saudi Arabian Mobily has mView, and Pay-TV operator OSN has launched GO across MENA.

SVOD is catching up Viewers are increasingly opting for OTT services like Hulu, Netflix, and Amazon Video, which gives them the freedom to choose the content they want to consume across different platforms.

Millennials are adopting subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) services faster than their older counterparts. A report from BI Intelligence highlights younger viewers watch four times as much video content online than aged viewers. The popularity of SVOD services like YouTube, Sling TV, and PlayStation Vue further underlines this fact.

For SVOD services, usability is the key. Companies need to innovate to leverage OTT and SVOD services to reach out to more viewers. For example, YouTube has launched offline viewing for consumers to download videos and

watch it at their convenience – even when there is no mobile connectivity.

With the first screen of the millennial being the mobile screen, digitisation provides a huge opportunity for SVOD providers to grow their business.

Content creators and marketers can reap the benefits from SVOD adoption. Content creators can profit from the surge in the short-form video, while marketers can capitalise on advanced product placements.

More connected TVs Thanks to connected TVs, which include streaming devices like Apple TV, gaming consoles, Web-enabled TV sets, and TVs connected to the internet by laptops in the group, monetisation is also growing. According to FreeWheel, an ad-serving company whose clients include major video providers such as AOL, Crackle, Fox, NBCUniversal, Viacom, and Vevo, more than one-third of monetisation was led by OTT devices.

An eMarketer report estimates that by 2018, 191.4 million or 58.2 per cent of the U.S. population will use a connected TV device to access the internet.

Changing fundamentals of content creation OTT has unlocked transformational changes in how content is created and consumed. The availability of unlimited content space has given more freedom to experiment and has provided audiences for all kinds of content.

Although most are amateurs, some are earning millions of dollars, while contributing to the depth and breadth of content available to consumers.

Further, the increase of mobile

and streaming access has enhanced consumers’ ability to choose what they watch and where and when they watch it.

With the rise in mobile use, the demand for short-form, high-quality content, also called ‘snackable content’ has also witnessed a massive growth. Consumers are turning to live, user-generated video and “citizen journalists” for news related to developing events or stories. For example, The Young Turks, which offers short-form news videos on relevant topics around the world every day, has become a key news destination for millennials.

The launch of Facebook Live in April 2016, which makes it easier “to create, share, and discover live videos” further highlights the changing fundamentals of content creation. Content creators are also focusing on introducing contextual parameters for content discovery.

Factors like mood and current affairs are being taken into account apart from their viewing preference while making a content recommendation to the viewers.

To ensure successful adoption of OTT, service providers must address three critical challenges – aggregation, subscription churn, and transparency.

As consumers look to fulfil the 3Ws – watch what they want, when they want to, and where they want – OTT providers not only need to manage content but also create new content and recreate legacy content to retain subscribers. Proper archiving, digitisation and tagging of content will help in aggregation while generating content across various formats will provide shared experience across devices and help in customer retention. – Anshul Gupta

May 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 33

OTT & IPTV | OPINION

The rise of the screens – on-demand causes multi-industry disruption Digital entertainment on demand is set to disrupt broadcasting, traditional media, telecoms, marketing and more. There’s no going back.

Written by Stephen Watson,

MD of on-demand solutions specialist, Discover Digital showed success and influence was not determined by the size of the screen.

New opportunities, new bedfellows

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hether you’re talking streamed linear broadcasting (accessing scheduled TV channels online), VOD (video on demand available online), SVOD (subscription video on demand where subscribers pay monthly to access content from a bouquet), TVOD (transactional video on demand where content is rented per movie or series), hybrid VOD or even EST (electronic sell through, where viewers download content to own it), digital entertainment now gives viewers unprecedented levels of choice, and they like it.

Next-gen entertainment arrives Internationally, multi-screened entertainment experiences have become mainstream, led predominately

by Millennials and Gen Z youth and underpinned by affordable high speed bandwidth. Nielsen reports that globally, 31 per cent each of Generation Z and millennial respondents pay an online service provider for content, compared with 24 per cent of the older Generation X, 15 per cent of Baby Boomers and 6 percent of Silent Generation respondents. Additionally, 40 per cent of Gen Z and 38 per cent of millennial respondents who subscribe to cable or satellite say they have plans to cancel their service in favour of an online-only option.

YouTube and other social video platforms paved the way for this and encouraged a culture of short form, shareable user generated content. Whilst this content is not necessarily of premium quality, it nonetheless attracts millions of viewers seeking authentic clips of real-life where the need for an emotional experience can be fulfilled instantly.

In South Africa, YouTube was the first video on demand service to heavily influence viewership habits and in 34 | SCREENAFRICA | May 2017

doing so fundamentally changed the way content generated revenues from advertising and subscriptions. Now, the country’s viewers are following international trends by seeking premium digital content customised to their own preferences. As eyeballs turn to new screens, new industry players and marketing professionals are sitting up and paying attention.

The enormous success and meteoric rise of YouTube stars ranging from Justin Bieber to Caspar Lee and Suzelle DIY and the multitude of ‘Tube stars’ in between, proved to advertisers that the millions of eyeballs it attracted – often more than traditional TV – could make the on demand industry enormously lucrative, not least amongst the ever changing and fickle high spend influencer youth market.

A further benefit of this success was the emergence of new local filmmakers and celebrities, producing accessible and desirable content that slowly began to change the face of the local industry. Rather than equating a successful launch through the prestige of securing a big screen cinema release, these various platforms

The field is open for new business, and traditional players and start-ups are moving to capitalise on this new trend. Discover Digital, the longeststanding digital content on-demand company in South Africa, is bringing to market an on-demand content hub offering a broad bouquet of premium local and international entertainment and educational content and linear channels. Discover Digital is taking this new service to market in partnership with mobile operators and big consumer brands that may opt to offer the service as a value add or add their own branding to the service.

The new multi-screen environment presents huge revenue and value-add opportunities for telecoms operators.

Pyramid Research noted recently that in Europe, an increasing consumer appetite for on-demand video services presents an opportunity for operators to complement their core portfolio of services and add new revenue streams. The company said that adoption of subscriptionbased OTT video and VOD services has grown steadily in the UK over the past two years, reaching 37 per cent and 23 per cent of pay-TV users respectively in the second quarter of 2016.

Discover Digital is aggressively entering the African market through partnerships with mobile operators, aiming to take fully converged linear on-demand news and entertainment streaming services to viewers across the continent.

But Discover Digital is not alone in pioneering the possibilities for ondemand content. Netflix and Showmax are making inroads in South Africa and across the continent. Naspers is reported to be seeking partnerships with mobile network operators across sub-Saharan Africa to boost Showmax.

The company has already concluded a partnership with Safaricom in Kenya and says talks are underway with other telcos. MTN Nigeria recently announced its converged OTT VOD service for subscribers, while Ericsson is actively securing content deals for its Nuvu VOD

service, which it is taking to Africa in partnership with mobile operators.

There are opportunities for smaller, niche players to enter the market too. Pride TV, a VOD channel for Africa’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community, recently announced its launch.

VOD is set to create new bedfellows as content specialists, software firms, telcos, media companies and big brands partner to tap into the potential.

Even the hospitality sector is seeing the potential for VOD services.

In the world of sport, Rider Research reports that 2016 was the year live sports went over the top, with mainstream live sports coverage moving from TV to the internet. Rider cited a Consumer Technology Association study as saying a third of sports fans now want to watch sports programming on their cellphones and tablets. In South Africa another brand-VOD service partnership saw Discover Digital breaking traditional moulds for sports event coverage, with a simultaneous live stream of the SuperGP Championship to the SuperGP website and the organisation’s Facebook page, presenting new options for web page branding, advertising sales and monetising of archived content.

Behind the scenes While the world of VOD presents heady new business opportunities, on-demand digital is not a goldmine in Africa – yet.

Start-up costs in this space could be prohibitive for would-be on-demand service providers, and newcomers must seek mutually beneficial partners and new business approaches to make the business viable. Content licensing and screening rights issues can hamper content offerings, while issues such as technical quality, payment gateways and recommendation engines must also be addressed. And these investments must be made ahead of mass adoption when economies of scale are achieved.

VOD is definitely having an impact on audiences but unfortunately this remains limited to the high LSM, high spend end of the market and therefore is still relatively small. It means the ability to generate revenue in the short term through subscriptions is extremely

OPINION

Early adopters are giving VOD firms some idea of the viewing trends to expect in future. In terms of storytelling and content we are seeing at the top end of the market the usual mainstream genres – one-hour dramas, half hour comedies, reality, soaps, documentary and movies. However, we are seeing a growth in short form content too.

Webisodes, skits to educational ‘how to’ videos are proving popular across a continent where mobile is the overwhelmingly dominant device and data access is expensive and/or limited.

Short form content is giving legs to a great variety of content for all members of the family and the way content is packaged and offered is changing. Audiences no longer want to be prescribed extensive, expensive bouquets of channels that they may only watch a small percentage of, or that overwhelmingly do not speak to their

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Not only does the VOD revolution present room for advertisers to attract a multitude of eyeballs and click throughs, but it also brings the opportunity for brands to sponsor select content packages and specific titles on the service – and in doing so make use of the characters and film studio creative collateral without incurring any licensing costs. This makes the space enormously exciting and racked with potential for advertisers to offer their clients bespoke ‘money can’t buy’ experiences for their customers.

Advertisers also benefit from the most

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sought after campaign result – attaining individual relationships and granular knowledge about their specific customers – who they are, their behaviour and habits, and their demographics. This is all information not available via traditional television advertising. Cost of sales and acquisitions become clearly defined and the richness of the results ensures effective targeted future campaigns rather than wastage through broad market spray and pray approaches.

Viewers today want freedom of choice. They want customisable, affordable access to movies, news, sports, music and TV series wherever they are. Disruptive new models are breaking the traditional broadcast and pay-TV moulds by letting viewers choose what packages and genres they want, what subscription models they prefer, and even how they’d like to pay.

VOD delivers. – Stephen Watson

interests; they want to be able to choose and so smaller packs of niche focused content or channels are becoming more readily available. Where some services will offer niche packs of programming as part of a general content offering, other services will launch an entire service aimed solely at a specific market.

We will see more of these services and offers emerging and again this will have benefit to advertisers because brands can align themselves far more strategically with their target markets.

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the benefits are clearly understood, South Africans will begin to take up paid-for ondemand services in greater quantities and I believe this will then start to significantly shift broadcast ad budgets and spend.

Film

limited and therefore high-cost VOD businesses are running, and will continue to run, at a loss for several years.

Because of the enormous expense of content rights, marketing and technical development, and the slow uptake of services, VOD is most certainly a long term business strategy and so one needs to be able to remain sustainable for a lengthy period before beginning to turn a profit. The casualties in this industry to date – The Node and Vidi (Altec and Times Media respectively) – have also shown that big listed companies don’t necessarily have the stomach or dedicated financial resources to stay in the game and so success in the VOD space heavily relies on being nimble, cost efficient, remaining dedicated to your cause and really to think out the box in terms of long term sustainable business strategies.

Those that do will strive and thrive.

The emphasis is on long-term. South Africans tend to resist new technologies initially – not trusting elements like e-commerce, recurring subscriptions and feeling uncomfortable taking their viewing experience into their own control and away from scheduled linear TV. But like all major digital trends, once

| OTT & IPTV

Te l e p h o n e : + 2 7 ( 0 ) 1 1 0 2 5 3 1 8 0

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TRAINING | Advertorial

Wits expands its Film and Television postgraduate offering The Film and Television Division within the University of the Witwatersrand’s School of Arts continues to expand its postgraduate study opportunities with a variety of degrees suited to both professional filmmakers and career academics interested in furthering their studies in this field.

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its University continues to enhance its global reputation and is currently ranked in the top two institutions of higher learning on the African continent in all major published rankings.

Building on its successful undergraduate BA (Film and Television) degree which continues to grow in response to demand from students, the Film and Television division has expanded its postgraduate offerings at various levels of study. The Honours degree allows access to the postgraduate level with the minimum requirement of a Bachelor of Arts degree.

Across all degrees, focus is split between practice based research and theoretical enquiry. On the practical side, the Honours degree in Film and Television offers students production experience in Documentary and Experimental films. The course also offers both theoretical and practical components in Screenwriting, Post-production, Cinematography and Sound Design. A diverse range of topics in the form of Research Projects are available including Short Formats

for online content, the Fact and Fiction course, as well as, the theoretical option of researching and writing a long essay.

Further study at a Masters (MA) level is suited to early or mid-career professionals who are looking for a deeper theoretical understanding of the field alongside a practical application of the film and television craft. For current students and new applicants interested in furthering their academic studies, the MA degree in the field of Film and Television comprises a variety of options to suit every need.

Those focused on a purely theoretical body of research may opt for the straight written dissertation which is conducted with an assigned supervisor in their chosen area of interest. For those looking to combine creative work with critical enquiry, the MA degree by course work offers a wide selection ranging from Narrative Screenwriting, Short Fiction Film to Documentary Production and also includes a written research report.

A successful candidate for the Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) degree would be a researcher who is motivated to specialise

Students being trained in the studio at the highest level in the study of film and television. Through independent research, also conducted under supervision, Doctoral students may choose between two options. Students with an existing body of recognised creative work to their name may apply to be accepted for the Creative PhD degree. This requires a written theoretical component alongside the production of equivalent creative work. Doctoral students also have the option to apply for the PhD by Dissertation that requires purely written theoretical research. Both options are evaluated at the highest level and are expected to make an original contribution to knowledge in the field of study.

Head of Film and Television, Dr Tanja Sakota points out that the increased focus on postgraduate degrees in the field of Film and Television “is in line with the university’s intention to remain locally relevant while ensuring that our graduate students are also globally competitive

through various international collaborations across the African continent and the world.”

In keeping with this goal, the division continues to build on its established international outreach programmes with initiatives aimed at the postgraduate level. Past successes include important inroads in developing an African practice of filmmaking through a Masters filmmaking exchange with the ALLE Arts School at the University of Addis Ababa in Ethiopia.

As of this year, Wits Film and Television students in the Masters and Doctoral programmes will be able to apply to RISE, an international exchange programme focusing on Intercultural Perspectives.

Residencies under this project enable research through conferences, exhibitions and creative practice at participating institutions in Poland, South Africa, United Kingdom, Italy and the Czech Republic.

Sponsorship for this postgraduate exchange has been secured until 2020.

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| POST-PRODUCTION

All things

POST May 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 37

POST-PRODUCTION

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The changing face of post Post-production has come a long way. I remember the days of cutting 2” Quadruplex tape with the aid of a blade, a microscope and fine iron filings! And if film was the originating format, having to telecine using a photoconductive machine with very little colour correction capabilities – and this was state of the art back then!

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“A lot of us have gone through difficult times and change in the market requirements will force change in the supply market. I foresee that the post-production process may be required to be more directly or indirectly involved in production at some stage but it’s a difficult one to predict accurately…” – Steve Harris Written by Andy Stead

he big changes came with Flying Spot telecine’s with colour correction and non-linear off line editing. Who remembers endless EDL’s and hoping and praying that the EDL would match the online edit? Nowadays of course most of this has changed and with the phenomenal technology spurt into the digital domain, film cameras are virtually a thing of the past and 4K origination with its infinite range of adjustments and imaging is the norm.

So too with post-production. Large facilities opened. They had the ability to transfer negative and grade it. They could also provide all the required off line and on line editing, digital effects and sound post-production facilities, and provide deliverables under one roof. The capital outlay was huge. Many

items of equipment cost several million rands and thereby precluding small time competition. This also changed over time and currently for commercial post-production in the main, these large all-in-one post-production facilities are almost a thing of the past.

Bladeworks Steve Harris has an interesting take. “I think that Bladeworks is one of the last two post-production

| POST-PRODUCTION

facilities for commercials in the country,” he says. “There are still a few smaller facilities that offer boutique type services, but no one offers the whole package as Bladeworks does and I doubt there will be a need for this going forward...

Bladeworks will keep a core of talented people as we always have, so we won’t be out of television commercials but the heydays of commercial-making are no-longer. The simple fact is that agencies have gone in-house, and offline companies are, largely, completing the process in-house. I think there is still hope for larger local post-production facilities in terms of long-form work.”

“A lot of us have gone through difficult times and change in the market requirements will force change in the supply market. I foresee that the post-production process may be required to be more directly or indirectly involved in production at some stage but it’s a difficult one to predict accurately… But times are tight so money is tight, and we have had to regroup to deal with the reduction in work and budgets. An interesting ride is ahead for advertising, and the supply chain to advertising,” he comments.

Whilst this may apply to commercial post-production, how do things look on the long-form front? Refinery Cape Town’s Lauren van Rensburg is positive: “The group purchased Waterfront Film Studios (WFS) in the middle of last year, which included the post-production arm. Thereafter massive renovations were done to get the facilities up to spec. The teams from WFS and Searle Street Post Production (SSPP) were then merged as part of the restructure. We moved in September and the decision was made to rebrand as Refinery Cape Town. This made the most sense in terms of the history of post-production here at 1 Port Road.”

“We are a generalist facility. We run two DI grading suites for both film and television. The cinema grading suite now includes a fully post-production calibrated 4K Barco monitor. We do still service commercials, but have experienced a downturn in this market. We are strongest on dailies processing for the international clients and deliveries and finishing for our local market.”

“I think there is always a negative perception when it comes to the local market, that being a larger

facility we are more expensive. We aren’t,” she continues, “And our experience in fact saves producers on their bottom line. We have a good split on the work – the international clients mostly utilise a different set of services to the local filmmakers…”

“There is a realisation that with the post rebate there are more opportunities to finish here than just the VFX work which has also seen a sharp increase over the last two years. We don’t have a large VFX team in Cape Town, but our Johannesburg branch has an extensive VFX team, and that is certainly an area we will look into in the future,” she concludes.

Warner Bros – I am focusing on local content – local features as I believe there is a need for cost effective quality postproduction… The barriers of entry have been dropping for years and anyone can set up in their spare room – but are they able to do deliverables and will they be accepted internationally.

These days it’s not so much about the technology but about the people.”

“Sound is more difficult for Pop Up Post to handle as suitably treated rooms are required for sound mixing. There are several sound facilities both in Cape Town and Johannesburg that have spare capacity and there are many sound editors available, so once again for me it is about matching the right person to the production and then finding suitable space for them to work,” he continues, “And there are many studios available in Cape Town – I think we have more Dolby Atmos mixing studios than cinemas in the Cape at present!”

“I think large facilities have their place in the filmmaking landscape globally – but in South Africa, unless they are

very busy, the overheads are just too large. There is a lot of work around in Cape Town at the moment and there are several movies being shot, but again most of the post goes overseas. Keeping overseas crews here for extended periods does make economic sense with the extra 25 per cent DTI rebate on all the post and we have the people and equipment here to do it. I don’t think there is anything overseas that you can’t get here, but big studio productions feel more comfortable working with post crews they know and facilities they are familiar with, which is why so much post returns to LA or London.”

There seems little doubt that by continually improving the standard and skills of our local post-production offerings, we will gain the trust of international producers and more and more productions will choose to finish here – and we have the tools and skills to compete world wide... – Andy Stead

One individual who is bucking this trend is well known post-production supervisor Barry Strick.

Enter Pop Up Post: “It started with an idea to start a post-production crew agency in Cape Town,” says Strick, “So a year ago I founded Post Production South Africa, partnering with accountant and tax practitioner Michele Bailie.

Our initial intention was to provide an agency and support structure for creative crew – editors, assistants, VFX crew and sound editors… Our new concept is what I call a Pop Up post facility. I don’t have permanent space or equipment so I work with Worx Digital, who have a lot of high-end hardware available and technical expertise in the form of Reg Nance-Kivell, and are able to provide everything I need for high-end digital cinema post-production. So I rent office space short term, Worx comes in and puts in all the kit, and I use my crew from the agency to complete the package. We literally Pop Up and create a post facility for the duration of the project. When the project is completed we simply send the equipment back and effectively scale down until the next project,” he says.

“Doing this, the overheads are kept at an absolute minimum as nothing is permanent, and if the client has space in their own offices we can even set up there so there are huge cost savings for the client. I am able to undercut a traditional large post facility by as much as 40 per cent… Since there is somewhat of a monopoly regarding big post facilities in Cape Town there was a need to do a bit of lateral thinking to secure work from the only large Post House here,” he adds.

“I am not pitching myself as able to handle big NBC/Universal type action movies, and trying to do dailies for May 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 39

POST-PRODUCTION | Thought Leadership

Outrunning the lion: Future proofing oneself in an ever-changing post-production industry There’s an age-old story of two men walking along an African path, when they come across a lion. The first man calmly puts his backpack down and slips on the running shoes he’s been carrying. The second man laughs and says: “You’ll never out run a lion.” To which the first man responds: “I don’t need to outrun the lion, I just need to outrun you.”

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his is a great story when you’re the guy with the running shoes.

But there comes a point in each of our lives when we look down and we’re the ones with the backpack at our feet, all packed up and ready to be shipped out of the industry.

Lions come in many shapes and forms, but in post-production the king of the jungle has always been technology.

Whether we like it or not our industry is so closely tied to technology that when it raises its magnificent head we all feel the ground beneath us shift.

In the past we could future proof ourselves through a sizeable investment in technology, today that same type of investment has more chance of sinking us. Simply put, the lion can no longer be owned.

Over the last number of years we have seen an exponential increase in industries around the world succeeding in becoming rental based, for the very practical reason that the gaps between the swells in technology are becoming shorter and shorter.

And it no longer makes sense to own technology that in all likelihood will be outdated before it is paid off.

However, to say that we find ourselves in a battle against technology is like man fighting his maker. Post-production only exists because of technology.

The question is not whether we can see the future; it is whether we are willing to embrace it. Unfortunately though, for many the cost is too high and they need to shut their gates and hide behind their

40 | SCREENAFRICA | May 2017

long established walls in order to survive.

At points of change like these, what is best is always dependent on which side of the equation you find yourself on. We love technology when it benefits us, but loathe it when it costs us. It’s our raw human default; we want what is best for us.

Fortunately or not, technology has shifted to side with the underdogs and we can no longer afford to hold the gates to our exclusive industry shut. If we do, we will one day wake to find ourselves in the middle of a wide-open field clasping to our wrought iron gates after all the walls around us have crumbled.

There should be no reason to fear technological progress unless your identity is rooted in the fact that you have it and others don’t. If that is your unique selling point then you have every reason to fear. Technology is a great servant, but a horrible master.

With shifts in technology comes not only fear but also opportunities. For example, thanks to technology we all have increased opportunity to reach out and pull in those processes that eat into our budgets. Clients are getting in house agencies, agencies are setting up production arms, production companies are putting in edit suites, edit suites are grading and onlining and online suites are delivering media… and in some cases clients are just deciding to do it all themselves. I would however propose an alternative way forward, one that might have similar results, but a completely different approach.

Written by Anthony Lee Martin,

film editor, Deliverance Post Production

Instead of waking up tomorrow with the sole purpose of pulling in all the processes that nibble at our back pockets, I think there is a much more important task that needs to take place if we are to thrive, not just survive. We need to learn the skills and processes of those that precede us in the filmmaking process.

As I’ve studied and grown to understand the importance of each of these skills, I have found that I am better equipped to serve both my clients and my suppliers.

As an editor I don’t just read blogs and articles on post-production, I listen to podcasts on cinematography, read books on directing actors and practice screen writing.

Film has always been an allencompassing art form and advances in technology have brought us to the point where the need to be a jack of all skills and a master of one is no longer preferential, but increasingly necessary. “If I am just an editor in five years, I’ll be obsolete…”

A couple of years ago as I observed how many parts of the process were being absorbed into others workflows I wondered how far my shoes would take me. More recently though, I’m starting to wonder if it’s possible to run barefoot.

I realised that if I am reliant on shoes, then I need a bag, and bags weigh me down. If I could train myself to run in a way that wasn’t’ reliant on external factors I would have no need to ever fear coming across the lion again. Besides running barefoot encourages transparency, vulnerability and courage. All of which are amazing characteristics to possess when stepping into unchartered territory.

It’s amazing to think that shoes…

I mean technologies, that once cost upwards of four million rand, are now available with ten times the speed and power for free.

Sorry, did I mention it’s free!

As the world around us changes and we continue to do the same things we’ve always done and expect to see the same results we become the foolish ones. Technology is shaking the ground beneath us and we would be foolish to not engage with, learn from and adopt it when we can no longer afford to stand still.

When it becomes detrimental to your clients for you to hold your position

you need to change your position or be prepared to lose your clients.

There are companies all around us working hard to expose themselves and their clients to new and exciting technologies. While we kick our feet up and look back over our gated cities full of ageing processes and technologies a new wave is rising over the horizon.

We cannot get angry at technology for progressing when we are the ones who have locked ourselves up in our grey rooms with our heads in the sand. We need to realise that the greatest opposition to our success is ourselves, not technology.

I count it not only my responsibility, but my privilege to open the gate of this beautiful industry to the new exciting waves of technology that are shaking the ground beneath us.

It’ll take hard work, but as they say: “hard-work beats talent 100 per cent of the time when talent stops working hard.”

I’ll need to embrace honesty when I don’t know, acceptance when things change and an aptitude for knowledge as they do.

Future filmmakers will live as vagabonds, owning very little and carrying with them no more than their chosen skillset and a bag of choice tools. We need to learn to live light if we are to survive the future.

In the past those who owned the technology enabled our successes. Today as technology increasingly encourages us to run barefoot, our destinies are in our own hands, and although clients may come to you for a great deal, they’ll stay with you for a great job.

“See a man skilled at his labour, he will stand before kings, he will not stand before obscure men.” – King Solomon.

Those that stand before the kings of the future will not be those that spend their time and energy fighting the lion, but rather those that focus developing their skills, the highest of which is an appetite for learning.

May we stop fighting the lion and let it lead and most importantly, may we learn to run barefoot. – Anthony Lee Martin WEBSITE: www.anthonyleemartin.com INSTAGRAM: anthonyleemartin

OPINION

The editor: an engaged voyeur

S.A.G.E.

Early in my career I edited the story of a brother and sister both suffering from the same rare heart condition, ARVD. I worked with the footage for about six months. The sister, the oldest, fell ill first and badly needed a heart transplant. When just months from a possible and terrible end her first potential donor failed, the heart was bruised and she was told to wait for another donor. Her brother, also suffering from the same condition, showed such compassion and understanding, especially for a 15-year-old boy. Everyone was deeply moved. Then she got a donor – her transplant was a success and her recovery, miraculous.

friends, and like a friend you learned to accept their quirks. You got to know them, but they didn’t get to know you.

The work of an editor is to render a three dimensional person in a two dimensional world. The depth of the craft, in terms of character, lies in piecing together shot scenes to create a whole, consistent and cohesive person. I pawed over the footage and I made him. I made this young man from what I saw in the footage as I got to know him. I made him so an audience could know him too; know him from a crafted series of episodes, which were made from representative scenes that were shot of his lived reality.

I made him and knew him but never laid eyes on him in real life. I had met his father, and sister, once in passing when they came to see the director. But in the edit suite, while I was alone, I bonded with a young man that was so positive and graceful, even as he swelled with water retention and as his weak heart pumped feebly in his chest. I saw his father tear up as he said ‘a dad is meant to fix things, that’s what dads are for’.

In our story the sister and brother both got hearts. They both lived through this disease. It had been fixed, kind of. Until, after the documentary series was done and had been aired, the young man died.

His body had rejected the heart and a subsequent infection was too much for him. I got the news abruptly in an email.

I didn’t know how to reconcile the deep sadness that I felt. Mourning the loss of someone I had never known, but knew so well. I had only the memories of what was captured on screen. The young man I knew existed for me in HD, not in the flesh. My heart was heavy and I wanted to reach out to his family and say ‘I know your son. He was amazing.

He was a fighter’. But they didn’t know me and they didn’t know how intimately I knew them. They had real lives and my relationship with them was not real.

This is the strange thing about the

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hortly after this her brother fell ill, as if waiting until after his sister had time to recover. He got very, very sick. Luckily and without a moment to spare he too received a donor, a heart from a middle-aged woman. I was editing the documentary series as it unfolded in real life. Getting footage of the transplants shortly after they were actually done. I shared the experiences of this family’s life. I journeyed with them. Yes, so did the audience, the viewers at home watching episode one, two, three and four. But I saw the raw footage, the 4.5 TBs of raw footage. I developed a soft spot for the brother, and his spirit. But I never met him.

As editors we all know that feeling.

When you suddenly hear a familiar laugh, you look over and see someone you know so well. You recognise exactly the inflection of their voice, the way they quickly run their sentences on, or their breathy words. And you realise you know them because you have edited them: an interview perhaps, or watched hours of their birthday party. Watched them, at least, make a cup of tea ‘for cutaways’ and as they spill the milk they awkwardly turn to camera (ruining the shot) and ask ‘you’ll edit this out, right?’ You have heard them say ‘Can I start again?’’ or watched them puzzle as the director stops them and explains to ‘please start your answer with my question’. You have hung out with them in the edit suite trying to slice their rambling sentences, attempting to cut around their discomfort from the camera.

You’ve spent time together almost like

| POST-PRODUCTION

Written by Dr Nikki Comninos, ‘invisible art’ of editing. It involves restraint, sometimes in moments of deep connection. This restraint is in relation to the footage, and in the interaction with the director – a delicate balance of helping to create structure and channelling a vision, but not taking over.

It is having your own sense of ownership of a project and understanding when to concede. It is collaboration. And in this it is also knowing a character for yourself, quietly, intimately, through the screen and not through real life. It does occupy strange space, being an editor.

My partner is a DOP and in his work he travels and sees it all, makes real connections, meets people, makes Facebook friends with them... We sometimes work on the same projects and reflect on the characters together – his observances from real life interaction and mine from watching the footage over and over again. Sometimes the way a character says a sentence repeats on me like a song stuck in my head, such an obvious trait but not necessarily something that sticks with him. For him, details not caught on camera, like things about their houses and the visceral experience of actually being there linger.

The facilities of each craft require and create our different relationships with the characters we work with. I find this interesting, and necessary. A DOP needs to put a character at ease, make them comfortable to share. They need to have a felt relationship. While the editor lives in a hermetic world, ever cautious of staying close to the truth while also aware that a character is being actively constructed. The editor breathes life into a character on screen, and in this you imbue them with part of yourself. An editor needs a certain amount of critical distance that those on set cannot afford to have. It helps the editor ‘kill the babies’ as they say, but it doesn’t stop you from growing attached. – Nikki Comninos

May 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 41

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e.tv’s Broken Vows media screening On 6 April 2017, e.tv held a VIP media screening of its new daily drama series Broken Vows. The star-studded black-tie affair took place at the lavish Four Season Hotel The Westcliff in Johannesburg.

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Press screenings – Origins: The Journey of Humankind and Genius FOX Networks Africa held an exclusive double screening of National Geographic’s new shows Origins: The Journey of Humankind and Genius. The event took place at The Campus in Bryanston, Johannesburg. Seen there were:

Aisling McCarthy and Julie Schulte

Akhona Qulu and Nic Billington

Ashlee Wilson and Siphilile Shelembe

Gary Alfonso and Tracey Gilchrist

Juanine Fox and Cherie Bowman

Natalie Erasmus and Janine Erasmus

Paul Luiz and Jennifer Luiz

Tshidiso Monageng and Lerato Letsoalo

Zinnia Peens and Mandy Spies

44 | SCREENAFRICA | May 2017

AFRICA’S LEADING FILMMAKING EVENT TODAY WRITE

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