This was a exclusive demo for the RED party during NAB 08 just a few weeks ago. As as I was leaving the party I managed to catch up with BIRGER Engineer Erik Widding very a brief moment as he gave a final rundown of his much anticipated 35mm canon mount for RED ONE. Erik and his wife are great folks, I want to thank them for showing up and hopefully this little video will restore any lost faith in his product. I managed to play with it for bit and I must say I was very impressed how super responsive the focus felt and look forward to taking delivery myself. LINK FOR MORE INFO COMING SOON.

Thank you Mr. Graeme. I often remind myself within this current surge of technology that is sweeping up the new world (myself included), its important to take a step back and look at the bigger picture. Time and time again, the same debate over “film vs digital” surfaces and while some feel they need to dictate, others offer their own two cents and many sit back and watch the show…to what extent does it really matter? Some artist use oil, others acrylic…what do you prefer? This is how I see it and there are times we choose the medium, other times the medium chooses us.

Indie filmmakers embrace the digital age mainly cause it is the one brush they can afford. I grew up watching film, learned how to cut on film and somewhere along the line the digital boom took place. Naturally I adopted it. We were were quick to jump on the train, to get our feet wet and start making movies cause we could, cause it was cheap and where you will find profit, you will eventually find Hollywood. Who cares if Steven Spielberg refuses to let go of film, its his preferred medium, to each his own. Hit the jump for a to see what Mr. Spielberg had to say.

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After a seemingly endless winter here in New York City, the Tribeca Film Festival has returned for its 7th annual showcase. In the midst of a recession one proven remedy is to gather friends, family or a loved one and forget your sorrows for at least an hour or two. Forged in the depression of the 911 aftermath, The Tribeca film festival has, in a short life, become one of the most prominent festivals in the world and without a doubt experience some growing pains in the past few years. This week I might have to break the piggy bank to scrounge up 8 bucks (or a lot more) to take my lady to a motion picture. With a 120 films to choose from, NyMag helps narrow it down with 9 sure bets and you can be the judge of that. Me personally…I would like to revisit Stanley Kubrik’s 2001: A Space Odyssey on the big screen.

Mark Pederson of Offhollywood Studios shared an interesting article from Filmmaker Magazine on two of their features. If you do not know much about RED digital cinema or Offhollywoods work then click here…http://www.filmmakermagazine.com/spring2008/redcamera.php, either way its a good read.

Thanks Mark.

Today is the deadline to finalize my order and after flying out to Vegas to visit the RED booth and others at NAB 2008, I feel good about the choices I am making.

If you have not been following then I will bring you up to speed; the RED Bomb Squad recently announced “You order is nearly ready” in an email and gave me a week to add or subtract items before finalizing! Although finalizing the order can be a bit daunting at 1st but if you follow RED at all then you know they are consistently playing catch up to update the RED Store product descriptions and its becoming much more clear then it use to.  In case your still curious I will break down some examples from bear bones to tricked out.

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Live from the Tim and Eric tour here in New York City! Tim and Eric are a couple of friends who do their own sketch comedy show simply called “Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job” on Adult Swim, Cartoon network’s late night offerings. The live performance was, well just that… essentially a live version of there famed tv show intercut with video clips of their not-yet-released 3rd season.

Like the tv show, Tim and Eric’s character driven skits may be a knee slapper for some, but in the subtext these guys are tapping into some dark corners of human nature.

I can not help but compare it to the sick and demented universe of Paul Mcarthy’s twisted video installations which watching live could be hard to stomach.

From what I saw, the 3rd season is going to be incredible. If your looking or some solid live contemporary performance art…the Tim and Eric tour is 15 dollars well spent. REST OF REVIEW BEING UPDATED.

It’s earth day people, and for the 1st time this year we are going celebrate a little different and turn off the tube. The fine folks at Joy Hog will tell you, its official…National Tv-Turnoff week. I really like this idea, not only are you saving precious energy and therefor the world but this could be a great opportunity to think about the screenplay of yours that is collecting dust…well I know mine is.

Set a new goal this week, gather up your notes and try knock out a few pages. Side note…this is a 1st post from an iPhone so I hope it works.

Let it be known that your resident thieves and clever crack heads are often aware of any film production that is taking up any portion of your town or city and they are watching, waiting to strike. Its not hard to spot a film production, nor is it hard to spot the rental truck loaded with pelican cases carrying precious cargo often guarded by the least paid intern on the set. Do yourself a favor and obtain an policy on your gear today, specially if you have over 5,000 dollars in hardware. Many independents often overlook the importance of obtaining a policy on owned equipment and although I am fully aware you need to save pennies…this is not a corner I would recommend cutting.

I know this cause I was one of those high risk filmmakers and I learned the hard way. Obtaining a policy that is best for you is not that difficult and can be done online in less then half an hour. My associates and I who are investing in RED agreed that we would not take delivery of the RED ONE until it was completely insured.

I was not exactly sure where to look so I turned to the RedUser.net community for recommendations and sure enough generated some solid feedback that ultimately landed me an insurer, thank you RedUsers! Click here to view my “NEED INSURANCE POLICY FOR RED ONE” thread.

I present to you our very 1st podcast. Still trying to figure out what that means but I hope you enjoy this tid-bit I threw together last night. Sorry it took so long but podcasting unfortunately does not pay the bills. Next episode will include an exclusive interview with Erik Widding, engineer of the BIRGER 35mm nikon/canon lens adapter. NOTE: The Podcast was NOT shot on RED.