"Online video is driving astonishing innovation in thousands of different fields ranging from the ultra-niche to the sharing of truly world-changing ideas" – Chris Anderson, TED
Wooshii is moving fast and we thought we might bring all our news and news of our industry in a new look funky blog. We wanted a place where we could keep you up to date with news and developments in the world of video production, viral video, rich media and animation along with useful tips and trick from our members. We will be featuring the usual guest interviews with both professionals and Wooshii users along with the odd product review, competition and give-away.
This post was fueled by some hardware coming out of Panasonic, but also to discuss the 3D trend of recent years. You all know 3D was a gimmick in the 50s and 60s that died off, cameback slightlyin the 80s, died off, and now in the last 3 years has had a big comeback.
The technology got better (if not perfect, of course), movies began shooting (or rather rendering) in 3D, and cinemas started converting their equipment to be able to project it. Plus, everybody got in the 3D wave and TV manufacturers also started making 3D TVs, broadcasting networks started 3D channels (the recent World Cup was an excuse to give this big push by them). The thing is, in cinema where this new age of 3D started, the percentage of 3D when 2D is available has been coming down ever since Avatar in December of last year – having horrible and rushed 2D to 3D conversions in the likes of Clash of the Titans and recently The Last Airbender doesn’t help, at all. So what does this mean for 3D video? We don’t know yet, but there has been some movement this week in the area. Yesterday, Panasonic announced the price for is 3D camera, the first one in the prosumer market. It will cost $1.400 and be available in October.
On the same note, the company announced today a 3D lens that will be able to work with still cameras, particularly micro four thirds (no price or availability yet).
What this really means is for the first time, this technology will be available to a wider audience of filmmakers.I mean, not particularly cheap (but cheaper) and not exactly the same kind of 3D you see in movies, but still.
And whether it’s a trend or not, it’s something we in the creative field should have a close eye on.
If you have one of those red-cyan glasses lying around, check out this video of viral hit makers Eepybird:
So what you think, as a creative?
Is this “cheapening” of tools something you look forward to experiment with 3D or dismiss it as a trend that will go away in a few years, just like before?
Is this something you’d like to use in one of your future projects even?
To finalize, and specially if you’re a 3D hater, check out this awesome t-shirt fromThreadless:
Over the years there have been many short films and even commercials that have jumped their lengh and either became features films, or the vehicle to their directors to direct a feature film. In this post, we’ll see some noteworth ones in the recent past, and some video of the features films inspired by them.
First, a south-african director by the name of Neill Blomkamp, with some very cool commercials work and short films, being the most know one “Alive in Joberg”. Due to this, he was chosen by Peter Jackson to helm the Halo movie adaptation, which fell apart but gave him the opportunity to adapt his own short for a feature film. This became the very much praised District 9. Let’s first have a look at the short film
And now, the trailer for District 9.
Next, another one with the 9 at the title. Directed and animated by Shane Ackerman(who also has a credit on the 3rd Lord of the Rings movie), this 10 minute short movie (which follows) was the basis for the feature film of the same name “9″, also directed by him and produced by Tim Burton.
The trailer for the animated feature film:
While we’re talking about Tim Burton, while he was at Disney as an animator, he was given the opportunity to direct two short films to prove his skills has a director. One was the stop-motion animation “Vincent”. The other, “Frankenweenie”, which is also in the works to become a feature film. Here’s the whole short:
This next example is of a different kind. It’s a series of commercials from insurance brand Geico in the US, wich featured cavemen characters in our world and were rather successful. So TV exec had the idea to adapt it to a TV show, which both short-lived and troubled TV show
Here’s a clip from the pilot of the TV show.
Last, but certainly not least, we have Fede Alvarez. This director from Uruguay with also an extensive commercials work, made a short movie that went viral, and a few weeks later the word got out that he had landed a deal with Sam Raimi’s production company for a feature film. The movie won’t be based on the short, but was probably the basis to get the deal, so let’s have a look
The trailer for the feature film should be coming maybe next year or 2012! And remember, we have an interview with Fede coming up soon, with questions submitted by you guys, so keep your eyes open for it.
This is not a recent trend. In fact, most of the top most seen videos on Youtube in 2009 were also music videos. But I’ve never seen such a big predominace of this types of videos over other types. So, in the past 24 hours, we have:
4 – Justin Bieber – Never Let You Go – 8,931,639 views
5 – Lady Gaga – Bad Romance (Official Music Video) – 238,127,269 views
6 – Timbaland – If We Ever Meet Again ft. Katy Perry – 8,335,008 views
7 – Justin Bieber – One Time – 66,171,000 views
8 – B.o.B – Nothin’ On You ft. Bruno Mars [Official Video] – 3,673,224 views
9 – Owl City – Fireflies – 13,435,393 views
10 – We Are The World 25 For Haiti – Official Video – 37,379,683 views
11 – Jay-Z feat. Alicia Keys – Empire State Of Mind (Official Music Video) – 41,946,259 views
12 – Timbaland – Carry Out ft. Justin Timberlake – 6,515,376 views
13 – Old Spice | Flex – 410,567 views This is one of the non-music video virals, an Ad by Old Spice being shared a lot since yesterday:
But let’s continue with the list, shall we?
14 – Aerosmith – I Don’t Wanna Miss a Thing – 57,620,193 views
15 – Iyaz “Replay” Prequel Music Video – 21,586,503 views
16 – Miley Cyrus – When I Look At You – 3,735,728 views
17 – Owl City – Vanilla Twilight – 2,568,100 views
18 – Black Eyed Peas – Meet Me Halfway – 13,416,689 views
19 – Jason Derulo – Whatcha Say – Official Video – 52,891,691 views
20 – He Lives: Testimonies of Jesus Christ – 88,059 views So what to make of this?
It’s pretty clear that music videos have a lot of viral potential, particularly when it’s from an already big name in the music industry. Although it doens’t have to be when the video has creativity, originality, and artistry above average. Sometimes, the two go together, like in the amazing OK Go video we already featured here but will show one more time:
Back with another week in virals review. (sorry a little late)
Ok Go’s video is still going strong with 7.5 milliono views, and the most shared video during the past week. A few new trailers have also gone viral, like the new from the Twilight Saga – Eclipse, and the awesome Tron: Legacy one (don’t forget we an interview with questions submitted by you guys with one of the animators on the movie – answers coming real soon!).
So what else is new and noteworthy in virals this week? First and foremost, I’d like to point out one by Wooshii members Seedwell aka Pantless Knights with a spoof of a Jay-Z song feature Alicia Keys. It’s becoming a geek hymn and it’s great at that. Take a look:
That Pedigree ad that shot dogs at 1000 fps is also still strong at the viral charts, but another great new entry is this video from BMW. It’s an old trick but done in an unexpected manner, and got 1.4 million views in a week.
The Embrace Life seat belt campaign as surfaced a few weeks ago but is still also being shared a lot, and particularly this week. It’s a great work of simplicity: great simple concept, great simple exectution, perfect result:
Another great detail about this is that it was made for a a public organism in the UK – the Sussex Safer Roads Partnership – so people can see virals are not just for private companies and brands. Now approaching the 3 million views.
Finally, we have a very strange video, and strangely hypnotic (both the visuals and the music) that I can’t stop watching. It was made by animator Cyriak on Youtube and it has been slowly crawling it’s way to the top charts since it was uploaded 2 days ago, already with 176.000 views.
Take a look:
There you have it, another week in virals. Once again, if you’d like to point out a viral from this week, comment away. Till next week!
Most weeks we see lots of music videos in the most shared lists. But this was even stronger, and was clearly dominated by two music videos, both of which were released almost at the same time. The first one was the new video for Gorillaz -Stylo, which immediately got the attention of the internet, getting 1.1 million views so far on Youtube, but it certaily has more since it’s on other services like we’re showing it here:
Amazing video, like we’re used to coming from this band. And the other video that dominated the week is from another band that we’re used to getting great views. Their career was almost launched due to a viral video, one that now has more than 60 million views on Daily Motion, and now they’ve done it again. With an incredible Rube Goldberg machine, they gone to the top viral video charts and got 3.4 million views in mere 3 days! If you haven’t already, take a look:
I said they have dominated this past week but the truth is, they’re still dominating it right now, and for sure will continue in the next days. Other noteworthy viral videos this week were a Pedigree ad with great slow motion and dogs catching treats. People love seeing animals, particularly cats and dogs, so being as good as it is, no wonder it has gone viral (and now we’ve seen virals for pretty much everything, even dog food!)
Finally, we have a great stop motion lego animation that started going viral yesterday. It’s fan made for a competition, like most stop-motion videos it displays the great deal of effort gone into it, and shows great filmmaking. Have a look:
And that’s it for this week. If you saw something really interesting and noteworthy going viral this week, tell us about it in the comments. Till the next week in review in virals!
Hi, back with another review of the week in virals.
The high school student video (A story of pretty much everything) is still strong at number two of the viral video chart, being the first the video for We are the World – Haiti. Right below it is a video that went viral for Windows Phone 7 series operating system. With the same feel as many Google virals, Microsoft scored one with 600.000 views in one week.
The Parision love video by Google is also still strong, going already on more than 4 million views, and a some numbers below is T-shirt war, a great stop motion video by comedy duo Rhett and Link and directed (and edited) by Youtube user and Wooshii member Mistery Guitar Man.
It has now 1.8 million views. Of reference is the first ever Youtube video that has been shared a lot this week. If you never seen it, don’t expect something exciting!
Google Buzz videos are still hot, the mashup that unites 25 top songs of 2009 too, and to close this off we’ll leave you with yet another Google video, one that has gone viral since yesterday and done by Wooshii member Jr. Canest . All in all a great week for Wooshii creatives! Take a look:
Past is the iPad presentation (in viral content time, one week is a long time), but still in the top 5 most shared videos of the week, 3 of them are about it. The first is yet another Hitler parody – I’ll spare you to it. But I’ll show you a cool edit one Neil Curtis made of the iPad keynote, putting together only the (many) adjectives spoken:
It had 550.000 views in 4 days. A big hit this week has also been a satirical piece from english journalist and comic writer Charlie Brooker that demonstrates how to build a news report. It got huge views, with more than 1 million views in 9 days.
Another notworthy viral is a truly inspirational one, a piece of conceptual art captured on video. Here’s the description of the piece: “For his installation in The Curve, Boursier-Mougenot creates a walk-though aviary for a flock of zebra finches, furnished with electric guitars and other musical instruments. As the birds go about their routine activities, perching on or feeding from the various pieces of equipment, they create a captivating, live soundscape.” And here’s the video, on Youtube for almost a month now, and with 400.000 views.
Another videos being shared a viewed a lot include some already known and older ones (in viral content time, remember!) like the Aids Graffiti one, the Mad TV iPad spoof, the Mashup by DJ Earworm of the top pop music of 2009, The Known Universe, and the Coca-Cola Happiness Machine. And, to finalize, in the week that started Lost’s final season (another great topic for virals this week), I’d like to show you a video made by Wooshii members Fine Brothers, with 260.000 views in a week:
Well, that’s it for this week’s review in virals. There have been others but these are the ones who stood out for me. If you have any suggestions, comment away!
