Twatter [sic], who needs it? Well apparently me. In a bid to build something bigger, better, more rewarding, more capable of doing what I want it to do, I need to generate more traffic and apparently Twatter [sick], is how you do it. The thought of sharing my randomest moments with the general public, as and when they occur to me, seems completely daft. WTF is a Tweet? It just sounds stupid. Anyway, I’m on it now, trying to see the benefits of the followers, trying to drum up interest in what’s coming next and how we’re hopefully going to build a brand new concept for filmmakers and funding/distribution models. My twats [retch] will appear on a column next to the blog (god it looks ugly, doesn’t it?) and if you’re even vaguely interested in knowing just how many sheets of toilet paper it takes to achieve a pristine posterior then you can always follow me, like a demented sheep, by checking ‘elskidblog‘ on Twatter [vomit]. Necessary evils. I hate em.

Er… follow me… or something… it’s lame, isn’t it?

Stephen Parker, axe man!

Over the last few months I’ve found myself drifting towards the fancy end of the DSLR market, shooting with full Steadicam, wireless transmitters, wireless follow focus, mid-range to pricey support rigs, L series primes and the 5D. My big recommendation to young filmmakers now is to get their hands on a 550D as soon as humanly possible, if you’re starting your career running, drop the fact you own one into conversation with your producers and you’ll be surprised how quickly you’ll find yourself considered and prized and valuable asset. Above and beyond that it’s just a great camera to start with and the sheer value for money beggars belief. Here you have a camera that can shoot excellent stills and astonishing video for a nudge over £600. Absolutely astounding. However, there’s not much chance of me jumping on it soon and shooting on it as I’m too heavily invested in the higher end of the range, like some horrid snob. I do think it’s possibly the most important camera of the lot, even more so now than the 5D as it has truly democratised the ability to shoot high quality video. Whether the 60D will kick all that into touch when it arrives only time will tell. So, I’m very chuffed to announce the introduction of a new blog contributor, Stephen Parker who will be sharing his experiences of life at the ultra low budget end of DSLR filmmaking. Stephen is a musician in the rock band The Mars Patrol and works for the company I set up back in the day, Chrome Productions. He’s exactly the kind of young, bright, filmmaker who are now embracing cameras like the 550D to get their careers started and seemed the perfect choice to start contributing to the blog. I’ll let him introduce himself more personally later on, but I think this is an important stage in an ongoing process to try and create a new support structure for independent filmmakers in this country, now that the UK Film Council has been given its marching orders. More on that at a later date, but I hope you’ll continue to comment on Stephen’s adventures as he shares them with you.

You can see Stephen’s band featured in a little Canon XF305 test I did a few months back as well.

MARS PATROL – BROLL XF305 and 7D from Robin Schmidt on Vimeo.

Apologies for being so slack with the posts recently but I’ve been away in Italy with the missus getting some sun and working hard to develop a couple of short film ideas and we had no internet out there. A week or so I got into a debate about whether the short film medium was an anachronism these days. The debate arose out of an article written by Mike Jones for Nofilmschool and he was pretty forthright in his denouncement of short films as a means for aspiring feature film directors to gain experience and demonstrate their skills.

There are two ways of looking at how a Short Film serves the emerging and aspiring filmmaker.The first is as a Learning Exercise, the second is as a Calling Card. The short film seeks to be a learning experience by providing a paradigm for engagement in film production within viable financial and resource constrains. Simply put, the short film allows you to gain experience without the overhead. Similarly, as a calling card the short film aims to serve as a demonstration of the filmmaker’s abilities. It has the express purpose of convincing financiers and funding bodies of the filmmaker’s worthiness of trust to make a longer project. The theory is that a good short film is a large flag to wave in the air saying “this is what I can do in 10 minutes of screen time and no money, just imagine what I could do with 100 minutes and a ton of cash!”

Learning Experience and Calling Card. This is what short films are for…. and at the start of the second decade of the 21st century, the short film fails pretty dismally at both.

I kind of agree and disagree with Mike. My experience on Ladies and Gentlemen has been invaluable and given me an opportunity to do long-form. It might have been desperately underfunded, but that doesn’t matter. I had to churn through 40 setups a day and be creative in how I shot and blocked the scenes. Many problems I have no idea about will emerge in the edit and I’ll learn a ton more as I try and craft it into a decent piece of drama. These are lessons I would never have learned making a short film. However, the project bears very few of the unusual details that I like to bring to my work. It doesn’t really show you what I’m about as a filmmaker, my point of view and what makes my work uniquely mine. I’m only really going to be able to demonstrate in a short (and a properly funded one at that) where I have control over what I’m doing. To that end I’m developing two short projects Damaged and Concierge - both very different types of films, but which possess all the elements I value in cinema. My ambition for these films is big wins at major festivals. For Damaged I’m aiming high, I’m aiming for a BAFTA nomination – that’s how much belief I have in the projects. I set up my own production company at 23 and used it as a platform to work in television, music video, commercials, corporate and extreme sports but my goal was always drama. After eight years working my knackers off I’d completely stagnated within my own company and was going nowhere, I’d just run out of juice, so I went freelance with the express goal of pursuing drama. Two years on I’m now in the thick of it and learning so so much about just what it takes to create that astonishing feeling that truly great cinema is capable of producing. My career goal is to be able to produce that feeling in audience members regularly and exquisitely, whatever the material. I’m a long way off. But I’m making progress and from working on Ladies and Gentlemen have a much sharper sense of what works and what doesn’t. It’s been a relatively risk-free experience and so I’ve been able to approach it with a fair amount of freedom and objectivity which I would never have been able to do on a short film project.

A friend of mine is about to quit the industry completely after an absolute horror show experience on his self-funded short film. Crippled by the ambition of the project and the shortage of funds to pull it off he had a huge barney with his crew and his lead actor resulting in him having to sack himself as director. He was too close to the project and every tiny setback just killed him. That’s the risk you take as a director every time you step up to the plate on a project you care about – there’s always that chance that you’re completely deluded and the beautiful gem in your head won’t work in the real world. In a way Ladies and Gentlemen was an advanced, on-the-job graduation for the film school I never went to and I’m very thankful for it. These two shorts I’m developing will test me to the absolute limit because I have such high hopes for them. But they’re very important because they’re going to be the first pieces of work I’ve ever done that demonstrate what I’m about as a director, and exactly why I’m worth investing in for a career in feature films. The web series, as predicated by Mike Jones, simply can’t offer that. So, for me, you need both. You need the space to be objective and learn the basic craft, how to mechanically get round a scene quickly and efficiently, developing the way you handle actors. But you also need the focus of the short film to set your work apart from everyone else. If you have a vision then that’s where you show it.

I’m an obsessive self-educationist. I like learning. That makes me a geek and I don’t care. For me directing demands that you be the equal, if not better of your Heads of Department in assessing the merits of the decisions you make. That means having as good an eye as your Cinematographer, understanding the cut as well as your editor and being a better amateur psychologist than your actors. I’m going to acting classes now, I’m buying books on production design, I’m reading fashion magazines, I’m even working on improving my memory so I don’t have to refer back to the script constantly. As with my BAFTA ambitions I’m deadly serious about being a feature director and I want to be in this business for a long time, not just making up the numbers, but challenging for honours on a regular basis. I’ll be laying bare the process of bringing these two shorts to productions on this blog, hopefully sharing some insights along the way which should provide an interesting contrast to Ladies and Gentlemen.

One more thing: I never really enjoy watching short films and that’s mainly because I don’t have the patience for them. That sounds completely nonsensical, but If I sit down with a piece of one hour drama then I know I’ll be entertained for a good stretch of time and that’s exactly what I’m after. Similarly with a feature film. With short films I always fit them in around work, or at other times of day when I’m not really in the mood for them. And that doesn’t really help me watch them properly. For me the best way to watch short films is at festivals as part of a programme where you get to watch a bunch at the same time. Sitting in a cinema watching your own short as part of a series of other work is actually pretty fun. On their own, online, I don’t enjoy them, but I do think there could be a real opportunity online to create virtual festival collections where respected viewers are invited to curate a selection of shorts, say an hour and a half. It’d be great to make them appointment to view, with a Ustream introduction by the curator and a chatroom available throughout the process so people can comment on them. That, for me, is where shorts get interesting online. Rather than sitting isolated on their own we should actively group shorts into collections and try and create a similar community feel to that experience at festivals. Just a thought.

Here’s a list of great, recently produced (I don’t actually like them all, but that’s just me) short films compiled by John at VisualRebel (trainspotter’s badge for you John!)

Also, Philips Parallel Lines competition.

Finally, a link to a film that I didn’t like at all but which was heavily supported by the UK Film Council. I leave you to judge for yourselves.

Alex and Her Arse Truck from Dan Cheetham on Vimeo.

7d or 5d?

I’ve been getting this a lot recently: ‘Bollocks I’ve bought a 7D, I wish I’d bought a 5D, but it was too expensive and now it’s bothering me because I know the 5D has to be better doesn’t it, but I shoot mainly video so what do I do, what do I do?’

Damn good question. Many people, most eloquently Philip Bloom have tried to rationalise the decision for you in their own way and at least give you a shot of making a decision you’re happy with. I’ve been fortunate to spend a really intense period working with both cameras over the last six months, pouring over the image, analysing how different lenses affect the image, being incredibly self-critical to that end and I now feel qualified to lob my ten cents worth into the mix. Definitely worth reading Bloom’s article about the different cameras because he lays out the technical differences and makes it abundantly clear exactly what you’re getting with the different units.

I won’t be doing that. I’ve nicked his frame size comparison because it gives you a very quick idea of why various cameras perform better.

You’ve probably all seen this comparison a hundred times already but it never gets boring. To imagine I used to be content as a kitten with the 1/2 inch chip in an EX1 (I remember being staggered by how good it looked) is it any wonder that an APS-C sensor can be as beguiling as it is. Bring in the full frame sensor of the 5D or the D3S and suddenly you’re looking at just an absurd leap in the amount of information it’s sucking in.

I bought a 7D, I bought it because it was cheaper, it seemed better set up for video, which was my primary usage and it just seemed the right choice at the time. I had no idea what I was getting myself into, I had a budget for a camera and before I knew it I’d spent four times what I’d budgeted for. Oops. I’ve shot on nothing but the 5D for the last three months, and I now have a conclusion to offer. This is not based on tech specs, or comparison charts, or financial considerations, it’s based purely on an emotional response. The 7D is fantastic and I will never regret purchasing it. I enjoy how rugged it is and, coupled with my Sigma 30mm f1.4 it’s absolute dynamite. There was a short period when I was shooting with the Marvels Cine profile doing backgammon and my short dance film when I shocked myself with how pretty it was. But that’s where it ends, an infatuation. No more than that.

I am completely in love with the 5D. Like I said, it is completely irrational and based on emotion, but that’s just the way it is.

Sony F35

For me, the 5D has the edge over the 7D but it really boils down to personal taste, I just love the way it looks, how involving it is, but given its place in the range you’d expect that. As an editor and post person I’m used to analysing my video footage in great detail and while I watch my 7D rushes and enjoy them I watch my rushes from the 5D and I giggle. It’s pathetic. I literally giggle and coo at how phenomenal it looks. I blow them up to the full size of my crappy Asus 26 inch monitors and they hold up. I shoot stills on my 7D and they’re very decent indeed. I shoot stills on the 5D and they’re just staggering. My much-maligned 24-70L that doesn’t really seem to work as well as you’d hope on the 7D (especially for video), just seems to be so much more in tune with the sensor and the electronics on the 5D. I’m not a techie and couldn’t give you a specific reason why this is. In Filmmaker Magazine this month Roberto Quezada-Dardon writes an overview of the DSLR landscape with anecdotes from DOP Brian Reynolds stating that the 7D cuts seamlessly with the Sony F35. I’m shocked by that. Genuinely. Much of my 7D footage exhibits very obvious tell-tale blockiness from the H264 codec, blockiness I just don’t see from the 5D. But if Reynolds says so, then who am I to argue?

So, what does this mean? Well, it means this: if you’re dipping a toe get the 550D. Now that’s a ridiculous camera for the price and I really like it. Yes it’s a bit plasticky and a bit of a fiddle to operate, but you’d get used to that in a day or two. If you have the money (well if you don’t then steal it) then do yourself a massive favour and get that 5D… at all costs… just get it. It will change your life. But what about the 720 50i on the 7D. I don’t bother with that on Ladies and Gentlemen anymore, I just trust Twixtor to give me a lifelike 50fps on my full frame 1920×1080 5D footage and most of the time it does. For sure, rent a 7D and get hold of some PL mount lenses like the new Zeiss CP2s or even better Cook S4s and you’ll probably have the time of your life but think really hard about what you’re after. Yes, we suffer from that insane shallow depth of field making focus a real challenge, but the image is just much better on the 5D. Also bear in mind that I’m just a punter and I like shooting drama so for me the 5D stacks up really well. For more doco style work then I actually think the 7D is a better bet, you’ll certainly have a better shot at focussing and you’ll create more immediacy. Horses for courses as always but the 5D sits above the 7D in the range and if you were wondering what your extra money bought you I can tell you that, for me, it represents good value. In fact they all do, ridiculous isn’t it?

One site I’ve been reading avidly since I was alerted to it a couple of months ago by one of the readers of this site is NoFilmSchool. Ryan Koo who runs it seems to be pretty much an American version of me (possibly a bit nerdier…, is that possible!?) but very smart and I suggest you check him out. Mike Jones wrote a guest blog piece about why short films are an anachronism for the 21st century filmmaker and, as someone working damn hard to build a solid drama reel with not one, not two, but seven drama projects ongoing in various stages of production his article makes interesting reading. My own take on short films is that they’re simply not relevant to me. I have no enthusiasm for trotting round the festival circuit, most film people who aren’t directors, or responsible for the actual work, bore me rigid and I’m horrid at networking. I really can’t be arsed and I just don’t see how playing that kind of game is going to make me stand out. I don’t watch short films, and I don’t enjoy making them. Ladies and Gentlemen, being a long-form project has been amazingly good fun, tough but very rewarding and it will be far more important on my CV than ten short films would. In terms of demonstrating an ability to tell a story that 60min window gives me room to create distinct arcs, changes of pace, mood and most importantly it allows me to let me my voice come through. I am actually prepping a short film for production towards the end of the year which we’ll shoot on the Alexa and which will probably come in at around 20mins. I’m throwing the kitchen sink at it, creating a piece that will complement the rest of my drama reel and be by far the most cinematic of my current lineup. That’s exciting.

What’s your take on short films, and can you persuade me to watch more of them? The best short film I’ve ever seen involved no dialogue and was only two and a half minutes long. It won Virgin Media Shorts a couple of years ago and was directed by a couple of fairly prominent UK music video directors. It’s called the Black Hole. Have a watch. Great short film, but does it tell you anything about what these guys would do with a feature film? No.

The Black Hole from Napoleon Ryan on Vimeo.

PUPPETS

So, in a shameless bid to make more people aware of my previous work and not just my adventures in DSLR land, I’m going to do a serious of in-depth writeups of some of my old projects, the good and the bad, to hopefully give you all an insight into some of the ridiculous problems I’ve come up against in the course of shooting music videos and other bits. You can find all my work on the regular website at elskid.com so if there’s anything there that you have a particular hankering to see posted then get in touch and I’ll do just that. I’ve done post heavy jobs, jobs with helicopters, jobs with high speed cameras, jobs with puppets,  and jobs where everything went wrong. You never stop learning. First up my vid for Feeder’s Tracing Lines, a head mangler of epic proportions.

So, I posted about my experiences with BT a week or so ago, a company whose brainlessness seems to know no bounds. The problem is basically that I moved house over a month ago, expecting to be able to take my fibre optic services from Virgin Media along with me. The problem with this whole thing is that no-one can tell you ahead of schedule whether they can even install what you need at your address. They assure you they can, but, as it turns out, in this case they couldn’t. Now, every time you need to book an engineer you normally have to wait ten days for the next available booking. Virgin gave up the chase, told me I should try and find another supplier as they wouldn’t be able to help. So much for loyalty. I then rang BT who I’d been with a couple of years ago and whose service is actually decent but they really are a bunch of mindless incompetent morons who make so many mistakes you’d think they were being run by baboons… well actually… The problem with BT is that they do not admit to making mistakes. This winds me up something rotten. I ordered my internet and tv package online and received a confirmation email that the engineer would turn up on a certain date. So far so good. Did he turn up? No. I then spent three hours on the phone to BT demanding to know why the guy hadn’t turned up and why they’d sent me an email telling me he would, requiring me to turn down work to stay at home, twiddling my thumbs, watching birds fly into walls. They told me that, because I’d ordered online it was possible that I’d made a mistake filling in the form. Right. Does that sound right to you? Surely you don’t take a website live until you have failsafes to avoid people making exactly that kind of mistake. He also called me ignorant, but we won’t get on to that now. I recorded the entire conversation, because I hate morons who deny accountability. I then spent another two hours complaining to the relevant department, demanding compensation for the time that I wasted trying to get it sorted out. They went away and thought about it then called me back twenty minutes later, saying they might be able to offer something by way of compensation. I know what that means, that means £10 off my next bill (I’ve been in big fights with these stupid monkeys before). They offered to arrange everything right there over the phone for me. Now I should mention here that the reason I ordered online in the first place was because it saved me £125. Talking to these guys over the phone, were they able to give me that discount now? No, of course not. When you order online you receive a confirmation email to tell you when the engineer will come. When you order over the phone you receive a confirmation email to you when the engineer will come. When I put it to the guy that if the first email I received could turn out to be a complete lie, then how could I trust the second email not to be a complete lie. He had no answer. Anyway, I went ahead and began ordering the services and was halfway through the whole mess when I was cut off. Now bear in mind that they called me, they had my number. Did they call back to pick up where they’d left off? No, of course not. I’ve spent a fortune on my mobile over the last six weeks simply because I didn’t have a landline and you know what they’ve cocked up so many times I just couldn’t be bothered or even trust them to get it right this time. Not one little bit.

So I moved on to Talk Talk. Talk Talk were very nice, arranged everything for me, and told me when my engineer would come, as well as sending me a text to tell me all the details. Then all the bumpf turns up and it’s labelled to the wrong address and they’ve got my name wrong. Ace! I actually had to rearrange my appointment to accommodate the shoot for ‘Real Enough’ but we rearranged for the ninth. So far so good. Of course, the engineer turned up on the 6th according to the original appointment and I wasn’t there. I spoke to the guy and he said the new appointment would still be honoured. Yes, I sat there all yesterday and waited for a Talk Talk engineer to turn up. What do you think the outcome was? Cue the music and yet another angry phone call to a call centre moron to try and find out what had happened. Oh, sorry sir, we’re incompetent toe rags with no accountability and we don’t give a shit about our customers. The only thing I can do is to rearrange your appointment for the 19th. Like I said, every time there’s a mistake it’s another two weeks. This shit makes me so angry because, as a freelancer I have to turn down work to be available for this idiots to not come and do their job. I also rely heavily on my phone and internet to do business and have spent a small fortune bridging the gap while I’ve not had the services I needed. It will have been six weeks. I hate incompetence, but I really hate people who refuse to admit they have made a mistake and refuse to offer to do anything about it. In most business if you make a mistake you do your damndest to try and make up for that mistake. These fuckers don’t give a shit. I recorded my conversation with the monkey at BT and there are some fabulously juicy bits in it, particularly where he called me ignorant. What should I do with it?

So there we go, I surf the internet using a dongle. People send me their work to have a look at and I can’t because I just can’t actually download it. I can barely blog as doing my research is nearly impossible. I apologise. I was supposed to be back online properly a month ago, but it’s going to be another week and a half. Wankers.

On a separate note I rented a monitor off Decode broadcast hire a month ago, having to pay a £250 deposit which I was assured would be back in my account four days after it was returned. I’ve chased these guys for three weeks, and they never ever get back to me. Never. Finally I managed to speak to someone yesterday who told me he would have to call me back. He didn’t call me back. Eventually I managed to get hold of him late in the day and he informed me that the money would only reach my account on the 13th. No apology. Just, oh yeah, nothing I can do. I don’t mind if people make mistakes, but ignoring my phone calls for three weeks, refusing to try and find out what has happened, then not even bothering to apologise, shifting the blame to the accounts, that shit bothers me immensely. These guys make the mistake of thinking I’m a moron. Believe me, I’m capable of some spectacular moronity but in general I have a very capable brain, one that’s become extremely adept at sniffing out bullshit. So, consider yourselves blacklisted Decode. If I need an example of companies whose working practices I don’t like, then you’ll be it. Along with BT. Nice one.

I’m normally really tolerant, I just put up with stuff but recently these people have got up my nose so badly and I’m seriously out of pocket as a result. That’s just not fair and I’m going after them. If you let them get away with it then you’re just perpetuating the issues that will continue to plague the normal consumer. Fight back. I’m going to. Oh, I’ll probably receive all sorts of complaints now, but I don’t really care.

It’s really easy to get lost in the excitement of shooting on DSLRs. They genuinely do make your work look the business. Many photographers have made the move sideways into video and many videographers are regularly turning out production that really looks fantastic. In the old universe you had to earn the right to be given a budget that would open up the world of 16mm or 35mm to you. DSLRs have removed that barrier. Phil Bloom began championing DOF adaptors, using stills lenses and a massive nozzle on the camera to give digital a more filmic look. It was a brave new world, but then the 5D came along, and, well we all know what happened next. So, now we have a film-look tool in the hands of, well absolutely anyone. The 550d and GH1 are both very very affordable and means we will see a generation of filmmakers who have felt no need to go to filmschool and have simply just got on with it. I am one of those filmmakers. My 5D was actually the PD150. We used to work so hard to get filmic results on that camera and you know what, we actually didn’t do a terrible job. See here for the first piece of work I ever made. The point is this, the point of differentiation between you and the next schmuck with a DSLR is your ability to tell a story. Never has it been more important to hit the books, learn your craft, develop your own style and stay ahead of the game. I’m currently in the middle of a huge learning spurt, developing my own style for drama and refining my directing style to suit the rigors of fiction work. I love it. I am fully aware that I need to make a huge and meaningful transition from being a jack of all trades, highly competent production bod, into being a refined single-discipline master and the present period is my best chance of achieving that. I’ve made it my mission to learn as much as I can about all aspects of production from the producers role, to post, to art direction, and clearly to the camera team, but my aptitude in those other disciplines has seen me get slack on directing. Now, I’m tightening up and trying to pass on what I’m learning to you, because I do feel the world we inhabit is in danger of being saturated with competent DSLR shooters, all of whom have a gorgeous showreel, thanks to lenses and large sensors, and if you want to stand out, then possessing the rare and difficult skills of top notch directing are more important than they’ve ever been.

My series of blogs with Photocinenews will be covering much of my thinking about directing drama, but if there’s one single rule that I would advise anyone directing to keep firmly planted in their minds, that is to ‘listen to the niggle.’ The niggle is that little voice in your head that isn’t quite happy with stuff. On set you’ll find yourself under pressure from everyone, from the 1st AD anxious to press on with the schedule, to the DOP who’s shot something lovely and doesn’t see why you’d change it. However much pressure you find yourself under listen to that niggle and stick your hand up. Flag it, get it out in the open, don’t bury it in the name of being a goody guy, or finishing on time. You have to say something. These things always come back to bite you on the ass so you must always be prepared to be unpopular. How you service the niggle is up to you but if you’re handling your on set duties correctly then people will listen to you and trust that you, and only you, know what’s best for the production. I cannot stress this enough. I’ve worked really hard to learn everyone else’s jobs, from the focus puller, to the gaffer, to the wardrobe department, to the art director, so that I can have meaningful and informed conversations with them on set. I think that really helps when it comes to dealing with niggles. If those guys trust you then they will go to hell for you to satisfy that niggle. Ultimately the buck stops with you, and no matter what else you learn, trusting your instincts, listening to the niggle when everyone else is done, wants to go home, thought it was right, is the absolute number 1 rule of directing. Don’t stop learning, be better, be more competitive, work harder, with DSLRs there has never been a better opportunity to make an impact. Yowzah.

Oh, and have I mastered this yet? No. I’m way better now than I used to be but there’s a big pussy inside of me that just lets things go and I hate it. Now, I just say what’s bothering me and deal with the consequences when they come. Working better… ish!

It’s been quite a good year. First, winning the 14 Islands Film Challenge, the film I made for the semi-final of that competition has now been shortlisted in the top ten of the Fireflies Framepool Challenge. You had to create a film using 20% stock footage from Framepool, a film about courage and you can see the film I made below. The judges were drawn from the advertising industry and apparently there was a huge entry list to choose from, including two rounds of shortlisting so to make it into the top ten is a pretty big deal. Here’s a list of the judges… make your own mind up whether that’s a big deal or not! Oh, and to Mr. Bob who got all angry because he felt I didn’t have a leg to stand on as he hadn’t seen any of my work… well these guys saw it and they liked it, and yes it’s petty to get all up in your face like but I’m doing it anyway! It’s a properly international field with filmmakers from Japan, the US, Indonesia, France, Germany and the UK (full list below). I’m chuffed.

+ Fabrice Agro (FRANCE)
+ Marcus Baier, Chad Ochs – Team Hamburg (GERMANY)
+ Mike Clear, Rob Hughes, Ben Harrex (UK)
+ Bianca Döring (GERMANY)
+ Daisuke Izumi (JAPAN)
+ Elwin Mok (INDONESIA)
+ Kazuhiro Morikiyo, Miyuki Saito, Ai Nakajima (JAPAN)
+ Robin Schmidt (UK)
+ Corlin Stubbs (USA)
+ Wakana Suzuki (JAPAN)

Monument – the ‘Fireflies’ edit from Robin Schmidt on Vimeo.

B&H - they want me... sort of

Pretty much every other blog I read has some form of other branding on it in the form of banners or click through affiliate links and my blog doesn’t. Now this isn’t because I have some kind of left wing anti corporate political leanings, but merely because I’ve only been doing this five months and hadn’t bothered to look up how you started hooking up such things. Now, however, the camera retail giant that is B&H has got in touch telling me that it

has hand-selected several sites that have great potential at succeeding as a B&H affiliate.  Your site is on this list. What separates the B&H affiliate program from other affiliate arrangements is our ability to assign a personal relationship manager who can answer all of your questions and coach you along the way to greater success.

We are very interested in discussing the ways in which we can help you provide additional value to your site audience and further monetize your site. Please feel free to contact me with any additional questions that you may have.

For some reason I always get a little bit twitchy when I receive stuff like this. I think it’s the plural ‘we’ and the phrase ‘coach you along the way to greater success’. I’m completely self-taught, I don’t need coaching, you don’t know anything about me, and me sticking a banner on my site will have no bearing on my success at all. So why do it?

I’ve had a few discussions with people recently about monetizing my site and how to extract value from the blog etc. The thing is I work. I earn a very good living doing what I do and don’t particularly want to spend my time gathering hits, driving traffic to my site, working hard at that and not at what I should be doing. When you look at the financials on being an affiliate it’s not exactly going to pay for that new Porsche. Here’s that data:

Monthly commission begins at 2% with the possibility for increased percentage based upon performance. In addition, we offer 8% commission on a growing list of over 1500 products from any of the following brands:

• Audio Engine
• Bose
• Grado
• Impact
• LectroSonics
• Pearstone
• Sound Device

The No Film School blog wrote a pretty sobering piece about what blogging could potentially earn them based on traffic of around 22,000 or so hits a month ( CORRECTION: NoFilmSchool is getting 25k visitors/month, but that results in roughly 100k pageviews – thanks Ryan!). At present I average around 6,000, not stellar, but decent given how short a time I’ve been doing it. In short, it’s unlikely that I’m going to earn a huge amount from being an affiliate. So, what else would it give me? Credibility? Well, I don’t review cameras, and I don’t claim to be an expert in them either. I’m a Canon pro envoy, I have a solid showreel and my work kind of speaks for itself. So, really, why would I want that banner there? Canon have been phenomenally good to me and have proved themselves to be a really open, bold and generous company and I owe them for that. They’ve also said they’d prefer me to be honest with them about product which I have been, but I run all my pieces past them first out of courtesy. Quid pro quo and all that. I like being impartial. I like not being beholden to brands, or banners, or affiliates. Just a personal thing, but I suspect that’s what people like about this blog, that and my big mouth. There’s no doubt that the B&H logo is good, it’s a great shop and it makes sense to have it on your site, but I’m not sure I want it.

I read through the terms and conditions to see what would be required of me and one particular paragraph made me think a little bit:

You also acknowledge that we (and our agents) may crawl or otherwise monitor your site for the purpose of ensuring the quality and reliability of links on your site (for example, to detect links that are broken or non-functional, links to products that are out of stock or otherwise unavailable, etc…) Therefore, you agree that we and our agents may take such actions and that you will not seek to block or otherwise interfere with such crawling or monitoring (and that we and our corporate affiliates, consultants and agents may use technical means to overcome any methods used on your site to block or interfere with such crawling or monitoring).

Hmm. All sounds a little bit Big Brother like. The thought of some nerd crawling through my website sounds akin to sexual harassment. What do you think? I’m actually genuinely curious to know what people think of the whole idea. Does Philip Bloom gain credibility through having all those banners on his site, or is he just smart for monetizing his site, reaping the rewards for quite a few years of hard work? I know the traffic through my site will grow but I kind of want to keep being a bit of a loose cannon, or as much of a renegade as I can be. It suits my way of working. Let me know what you think anyway.