Here are two I found today in just a short online search session. In this first video, the Department of Health & Human Services is asking for amateur videos in the form of a contest to inspire a PSA about swine flu. The winner gets broadcast and $2,500 in cash.
The second video is another contest, which will net the lucky winner an HD camcorder and a day with award winning documentary filmmaker Jeremy Gilley (founder of Peace Day) and Peace One Day.
Turns out, amateur video is becoming big business too. You many have noticed that the overall pricing of video cameras is dropping. At the same time, sales are up and amateur video is skyrocketing. Did you know that more than 100 million people visit YouTube every day?
As a matter of fact, according to YouTube's co-founder Chad Hurley, uploading and sharing videos increased to 13 hours per minute last year (as of October 2008). By those same statistics Hurley claims this is the equivalent of Hollywood producing 57,000 full length movies per week. Yeah right - if quality and entertainment value aren't factors - but we get the idea. Massive, massive volume.
Record companies know this too and are producing "faux" home music videos for YouTube. Here's an example. At first blush this music video looks spontaneous, like a casual-at-home recording but if you're paying attention, it's pure studio product. I'm not saying it's not pretty, it's just not the amateur video it may appear to some to be (note the flawless lighting, stellar sound).
Of course camcorder companies have also noticed the move from family-friendly viewing to the massive uptick of amateur videographers who've discovered the global reach of YouTube. Now that amateur video has gone online, it has captured 25 percent of the camcorder market so the companies that produce them are lensing in on "tube-friendly" products.
And voila. We now have digital videos that can be published worldwide with the push of a button. Trust me, you can't do this with a webcam! Samsung came out with a new digital camcorder last summer that aims right at this market. Toshiba unveiled it's Camileo line of HD camcorders in January 2009 and now Sony has a whole line-up of HD camcorders they call webbies.
This week the amateur video story takes on yet another rather dynamic dimension. On Tuesday, August 25, 2009 YouTube announced profit-sharing for members via their partnership program to video producers who meet their terms (whatever that means) and post clips that get mega hits. The keywords are monetizing online content. Everybody on the planet wants to figure this out.
What does all this have to do with scripts? Well, one obvious application is that a writer can get exposure and work on their chops by writing, producing and directing short subjects. People with the power to give you a hand up are actively looking for new talent. Of course they always are, but thanks to affordable technology and the web, gaining visibility to those people has never been easier.
The new media is definitely impacting Hollywood, as all of us who belong to a craft union or artist guild know. That's what the recent contract haggling has been about. The economic downturn has just compounded the growing pains our industry is in right now. In any case, you can bet YouTube content of all kinds is being monitored by the studio execs (or their digital media counterparts), to at least some extent.P.S. It just so happens that this year's October MIPCOM conference in Cannes, France is all about the "new-now-next" concept and will feature many leading producers and creators of content speaking about how technology and the new media is revolutionizing our industry.
P.P.S. And the next generation of YouTube friendly camcorders are already in the pipeline. I'm not just talking about iPhone video recorders and HD minis but wearable HD camcorders like the HD Helmet camera.
