Communications

Brilliant directors: Roman Coppola

Just last August, writers around the world were invited to become part of a very tantalizing short film competition. In short, filmmaker Roman Coppola had teamed-up with Intel and W Hotels to create an original series of four short films to be written by you or me. Here are a few details that appeared with the original announcements in Portable and many other high-profile media outlets across the creative industries.

“Write a screenplay for a short film set in a W Hotel, featuring an Intel-inspired Ultrabook. Roman and a panel of judges, including Chloë Sevigny, Michael Pitt, James Ransone, Jeff Baena, and other notable filmmakers, might just choose your screenplay to be developed into a short film by The Directors Bureau! Your story awaits behind a hotel door. Submit your script by August 30th. Come make a film with us.”

The opportunity absolutely sparked a great deal of interest… but before I knew it, the winners were being announced, and the resulting films, too. Above, I’m embedding Coppola’s own contribution. Below you can also find the project’s official trailer. Enjoy!

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“Kickstarted” documentary feature gives back

From “Kickstarted” – the first documentary film for, by and about crowdfunding – comes “Funded in 60 Seconds.” This is a special series of crowdfunding tips, insights and best practices all delivered in under a minute. Help us keep making more content – and support “Kickstarted,” the first documentary about crowdfunding: http://bit.ly/KickKS

Creative Entrepreneurs: Jose Sebastian Gomez

Over the past year, creative production company Shilo and director Jose Sebastian Gomez took on the challenge of creating a great deal of stunning cinematic content for Qatar TV, as you can see in the montage featured above. After traveling to Qatar to learn more about the culture and people – and make a lot of new friends – Shilo crafted this original HD content and much more for Qatar TV’s on-air identity.

“We were asked to make each promo a metaphor for different aspirational subjects such as education, business, environment and family,” Jose explains. “The main creative challenge was to render these stories in artistic and simple ways that didn’t require further explanation or language. We focused on conveying a feeling and tone for each subject in ways that are abstract and metaphorical but still understandable.”

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Inspiration for life: Toys and stories

How many people out there feel like the blockbuster Pixar series “Toy Story” relates to them, and their own experiences as youths playing with toy cowboys and astronauts? You can certainly count me among them, and of course I know that Woody is meant to be Johnny West, and at least to me, Buzz is … Read moreInspiration for life: Toys and stories

Transcending dimensions with The D4D

Hoping you will enjoy this behind-the-scenes look at how The Department of the 4th Dimension designed the experience, content and technology for the Lucid Dreams exhibit in Sephora & Firmenich’s Sensorium, the world’s first pop-up fragrance museum.

“In the Lucid Dreams interactive installation, visitors can affect floating holographic dream images inspired by Firmenich’s master perfumers. Using a high tech flower sculpture, the images transform based on the power of the individual’s sniff – triggered by the unique sound transmitted by the physical act of smelling. The multidisciplinary team at The D4D designed the complete Lucid Dreams experience including each room’s architecture, short films, floor-to-ceiling motion graphics, glowing sniff-registering flowers and the software that drives the interaction. Every step of the creative process was taken hand-in-hand with the perfumers at Firmenich to ensure a truly integrated and multisensory experience the brings their fragrances to life.”

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Doug Pray: Thanks for the Documentaries

Award-winning documentary filmmaker Doug Pray‘s exuberant portraits of subcultures and maverick individuals have led him to three Sundance premieres, critical raves, numerous awards, and worldwide distribution.

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Thornberg & Forester’s time

It has been almost two years since fate connected me with Elizabeth Kiehner, Scott Matz, Justin Meredith and their colleagues at the award-winning NYC-based design and digital production company Thornberg & Forester, and as time marches on, their story just keeps getting better. Most recently, they collaborated with the gentlemen behind Paris-based creative agency VERSUS for a new global campaign for Bisquit Cognac.

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Forces for good: Kobe Bryant

In this first episode of Mission: Kobe Bryant, the renowned NBA star visits Skid Row to learn about the issues facing homeless people in LA, and speaks to four extraordinary men seeking to improve their lives. You can learn more about the Kobe and Vanessa Bryant Family Foundation’s fight to end homelessness in LA by visiting www.kvbff.org. You can also follow the link to the YouTube posting to find a Homeless Service Organization near you through the National Coalition for the Homeless.

More on Mission

In Mission, Kobe Bryant documents an honest account of challenges facing residents of Skid Row, the downtown Los Angeles area with the largest concentration of homeless people in the United States. Through his personal and candid conversations with residents of The Los Angeles Mission

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Adventures in publishing: Maria Popova

The Marginalian is the brain child of Maria Popova, an interestingness hunter-gatherer and curious mind at large, who also writes for Wired UK and The Atlantic, among others, and is an MIT Futures of Entertainment Fellow. The Marginalian is a record of Maria’s reading and reckoning with our search for meaning: sometimes through science and … Read moreAdventures in publishing: Maria Popova

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