Living as Independent Developer

Manuel Marino: You declare yourself and your team as “video game enthusiasts”. How much being a “videogames fan” is important in creating games?

Andres Martinez: All companies have their own stories, but in our case, developing and self-publishing our games has been difficult, with low sales during several months at our beginnings, and still low if they get compared to a regular studio. The only reason we have been able to survive is our passion for the art of game creation.

Can we say that the old games of the past were “better”? What can we say to the nostalgic gamers?

20 to 30 years ago the video game space was totally different. Accessibility to video games was very low, the product itself was like an experiment and the assumed audience was reduced, fortunately for us, we fell into that target, and we enjoyed every bit of Space Invaders, Galaga, Pac-Man, etc.

Some may say that it was better for game developers at that time because it was easier to create totally new and different IPs (Intellectual Properties). But the reality is that, they created myriads of games and only a few stood up to catch the public’s attention. Additionally, they were tremendously limited by technology and market penetration.

So, to answer your question, I don’t think old games were better or worst. But I think that our judgement is usually biased by the emotional attachment we have to those old great experiences.

How is the Independent developers world?

If we can name our day to day activities at baKno a “world”, then it is great!. Being able to make a living out of our own game creations is a wonderful feeling. None of us worked in this industry before and we don’t know how it is to distribute games through an experienced third party, maybe sales are much higher, but I suspect that for those particular jobs your independence is quite compromised.

What’s the difference between being “indy” and being “in the industry”?

We don’t consider baKno to be an industry player yet, we are independents as explained before, but it does not excludes the possibility of being an influent member of the gaming industry at the same time.

Videogames are more a “work of art” or a “industry product”?

All baKno games are a “work of art” built upon an “industry product” foundation. This foundation provides a minimum quality, design and support standards, and it becomes the canvas where the artist paint his game creation.

What can be done to make modern games better and innovative?

Creating better games is not that difficult, just use your common sense to take advantage of the ever-growing processing capacity, graphics and audio capabilities and internet bandwidth. As an example, you can enhance a simple old-school cards game with better graphics and effects, and maybe adding a multiplayer option with audio chat capability. Creating quality innovative games is an art, and for that there is no recipe or guideline to follow.

Why is it that I find games from independent developers being more innovative?

Innovation is weapon that cuts both ways. The more you innovate in a game, the higher the chance of being a great hit or a great failure. Established studios have serious economic responsibilities like payroll or rent, and they cannot afford to risk the company viability in a single game. On the other hand, and usually not even knowing about it, independent developers working from home are the risky creators of real innovative game experiences.

Internet can be of help?

Sure. In general, for casual games Internet has been the medium to reach massive audiences by offering free-to-try downloads, something that would have been impossible (very expensive) by mailing free CDs. In particular, baKno relies heavily on the Internet not only as a distribution medium but also as an effective way to communicate with our customers, and also to enhance the game experience with additional online features.

What are your next projects?

We are working now the online gaming for Billiards. We want to create a subscription service before mid-year. And by the end of the year we want to create a game with 100% pure baKno IP.

How do you see the future of videogaming?

As an interesting mixture of platforms, game genres and players’ demographics. Internet is going to be the default distribution medium, there won’t be a single dominant gaming platform, more and more people will embrace video games as an entertainment alternative, and most important: the general public will recognize the cognitive development value provided by video games (most of them).

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Global Financial Crisis and Books

The Subprime Solution: How Today’s Global Financial Crisis Happened, and What to Do about It. In this trenchant book, best-selling economist Robert Shiller reveals the origins of the crisis and puts forward bold measures to solve it. He calls for an aggressive response, a restructuring of the institutional foundations of the financial system that will not only allow people once again to buy and sell homes with confidence, but will create the conditions for greater prosperity in America and throughout the deeply interconnected world economy.

The New Paradigm for Financial Markets. George Soros argues that the current crisis differs from the various financial crises that preceded it. He bases that assertion on the hypothesis that the explosion of the US housing bubble acted as the detonator for a much larger “super-bubble” that has been developing since the 1980s. The underlying trend in the super-bubble has been the ever-increasing use of credit and leverage.

The Finance Crisis and Rescue: What Went Wrong? Why? What Lessons Can Be Learned?. It features thought leaders from the Rotman School explaining the financial crisis and rescue from a variety of perspectives.

• E-commerce, a cultural fact? E-commerce, online marketing, shopping, globalization, innovation are all linked together. It is becoming a real huge cultural fact, to be studied, to be understood to comprehend our world and where this world is going to in the near future. E-commerce, a cultural fact? Global E-Commerce and Online Marketing: Watching the......
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• Music Biz Marcos Marado wrote this exclusive article about Music Biz. Is the situation really so dramatic as he explains? Leave your comments, this could be our first really important debate on ManuelMarino.com. Music Biz I'm, first of all, a passionate for music. My passion for music before I can recall it,......
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E-commerce, a cultural fact?

Global E-Commerce and Online Marketing: Watching the Evolution By Nikhilesh Dholakia is a great book that explains all of this.

Specialists from business and academia present a meticulously researched, compelling examination of the effect that globalization, innovation, and relentless technological competition are having on the development of e-commerce and marketing. The editors offer practical managerial insights, important empirical findings, and new ways to comprehend the intricacies of the fast-morphing world of electronic business.

Another book that really catched me is Cyberpop: Digital Lifestyles and Commodity Culture by Sidney Eve Matrix.

Cyberpop: Digital Lifestyles and Commodity Culture is an analysis of cyberculture and its popular cultural productions. Each chapter focus on a particular cyberfiguration, including Hollywood films (GATTACA, The Matrix), popular literature (William Gibson’s Neuromancer, Scott Westerfeld’s Polymorph), advertising for digital products and services (AT&T’s “mLife” campaign), video games (Tomb Raider). Each close reading illustrates the ways in which representations of digital lifestyles and identities which typically fetishize computers and celebrate a “high tech” aesthetic encourage participation in digital capitalism and commodity cyberculture.

What I’m seeing on Internet and around me is an impressive and crazy explosion of virtual shops, like StreetWear-And-Red.com (also StreetWearAndRed.com). Goal of the shop is providing cool designs for the urban and street fashion along with elegant ideas for the modern gentlemen.

In the same explosion I can put my ebook and also my new CD with Rock and Metal Guitar Solos for Multimedia.

I’ve got just a fear, that all of this is going to result in a soap bubble in the future. How much will we be fascinated by the virtual world and how much can we stay far from reality? (Or virtuality is going to be our new reality?).

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Manuel Marino: When did you start your movie studio and how did you have the idea?

Todd Cericola: Clocktower Pictures was started in February of 2008. We are a new company in the Philadelphia area that specializes in independent film. We started it after working on a t.v. sitcom pilot called “Two One Five.” Myself, and my two partners Keelen Monahan and Matt Tomko had all been working individually on producing, directing, and writing and decided to put our efforts into one basket by opening up what would eventually become Clocktower.

How much is difficult to manage a movie studio?

I don’t know that it’s as difficult as it is fun. We are all doing something that we throughly enjoy doing. There is a strong workload, especially since we are a new company, but we wouldn’t have it any other way. We are a very hands on company working directly with our actors on a one on one basis. We try to cater to all of their needs as well as our own.

I’m a music composer, so the question is natural, how much music is important in the production?

As a musician myself, I think that music is one of the most important thing in a film. If you’re trying to paint a picture to set up a scene, background music is key to setting a mood. A good song will always have the scene set perfectly and you may not even notice it in the background, but when you have a bad song you, as the filmgoer, will always notice the mistake of choice.

What is your latest production? Can you tell us something about it?

Right now we are working on a few things. We are working on a feature film called “Describing the Moon,” about a guy in his mid-twenties struggling with trying to please his friends and complete his life’s goal of becoming a script writer. It’s a fantastic script that’s really dialogue driven, and very funny. We will be finishing up auditions for that next weekend, and should begin filming in October. Two One Five is a big priority as well, we are shopping around to try and sell and make an entire season. As well as entering short film and television festivals to get the name out. The entire episode is up on our website for free viewing at Clocktower Pictures. We are also looking into opening up a second branch of the company under the banner Clocktower Music helping to produce local artists and independent musicians. So we have a lot going on.

How we can define an independent movie and why it’s important that indies are supported in their work?

I think independent film is a very important thing because it brings out more creativity in people. When you’re writing without cause and shooting without big budget you’re working harder at making something the way you see it, so you’re getting the original vision of what you’re going for. It’s like an artists painting, you want to express your own ideas in your own way, not someone else. Too many hands in the cookie jar is never a good thing.

Do you think internet can help indies?

I think the internet is a great advantage for people in any area of creative arts. You can reach out to millions of people at the single click of a button for your company, your movie, your art, your music anything you want. I think with the advent of facebook, myspace, mandy, craigslist, and countless others we’re living in an age where getting yourself out to the masses of people is just that much easier, and that much better.

How do you see the future of movie production?

As far as movie production in general goes, I see it bulking up even more. Budget’s for production are getting larger by what seems daily, actors are making more and more money, and the intake is getting outrageous. On a smaller scale, Philadelphia is getting its own studio soon which has already scene production in the city jump up ten fold.

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How to film an award winning movie with no money

The four year, twenty-three day, ninety-three minute movie!

Yeah, yeah. The movie’s not that long, it just has been for me. Everyone else, besides friends and family, will get to see the 93 minute version. And the reality is, I might be on it another couple years, though what anyone sees will still be the 93 minute version.

“Blood Ties” was filmed with no money by a crew of three in both the US and Thailand (with just a few moments over the border into Cambodia). Just to make things a bit more complicated, we filmed in the mountains of Virginia, Washington D.C. on the Mall, The Port of Miami, and Atlanta. Our crew numbers stayed at a maximum of three and our cast grew to 154.

And post production? Me. Sound, visual effects, editing, ADR, Foley, graphics, titles, music? Me. Which is not to say everything is great, it’s just what we could afford on a no budget movie. Every time I’d get ready to fire myself, I’d remember that I’m the only guy I could afford! And even with that, I definitely had some long talks with myself.
Is it worth watching? We hope so, and our success on the beginning of the film circuit says we might be right.

Blood Ties won The Action on Film International Film Festival’s “Action Film of the Year”, The Audience Award for “Best Director” at the Big Bang Film Festival, “Best of the Festival” at the Indie Fest USA International Film Festival, “Best Visual Effects” at the same, and has been nominated for various other awards at various other festivals.

Could I teach something about directing? Yeah, probably, even though Blood Ties is a first movie. About editing? Yeah, I’m known as a strong editor. After Effects, sound editing, composing for film, and 200 other subjects involved in making a movie? I’m pretty sure I could. But that’s not want I want to teach or preach or pass on in these few words.

The lesson I hope to share right now is in creating a vision – not only of the movie and what you want it to be but how you want to be perceived – keeping it in mind, and striving toward it with as little compromise as possible no matter how long it takes. Knowing that in twenty or thirty years, your first film won’t matter in the scheme of things except that it will always be, no matter how successful or not, your first film.

One of the things to strive for is surrounding yourself with a strong cheering section. My film partner, my family, my amazing girlfriend. Though they might not physically take on the work, without them, there is no movie.

My film partner, Robert Pralgo put up the initial money, as well as a seemingly endless trickle of money since. He also co-starred, help cast, pushed, pulled and dared me to make a better movie than what we thought was possible.

My family never talked down to me even though I am the one brother of five who they all have to worry about if I have a roof over my head.

And the Amazing Amanda let me see the movie from many different angles, again setting me up to challenge myself to make it even stronger.

Our crew of three rotated several times, and our cast gave their all because they somehow knew that I believed in what I was doing. There would be no movie without all of their many efforts. I give credit to almost everyone I meet and genuinely mean and feel it. They color the way I look at myself and my work, and are reflected in the images jumping around on screen.

And jump around they do! Blood Ties embraced the hand held look simply because I knew where I was wanting to shoot, a tripod, a dolly, or a steadicam would get us arrested. “You mean you aren’t supposed to shoot on the Mall or the Port or in the streets of a foreign country without permission?” Permission is relatively easy to get, if you pay for it. And that just wasn’t part of the budget!

I am sure I could talk about the making of the movie for the about the same length of time it took to make it. And maybe I’ll get the chance to write more. There is a lot more information on our website and other people are starting to talk and write as well.

What I hope with this introduction is to pass on the challenge to others to make the movies they want to see. To learn and persevere. To look at the art around them and if they find themselves saying “I could do that” – then to do it!

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How Has the Internet Affected the Music Industry?

Music has always been something that has inspired mankind. Sir Thomas Beecham once said ‘a musicologist is a man who can read music but can’t hear it’. The pure beauty of music is that we can all listen to the same notes played by many different instruments, yet make our own individual conclusions with regards to what the music means to us; and nobody can argue.

It is not in the nature of this post to go in depth on musical history. Nonetheless, music has developed rapidly through the ages with the vinyl when it was first really used in 1948 by Columbia Records. Since then the music industry has seen the use of the Audio-Cassette and Compact Disc (CD).

Consequently, since the internet became more widely available it has made music more easily accessed by such means as Online Music Stores. There are thousands of these stores online including three of the most famous: iTunes, Napster and Rhapsody (US only). Let’s focus in on iTunes; an offshoot of the Apple Company.

I refer to iTunes as the ‘pied piper of the 21st century’ lulling people into easily downloading content with minimal hassle. iTunes is a free piece of software developed by the Apple company at Macworld Expo in San Francisco. This allows you to download digital music, music videos, television shows, iPod games, audio books, various pod casts and in the USA feature length films, and ringtones. Downloaded content can then be used to create your own play lists and personalised albums to burn to CD. It can also be transferred onto various different types of iPod including the new iPhone making music more accessible and easy to get hold of.

How does this affect the ordinary person who enjoys listening to their preferred genre(s) of music?

In this case, music has never been so easily manipulated and accessible. We live in a convenience obsessed world with personalised portals such as Last FM where you can listen to any artist known to mankind, you can listen to personalised internet radio with Pandora and also listen to all the music and view the videos on YouTube. It doesn’t take much effort to rip music (ripping is the term for digital audio extraction). The cost of downloading an album from the net is generally cheaper than an album brought in the shops, after all, downloads should cost less as there are less overheads for the record label to pay for: CD sleeve, CD case, CD cost, copying equipment etc.

How does this affect the music industry?

Some artists find the concept of the internet hard to adapt to; however, as they are forced into the mould of technology modern artists tend to embrace the internet as a friend rather than a foe. They view it as a ‘creative and inspiration-enhancing workspace where they can communicate, collaborate, and promote their work’ – Mary Madden (Research Specialist) in her project ‘Artists, Musicians and the Internet’. Sites such as MySpace have helped Artists and Musicians address their target audience rousing more interest in their style of music.

But let’s face it; there will always be people that are looking to find a loophole. I’m talking about those who engage in illegal music downloading. Experts admit that illegal downloads will never be stopped. This messes up the system and makes it unfair for both the artist and the people who are paying for downloads. The British Phonographic Industry (BPI) has joined forces with the Federation of Phonographic Industries (IFPI) to take legal action against internet file-sharers.

How will illegal downloader’s effect record labels? A record label makes, distributes and markets sound recordings; basically at the end of the day they’re out there to make money. The music industry produce mainly alums…how many albums have you brought just because you like one song? I have! We’re forced to buy albums to get the songs we love. As sales figures are falling record labels will be forced to look at the logic. Are people going to buy a whole album or just download one song? What effects do you think this will bring? Might we see a rise in the cost of internet downloads?

So in conclusion we have seen that the music industry has created stronger ties with new technology over the past decades and now can only go forward. We have seen that internet music downloads can be both an advantage and a disadvantage as we see the battle between the illegal downloader and the record companies continues. However, it is safe to conclude people – adapt or die!

• The Invictas are back Bruce Atchison is one of my Yahoo Group best members and he wrote this great article. Bruce is a legally blind freelance writer and the author of two books, When a Man Loves a Rabbit (Learning and Living With Bunnies) and Deliverance from Jericho (Six Years in a Blind School).......
• Reflections on some well loved Poets Ziggy Olivier wrote this article. He met Dylan Thomas and spent some of his youth drinking whisky with him. He said me: "Everything you may have read about him was true." Reflections on some well loved Poets Approaching my own demise, I was delighted this Christmas to receive from......
• Creating Clouds Frank Kane job is very particular... he creates clouds! He can do it through his C++ library for real-time sky and 3D cloud rendering, used worldwide by scores of games and visual simulation applications on the Windows platform. Its name is SilverLining. Creating Clouds Manuel Marino: Your sky and clouds......
• Music Reviews: Wind and Wire Magazine I've been asked why there is no music reviews section. Well, if you search my name on Google.com, you'll find many pages (in English and Italian languages) that talk about my music works or music albums. So, I don't want to put a complete list of the links, but anyway......
• Music Arts, Orchestra Music, Music Compositions... Music Arts, Orchestra Music, Music Compositions... being Artists, Fine Arts, Poetry... In few words: Music, Arts, People and Ideas. What links all these words together? It’s not difficult. But first let’s begin studying the term “artist”. It means “One, such as a painter, sculptor, or writer, who is able by......

• Work at Home Research Assistants If you are looking for a work at home position, a research assistant might be just what you can do. If you have a way of searching the Internet and finding information that most people cannot find, this type of work would be just perfect for you. Many companies and......
• Staying In Touch With Friends and Family Members Is Finally Affordable A number of years ago I was visiting with a friend whose family was from Sicily. His parents and siblings were here in the US, but the extended family lived in Italy, Argentina and Canada. Though time and distance were important separators, I learned during my visit that the......
• Music Memorabilia Memorabilia -> Music Memorabilia -> Rock, Pop Music memorabilia has always been popular, and although we associate it primarily with today’s rock and pop musicians, the practice of collecting items for musicians and groups dates back many hundred years. In fact, in Japan, before mass printing was used on a......
• VoIP and the Communications Industry Are you worried about the costly long distance phone rates? Do you want to find some ways on how to call your loved ones in a cheap way? Are you a student who finds it hard to make a call with your parents? Is your company paying too much......
• VoIP and Internet Telephone - The Ins and Outs The fact that the Internet opened up a whole new world of communication options has not been lost on those providing telephone service - or on those who spend lots of money on voice communication. The ever-changing technology and emerging market for more cost-effective and better communication is creating......

Growing Independent Film Industry in the Southeast

When I returned home to Louisville, Kentucky from my three year-long stint in Los Angeles as a professional actress I expected more. I anticipated that my recent win as a Marilyn Monroe Look-Alike by Premiere Magazine and my appearances on Beverly Hills 90210 and Matlock would have every talent and casting agent in Louisville falling over themselves to represent and utilize my homegrown talents and experience. It didn’t happen. I felt like Yukon Cornelius after I swung my mining pick into the ground and brought it to my mouth to taste for traces of the delicious silver and gold acting opportunities at home and “Nuthin’. Hello, I won the Marilyn Monroe look-alike contest!

Fifteen years later, to my delight everything is coming up roses in the Southeast independent film industry. Is it because I am no longer a platinum blonde ingénue and now a sultry redhead? Is it due to widely available and affordable video and film equipment? Has the increase of Los Angeles film location shooting in Kentucky infused the film community here: ELIZABETHTOWN, SEABISCUIT, THE INSIDER, STRIPES, etc, etc? The 48 Hour Film Festival, among others may have tempted some independent film makers who otherwise would not have stepped behind a camera with simple, short formats and alluring prizes. How wonderful to have developed an extensive filmography in my own hometown due to the indy boom.

Louisville has had a thriving arts community for the entirety of my life. The city has claimed a local ballet, orchestra and professional theater company: Actors Theater of Louisville (that had everyone I auditioned for in Los Angeles inquiring). The River City also boasts a cultural center, the Kentucky Center for the Arts that is used for a myriad of artistic and mind expanding events—from K.D. Lang concerts to poetry readings by Maya Angelou.

The semi-professional theaters in Louisville are also noteworthy and prolific. I cut my teeth at the KY Contemporary Theater before I got my B.A. and moved west. Pandora Productions produced a compelling version of SOUTHERN BAPTIST SISSIES. Since, then Susan Linville, Founder and actress at the Necessary Theater has offered amazing productions with compelling new scripts as does Looking for Lillith. The recent one-woman show WOMEN SPEAK IRAQ developed and performed by Shannon Woolsey was performed with such virtuosity and passion for the widest range of opinions and postures I could imagine.

My training, my stage and life experiences experience have given me the depth that I claim and utilize now as a film actress. Oftentimes, people will ask me which medium is my favorite. They both have their draws. In the live theater experience, the actress has the opportunity to get immediate feedback from the audience, has a substantial amount of time to build emotional crescendos and has the obligation and luxury to live in the moment and keep going whatever the immediate reality (not fun when scenery or a co-actor is falling on your head).

Film offers the luxury of another take, if the first one or fifteen takes aren’t the cat’s meow, you can do another. Film tends to pay better. (However, anyone who acts for the pay is a little misguided). You can capture the moment forever on film (This can be most upsetting for some who aren’t involved in savory productions). Most films have a larger audience than the theater does.

Advice for the film actress: study. If you wish to be an actress, learn from the best in your community who teach. Do not study under an opera diva and expect that you will be taught the subtleties of a fine camera performance. Do not study at modeling agencies who are primarily interested in increasing their bank accounts. Study under those who have the experience you are seeking. Universities are an excellent place to learn and perform as an actress.

If you are younger than college-age and wish to act, go see as many plays and films as you can. If you enjoy someone in a stage performance, find out his/her name and if you may have a few minutes of their time to see how they gained their polish. Community theater is a great place to start. Hopefully you will get a sane director and be able to squeeze into the cast despite the member of the board of director’s narcissistic casting. If you think that Hollywood is political—spend a summer in a community theater!

Surround yourself with positive people. If you consider someone incredibly talented as an actor or director, but he/she is constantly negative, overbearing or abusive—go elsewhere. Life is too short and no matter how badly you want to act—it’s not worth it.

The directors that have had the distinct pleasure of working with are great collaborators. Chris Courson from Lightspeed Productions first cast me as a lead in his film called EMMA’S CODE for Louisville’s 48 Hour Film Festival. Immediately after that in July 2007 he wrote the most amazing short called CIRCUS NUTS and cast me again as a lead. We were so pleased with the results we will be shooting a feature-length on this premise this summer.

Chase Dudley is a young director who was open to my suggestions when he needed other quality actors for the independent feature film LAST SEEN ALIVE (knowing people always helps good actors who are easy to work with get cast). Tracy Dudley his wife wrote an amazing screenplay with a strong female lead, Detective Malone. Tracy was very open to working together to make the script and character as believable and formidable as possible. The process and final product was such that we are planning on working together on a sequel in 2008. LAST SEEN ALIVE will be available at www.amazon.com in late January 2008.

• Artwork Displayed in Unusual Places Joyce Boncal wrote this exclusive article for us. Artwork Displayed in Unusual Places If you’re young, budding artist, hoping to be discovered, where can you display your artwork? There is always your own web page but I wouldn't recommend it unless you can afford to advertise that web page. This......
• Music, Movies and Independent Films In this exclusive interview, Todd Cericola, owner of Clocktower Pictures, talks about his movie studio, about music in movies and about the independent productions world. Manuel Marino: When did you start your movie studio and how did you have the idea? Todd Cericola: Clocktower Pictures was started in February of......
• Independent Filmmaking We're back with a new interview, to Actress and Producer Glorinda Marie. We talk about independent filmmaking, filmmakers, actors and movies industry. Here are some interesting links to check, after reading the interview: - Actress Website - imdb - SF Indieclub - Get Bizzzy Acting Coach Manuel Marino: "Glorinda, what......
• Documentary Filmmaking This is a special article written for us by James N. Weber. He has worked on Socially Aware Media, especially documentaries, in South Africa, the Dominican Republic, Honduras, and Mexico, and is currently working on a project on food security in Guatemala. His work and more info can be found......
• Living as Independent Developer Today we interview Andres Martinez, owner of baKno, a game development studio located in Key Biscayne, Florida. They are a group of video game enthusiasts committed to developing new ways to deliver fun, interactive and challenging software. Living as Independent Developer Manuel Marino: You declare yourself and your team as......

• How To Get Over Your Ex If a person has an experience that is physically, mentally or emotionally traumatic, the mind deals with the situation in one of several different ways. Some people abuse alcohol, food, drugs or other substances to numb the feelings they have inside. Others mourn for a short period of time,......
• Recession dating means talking about debt Whether young and saddled with student loans or older and under water, dating couples find that when things get serious, it's time to talk money. By BILL WARD, Star Tribune Last update: May 15, 2009 - 6:00 PM WHEN AND HOW TO TALK MONEY Just do it. "People who don't......
• Obama At House Republican Retreat In Baltimore: FULL VIDEO, TEXT [/caption] Video of President Obama's remarks to the House Republican retreat in Baltimore on Friday, Jan. 29, 2010 and Q&A With GOP Lawmakers: Complete transcript of Obama's remarks as recorded by the White House: 12:10 P.M. EST THE PRESIDENT: Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Please, everybody be......
• Blogging Is It Good for your Health ? Is Blogging good for your health my thoughts Well based upon my own experiences of blogging, I would say that most of my experiences have been good as far as blogging is concerned. The reason for writing this post is I came across a article on Discoveries website which speaks......
• Polycom Desktop IP Phone Combines Color Display, HD Voice and 1Gbps Ethernet Polycom Desktop IP Phone Combines Color Display, HD Voice and 1Gbps Ethernet By Tim GrayTMCnet Web EditorUnified collaborative communications solutions player Polycom (News - Alert) today announced the latest addition to its SoundPoint IP desktop phone line, the SoundPoint IP 670. The SoundPoint IP 670 is an application-enabled desktop SIP......

He said me: It’s countless hours, in fact I could count it as months, I’ve put into this industry for very low results in the end. This is my first attempt at writing articles and I hope people gets the point across that this art is reserved to an elite and that you must obey to some fixed rules to get into their circle. I hope to help people understand what are those traps and guide them to avoid those.

Julien, your voice can be heard now, thanks to ManuelMarino.com!

Recording Music Industry

Lately I’ve questioned myself why was there so much newcomers in the music industry that didn’t grab my attention. Soul less recordings, heavy thumping bass, yells and screams is all I hear these days. Where is the hear candy? You know that kind of song you listen once and you’re not sure you like until you give it more listens. The kind of lyric that hooks you and makes you want to change something about you, or even the world. The strange feeling of nostalgia, of fear or faith. That is all gone since the music industry is now all about money and none about feelings.

What people want these days are instant rewards, premature orgasms while what we need from the music industry is more like a long term relationship. Don’t get me wrong; I understand why people want it that way, but there’s one kind of songs that’ll eventually fade in history while the other one will be there to stay. I think music needs a second chance, a change in the way of thinking, a split for newcomers that don’t want to fit in the prefabricated mold that today’s industry is.

Most contemporary musicians want to have the right “recipe” for success. The recipe that would get their songs top the charts and generate a buzz. They want the special ingredient that would get them out of normal life and throw them right into the elitist artist world. And that is understandable since the industry demands it. Instant success stories are heard all over the newspapers but from experience I know that most of those stories are forgotten shortly after. And if they are not, maybe they should.

What’s sad is that the music that doesn’t fit the standards gets pushed on the midnight playlist on Tuesdays, or worst, not played at all. So the infamous Verse Chorus Verse type of song is filling the entire rush hour playlist. Miss “Perfect Body” and Mr. “Perfect Voice” are all over the radio stations. We’ve come to an era where the beauty of the singer is more important than the beauty of the song. And that’s where it must stop. Sure an anti-charismatic singer won’t attract much audience at first, but fans listen to the music more than looks at the eyes, do they?

I really don’t care what the band looks like. They could be just “okay” but if what they do is pure genius, nobody will notice. What people will notice after some time is the music, the real reason why the band existed in the first place. Since when does a rock star need to be a supermodel to sell tickets? What we want is presence not nude skin.

Maybe I’m wrong a little bit though, since so much people are going to Justin’s or Britney’ shows. As they say “sex sells” and this can’t be truer. A lot of artists are betting on this to make their stash bigger. Think Janet Jackson at the superbowl. Publicity, marketing and word of mouth are what is important now, no matter what you do to get it. Good or bad, talk about it, heh? That’s what they want… And it works! What’s sure though is that good rock music has left its place to rap, screaming rock and pop music this decade and I can only hope it will be back for the next.

• Music Geek Robin Mookerjee is a songwriter obsessed with music. Is this a good thing? Or a bad thing? I can say he is a real music geek! Read his story and check his website. Music Geek I’m really a fan as much as a songwriter, but a lot of songwriters say......
• A Beautiful Interview Ceri Shaw suggested me an interview from our friends at Americymru. So here's this beautiful interview with Dr. Karl Jenkins (I include also the link to their ticket giveaway competition for his performance at Carnegie Hall NY on March 6th 2010). A Beautiful Interview Dr. Karl Jenkins is Britain's greatest......
• To the audience of music Gunnar Colding is a former professional cellist who for 25 years has been employed by chamber orchestras as well as symphony orchestras of Sweden. This is an exceptional article he wrote for us. To the audience of music There was recently given a concert in New York mainly consisting of......
• How Has the Internet Affected the Music Industry? This article is written by web designer Josh Gutteridge who runs Skyte Media. Skyte Media is based in the Midlands (England) and is a professional web design company that specialises in web design and development. Josh would like to receive comments about this article on his blog. But of course......
• Punk music in the late seventies Wade Crawley said me "I propose to write an article about the influence of punk and indie music and culture on a young person (myself) coming of age in England in the late seventies and early eighties". I accepted, and Wade wrote this article! I must add also these more......

• 10 Steps to Help Your Success in the Music Industry Below is a list of steps that I have compiled together from some of my closes friends in and around the music industry. All of them make a living strictly off of the music. So play close attention to these Ten steps. It could actually make your career. 1. Make......
• Beatles Memorabilia Memorabilia -> Music Memorabilia -> Rock, Pop-> The Beatles Out of all of the rock groups that rose to prominence in the 1960’s, none took the world by storm quite like The Beatles and since then, Beatles memorabilia has been a hot commodity. There are fans that have built up......
• Should We Buy Beatles Rock Band? Have you seen the buzz around Beatles Rock Band? This must be one of the better marketing campaigns I've seen in a long time.  Every other channel seems to have something about either the game or the Beatles themselves.  I love it!  I've been watching The Beatles Anthology when I......
• The Changing Face of the Music Industry When was the last time you paid $12 or more for a CD? For many, it has been years. It's really no wonder why so many people have stopped spending their hard earned money on overpriced CD's. People used to go out and buy a CD because they heard......
• Text of President Obama's State of the Union Address [/caption] Remarks of President Barack Obama The State of the Union Wednesday, January 27, 2009 Washington, DC Madame Speaker, Vice President Biden, Members of Congress, distinguished guests, and fellow Americans: Our Constitution declares that from time to time, the President shall give to Congress information about the state of our......

Music Biz

I’m, first of all, a passionate for music. My passion for music before I can recall it, and grew with the fact that I had the luck to have older brother and sisters whose music collection was wide enough to feed my music interests. Also since a little kid I was interested in technology, and started programming at the age of four. Being nowadays a music lover and also a musician, and at the same time graduated and working as a Computer Science Engineer, I feel myself lucky to have some ground bases to analyse the state of music business.

The music business is in a chaotic state. The record industry is declining, and is throwing the guilt of it to what they like to call “piracy” – the unauthorised downloading of music. While they blame it, the truth is music market is falling, whos to blame? The fault is from the music industry itself. Doug Morris, Universal Music CEO, recently admitted he knows nothing about the music industry of nowadays. They decided to sue their customers by suing music fans that do unauthorised downloads instead of suing those who really make money out of copyrighted works, and restricting their clients’ rights with technologies like DRM.

It is surely true that it’s hard to find a completely fair way of compensating musicians while promoting the access to culture, but there are efforts to design market models that work – at least better than the actual one. The biggest problem is that the music industry – defined by the four major labels – doesn’t get it. The music market has changed, music, musicians and music lovers adapted themselves to new trends and technologies, but the music industry decided to ignore all the signs, refusing to see the big elephant in the room, and kept doing business in an obsolete way.

The proof that they simply don’t understand what’s going on is right in front of everyone wanting to see it, when we get news that Elton John wants the Internet shut’ed down, or when countries try to impose Internet Services Providers to filter illegal downloads, even if that’s technicly impossible to do and the music industry does political pressure to make the countries change their laws.

They spend tons of money implementing DRM systems, and others sell the rights that were restricted to listeners back, making money from what they first took, even if it’s known that DRM systems cause sales losses, music artists and fans are against such systems and new businesses are arising just by the fact that they don’t adopt DRM technologies, radio stations create petitions against DRM. Now, it’s too late for them – but what’s going to happen to the music market?

Well, we’re also seeing a lot of emergent business models. First of all, we have to realize that while CD sales are decreasing, music consumption is rising twice as fast. Also, if you open your eyes and start considering the music business as everything around music and not just music sales, then you’ll see that, for instance, in North America, the music business will total $26.5 billion in 2011, growing at an average annual rate of 2.8% from $23.1 billion in 2006. Recorded music revenues will still declining as declining CD sales cancel out the sharp gains in digital sales. Music publishing and live music will grow. Norway has a party that wants to free file sharing and sampling, shorten the commercial copyright and ban DRM.

The number of web services for bands is wildly growing. Artists have now the means of making money while giving music for free, for instance. Musicians are finding new ways of doing their work by themselves, even if sometimes things aren’t simple. While there’s no formula on how to create the perfect record label, there are some labels and distributors that understand nowadays music market and know how to do business in it.

The future is smiling at us – we just have to let obsolete formulas and vices die.

Of course, new issues to be solved will appear. New fights have to be fought and won, or we’ll end like citizens of a dystopian world.

But soon enough it is going to be a great time to live – as a musician, a music lover or even a technologist.

• How Has the Internet Affected the Music Industry? This article is written by web designer Josh Gutteridge who runs Skyte Media. Skyte Media is based in the Midlands (England) and is a professional web design company that specialises in web design and development. Josh would like to receive comments about this article on his blog. But of course......
• How to film an award winning movie with no money This is a very interesting story about a director with a great idea but no money. Kely McClung is a director writer actor editor. He's been able to film his movie with no money and very low resources. But he made it! The award winning Blood Ties is his first......
• Sounds like music and networking Wizzit Magazine interviewed me about Blogging and Social Networking. I have to thank Matti Mattila, the reviewer and open networker. If you remember, Matti wrote A musician story. Here is a short excerpt from the magazine article that you can download here in pdf format. Sounds like music and......
• History of Music and Current Recording Industry Crisis Roger L. Bagula wrote this exclusive article for ManuelMarino.com. History of Music and Current Recording Industry Crisis In a time when the whole future of how music is distributed is in question, maybe we should look at the history of music for a guide. Many of us find music......
• The value of photographic prints Stephan R. Lewis is a professional photographer. He accepted to share his knowledge with us, with this exclusive article. The value of photographic prints I have been in the photo industry trenches for a long time and have watched many things come and go in popularity. When I say 'trenches'......

• Affiliate Marketing Sales - Learn How To Boost Affiliate Marketing Sales One of the most common and widespread approach towards making money on the internet nowadays is through affiliate marketing sales. The internet has witnessed a boom in online businesses that are launched on daily basis. This can be attributed to the economic downturn and the ineffectiveness of traditional approaches towards......
• Network Marketing - Fixing Problems From The Ground Up A good majority of people don't really understand network marketing it is like they love the comp plan but they never fully understand what it takes to make  massive success happen in their lives.  I have seen it happen so many times its scary.  A person joins a business all......
• Sunday Money Madness: Gas Prices Drop Have you seen gas prices drop in your area? We have, my family out in Florida has. How far down has it dropped in your area? Let us know - leave a comment! Enjoy the weekend reading. Life | Personal Finance: Wall Street Journal says it's Time to Rebalance Your......
• Buying Acoustic Musical Instruments Online Acoustic instruments have been providing such wonders of sounds and melodies since before the Renaissance period. These instruments provide a quality of music that cannot be replicated by their electrical counterparts. Pianos, violins, guitars, learning to play an acoustic instrument is something that can only bring growth to a person.......
• PotPieGirl's One Week Marketing Guide. Interesting Points to Know Have you considered starting a career in internet marketing? It seems that everyone you see out there has made money in the internet marketing business and has posted their success on many different sites. After seeing their success stories you think to yourself, "If they can be successful online, then......

Documentary Filmmaking

On the video shelf where the Dewey Decimal starts with a number, there is an odd conglomeration of videos: a man gorging himself on fries, some guy living with grizzlies, and a bunch of slide shows of old wars. It’s the documentary shelf, a mix of the sensational, humorous, serious, and (supposedly) true videos.

So let’s say you want to get your work on that shelf. Maybe you know this awesome woman down the street who invents things. Or maybe you’re interested in the affects of high fructose corn syrup on your body. Here’s how you can do it, and really, you can.

Throughout my experience with documentaries, I’ve developed what I call Socially Aware Media. In other words, I try to make sure that my projects are dedicated to making life better for people, or at the very least, trying not to hurt people. A key issue for me is how people are portrayed, as many of the people I interview or film are oppressed in some way. I do my best to treat them with respect, and try to convey their own words, instead of shaping it into the message that I (or the intended audience) would like to hear.

To give you an idea on what it takes to make a documentary yourself, I’ll use my biggest documentary, Fuerza, as an example. Fuerza is a 30 minute documentary on immigration from Apan, Hidalgo, Mexico, to Goshen, Indiana, U.S.A. I and three others started pre-production in November of 2005, and then put together a short proposal (video and written), which we submitted for a grant in spring 2006. The grant was a meager $5,000 (mostly for travel) plus access to equipment and editing space.

Through the summer of 2006, we conducted interviews and taping, making sure we got some major events such as protests and important local meetings. In late August, we spent a week in Apan, where we interviewed tons of people who had lived in Goshen or had family in Goshen, as well as city officials. Then we spent three days at the border, interviewing the border patrol and attending a press conference for Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff.

After the trip, we tracked down some pivotal interviews, and interviewed local politicians, and started transcribing, translating, and writing the script. Finally, we started with the actual edit. By this time, I was spending 40 hours a week on the video, on top of my college classes, in order to have it ready by our premiere date in November 2006.

We premiered it a year after we started preproduction, on November 9, 2006, to a packed theater in downtown Goshen. Since then, we’ve sold hundreds of DVDs and been invited to show the film and speak at universities like Notre Dame, churches, schools, and homes.

One of the biggest challenges to making a documentary is finding the money. You’ll want about $1000 per minute of final product. At least. And if you’re wanting to make money, find another career (or more likely, hobby). There is very little money to be made, and very few documentaries actually become profitable. On the projects I’ve completed so far, I stand to actually make about $200 total (plus a lot of travel). So I do this because I love it.

In Fuerza, we had a lot of difficulty knowing how to apply some of the ideas of Socially Aware Media to a scene where a Mexican mother breaks down and cries over her son who had emigrated to the U.S. It’s a highly emotional scene, with footage of the son watching the video of his mother cry, followed by a heartfelt directive from mother to son to “Work hard so you can return home.”

We ended up cutting time the mother cries in half, and then probably half again, until we reached a point that did not gloss over the pain she felt, but also didn’t exploit either the mother or the audience.

So if you have an idea for a documentary, do it! Go find the money, and if you can’t, there are ways of doing it dirt cheap.

• Artwork Displayed in Unusual Places Joyce Boncal wrote this exclusive article for us. Artwork Displayed in Unusual Places If you’re young, budding artist, hoping to be discovered, where can you display your artwork? There is always your own web page but I wouldn't recommend it unless you can afford to advertise that web page. This......
• An Artist Portrait (Part Two) This is the Part Two (and final part) of the true life story as artist written by Frank V. Cahoj for our Weblog. (Part One) An Artist Portrait (Part Two) I give an unbelievable amount of credence to these two early periods in my life: one of everlasting creation, one......
• How to film an award winning movie with no money This is a very interesting story about a director with a great idea but no money. Kely McClung is a director writer actor editor. He's been able to film his movie with no money and very low resources. But he made it! The award winning Blood Ties is his first......
• Game Dev Famous Game Dev Vince Desi writes for our Weblog! He will write a series of articles, and this is the Part One of an article about being successful in Independent VideoGame Developer Art! Become a famous Game Dev now! Game Dev (Part One) Part 1. The 3 Essential Elements: I......
• Growing Independent Film Industry in the Southeast Heidi Yost wrote this exclusive article. Heidi (photo) is a talented actress. In this article, she explains Film Industry situation in the southeast, talks about her experience as artist and gives also important hints for the new actors. Growing Independent Film Industry in the Southeast When I returned home to......

• So, where do you keep YOUR money? I received an email this weekend asking about good places to have financial accounts, as the emailer was not sure what investment companies were good, bad or ugly. So I wanted to write out this list about where we keep our money for various things like retirement, emergency funds, etc......
• 25 Quick Online MLM Tips You Can Use Now 1. Register your name.com if available. If not get the closest one to your name registered. 2. Focus on using and promoting one website at a time and get a large flow of leads from the one website before creating another one. 3. Start building your list now. Offer......
• Palm Pixi to Get Video and Voice Recording Soon? One of the biggest things missing from WebOS is video and voice recording capability. It seems like a glaring hole since PalmOS had the ability and that was years ago. Well the good news is that there's nothing preventing the Palm Pre from recording video... nothing other than Palm getting......
• Boost Your Business Blog with Video Blogging As a result of video sharing websites such as YouTube, the popularity of hosting videos on the internet has really gone right through the roof in recent years. More and more people online are preferring the idea of watching a short video in place of reading a great deal of......
• Meet The M-Network Friends: An Interview With Mommy Gets Paid. Now that I have wrapped up all the interviews with all 8 M-Network members other than myself, I decided to expand the series a little and include all the friends of the M-Network who participate in our group projects and forums. Up this week is LJ from Mommy Gets......

Independent Games

MM: Adrian, what can you tell me about the actual situation of independent videogame developers?

AG: Life as an independent game developer has always been a lot of fun. It requires a lot of dedication, but it is hugely rewarding to watch other people happily play your game once it is finished.Being your own boss also has its advantages. I love having the freedom to work whenever I want, as long as I want and wherever I want. I’m not sure if I could take my laptop and work outside in the garden on a beautiful summer day in a “regular” company.

Business-wise things have changed a quite bit during the last 4 years. Casual games have become a huge trend and lots of larger companies have entered the market. There is a lot more competition and both budgets and production values have increased dramatically, making it much harder for small developers to keep up.

For example, a VC funded games company outsourcing development to Eastern Europe can afford to produce 10 titles even if most of them don’t recoup the production budgets. As long as just one title reaches AAA status, this can still be a profitable business strategy. Most indie game developers cannot afford to do this.

There are still great opportunities on the casual games market for indie developers if you have a good innovative idea. It is not easy to succeed though and opportunities are not quite as good as they used to be a few years ago.

Can we talk about the relationship between the big distributors and the independent developers like a “collision”?

The rise of huge game portals such as RealArcade or Bigfish Games during the last few years also caused a drop in (games-related) traffic to the traditional shareware sites. Indie game developers have therefore become dependent on the portals.Teaming up with a publisher / distributor can be a good way for indie developers to get more publicity on the portals. This is also what we have done for our latest title Gemsweeper.

How did you have the idea to found Lobstersoft?

I started creating my first game called “Five+” just to practice C++ programming while I was studying at university. The game was free at first, people only had to send me an e-mail if they wanted to have an unlock code for the full version.After just a few days I got so many e-mails that I had to think of a way to automate registration key submission. I was also surprised to see that a magazine wanted to include the game on their cover mount CD. Then I found one of the first shareware payment processors and decided to convert to Five+ a shareware game.

Your next projects?

We are working on a sequel to Gemsweeper and on a subscription-based web site. The website is not gaming-related, but I never saw myself solely as a game developer, even if computer games have always been one of my favorite pastimes.

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• Creative Ideas (Part One) Like the power of electricity your Ideas have greater impact when they rapidly flow in concentrated streams of thought. You'll find this and more in the article wrote by Deremiah, exclusively for ManuelMarino.com . Deremiah *CPE (Customer Passion Evangelist), is the winner of the 2004 Nightingale-Conant Acres of Diamonds Award......
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Creative Ideas (Part Two)

RELATIONSHIPS INFLUENCE THE POWER OF YOUR IDEAS…

Brian Tracy who has done a lot of research to compile the information in his wonderful book “CREATE YOUR OWN FUTURE” expresses in Chapter 7, page 115 that Relationships Are Essential toward the development of your future. The Power of Ideas are improved by the friendships we develop and nurture. Most people underestimate how their friends impact the direction they are going and will continue to go in as a result of the company they choose. Sometimes you have to realign yourself with new partnerships in business, new personal and business relationships just to place yourself in a more positively influential environment with others who have the same values that you do. When you begin to hang out, spend time talking with people who reflect the kinds of attitudes that uplift you. It’s just as important to get yourself moving in the right direction as it is to get an electric current to the right appliance or device you’re trying to power. Like electric current powerful ideas have to be directed. It’s very important that if we want to be successful business people that we need to hang out with other successful business people. If you want to be elevating the level of the power of your ideas you need to begin to elevate your level of friendships. Edward Bernays said it best in his book called “Propaganda” where he references many times that a large volume of our society is often being governed by a small handful of influential people. So who are the small influential players in your commiunity? How could you influence the relationships you desire to have in the art world, the music world, or the business world that governs a great deal of the future direction of those industries? Finally how can you gain recognition and be known as one of the Kings or Queens of your industry?

ELECTRICITY AND THE POWER OF IDEAS BOTH OPERATE IN STREAMS…

Real electric power moves in streams we call currents. Those currents flow in the direction we aim them in. Now the Power of Ideas works the same way. The more powerful the idea the more others join in to move along with the flow of our stream. So it becomes very important that others know that the ideas that we have are electric. The sooner others find out and hear or see the impact that our elecritc current has the better it is for us and the sooner they can jump into the stream and add to the flow of the current. When an idea doesn’t have a charge it will fail to add it’s electricity to the atmosphere. It’s like the creative atmosphere of our house when I was a child was conducive for bringing about more artistic gifts because the atmosphere was charged with a certain current for the arts. How can you charge the atmosphere of your home or your job to create the type of electricity that gives your ideas the power to channel themselves into a boisterous stream that grows?

WHAT YOU CAN DO RIGHT NOW TO INFLUENCE THE POWER OF YOUR IDEAS.

I have over 21 things you can do to unleash the “Power of Ideas” but I’ll give you 4 today that will free you up to live more creatively right now. If you’d like to get 3 more Free ideas shoot me an email at deremiahcpe@gmail.com . And the first 20 people to respond who use the headline “More Power of Ideas for me, Deremiah *CPE” and give me their name and mailing address I’ll give you a Free opportunity to coach you via email (which means I’ll respond to no more than 7 of your emails…working toward helping you to solve the problem). Here are the four I said I would share with you right now.
1.) Make a list of 7 people you’d like to meet and then get on the internet and get to introducing yourself.
2.) Get a journal today and start using your journal like a Fishing Net to capture all the ideas you’re loosing.
3.) Turn your TV off for the next 30 days and dedicate your TV time to making one or more goals develop.
4.) Get a pack of 25 Thank you cards and force yourself to Thank at least 5 people everyday.

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And now… the article:

The Power of Ideas (Part One)

Although I’ve been drawing most of my life I can only really remember having the ability to control this talent somewhere around 4 years old. By the time I turned five I got a hold of an oil Paint by Number set. It was one of those cheap simulated board canvases with numbers that matched the numbers on the small plastic oil paint containers and they came with a few red enamel paint brushes. My mom who was very creative used these paint by number kits to paint pictures for the walls in the duplex we lived in. She often did these kinds of things along with sewing clothes. In between all this she’d drive out to the military base to create these ceramic roosters and salt & pepper shakers she used to make. Every now and then she’d take me along. There were very large multiple rooms like a cafeteria style set up and most of the attendees were military housewives. In one area they’d create the ceramic figures, in another they’d paint the figurines and in the last room is where they’d fire the objects that were painted in these ovens they called kilns. We were living in Fairbanks Alaska at the time because my dad was stationed there in the U.S. Army. During this time my father had an amazing collection of music and he used to love to sing in his spare time. But occasionally I would find him at the kitchen table doing a few figure drawings of people. My dad was very good at drawing full figure images of people and it was during this time that I began to recognize that I too had the gift to draw and the power to control my ideas. In this kind of environment burgeoning with creativity is where I uncovered multiple gifts. This is also where I experienced the beginning of my discovery of how diverse gifts influence one another and spring forth through the power of ideas.

THE OUTER WORLD CREATES ENVIRONMENTS FOR THE INNER WORLD…

It is easy for most people to see how we are shaped by the environments of our communities. Having lived in 13 cities here in the US and two cities in Germany and being a teacher of history I see very clearly how environments affect everything. We are all shaped by the geographical land masses, oceans and climates of the environments we live in. Those things alone dictate everything from what kind of clothes we were, which trickles down to how we look, what kinds of crops we grow, the things we manufacture, what we eat and even how we speak. But it doesn’t end there we are influenced by cultures, religions and the races of people and these things likewise affect everything I named above. However beyond those basic influences of culture, religion and races and our environment there are other things that also affect how we think and eventually how we behave. And with all these outer influences shaping and affecting who we become it is so easy to forget that there is an inner world of influence…a world of thoughts and ideas that eventually have more impact upon who we become than all the changes in weather put together could ever have upon us. It is here in the environment of our inner-hemispheres that we have the greatest control upon our present condition when we use the power of ideas to fuel our successes.

IF YOUR IDEAS ARE POWERFUL THEY’RE INFLUENCING THE WORLD…

Are your ideas influencing the world? Shoot me an email at deremiahcpe@gmail.com and share with me how your ideas are influencing the world. Think about it! It was the power of ideas that brought your parents together. And the power of their ideas that influenced the future of the world’s collective ideas when you were consumated and birthed into this planet. Every member of the world is a part of the collective governing body of our world, our countries, our cities and our communities through the power of ideas. From Steve Jobs release of the iphone to CNN’s release of the news everyone is influencing the power of ideas. Every person within this creation we call earth has the complete authority to change the future direction of this world through the ideas they release. Whether their ideas are productive or unproductive they still have influence. Like the butterflies in China can impact the weather in Italy we have the ability to affect the future climate of ideas. But the kind of effects that we desire to have must be considered before we take action. Often times our ideas are creating environments for us that are not strong enough to resonate the kind of powerful influence we want them to have. If you desire to really use the power of ideas to work in your benefit remember that powerful ideas have a life force that is very influential. So don’t you want to start thinking about choosing the kind of ideas that could really influence the world? (Part Two)

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Here are some interesting links to check, after reading the interview:

- Actress Website
- imdb
- SF Indieclub
- Get Bizzzy Acting Coach

Manuel Marino: “Glorinda, what do you think is an artist?”

Glorinda Marie: “An artist creates something through utilizing his or her imagination or minds eye as the primary tool of invention.”

MM: “You teach and coach other artists, why do some artists fail and other succeed?”

GM: “I teach my ‘Get Bizzzy’ students to practice the 5 P’s:
- Professionalism
- Punctuality
- Practice your Craft
- Persistence
- Patience
If any one of these key elements is missing, one can fail. Always be a professional treating everyone respectfully. You see the same people on the way up as on the way down. Show up early or on time for auditions and work. I know some CD’s that take points off for actors that are late for auditions and producers who will fire people from jobs if they are late. Also, it is especially vital that an actor hone their skills continuously – so practicing one’s craft, keeping one’s instrument sharp and tuned. And – truly persistence is the key that opens the door to opportunity! I think many talented people give up way too soon. So, practicing persistence and patience while doing the other things listed above, will eventually pay off! I loved Allison Janney’s speech at the Emmy’s a few years ago. Some one had referred to her as an ‘overnight sensation’. She laughed and retorted that it was the longest 30 years of overnight ever!”

MM: “You manage SF Indieclub, what can you tell us about it?”

GM: “I founded SF Indieclub to help enhance local filmmaking and filmmakers. Our collective mission is to create more work for all of us and also to enhance the quality of films being made locally. We hope to be inspirational, informative and helpful to our filmmakers. In the 8 years I have led the group, we have made some progress and sincerely intend to continue to do so. At this time, we network together over 2,000 filmmakers, directors, producers, writers, crew and talent. It is extremely rewarding to see many of our filmmakers go to festivals, win awards and even obtain distribution! My mantra for them is… keep creating!”

MM: “What are your next steps in career and life?”

GM: “Although SF Indieclub has proved to be somewhat instrumental in improving and expanding local filmmaking in the SF Bay Area, there is no comparison to the bountiful union work that is available in Los Angeles. As a SAG actress, I must expand my career and take it to the next level. Therefore, I have been living nomadically between Northern and Southern California. Although I am relatively established in the SF Bay Area, I nearly have to start all over again in LA. I’ve been going down there during pilot season and taking classes, meeting new teachers, meeting new casting directors and networking with actors. I am submitting myself in the hopes of finding a quality mid size agent to help me reach the next level in my career. I want to find someone who believes in me and my talent. In the meantime, I am submitting myself for every breakdown that would be considered my appropriate ‘type’ possible in film and TV. I believe that even if one does have an agent, the agent does 10% of the work and takes 10% of the cut because they do 10% of the work. An actor must always be actively involved in his or her own career. My goal is to get my feet in the doors of some TV shows and do some Guest Star and Co Star roles. Of course, I wish to play many more interesting roles in film as well.

As for life – I am traveling to Thailand next month. I love to expand my horizons and explore new cultures and people, customs, beliefs and ways of life. When I return home refreshed, I will enjoy the holidays with my friends and family before going back to LA again.”

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He can be heard on three US radio stations, as well as occasionally on “The Dennis Miller Show,” which airs across the country.

He got his first byline as a young boy with his hometown newspaper. He reviewed “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” and the paper misspelled his name.

Howard Stern, the radio bad boy, once read one of his columns on the air.

This is his story.

Freelance journalism

This isn’t exactly the best time to reinvent oneself in journalism. If newspapers aren’t dying, they’re very sick and doctors aren’t sure what to prescribe.
That didn’t stop me from quitting my job at a metropolitan newspaper and traveling across the country for the chance to start a family and buy an affordable home.
Priorities are priorities, but I feared giving up doing what I love for a living – writing movie reviews and entertainment features.

Thanks to the Web and some creative thinking, that hasn’t happened – yet.
Since moving to Colorado I’ve been able to continue my movie reviews but in a freelance capacity. The adjustment to being my own boss has been enlightening. My commute entails shuffling from the bedroom to my office, with no reason to check shadow traffic reports for fender benders or overturned trailers. Nice.

But the amount of rejection I face each day makes me long for the security of a regular gig. That’s where the Internet came in. I decided to create my own Web site, attempt to brand myself and see where that might take me. I know less than zero about HTML – heck, I didn’t know it was now referred to as XHTML, and I had never heard about CSS either.

For starters, I decided to leverage my last name, Toto, as something that sets me apart from the competition. Thus www.whatwouldtotowatch.com was born. Silly? Perhaps. But after decades of “Wizard of Oz” ribbing, that name had to start paying dividends.
I began the site on a blogger platform, but I soon changed it to have my own domain name.

But boy, was the site genetic. It took me weeks of poring over a comprehensive XHTML starter book to learn how to tweak the site and add some usable content.
That learning curve remains steep, and my site still needs a considerable amount of work. But web design wasn’t the only area where I needed to stretch my brain. Marketing my Web site required another skill set I lacked. The Web actually helped me out here, and with a few google searches I found a number of ways to spread the news about my new site.

Today, www.whatwouldtotowatch.com receives a modest amount of visitors, and every time I pitch a story I direct the editor to my home on the Web for further details. Blogging on a daily basis also makes me a sharper writer, or at least one who can pound out paragraphs at a steady clip. That efficiency will serve me well someday, I bet.

In a year, I might be writing press releases for some faceless think tank, or correcting grammatical errors for a local company’s human resource division. I’ll probably double my salary in the process, but if I juggle my web efforts just right I can avoid that fate.

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• Independent Games We interview Adrian Grigore, president of Lobstersoft, an independent casual games developer from Fulda, Germany. Their company consists of 2 people, although they have outsourced some parts of the development to freelance graphics and music artists when creating Gemsweeper. Gemsweeper is their latest title, a PC puzzle game. Independent Games......
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Game Dev (Part One)

Part 1. The 3 Essential Elements:

I started Running With Scissors in 1996. Desire, Focus, Commitment. I like things to be simple, so I will concentrate on what I believe are the most important Elements to be successful. While you may think these 3 Elements are general factors and would apply to any endeavor, your right. How you apply them is what determines how successful you will be.

Desire is the soul of life. It makes you who you are. It’s what drives you to get up in the morning, to work late into the night, and to do it all over again and again, as long as necessary. Desire is blind to failure. Desire is based in the question “What do you want?” Do you want to be a Video Game Developer? Do you have the skills it takes to make games? Are you creative? Inventive? Can you write, draw, program, build and lead a team, manage the ups and downs? How bad do you want it? Desire will deliver you to success if its true to who you are.

Focus is the roadmap for success. What type of game are you making? Is it a puzzle game, or a shooter, or a sportsgame, etc. What platform are you designing it for? Console or Computer? Handheld or Mobile? Is it a single player or multiplayer, is it time based or mission based? Who is the audience, male and female? How old? What languages? What cultural impact is there? Will there be a sequel or mods? The more you Focus in advance the more reliable your roadmap will be, and the faster you will become successful.

Commitment is what determines your priorities. Are you single? Or Married? Do you have kids? How much time are you willing to devote? Do you want a nice car now or later? Do you want to go on vacation this year or later? Do you want to go with your friends this weekend or work late? I didn’t say it would be easy or all fun, but if this is what you really want, then it will be fun, and easy and most important it will be natural to be committed to your project, and the project will come to you, just like success will follow.

I’m not here to waste your time, or mine, so unless you can honestly ask yourself and answer Do you have the Desire? Can you focus? Are you willing to make and keep the commitment? If you truly believe your answer to all these is YES, then congratulations you are have taken the 1st step in becoming an independent video game developer.

Part 2. Game Concept to Design
Part 3. Build your Development Team
Part 4. Create a Business Plan: Marketing, Publishing, and Distribution
Part 5. How to live after your game is a Hit!

Bio:

I have been a creative person my entire life, from painting clam shells from Coney Island beach in Brooklyn to everyday parenting of my kids. When I was ten years old I met someone who could draw a lot better than me, so I started writing songs. When I was sixteen I met someone who could write better songs than me, so I started painting, then I wrote poetry, then short stories, and philosophy, all along I was living life, not looking for who I am, but living who I am.

At 28 I started in the video game industry as a Producer for the original ATARI. In 1982 my first big title was SPY vs. SPY for the C64. From then to 1996, I worked on over 50 titltes, including Alter Ego (1st game made in male and female versions), Ghostbusters (1st game to use software speech) and Tom & Jerry, for companies including Activision, EA, Disney, Hanna Barbera, Jim Henson and Sesame Street.

In 1996 I created Running With Scissors for the sole purpose of developing POSTAL. Now, in 2007, we are celebrating our 10th Anniversary with a feature film POSTAL-The Movie, a POSTAL mobile game by Russian publisher Ministry of Fun, a POSTAL BABES mobile game by Russian publisher HeroCraft and we are co-developing and publishing POSTAL III with Russia’s premier game publisher Akella.

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