#Vanguard the best doc series you might never see again
This is a special Tuesday’s with friends. In fact it’s more like a Tuesday’s with former colleagues in honor of the great work done by the Vanguard team at our alma mater Current TV.
Vanguard is an institution of of investigative journalism, and the jewel in the crown at Current TV. Unfortunately, due to shrinking revenues and a change in format, Current is moving away from in-house production of the series. That means layoffs and a questionable future for investigative journalism at the network.
On Saturday we saw a tweet from one of the Vanguard staff saying that the series was not being renewed. That was followed by this article in Sunday’s Media Decoder section of the New York Times, where Brian Stelter wrote that:
In what some called a cost-cutting move, the channel last week dismissed most of the roughly 10 “Vanguard” employees. Some were offered other jobs. The channel will continue to produce “Vanguard” documentaries, but with freelancers.
David Bohrman, the president of Current TV, said in a statement that production was not being canceled. “But given the network’s new focus on political news and analysis, we have chosen to change the present in house production model for ‘Vanguard.’ ”
After that article hit the interwebs several tweets and Facebook posts from our friends and former colleagues still working on the series followed (along with lots of support sent to those folks from all of our peers in the ex-Current TV community).
We understand the economics behind this decision. We also want Current to succeed. However, we still see this as a sad moment for Current TV. Vanguard represented that last ray of idealism that propelled us to working for Current early on, and we aren’t alone in feeling that way. In truth, the scale back of Vanguard is just another example of media landscape abandoning expensive investigative journalism in favor of rambling pundentry. And that’s sad for more than just Current TV.
Our best wishes to all the Vanguard staff entering the “freelance” world. The water’s not bad out here, especially not for talented folks like y’all.
In the meantime, you can still check out episodes of Vanguard on Current (if you have it) and you should.
JADED Sizzle Reel
This is our first sizzle reel. It’s meant to be fast, fun, and to communicate the scope of what we’re capable of with an emphasis on Branded Content, Serial Programming, and Non-Fiction.
It features work written, produced, shot, or edited (and in many cases a combination of all of the above) by Abby and/ or Jeremey. It includes work produced as staff at Nick@Nite and TV Land, Current TV, HarperCollins, and Seesmic. It includes client work for Bank of America (iB5k), ESPN, Causes, Current TV, Supercharged: The Life and Times of Tim Brauch, Institute for the Future, Roughneck Hardware, and DWNTWN Skate Supply. It also includes clips from independently produced projects including Make it Happen: DIY Across America, It’s a Rough Life, and Roughcutz Da Movie.
Full list of videos below:
DWNTWN: SOMA
One Ride
Current TV: Sisterz of the Underground
DWNTWN: Tenderloin
Roughneck Hardware: BART Tour 2010
Make It Happen: Chuck Perkins and Voices of the Big Easy
Roughcutz Da Movie
Make It Happen: Lost Film Fest
HarperOne: Tales of Wonder by Huston Smith
Bank of America: BUILT NYC
Bank of America: White Memorial Hospital
Bank of America: Adams and Central
Bank of America: Butte College Workforce Development
It’s a Rough Life
Causes.com: The Gift of Giving
ESPN.com: Roughneck BART Tour 2009
Atlas Skateboard Store
Supercharged, the Life and Times of Tim Brauch: Open/ Web Promo
Nick@Nite: Brady Weekend Promo
Institue for the Future: Future Cal Courts Employee Orientation
HarperOne: Mariel’s Kitchen by Mariel Hemingway
Current TV: Current@Bonnaroo, SuchNSuch
Seesmic Cafe
Unboxing on Seesmic
Yahoo! Current Action Buzz
Thrasher Bust or Bail 2008
Make It Happen: Lowcard
Current TV: Invisible Children, Displace Me
Seesmic DuJour
Make It Happen: Okay Mountain
Make It Happen: Austin Craft Mafia
Institue for the Future: Cal Courts Justice Chronicles
Current TV: BlakkBox, Kidnapped
It’s a Rough Life coming soon…
This is a quick update on one of our projects, It’s a Rough Life with Johnny Roughneck:
As some of you know, we’ve been working with the Roughneck squad for years.
In 2010, while Jeremey was on a trip with Roughneck to shoot the Cowtown Phoenix Am contest for ESPN.com, he shot some pilot material for what we hope to be a Roughneck reality show concentrating on Johnny’s eccentric circle of friends, family, and team riders.
We are now editing that material into a a series of webisodes that will be premiering later this year. In fact, we already have a few in the can.
Stay tuned for lots more.
The Death of Radio Bandido: A Chicano Mystery
A few years ago we started working with an excellent Bay Area Filmmaker/ production jack-of-all-trades by the name of Pepe Urquijo. THEN he decided to move to New York City to further his education so we didn’t see him for awhile… that is until this spring when we had a gig in New York City and we reached out to Pepe to give us some names because we needed assistance on the shoot. Like the champ that he is, he offered himself (even though were pulling a 6am to 9pm day). Pepe is solid.
The Death of Radio Bandido: A Chicano Mystery is his latest documentary about…
Oscar “Bandido” Gomez was a radio activist based out of the University of California, Davis who roamed the Golden State like the famous social bandits of a hundred years before. He was a hero, a voice for human rights in the U.S. and abroad and exposed audiences to many struggles against injustice. Oscar emerged as a citizen journalist with a loyal audience ranging from farm workers, neighborhood youth, activists, prison inmates, and college students…
In 1994, sadly, Oscar’s body was found on the shores of Santa Barbara. The local police dismissed the case as an accident. The more I studied the official recorded circumstances of his death, the more I realized it is filled with unsatisfactory explanations, unexplained conclusions and unanswered questions thus making the case of Oscar’s death a perfect example of the type of injustice and oversight that Bandido himself would expose through the media…
This documentary is not only a sincere heartfelt attempt to make clear the events of that night which led up to Oscar’s death but also shedding light on his journey from Baldwin Park to the unfortunate bluffs of Isla Vista, Santa Barbara. Without fully comprehending the possibilities of what might have transpired that night and without fully appreciating the significance of the voice we all lost, we can’t possibly move forward. Radio Bandido begins the process of moving in that direction.
For a full write up please go to the Kickstarter page where Pepe is trying to raise $22,000 for post-production, finishing, marketing, and festivals. This is a worthy project and we encourage you to support it (as we have ourselves).
For more info visit the facebook page, twitter account and wordpress blog.
Skatopia: 88 Acres of Anarchy out on DVD
Skatopia: 88 Acres of Anarchy takes you inside a hillbilly skateboarder “commune” in Appalachia where anything goes. The self-declared cult-leader of Skatopia converts punk skaters into volunteer labor, battles bill collectors, does a stint in jail and raises his own family amidst the chaos. Not just for skateboarders, the film explores the glory and the challenges of pursuing your own dream.
Back in 2006, Jeremey happened to be at Skatopia with his partner at the time, Allison Muir. They were filming the Bowl Bash for Current TV.
88 Acres of Anarchy was in production then. The filmmakers, Laurie House and Colin Powers had been camped out at Skatopia with their Headlamp crew for a few months and they were planning to be there for a few more, which blew Jeremey’s mind. If you’ve ever seen any footage of Skatopia than you know what a commitment to filmmaking that was. JADED’s been following the progress of the film ever since.
In fact, we had the pleasure of premiering our short documentary Make It Happen: Lowcard a few slots before the North American premiere of 88 Acres of Anarchy at the 1st International Skateboard Film Festival in Seattle a couple of years ago. Then we hung out with Laurie and the Skatopians during the after party at Marginal Way. It was great talking to her about filmmaking, and we are now excited to share the news that Skatopia: 88 Acres of Anarchy is out on DVD at skatopiathemovie.com and it hits the stores on July 12.
The Collector’s Edition features over 90 minutes of material not found on the retail version. If you order before July 12, they’ll throw in a sticker pack free.
The retail edition ships free in the US with the discount code: freeship
They also need some help getting it up on Netflix. Click here and hit “Save” or “Add to My Queue”.
Oh yeah, and like them on Facebook
.
New JADED Promo Reel!
Enjoy our first JADED sizzler! Jeremey wanted to name it “We Out Here”, but Abby thought that would look like we had bad grammer.
This promo is a long time coming. The last reels we cut were in 2006 after we left Current TV. Almost every year since then, we have planned to produce a new one, but it’s never been able to rise high enough on the priority list to become a reality. How it happened now is mystery to us. We are actually really busy. Slammed in fact. We’re working a big job for an important client. Yet somehow, in between rounds of notes, Jeremey was inspired to start cutting a promo reel. We figured that we’d get something started and get around to finishing it at some unknown moment in the future… and then it just came together. Crazy. We’re really happy with this video, and we hope you enjoy it.
It’s meant to be fast, fun, and to communicate the scope of what we’re capable of with an emphasis on Branded Content, Serial Programming, and Non-Fiction.
It features work written, produced, shot, or edited (and in many cases a combination of all of the above) by Abby and/ or Jeremey. It includes work produced as staff at Nick@Nite and TV Land, Current TV, HarperCollins, and Seesmic. It includes client work for Bank of America (iB5k), ESPN, Causes, Current TV, Supercharged: The Life and Times of Tim Brauch, Institute for the Future, Roughneck Hardware, and DWNTWN Skate Supply. It also includes clips from independently produced projects including Make it Happen: DIY Across America, It’s a Rough Life, and Roughcutz Da Movie. For a full list of videos used in this promo click here.
Enjoy!
Riding the Long White Cloud
I miss skate trips. This documentary series makes me want to hit the road.
Riding the Long White Cloud was a bicycle skate trip [through New Zealand]. It was shot and edited by the Vancouver based FriendlyFire productions.
It features pro skaters Cairo Foster, Chris Haslam, Silas Baster Neal, Kenny Anderson, Keegan Sauder, Rick McCrank, and John Rattray.
Travel and skate.
The City Dark
The City Dark is a beautiful film that we missed at SXSW, but are anxiously awaiting a chance to see. With any luck it will come through San Francisco on its screening tour starting late summer (you can even host a screening if you have a venue).
Synopsis from their press kit:
THE CITY DARK is a feature documentary about light pollution and the disappearing night sky, premiering in competition at the 2011 South by Southwest Film Festival. After moving to New York City from rural Maine, filmmaker Ian Cheney asks a simple question, “Do we need the stars?” Exploring the threat of killer asteroids in Hawaii, tracking hatching turtles along the Florida coast, and rescuing injured birds on Chicago streets, Cheney unravels the myriad implications of a globe glittering with lights – including increased breast cancer rates from exposure to light at night, and a generation of kids without a glimpse of the universe above. Featuring stunning astrophotography and a cast of eclectic scientists, philosophers, historians and lighting designers, THE CITY DARK is the definitive story of light pollution and the disappearing stars.
It was produced by the guys who made King Corn, we can’t wait to see it.
UNDERCITY
This film awakens our inner explorer.
Directed by Andrew Wonder and featuring Steve Duncan of undercity.org, it was
shot on a canon 5d mkii with canon 24 f/1.4 (version 1) with the zacuto rapid fire, Zoom H4N and a sennheiser g2 wireless lav.
Enjoy. For more info about the film and filmmakers head here.
Snow Guardians a Collaborative+Film project
Did you see those Redrock Rigs? That video is like gear porn. (Cool idea for a film too.)
We stumbled across Snow Guardians while browsing the latest issue of Videography magazine. We love the concept of the film (from it’s website)…
We have combined a group of cinematographers, photographers, editors and VFX gurus to use the latest HD DSLR, and large senor digital HD cameras to shoot a documentary on Ski Patrol and Search & Rescue in Montana. Get ready for an immensely visual documentary on the life and work of Ski Patrol at several Montana Ski Resorts as well as the Search and Rescue teams that respond to winter emergencies in the backcountry.
We are working to prove that you do not need a large production company to create an amazing broadcast film using the latest HD digital cameras from RED, Canon, and Panasonic. During the shoot we will take this new breed of digital film cameras far outside the comforts of the studio.
In addition to the documentary, a separate behind the scenes film with be shot in parallel. The behind the scenes capture will be integrated into daily filming and will be used to highlight the abilities of a new breed of small, digital broadcast cameras, HDDSLR and digital encoding technologies. Weekly blog updates will be posted on a production website, allowing followers to track the progress and learn from the behind the scenes content.
…but the part of the article that caught our eye was this:
We had two [MX] REDs, which are great because you can shoot at 4K at up to 120fps and you have a RAW codec that gives you a lot of room to push the look around during color grading. We shot most of the interviews with Panasonic AG-AF100s. We did a lot of work with multiple Canon EOS 5D,7D and 1D Mk IVs, which are so small and light and give that shallow depth of field. We used those for some interview work, too, and we did a little bit of 60fps shooting with the 7D for slow motion. We brought 18 of the really tiny GoPro cameras, which were great for mounting to a helmet, a ski patroller’s chest, a rescue dog or a snowmobile.
How did they get all those cameras? If you watched the video above, then you know the answer is at least in part related to sponsorships (which is an excellent model for securing a equipment that we will be looking into in the future).
There was also a social media element to getting production off the ground. Co-Producer Tyler Ginter started tweeting about the idea for the film, and then magically a crew came together over twitter (follow that link for the twitter account of the whole crew).
The idea that a high production value, adventure style documentary can be produced by pulling a crew together over social media and shot using smaller, relatively inexpensive digital cameras is one that resonates with us. It inspires, and makes us optimistic for our future long-form projects. After all, it’s not so different from the way we coordinate our network of freelancers now. We will certainly be following the progress of this film and encourage you to do so as well.