Monthly Archives: March 2012

Australian docs – view from the US by Peter Hamilton

Documentary, Latest News, , , ,

Peter Hamilton runs documentary.com, a site about the market for documentaries around the globe. Peter is an Aussie who once taught at Sunshine Tech, would you believe, but is now based in New York.

Here is his summary of what’s going on in Australia, gleaned at the WCSFP congress in Paris late last year.

Australia: Rich in Coal and the Flat White Lifestyle. But What About Factual Commissions?

2012 March 7
by Peter Hamilton

Australia is enjoying its biggest boom since the 1850′s Gold Rush:

  • The GFC wasn’t even a hiccup.
  • Carpenters sip their early morning strong flat whites and then head off to work in their Audi’s.
  • New Coal-for-China billionaires seem to be minted weekly.

Is this wealth trickling down to the Aussie Factual sector?

For the Paris Science Congress, we surveyed the Australian landscape from 20,0000 feet through interviews with local industry participants. We focused on Specials, limited series and docs. Here are our updated findings…

———————-

TAKEAWAYS

  • 90%+ of Australia’s total factual spend is accounted for by ABC and SBS.
  • Both are taxpayer-supported broadcasters.
  • And they are experiencing reorgs.
  • Australia’s economy is booming, and there is a traditionally sympathetic Labor government in power in Canberra
    • But neither pubcaster has benefited from a big step up in the public TV budget that would have flowed through to local unscripted production.

    FUNDING

    • Funding from Screen Australia is steady – this year $16+/- million is budgeted for factual, indicating the  modest scale of the Australian market
    • Screen Australia’s factual spend is directed (+/-):
    • 50% for ABC
    • 40% for SBS
    • And 10% for cable/satellite channels.
  • “Screen Australia has budgeted $3-5 million for 2011/12 in the All Media Fund, a new $3-5 million Fund which encourages interactive or multi-platform innovative, risk-taking storytelling and includes factual -based projects.” Continue reading Australian docs – view from the US by Peter Hamilton →

    • Screen business online

    Latest News, Online Media, , , ,

    Appropriately enough I saw this session advertised on twitter, as for some reason I missed it in the Film Victoria ebulletins.

    Film Victoria’s Brad Giblin opened this information session at ACMI today by explaining that it was a follow up to a similar one held around a year ago. The Screen Business Online program is an attempt by Film Victoria to encourage and assist people to build their ongoing viability by ramping up their online presence, and engage with their audiences online. Up to $10,000  is available as a grant, and two of the three speakers in this session were past recipients.

    So what did they do with their dough?

    One key takeaway from the morning was the flood of people migrating onto the WordPress platform as a way of avoiding all that mind-boggling HTML code and enabling the owners of the business to update their content easily and constantly. WordPress is essentially a way of creating a blog, and it can be free, but it’s also a way of creating a web site that will look fine on the major browsers, including the horrible Internet Explorer. So you can slap content into your site without shoving the borders sideways or ending up with a blank screen. You can go a long way with WordPress, assisted if you wish by designers and techheads who know more about CSS than you ever wanted to.

    And that was well demonstrated in the presentations by Sue Maslin and Robert Connolly, who both demonstrated gorgeous sites full of content.

    Sue Maslin even quoted sales figures that proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that you can make cold, hard moolah from online sales of your back catalogue – surely a thought that will bring smiles to every filmmaker’s screen. And useful wads of cash, not biscuit money.

    Continue reading Screen business online →

    What’s a documentary?

    Documentary, Latest News, Television, , ,

    WHAT’S A DOCUMENTARY?

    This session at the AIDC 2012 in Adelaide has arisen via a ‘stoush’ between Chris Hilton and Screen Australia over their production Lush House. Chris applied for a producer offset for the program, but it was rejected. However Chris appealed to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, who overturned the decision. Then Screen Australia appealed, and this was heard on 13 February. To date the outcome is still pending.

    The session was the liveliest of the conference, with robust discussion as could be expected – and then some! Chris Hilton put forward a passionate argument in favour of Lush House being awarded the offset, and Screen Australia’s Chief Operating Officer Fiona Cameron rebutted his arguments.

    Simon Nasht countered with an offer of a bet that Screen Australia would lose its appeal, as in his eyes their case is weak. If he is right, this will create the very uncertainty that Fiona said they were seeking to avoid over what sort of documentary is eligible for an offset.

    Bob Connolly unleashed an astounding diatribe against the current state of the documentary industry in Australia. It was so astounding that we have reported it as a transcript of his comments, to the best of our ability in transcribing it. Our apologies for any errors.

    Finally Jennifer Peedom put forward a perspective of someone with fewer kilometers on the odometer, but some equally penetrating insights into the dilemmas facing writer-directors or producer-directors who were not part of a large production company, and who wanted to continue to make films, and also pay the mortgage.

    Continue reading What’s a documentary? →

    Joost den Hartog mourns Film Australia

    Documentary, Latest News, Television, , , , ,

    To herald the 2012 AIDC documentary conference just completed in Adelaide, Director Joost den Hartog took the industry to task for failing to save Film Australia. He suggests that only Film Australia was capable of looking after the need to make culturally relevant documentaries here.

    This is what he said in IF magazine:

    In 2006 – the year I migrated to Australia – Film Australia made its submission to the federal government’s film funding review. That year my ignorance prevailed when I was occupied programming my first Australian International Documentary Conference (AIDC) as its new director.

    Encouraged by industry anger about the terms of trade, role and direction of Film Australia, I programmed a keynote address that criticised the six-decade-old institution and put some more fuel on the already burning fire. The keynote by Wall to Wall’s chief executive Alex Graham was meant to alter the terms of engagement, but it set the tone for a further attack on Film Australia as a whole. Unfortunately the industry mobilisation happened at a time the federal government was keen to cut some costs and a golden opportunity arose to axe Film Australia with seemingly the full blessing of stakeholders in the documentary community.

    Had I paid more attention to Film Australia’s submission, I would have realised the deep cultural importance of the institution as the people’s production house. I believe cost-cutting was the true reason behind the demise of the agency – there is no other logical explanation why a small industry would liquidate such a national public asset. Unfortunately Film Australia only made it to the age of 61. Something Australia has always understood very well is the importance of documenting its history. The national documentary history exists parallel with federated Australia’s narrative of nation building, starting with the first multi-camera documentary The Inauguration of the Commonwealth in 1901, and onwards to the present day.

    Continue reading Joost den Hartog mourns Film Australia →

    ScreenAus’s optimism not shared by ADG

    Directing, Documentary, Latest News, Television, , , , , ,

    Australian documentary makers are struggling to make a living and are losing the
    grip of their rights to their own intellectual property, Kingston Anderson, general
    manager of Australian Directors Guild told the Australian International
    Documentary Conference in Adelaide yesterday.

    The comments came after Ruth Harley, Screen Australia CEO on Tuesday told the
    conference as a keynote speaker, the value of documentary production was the
    highest on record to date and driven by more hours of high production value series.

    In Tuesday’s address, Harley said: “It’s been a great year for documentaries with 430
    hours of Australian documentary projects made in 2010/11 and a total of $133
    million spent on documentary production. This is above the $118 million five-year
    average for documentary production.”

    Anderson’s point was backed by an ADG survey which showed that the income levels
    of documentary makers have declined further in the last 12 months, from 55.5% of
    2011 respondents earning less than $45,000 compared to 58.6% of respondents in
    2010 earning less than $60,000 per annum. This is below the average Australian
    wage for August 2011 of $68,700.

    Continue reading ScreenAus’s optimism not shared by ADG →

    At least on YouTube it’s not all black and white

    Latest News, Online Media, Television, , ,

    Online star … video blogger Natalie Tran says that while ethnicity is irrelevant to
    YouTube success it would be preferable to see a greater spread of racial backgrounds
    on television.

    MAJOR TV networks stand accused of creating too few roles for people from
    Australia’s ethnic mix. Firass Dirani, who portrayed John Ibrahim in Channel
    Nine’s Underbelly: The Golden Mile and New Zealand actor Jay Laga’aia, recently
    cut from Home and Away, have slammed racial tokenism on television.

    But viewers of the democratised online platform YouTube see a different
    representation of Australia.

    More of them log on to Natalie Tran’s channel on YouTube than any other. Ms Tran,
    25, who lives in Sydney and has a Vietnamese background, is at the top of the list of
    the most subscribed to channels in Australia. Her witty and instructive video blogs
    have earned her hundreds of millions of viewers globally – and a large salary.

    Continue reading At least on YouTube it’s not all black and white →

    Feature projects to receive development from SA

    Film, Latest News, Screenwriting

    Screen Australia today announced over $350,000 to support 13 filmmaking teams
    develop their feature film projects, taking them to the next level on the path towards
    production readiness. Five new projects have been added to the development slate
    while eight teams will receive continued support to develop their projects. Genres
    include horror, comedy, romantic comedy, drama, adventure and children’s
    animation.

    Among the new projects to receive support for development is The Tunnel: Dead
    End, the sequel to the successful crowd-funded online horror feature film The Tunnel
    from producer/writers Enzo Tedeschi and Julian Harvey and director Carlo
    Ledesma.

    Continue reading Feature projects to receive development from SA →