What's the BuZZ?

Julien McArdle - Director, On Piracy: On Piracy and the Future of Media

With his first film, EYNTO, Julien managed to produce a feature length edutainment movie with a digital camera's 30 second movie mode. For his documentary, he managed to film heads of recording agencies, bands, youths, and copyright experts all on a shoe-string budget. Along with Indy film maker Jason Scott, he hosted a panel at New York City's HOPE conference on Underground Documentaries.

On Piracy: On Piracy and the Future of Media is an attempt to pay some attention to the topic of Piracy beyond all the media frenzy and news reporters regurgitating the contents of an industry press releases. Julien and his crew interviewed industry execs, copyright lawyers, pirates, consumers, artists, and everyone we could think of - and made this film. The documentary is available on DVD and via a torrent download.

Julien has produced an episode of HackTV:Underground, and is currently working on his next full feature film, Docks.

The BuZZ Beat

Video on the Net - Scott Flack

Vice President, Stickam.com

Stu Maschwitz - Author "DV Rebel's Guide"

Stu Maschwitz is a director, visual effects supervisor, renowned technologist, writer and founding partner of  The Orphanage, a leading VFX and film production company based in Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Hailed by Shoot Magazine as one of the Ten Commercial Directors To Watch, Maschwitz has quickly gained a  reputation for his ability to tackle extraordinarily complex visual challenges while injecting his signature wry sense of humor and kinetic filmmaking style.  His mind-bending spot Consequences for Playstation 2 and  TBWA\Chiat\Day was named Shoot’s Spot of the Week and Board’s Spot of the Month, and was ranked #1 on Adcritic.com for several weeks after its release.  In the past year, Maschwitz directed an impressive collection  of commercials, including: a three spot campaign for Gamefly; a time-lapse spot for PG&E (part of a 5-spot  campaign); a Super Bowl spot for Ruby Tuesday; and as well as spots for Toshiba and Dr. Scholl’s.

As one of the film industry’s top visual effects supervisors, in 2006 Maschwitz lead a team of artists at The Orphanage as the main VFX house on The Last Mimzy directed by New Line’s Co-CEO and Co-Chairman Bob  Shaye and completed production on Robert Rodriguez’, live-action/CG animated family film The Adventures of  Shark Boy and Lava Girl in 3-D.  Prior to that, Maschwitz twice collaborated with Robert Rodriguez - for the  noir comic book film Sin City as well as the children’s adventure film Spy Kids 3-D – among many other films.

An innovator in filmmaking technology, Maschwitz is the creator of The Orphanage’s revolutionary Magic Bullet  software.  The software, which gives inexpensive digital video the lush look of film, has been used to master  hundreds of digital films, including the Paramount/MTV Films smash hit, jackass: the movie and Lion’s Gate’s  acclaimed comedy Lovely & Amazing.  The technology has become so highly desired by independent filmmakers  that major companies such as Sony, Panasonic and Adobe are now bundling it with their filmmaking products.

Prior to joining up with his fellow co-conspirators to start The Orphanage, Maschwitz spent five years at  George Lucas’ Industrial Light + Magic, where he quickly became ILM’s youngest supervisor. Leading the  notorious “Rebel Mac Unit,” he supervised all of the space battle sequences on Star Wars, Episode One: The  Phantom Menace.  His other visual effects credits include the blockbusters, Twister, Men in Black, Deep  Impact and Mission Impossible.

He is a graduate of CalArts School of Animation.  Maschwitz recently authored a critically acclaimed book  entitled DV Rebel's Guide: An all-digital approach to making Killer Action Movies. of which  Robert Rodriguez wrote: “"I'd been wanting to write a book for the new breed of digital filmmakers, but now I  don't have to. My pal and fellow movie maker Stu Maschwitz has compressed years of experience into this  thorough guide. Don't make a movie without reading this book!"

Pick our Brains

Your chance to get your technical and creative questions answered.