Tubefilter News

Finally, after months of preparation, after thousands of Twitter nominations were parsed down to hundreds of shortlist nominees which were then trimmed down to the list of official nominees, the International Academy of Web Television announced the winners of the 2nd Annual Streamy Awards during a live ceremony hosted by actor and comedian Paul Scheer at the Orpheum Theatre in Los Angeles.

Over 1300 digital entertainment leaders and over (insert estimate-get from Pam) live global online viewers gathered together to celebrate the best in web television programming. The live online broadcast offered closed captioning in five languages. Among attendees and participants were: Streamy Visionary Award Honoree Chad Hurley (CEO, YouTube), Keanu Reeves, Zach Galifianakis, David Spade, Nigel Lythgoe, Chris Hardwick, Illeana Douglas, Tony Hale, David Faustino, Robert Englund, Kenan Thompson, Tatyana Ali, Jaleel White, Jason & Randy Sklar, Eric Balfour, Julie Benz, David Henrie, Justine Bateman, Patrick Duffy, Kevin Pollak, Crystal Chappell, Danielle Harris, Rob Huebel, Autumn Reeser, Jason Calacanis, and top Internet stars Ryan Higa, iJustine, Kevin Rose, Alex Albrecht, Felicia Day, Pete Cashmore, Lucas Cruikshank, Shane Dawson, Lisa Donavan, Zoe Bell and Nick Kroll.

More extensive coverage of the event will be coming in the next few days (you know, after the real stories that come out of a long night of afterparties), but Tubefilter wanted to be sure to get you the official results.

It’s finally here—after months of submissions, voting, odds-making and hoopla, the 2nd Annual Streamy Awards, hosted by Paul Scheer, are about to start. The live internet TV broadcast will be making history tonight as the live feed will be syndicated LIVE over dozens of web video hubs—Ustream, MyDamnChannel, Crackle, NewTeeVee, Mashable, Atom.com, Streamys.org and more. So if one of the sites goes down, head to another to stay up on the feed. And follow @streamyawards on Twitter for live tweeting updates. On with the show!

It’s been an extremely exciting week for the Riese team. Not only did they pick up a Streamy win for Best Cinematography at Wednesday’s Craft Awards, they also teamed up with legendary ICM New Media agent George Ruiz. Ruiz also reps web series standouts like Felicia Day, Alex Albrecht and Brigitte Dale.

And as if that wasn’t enough, then came the exciting news Thursday that SyFy has acquired Canadian series Riese for both online distribution and possible development for television. This will mark a return to the web for the series that had been pulled offline a few months back when it linked up with international rights distributor Fireworks.

Tubefilter had a chance to chat with Riese creator Ryan Copple (little bit of trivia: he actually originates from Omaha, Nebraska) on the team’s reactions to the deal, how it will effect future production, and how the fans feel about the development.

Tubefilter: How did this deal come about?

Ryan Copple: Once we pulled our episodes down from online, per the request from our distributor Fireworks, they began an aggressive campaign to find the show a good home. Jonathan Ford contacted SyFy Digital, who were extremely interested in the property, and we spent the next few months negotiating the licensing.

Tubefilter: How will this effect future production?

RC: It bodes well on many fronts. The episodes we’ve produced thus far will be featured on SyFy.com and other NBC/Universal affiliates, specifically in the US, so we’ll be getting great exposure. Plus, SyFy has already expressed a large interest in developing the show for broadcast. I think we’ll be seeing a lot more of Riese.

Bablegum continues to roll-out their unique brand of sci-fi comedy, this time teaming up with comedy legend and actor in over 60 films, Kevin Pollak. Vamped Out marks the directorial debut of Pollak, who also co-created and stars in the project along with Broadway and film actor Jason Antoon (Contact, Minority Report). The show also features Samm Levine (Freaks & Geeks, Inglorious Bastards) and Seana Kofoed (Broadway’s Proof, TV’s Men in Trees).

Pollak isn’t new to the Internet. His extremely popular online talk show, Kevin Pollak’s Chat Show, launched last year and is nominated for a 2010 Streamy Award. “The Chat Show has really made me aware of how incredible the Web community is to interact and support high-quality and funny content. With ‘Vamped Out’, I wanted to create a series that would truly appeal to fans of comedy no matter what platform”, said Pollak. “We chose to collaborate with Babelgum because it was a perfect match in terms of smart comedy and allowed us to share our series with an incredible audience of comedy lovers”.

Vamped Out is shot documentary-style by award-winning filmmaker Elliot Finke (played by Pollak) as he follows a modern day 35-year-old struggling actor (Antoon) trying to make a living in Los Angeles. The actor also claims to be a 172 year-old vampire who knew Bram Stoker and spoon-fed him myths about vampires for the novel Dracula.

FremantleMedia, creators, producers and distributors of entertainment content such as American Idol, announced today a partnership with syndication and packaging agent company AlphaBird. AlphaBird is exclusively representing online syndication efforts for FremantleMedia’s central new media division, FMXs new web series As Worn By.

As Worn By will be an online 12-week female-focused fashion reality series where deserving women get the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to wear legendary garments donated by celebrities for their very own moment in the spotlight. There will be multiple levels of community engagement in the series: from weighing in on which contestants should have their fashion dreams made reality to submitting personal stories of a fashion fantasy they have always wanted to make a reality.

Slated to premiere by the end of the year, AlphaBird plans to “guarantee” the show views through a process their COO Alex Rowland describes as The ‘Cadillac’ Of Online Video Advertising, which is a combination of access to almost every kind of video syndication as well as integrated branding that will form an organic bond with the audience, as opposed to the impersonal feel of pre- and post-role ads.

With FremantleMedia’s experience in the reality/competition entertainment world and AlphaBird’s knowledge of advertising, community involvement, and branding, this partnership is one to keep an eye on.

Today the Board of Directors of the International Academy of Web Television announced that it has selected YouTube’s Co-founder and CEO Chad Hurley to receive the Academy’s inaugural Visionary Award at the 2nd Annual Streamy Awards this Sunday night. The annual Streamy Visionary Award honors leaders and innovators who have made a significant contribution to the digital entertainment community.

“I’m honored to be recognized with the Visionary Award,” said Hurley about the honor. “Thanks to the YouTube community, the media platform we created has grown into a destination where billions of people connect and shape the world through video each day.”

And connect people it does—YouTube serves over a billion videos every single day. There’s also that oft-quoted, and ever-growing, statistic that every minute, 20 hours of video is uploaded to YouTube. One way or another, YouTube intersects and shapes the future of web video viewing and the future of online shows. Many have attributed the site for popularizing the concept of open embedding of videos across the internet, allowing for rapid sharing of video content. Open embedding is what allows sites like ours to bring the shows we cover directly to our readers without having to click people away to some clunky destination site.

To help honor Chad and his team’s work in building the world’s largest media site many of the top YouTube community members will be appearing at the Streamy Awards including the #1 most subscribed YouTuber Ryan Higa (NigaHiga), Shane Dawson, SMOSH, Philip De Franco (sxePhil), ShayCarl, Lisa Donovan (LisaNova), Joe Penna (MysteryGuitarMan), TheWillofDC, Michael Buckley (What the Buck?!), Lucas Cruikshank (Fred), iJustine, The Fine Brothers, Dave Days, KassemG, Rhett & Link, Marina Orlova (HotForWords) and more.

Another mind-blowing statistic: combined these YouTubers have racked up over 3 Billion(!) views.

Watch the Streamy Awards, hosted by comedian Paul Scheer, LIVE this Sunday April 11th starting at 5:30 PM (PT) / 8:30 PM (ET) on Streamys.org.

Nikki Finke, Founder and Editor in Chief of Deadline Hollywood, announced on her site this week that for the first time in the history of the Producer’s Guild of America, a new credit was voted on and ratified — that of the Transmedia Producer. The PGA’s New Media Council Transmedia Producer was co-authored and spearheaded by legendary transmedia scholar and producer Jeff Gomez. Gomez is President and CEO of Starlight Runner Entertainment, member of the PGA East, and has designed transmedia campaigns for projects including James Cameron’s Avatar, Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean, Prince of Persia and Tron, and Microsoft’s Halo.

Gomez describes this accomplishment as “one of the most thrilling moments in my career” and in an e-mail correspondence with Tubefilter, went on to explain what he views this will mean for transmedia as a whole: “This credit will help move transmedia storytelling from methodology to artform, from marketing tool to a conduit for dialog, mutual expression and co-creation. The credit will empower producers and creators, allowing them to take equity in the worlds they’ve worked so hard to build, even as they move like quicksilver across a dozen media platforms.”

Like many first-time web series creators, when I set out to shoot the Odd Jobs pilot I called up a bunch of friends, withdrew a thousand dollars from my bank account, and went out into the world just hoping to catch something on tape. It was a blast… and even if we didn’t always have well-crafted lighting and sound, I just had hope that the content would shine through.

… and I guess it did. We threw the first episode up at Odd Job Nation and immediately started raking in national press. Before I knew it, I was hearing from major agencies, showrunners, and even some networks. The right people were watching, but they all wanted to see more. I figured this meant Uncle Dave probably shouldn’t keep holding the camera, so I brought on Ed Riew of Urban Sled who provided a professional crew and introduced me to the glorious Canon 7D.

Ladies and gentleman, I’m happy to report that there is officially no longer an excuse for poor technical quality on a web series.

Retailing at approximately $1600 plus lenses (and renting for about $100 for the weekend in NYC), this SLR-Camera is making a lot of noise in traditional and new media production circles: SNL’s new opening sequence, Robert Rodriguez, and high profile web shows like Continuum TV, Vuguru’s The Booth, and Anthony Zuiker’s Level 26 are all taking it out for a spin.

The 7D is a game-changer, but it’s not perfect. Here’s everything you need to know to shoot successfully: