I’m shooting the pilot episode of a funny, short web series July 4th to 7th, 2009. It’s called Act Natural, and it’s an original, dry comedy series about the surreal world of commercial actors. It follows the lives of three less-than-perfect actors with visions of success but very different viewpoints as they try to make careers for themselves in film & TV. Think Flight of the Conchords, It’s Always Sunny, and Arrested Development. The show is comprised of short, web-only episodes 5-10 minutes in length.

I’m looking for enthusiastic, dedicated up-and-comers who’d like to get involved with the production side of the project in the areas of wardrobe, hair/makeup, production co-ordination, craft, sound, set decoration or design, and props. If you’re trying to build a reel or resume, or want to get involved in indie production, this might be a great way to get your feet wet (or wetter).

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Act Natural is an original, dry comedy series about the surreal world of commercial actors. It follows the lives of three less-than-perfect actors with visions of success but very different viewpoints as they try to make careers for themselves in film & TV. Think Flight of the Conchords, It’s Always Sunny, and Arrested Development. The show is comprised of short, web-only episodes 5-10 minutes in length.

This is a no-budget, beyond-indie web production, but you never know with these things. I’m looking to build a great up-and-coming cast and crew who can learn, grow and find opportunities through the project. My plan is to build a small following for the show on the web, and then leverage that either through sponsorship, syndication, or reproduction for a larger media body.

Casting is taking place May 17th through the 19th, and the pilot is shooting at the beginning of July. I’m casting for three leads and a bunch of great supporting and recurring characters.

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While it may seem like it’s already everywhere, video is the new kid on the internet media block. The rich, good-looking, smart new kid with a bright future and a car, but still, compared to the photography club nerds and the moody creative writers, video’s barely out of the blocks.

That might be why, despite how much surplus design talent is currently devoted to the production of portfolio-centric site templates for the budding web designer, photographer, graphic designer, et al., the poor, misunderstood filmmaker and videographer get stuck with only a handful of options. Creating a good and good looking portfolio site for video is such a unique and specific task, there just aren’t that many people doing it.

“You put a new piece of work on your site / release a DVD / have a short film featured in a festival. Pick only one of the following scenarios: A) 1000 people who think you’re talented all check it out. B) Nobody gives a shit.”

So what do you do? One thing you don’t do is create a traditional video portfolio site. You’ve seen those. They spawn tiny flash windows with structured interfaces and lumbering loading graphics. They beep, slide and wipe their way to tiny thumbnail video files that require you to have your nose an inch from the screen just to see clearly. Flash is great (and great for video), but as we’ve learned over the past couple of years, when a site is 100% flash you’re lucky if 10% of visitors make it past your snazzy load screen before clicking the back button. You still see tons of flash portfolios by really talented, working pros (Mara Shiavocampo, for example, via newsvideographer.net), and there are even templates to help you create them (run, far away, from anything with a film reel graphic), but that doesn’t mean you should ignore all common sense and progress and build one yourself.

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“It’s the media apocalypse! Pull up an oil drum.”

Hi, I’m Chris Frampton. I’m a filmmaker, PDN award-winning photographer, writer and web designer, and this (gestures grandly) is Flyweight Films, my little media production company. Specifically the blog part, so welcome to that.

This blog might not be what you’d expect. Specifically, this isn’t a blog just for filmmakers, with all sorts of articles on how to fix 4:2:0 artifacts on DVC downconversions in Final Cut Pro (whatever that means), and comments that sound like a conversation overheard at a car show. This is a blog about filmmaking only inasmuch as filmmaking is creative work. Because essentially, this is a blog about creative work. Or more specifically, this is a blog about what it’s like to be a creative worker, whether you’re a student, freelancer, advertiser, or commercial artist of any sort.

So, topics?

• The Media Shift. It’s the media apocalypse! Pull up an oil drum. Magazines are dying like dinosaurs, nobody wants to pay for music or movies anymore, professionals are turning out derivative shit and amateurs are…. Well amateurs are turning out derivative shit too but their shit looks just as good as the professionals’ and cost almost nothing to make.

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