Webisodics (behind the scenes)

A lot of interesting insider dope concerning websodic production is revealed in the interview at FreshDV with Blake Calhoun, creator of Pink. On the show's website we learn that the first ten episodes (approximately 3 minutes each) were shot in a six day period last July.

It interests me to compare this approach to that of PromQueen, with three directors working in parallel in order to optimally utilize a relatively large ensemble cast.

With my MSM soap opera production background (i.e. productivity benchmarked at a minimum of 110 minutes of screentime each five-day week) I continue to be fascinated by the interface between production logistics and narrative structure. The challenge for webisodics is easily stated: get the best talent you can afford for the shortest possible period of time. And this will only work of the series concept and the episode scripts have all the attributes needed to power a short, highly focused shoot.

Yesterday I set up a meeting at the MipCom conference in Cannes with YouSwitch.TV. They have an interesting and very sticky application which allows the user to be the editor of four parallel video streams. They see this as a winner in the music sector; let's imagine it's footage shot of the Beatles, a camera each dedicated to John, Paul and George, a fourth p.o.v. with all four (including Ringo!). The user makes his or her own edit version on the timeline. There's something definitely alluring about the concept.

So I wasted last evening wondering how this could be applied to webisodic fiction. Each scene covered by four cameras, of course. But, in a first community-only iteration, all four video streams would be available for users to chooses their own camera-switch cue preferences. (I just might be the nerd who keeps on cutting back to the eye-candy!) After this closed release phase there could be episodes released in versions which statistically mirror the most preferred cuts as executed by YouSwitchers. A bit of crowd-sourcing hive-mind drivel here? Perhaps. But food for thought, nevertheless.

A demo in French of the YouSwitch application is here.

Final random observation: did these guys have anything to do with the web show The Stand, or is it that for webisodic indies the 'Arschgeweih' is the new 'lower third'?