Press Release
19/10/2011
For immediate release
Feature film goes open source on straycinema.com
Stray Cinema is an open source film project. It is a unique experiment in film construction and distribution, allowing many movies to be made from one source of footage.
Raw footage has been made available for the public to download from the Stray Cinema website. The footage was taken from the feature film, Beginning, Middle & End, directed by Ryan Alexander Lloyd.
To participate, people all over the world can download this footage and create their own version of a film - which can then be uploaded back onto www.straycinema.com. All films are voted on by the online community.
The top five films and the director's edit will be navigated out of the 'digital world' and into the 'real world' at a multimedia screening event, tailored for an online and real world audience.
“Traditionally films are created by a tight network working towards a singular vision, and the footage is only released when its owners can control how it is interpreted. We want to allow more people - different people - to tell their stories with this footage," says Michelle Joy Hughes, founder of Stray Cinema.
Stray Cinema is also an experiment in film distribution. While the filmmaker's raw footage has been released online, Stray Cinema will screen the director's original edit called Beginning, Middle and End. It will also promote the original film’s cinema and DVD releases to the online community next year.
“Audiences are no longer satisfied with just consuming content, they want to participate. In this new world we have to be smarter about how we distribute and make money from our films, so let’s start experimenting,” says Michelle Joy.
The Stray Cinema screening event caters to both a real world and online audience, with footage from the event being webcast live onto straycinema.com, along with music, live chat and blogging.
“We want to acknowledge that important things still happen in the real world. We believe that many film-makers ultimately want their work to reach and engage a live audience,” says Michelle Joy.
Stray Cinema has been running since 2006, year on year they aim to increase the quality of the raw footage used, this is the first time they have released feature film footage.
The End.
Spokesperson: Michelle Joy Hughes, Stray Cinema Founder & Co-Director
Phone: +61 4173 07013
Email: info@straycinema.com
About Stray Cinema
In October 2005, a team of six people shot a film in London, none of whom had formal training in the film industry, only related experience.
A handheld digital camera was used to shoot this film, which allowed greater freedom with the location and content of the footage they were able to capture. The main point of interest at this stage in the film project was the accessibility of digital film, allowing different people to tell their story via film, placing filmmaking into new hands.
In 2007 raw footage was filmed in New Zealand, in 2008 Spain and 2010 Melbourne Australia. Each year new raw footage is made available for free download from www.straycinema.com.
Stray Cinema also embraces an online community of independent musicians. Musicians and bands have been contacted via social networking websites such as facebook.com and myspace.com, and they have been invited to make their music available for participants to use in their film submissions. There are currently 65+ bands from around the world contributing music to the project.
Free video editing software, and a tutorial for first time editors, are available from www.straycinema.com.