Visuals really do speak louder than words so check out their site, Samurai.fm and some ‘looks like it was shot on a phone’ footage on youtube.

A Swarm of Angels reinvents the Hollywood model of filmmaking to create cult cinema for the Internet era. It’s all about making an artistic statement, making something you haven’t seen before. Why are we doing this? Because we are tired of films that are made simply to please film executives, sell popcorn, or tie-in with fastfood licensing deals.

We want to invent the future of film. Call it Cinema 2.0.
To do it we need your help.

VJ Collective The Kleptones have just signed up to do the soundtrack so you’ll be in good company. Via Protein feed. [See also our earlier post about Mod Films]

A bad artist imitates, a good artist steals.

Pablo Picasso’s quote is the mantra for production company MOD Films, who plan to hook remix culture into feature-film making. Hype or heat? We’re not sure. They’ve won funding from NESTA, The Australian Film Commission and others, and have their first film, Sanctuary — an SF short — due for release ‘real soon now’, according to their bloggy website. They’re saying all the right things, but will it fly? Handily, they’re presenting at a London geekfest later this month — we’ll be there and report back what we see. Stay tuned.

Upload your own video, photos and music; Explore shared content; Grab what you want.

First collection of clips ripe for remixing? Things on kittens. Of course. More seriously, this could be a very useful tool for communities-of-interest who have lots of individually-recorded footage of events, and who want to collaboratively edit it down to a single film — think weddings, club nights, street protests: welcome to group mash-ups. Last year we pointed at the Glastonbury Festival coverage on Flickr as a tipping point for photosharing. This year we’re predicting Glasto ‘06 The Movie — assembled and edited in close-to-real-time on something like Jumpcut, from video and still images contributed by festival goers themselves via their videophones… sponsorhip opportunity, anyone?

Sourced (along with reviews of loads more sharing/remix sites) at Techcrunch.

Like Snow? Beautiful landscapes? Be sure to take it all in now because…

Tomorrow this asshole’s SUV will change the world

Global warming isn’t a pretty SUV ad

It’s a frightening reality

ExxposeExxon.org

Tahoe — An American Revolution

Via AdPulp who also point out that this is now officially Out There — as soon as Chevy take it down it’ll be up on YouTube. April fools.

UPDATE: this is starting to spread with activist sites encouraging people to go to the site and make a statement — the results are piling up on YouTube as we type… We particularly like this one sent in by a BST reader — page down the YouTube link for handy hints on how to upload your version now that Chevy has blocked entries to the competition.

UPDATE: Chevy are now claiming that they *expected* this to happen.

A spokeswoman for Chevrolet, Melisa Tezanos, said the company did not plan to shut down the anti-S.U.V. ads [note they have blocked any more uploads to the comp]. “We anticipated that there would be critical submissions,” Ms. Tezanos said. “You do turn over your brand to the public, and we knew that we were going to get some bad with the good. But it’s part of playing in this space.”

To paraphrase Mandy Rice Davies: well, they would say that wouldn’t they?

See their stuff for yourself (lo res) at Samurai.fm.

Addictive are next playing in London on April 5th at The Garage with German electro punks Warren Suicide. Go. See.

The best way to predict the future, is to invent it.

and his stunning success in doing just that — during his time with Xerox in the early 1970s, Kay and his team developed not just the computer interface as we know it — with windows, icons, mice and pointers, but also, in 1972, conceived of the Dynabook: a radical portable device somewhere between a laptop and a tablet PC, unbuildable for another 30 years.

We’ve been reading some of those early papers, and were interested to see what he had to say, in 1972, about what people would do with such tools:

The ability to make copies easily and to ‘own’ one’s information will probably not debilitate existing markets, just as xerography has enhanced publishing (rather than hurting it, as some predicted), and as tapes have not damaged the LP record business but have provided a way to organize one’s own music. Most people are not interested in acting as a source or bootlegger; rather, they like to permute and play with what they own. [our emphasis]

and

A combination of this ‘carry anywhere’ device and a global information utility such as the ARPA network or two-way cable TV, will bring the libraries and schools [not to mention stores and billboards] of the world to the home. One can imagine one of the first programs an owner will write is a filter to eliminate advertising. [our emphasis]

Business affairs director Peter Leathem told Radio 1’s Newsbeat: “Rather than saying stop it, don’t do it, we’ve actually tried to embrace what people want to do and come up with a licence to be able to do that.” He said the £200 charge was “reasonable”, adding: “You don’t actually have to DJ using a laptop. You can use vinyl, you can use CD, so we’re saying that if it’s not worth your while spending £200 then don’t do it.”

We think they’re missing the point of media convergence, cramping creative style, and being greedy — they’ve already been paid! Besides, £200 is a lot of money for most DJs, and after all, who is it who does most of the work in getting new music in front of the punters?

Can I Get An Amen? is an audio installation that unfolds a critical perspective on perhaps the most sampled drum [loop] in the history of recorded music, the Amen Break. It begins with the pop track Amen Brother by 60’s soul band The Winstons, and traces the transformation of their drum solo from its original context as part of a ‘B’ side vinyl single into its use as a key aural ingredient in contemporary cultural expression. The work attempts to bring into scrutiny the techno-utopian notion that ‘information wants to be free’- it questions its effectiveness as a democratizing agent. This as well as other issues are foregrounded through a history of the Amen Break and its peculiar relationship to current copyright law.

Listen and learn. On a similar theme, check out leftfield hiphop DJ Edan’s Sounds of the Funky Drummer project: a 60-minute mix of 80s rap records all of which sampled James Brown’s Funky Drummer breakbeat.

Big thanks to Reuben for this.

Found on BoingBoing.

Okay, holy crap. This is awesome. I think it justifies the whole thing, and I’m only four minutes into it. The first appearance of Palpatine in TPM and AOTC is ON THE SAME FRAME. And at the same time in ROTJ, Vader is telling Moff Jerjerrod that the Emperor is coming.

The clips, mostly a few minutes long, range from animals to landscapes and art. The Creative Archive licence under which the clips have been released says they must not be used in commercial or campaigning ways and must not be used to defame other people. The British Film Institute, Channel 4, Open University and Teachers’ TV are also set to make more material available.

More information is available via the BBC website.