When Apple's Macintosh computer made its debut in 1984, it ushered in a revolution of sorts. It allowed anyone, not just computer geeks, access to the power of computers on a personal level.
Apple created a new industry in desktop publishing with the release of its Apple LaserWriter the following year. Combined with the ease of use of the 'what-you-see-is-what-you-get' user interface, and with the crisp quality of the LaserWriter, an explosion of alternative publications took place shortly after. Anyone with a voice could publish a great looking publication. Today, even mainstream publications like Time are created on a Mac.
Apple did the same with multimedia-video production. Special editing software combined with Apple's high end machines allowed creative people to produce award winning videos. At first, the cost was not for the average Joe. That has all changed.
Apple's new iMac DV (digital video) and bundled software iMovie is a winning combination for less than $1500. IMovie has the ability to give professional looking results with professional like features that once was only available only on higher priced software.
However, before the release of the iMac and iMovie, you could still produce professional video for a song and dance (pun intended). Take the case of Joe and Dan Masucci, two area movie makers, who produced an episode of the X Files for around $500 using a G3 Mac and Adobe Premier software. If their X Files production is any indication of things to come, you will see an avalanche of independently produced quality videos at a local BlockBusters, or streaming from the Net. The new Video Revolution is about to begin.
Joe and Dan are originally from Newark, but moved to Columbia County in the early 1970's and attended Columbia-Greene Community College. Joe went to graduate school at Albany State getting a B.A. in History. Dan works at home caring for his 2 1/2 year old son Nicholas.
Joe and Dan started shooting movies in 1995 with a couple of ten minute action shorts and then in the spring of 1996 shot 'Pistole di Morte,' a 37 minute action drama set mostly in Columbia County.
This production landed Joe at the American Film Institute's graduate program in Los Angeles in the fall of 1997. Only 24 people from around the world are accepted each year in one of six disciplines. His selection naturally was for Cinematography.
Due to the high cost of LA, Joe came back to the area and now works as an Apple Certified Technician.
After 'Pistole,' the boys did a 74 minute feature action horror titled 'Inferno' though they were not hot about it. Their last project was the Albany based 60-minute crime drama entitled, 'Stranglehold,' in April 1997. They wanted to get back into action since then.
Both are avid X-Files fans (who isn't, right?) and decided to do a spoof of the show. The result is a high quality X-Files episode that David Ducoveny and Gillian Anderson, the REAL XFilers, would feel right at home playing.
In their episode, called Graceland, Mulder and Scully explore the claims of a small town waitress that the real Elvis impregnated her. The show reveals the true nature of a large plot by the entertainment industrial complex that, even with tongue in cheek, sounds and feels like a real X-Files episode. While Joe and Dan do all the writing, filming, editing, etc., they had plenty of help from family and friends. The only real actor in the bunch was Mr. Y, played by Daniel B. Region. Although, Dan Masucci had done theater in college with several acting credits in student films, and recently was an extra in the Peacemaker with George Clooney and Nicole Kidman.
The entire production cost about $500, in contrast to an average TV episode that runs over a million a piece. The most expensive part of this production was buying ten 60-minute miniDV tapes at around $15 each. The rented a motel for one day at $45. Other locations were free including a stint at the Lark Tavern in Albany. Friends and family filled in the other parts.
The production was shot using one camera, a Sony VX-1000 3 CCD miniDV attached to a Steadicam JR from Cinema Products, makers of the big rigs for Hollywood. It was then fed into a PowerMac G3 233MHz (original beige) with 288MB RAM, a Maxtor 20GB 7200rpm Ultra ATA-66 hard drive as the video only disk, and a miroMOTION DC20 video capture PCI card.
They edited the work using Adobe Premiere 4.2.1 video software capturing at half resolution (320x240). After making it a movie in Premiere they exported it back to VHS at full resolution (640x480) to take off the video edge and make it look more like film. Video often has too crispy an edge to it so by working this little magic it had the feel of a large scale film production.
Joe and Dan hope to use this production to interest investors in their new project, a feature script they're currently writing with Robert Millman, a professional film maker in the area.
What makes this all exciting is the fact that two people with ambition and talent can produce a quality video production that rivals that of Hollywood. Last year the Blair Witch Project took the show biz pundits by surprise. You can look forward to the not so distant future when anyone with talent, inexpensive software, a camera and Mac, can produce award winning multimedia projects. Joe and Dan Masucci already proved it can be done.
Soon, 'amateur" movie makers will be streaming their productions live to millions of people on the Internet. The truth is out there! And, with this new computer-video-Net revolution, it won't be that hard to find.