Digital Entertainment Network Setting New ""Standard"" For Filmmaking By Gary Reber
Digital Entertainment Network is uniquely setting a new ""standard"" for filmmaking in the its approach to producing 30 pilots for Internet shows. Is this the future of filmmaking? The Santa Monica, California-based Netcaster launched the series of shows in May on its Web site www.DEN.com. The pilots are budgeted at less than $200,000, far less than the millions spent per episode of a network show. Using a green screen-covered soundstage is largely a technique used in shooting the pilots to save money. This is a process similar to how George Lucas helmed ""Star Wars: Episode I ñ The Phantom Menace."" Following weeks of pre-production, shoot days, and weeks of post-production, the shows then are digitized, compressed and turned into an Internet-compatible video file, which can be viewed in different resolutions selected by the user depending on the bandwidth capability of his or her connection to the Internet. When the shows go online, they also feature 15 minutes of interactive elements, including set visits, profiles of the actors, the props, costumes, etc. Much of this is catalogued on the Web site and viewers are pointed to retailers where then can buy items worn by the actors. According to, President of Digital Entertainment Network, ""DEN's mission is to provide the youth of today with a revolutionary replacement for the passive, brain-killing experience of watching network and cable television. The DEN Century began the week of May 10th, 1999, when we launched the first wave of our thirty interactive television pilots into cyberspace. ""DEN offers programming that is a hybrid of television and the Internet - one that is absolutely unique. Rather than diluting our programs to appeal to the lowest common denominator, we produce and deliver shows, via the Internet, to the world's virtual communities. These are audiences with interests that are not currently addressed by traditional broadcast media. People everywhere can access DEN shows without having to comply with broadcasting schedules. ""DEN constantly shapes programming to fit the interests of the audience, rather than expecting the audience to adjust to the programming. DEN viewers have the opportunity to communicate with our writers, actors and producers, and help shape our programming. They can contribute their own ideas, as well as explore story and character background, shop, and communicate with other viewers. They even have the opportunity to be cast in our shows or join the DEN team. In this way, DEN hopes to shatter the heretofore-impermeable barrier between audience and programmer."" DEN plans to split up the 30- to 40-minute pilots into six to eight, five minute installments and air them over 24 days ñ with a new episode running every three days. DEN then expects audience feedback to decide whether or not they want the producers to go forward with more episodes. Unfortunately, the pilots look like comic book strips make up of individual frames that air in a 2-inch-by-2-inch square of streaming video online - no widescreen and no big screen ñ with virtually no camera movement due to the current limitations of video streaming technology. But then, those active in this new form of filmmaking see the technical obstacles as temporary and the current process as the tip of the iceberg the way films are distributed in the future.