If Netflix is in part of your entertainment life, you probably already know that the movie streaming and DVD giant just announced that it is raising its prices by as much as 60 percent (if you keep both streaming and DVD services).  You probably have already also heard the cries and whines begin as people react to the news.

It reminds me of comic Lewis Black, who said, “We live in an amazing, amazing world, and it’s wasted on the crappiest generation of spoiled idiots.”  Let me explain.  

When Mr. Black said that, he had just told a story to Conan O’Brian about a plane trip he had just taken.  The airline was testing a then very new Wi-Fi system on the plane, and invited the passengers to check it out.  In moments they’re checking email, watching YouTube, flying on a plane at 30,000 feet.  Then the Wi-Fi breaks down.  They guy next to him says, “Well this is bullshit!”  Ha. Mr. Black points out “how quickly the world owes (this guy) something he only knew existed ten seconds ago.”  Everything’s amazing and nobody’s happy.  (Watch the clip here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8r1CZTLk-Gk  )

So how does this relate to Netflix?  Well yeah, a price increase might seem sucky on their part, but however you cut it, it’s still an amazing bargain.  Unlimited viewing of all content.  Those of us in the industry know how much it costs to make & market a movie.  Granted, Netflix has far from everything ever produced, but there is incredible diversity in their catalog—there is always something to watch (and its a great way to expand beyond your usual fare of Hollywood blockbusters).  Unlimited DVDs and streaming for $16/month.  After you see a few movies in the month anything you see after is gravy—basically free.  

I would imagine that this price increase might help them stay in business, because as it is today their business model is not sustainable. Nor is it sustainable for the movie studios.  Netflix pays a flat license fee to a studio for the right to stream a film for a year, in which time it can be viewed an unlimited number of times by all Netflix subscribers.  When streaming was a new thing, the studio’s quandary was this: If they don’t sell the streaming rights to Netflix, would they sell more DVDs? Their entire fan base — tech-savvy people — is Netflix subscribers, who could now watch the movie for an unlimited number of times for free whenever they want to, which means they don’t buy the DVD. The studios had to hope that they’re selling those streaming rights to Netflix for more than they would have made in DVD sales.  Well when this all got started, they definitely didn’t do that, but in the next round of negotiations Netflix is having to pay a fortune for the streaming rights, and they can’t stream the movies until three months after they’ve been on cable.  All to protect the studios’ investments in their content by protecting DVD sales, cable sales, etc.  

But there are a massive number of people streaming content for “free” now, at home, on smartphones & iPads.  Netflix streaming accounts for almost 25% of internet traffic!  Add in other streaming services (Pandora, Hulu, etc) and it comes to 43%.  People love the convenience, the multiple devices, the choices.  

In a word, they’re spoiled. And now Netflix raises prices because the content providers raised their prices, both entities trying to make this all work as a business model…and just watch the “crappiest generation” cry. 

Its coming to a 24-hour news cycle near you.

I love making movies. Can’t really imagine doing anything else.

The best quote I heard today:  Bad acting will kill your movie faster than anything else except for bad sound.

For years we would gather in the amazingly wooded urban park nearby with our dogs and coffee, every Saturday & Sunday morning, early.  Our dogs would run and play off-leash, we would have a laugh and solve the world’s problems.  It was a strange group, people that surely wouldn’t have met if hadn’t been for our dogs. Two lawyers, a urologist, two filmmakers, an advertising guy, a pawn shop owner, a union rep, a teacher.  All fans of politics, football, movies & music.  It made for many odd, interesting and sometimes heated exchanges.  

We called it “Dog Park”, as in “Will you be at Dog Park tomorrow?”  Of course the irony is that the park wasn’t an “off-leash” dog park at all, and without fail, every couple of months some uptight old lady would complain that our dogs shouldn’t be running around off-leash.  Bad move on her part.  Don’t mess with Dog Park.

Although some form of Dog Park had been at the park for many years, with a revolving cast of characters, I guess it went on for a good five years after my wife and I joined with our spotty little 8 week old puppy, Jack.  Five years before it started to change, that is…

In retrospect the glue that held our little group together was Joel, a fiery lawyer with a big opinion and a bigger heart.  He personally forced Chrysler to recall all PT Cruisers when his caught on fire.  That was fun for him.  Always there when we got there (no matter how early we came) the Miami Herald under his arm.  Smoked too much and knew it.  His dog, Tahoe, was a smaller, stay-close-to-the-table type…except for when he wasn’t.  Sometimes he would just take off toward the lake at a full gallop…followed by a cursing Joel.  See you and your muddy dog in about 20 minutes Joel.

Mike, a lawyer, had two big old dogs of indeterminate breeding—one black, one white but otherwise, oddly the same.  Flower was white, and so old and feeble that Joel would joke “If that dog had opposable thumbs it would shoot itself.”  Phideaux (the fancy way of spelling Fido) was black and was somewhat less frail.  He had a giant wad of a fat rump, like a shelf.  The oddest thing I ever saw on a dog.  Over time we held little memorial services for both dogs, them Mike stopped coming regularly.  For awhile he would occasionally “borrow” a dog from a neighbor or his daughter, then he stopped coming at all.  Last I heard he had a cat.

Seb, the urologist, had a doberman that spent most of her life in a crate, so when she got to dog park she would go a little nuts, running chasing swimming digging eating, running some more.  Can’t blame her.  Seb was actively seeking a wife, never hesitating to tell us about his most recent blind date.  And occasionally he’d bring a candidate by for an audition.  At least that’s how the rest of us saw it.  One day he announced that he had a winner, and they were moving to her hometown in Indiana.  A town that would now have a resident urologist, by the way.

Dave was in advertising, although he had a storied past as a rock band manager.  Quick with a story or joke, but also quick with compassion and generosity.  One of the best listeners (well, one of the best male listeners) I’ve ever met.  Knew a wide assortment of people from all walks of life (look up “Maven” in Malcolm Gladwell’s “The Tipping Point”).  His dog Lucky was a pound puppy for sure, but its a safe bet to say he was mostly beagle.  One of the happiest dogs ever.  We all thought Dave was the eternal bachelor, until one day he involved some of us in an elaborate distraction that was all part of him popping the question to his girlfriend.  And then we had our first Dog Park wedding.  Well, not at Dog Park, but you know what I mean.

Dave and his wife eventually bought a house on the beach, and now spend most weekends there.  The rest of us still see him occasionally on weekdays, and we talk about reconvening Dog Park at his beach someday.  Road trip.

John was the grizzled veteran of Dog Park.  He was a member way before me, and was already on his second dog when I joined.  A lover of classic music & movies, he could fill an hour talking passionately about either, or politics, or electronics, or whatever.  It didn’t matter the topic, he dove in and stirred the pot, speaking in a way that would inevitably spark a heated discussion.  We were a diverse group politically, and I think John loved to stoke the fires of a few members.  Political theatre. Good times.  One time he stopped coming, and in a few weeks showed back up with the story of how he fell off a ladder.  His broken bones were healed, but he had lost the senses of taste & smell.  Odd.  Too bad we didn’t have a Neurologist among us.  A couple years later he once again stopped coming, and fearing the worst, I emailed him asking why.  Turns out his dog Misty was having trouble getting around and didn’t feel right coming without her.  I get it.

I think it all started to fall apart when Joel died.  He had a sometimes slow, sometimes frighteningly quick decline from throat cancer.  He (and us) knew it would all end soon, and he was upbeat and thoughtful to the end.  When I got the call from Mike that he had passed, in addition to the sadness and feeling of loss, I also felt a twinge of knowledge that things were about to change.  Then we had our first Dog Park funeral.  We clandestinely planted an oak tree in the park in his honor, but it was wiped out when a huge oak fell on it in Hurricane Charlie.  Joel would have appreciated the irony.

The rest of us still try to come by Dog Park on weekends, but it’s just not the same anymore.  Back in the Joel days we got there around 7am, then years later we met around 8am.  Nowadays its more like 830am, if anyone comes at all.  Sometimes I arrive with Jack, now almost 9 years old, and we’ll be the only ones there, making it just like any other morning.  We still call it Dog Park, but when I get home and Kris asks me who was there, often I sadly report that it was just us.  

I miss it.

The following is an article I wrote for HDVideoPro magazine in February of 2010.  The issue was all about how DSLR cameras were invading the film business, and this was the story about the moment I knew everything had changed:

I’ve been working as a DGA Assistant Director for almost 20 years, and have worked on  projects ranging from indie features to multi-million dollar blockbusters.  But the routine of moviemaking was established long before I started, and it hasn’t changed a great deal over the years. It doesn’t matter if its a no-budget music video or a huge-budgeted tent-pole, the basic pre-production routine is pretty much always the same:  breakdown the script & storyboards, find locations, hire talent & crew, make a solid plan for all the logistics that go along with it (equipment needs, transportation, food, parking, etc). Kind of like building a factory and hiring workers to make any product.  The pre-production period ends with the tech scout, where the various technicians gather at the locations to fine tune their logistics and see what we’re all up against.

A couple of months ago I was hired to work on a commercial campaign for a national fast-food chain. On the day of the tech scout, all the usual suspect crew members were there in the restaurant, including, of course, the director of photography.  Commercials, unlike feature films, often have a limited pre-production.  Whereas on any feature I would have been working with the DP for at least a week or two before the tech scout, on a commercial sometimes you don’t have that luxury.  On this particular spot I showed up to the tech scout having never met the DP, but luckily we hit it off immediately.  Like nearly every DP I have ever met, he had a high-end digital SLR with him, testing lens sizes, picking camera angles and making a plan for the setups we’d need to get. Usually he or she will then order and tweak the photos in Photoshop for the production meeting, to bring the hand-drawn storyboards to life and illustrate what the look of the spot would be.

Once we had made a good plan for the order of shooting and had picked out our general work areas and shooting direction, I left him to his work with his gaffer and key grip.  As they went over their details, the production manager and I got together to talk over some of the logistics of the job.  Looking out the window at an empty lot across the street, we made plans for the trucks and crew parking.  As we went over the list of vehicles…two motorhomes, the art department cube, the SPFX trailer, etc, I added, “and the camera truck.”  She looked at me and said, “Nope, no camera truck.”  “Okay, the camera van”, I responded.  “No”, she said, “There is no camera vehicle at all.”  She then pointed to the DP with his DSLR, and said, “We’re shooting the spot with that.”

Since I wrote this, of course, the pace and depth of the DSLR Video insertion into the industry has not slowed one bit.  This is a time of tremendous change in camera technology, with manufacturers trying hard to set the pace (Canon, RED) or keep up (everybody else).  Entire sub-industries have sprung up to accessorize these cameras for use as filmmaking tools (like Zacuto, Cinevate, etc) and careers have been made (Philip Bloom) by it’s new-found authorities.  Feature films have been made on minuscule budgets (Tiny Furniture) and bigger budget features have used them for clandestine shooting (Black Swan’s subway portions).

Honestly, its an amazing time to be a filmmaker for so many reasons, but the HDSLR movement just might exemplify it best…