TAMPA BAY FILM ONLINE FILM FESTIVAL 2007-2008

The official Tampa Bay Film review of the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival By C. A. Passinault

Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival
The Official Review
words and pictures by C. A. Passinault

About this review and potential conflicts
This is a review of a property that I own, as I am the designer, the director, and the owner of Tampa Bay Film and the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival. My review portfolio would not be complete if I did not review every Tampa film festival, and when it is one of mine, I still feel professionally obligated to review it, for the record, so that my readers can evaluate the full scope of film festivals and indie film promotional services available in the Tampa Bay market. My other events, my films, and my creative projects are also subject to be reviewed by me, as I scrutinize the results of my work, weigh it out, identify any flaws, and then plan to improve the discrepancies of that work. It is only through a process of analysis and identifying opportunities that we can improve upon what we do. This said, I work very hard at putting quality into every thing that I do, and always pay a lot of attention to detail. As a result, I do excellent work, and there are not a lot of things to nit-pick over.
There are Tampa filmmakers and Tampa film festival organizers out there who think that I like to trash what they do. While I do try to make my constructive criticism entertaining, I am very serious about my evaluation process, and take reviews seriously. Regardless of their protests, I am fair and objective. If they did good work, then they would get positive reviews from me. As it stands, many of them take short cuts, and do poor work. They also cannot take criticism well. This is a perfect storm which makes my reviews unpopular with them. I tell it how it is, however, as being honest and objective serves my readers well as they build an accurate picture of the Tampa indie film scene. Also, if I gave everyone a good review and cheerleaded Tampa film festivals instead of telling it how it really is, like certain Tampa film bloggers do, what would be the point of me reviewing a film festival?
As a professional, I am equally as objective with my own work, and examine it with scrutiny when I review it. As a matter of fact, I set my standards much higher than the expectations that I have with the work of others, so I am even harder on my own work than I usually am. This is the reason why so many of my creative projects are ahead in the market, and why everything that I do has superb quality, and a stunning attention to detail.
Sometimes, we all do things which have a result which is different than what we planned. Even my work is not perfect, and this is why I have yet to give myself a perfect evaluation. There should always be room for improvement, and opportunities to improve and to get better at what we do.
This said, there is a danger that, by reviewing my own projects, that I will expose weaknesses with my business agenda and tip my hand as far as what I am planning to improve on current projects. I am well aware of that risk, and have accepted it. My reviews are for my readers, who deserve to know what is going on, and it is worth the risk, although I have taken steps to minimize those risks.
In most reviews, too, I obtain the opinions and the reviews of others. I evaluate all opinions, and this also weighs into my review process.
It is my hope that you will find my reviews to be useful. In the process of this review, because it is a review on something which I have done, there will be some anecdotal content, trivia, and some little-known facts revealed. I will write as an artist evaluating his work, the process which went into the work, and will openly criticize and fairly report on the results of that work.
Enjoy.

Why An Online Film Festival?

The overall concept of an online film festival is not entirely my own, although creating a Tampa online film festival was entirely my idea. I had looked at sites such as Youtube, and realized that the technology was finally available to realize an online film festival. Internet broadband speeds were finally fast enough, flash-based interfaces had been developed, and server space and bandwidth were finally plentiful.
Just a few years ago, in 2002, there were signs that Tampa filmmakers were starting to use the Internet to promote completed versions of their films. A local Tampa film production company, Renegade Films, had just completed a short film called The Pledge, and they made the full film available on a horror film site for downloading. Once downloaded, the file could be viewed on a computer; it was not streaming video, but at least the film was available from the Internet. Curious about the film, which was a short film running 12:32 in length, I downloaded the 124 Meg file, which took a good twenty minutes. After I downloaded it, I finally was able to watch it, and I recall sitting in the studio watching The Pledge with Melissa Maxim seated beside me, who was a model / choreographer friend. After seeing the film, I asked Melissa what she thought of it. She made this funny face which made her cute nose sort of crinkle, and then she nodded toward the door. She smiled. “Let’s go get a pizza.” she cooed, “I’m suddenly craving cheese”. She sprang out of the chair, got halfway to the door, and then gazed at me over her shoulder with those eyes of hers, a strand of blond hair flowing around her ear. I followed her out. I was hungry, too, and thought that it was great that a model in such superb shape loved pizza as much as I did. Melissa was a beautiful woman, and she was smart, too, never hesitating to give her opinion when I asked (she always got on my case for fighting with people in the modeling industry- I wonder what she would say about my fights in Tampa indie film, today). Of course, in this instance, she seemed to have her mind on more immediate things. For that night, it was pizza, beer, and hanging out.
That’s all I got out of her (I did like the film, however), but we did succeed in downloading, and viewing, a short indie film on the computer. The future was obvious, and it was only a matter of time before we would be able to watch films online, in real time. It would take several years, but it was definitely coming.
It came with the widespread adoption of broadband Internet access and video viewing sites such as Youtube.
My web sites were coming along, too. By 2004, my web sites were of professional quality, were among the best in the Tampa Bay market, and I seemed to be creating quite the portfolio of web sites. With talent resource sites such as Independent Modeling, I had a major advantage in the Tampa entertainment industry, too. Doing research into film festivals, it began to make sense that, eventually, film festivals would move online, and that the advantages of an online film festival over a conventional film festival event greatly outweighed the drawbacks. While each format had its purposes, as far as screening, promoting and marketing indie films went, online was the future.
So was downloading movies, although I had plenty of people arguing against it as far back as 2001, when I initially suggested it to my second film production team during a production meeting of my Reverence feature film. God, the debate was fierce. They argued that people would pirate the film, so on, and so forth. I told them that this wouldn’t be an issue with the business plan that I had come up with, and with our new security protocols. Besides, if someone were so determined to pirate our movies, they would do it, regardless. What was to keep them from copying the DVD?
In my opinion, however, I believe that the piracy and distribution channel debates were a scapegoat for other issues. Namely, a 2 hour feature film was very expensive to do back then (using a Canon XL-1, which was state-of-the-art at the time, software, home-built booms and other tools, and a Terabyte’s worth of fast hard drives was clocking in at over $45,000), and they did not have the resources to follow through. Neither did I. I knew that I was right about one thing, however. Downloading movies as a viable distribution channel was the future, as were online film festivals as the ultimate means of getting exposure for an indie film.
So, is making a film available online, or allowing it to play on an online film festival, too risky? Is it possible that someone could steal your film, or your ideas?
Well, of course it is. Regardless of what you do, there will always be risk. It’s riskier, however, to keep your film from being seen, as many filmmakers still do. Those filmmakers who try too hard to protect their films and submit only to film festival events ultimately limit themselves, however, and handicap the promotion of their film. Filmmakers who comprehend the advantages of online film festivals, and who know how to capitalize on those advantages, will have the advantage over those who don’t.
The point is, however, that the filmmaker has to know how to make an online film festival work for their film, and not undermine the marketability of the film while promoting it. The purpose is to allow the film to be screened and to be seen, but not to give away the store. You have to allow people to watch it, and give them every incentive to buy it, too. How is that possible?
I have some suggestions.
First, in some ways, showing your film on an online film festival can be SAFER than submitting it to a film festival event. How is this possible? Please read on.
When you send a DVD of your film to a film festival, they have a full, high quality copy of your film! What’s stopping them from making a copy of it, selling it through another party, or uploading it to a peer-to-peer network? Better have money for the legal battle, my friend. Also, with filmmakers submitting their films on DVD to several film festivals, and with most film festivals retaining the copies regardless if the film is selected or not, safety is an illusion, at best. You can never completely protect your film if someone is determined to take it.
So, how can you protect your film, and how can it be safer to show it on an online film festival?
Well, it’s relatively simple. You minimize the potential payout for anyone taking the time and going through the trouble to steal your film. You take measures to make it less cost effective for them, and they will move on to greener pastures. It’s like burglary. You can never completely make your home safe from burglars, but you can make it tougher on them so they will move on to an easier target. As a result, it is far less likely that you will be robbed.
In a nutshell, and without turning this into a full-scale article or tutorial on the subject, I will give you a few pointers. Think about how this relates to showing films online. I not only have proof that these tactics work, but I have enough confidence in them to use them for my own indie film productions.

1. Minimize your risk.
If you submit to a film festival event, maybe you should make an online version of your film and send them a link so they can screen it. If accepted, bring along a high quality, current version DVD of your film to show at the film festival, watch them put it into the DVD player, and then retrieve it immediately after it is done playing. The motion picture industry does this with movies (I have first-hand experience with this because I have extensive experience helping the major motion picture studios combat piracy at the theater level- I’ve done everything from coordinate and manage anti-piracy staff, have sat in the back of movie theaters with night vision equipment looking for people in the audience recording movies, and have even worked with projectionists and theater management with preview prints of movies which are weeks from release). They will ship a movie reel, which is broken down into two or three smaller reels, shipped in cans with padlocks. The cans are opened in front of a witness (in my experience, I was the witness), who signs off on it and observes the projectionist assemble the main reel from the smaller reels. The witness then searches the projection room and examines the projection equipment for any unauthorized modifications. After the movie plays, the witness observes the projectionist break down the main reel into the smaller reels, and load them into the cans. After loading the small reels into the cans, the cans are locked with another set of padlocks, and the witness signs off on them. They are then shipped back to the motion picture distributor, and the risk of leaking of the film is kept to a minimum. It’s still possible for the film to be pirated, and I won’t go into exactly how (for legal, and ethical, reasons), but for insurance purposes, this process is satisfactory, and it is effective in deterring most piracy attempts. The amateur pirates simply won’t bother to try, because it’s too much effort for a limited return.
The point is to make it so that it isn’t worth the effort to steal the film. The pirates will then move onto an easier target.
Regarding showing a film online, you’re safer because the quality will never be as good as the film would be on a DVD. If they do copy it, the quality won’t be good enough to justify the selling price. I’ve seen online films of varying quality, and I’ve watched downloaded films that were pirated. The films that were made available online through services such as Youtube or Revver looked fine on the computer, but made poor-quality DVD’s. People want quality. If they get a copy of a film to keep, they are going to seek out the best quality, regardless of the price, and will buy it even if low quality versions of the film are available for free. With media such as music, however, it’s a little different, as audio files are tiny in comparison to video files, and MP3's are hard to distinguish from music on CD’s. The piracy which has ravaged the music industry, however, has less of an effect on the film business, although I will state that the effect that piracy has had on the music business is greatly exaggerated. Sure, you could steal MP3 files of your favorite music, but is it worth the hassle? The quality of bootlegged MP3's are often questionable at best, even though, technically, it sounds as good as a CD, and you often get music files that sound like crap because there was no quality control over how the song was ripped. You could look around, but it takes more effort, and time, than its worth because you can get excellent quality versions of the MP3's from the online stores at a low price. This is the reason that online music retailers such as ITunes are doing extremely well despite the availability of free MP3 files on peer to peer networks, and despite the limitations that they put on their files regarding copying them. The legal music files are around 4 to 5 megs in size and cost between $1.00 and $2.00. People will pay for the best quality if it is available, despite free versions supposedly undermining the market.
The best quality “free” movie files are DIVX or DVD rips of movies, and the average movie will clock in with a file size of around 700 Megs or so. I’ve seen some of these “pirated” movie files (although I do not own any). They look and sound good on the computer, or on a portable device such as an IPod or a Playstation Portable, but they are a pain to work with. The quality is ok, you can never be sure that the movie is the movie named when you download it, and you don’t get extras such as deleted scenes and running commentary. Every MPEG copy of a movie that I have seen merely convinced me to buy the DVD if I liked the movie. When you buy from a legitimate source, or even buy a used DVD for dirt cheap at a used movie / music store, you get quality and features that no illegal download can give you. In my opinion, the movie studios lose more money to used DVD sales than they do to piracy.
Piracy and theft? It’s more of a threat in principle than in fact. You will never be able to stop people from stealing. It’s human nature to take what you want. Even in retail sales, with all of their security measures and loss prevention, you cannot stop theft (I know this because I have years of experience in retail sales, and I am also a certified loss prevention officer). In any business with products to sell such as films, you always have shrinkage (losses) to factor into operations, and this will effect your profit margins. Sure, when you have to answer to stockholders and insurance companies, you are going to take an aggressive stance against piracy to cover all your bases and assure them that you are trying to maximize profitability while reducing losses. A part of this process is to use public relations to inform your target demographic that piracy is wrong, and that you won’t tolerate it. In reality, however, most people are going to buy what you are selling legitimately because it is convenient, and you will make money even if a few people are ripping you off. A dirty little secret of business is that complete security of what you are selling is impossible. To make it completely secure would be to avoid bringing it to market in the first place, which defeats the purpose of being in business. Accept that theft of what you are selling is a part of the cost of doing business, and work toward minimizing losses while maximizing profit margins.
Going back to music, the music industry has done more harm to itself through high retail prices of CD’s, forcing their customers to buy music that they don’t want, and treating all their customers like common criminals. This illegal music file sharing business is the modern equivalent of the Boston Tea Party as their customers, including the law-abiding ones, rebel. Despite illegal file sharing of music, however, the music industry is still making a lot of money. They use the music piracy as a scapegoat to explain losses from their other shortcomings.
Pricing, pricing. This has a lot to do with it. When you sell a DVD of a movie for $10.00, do you think that you are going to have a problem with people pirating and stealing your movie? Because of the fair price, you won’t have a problem with lost sales due to theft because it’s not cost-effective to obtain the film that way; some might steal your film, but most of them probably would not buy your film in the first place (they are not your customers), and your losses are minimal. With DVD's of films selling for $20.00 and up, however, you will get more piracy, but you will lose more money from customers simply not buying an overpriced product than you will from piracy. Go ahead, though, and blame your losses on piracy, anyway. The average consumer will believe it, and you will sift the blame away from you. Just don’t admit that you’re mostly losing money because you rip off your customers with an overpriced product, and the customers are not buying it because it is too expensive.
The bottom line? The average consumer, which makes up over 80% of your market, isn’t going to go through all the trouble of stealing your film and settling for lower quality versions of your film. They are going to go to the store to buy your DVD, or are going to go to theaters to watch your movie. For indie filmmakers, however, the risk is much lower.
It absolutely stuns me regarding how many filmmakers and indie film production companies who think that their films are good enough, or important enough, to worry about theft and piracy as much as they do. Their levels of entitlement and their sense of self-importance is ridiculous. It’s a lot like certain paranoid, vain, psychologically damaged people who think that they are being stalked by people who they simply don’t understand, and don’t bother trying to understand. Oh, it’s never you. You’re an important person, a desirable person, a person who is special enough to be desired by people who you find to be creepy in some way, and you convince yourself that you, out of all the other people in the world, are somehow important enough to be stalked. I know some idiots who endlessly claim that they are being stalked, and they never have a shred of evidence to support their claims. They seem to validate themselves, and their sense of worth, by the number of stalkers who they convince themselves that they have.
People, be objective. Deal with facts. It will help you to put things in their proper perspective, as well as keep you out of all sorts of legal problems when you wrongfully accuse people, who are actually innocent, of doing something criminal.
I have stalkers, and people have stolen things from me. This is not me trying to be more important than I actually am, or blaming people for my shortcomings, either. The difference between me and those idiots is that I have proof, and I have evidence which could hold up in court.
Think that your film is important enough, or desirable enough, to be stolen and pirated? Think again. Most indie filmmakers, especially Tampa filmmakers, won’t have that issue, and can only hope for it. If your film is good enough to be pirated, what will probably happen is that your sales will increase because the bootlegs of your film will help market it. People will seek out the best version of the film. Well, that is, providing you sell high quality versions at a fair price, and it is more convenient for most people to obtain your film legitimately. Making sure that the legal copies of your film are the most recent editions, and adding features such as running commentary and deleted scenes, will help, too. Make your film hard to find and hard to buy, and you will lose money to piracy and to illegal downloads of your film, because people will get it any way that they can, if they want it. Those who go overboard protecting their film due to a fear of piracy may find that their fears become a self fulfilling prophesy as a result of their actions.

2. Pick your business plan for your film.
Ok. Here it is. I’m not going to spin, or sugar-coat, this for anyone. I’m not going to try to convince you that playing your film on an online film festival is right for you, either. It’s really up to you to weigh out, consider, and decide.
If you are old school, have completed a feature-length film, and plan to shop it around and have a major Hollywood indie film distributor give you a distribution deal, an online film festival probably won’t be your best promotional outlet. Most studios will frown on showing your entire film online, and it will probably cost you a deal, unless - UNLESS your film has sky-high buzz and is really, really good. Of course, showing your feature film at the wrong film festival will probably do more harm than good, too.
If you do choose to go the old-school route, and many filmmakers will claim that this is the only legitimate route (and I strongly disagree), realize that it’s a long shot. Most filmmakers go this route, there is a lot of competition, and they limit their exposure, and their chances, of selling their film this way.
If you are seeking a major distribution deal, are trying to market the film as much as possible, and want to have your cake and eat it to by submitting your film to an online film festival, there may be a way to do it without jeopardizing potential distribution deals. How? Do a great film trailer (I don’t recommend trailers because they are a dime a dozen and everyone does them. Also, you cannot do a film festival of any kind with only trailers, and most film festivals, including my online film festival, frown on them. Also, if you do do a trailer, make it at least 3 minutes long, and keep it PG clean!) or even better, create a short version of your film with the first act or the main exposition. The point is to expose the film as much as possible, and to hook your audience. Make them want to see how it ends.
I remember once that I watched a cliffhanger season ending of a television series on DVD, and I was so hooked on it that I had to see what was going to happen next. As soon as it ended, I immediately went across the street and bought the entire next season. Was I planning to buy the next season that day when I sat down to watch the cliffhanger season ending? No, but I got so wrapped up in it, I went out of my way to seek out, and purchase, the rest. I spent $45.00 that day which I normally would not have spent.
That’s one way that feature-length films can be marketed. Hook them on the first chapter of the story, and they will be motivated to pay for the rest just to see how the story ends. There is a lot of psychology behind selling a film. If you make people want it, it will sell.
Want to get distribution for your short film? Good luck! Most major distributors won’t buy a short film because it is hard to position in the market and to sell. A compilation of short films may sell, but your best bet is to use short films as marketing tools and to use them as a selling portfolio. The short films are examples of the work that you do, and they can help you get investors and land the money to do more ambitious, feature films. Those feature films are much more marketable.
The better route to selling your film, in my opinion, is self-publishing and self-distribution. You can do anything that you want with the film, and if you know what you are doing, you’ll be better off than the filmmakers who play it safe and limit themselves by seeking distribution deals.
I know of more than one instance where filmmakers made a feature film for a minimal investment, made the first edition available for viewing for free online, then made their money back several times by offering later, expanded versions of their film for sale. Their films became viral, and they showed demand, which helped them sell the film and secure investors for other films.
Is an online film festival the best for you and your film? Consider my points in this introduction. Also consider that a conventional film festival event can’t even approach the levels of exposure that you would get from showing your film on an online film festival.
The Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival is an excellent promotional tool and marketing resource for indie film. I know this, both from the results, and because I created it as a platform to promote and market my films. I encourage filmmakers to take advantage of the benefits which it offers, because if it is good enough for me, it will be good enough for you, too. It’s also free, and with effective results, it is the ultimate film festival value. Just, please, don’t send us a trailer and claim that it is a film. I hate trailers, and so will most of your target market if it is promoted as a film and turns out to be a trailer.

The Beginnings Of Tampa Bay Film

It all began in the summer of 2006. I had recently started attending Tampa film festivals, such as The Tampa Film Review, and was not at all impressed by most of them. All of the film festivals had issues which needed to be addressed, and it must be noted that most of those issues could have been corrected if the organizers had been motivated to do so. In most cases, Tampa film festival organizers seemed to do film festivals just to do them. They didn’t seem to care if they promoted indie films or not.
In 2006, I noted these Tampa film festival flaws, researched film festivals, and began drafting plans for my own Tampa film festivals. One problem that I noted, however, was that many Tampa filmmakers were hacks who operated under false pretenses, and although they claimed to want to help other filmmakers and the so-called “Tampa indie film community” grow, they were not sincere. They were very fake, misleading, and had haughty, self-important attitudes. Insecure and unprofessional, you had to watch your back around them, and these unethical filmmakers only served to undermine professional progress in the Tampa indie film scene, and to keep it in chaos.
Additionally, no one had the courage to tell it how it was. They spun things unrealistically positive and embellished their achievements. It was a joke.
With my modeling and talent resource web sites, such as Tampa Bay Modeling, I had helped to change the industry by being outspoken, and by introducing new ideas. I set out to do the same with Tampa indie film because there was a dire need for it. Someone had to do something, and no one was doing anything. I took charge, and began to work to change it.
Tampa Bay Film began development.
One of the first things that I did while developing the main Tampa Bay Film web site was to create a Myspace profile for it in the meantime. While tinkering with the Tampa Bay Film Myspace profile and html code, I noticed that there were films on sites such as Youtube, and that most of these films had embed codes. Many Myspace users were placing embedded video files on their profile pages, and it was cool. It gave me an idea, and I quickly cobbled together a crude “online film festival” on the Tampa Bay Film Myspace profile. As this became popular, I decided to build an online film festival based on embedded video files into the upcoming Tampa Bay Film site. At first, I intended to make the online film festival one of many features on the Tampa Bay Film site, and didn’t put much thought into it becoming a film festival contender or competing with film festivals. It kind of took on a life of its own, however, and in those early days, I struggled to keep up with demand, while working out the kinks in formatting and how the online film festival would eventually work.
One thing that I didn’t like at the time, however, was that few filmmakers were posting their films online, although the technology was there to support it. There were way too many trailers, and you could not put together a film festival with trailers alone. Additionally, sites such as Youtube had lots of boring, useless videos on them, and a lot of content were awful video blogs and illegal copies of copyrighted television shows and other media. It was a mess, and it was very difficult to find indie films in the clutter. While the clutter of video sites would only increase, which worked to validate online film festivals which would serve to do the weeding for people looking for online indie films, more and more filmmakers were waking up and posting short films online. Things were changing.
During the fall of 2006, I collaborated with some Tampa filmmakers on the set of a Tampa film. While working on the set, I discussed indie films with some filmmakers, and how effective online film festivals could be. I mentioned that I was developing an indie film web site with an online film festival. During one such conversation, I noticed that a Tampa filmmaker stood near us, listening and not saying a word. This observation would prove to be significant later.

Launch Of Tampa Bay Film And Its Online Film Festival

After a couple of months on Myspace, the official Tampa Bay Film site launched on January 11, 2007. The main feature of the fledgling Tampa Bay Film site was its built-in Online Film Festival, or OFF. The initial Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival started with most of the films which had been on its Myspace profile, along with several others.
The Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival had some really cool features, such as a "film festival channel" system of organization. Viewers could select, and watch, films from genre channel menu channels, or select from all the films available on the online film festival. This intuitive way of navigating the film festival was very effective, and proved to be easy to use. There was even an online film festival Showcase Channel for the best indie films, and these films were selected through an ongoing online competition, where viewers could vote for their favorite films.
The debut of the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival was not without its controversy, however.
When Tampa Bay Film and its online film festival were announced on Myspace in late 2006, many filmmakers, and a Tampa indie film blogger, noticed. The Tampa film blogger posted on a message board that Tampa Bay Film was in development, and that it would feature an online film festival. The blogger insinuated that the idea was not new. Her friend, the filmmaker who had been listening to me at the indie film set, responded with a link to his online film festival, which was in development, also (which I was unaware of until that moment- obviously, the filmmaker told her about his online film festival and she assumed that I was taking his idea, and the filmmaker should have clarified the situation, which did not happen. At any rate, I strongly resented the comment which may have led the uninformed to think that I was some sort of unethical thief, and it’s apparently fine for these people to allow people to think these things because slander and credibility attacks seem to be their way of dealing with perceived competition). It came across as an insinuation that I had stolen their idea for an online film festival, which was not the case at all. If anything, they seemed to be running with my idea (The old saying that loose lips sink ships is especially true around so-called filmmakers in the indie film scene. Be very careful what you say around them). The blogger, of course, denied insinuating that an allegation of general ripping-off was ever made, but the damage was done. So began an arms race for the premier Tampa online film festival.
Upon launch, the film blogger reported that Tampa Bay Film had launched, and her review was decidedly negative and biased against the new site. The blogger wrote that the site used frames (which it did not; she had issues with the locked layout), and that the term “online film festival” was not an accurate depiction of the online film festival because the films were not hosted on the web site, and there was no time limit or awards. I strongly disagree with this statement, as the blogger obviously had limited knowledge of the definition of what a film festival actually is (although she claimed to help run some). An online film festival promotes and screens indie films, period. It does not have to have time constraints, a schedule, or awards, as those features are more appropriate for a film festival event (as a matter of fact, one of the advantages of an online film festival is that is can be viewed all of the time, and this would prove to give Tampa film festival events serious competition over time). Her statement that the films “not being hosted on the Tampa Bay Film” site as one of the factors disqualifying its consideration as an authentic film festival is ridiculous, too. It’s almost like saying that a film festival is not a film festival if the film festival organizer does not own the projection equipment or the film media; if this were a film festival event, this would not have been an issue (or perhaps she still would have made it one). If it shows films without the viewer having to leave the site, it is, my friends, a film festival.
The blogger ended her so-called “review” by stating that she hoped to see Tampa Bay film flourish and grow, and that she was “for” anyone and “anything” that promotes local filmmakers. Once again, this compliment came off as backhanded, and, in my opinion, was an insult. Also, in my opinion, she seemed to be covering for her friends in the small Tampa indie film clique, and among her friends was the Tampa filmmaker who stole my idea for an online film festival. Stole my idea? Well, I don't know how else to put it. His online film festival began development well after mine did, and after that day on the film set, when my online film festival was already in the works. I must be a time traveler, or a fortune teller, applying the logic behind their allegations. Either that, or it was one hell of a coincidence. Frankly, I am sick and tired of these so-called filmmakers reading my web sites and listening to what I have to say, and then trying to steal my ideas while they try to attack my credibility. I can see it now: "That's a great idea! Oh, no, I can't let this guy compete with me, because I can't compete. He's smarter, and better, than I am. I'll just take his idea, do it first, and then claim that he is insane and imply that he is some sort of psycho when he calls me out on it. I can then deny his allegations, and later, when I am mad at him, admit that he was right in an email. Yeah, that's the plan! I'll be the leader in the film scene with his ideas! My friends can help me, too. My overweight, homely blogger friend, who I secretly humor and feel sorry for, and who is into the fan scene because she must feel that it's the only way that any man will ever pay attention to her, can help me trash him! She can even do something cyberstalkerish by dot comming his name! Ha ha! So, we'll slander him and attack his credibility, while stealing his ideas, and there isn't a thing that he can do about it! He doesn't even have a right to get pissed!" (Editors note: Don't be surprised if I end up suing these "filmmakers" in the future. I have evidence supporting my allegations, they don't, and I am building cases against them. The difference between what I say about them, and what they say about me, it that they slander. I voice my opinions, as well as the truth. They need to stop while they are ahead. If I start suing, and win judgments against them, I will make those cases public knowledge, and this will seriously undermine their credibility and the integrity of their "careers". Fortunately, for them, I have used better judgment since then regarding publishing my ideas before I am ready to utilize them, which limits their ability to steal them. This may make lawsuits less likely).
Regardless of what the vocal minority thought, however, it didn’t stop Tampa Bay Film from taking off, and did not stop its online film festival from being accepted as a genuine film festival. Indeed, the distinction of the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival being a real film festival, without the limitations of a film festival event, would allow it to compete against the film festival events, which was never the original intention.

Defeating A Challenge

Soon after the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival launched, the competing online film festival launched and posed filmmakers the question if they were up to the challenge. Although the design of the challenging online film festival was satisfactory, there was a drawback with it which, ironically, addressed the main complaint that the blogger had about the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival which disqualified it, in her opinion, from being a genuine film festival. The challenging online film festival hosted all the submitted films on its server, and had to encode the films using a flash template which didn’t look like the designer had coded themselves. Although, technically, this should have given the new site an advantage over the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival, it backfired. The site was slow, the footage of the few films that were online was not smooth, and the film festival content was limited because the films had to be submitted and encoded to run on the site (which would have worked much better if the site had a lot of traffic, but new sites never do- there was no way that, with limited updates, that the site could have easily achieved the critical traffic levels needed for it to grow). This led to some serious administrative maintenance issues which made updating, and maintaining, the site difficult. The challenging online film festival was indeed ambitious, but not at all thought out well. It proved to be clunky, and slower, than the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival. The Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival was designed to be more of a guerilla style project, and it was more clever, and flexible. Designed for ease-of-use and easy updates, the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival was designed to use embedded film files from a variety of sources, and its content options were vast. Additionally, films were not dependent upon submission to be added, and films could be added in minutes as long as the film was already uploaded elsewhere on the Internet. As a result, the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival was smarter, faster, easily had more content, was organized better, and had an overall better design than its more limited challenger. The challenging online film festival could not compete with the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival, let alone keep up with it. The challenging online film festival stalled and faded, while the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival quickly grew, and left the competition far behind.

The Online Film Festival Becomes Successful

Throughout 2007, the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival experienced explosive growth. By the summer of 2007, the challenging online film festival, which was the only competition, was abandoned and left adrift on the Internet.
Although the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival had become successful, and extremely popular, there were issues. The film festival menu system was cluttered, and some of the directory paths did not work that well (once you went into the online film festival from the main Tampa Bay Film site, it was hard to leave and return to Tampa Bay Film). The color scheme proved to be unpopular, too, with dark greens and yellows giving the site a 90's BBS look (the BBS look comment was mine, and many people did not know that it was. My critics were all too eager to throw it in my face, ignorant of the source).
This would change, in time, but not in 2007, or even most of 2008.
By December, 2007, Tampa Bay Film and the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival had become huge, and very popular. The site layout was altered so it wasn’t locked into a “frame look” any longer, but the plain menu system, the cluttered film festival menu, and the dark green color scheme remained. Plans were drawn up for an overhaul of the site design and the menu system, as well as the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival. It would take months, however, to do the necessary research, and to finish the design work. Several months were put aside for work on the next generation of both Tampa Bay Film and the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival, and the site was placed on standby. After the December 2007 update, there were no new uploads to the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival, as work was being done on the next generation. It remained online, however, and fully operational, with a huge library of over 150 indie films, and in that time it became more popular than ever. No one, except for a few critics, realized that there were no new updates. Some critics hoped that the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival had finally run out of steam, and had failed. This was not to be the case, although work on the next generation of both Tampa Bay Film and the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival were delayed due to increased focus on a sister site.
There were some updates on Tampa Bay Film and the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival, however. For over a year, it had been a part of the Tampa Hub network of sites, and Tampa Bay Film was a subdirectory of Tampa Hub and not a part of its own domain name; TampaBayFilm.Com was little more than a marketing lead-in domain name pointing at the Tampa Hub section for Tampa Bay Film. On March 23, 2008, all Tampa Bay Film file directories and the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival were moved under TampaBayFilm.Com on a new server. This would serve to enhance search engine performance, and would be mandatory for what was in the works for the next generation.

Back Seat To Tampa Bay Modeling

In early 2008, Tampa Bay Modeling, which was the older sister site of Tampa Bay Film, began engaging the increasing number of Tampa model search scams in a new scam-fighting offensive. The Tampa Bay Modeling site began record-breaking numbers of updates, with media interviews and models sent out on press engagements to raise awareness of Tampa Bay Modeling. The resources needed for this campaign slowed down work on Tampa Bay Film and the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival, and updates to the sites were suspended for over six months. Although the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival continued to draw increasing numbers of viewers, Tampa Bay Film began to look like it was dead in the water. Work on the next generation of both Tampa Bay Film and the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival, however, continued. By the summer, preliminary design work was completed on the next Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival, and updates were scheduled to resume with an all-new Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival in late summer, 2008. There were a few more hurdles, however, and the work obtained some more time due to other issues coming up with other business priorities.
In late summer, 2008, updates to Tampa Bay Modeling has slowed to routine levels, although Tampa Bay Modeling models continued routine television appearances. Tampa Bay Film work began to increase again, now that web development resources were available.

Learning From Experience

With some more time available in late summer 2008, the web team went over the data that they had with the earlier version of the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival. The menu format was cleaned up, new design elements were worked on, and it was decided to make the new Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival a stand-alone web site, separate from Tampa Bay Film, but both the Tampa Bay Film site and the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival would be interconnected with each other. To the average visitor, the stand-alone online film festival site would seem transparent, as it would be accessed from the Tampa Bay Film site and marketed through Tampa Bay Film. The new online film festival, of course, would have its own domain name, and could be accessed directly through TampaOnlineFilmFestival.Com, too (the stand-alone domain name was obtained on May 6, 2008, so the decision to make it a stand-alone site had already been made before the summer peak of Tampa Bay Modeling work).
There were two options available for the second generation online film festival. The first, and fastest, way to launch the new online film festival would be to copy the existing Tampa Bay Film site, strip out the Tampa Bay Film directories, and expand the online film festival directories. This would have been taking a short cut, however, and would have limited what the new online film festival could have been, burdened with old files, although the new online film festival would have completely retained its full library of indie films. The second way was to take a longer, and much harder, approach, coding the site as a new site from scratch, with a new format. The problem with the second approach was that it was ten times the work, and each indie film would have to be ported over to the new online film festival format, and ported to new file directories. Ths was long, and tedious work. The decision was soon made. It was decided to take the time, and the effort, to do things right. Work on a brand new Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival site began.
The decision to work on an all-new second generation site really did lead to a lot of hard work, but proved to be the right way to go. With the next generation site, major adjustments were done to the menus and the format, and with those adjustments came new operating rules for the next generation online film festival. For all new films added, and all older films ported to the new online film festival directories, it was decided to add a new thumbnail screen-grab button system for the online film festival directories. This would slow down updates by tripling the work, but it was still much faster than what the old competing film festival had to do. Updating the next generation online film festival was still fast, and easy, and this worked nicely.
There was a new menu interface design and new colors, with the new online film festival going dark blue and bright yellow. The buttons were redesigned from scratch, also. The online film festival channel system was refined and expanded upon, too, as it worked quite well over the past eighteen months of operation. New channels, such as theme channels, were adopted.
It was a lot of work, but the results were worth it. The next generation Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival was not only better in every way, but it was nice to look at, too. The site looked so nice, in fact, that it left the design of Tampa Bay Film far behind. For continuity purposes, Tampa Bay Film received a design overhaul around the time that the new Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival launched. Tampa Bay Film, after the overhaul, looked just as nice, and complimented the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival nicely. The green BBS look was history.

The Second Generation Online Film Festival Launches

On October 10, 2008, the next generation Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival launched with 18 indie films active and available. This quickly expanded to over 61 films available by the end of December 2008, with much of the back-library still in the process of converting to the new format.
On day-one of the launch of the stand-alone online film festival site, the new online film festival enjoyed the full traffic of the older online film festival, as all menu options on Tampa Bay Film and other sites were rerouted to the new online film festival. The old online film festival directories on Tampa Bay Film were maintained and kept active as archives on Tampa Bay Film, with all menu links rerouted to the new online film festival domain and its subdirectories. This smooth transition, while it limited the number of indie films which were available initially, proved to be very effective. The new online film festival quickly dominated search engine results, and it proved to be more popular than ever. In just over two months, it experienced growth, and popularity, which far exceeded what the original had accomplished in almost two years. This exceeded our wildest estimates.

The Online Film Festival Dominates Tampa Indie Film

At the time of this writing, the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival has been extremely successful, with record-setting viewer traffic and growth. 5,000 viewers a day are watching films on the site, and on every given minute there are films being screened on the online film festival. That’s cool. At all times, all the time, there are at least a few people watching films on the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival. How many Tampa film festivals can boast those kind of attendance numbers? As of now, there is simply no better way to promote indie film in Tampa, and even the large Tampa film festivals can’t do it better. The Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival is now in position to take on the large Tampa film festival events, and that’s quite an accomplishment for an online film festival which shouldn’t be able to compete with large film festival events.
It makes sense, however. The Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival is always open, and the films can be viewed 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. The films can be viewed, viewed again, skipped, and watched in any order, regardless of how many people are online watching films. There are a few things that a film festival event can do that the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival cannot touch, such as socializing and face to face networking, but since most Tampa film festivals have not been able to get that right, there are few advantages over the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival. When it comes to screening films, there is no competition.
It’s awesome, and I find myself watching films on the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival all the time, as do other professionals in the Tampa indie film scene. Even the critics are watching films on there, and that’s cool, although they would never admit to it.
It will be interesting, however, to see what the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival will do in 2009, and what effect that it will have on Tampa film festivals and the large Tampa film festival events. The 2009 review of the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival should be an interesting review, and I already have some cool plans for it, with an online film festival review party planned with models and entertainment professionals voicing their take on the online film festival. With some surprises in store for the online film festival next year, this should prove to be interesting at the very least.

New Challenges Ahead

I have some issues with the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival, though, and don’t think that this review is all about hyping it. There are also some challenges ahead which we look forward to taking on.
One of the things that give the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival its advantage, utilizing embedded film files from other sites such as Yotube and Revver, has drawbacks. First of all, the experience is dependent upon those sites. When they make adjustments to their flash / shockwave templates, such as adding annoying pop-up ads when the viewer mouse-overs on the film window, it alters the viewing experience. I also don’t like how clicking on a film viewing window can take viewers away from the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival. To get back, the viewer simply has to hit the back arrow on their Internet browser, and all of them have no problem doing this, but it is annoying.
This should be fixed by the time the third generation Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival debuts in the future. We will have our own custom flash format, which will be automatic. Submissions will be added automatically, too, which will be welcome to us, because right now we have to manually add each and every film. Note the word “automatic”. The competing online film festival still had to manually format film submissions as well as store them on their server, so they had all the drawbacks as well as the maintenance overhead. We will have none of that. Of course, we would still have bandwidth concerns, and other issues such as too many “film” submissions where the viewers would find it difficult to find legitimate indie films, but we will govern that with site moderation, and by weeding out and deleting files which are more Youtube garbage than indie film. We’ll keep the quality standards up.
Ah, I have other issues, too, but these have to do with the filmmakers. The first one would be too may film trailers. You cannot have a film festival with trailers, and I refuse to build an online film festival full of trailers. Fortunately, this situation improved last year, and now there are plenty of good indie films online. The second issue is ongoing, but should be rectified in another year or so. There are too many films cut up into chapters of only a few minutes of duration. You watch a few minutes, and then you have to go to the next chapter. I understand that this is done for quality purposes, usually, but it is distracting and tedious. With feature films now online with running times of over an hour an a half, this is annoying. In the near future, however, we will have an online film experience with fewer interruptions, and where we can watch a twenty minute short film without clicking to another chapter in the middle of the film.
Well, nothing is perfect, but the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival is an awesome thing, and it will only get better. I’m very proud of it, and I look forward to using it to promote my own indie films.

Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival Scorecard

Please note that a score of 5 is average.

Concept (1-10): 10
Great concept. An online film festival is convenient, and can be viewed any time and any where. The films can be viewed in any order or skipped, so the experience of watching and screening films is superior to any film festival event. This is a pure film festival, simply put, just without the audience and the social aspects of interacting with audience members and filmmakers.

Venue (1-10): 7
This varies, as the venue is wherever you are. The score receives a higher score because this film festival is always open, and you can watch films at 3 AM, if you wish, from the comfort of your home.

Vendors (1-10): 3
There are advertisers, such as the ones in the ads, but these are not really vendors. There needs to be a way to market and sell indie films and other cool items, and this is on the way. This score should improve in 2009.
Here’s a complaint: In some of the Youtube and Revver videos, you get obnoxious pop ups whenever you mouse-over the films. This is distracting, and annoying. This will improve once the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival begins to host the films instead of embedding film files from other sources.

Organization (1-10): 9
The online film channels, organizing the films by category, are brilliant. The design of the new second-generation site is awesome, too, with tweaked navigation and an easy film viewing experience. The latest online film festival is many, many times better, and more organized, than the first one which was built into Tampa Bay Film.

Entertainment (1-10): 10
There are some great films playing on the online film festival. There are some terrible ones, too. It’s all entertaining, however, because you can skip the bad films and spend your time watching the good ones. You could even, if you had the mind to, watch the bad films and make fun of them. We know many people who do, and there’s nothing wrong with being entertained, even if it’s not in the way that the filmmakers wanted, or intended.

Attendance (1-10): 10
There is no Tampa film festival which can match the attendance numbers that the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival gets; not even the large ones such as the Gasparilla Film Festival. The film festival is always up and running, and thousands of people watch films on it every day, and all hours of the day and night. In a single day, the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival gets more people watching films than all the Tampa film festivals get in attendance, combined, in an entire year! This is the best way of obtaining exposure for any film in the Tampa Bay market, although the drawback is that you can’t sit with an audience and see their reaction to your film. Right now, at this moment, there are several people watching indie films on the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival, and that’s awesome!

Features (1-10): 7
The Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival has quite a few features, such as genre / category based film festival channels, and recently added film festival channels for individual filmmakers, indie film production companies, and themes. It’s a lot like an online event with no particular order, and it works quite well. There are film reviews coming, but at the time of this review, there were too few to notice, so this doesn’t help the score.

Admission Value (1-10): 10
It’s free, so that’s good, but the ads can be annoying. It doesn’t take much effort to ignore them, however, and they are easy to get rid of.
Although the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival is free, it is well worth the time if you want to see indie films. The Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival is well worth checking out again and again.

Overall Film Festival Score (1-10): 8
Good, clean web site design and layout. Great market branding. Films playing all the time, and accessible from any Internet connection. A wide assortment of indie films which can be watched in any order, paused if needed, replayed as many times as you wish, or even skipped, if you get bored, and want to watch another film, instead. This Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival gives any Tampa film festival serious competition when it comes to watching and screening indie films. This is the ultimate indie film marketing platform for promoting Tampa indie films and inspiring Tampa indie filmmakers with the possibilities of filmmaking.
Although there are a few things that a Tampa film festival event offers that you can’t get from an online film festival, the advantages of the Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival far outnumber any from a traditional film festival event. The Tampa Bay Film Online Film Festival even exceeds the value of the source of its film files hosted on Youtube, Revver, and other video-sharing services, as the files are used in an indie film-relevant format, and the viewers don’t have to waste time shifting through thousands of crappy video files looking for indie films. Once the reviews are up, it’ll be even better!

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