I’ve been down the road in this commercial 4 times. 4 different daughters that I have held, diapered, fed, walked, watched movies with, taught to ride a bike, sent off to college, and endeavored to protect from bad boys and dangerous decisions. And I’ve never given one of them a car, which makes me cry too.

Have to admit DDB did a fantastic job on this one.

Though I’m a video producer, I’ve always felt that video on the web lacks the interactivity that drew me to Flash when it came out in 2000 or so. In fact, back then video was so utterly impractical that Flash was a necessity for light weight, interactivity, and preloading of content.

Now a new Mozilla technology startup called Popcorn addresses the interactivity issue of video on the web, if not the preloading or weight issue. Of course, the speed and bandwidth of the web in the last couple of years has made the speed and bandwidth issue much less of a problem.

I first learned about this about 30 minutes ago when I stumbled upon a TED talk by Ryan Merkley. In the TED blog, this video is augmented in Popcorn here.

It’s a great idea. Take your content and add interactive points to it. I took a little video I did for my client Keith Gormezano, and in a matter of moments added some functionality and web interactivity.

Popcorn demo on Keith Gormezano\'s video

Popcorn will be available soon, but as you can see the beta site already works and you can get started using it right away!

Here’s part 1 … Part 2 is here. It’s great to see the world’s best cinematographers talking about their craft… though the opening salvo is a little melodramatic for my tastes, the 2nd installment is definitely worth the wait. I’m not going to give you the list of cameras. Watch Part 1, about 2/3 of the way through, to find the 9 cameras, labeled A through I. Then watch Part Two to find out which camera was which. The cameras range in price from hundreds to hundreds of thousands of dollars… and one thing the whole process demonstrates is that cinematography trumps technology. Regardless of the camera, a great looking picture is possible.

Revenge of the Great Camera Shootout 2012 – Part One: Starting With Darkness from Steve Weiss on Vimeo.

Ad Age tells the gratifying story of how Procter & Gamble has made a conscious decision to find ways for their creative suppliers to come back with truly outstanding content. The current Wieden & Kennedy Olympics campaign is one manifestation of that support. “It takes great clients to do great advertising”, and in my view a great client is one who (1) knows good quality  (2) hires for quality, and (3) is willing to pay for quality.

I’m really impressed with the quality of this spot… great cinematography, editing, and character storytelling. It’s the little moments that carry the authenticity… and the emotional impact. Ultimately, it works because of the reality of its major point: That moms are essential to a child’s success.

Though the insertion of gratuitous  dishwashing and laundry scenes threaten to take us out of the story moments, I think they are just understated enough to keep the emotional arc of the story moving forward. The director was Alejandro Gonzalez Iñárritu, who directed Babel and Biutiful.

Here’s an interesting scam. I get this letter:

Ztoryteller LLC Apex Hill Inc.
Apex Hill, Nunavut, Canada
Friday 13th of July 2012

To whom it may concern,

My name is Ms. Hettie Armistead and I am the secretary of Ms. Leonore Wojak, the owner of a group of companies including Apex Hill Inc.. Our company has just opened a new trading division that is near to your location. As traders our company supply a wide range of first-class quality products and services at extremely competitive prices.

We want to recommend your products and services to all our customers, and that is why we want to know more about you and would appreciate the opportunity to speak with you directly.

Please let us know if we can call or visit you in the next weeks. You can view our company profile and contact us here.

Rather than my usual automatic response of deleting letters from people I don’t know, I decide to try out Google search by image…

I ran a search on what I’ve duplicated and named “MysteryFace…” and here’s what came up:

So Amy, please be warned that somebody masquerading as Alana Jones is using your face on Facebook, and a bogus company claiming to be in Canada is using your face, and claiming you are Hettie Armistead.

I love Google!

Thanks to @TimReha of New Media Synergy, who like me operates out of the SURF Incubator in Seattle, I had the honor of meeting Mirta Gilson last week. Mirta is the Business Development Manager for Make.TV. Mirta has established an outpost in Los Angeles where she is developing partnerships and doing deals to help producers discover a whole new platform for both broadcast and social media.

I found Mirta to be intelligent, fun, and a very gracious exponent of her exciting new technology. I hope you enjoy these interviews.

Here’s the first 2-minute edit of my interview, in which Mirta explains and demonstrates how Make.TV works. I’ve never been so excited about a new technology…

In future exerpts I’ll share Mirta’s thoughts on the amazing ways people, interest groups, and companies are already using Make.TV…. and the awesome possibilities that await producers because of this platform’s ability to sell tickets and monetize content.

I’ll also be uploading Mirta’s tour of SURF and her reactions to this exciting new business-development ecosystem in Seattle.

A lot of effort to sell headlights.

All the right moves.

Hubris of Biblical proportions.

Visual storytelling at its best.