Success In Art
Author: tomweber In: FilmmakingHow do you measure success in art?
Why do we equate success with money, fame, celebrity? Why do we think a band that’s on tour with a big bus is successful, when we think a band that plays on Saturday nights for beer money is not? Even if the touring band plays songs that are devoid of any human emotion and the local band plays heartfelt songs that relate directly to their audience’s lives?
I’m beginning to think that our concept of success is a gatekeeper, used by big media conglomerates to stay in control.
[ Read More → ]South By Southwest 2012
Author: tomweber In: Digital Content, Filmmaking, Movie Reviews, Technology, World Wide WebI’m approaching the gigantic South By Southwest conference-festival-tradeshow like I approach most things — starting with small exploratory trips around the periphery before diving in headfirst. Today I stood in various lines for about 90 minutes to get my “platinum” registration badge. The picture captures but a small portion of the endless queue, which snaked all the way around the gigantic Austin Convention Center.
My platinum badge is not some kind of VIP item, it just means I am here for all three segments of the 10-day event: Interactive, Film and Music.
[ Read More → ]FAVORITES AROUND THE WEB
DIRT AND SEEDS is an excellent blog by multiple contributors that covers music, culture, politics and education. They recently reviewed my film Troubadour Blues.
“Selling Your Film Without Selling Your Soul” is a great new book by Orly Ravid of The Film Collaborative, together with DIY marketing pioneers Jon Reiss and Sheri Candler. Bare-bones PDF version, without images or links, is available FREE through this link.
“Think Outside the Box Office” author Jon Reiss, on how he would release and promote his film “Bomb It!” if he were doing it today. Sage advice from one of the pioneers of grassroots movie distribution.
My presentation from the 2011 University Film and Video Association conference, on “How Not to Make a Documentary.”
I'm a filmmaker and teacher with a passion for music and 40 years' experience in audio/video production, journalism and graphic design. My feature-length documentary, Troubadour Blues, was released in September 2011. I'm working on another film about "hidden musicians" in local music scenes across the USA. I am a native of western Pennsylvania and currently live in Pittsburgh.
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Music I've produced