[00:00:05]
>> My name is Amanda Weiss and am assistant professor of Japanese at Georgia Tech School of modern languages and director of the global media festival. The Global Media Festival is the Georgia Tech School of Modern Languages annual film and discussion series focusing on sustainability across languages and cultures our festival aims to foster conversation among attendees international filmmakers educators and partners what it means to design and engage in innovative initiatives that address social needs today our event has 2 parts a virtual screening of the short film drought resilience on the flint by Georgia climate project and a panel on running virtual film festivals bittering some programmers from around the world we will hold our audience questions until the last 15 minutes of the event where we will ask you to either put your question in the chat or raise your hand by clicking the reason.

[00:00:59]
We are recording this event so please turn off your camera if you do not want to be filmed I am honored to take it away and start with presenting our 2 speakers who are coming to us from the Georgia climate project Michael shorts and Rachel I share Michael a short it's an independent editorial and corporate photographer and videographer based in Atlanta Georgia.

[00:01:22]
Over 35 year career Michael has completed more than 6000 assignments for publications like light National Geographic The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal Michaels also a 4 time Pulitzer Prize nominee has received numerous awards from the pictures of beer competition and was the winner of the diet Homer scald award for human rights advocacy journalism Michael thank you so much for joining us Rachael Esther Sorry Rachel Esther is the project manager for the Georgia climate project and the Emory climate and health research in keeping her in 2020 she graduated with a master's in public health in the Department of Epidemiology at the Emory Rollins School of Public Health previously Rachel received her Bachelor of Science in ecology from the old school because at the University of Georgia in 2016 a lifelong South America she is proud to be a part of Climate Change Research and Action across the United States so I turn it over to to you Rachel and Michael please take it away.

[00:02:28]
Thank you again Amanda for the very kind words and invitation to be here today and welcome to all the attendees that are joining us from it sounds like all over the world this is incredibly exciting before we get started I just wanted to give everyone a little bit of context about the Georgia climate project because you may not be familiar with it.

[00:02:51]
We are as a group of academic institutions colleges and universities across the state of Georgia that are working together to answer 2 fundamental questions what does a changing climate mean for Georgia and what can we do about it and while the Georgia climate project was started up an e t 2018 that we have pursued many different types of projects and initiatives to address these 2 questions but we're really here today to talk about one of my favorite pieces and probably one of the favorite parts of my job which is I'm telling stories through the Georgia climate stories initiative so I want to go ahead and show you all a little bit we're going to go on a little bit of a tour here on bluejeans just her meant so please bear with me I hope this technology will work so as I mentioned we're here answering these 2 questions What does a changing climate mean for Georgia and what you do about it and early on we were well aware that storytelling is a really powerful media to communicate both the urgency and also the hope and excitement of all different climate action that's happening across the state of Georgia and so with our Georgia climate stories and you know here we have a lot of film lovers in the room and all of you know that you know storytelling through film is a way of connecting with people in faraway places showing them really what what is happening on the ground and really winning over hurts and minds and that it's been such a powerful tool for us to use average a kind of project we bring so.

[00:04:27]
Much scientific expertise to this people working with fabulous client climate scientists across the state but we're really really proud of highly the work of individuals who are not kind of scientists who are doing the work every day here so we're going to be doing a screening today of drought resilience on the flint which takes place in Clayton County and Michael is going to give us a little bit more context on this piece he was there and the brains behind making this decision come to life but you know we've worked on other stories as well another piece I'd really like to highlight that if you have an opportunity go check it out in this piece about blueberry farmer in Georgia and you can watch the story right in our Web site but I'm just incredibly excited to have the opportunity to share one of our stories here today and I'm going to go ahead and turn it over to Michael to talk a little bit more about you know the actual process of capturing this film and you know what it's been like to work we're good that's a church a kind of project thanks thanks very much all.

[00:05:36]
Well it's been great working with you and working with the other concept of climate project. I'm a photographer and a videographer and I always tell folks that. About 95 percent of the stuff that I do each year. Is just kind of work and then the rest of it is really a labor of love and all the stuff I do for the project is definitely a labor of love I feel like.

[00:06:04]
Obviously it's a very important issue and we've worked. Or videos together and the people that we've met working on those videos are all very. Fun and committed and passionate and enthusiastic. So this particular project is kind of interesting because it's really the confluence of a couple of different stories and when we 1st started out on it we didn't really know for sure how it was going to work out and so as we proceeded to do the reporting.

[00:06:41]
Idiocracy it sort of became evident that were there were really 2 stories here and we're going to try to blend those 2 stories and if you stories were the. Existence of the unique constructed wetlands which is a project of the Clayton County Water Authority this is an area just south of the Atlanta airport and it's a fascinating place it's an artificial weapons that they they built a few years ago it's not new.

[00:07:13]
But it looks like a real weapons and in fact they say they do tours because it's become kind of a wildlife habitat especially for migratory birds that was another interesting part of the story we had to get in there. But the other part of the story is that the.

[00:07:34]
Flint River. Which runs from the airport in Atlanta south viciously through Florida and into the ecological Bay in the Gulf of Mexico has experienced some really bad drought. Conditions in the last 20 years much worse so than in the entire century before. In the 2. Are related because the quite County Water Authority since.

[00:08:04]
The sub continental divide. Where the water. Really of us Lee had been mostly drawn from the flint but then was released into the river and the flint eventually flows in the Gulf of Mexico the eventually flows into the Atlantic Ocean and the problem in the last couple of decades is that the Flint has experienced some really serious drought.

[00:08:31]
Situations and the fact that Clay County Water Authority has taken water out of the flood and putting it into the multi is not helping any and thank County Water Authority is well aware of us and this is the 3rd part of the story is that they have recently built.

[00:08:50]
A publishing plant where some of that water that was headed towards the old moldy and the Atlantic Ocean is now going to be diverted back into the let river in the Gulf of Mexico and what was great about this story is that it involved. The water authority folks so industry people and some conservation groups and they're all working together and they're all working towards the same goal so it's really.

[00:09:20]
A solution story about how these disparate groups and come together on if they have the same goals to work towards achieving those goals together though the 3 characters in the story that you'll meet. Are Ben Emanuel and Ben is director of the clean water supply at American reverse He's our conservation guy and then kind of explains the situation with.

[00:09:44]
And then we bring in Mike Thomas and Mike Thomas is with the Clayton County Water Authority or should say he was here he retired but all of these things the construct of wetlands and the new policy plan. Were formed under his. Supervision So you kind of can see his love for the wetlands and his enthusiasm for what they're doing diverting water back into the flow and the last character is Kendra Stansell and Kendra now is in charge of the new plant that's going to take water from.

[00:10:22]
Moldy and put it back into this. So those are the characters those are the. The different issues that the short film deals with. I will tell you it was great fun going out to the wetlands it's really a wonderful place from a nature standpoint. And they gave me free rein there which as a videographer I'm not used to having Usually their p.r. people and Company people who want to watch everything you do but they would walk me around at a little bit of time with me and then just cut me loose which the 1st time to did that I was so in thrall by it and I shot still.

[00:11:08]
Pretty much the sun went down and then realized I had no idea where I was or how to get out of there because it's so huge places $4500.00 acres there are no there are rows but they're not marked u.p.s. doesn't work real well so it was kind of getting a little creepy but.

[00:11:25]
The next time I went back and made sure I went back with the. Google Earth map of the roads in the facility and then it was able to navigate it pretty well. But it was a great it was great fun working on it and you guys enjoy it and when you see it.

[00:11:48]
People who know the river well have seen the river change since the year 2000 we've seen 5 droughts strike the flood river basin and in every one of those drought events we've seen river flows go to severe low flow levels that are lower than any flows recorded during the draft in the 20th century on the river in recent years water utilities conservationists and others have been working together to find ways to restore drought resilience to the river.

[00:12:16]
With climate change we know will have more droughts in the future and so all these actions add up they build on one another to restore the river systems on resilience the drought that benefits communities throughout the area and the health of the river system itself. The flat is a remarkable river despite its humble beginnings it starts near the airport on the south side of Atlanta flow southward throughout the length of Georgia through west central Georgia and into southwest Georgia it meets the Chattahoochee River at the southwest corner of the state to form the Apalachicola which flows to the Gulf of Mexico at Apalachicola Bay.

[00:13:01]
In the upper reaches it provides water some pot and hundreds of thousands of people on the south side of metro Atlanta and in fact restaurants that flows through the heart of the very productive farm belt in that area. 2007 was the 2nd worst drought on record for the state of Georgia in many of our communities were close to running out of water that one true in Clayton County the constructive well is behind me are a big piece of us being able to return 60 to 70 percent of the water we used every day.

[00:13:29]
Huey Truman Whelan's or about $4500.00 acres in size and that's one of the largest treatment Wellens in the United States and as far as I know it's the only one that was intentionally built to recycle treated waste water. Back to our water supply for the well as receive treated wastewater from one of our wastewater treatment plants in the water flows very slowly through the well and system in the plants the soul in the microorganisms in that community all work to remove any impurities in the water before it's discharged to our reserve.

[00:14:04]
So that he well and has one of my happy places so when I was having a bad day at work I'd get in the truck drive down here and that would help me remember what it was we were doing and how we did it and what a great place this was to work.

[00:14:17]
The well is behind me are not generally open to the public but I can arrange a tour with for the party when I come out here with other people who haven't seen the side a really give me a lot of satisfaction to see the look on their face and this place is sitting here right south of downtown Atlanta it's just a beautiful environment and people can learn how the water cycle really works and they can see something different that they can see in their own neighborhood.

[00:14:45]
Quite uncanny sits on the some continental divide so half the water flows into the Atlantic half flows in the Gulf of Mexico and playing county draws its water supply primarily from the Flint River on the Gulf of the county but this is still where we treat the wastewater and return it back to our surface waters is on the Atlantic with flows of the old mode River not the Flint River.

[00:15:12]
Quite in county water authorities constructed wetlands system is a fantastic example of sustainable and resilient water infrastructure as a lot of environmental benefits but it's had one notable exception which is that the water in the wetlands comes from the river but most of it ends up in another river altogether the old Malky also harbor system.

[00:15:32]
Quite uncanny waters decision to upgrade its treatment plant and take water from the weapon system and return it to the foot river where it came from is a great step forward for the river and all the communities that depend on. The Casey polishing facility is an upgrade to our treatment system and it has been in the works for many years it will allow us for term questions of the war that normally goes to the wetlands to the flame it will also give us the ability to return just as much water as we withdraw the flame this will improve drought resiliency and help out downstream neighbors.

[00:16:12]
The good news also is that quite in county waters not alone other water systems on the south side of metro Atlanta have taken steps to restore resilience to the river for times of drought. It's really gratifying for me to work with clean county water and other water utilities throughout the upper basin in collaborative dialogue to work together to find these kinds of solutions.

[00:16:34]
So the more we can do to restore misalliance and restore the health of the river in the face of that change the better off will be in the future. Thank you very much so we have about 12 minutes for a quick so I prepared a couple questions for Rachel and Michael and then if we have some time before I reached on Michael Eavis at 130 if anyone wants to put a question in the chat we might have some time for questions from the audience so my 1st questions for each Also region we talked about this a little bit earlier but when we when we were looking at the climate change about water and other things it's very easy to get great pessimistic and even mention some action items and things that we as people can do about it and I was wondering if you wanted to talk a little bit about.

[00:17:37]
Absolutely I think this story is a really powerful piece just to as Michael mentioned earlier the power of communities coming together you know really across different types of lines you know you have a water authority and and people from the community rallying around this idea that water resiliency is something that really matters and you know I I like to think you know about kind of action in 2 ways there's you know reducing how much carbon and mitigating our future impact but we're also having to do it we're having to adapt you know that the climate is changing and there are things that we need to do to build resiliency in communities and so this piece really highlights you know how communities can think about something as complicated and sometimes contentious as you know water and access to water during times of drought especially for a river that is so critically important that flows the length of Georgia and serves so many you know serves urban communities and also serves quite a few rural communities that are farmers in the southwest corner of the state so I think you know there's in climate solutions land people can get really frustrated and say wow these these problems feel very large they feel too big I don't feel like I can engage with them but I encourage you to look around in your community and get involved because there might be worth in one way then you think to you know build resiliency and community and also address kind of solutions I would be remiss not to mention draw down Georgia I know many Georgia Tech students are on the line here today and he might be familiar with it but it's an effort here led by Dr Marilyn Brown of Georgia tack to identify the most important climate solutions in the state and you know things as simple as reducing your how much you know reducing food waste or looking at other forms of transportation there are many ways we can get involved in climate action and I think our climate stories are just a fabulous medium to showcase the hope and that all the things that you know we can do and all those all of the benefit that we can gain now through our individual and collective action.

[00:19:48]
Great beautifully sent so might my next question for Michael on the film side so Michael 1st up I saw your biography want to lot of the words in photography and it really like it's beautifully shot I just wanted to know and I don't know if you want to say a little bit about cinematography but I thought that that was very striking and I met me like my question would be about building relationships with subjects so.

[00:20:15]
I know that when you're making a documentary it's kind of a process and so I was wondering if you could talk to talk us through that a little bit how do you build your relationship to the subject how much time does it take you know what is there a given take like how does it how does it build over time thank you it's a great question and thank you for the Quite word started with.

[00:20:39]
And building relationships really really are critical. Because you have to have the trust of the folks that you're involving in the story. Stories like this. Are a little bit easier because everybody's car on the same team and has as the same goal. So I think the couple things that I try to do is one is I spend a lot of time Martin shooting.

[00:21:09]
Just talking with people and. Getting all comfortable with me. And convincing them that I'm trustworthy and that I'm really trying to tell truthful story. And then get them to see you know we all have the same goal. But sometimes in some stories that's not true but in this story definitely it's true you know everybody wants it's all the story everybody is really happy with that but it works.

[00:21:42]
Together to achieve the same goal it will cooperate in. There were always on the same page but in the end the goal. Was mostly the same. I considered assignment last weekend. But The Washington Post in South Carolina and it's really delicate story it's going to run next Monday and I was there for 2 days and probably spent a total in 2 days or.

[00:22:12]
An hour actually shooting pictures on the rest of the time just talking on the people that we should. Because you have to make people comfortable with your presence for them to kind of relax and be themselves. In the. All drug resilience video one of the issues that we had with the 2 people from the water authority.

[00:22:42]
They're not used because of the camel. And so they were a little they're really nervous and done really worried about how they were going to sound so there were a lot of takes. To get them so they things the way I knew they wanted them to come out and also to get better.

[00:23:06]
Naturally and so on was my time you know it was all over thank you for that can make him look good so that was nice to be. Awesome I'm going to ask you each of the next question which is Rachel. As one if you could talk a little bit more about what you will to minute like what your you ultimately hope to do by telling these stories to these video stories like what was you know what has been the impact to have you have you noticed any kind of reaction and do you have any next projects that you are on a highway thank you for the question and I really think we see.

[00:23:48]
We see your project as a as a big umbrella we're a big network in Wa academic partners are our bread and butter we really do want to be this team huddling zone for bringing in people who are really excited to work in this in this space and I think the role of stories and all of that is helping people from communities who might not identify themselves as find it solution makers and really you know being like look this is a person in your community you know they're doing resilient farming they're doing you know they're working to make their community drought resilient you know they're people they're ordinary people doing this work and you can identify income join us in whatever space and wherever it makes sense to you because climate it impacts the lives and livelihoods of all dirges whether they realize it or not and I think this series Our ultimate goal is to really paint that picture you know it's not just coastal Georgia that struggling with sunny day flooding and hurricanes I mean it's people in rural and urban communities and they're facing different challenges and we really see the role of stories as you know highlighting some of the challenges they're dealing with that really shut a shining a light on a lot of the solutions space because it is it's inspiring and it really empowers people to take control of the narrative in their community and what's possible as far as next steps I think we've really leaned into this idea of highlighting at the solution space I mentioned drought on Georgia earlier and we're in the process Michael and I and the rest of the Georgia climate.

[00:25:26]
Of creating this new suite of story and many stories they're incredibly short which can be actually quite challenging around 707080 seconds called climate on our minds so it's nice verge of a play on words that we've already launched our 1st one with concrete jungle who some of the Atlanta folks in the room might be familiar with they're a nonprofit group.

[00:25:47]
That does as food reclamation activities basically helping turn wasted food into food that can feed people and as a great added side benefit that's a kind of solution so we're really looking around the state to highlight these human solution pairs and bring them together to highlight on our platform so this is a quick plug to you if you're interested in seeing re stories they're going to be a lot coming out in the near future so I'll drop some links in the chat and please do follow us there on Instagram and Twitter and Facebook and You Tube and check out our Web say we're happy to invite you to come check out our stuff and we'd love to see you in the future right thank you so much and Michael and ask you one more question I know that you have to run at 130.

[00:26:34]
Though challenge it speaking of challenges like what what what are some of the biggest challenge of faith based as you've been producing these stories and if not challenge if you have any memorable moments during the production that you you want to highlight. Yeah the one thing that. Rachael I discussed early on before we even started working on evidence films was one of the poles of the George Klein project and one thing that was became apparent was their goal is to foster pilot in the state and not just preach to the choir so when we're constructing these we're trying to create pieces.

[00:27:18]
That you know even if you don't believe in climate change and there are a lot of folks in Georgia that don't for whatever reason you might still find the story compelling for the whole the characters or. You might see yourself in the characters and that really played out in the 1st piece we did was which was the story but we're very farming in Georgia and the challenge with who's doing that.

[00:27:47]
Finding a participant because so much so many of the Georgia farmers just don't believe in climate change it's become very political and it was it was really difficult to find somebody who wanted to be a part of it we knew early on we wanted to do a story about how climate change was affecting you very close and probably reached out.

[00:28:13]
Armors in the canoe and it was only really able to find one. And it actually turned out that he was the perfect. Character for the story because he was a 6th generation farmer. And he was trying to keep the farm going so it was ordered to take it over to the 7th generation.

[00:28:34]
But in doing that story he never once occupied unchangeable on I would ask him directly of people who didn't they never would say yes or no I think some of that might have been a little bit of peer pressure I think deep down inside he actually. But he would talk about.

[00:28:55]
Instead of saying yes climate change is real it would say well I don't know if it's real but in the last 5 years we've had these weird things happening that have never happened before and they all have to do with weather. And he went on the talk about that so.

[00:29:11]
Rachel I discussed discuss this that you can't the guy is not talking about climate change and then we realize that well that's good because the farmers are going to watch this and the guy starts had to pay to get up on the chains you know they might look at often want to watch the rest of it but instead it talked about you know keeping the farm going for his family and how difficult it was for him to make a living farming the last few years because his crops kept getting destroyed because of these weather and on the winds.

[00:29:46]
So we're we're you know we're just in the early stages of doing these videos and that was really the only one so far we had to deal with that as far as challenges go that was probably the most difficult challenge of the point Ok accident thank you so much I think we heard and we've reached the end of our entire way of Michael and reach us and if anyone has any questions please feel free to either put them in that chat you can send them to me and directly or indirectly to to Rachel to share your and your questions at them and let's give them around the class think you so much for sharing your town we really appreciate it thanks for having us it's wonderful.

[00:30:28]
Thank you thank you Rachel All right so Dr Gregory Ziman is an associate professor in the school of literature Media and Communication at the Georgia Institute of Technology his writing on film and media has appeared in The New Yorker the Atlantic and October and none other publications Yes program film and media art at the filmmakers co-op the Museum of the Moving Image Asia Society New York the Smithsonian American Art meet them and the Ann Arbor Film Festival as well as a number of the news in Atlanta where he is that he recently served as a technical consultant for Ad Astra James directed by James Gray 2 102019 is currently consulting on a documentary about the future of computing pride b.m. he is the author of making images move handmade cinema and the other arts University of California Press 2020 and coeditor with John Hampshire and he did Decker fellow we are an open circuit writing site and 2 Pac that mit Press 2019 thank you so much for moderating this panel discussion and I will turn it over to doctors and men thanks so much around thanks to Michael Rachael for that excellent film discussion and thanks to Dr Weiss and all of our Georgia Tech colleagues and students have been working so hard to make the global media festivals.

[00:31:49]
And thanks for the invitation to moderate our panel today I'm honored to be sharing our virtual stage with some really exciting to discuss the some discussions and I'd really like to introduce them to you know we have with us today stunts all of her as a Europe and Japan based innovation strategist and content and technology entrepreneur.

[00:32:13]
Stern is the founder of Story tech vertical focused really stage media tech Excel reader and innovation which startups have raised more than $10000000.00 euros to date Stern is heading the innovation track next at the mushy do film at the Cannes Film Festival is also a partner in the exit Academy a tailor made coaching and advisory program that helps passionate start of founders to master the skills for reaching the potential of their companies toward successful exits and the team has over 100 exits in their portfolio done as also work with a number of other wonderful international festivals including c. ph docs b c b 3 b. an alley and talent Black Knights and if that was enough he's also currently finishing his Ph d. dissertation the University of Tokyo value creation in content and film markets welcome Stan we also have with us today Georgia Tech's own Katherine Massey the public program in a community engagement librarian for Georgia tack in her role she organizes public lectures symposia are author talks and arts beats programming Most recently she was involved in organizing the fast film festival the festival in which participants use paypal as the basis for a 5 minute or shorter fast film under the leadership of festival coordinator Graham Hi Catherine thanks for being here and finally today we have Matthew Foster Matthew Foster reading his bio here lives in a fake infested mildly haunted house in metro Atlanta for the past 20 years he's written film reviews acted as an mc and judge at film festivals has been the director of Dragon cons Short Film Festival his recently released book The birth of monsters a guide to the 1930 s. horseman Welcome Matthew.

[00:34:02]
Thank you The Thanks everyone for being here I thought in our brief time together we could start today I often hear from both undergraduate and graduate students how do you get involved with programming you know what's the career path so I'm wondering if each of you could tell us a little bit about how you got your start how you got involved with the school programming and then if you could describe what it is you do especially in prepared Demick more normal times before we talk about all the shifts and changes and pivots What is it how did you get to where you are and what is it that you do stand and if you could start us off that would be wonderful All right so thanks 1st of all for having me and being in this company we want a few people.

[00:34:49]
So my career in film actually started many many years ago and. It actually started in 1988 in Suva to an end and tuning in from a still in the I'm a very small country of my 3rd about quite the digital country but in 1800 s. it was still part of the Soviet Union and as you know it kind of a fun fact officially Japan and Soviet Union had never signed the peace treaty but somehow about and soviet union of a very friendly in terms of feel and since my my father was well enough a Soviet rock star than most of my time and he was always touring around them and you know what's the best way of sending sending your kid to see I was so I just went to see a lot of films and I saw I think in 1808 I saw Ron you know so it's you know and it really made me a very profound difference and a few years later actually somewhere in an underground party where the wall had already came down and I So she stood so which was a film that very profoundly changed me and I decided that you know this is something that I really want to dedicate my life to and originally actually graduated as a communication theorist and the film producer and then.

[00:36:01]
At the time that the blackness in festival in Estonia kicked off and partly I'm hoping 1st it was of course happening is that they want to create a journey the distribution networks and the way the black mass was formed was that after Soviet Union there was no art house distribution in the most of the Eastern Bloc So a festival was created and that that's I mean we had to be guests and 40 films and now we have 2000 guests and you know a class and if not 7 kind of a long journey but you know at the interesting kind of coincidence was that this whole Asian New Wave studied at the time it was late ninety's and you know films that were coming up and nobody else actually dared to watch these films at the office.

[00:36:43]
So and somehow that was my affinity and I just literally went through collecting films watching the films and actually you know if there is a career question it was so so actually trying to get films and when I was $21.00 I collected money for about a year and bought myself a ticket to the Berlin Film Festival and book to the Japanese.

[00:37:05]
Means that you'd spoke with and said Hello I'm Stan from a spoon I'd like to show Japanese films Well most of the people laughed so the 1st year I got one film and the next year I got 3 and you know it you know flash forward and this is how you build relationships and you know we have you know premiers and and you know who who production programs and cetera so they were actually really started from the film but if you don't have started about a very big question of bringing the very specific art form to audiences that's fantastic thank you.

[00:37:40]
Catherine tell us a little bit about yourself. We were I had quite a different path I grew up in South Carolina and I always had a passion for the arts and literature and so I think a high school teacher after college and I moved to St Louis Missouri and taught for a few years and kind of during that time had a realization that.

[00:38:07]
There was a lot that I wanted to teach that kind of student fit into the curriculum that the school was having a few years and so I kind of looked around and I surveyed my apartment like what who's doing what I want to do and I kind of found libraries and interestingly a sign out I'm actually named after my grandmother's sister who was a librarian character just.

[00:38:32]
So maybe it was just the universe pulling me back in and so. So on a whim I didn't sign my teaching contract like a month before it was due I applied to graduate school and I became a librarian and I thought that I would be a public library and that I would come work with the community and just as it turned out I ended up getting a job in an art school and I was an instruction librarian there for a while and when this job at Georgia Tech came up and for public programming and community engagement I realized that that was that was really my passion it's kind of the blending of a public library and jobs at an academic university so doing outreach.

[00:39:18]
We're kind of for anything right there's a lot of creativity and so so that's what I do with Georgia Tech and so we do our space program program and we just call early programming we try to just engage people with ideas and art. It in a format that is free and extensible so you know I think that's how I who am representing today in this panel is schools and libraries where people kind of get their start in this type of programming.

[00:39:50]
Thank you so much and Matthew how did you end up at Dragon Con. Well I was. I was back as a corporate boy in the Midwest where film was rematch a hobby but it became enough of a hobby that I was interacting with a lot of people from festivals so just getting to know people so they started different festival started calling me and to help in the selection process and one called me to be a judge.

[00:40:21]
So I started getting know people and then. We came to Atlanta to see Dragon Con in a completely non film related way it was for literary purposes we. Came came down here to see Harlan Ellison and Ray Bradbury and otherwise didn't know what any of it was and we liked so much we started coming back.

[00:40:46]
Year after year and wanted to work for it and became the editor of the newsletter at Dragon Con and they had a. Sort of a proto festival had started out as a video fan video contest and it was transitioning a bit so I wrote up a proposal to turn it into a full fledged festival and submitted that to the directors there or to the the board there and they came back with we love everything that you did we're going to do that and have somebody else do it so.

[00:41:30]
I had someone else in charge and they ran that for a couple years and then they came back to me and said. Hey how are you doing it instead though I've been doing this now for nearly 20 years and with that of course then you know more people and more interactions so then I started ending up doing things like am seeing Troma dance and working as judges at other festivals and sort of going around the whole circuit.

[00:42:04]
I'm glad that it eventually found its way to you just as you found its way to it that's that's good to hear it's interesting hearing the 3 of you speak about your paths because it's clear that there is not a a guide a singular path to working in programming or in festivals what I'm hearing mostly from the 3 of you is passion right that you have something that you really wanted to do and then sort of figured out different in routes and initiatives and so it's like there's a fair amount of hustle on all 3 of your parts to get where you are now.

[00:42:44]
And wondering now if you can tell us a little bit about because we're talking about the changing nature of festivals due to the pandemic and what changes happened and what changes you think will be lasting once and I'm just where if you can tell us a little bit about what happened with Dragon Con last year I believe it was canceled right and but it's going to happen this it's scheduled to happen this year so I'm just wondering if you could talk a bit about how you conceive of that transition for Star Dragon Con wasn't cancelled but we did cancel the fast of all in Dragon Con and it was we're talking about what Cove in the pandemic means for festivals our lot of it we're still guessing.

[00:43:34]
It's it's hard to say but as as is often the case festivals always spend a lot of their time speculating on what's the purpose of the fast of all and what we're doing and who our clients are and who we're trying to help and that centrist. That's accelerated this year it's been a constant conversation of what's the point.

[00:43:57]
For last year so we've been we've been doing quite well for some years and our reputation has been getting better and. A lot of it with us has always been the in person factor the bringing the festival the filmmakers in and sitting around and getting discussions and getting them to work with each other before we get to the actual screening of the films and having them there so when last year came around and we realized that Dragon Con physically couldn't exe and then I said dragon can happened last year happened virtually.

[00:44:36]
But the 1st well did not happen at all because we had to sit down and say can we in this one year suddenly supply what it is that we've always supplied it just has a festival and the answer was simply no we couldn't get the interaction we couldn't get the people involved so then it came down to well we can show films.

[00:45:00]
But that's a lot harder than it comes out 1st if we didn't have legal rights to any of the films that were submitted to us not to show on line we only get rights to show them in a theatre and so we didn't have any of those rights but more there's a whole lot of complexity about showing films on line any decent person with a computer can swipe those without a whole lot of security involved and we have a lot about of our 3rd of our filmmakers are very concerned about the security for their films we have some who aren't at all who just want it out there but.

[00:45:44]
Particularly those on a very professional track are concerned. And that kind of security requires a whole lot of. Infrastructure which week simply couldn't build up. So we sighed in the end we just couldn't supply for that year what it was we wanted to do now for this year Dragon Con is going to be physical again in lust and that's something really bad happens we're planning on a physical event although a smaller one we're going to be pulling it back.

[00:46:21]
Because Dragon Con is around 90000 people and getting 90000 people into a confined area. This year is a questionable enterprise so the plan is to have it physically but we're still in talks about the shape of the festival for this year because it still can't be what we had before worst we're bit we're moving very slowly this year on Normally by this point I've selected a bunch of films and gotten the word out and pulling things in and this year we're walking it back very slowly because it's going to have to be smaller it's going to have to be fewer films it's going to have to be less in person and we're going to have to deal little bit with the idea that we may have to do something for people who can't show up so we may have to have some sort of online connection if not showing the films which I really don't want to do some sort of communication to having the filmmakers able to talk to people who can't show up to the actual event and to stream that out.

[00:47:35]
Like I talk too long in Iraq no not at all no it's fascinating to hear about my health I hope that things can go as smoothly as possible Stan I was wonder if you could tell us more but I think some people in our audience are very familiar with the console 1st of all they're perhaps less familiar with the mushy defense and next in particular I was one if you could tell us what what those relationships are and I know that the much of the film is coming up this summer and I was wondering how how are you doing yeah so 1st of all I totally 2nd with Matthew was saying and.

[00:48:12]
In my work last year so much remembered now with days. Of their own programming but mostly advising just about the rector's exactly in the intersection of technology and creativity and much of my last year actually was spent. On building and trying to build solutions and you know that would have creatives to realize what they're supposed to do in films reach audiences but at the same time sort of keep 50 was afloat and we had to deed I had to do it in less going to beat for the c.p.a. stocks which is of equal.

[00:48:46]
It's the kind of the 2nd biggest documentary festival in Europe an excellent one but could be the exactly hit on the kind of the week before the festivals and then it was a lot of calling and it was nights and then it was canned which obviously was a huge build and you know some some of the 1st to us as well.

[00:49:07]
Coming coming to Moshe and but but of course many you know it's the kind of film festival and it's 60 plus year institution that many people don't know is that what really powers came in and many of those big festivals are really what we call the industry of answering just to markets where exactly he's producers directors come together to finance films do present films to discuss issues industry to make deals and.

[00:49:34]
You know both your online and physical exhibition and cetera and and you know. We have about $30000.00 people every year who come to come to kind of. Really negotiate this deal isn't that something that I've been looking us economical in this quite interesting what is exactly a relationship between a market and a festival and you don't just start understanding about the artistry and the awards and the whole process goes very much in line of what the market doesn't how it reacts to a certain type of feeling and we can discuss about that a little bit later right so.

[00:50:08]
Those types of markets in kind of a rain are obviously really really him really really important and you know films wouldn't reach distribution or exhibition if he had those kinds of players who have been kind of congregate in these places now of course but Matthew said he is absolutely right and what I what I was what I saw last year is not below the festivals are in trouble but the 100 value chain of cinema itself has imploded in a sense and if if some of the at in these are quite familiar with like John Porter's classic work of Mallett chain where the whole independent The industry has been just performed and built on steps that each player kind of adds value to the chain and it might involve several layers of middlemen and organizations then of course it all has imploded with digital and covert and but I basically see this transition as just personally one of the largest for haps on on a magnitude of going from sides to talkies or more from from you know Prince to disappears in a way that we had never come back but what it what is about to come we really don't know and you know that there are several types of implications there and I guess what I saw last year I played to just point of 2 so.

[00:51:27]
So the one aspect if in at least the whole the management structure of film festivals and unfortunately. In festivals are and I'm kind of an optimist in the sense that they are at the very end of their chain the much of these pressures of other players with Aids about acquiring rights and this whole confusion around that but Matthew was reflecting that you can't use theatrical rights for it it does create things right but nobody really knows where it's still her map right there and you know and who is actually supposed to granted permission to go with digital or not and you know there is no best practice so in a way we are really dark and kind of building this new type of capillary and there are certain types of interest so the 1st thing is we'll see that pressure investors really have to do tremendous work in building infrastructure and so forth.

[00:52:19]
So there is a lot of pressure out there and and But secondly I'm pretty optimistic in the sense that there's been a great a big democratizing effect that because of building the audience is in line you can actually reach groups whether it's about a genitive audiences minorities an hour or so forth or even geographical groups are other ways totally inaccessible and kindly so people are really getting in from Bangladesh to.

[00:52:44]
Devote Hama's of everything in between and I think that's that's really liberating because that elitism around festivals this kind of this is paving. So so that's the opportunity but there is a lot of pressure and I think there will be a pita to go read negotiations very 1st you have to say no sorry this is not our job this needs to be a collective decision we need to negotiate out.

[00:53:07]
The other way but it isn't going to say what is really really interesting and sorry for taking this space but I want to spell it out this is a little bit closer call of. Ok caller's question to the to the audience but I read it so I think right now the relationship between the filmmaker and an audience and a festival in between will become extremely prominent because to be more the big players they definitely have their own content prefer nces and having you know kind of a culture of programming or you will only have been through a festival So what is really the issue in there but the cove is perhaps a year ago people were quite keen to attend and festivals but now it's another type of a reality and and on the point of conversion where you know you're surprised supposed to buy the ticket many people choose not to because our own I live there are so crowded and I think it's I think there's a lot of cultivation to be done in terms of the responsibility of audiences to the filmmakers if they want certain types of content to persist but at the same time I think there's a better verb to be also done to shift a discussion around 50 votes from killing technology or exhibition of actually thinking about how to build communities and.

[00:54:19]
That's a really interesting point because what you're talking about is we're so suffused being at home with content right and choices and how do you foster those communities how do you incentivize participation and that's that's really challenging I mean I know that you know from my own work in the art world and not to be a Pollyanna about this but this year in some ways has been extraordinary because all of the things that I normally miss in London in New York in Los Angeles and Chicago in Mexico City that I simply wouldn't physically be yet I am I'm able to see more in the last year of the kinds of things I'm interested in and I have for years and there's something wonderful about that and it does democratize it's a democratizing impulse in some way and obviously there contaminant loss having to but there's the possibility of other kinds of can it's not just the community you knew right or the community that was so insular before but a potential widening of a community I'm not saying it's easy but I've seen a little bit of daylight here and there Catherine could you tell us a little bit about how covert has shifted your understanding of public engagement through Georgia Tech over the last year absolutely.

[00:55:45]
I like that you brought that community because this is. The big question that a lot of us are trying to figure out through programming so. Like a group of people together in a room are not a community but they can become a community like how does that happen and we have a lot of history to draw on and thinking about how to take a group of people and turn them into a community in a physical setting.

[00:56:14]
And there's this really interesting author Her name is Priya Parker I'm She's a really great thinker about gathering she read this book The Art of gathering and and a big piece in turning groups of people into the community is often like who's not there right it's like that things are not for everyone.

[00:56:35]
And that is kind of the balance that we're trying to figure out with virtual post public programming during a pandemic is like it's really easy to say well everything can be for everybody now because they have access to it online. But in fact that's actually what kind of steals that moment of turning something that it an experience into a small community and I wish I had a great answer if I had to you can read it in my book one day.

[00:57:08]
But but you know this is what we're thinking about how do we create programming whether it's around films or around of also or and how do we create a program for making this a gaging that people want to go to but that they leave kind of feeling that they become part of the community and that's a big question fortunately for us.

[00:57:33]
We had some very forward thinking people and the library. When we did a renovation over the past few years and so we have these spaces for programming that are equipped with microphones and cameras they anticipated this future where all of our programming is hybrid. So that is that's kind of what we're looking for in the future is having an in person element where we can kind of engage the Sissoko community with a hybrid community but until now we've been online.

[00:58:09]
And I also want to speak to something that stands and which is really interesting like this presumption. This really monumental transition that we're in and I think a lot about this and maybe I will make a bad metaphor with writing but it's like when the internet came about and everyone had a blog and maybe there isn't a lot of fat writing out there but you know you could say like well no one will recall now we'll just 3 blocks like maybe some people do but there are still bestsellers there are still books that people read regularly and so I wonder if there's a moment for people to get engaged in the making process you know in terms of films and so that's what libraries are are often thinking about is like Ok we'll well maybe let's let's teach people how to edit write a film and that's what we're doing you know we're doing after effects so.

[00:59:06]
So I think in this transition that's kind of where we're putting our efforts and that's what we done with the fast on Festival which is the stop motion paper festival we've put a lot of our efforts on on the making of the film. And and that's been kind of exciting but it's and I'm precedented time and I hope that will come away with some really good lessons about how to create community online because I do think some people are doing it I also want to know that I think it's possible.

[00:59:38]
And I have a very quick quick remark here so I just want to have kind of 2 things and especially under the rule of libraries and you know generically doing Newnham commercial work. One of the things that I think is very little talked about. Especially with access access to streaming and so forth is obviously there are certain types of culture and politics in play and you know if I make a very academic generalization the content what we then to receive from the streamers whoever they are are rather I would say like.

[01:00:14]
That it's supposed to entertain or it's kind of driven by the pleasure principle so to speak but but But what we also tend to forgot is that cinema quite often is a very bluntly and a very visceral experience and and we all. We all remember the so experiences where we if we we go out and we suffer together and you know we you but you know it's sort of like glorified us and it was an experience right so so I think because the discussions that especially around in our field when we revolve around how that kind of collective experiencing and collective suffering comes back because it's up it's something that also contributes to us as a human being so that's the one aspect the other one obviously I want to point out that I guess there is no not so much of differences between in Europe and elsewhere is that there is a tremendous need for libraries and the public said that to serve the public in that especially in this tremendous economic times and we've done some extensive research and for example in u.k. an average person pays about $75.00 to $100.00 pounds of subscriptions per month and we are getting into an area where where the affordability and that's this too I would say would be a broadening context starts content starts becoming public goods where people just won't afford to have our 6 perience is and this is exactly where 1st it was and libraries need to be in.

[01:01:41]
You know it's strikes me that one of the things about streaming and also about virtual platforms is that they put different pressures on time for us that that it is it's it's harder to pay attention I don't know how many of you have been on like all day zoom calls or things like that it's a different kind of engagement than.

[01:02:06]
A festival where you're in a darkened theater with perhaps some like minded folks experiencing something communally it's a different sense of time. And similarly streaming at home you have and I'm certainly not 1st person to say this but you have distractions and many of us have 2nd screens we have a tablet open we have a phone up and we're scrolling through things and it's a different economy of attention so I'm wondering if if you all could could think a little bit about what has worked well that you've seen in online presentations I mean I know that.

[01:02:47]
I know that Catherine you've been involved in short this short short paper based from 1st of all I love that mixing of the analog and digital technology that's great but those are all short films and Matthew's program I understand those are short works as well and right here primarily So what what have you seen or experience that you thought they've done a nice job presenting something in a virtual environment are there examples that you can point to.

[01:03:18]
This is they want to be for sure. Yeah I mean I'm I'm not sure the 3rd house has been the golden egg yet. I've seen some things that are functional but are. How have I seen the ones that replace what a fast of all can do in person at this point and quite honestly no I have not I totally agree and think the big issue.

[01:03:59]
I think really from kind of a content presentation side and functionality where we're I think we're getting there Sundance did an amazing job and obviously this whole industry just I mean looking back what I what I put together a year ago on where we are right now I think it's just really a kind of a night and day situation and it's going to definitely involve more since this hybrid reality is going to stay with say it really player 0.5 If it's not.

[01:04:27]
One it's going to stay for a while but I think one of the big issues really. Is that digital in general or we haven't really figured it out is that we don't really have ways of replicating intimacy and I think intimacy you know and intimate relation to the content and intimate relation to the filmmaker imaginary or equate really in that space and so forth that's been very very hard to replicate and I think one of the ways I will be held for I've been just recently thinking about it is trying to also establish certain types of rituals or more practice is which just kind of even around screenings whether there are you know printing them in certain types of ways or trying to trying to create some imaginary spaces because it can sort of create a sense of of intimacy but I can honestly say that.

[01:05:23]
Whether you are from a talk or whether you are a beginner I think we're more you know and it's not just receiving the new new festival I think we're all are just trying to build that grammar and figuring out the solutions and I think that's really exciting as well because really at the hierarchy of some of the hierarchies which have been there for years and years I think there's been no crushed and I think it gives an equal opportunity and democratizing opportunity in this space that's it's interesting to hear you talk about that stuff and I know that Khan has put some energy behind its mixed reality program.

[01:05:58]
And do you see any of those technological vistas as potential bridges or do you find that they are. Do you find them more faddish I'm just I'm curious how do you how do you think about the m.r. x. are so I think you know they're finitely it's an experience but I'm not really really sure if it's a cinematic medium or if you know you know per se but it's definitely an interesting immersive medium and I think you know just as a kind of sidetrack I think games are such.

[01:06:37]
I think the crossover between games and cinematic it's much more evidence and perhaps what we are especially looking back into last year is like big big arty games with dates that that's trending or you know the last one of us or or even the ghost of 2 shimmer right which at this corrosive I mean.

[01:06:57]
Obviously one of the big question complete questions this year is that too 2 questions really for us you know who would dare to put on a headset and you know to which level of security is secure so so there's a lot of perception around that and but I hope at the back summations that's going to get better but over there the other aspect there is really the.

[01:07:19]
You know how many people can experience that I think experience and experience and I think there is still this great big monetary go up in there but I really if you want to go and have a kind of a larger future or. Deep dive into this than a web quite well the future is just had a an amazing talk at south by about this immersive media which which necessarily is not visual but it could be like adding or diminishing and I think that is the time to play bridge early days or perhaps with 5 g. we'll be able to you know engage engage more on our kind of device live and I think that's that's really exciting but I want to just bring in one point of view as well and I shall I think one of the really big issues and really interesting opportunities in the film festival space is generally the film festivals and I would say culture pointed to tends to ignore the you know say call it like an agenda c.e.o. or you know anyone below like 25 and because you know those are like kids on You Tube and you know kind of excluded from that very.

[01:08:26]
Cemented sort of classical understanding of film but I really do see that this online space everything that happens on that on a space and a community level it is extremely involved personally it's extremely empowering and extremely exciting Ok there are certain types of mechanics in politics which obviously are there but I think there's a lot of interesting things going on in the imagining how there is a whole new generation of audiences quite familiar as themselves with you know watch parties and and you know that kind of collective vision the experience for perhaps the only sense speak against you know experience content in that way is not yet there a place that's transformative I think the realisation can be extremely empowering both in terms of the art of cinema because it's a process for the So we've basically looked at the whole exhibition and distribution set also for festivals so we've been running some experience experiments around that and they're quite exciting.

[01:09:23]
The whole watch party concept is I think really basic for making a lot of this work in the future because what I've seen with this is the big problem that we have to get around is that anything online is to a certain extent planned I mean if you're having an online event people are coming to do something whereas out a thoughtful Yes people are showing up planned to the screening but the overall activities of the festival are unplanned it's simply people interacting running into each other discussing without any foundation so that lots of things can happen that perhaps these filmmakers weren't there to.

[01:10:17]
Start new relationships to find a director to find a cinematographer but they do randomly perhaps they weren't there to learn about some new thing but they do because they run into the people and there's that crossover discussion. Whereas on line when I'm putting something together I have to say Ok Well we're all here to watch this film and we're going to discuss this topic and then we're going to do this it's not the loose interaction and we need to find a way for as much as we're going to be going on line for things and I think what we've kind of established here is that's part of our future.

[01:11:01]
Is that we need to find a way to get that interaction that's unplanned without it just being you know Facebook an arche or something but to let people interact in a way that is more like the sort of thing that we do get in 1st and that. That hasn't been done really well yet yeah and our thought forms are not really built for spontaneity.

[01:11:33]
But you know they're built for control which as that organizer I I want to write. I don't want someone saying terrible you know basis things that might offend I want to control to keep the personality and so you know that that's a bigger conversation which I think there's a good question that chats that kind of connects to this is like who's in control and making the decisions in these pop forms that is there a way to kind of allow for that spontaneity without it kind of turning into chaos.

[01:12:08]
So yeah Matthew I mean we ask that all the time how do we allow for that intimacy and Spot. In that fire met that's just not built for at. I would also do you know since we started our program today with a film about ecological and environmental concerns that the eco footprint festivals and all of the travel that's involved and going to festivals and people who do the festival circuit that's where they hop from one to another I mean that's a tremendous impact on the environment that is being currently mitigated by virtual vents and I'm not saying that we're we're going to lose the importance of sites about specific events or anything like that but it is something to keep in mind as we develop a calculus of how best to move forward with these things we do things actually are very very right we have some notes and questions in the chat and it's 215 so what we'd like to do is open our discussion to everyone here and if you have a question or comment for our panelists we really appreciate it I can just share of the ones that have been mentioned here Professor Kalen So thank you just on for mentioning rule of libraries and Katherine to obviously and how they can offer film students especially films in languages other than English as an instructor of German German at Georgia Tech it's been very difficult to get access to these songs and show them to our students Netflix and other streaming services or revolutionizing access and supported the needs of multilingual movie audience react to.

[01:13:51]
This go ahead so. I think. This is getting into very kind of an interesting territory of course and and I think obviously in many ways I'm very big of mayor of meth flicks in terms of what they've built as a business capacity because their whole journey of transforming from this d.v.d. rental to a you know streaming behemoths it's just it's excellent However what I want to basically point out and one of these big issues that we are facing as Mr managers but also you know academics and so forth is that.

[01:14:25]
And I would say rather hyper on digitalisation has has led us really to to question the. You know put out the question of accessibility and you know the the who jumped for example from 35 Prince to the c.p.a.. A kind of dropped off about 30 to 40 percent of our culture our history and then in many places for example in Europe of you know the mostly us that consortia so forth terms that if you want to get the peace you have to kick out the 35 millimeter projection projectors in Sweden they actually were hammered.

[01:15:01]
And you know that the fact that so much of our culture and history has not been digitalized or or is not made available in the digital form I think that's something that we'll be in here at the shooting us to and to the lengths that to speak so I think a lot of these discussions around access into.

[01:15:20]
Access to culture of resources and culture heritage I think that's that we're starting to treat that as a I don't want to say human right to basically as a very basic resource that that needs to be there for just a coherent of societies and so we should have a very kind of a critical eye and also what platforms to offer especially around there are under curation So there's definitely convenience but he's like convenience really sort of serving that particular purpose that's kind of the.

[01:15:53]
Kind of going to be really a major major question in that space. It's so funny you mention that when I when I speak to students about it what percentage do you think of the Moving Image is available to current and they think everything is about because they see that there's so much stuff they scroll through Disney plush and they see all sorts of offerings and then when they realize we have a discussion with them about how little has been preserved and the questions and we follow about well which things get preserved why who has the means the money the resources the people Power to do so and how does that affect the history that we have and can access to the right it's a very it's a very thorny set of questions Catherine and I think I interrupted you I'm sorry I was just going to mention that you know libraries think about this constantly like what happens when when you don't own anything and no one owns anything at some point right it's like Netflix a corporation is making these decisions for us.

[01:16:57]
And so you know there are lots of libraries that are still collecting D.V.D.'s you know just for preservation right there things truly disappear people don't believe me when I say that but digital archivists now that like things disappear and they're on some computer in someone's basement somewhere there was a Pulitzer Prize winning.

[01:17:22]
Article that was digital born that. Actually disappeared at some point these artists had to let go it's this you know person who passed away his family it's like get this computer so so yeah like who makes the decisions when we don't own anything is a really big conversation and that you know like you mentioned a lot of young people don't even think about that they think everything is straining a lot we refer to it was brought up earlier that we might be in the midst of another paradigm shift similar to how it was when we went from silence to talkies and people tend to forget that we've lost the majority of all film when we went from silent to talkies.

[01:18:09]
For multiple reasons but we lost so much of our heritage so much and that's even though I mean I was working recently with horror films of the thirty's and there's this a lot of missing stuff especially when you get into the international world that you know this this country made films we don't know anything about it because they're all gone they weren't preserved so now if we're going through another paradigm shift really unfortunately the expectation is that we are going to lose a lot of material that we are lesser for losing it thank you cure for you have your hand up.

[01:19:02]
Yeah hi thanks guys for doing this isn't really a fascinating so I'm going to Syria and the global media cultures program and part of my it found project I'm interning with global peace time possible and working what they're like and I shall our ancient marking steps I want to ask you guys like how has the role of marketing changed pre-code bedpost coded and also how you guys like you know I social media or do you find that social media now the with the way the culture is of social media now how has it helped or hurt your work and your thoughts can I have a reprieve comment in here so so here's my kind of really practical and pragmatic Six's suggestion.

[01:19:55]
So one of the things and believe me or not many major film festivals fave last year with this because when something what is really fascinating is the fact that audiences online and audiences in physical life they don't match they sometimes overlap but they don't match at all and.

[01:20:14]
Want to play and it wasn't can but doesn't matter who it was. We were you know they had a wonderful programming around art house films and political documentaries and so forth and usually you know by definition a film festival if it's not a genre festival you know they reach audiences I would say early thirty's highly educated mostly female and you know cetera what we actually found out in online space is that most people actually male audience in early twenty's but they wouldn't actually it was quite diverse and their resumes them different audience for each of the films what was presented and festivals you know tend to approach marketing perhaps tend to approach marketing basically taking the sort of bulk advertising concept on Wednesdays and saying that hey you know we're going to like grow this out and let's see what's going to happen but actually what I recommend recommend to do would be to 1st of all run experiments of basically you know getting the content of the films or what you want to showcase and then you know even spending 5 your $5.00 or $10.00 or $15.00 just to identify which types of audiences have and then you know approaching it really on a very kind of a program Matic marketing principle of kind of cutting through the noise and and it that type of an approach has been very very helpful the other thing what I recommend to do is bring in the filmmaker and there's a kind of a win win situation because the filmmaker wants to you know abuse your festival to showcase their work that they can bring on audiences or they can have tracked audiences and this is what I find a really democratizing aspect because right now the indie filmmaker has been sort of like put it out of the system where there's like sales agents and distributors and exhibitors and licensing not but now really a filmmaker has the power of talking you know engaging with their audience and that's why you know and cultivating that we close knit contact and I think that bringing in the filmmakers early on to the the engagement process is very very beneficial so experiments and and having the filmmaker at hand.

[01:22:17]
Yeah I would absolutely agree we have also found that our audiences are quite different so previously proximity was really important if you're in the right place if you have a friend that has invited you proximity was just as important as content and now content is what we find is almost more important is finding the audience it almost feels like kind of grassroots you like knocking on people's doors like inviting them to the things that you think like they would be interested in and and said leaning on that has been really important and recently we have seen in some of our programming that we've hired more retired people engaged which you know we're a university previously we didn't really maybe it an alumni so if you along I would join and invest but that's been kind of an exciting outreach that we've been able to do.

[01:23:13]
And honestly those those attendees are really appreciative and they love the event so it's it's been really really different but really great. Q 2 things I would comment when you asked about social media and. Found there's very little overlap between my audience and their connection to social media from us.

[01:23:43]
Social media has turned out to be a very poor advertising system for us which is unfortunate but that's the way it's been that could change the more we go online but I don't know. The other is. Following what stands out about bringing in the filmmaker is that's kind of the absolute essential thing that.

[01:24:11]
Sort of makes a film festival suffer from it directly of noticed over these years people like a film better if the filmmaker is there in some way i'm they straight up think it's a better film they interact with the film a great deal more and it becomes a matter of no longer just the audience interacting with the film but it becomes the audience interacting with the film and the filmmaker they're all kind of one and we've thought for a while that as much as we have whether we have to do online it needs to involve directly the filmmaker we need the filmmakers face there we need his words connected to the film.

[01:25:02]
Or quite frankly we are we're going to turn into a huge you know somebody who's You Tube curated list the filmmaker is the essential aspect of saying that this is a festival all right I think return for a couple more questions that we have Meyer saying you have your hand up.

[01:25:26]
Yeah I Everyone thank you all for speaking I was really in gross but this I kind of just like just why I guess commenter mentioned something because I was very much feeling I guess that Mr such So here's a Commons about like streaming in and out and and all the ownership of it thing as I and I feel like I watch a lot of international film and when I want to watch that it's not available on a single library and I feel kind of really fragmented by of my my choices either Sometimes the movie I want to fly different streaming service do I pay just to watch that in that movie I don't know it's just I can't just want to echo that I do I think she's deeply relate to that feeling of a I want to watch all these films why this one person they're not in the same they're on one place.

[01:26:20]
So if I may be filming quickly prepped react to your comments of what I'm going to someone's point I would say it's. Theirs because when I want to you know here is. A very physical medium and there is. No point that you can do that you know if you have access really and you know imagine the films that were made in early ninety's that you could really watch them anywhere so you know what you might find to me now is under some green especially is there but there's one other aspect that is the one to kind of.

[01:26:51]
I want to point out is what we haven't touched today but we are in terms of you know the kind of the big streaming and and the kind of independent or films that kind of don't conform to the big strain is the fact that quite often festivals are providing livelihoods for the filmmakers and you know your engagement as an as an audience or you're going and buying the d.v.d. or you know.

[01:27:16]
And buying that particular piece it actually contributes to the going to being of somebody of being able to make more films because the ultimate in the mechanics of have changed so much so that I really encourage you to go and and you know actually make kind of making your contribution to to this field because you know sometimes really as a matter of fact it is a question of life and death correct practically and humorously to to back that up I have a lot of interaction with computer security people.

[01:27:52]
That I strangely have a lot of interaction there and they overwhelmingly say Get Physical media whatever you've got get physical media. It's and it's so interesting this is the cover solution we've been talking about all this virtual digital all these things but what's come up again and again is the necessity of like real life humans with real lot of things that you can hold in your hand and it's been it's fascinating I mean clearly we have not only.

[01:28:27]
A desire to return to a situation where humans can be together but also that there's there seems to be a desire or necessity from what I'm hearing from our panelists for thinking this for actual. Working with the materials of the moving image and all of the surrounding. Apparatus that's really that's really interesting we've reached 230.

[01:28:54]
And I just want to thank our wonderful panelists Matthew and Kathryn and stand for taking their time sharing their insights and expertise has been a really interesting conversation and thanks again to Dr Weiss for all of her organization and all the programming for the global media festival it's been great Amanda I don't know if you have any final thoughts or announcements that you'd like to I would just like to reiterate what you just said Thank you Matthew standing Katherine for participating on this panel and thank you Greg fair being a wonder I'm so relieved you did a great job thank you so much.

[01:29:34]
And one of my absolute favorite events of the festival so interesting I feel like I learned a lot and I I just really appreciate it now we have recorded this it is not a physical copy but we will be our economy and it won't get lost somewhere in the after you know the digital Yeah well thank you very I don't have a permanent You're I'll let someone see how good I d.v.d. that I have a physical copy but thank you so much and we will and you know if anyone wants you.

[01:30:05]
Let me put my email and if anyone has followup questions or anything that you want to ask the filmmakers that you didn't have time to ask please feel free to e-mail me. And that's about it. So feel free to email me and just thank you all for this wonderful event I will talk to ya later thank you thank you thank you Matthew I mean it was our morning but I'm going to be in touch with you soon I met with police thought a few weeks ago and how I think we want to do you know if you wanted to do foster symposium.

[01:31:04]
In cooperation with 50 years of side this October. I think it could be put we could use something hybrid that would be pretty fun if you're that sounds interesting. Yes I need to email you have with your book because I am so fond of the 1st version or if it interests you here in the Baltic So it's like it's totally kind of up in Miami so we didn't really get a chance to talk about this but I learned I soon journeyman about this the love it Super thanks so much that was a really really wonderful conversation be safe and have to talk to Merson.

[01:31:43]
Now you're right Bill thank you cheers.