Cinema Canada (Nov 1981)

gine’ BANFF — Communications satellites will soon be used to shorten the distance between film producers and prospective buyers. An American-based com pany is about to inaugurate what it calls the Preview Channel, James Speck, VicePresident of marketing for the Preview Channel, announced at the Banff festival Pay TV seminar. The company has leased time on Comsat One and plans to broadcast three-and-onehalf hours of film previews each weekday to prospective buyers commencing October 19, said Speck. Time on the broadcast would cost $5,500 per half hour but the broadcast would be available without charge for the approximately 6,000 owners of satellite earth stations, also known as downlinks. These owners include about 4,500 North American cable sta ~<tions and 249 television sta Pies Canada-November 1981 tiohs, Speck added. The program will be supported by a Preview Channel newsletter which would serve both as a program guide and an advertising medium. Each preview will be broadcast twice in a month and, at the conclusion of each preview, buyers will be able to telephone the Preview Channel directly, thus forming an instaneous communication link between the producer and buyer. This reduction in time be tween presentation to buyers . and buyer reaction is a major selling point of the scheme. The other, says Speck, is thata film producer will be able to reach many more prospective-buyers than is possible by other means. “The shortest distance between two points is now 46,000 miles,”Speck told the seminar. “The Preview Channel is an electronic trade journal aimed at program directors and distributors. It’s not for the public. “Now you (producers) can reach programmers directly,” he continued, “and they can pick up the phone and respond directly. Producers will have a bargaining chip and buyers will be able to make a more educated buy.” Speck, a former salesman for retail radio-advertising and for cable TV stations in the U.S., said the idea for the Pre view Channel came out of frustration at not being able to get to people. “Getting the product to market was the problem,” said Speck. Now, thousands of potential buyers can view a producer’s proposal simultaneously, saving the producer an enormous amount of time and effort. Speck estimates the Preview Channel will be 40 times as cost effective a film marketing procedure as more conventional methods. All the producer has to do is hand the Preview Channel a 20 or 30 minute video package, pay the fee and await the results of the broadcast. Speck emphasized that users of the Preview Channel did not need to have a finished film, just a video package that would attractively present their product. “I would recommend the project be at least at a storyboard stage, though,” Speck said, “and preferably include a few selected scenes with the actors intended. Itshould . include all the information an exhibitor would need to know.” If the producer needs help designing his package, the Preview Channel would help, Satellites provide shortest distance Speck said, and the company is preparing a guidebook for its customers. The channel’s first broadcast is on October 19 and Speck said his company has booked satellite time on a regular time-slot indefinitely. Speck sees the project as a new use of existing technology, one that will produce an electronic marketplace to facilitate the flow between film producers and buyers. Although exact sales figures are lacking at this time, Speck says he is confident the channel will succeed. “It’s very hard to get any thing done without people’s cooperation,’ Speck concluded. “You have to figure out how to make an everybody wins situation.” _ And that is what he hopes the Preview Channel will bring about... for producers, buyers, and for the Channel itself. Paul Hepher © TORONTO The National Film Board reports that the complete works of _ internationallyacclaimed filmmaker Norman McLaren have been purchased by the new Fourth Channel in Great Britain. Videodisc (cont. from p. 15) new way. You can use video discs to learn at your own speed in your own way.” He said early indications in England point towards a huge market for vidoe discs, despite their cost. “We have to use the discs in a positive and enriching way,” he added. “Communicators must never lose sight of the power of their medium. We must take care we are not blunted to our responsibilities.” P.H. Cannel says (cont. from p. 14) terpretations to the script. That’s what makes film exciting. And, as shows can become wonderful upon execution, they can be terrible too.” The rise of cable and Pay TV is creating a vast new marketplace for film writers and Cannell told writers, “We have to get into that marketplace and create and be innovative or cable too will be imitative.” And that, to paraphrase one of Cannell’s more famous characters, you can take to the bank. P.H. Specializing in high quality video duplication. Astral Bellevue Pathé extends it’s established leadership and quality in Motion Picture Post Production into the Video Duplication Field. DUPLICATION IN ALL VIDEO TAPE FORMATS THEATRICAL AND COMMERCIAL A DIVISION OF ASTRAL BELLEVU Pathe = Canada’s largest integrated organization serving the Motion Picture and Television Industry. Pathé Video Inc. 100 Lombard St., Toronto, Ontario M5C 1M3 Bernard Kroeker Vice-President Operations Tel: (416) 364-6720 Montreal: Jacques Amann Tel: (514) 484-1186 ab iets hi we