Matt has been doing some crazy science shit with the show notes, and before making this the norm for the show, I wanna see how you guys feel.

So download this m4a of the Empire episode, load it into iTunes, and watch the album art. (Also, Chapters, on the top bar.) Do you like?

So glad forum members are bringing this up; thanks for the suggestion.  Dorkman makes some excellent points.  Right now the majority of the show is paid for out of one guy’s pocket, and he’s perfectly happy with that, as are the rest of us happy to keep going just as we have been. 

That said, there are a few other ideas I've been trying to implement.

1.) Netfilx affiliate.  Netflix streaming is hands down just plain awesome; we highly endorse this product.  The basic package is like $9 / month, and there are tons of movies and t.v. shows you can stream instantly.  The quality is pretty good too.  The way we would implement it is with a banner or icon or link on the site.  Click the link, sign up for the free 30 day trial.  You can cancel after the 30 days, but I don't think you'll want to, especially for $9 / month.  We get a referral for every customer that signs up via our link, even if they cancel after the trial, and the kickbacks for us are pretty good, by far the most profitable.  We think it's a service that rocks, you are under no commitment to keep it (but we think you will want to), and we get paid just for getting folks to try it.  You get a great service, and help us out at the same time.  So that's pretty much win-win.

2.) iTunes affiliate.  Many of the films we cover are available to buy or rent on iTunes.  It's like Netfix in that you can click now, watch now.  I'm pretty sure when we did The Core that was an iTunes rental.  Rentals are only $3-$4, so it's a reasonable way to watch a movie you might not have seen, but don't want to buy outright.  Again, it would be an easy link somewhere; click, opens iTunes, brings up the store.  Like Amazon we get like a buck, and again, it’s a service that we use.

3.) PayPal.  Good old fashion donations.  I see this working two ways; one as a “Donate here” button, throw us what you want, when you can; and two, as a regular membership.  Maybe we could integrate some sort of sponsorship icon, a gold star or something in the forum next to the member's name depending on how much / often they donate.  A full membership would be something like $10 every 6 months which gets you a special identifier in your profile and in the forums, and maybe access to commentaries early, as we finish them.  Dunno, I'm open to suggestion as to membership extras; you tell us, what would you want if you were getting everything you get now, and throwing us $20 / year?  What sort of perks would make that worth it?

I would further implement an actual commerce page; one page that will take you to Amazon, Netfilx, iTunes, PayPal, Cafe Press, and whatever else we might incorporate in the future.

When I come across folks generating regular compelling content I enjoy that offer an easy and convenient way of thanking them financially, I know I don’t mind throwing them a few bucks to help them out.   I know if I were still just a regular listener and one day a “Donate to the DIF Pizza fund” or some such button became available, I’d throw in a couple bucks, and that’s really all we’re talking about.  The point is, if it’s not there for folks to take advantage of, they can’t.

I know that a good deal of the resistance to these ideas comes from the notion that if we start asking people for money, we’ll be seen as just that, guys out to make a buck.  You all can let us know if that’s the impression you’re getting, but I hope we’ve made it clear that’s not the case.   Amazon, Netflix and iTunes are all services we use and would recommend to anyone, regardless of what was in it for us. 

The Amazon store has been up for months now, and I think we’ve been pretty good about letting folks know it’s there, without being overbearing about it.  Same goes for this stuff.  We want you to want to help us out, in your own way, to your own degree, and give you the means to do so.  That’s it.

”Like Down in Front? Want to help us out?  Check out our commerce page, there’s a lot of good stuff there.” 

Discuss.

The question was tabled as to whether we could go back and re-master old episodes in this fashion.  The answer is definitely yes, but I’m afraid I just can’t do it by myself.   I simply don’t have the time to take on what would be the equivalent of a full time job, but I have a suggestion.

Ever wonder what it’s like doing my job? How would you the audience like to participate in Enhancing Down in Front?

“Great! How?”

Well, basically you would select whatever episode(s) you would want, and find the links and perhaps artwork to go along with it.  Send them to me, I’ll assemble them and output the final file.  If you have Garageband (5.1, part of iLife ‘09) you can go ahead and assemble everything yourself, but I retain editorial and encoding control.  You’d send me the Garageband file, and whatever artwork that goes with it.   I’ll check you’re work and make whatever changes I deem necessary.  Feel free to contact me with questions; my email and chat id’s are in my profile.

We can work out the details if there’s enough interest, but for now you need:
1.) The ability to research online.
2.) At a minimum, output a list of links, with time codes to a text file.
3.) If images are to be included, either links to them, or include them as part of the archive file you will send me.  Name them whatever works for you, but include that name in the text file appropriately time coded.  Feel free to resize  / crop them to 300px x 300px.  This part is optional, but it would be a big help.
4.) The ability to archive everything into neat, tidy zip file.
5.) You have one week from the time you submit your choice to deliver the episode to me.  After that it becomes available to the forum again.

So a line in the text file would read something like:

[Time code] [Description of link] [html link] [name.jpg or link to image]

I could even whip up an Excel spreadsheet if that would make it easier.  Basically I just need at what time to drop in the link, and the picture if one is to be included.

I can accept text files, MS Word files (I’m on Office ’08, so docx files are fine),  and MS Excel spreadsheets.  If you have a question just contact me.

Have a look at old show notes to get an idea for the kinds of things I link to, and again, have a look at the Empire Enhanced episode to get a feel for how it works.  Keep in mind that in order to be effective the link should be able to remain visible for several seconds, so if the topic is shifting quickly, choose your links carefully.

This should be a fun exercise, but please take it seriously.  Don’t volunteer for more than one episode at a time, and please complete them in a timely manner.  Again, I reserve editorial power, so don’t get all upset if what winds up online isn’t exactly what you submitted.  I’ll try to keep you in the loop though; the idea is to make this easier for me, not harder. 

As a perk, you will have a chapter just for yourself, as thanks, so link to your site, and choose a picture (tasteful please) if you want to.   Otherwise you’ll get just a standard “This Enhancement brought to you by _______” chapter, and that’s it.

Again, anyone is eligible, but as I don’t have time for “try outs” make the most of your first choice.  If I’m not getting what I need from you I’ll have to disregard your entries, so let’s not get to that point. 

Just submit the episode you want to do in this thread.  First come first serve, so if there’s one you want, grab it, but please be able to complete it within a week.  I don’t want to impose hard deadlines unless I need to, so for now, let’s say if you post your request on Monday the 6th, have it turned in by Sunday the 12th, or it will become available again the 13th. Clear?

I’ll give everyone a few days to ask questions and decide on which episode they’d like to do before I open the forum for selection.  You have until 12:00 noon, EST on Thursday August 9th to ask questions; at that time the bidding will open, bids placed before that time will not be counted.

Final archive files will be mailed to me at matt.vayda@gmail.com

So, questions?  Who’s in?

1. I did NOT write this. A friend of mine did. I did the camera-work/directing and editing.
2. I went to college for theater, but grew more towards film in the latter years. My college didn't have a film program so... I learned as I worked at it.
3. This is, in my opinion, the best episode of the ones I worked on. Don't worry about being lost, there's a mini-recap of what's happened so far in this particular episode.
4. I repeat, I did NOT write this.

Looking for feedback/criticism. Bring it on, guys. Other than that, I hope you enjoy.

Chemically Unbalanced, Episode 13: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-_hJJ7zlo8

We try to avoid comedies, because we usually end up losing our focus and laughing along with the movie, which doesn't make for very good commentary. (However, movies that think they're funny and fail miserably are just fine.)

If there's anybody in particular you'd like to have on that episode, be not afraid, speak up. We live to serve.

1. Further Down the Spiral - Nine Inch Nails / Aphex Twin.

2. Boston - Boston.

3. The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner - Ben Folds Five.

4. This is Hardcore - Pulp.

5. The Black Parade - My Chemical Romance.

And now I'm going to tell the next poster what top five list to give. That person will list their answers, and then gives the next person a list type to answer. And so on.

Let's make this ridiculous as quickly as possible.

Top five movies starring a black dude in a leading role.

spoiler warning for anyone who hasn't for some reason seen past season 3 of Battlestar Galactica. It's at the very end.

http://www.4shared.com/audio/9pZb5G4i/Voices.html

Ten months ago, my job transferred me to the night shift. It turned my life upside down in so many ways, but what I missed more than anything, which conflicted every week with my new schedule, was hanging out with my friends and making fun of movies -- er, shouting "constructive criticism" at the screen. I used my vacation time to keep going, but the job ruined the fun of it. On the other hand, they do let me listen to my iPod...

I found Down in Front because I follow the Pink Five production blog (and wait patiently for Vol. 3), where Trey mentioned it about six months ago. Again, thank you. This show kept me sane, at least as much as before. I've listened to every episode at least once, and it made a great refresher course for filmmaking and just general storytelling. I'm one of those guys who doesn't watch the movie with the commentary, but DiF has done so many I know so well (I don't need to have Star Wars in front of me to know every frame) and others I got more than enough of the first time, it doesn't seem to matter.

Then I could come to the message boards and keep the conversation going. I was back, talking about movies with friends... in my head.

I'm writing this because three days ago, I finally got my bosses to put me back on the day shift, and now that you've done Surrogates, the only movie I would watch for the first time with DiF turned on, we can all retire the show, satisfied that we've completed cinema. Yup, all done.

Thank you all,
    Tim Kay

...wait, you were kidding about that being the last show? And next week is Empire? Well shit, I still got ears. Bring it on. Down in front!

One of my favorite movies, and one of my favorite releases thus far. Enjoy.

So we signed it, for posterity.

Here's what's up. I've (temporarily) wrapped all of the posters with a colored stroke outline, in one of four colors, indicating what the bulk of the episode is.

Blue indicating general discussion and analysis, red indicating us ripping into the movie, green indicating an episode wherein we address and try to fix story problems and re-write, and yellow being a movie where someone on the panel has first-hand experience with something relating to the flick.

What do you think? Obviously the intention here is to make it easy for a listener, especially a new one, to find the type of conversation they want to hear. (Also obviously, somewhere easy to find will be something to explain the color system, an image on the home page or something.)

...

I am ashamed.

That aside, hey, it was Armageddon!