Screen Africa January 2017

BROADCAST, FILM, TV, COMMERCIALS, NEW MEDIA & TECHNOLOGY NEWS

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VOL 29 – January 2017 R38.00

BRINGING STORIES TO LIFE. WHAT IS YOUR STORY?

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| IN THIS ISSUE

11 Lilliput monitors in South Africa

5

15 Africa made magical by a drone

Nat Geo increases investment in Africa

25

22

The future of VR and AR with Johannesburg’s Dondoo Studios

The art of time-lapse

News Food for thought…....................................3 SA’s TH Films scores with new narrative platform..............................4 Man to Mars.................................................4 Nat Geo increases investment in Africa....................................5 Rest in Peace Nic Bonthuys.....................5 Vodacom collaborates with DStv and ShowMax to launch VOD service..............................6 Tyler Perry Studios casting director scouting in SA.............................6 The Wound to make world premiere at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival........6 LA’s Hoplight Entertainment partners with SA’s AAA Entertainment..................6 StarSat and AFOREVO join forces to elevate local content..................................6 Keeping up with the Kandasamys to release in cinemas March 2017..........8 Kagiso Media makes big move into e-sports.....................................8 Applications now open for Realness pan-African

Mzansi Magic’s prison series Lockdown to premiere

Egg Films’ Sunu directs latest

in January 2017............................................8 BBC World service expansion includes six new African

Africa made magical by a drone........... 15

pan-African Standard Bank spot........... 14

FILM

language services.........................................8

The Whale Caller..................................... 16

TECHNOLOGY News

Director Speak: Guru Kali..................... 20

Sony FS7II camcorder................................9 Blackmagic Design’s new Video Assist 2.3 update.............................9 AJA expands IP-based workflow technologies........................... 10 Crystal Vision releases digital and analogue audio Das for new frame system............................. 10 Lilliput monitors in South Africa.......... 11

ADCETERA Greeting the competition head on...... 12 One ad can make a profound impact................................... 13 Going underground to capture the surface.................................. 14

From Kenya to the world...................... 18

STUDIOS AND PRODUCTION FACILITIES Reclaiming our culture, creating jobs, showcasing SA................. 30

AUDIO Location Sound......................................... 32

SATELLITE Is satellite the solution for the expanding

Cinematography The art of time-lapse.............................. 22

VOD demand?.......................................... 34

BUSINESS, POLICY & LEGISLATION

Documentary VR documentary blazes a trail.............. 24

VIRTUAL REALITY The future of VR and AR with Johannesburg’s Dondoo Studios........... 25

Ola! Films sheds light on SME challenges................................... 36

REGULARS Social Harambe/ Avid dinner............................. 38

POST-PRODUCTION

Discop Africa 2016.................................. 39

Avid powers ahead

PromaxBDA Africa 2016........................ 40

with new strategy.................................... 26

MArketplace........................... 37 Upcoming Events................... 37

MEDIA ASSET MANAGEMENT Digitising archived broadcast footage – creating additional value...... 29

scriptwriting residency 2017....................8

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From the editor I find myself, after three years as the editor of Screen Africa, writing my last editor’s note. By the time you read this – as melodramatic as that sounds – I will no longer be the editor of Screen Africa and my colleague, Chanelle Ellaya, will have stepped into the role as acting editor.

Let me first express my gratitude to all Screen Africa readers, advertising clients and other stakeholders, for making my three years here pleasant, inspiring and challenging (in all the right ways). I wish you all the best as we move forward into what is shaping up to be a difficult but exciting time. As for me, after years of carefully circling the pool, I am about to dive into the deep end with you as I take a plunge into the film and content creation career I actually trained for. See you there.

Chanelle has worked on Screen Africa now for just over two years and is well versed in the style and content of the magazine and the developments in the industry. I have every confidence that Screen Africa will be in good hands.

Over the years I have witnessed an industry fueled by intense passion (and often little more than that). I have seen brilliant creatives and techies whose expertise borders on guru status – the reason we have the best crews in the world. I have spoken to thought leaders light years ahead of the game. I have read and watched beautifully crafted stories that can stand up to audiences anywhere in the world. I have conversed with people whose ability to create a complete, sellable product out of next to nothing can only be described as alchemical. I have watched an industry that continues to hang on the cusp of greatness and has all the potential in the world to tip over that edge. I look forward to seeing it grow and cross the threshold in the weeks, months and years to come.

I have also seen the challenges we face, many of them self-imposed, and while many of these are not worth dwelling on in much detail, as we have covered them ad nauseam in any number of editorials and seminars, I personally hope for an industry that sheds its reliance on the state sponsorship crutch, which has got us to a point where the collapse of a single broadcaster brought hundreds of professionals to their knees, a position from which many of us have yet to rise. I hope we will learn to grow our own audiences and cater to them accordingly. We need not push for unity of ideas or purpose – it is the love of our medium that unites us. We need not aim for conformity – it is our diversity that will be our saving grace. We have it all here – there is no reason, indeed, no excuse, for failure or mediocrity.

Let me conclude with the words of Orson Welles – understanding that one may substitute the word “movies” with all and any of the motion picture content that is currently available to us, no matter the format or platform: “Let us raise our cups then, standing, as some of us do, on opposite ends of the river, and drink together to what really matters to us all: to our crazy and beloved profession. To the movies, to good movies, to every possible kind.”

– Warren Holden

The Team Editor Warren Holden is a writer and journalist whose lifelong love of film and television prompted him to study for his BA in Motion Picture Medium at AFDA Johannesburg, specialising in writing and directing. After graduating, he worked for three years in the television industry before following his aptitude for writing into the world of publishing. He then worked for five years as assistant editor on the arts and culture publication Classicfeel, before taking the helm of Screen Africa, where his experiences in the separate streams of motion picture and publishing have finally come together. In addition to his work on Screen Africa, he is also hard at work developing stories for film and television and studying for a second degree in economics and African politics.

JOURNALISTS Cera-Jane Catton is a writer and journalist with years of experience in community newspapers, blogging and freelance journalism. She has migrated to Jozi from Durban to join the team at Screen Africa in the hope of sampling lots of free popcorn.

Cera has worked in a cache of capacities, often finding herself behind or in front of the cameras, intentionally and less so. She has been a stunt double in two Bollywood movies, has worked in various capacities on a number of natural history documentaries, and other international productions shot in South Africa.

She studied journalism and photography and is always eager to learn something new. She speaks up for the voiceless, is a dedicated movie lover and a wannabe doccie maker.

Chanelle Ellaya is a writer and a journalist. She completed her BA Journalism degree at the University of Johannesburg in 2011. While writing is her passion, she has a keen interest in the media in various capacities: In 2012 she co-presented the entertainment and lifestyle show Top Entertainment on TopTV and later that year she was handpicked as part of a panel of five dynamic young Africans to interview Winnie Madikizela-Mandela on a youth focused television show called MTV Meets. Chanelle is an avid social networker and a firm believer in the power of social and online networking. Between writing and tweeting, she finds time to feed her love for live music.

Greg Bester with 16 years in the audio industry and a penchant for the technology of things, has funnelled his accumulative experience into writing since 2007. An audio engineer by trade, he has worked in many areas of production such as live sound, music, post-production, location recording and film audio and his work has garnered several award nominations.

James Sey is a writer, academic and journalist with many years’ experience in business to business journalism. He is the current editor of Screen Africa’s sister publication, Pro-Systems Africa News.

SCREENAFRICA Publisher & Managing Editor: Simon Robinson: publisher@screenafrica.com Editor: Warren Holden: editor@screenafrica.com Journalists: Chanelle Ellaya: news@screenafrica.com Cera-Jane Catton: cera@screenafrica.com Greg Bester: greg@suncirclegroup.co.za James Sey: editor@pro-systems.co.za

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Editorial Disclaimer The views, opinions, positions or strategies expressed by the authors and those providing comments are theirs alone, and do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, positions or strategies of Screen Africa or any employee thereof. Sun Circle Publishers makes no representations as to accuracy, completeness, correctness, suitability, or validity of any information and will not be liable for any errors, omissions, or delays in this information or any losses, injuries, or damages arising from its display or use. Sun Circle Publishers reserves the right to delete, edit, or alter in any manner it sees fit comments that it, in its sole discretion, deems to be obscene, offensive, defamatory, threatening, in violation of trademark, copyright or other laws, or is otherwise unacceptable.

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Food for thought…

Greetings!

Let me start by introducing myself, I’m Chanelle, journalist by day, avenger by night! Some of you may recognise me from my bio on the adjacent page – I’ve been a journalist here at Screen Africa for a little more than two years now. From this month, I will be undertaking my new role as acting editor of Screen Africa magazine. Our editor Warren Holden is leaving us to pursue his filmmaking passion and while we are sad to see him go, let me take this opportunity to say it has been an absolute pleasure working under his leadership and wish him all the best in his future endeavours.

So January 2017 hey? Reading it (and writing it) still conjures up seemingly far-fetched futuristic notions, and futuristic it is, with its booming VOD, SVOD, 4DX and most recently VR and AR industries. What was once thought to be the future, has fast become our present.

VR and AR in particular are moving into an interesting and more practical space – which we explore further in this issue.

Johannesburg-based interactive and narrative 3D content development company, Dondoo Studios, are doing some pretty cool stuff by using these technologies in a fanciful and functional way, moving away from their traditionally envisioned use inherent in entertainment, to develop training solutions for the mining industry. Though fairly new in implementation, these innovative interactive solutions are set to increase the effectiveness of safety protocols on our mines.

Stanlib chief economist Kevin Lings recently said that going forward South Africa will need to create more than 350 000 jobs a year just to keep the unemployment rate at a shocking 27,1 per cent. In late November 2016, Statistics SA

announced that the unemployment rate had risen to 27.1 per cent, the highest it’s been since 2004. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that mass unemployment in South Africa disproportionately affects marginalised communities and people of colour. With this in mind production company Ola! Films has decided to participate in the MICT SETA’s 12-month internship programme. As a plea to other SMEs in the industry to not shy away from their social responsibility, the company’s FD Eleanor Talbot takes the lead in sharing the company’s experience with the Seta and the new BBB-EE code in a thought leadership piece on SME challenges.

Now it’s no secret that the SME is the cornerstone of the local film industry.

Despite the existence of several large studios and content houses, most operations in the industry are carried out by smaller enterprises. These passion driven businesses are what keeps the industry going. So then we might ask, how is it that these businesses survive?

Where do they get their support from?

While the SETAs and other government funding institutions do assist to some extent, should we rely on them? How do these businesses become self-sufficient?

There is something to be said for public funding – it has its place. But are we at risk of settling into an industry built on government handouts? Surely we need to build a profitable, self-contained industry that can fund itself. This is where audience development comes in. Yes, there it is, that term that gets thrown around this industry without anyone really being able to say how it is supposed to be done. But the point is that if content creators can find and target their audiences and monetise their content efficiently, they will have empowered themselves to keep on creating – and not

ACTING EDITOR: Chanelle Ellaya starve in the process.

With all the platforms available for content now – television, mobile, YouTube, you name it, this should be easier than ever. Yet there is still a heavy reliance on soft funding and a sense of

resignation that returns on investment are an added extra, not a key element of a thriving industry.

Something to think about…

– Chanelle Ellaya

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SA’s TH Films scores with new narrative platform Held in conjunction with the 2016 edition of Africa’s largest television content market, DISCOP Africa Johannesburg, Digital Lab Africa’s (DLA) global pitching competition attracted in excess of 500 entries from 30 different countries.

Digital Lab Africa, launched at DISCOP Africa Abidjan 2016, is a programme organised by the French Institute of South Africa, in partnership with DISCOP Africa and TRACE, to encourage multimedia innovation and nurture African talent for the new digital era. In his speech given at the launch of the DLA, Frédéric Chambon, regional head of Media, Film and Music at the French Embassy in South Africa and producer of the DLA said: “Digital Lab Africa is a platform dedicated to the African digital content of tomorrow. In the age of digital convergence, TV, film, music and video game content in Africa is increasingly consumed on internet and mobile phones, like everywhere else.”

Earlier in 2016 the DLA announced a call for projects targeting artists, producers, start-ups, developers, and students in the media and creative industries. The call invited any individual with an innovative project or idea that fell into one of four predetermined categories of multimedia production – web creation/transmedia, virtual reality, video game (serious game) and digital music – to submit their entry and stand a chance to take part in the final pitching

round taking place at DISCOP Africa Johannesburg 2016.

An international panel of industry experts narrowed down the initial 500 applications to just 15 finalists. Of these 15, South African production company TH Films’ writer/director John De Vries and producer/actor Gregory Kriek were selected to pitch their idea in the Transmedia category, in which they ended up taking home top honours – a cash prize as well as a one month incubation to be held in France next year.

“While we’re there, we’ll get to team up with, and learn from, some of the greatest in the industry in order to get our project to the next level and to a point where we will sell the show and get ready to start shooting,” comment Kriek and DeVries.

The theory behind transmedia is to communicate one single narrative or story across multiple digital platforms at the same time. “So one TV series for instance can have elements supporting the narrative through web, VOD, VR, games and social media,” explain Kriek and DeVries, “Transmedia embraces digital technology and helps to create content that interacts and engages with the audience on a deeper level.”

The duo describes their winning idea as a high octane, narrative driven action series with big international pull. “The transmedia element comes in by combining an engaging story with an innovative platform, incorporating a

DEDICATED TO THE AFRICA OF TOMORROW: TH Films’ Gregory Kriek and John DeVries multi-threaded narrative giving the audience the power to choose their own story…Our project aims to not only redefine the genre but also the way the audience engages with content,” says Kriek.

Drawn from a shared passion for telling stories that engage and inspire, and DeVries’s keen interest in gaming, the winning project came about with the decision to combine their idea for a new action television series with the gaming constituent of a multi-threaded narrative resulting in a new narrative platform.

“Gaming is a unique space. It lets us live into a narrative and transports us into a world where our decisions matter. With this in mind it’s no wonder that the gaming industry is growing larger and faster than any form of entertainment,” Kriek explains. “A big trend in gaming is the multi-threaded narrative. Here your choices influence the story as a whole.

Choosing who lives or dies, going left or right, all these choices influence the

Man to Mars Within 20 years, man will be living on Mars. This is the bold conclusion given by Dr Adriana Marais in Johannesburg at the November launch of the National Geographic series, Mars.

Before the premiere screening of the first episode of Mars, Marais, a theoretical physicist currently doing research in the area of quantum biology, explained her mission to get there. She’s made it onto a shortlist of 100 people vying for a front row seat on the Mars One expedition.

The Mars One organisation proposes to land the first humans on Mars and establish a permanent human colony there by 2026, aiming to send four at a time. Of the 100 candidates seven are from Africa. Marais not only explained the process and the purpose of the project but she brought it to life with her pioneering spirit and passionate excitement for the possibilities that she is a part of. She opened the audience’s eyes to the new era of innovation and space travel we are entering, and enlightened them to feel as excited for the mission and her willingness to give up her life on earth to pave the way for the future of humanity.

4 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

MISSION TO MARS: Dr Adriana Marais giving her talk, “Watch This Space” “Billions of years of evolution of life on Earth have culminated in the possibility of us calling another planet home for the very first time,” says Marais. She set the tone for the series that is partly factual and partly speculative, as we are taken into a world of the unknown and given a taste of what is in development and almost possible, while also being shown what is imminent and unfolding before our eyes.

The series premiered on Nat Geo in 171 countries and 45 languages during November 2016. The Mars production team took every effort to base the scripted narrative on accurate science.

The series writing team worked with an extensive group of experts, both in the public and private sectors, to understand how the science could serve the story.

The series also forms a collection of interviews with the top scientific minds

eventual outcome of the game. Our thinking is, why not give this power to the TV audience? We want to give people another level of engagement with content turning them from a passive, to an active audience.”

As the writer/director of the project, DeVries will be focusing primarily on the creative side of things. Additionally, as a ‘techie’ he will be dabbling in the implementation of the new platform. As the producer, Kriek will be focusing not only on the packaging of the entire project, but will also be working together with the team in Europe in honing the concept and seeing things through to implementation and distribution.

“Projects like these are the product of a lot of hard work so there’s still a long road ahead of us to get this ready for market, but we’re making great progress,” says DeVries, “Other than that, we have another series and couple of feature films in development, so watch this space.” – Chanelle Ellaya

currently working to overcome the many obstacles that stand in the way of an eventual inaugural launch, including exclusive interviews with Elon Musk and his team at SpaceX mission control as they successfully landed their Falcon 9 reusable rocket on a drone ship off the East Coast of the US in April 2016.

“The future of humanity is fundamentally going to bifurcate along one of two directions: either we’re going to become a multi-planet species and a spacefaring civilisation, or we’re going to be stuck on one planet until some eventual extinction event. In order for me to be excited and inspired about the future, it’s got to be the first option,” says Musk in the series.

The six part series brings this exciting phase of human exploration home, despite it taking us to Mars. “Showing that life is sustainable on Mars, or furthermore finding evidence of life on Mars, would be one of the most important possible discoveries for humanity. A giant leap in terms of understanding who we are, where we come from and what the future may hold, the Mars One Project, one of the most ambitious ever proposed, makes this dream realisable,” concludes Marais.

– Cera-Jane Catton

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Nat Geo increases investment in Africa The president and CEO of the National Geographic Society, Gary Knell, was in South Africa recently (in November 2016) to talk about Nat Geo and its continual investment in Africa. For the past 128 years, Nat Geo has been one of the world’s largest science, research and education platforms; documenting the world through television programmes and its magazine.

Since 1888 Nat Geo has funded myriad missions in uncovering and understanding our planet better. “This work is now more important than ever,” says Knell, adding that Nat Geo will increase their grants in Africa. “Tapping into the deep knowledge and curiosity of the African people and creating an ethos of conservation and spreading this across the region,” he says. “There is no place like this continent and this is a place where Nat Geo hopes to create thoughtful analysis and provide a long term contextual view that we can all face,” says Knell.

Knell, who first came to South Africa 22 years ago, and has visited many times since, says he loves the country and the creativity the people here possess. “I wanted to walk you through where National Geographic is today, and maybe inspire you to think in new and different ways,” says Knell.

Nat Geo was founded on the belief that science and exploration can change the world. Overpopulation is causing massive strain today and by 2050 it is expected to exceed nine billion, where Knell says 1.2 billion of that will come from Africa alone.

The society’s role is to assist in funding scientific answers to the threats facing the

DOCUMENTING THE WORLD: Ami Vitale took this photo at the Lewa Wildlife Conservancy in Kenya

planet and the people living on it. An NGO, Nat Geo has been one of the leading sponsors of expeditions including famous finds like that of Machu Picchu, the work and welfare done by Jane Goodall, and the discovery by Professor Lee Berger of Homo naledi. Berger, of the Evolutionary Studies Institute at Wits

University, was awarded the Rolex National Geographic Explorer of the Year award for his discovery in South Africa.

“We have been able to invest in people like Jane. In taking risks, and investing in people like that, we really have changed the world,” says Knell.

Nat Geo is committed to exploring and

protecting our planet, while funding hundreds of research and conservation efforts and “pushing the boundaries of exploration to further understanding of the planet and generate solutions for all.”

To do this, Nat Geo will continue to invest in people and document these journeys. “We’re redefining how explorers are documented,” he adds.

In Africa Nat Geo has awarded more than 2 300 grants totalling $42 million for field work on the continent, and Knell says that they will continue increasing that amount, investing in more people.

Africa projects include the Big Cats Initiative, and the more recent Savage Kingdom, the Okavango Delta project to save Africa’s largest wetland, and Pristine Seas, focusing on saving the planet’s oceans.

“We are working throughout Africa.

We want to increase our work in Africa.

We want to increase our grant making in Africa,” adds Knell. “This investment architecture at the National Geographic Society is exactly what we trying to do, to create an ethic of conversation, and be able to spread this across the region.”

Through storytelling throughout the Nat Geo platforms they reach millions of people across the globe. Knell gleams that the society’s social media pages are so successful that they may one day surpass the Kardashians. At least Nat Geo carries a message of hope for the planet.

Given the urgency of the climate challenges and population growth and natural species dwindling, this investment in Africa and the world over should be copied and constitute a following that leads to more investment and more life changing journeys. – Cera-Jane Catton

Rest in Peace Nic Bonthuys

LEAVING A LAGACY: Nic Bonthuys 15/01/1955 – 11/11/2016

In November 2016, the South African television industry bade farewell to one of its most respected veterans. Barely a year into his retirement after decades of service to the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC), Nicolaas (Nic) Bonthuys passed away.

Bonthuys first entered the industry as a broadcast engineer in the very early days of SABC television. He was then at the forefront of developments in broadcast technology in South Africa for the next 40 years, taking a leadership role in the outside broadcast division at the national broadcaster. The industry is filled with highly skilled operatives who owe their training and expertise to Nic. He stands among an entire generation of South African television professionals – several others of whom have also left us recently – who established the standards and set the best practices that have been the

mainstay of broadcast operations in this country.

What one remembers most about Nic, aside from the depth of his knowledge on his chosen career, is his friendly, personable and laid-back nature. I remember my first meeting with him, when, barely two months into my job as editor of Screen Africa and not terribly knowledgeable about the broadcast technology side of the industry, I went to talk to him to gather information for an article on outside broadcast. Sitting in his office at SABC OB, over cups of tea and coffee, he patiently talked me through the evolution of the technology from the early days of six-camera rigs, broadcast via telephone lines, and machines that needed to warm up for an hour before showtime, to the new 24-camera giants, with all the modern fittings and benefits, the commissioning of which he had

proudly and carefully overseen in preparation for the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Every one of my interactions with him thereafter felt more like talking to an uncle than a professional contact. Although always completely authoritative on his subject, he imparted his knowledge with humility, ease and a sense of humour.

In Nic, we have lost someone important. His spirit and knowledge will be missed. But I have no doubt that, just as his personal legacy will live on in his children and grandchildren, so his professional legacy will live on in those who met, worked with and were trained by him.

Screen Africa pays tribute to Nic and our thoughts and wishes are with his family and friends. – Warren Holden January 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 5

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Vodacom collaborates with DStv and ShowMax to launch VOD service African mobile telecommunications service Vodacom has revealed the future launch of its video-on-demand (VOD) service in collaboration with DStv and ShowMax. The new VOD platform, Vodacom On Demand, will offer mobile streaming to its users.

Next TV News Africa reported that with the new VOD service, subscribers will be able to access on demand content and TV services in one app. The launch is

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LA’s Hoplight Entertainment partners with SA’s AAA Entertainment

expected to be carried out in 2017. The service will allow users to pay a single amount for the content and data used for download which will in turn be added to their Vodacom bill. Access to linear TV channels will also be allowed.

Vodacom CEO Shameel Joosub said, “The service will use spare capacity on Vodacom’s network to download media content to a user’s device and allow them to watch it on demand. It will offer quality content at an affordable price, and more details will be revealed in the future.”

Tyler Perry Studios casting director scouting in SA

Rhavynn Drummer

For many years, the International ARTS Talent Showcase (IATS) has been making dreams come true for South Africans seeking a career in the arts by providing them with a stage to showcase their talent for international talent scout Kim Myers.

Regional director for the ARTS, Elsubie Verlinden, has invited Rhavynn Drummer – casting director for Tyler Perry Studios – to attend the IATS in October 2017, where a select group of actors will get to perform for the international casting agent. But before performing for Drummer, actors will need to audition for Verlinden with auditions taking place in all major South African cities starting in Johannesburg on 28 January 2017.

To enter or find out more on audition dates, times and venues, contact director of Admissions, Elouise Janse van Rensburg at (011) 039 2481 or email: itsartsafrica@gmail.com.

Los Angeles based Hoplite Entertainment, has officially opened an office in Johannesburg South Africa.

Bringing its growing TV production business into the region.

Emmy award winning Hoplite has been in talks with South African based and majority black owned AAA Entertainment for the past three years about coming into the region. AAA Entertainment has been predominantly active in the scripted space, as well as the sales and distribution of African content, locally and internationally. The co-founders of AAA Entertainment and now shareholding partners at Hoplite Entertainment, Mayenzeke Baza and Pascal Schmitz, combined have 23 years of producing experience in the region and were looking for an opportunity to move into the global unscripted television space.

“This new branch allows us to continue to not only grow, but find stories focusing on unique characters globally” stated Jon

StarSat and AFOREVO join forces to elevate local content

SA PayTV operator StarSat and online African entertainment video content provider AFOREVO, have joined forces to extend reach across the African continent.

Commenting on the launch, Michael Dearham, StarTimes vice-president and managing director of its Media Division said: “Consistent with StarTimes mission and values, our search for quality TV channels and award-winning television programming is at the heart of our commitment to service excellence. We are pleased to announce our partnership

with AFROREVO, whose exciting channel will most certainly add great entertainment value and diversity to an already stunning line-up of channels on our digital platform.”

AFROREVO has two components; AFOREVO Movies, showcasing a wide range of local movies and AFOREVO Music TV which takes a behind the scenes look at popular musicians allowing fans to get to know them better. The latter showcases a wide variety of locally produced music content.

AFOREVO channel will be carried on StarSat, channel 606. Fans from the rest of Africa can enjoy entertainment video content such as movies, comedy shows, gospel music, high-life music, talk-shows etc. all at the touch of a button.

men of his community in the mountains of the Eastern Cape to initiate a group of teenage boys into manhood. When a defiant initiate from the city discovers his

best kept secret, Xolani’s entire existence begins to unravel.

Co-written by John Trengove, Thando Mgqolozana and Malusi Bengu and produced by Urucu Media, the film stars musician and novelist, Nakhane Touré in his first ever film-role. It was shot entirely in South Africa with an all-male Xhosa cast.

A co-production between South Africa, Germany, The Netherlands and France and shot on location in the northern region of South Africa with an all-male Xhosa cast, The Wound has been presold to broadcasters ARTE France and ZDF in Germany. The film’s intended for release in South Africa in July 2017.

The Wound to make world premiere at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival The Wound, a film by John Trengove, will make its world premiere in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival. The 6 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

Sundance Film Festival takes place 19 to 29 January 2017.

The Wound tells the story Xolani, a lonely Xhosa factory worker who joins the

Smith, the CEO from Hoplite Los Angeles. The company will be bringing two to four shows a year into the region shooting both localized as well as global versions of each show, with its first series coming into the country first quarter of 2017.

Hoplite South Africa’s founders Mayenzeke Baza and Pascal Schmitz commented: “The strength we now have with combined investment, both locally and abroad, will allow us to stimulate the local television industry while creating new exciting content from Africa designed for a global market place.”

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| Keeping up with the Kandasamys Mzansi to release in cinemas March 2017 Magic’s prison series Lockdown to premiere in January 2017

NEWS

From the producers of Hard to Get and Happiness is a Four Letter Word, comes the two-sided, family-engaged-comedy affair, Keeping up with the Kandasamys.

The film will be released in cinemas on 3 March 2017. It is directed by Durban filmmaker, Jayan Moodley and produced by Helena Spring and the late Junaid Ahmed.

Keeping up with the Kandasamy’s was filmed on location in Chatsworth, Durban, and stars Jailoshini Naidoo and Maeshni Naicker as the matriarchal rivals of neighbouring families, whose young adult

children become romantically involved, and despite their best efforts to keep them apart, they are forced to acknowledge that in the end “love will always prevail.”

The cast comprises, among others, Mishqah Parthiephal, Madhushan Singh, Mariam Bassa, Rajesh Gopie, Koobeshen Naidoo and Neil Govender. Keeping up with the Kandasamys was produced in association with M-Net and the DTI, with distribution by Ster-Kinekor Entertainment.

Kagiso Media makes big move into e-sports Kagiso Media is placing a big bet on electronic sports and competitive video-gaming with the launch of Mega8 eSports, which will host regular tournaments and offer “ample” prize money to players. TechCentral reported that the gaming platform was acquired by Kagiso Media from Cape Town-based software developer Critter, which is now a shareholder in Mega8.

The launch of the platform should “further grow and legitimise the

competitive gaming industry in South Africa,” said Kagiso Media chief innovation officer Vincent Maher. Maher said e-sports is still a relatively young industry in South Africa. “It is poised for an explosion in growth with improved Internet speeds now more widely available. Predictions from PwC suggest that by 2019 it will be a R3bn industry.”

Mega8 will launch official seasons and regularly host tournaments starting in 2017.

Local drama Lockdown is Mzansi Magic’s newest and edgiest drama series to date. Set in a fictional high security female prison, this Black Brain production brings maximum drama delivered by authentic characters.

The series, starting January 2017, stars Dawn Thandeka King, Zola Nombona, Luxolo Ndabeni, Lorcia Cooper, Nomsa Buthelezi, Slindile Nodangala, Mthunzi Ntoyi and Lindiwe Ndlovu.

“Lockdown is an exciting new series that will raise the bar high for South African television drama; there’s nothing like it on

8 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

film markets.

Applicants must submit ONE PDF dossier containing: • a motivation for wanting to participate in REALNESS (1 page) • a synopsis of the proposed feature project (1 page) • a narrative treatment of the proposed feature project (6 pages) • a draft of the screenplay (if available) • a writer’s note of intention (1 page)

our screens. Mzansi Magic viewers are in for a treat because this is gripping stuff.

Each episode is guaranteed to keep you on the edge of your seat and leave you craving more,” said M-Net’s head of Drama, Reneilwe Sema. “These characters are authentically South African and their stories are recognisable to many of us. Viewers will alternately love and vilify them because they will recognise someone they know, have heard of or even a little bit of themselves in the characters.”

BBC World service expansion includes six new African language services BBC, the British public broadcaster has revealed its biggest expansion since 1940. The company is launching 11 new language services, among which are six African languages for 2017. This includes Afaan Oromo, Amharic, Tigrinya, Igbo, Yoruba and Nigerian Pidgin.

Fran Unsworth, the director of BBC World Service, said: “An increasing number of people are watching the World Service on TV, and many services are now digital-only. We will be able to speed up our digital transformation, especially for younger audiences, and we will continue to invest in video news bulletins.”

Applications now open for Realness pan-African scriptwriting residency 2017 Following the success of the inaugural edition, Realness has announced the call for submissions for its 2017 edition.

Realness is a scriptwriting residency that provides filmmakers with the opportunity to hone and develop their creative scriptwriting skills. It serves to address the need for promising African film projects to be supported in their development phase to be able to realistically compete in global

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• a short biography (1 paragraph) • two links to samples of previously produced work, uploaded to vimeo.

If selected, residents will be required to donate one copy of their previous work to the Nirox film library.

The new language services mean the BBC World Service will be available in 40 languages, including English. Presently, its African language service is available in Hausa, Kirundi, Somali and Swahili. The latest addition will thus amount the total to ten.

The call is open to screenwriters from across the African continent and selection will be based on artistic merit. Realness will hold no legal claim over the work once the residency is completed. All submitted material must be in English.

The Realness 2017 selection will be announced at an event hosted by the pavilion Les Cinemas du Monde in Cannes 2017.

Dossiers must be submitted to realness@urucumedia.com. For further information and to download the application form visit www. urucumedia.com.

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Technology

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Sony FS7II camcorder Sony expands its FS series this month with the release of its new FS7II. The new model expands on the original FS7’s strengths by adding advanced features such as Electronic Variable ND technology, a lever lock type E-mount and a new design for faster and easier set-up. It also supports the Sony-mount system.

The new model maintains all of the features that made the original FS7 so popular, while including these new features which enable the following added advantages: • Electronic Variable ND Filter system, combined with its large sensor, delivers greater exposure control, with the option of preset or variable operation modes. The variable mode allows the user to vary the density of the ND filter during shooting. The ND operations also enable fine exposure adjustment, prevents soft focus and prevents colour shift caused by stacking multiple external ND filters • E-mount (lever lock type) allow for lenses to removed by rotating the locking collar rather than the lens itself, which means that lens support rigs don’t need to be removed, saving time • Mechanical design enhancements: tool-less design lets users make quick changes to set-up and operation; the viewfinder eyepiece provides third stabilizing contact point when shooting handheld.

Blackmagic Design’s new Video Assist 2.3 update Blackmagic Design has announced a major new update for Video Assist customers that adds 3D LUTs to both models. This update also adds features to the 5” Blackmagic Video Assist including improved DNxHD and DNxHR support, false colour monitoring, expanded focus options and new screen rotation features. The Video Assist 2.3 update is available for download now from the Blackmagic Design website and is free of charge for all Blackmagic Video Assist customers.

The new features in the update include the ability to record to DNxHD and DNxHR files in MXF format, which improves compatibility with Avid systems running on Windows. In addition, customers can now choose between DNxHD 220, 145 and 45 bit rates, or between DNxHR HQ, SQ and LB formats when recording.

The Video Assist 2.3 update also adds false colour monitoring exposure tools to the 5” Blackmagic Video Assist model. False colour exposure tools make it easier to properly set exposure in different parts of the image by highlighting specific colour ranges of luminance with a solid colour overlay. For example, green indicates neutral grey, while pink tones are good references for skin, which is typically one stop over neutral grey. Using false colour helps camera operators keep exposure consistent from shot to shot.

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NEWS

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Technology

AJA expands IP-based workflow technologies AJA Video Systems has announced two new Mini-Converters supporting IP-based video and audio workflows. The company simultaneously announced free v12.5 Desktop Software with new features for KONA IP that improve redundancy and reliability in Broadcast IP pipelines, including SMPTE 2022-7 support for protection switching.

IPR-1G-HDMI and IPR-1G-SDI Mini-Converters IPR-1G-HDMI decodes VSF TR-01 and other JPEG 2000 streams, and formats the data for output on a full size HDMI 1.4 interface. IPR-1G-SDI decodes VSF TR-01 and other JPEG 2000 streams, and formats the data for 3G-SDI BNC output. The rugged, fanless converters support a range of HD and SD formats, and are

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designed for several point of use applications – including source monitoring, digital signage, and video walls. Key features include: embedded and RCA analog audio outputs, a full 10-bit pixel processing pipeline, LAN control and status, and a USB 2.0 Mini-B Connector for simple network setup with AJA eMini-Setup Software.

New KONA IP features in v12.5 Desktop Software AJA v12.5 software adds SMPTE 2022-7 to KONA IP, which offers a seamless protection switching experience. It allows users to send the same uncompressed data stream from the top and bottom SFP+ cages onto two separate networks for easy routing of video over IP networks. New v12.5 software support for KONA IP also includes HDR 10 metadata support in AJA Control Panel. Support for SMPTE 2022-2 workflows with JPEG 2000 is planned for future updates

Crystal Vision releases digital and analogue audio Das for new frame system Crystal Vision has released two audio distribution amplifiers for its new Vision frame system. Designed for distributing AES or Word Clock reference, the DADA-VF offers the choice of dual or single channel configuration (with four outputs per channel or eight outputs), reclocking or non-reclocking, 110ohm or 75ohm impedance and 32kHz to 192kHz sample rates – and is the first digital audio DA from Crystal Vision to include remote control.

Designed for the robust distribution of analogue audio, the AADA-VF can be configured as either a stereo amplifier or mono amplifier (with four outputs per channel or eight outputs) and includes audio silence detection, overvoltage detection and the most extensive gain adjustment Crystal Vision has ever offered.

The DADA-VF is ideal for use in all broadcast areas where AES signals need to be distributed. The DADA-VF can be set to reclock to provide high protection and correct unstable AES inputs.

Alternatively the reclocking can be switched off where the quality of the AES inputs is known or for Word Clock distribution. This flexible product includes support for 110 ohm and 75 ohm input and output impedance and sample rates of 32kHz to 192kHz. The AADA-VF analogue audio distribution amplifier allows the flexible distribution of analogue audio in any broadcast environment. The AADA-VF features two separate audio distribution amplifiers, each with an electronically balanced input and four floating outputs which are very robust. Each output also has an individual line driver which gives excellent isolation between them. The extensive gain adjustment makes it easy to match the audio to the broadcaster’s standard setting, with +/- 30dB of gain relative to the input level adjustable in 0.5dB increments.

Crystal Vision products are distributed in South Africa

by Telemedia.

10 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

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Lilliput Q5 ( 5’’) monitor with cross conversion BM280-4K BM230-4K BM150-4K

Lilliput Q7 monitor and Arri on location – Diego Ollivier DOP on the set of ‘’So You Think You Can Spin’’ series for e.tv

Lilliput BM-4K monitor range

Lilliput monitors in South Africa New range of full-HD monitors Macro Video Pty Ltd, distributors of Lilliput monitors in southern Africa recently announced that Lilliput Corporation had released 6 new full-HD monitors. They all offer exceptional image quality at a very affordable price.

According to Eric Wiese from Macro Video, the Lilliput Q5 ( 5’’) and Q7 ( 7’’) are full-HD resolution 1920x1200 ‘’on-camera’’ monitors with 3G-SDI and HDMI in and out. Both monitors are Type E+ as they also cross-convert from HDMI to SDI; and from HDMI to SDI. Both feature Pro-software features including integrated column YRGB , time code, wave form, vector scope, and audio level meter.

The Lilliput BM units are the BM150-4K, BM230-4K and BM280-4K being 15’’, 23’’ and 28’’ respectively. Panels resolution is up to 4K (3840*2160) ultra-HD native resolution. 4K is supported via HDMI. Mounted in aluminium carry cases, they are ideal as directors’ monitors and for video review on the go. All units have 3G-SDI in and out, four HDMI inputs capable of quad view, audio inputs, DVI input, VGA input, tally input and power supply is via a Sony V lock battery plate and 220V.

Video Pty Ltd, the importers of Lilliput products.

Meyburgh notes that the first generation 7’’ Lilliput’s were HD-ready with a resolution of 1280 x 800, but the newly released Q5 and Q7 are full-HD with HDMI in and out, also capable of cross-conversion, ie HDMI in, 3G-SDI out!

The new HD Lilliput’s metal housing remains as rugged as before. But it is the Lilliput’s compactness and light weight that are the most important considerations when building up portable rigs, that makes them absolutely magic, putting it ahead of the competition ! The Lilliputs are powered by a variety of popular battery sources such as Sony NPF and Canon LP-E6. Vlock and D taps are another option.

Service and back-up Meyburgh rates Macro Video’s service as second to none as they keep a selection of parts in stock, which in Meyburgh’s words “has got me out of jail, metaphorically speaking on more than one occasion!” He adds that Macro Video also go the extra mile – even stripping their new stock to repair a Magic Lightbox rentals unit that somebody had dropped which resulted in a smashed screen.

Frank believes in service excellence, and Macro Video offer just that.

SD, multi input monitors

Lilliput users

The 2015 generation monitors were not full-HD, but with a panel resolution that is a respectable 1280x 800 ( supporting up to 1920x 1080) on the older 7’’ , this remains a very popular and cost-effective on-camera unit. The Type E has 3G-SDI and HDMI in and out as well as composite, component and RCA audio inputs. Prosoftware functions: Histogram, wave form, vector scope and audio meter level, rendering the product ideal for professional use

Regulars at the Magic Lightbox are, among many others, Brendon Keyser and Drikus van der Merwe. They have used the Lilliput’s and have the following to say: Brendon Keyser: ‘’The Lilliput Q7 is a magic monitor as it deals well with extreme contrasts. As an example, I was looking at the difference in contrast between very bright, back-lit paving versus the shadows underneath the car, which all remain true. Now I have a directors monitor that will show the director what exposure he is really getting. Both 5’’ Q5 and 7’’ Q7 Lilliput’s have a lot of ‘’dynamic latitude’’ if you know what I mean!‘’ Drikus van der Merwe rented a Full HD Q7 Lilliput with cross conversion, was suitably impressed and purchased one the next day!

Macro Video provides back-up, service, and support on Lilliput monitors imported by them.

For more information and detail specifications on the range of Lilliput models available in South Africa, visit Macro Video’s website www.macrovideo.co.za.

The Magic Lightbox Company Frank Meyburgh’s name is well known to the South African broadcasting industry.

For Frank, recognising the need to embrace new technology is paramount. In that, DSLRs are an important component of the equipment that The Magic Lightbox has on offer. These require an LCD screen when mounted on a rig. Enter Lilliput monitors; these were Frank’s monitors of choice with Magic Lightbox purchasing more than 50 Lilliput monitors in the last two years for rentals and sales from Macro

Macro Video’s Eric Wiese with Lilliput corporate management

Brendon Keyser checking contrast on Lillliput Q5 monitor

Kevin and Frank from Magic Lightbox inspecting the BM150-4K Lilliput monitor January 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 11

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Greeting the competition head on Motorola is back in the TVC game with its first commercial since 2011 and they are bringing back Hello Moto. The South African take on the TVC is a visually arresting, culturally diverse and uplifting rendering of how people say hello. This is in striking contrast to its American counterpart, which knocks competitors’ devices in a way that only US commercials can.

T

he US version, similarly created through the international agency Ogilvy & Mather, plays off the lack of enthusiasm and innovation in the mobile phone market where the SA one greets viewers with a refreshing take on the slogan. ‘How do you say hello?’ simply and rhythmically explores how diverse cultures around the world say hello and greet one other.

OgilvyOne Dubai brought in 7Films Johannesburg to create the South African TVC. It was shot in both countries in September 2016. In South Africa 7Films shot 80 per cent in Cape Town between 5 and 7 September at the Pan Africa Market, Yours Truly Café, Hill Crest Quarry, Clara Anna Fontein Nature Reserve and at the Gardens Skate Park.

The remaining 20 per cent was shot in Dubai between 15 and 17 September at the business district and old town. The TVC was release on 1 October.

7Films director SJ Myeza-Mhlambi says “The most challenging part of the prep was trying to represent 14 different characters and locations around the

12 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

Still from the Hello Moto TVC world. On a production front shooting 11 different locations in two days was an absolute push. We managed to get seven locations done in one day.” Throughout the shoot he says they were chasing the sun to get the perfect light. “This challenged us on a physical, emotional and mental level. We literally had to run from location to location,” he says. For lighting the scenes they used small HMIs for speed and ease of set up, explains SJ. “We also used Kino Flo’s for their soft quality. However, in most cases we made use of natural light as the natural light of each location suited the narrative.”

SJ says that the look and feel they were going for was that of a rich grade that complimented the characters and their environments. “The piece was very much character orientated so we wanted to bring out the beauty, emotion and humanity in them,” SJ explains. “The environments had to be graded slightly different so that their diversity could be accentuated. We really wanted to go with a cinematic look with a unique identity that is reminiscent of travel, adventure and landscape cinematography. Imagine Red Bull meets National Geographic. It is current, dynamic but at the same rich and natural.”

Filming was done using an Arri Alexa mini, because according to SJ it had the right lightweight design with high quality imagery. Post production was done by Upstairs LUDUS where Mark Ash did the offline edit on AVID and Nicholas Young completed the online. Michele Wilson did the grade using DaVinci Resolve. Sean Williams at Sterling Sound did the sound design.

“This project was done 100 per cent remote from our Johannesburg studio with agency, client and director in

different cities around the world,” explains Joe Erasmus, head of post at LUDUS. “Managing the post process was tricky but despite the time zone difference, Amanda Newall and Logan Allanson (from OgilvyOne) were fully committed to executing a world class piece of work in the most efficient way possible whilst meeting a tight deadline.”

Erasmus adds that “Mark Ash raved about how great it was working with such a professional and dedicated team. SJ too credits the team, “I was blessed with an amazing team which is 7Films, the agency OgilvyOne and the client at Lenovo were awesome to work with and I am proud to call them my friends.”

SJ who won a Gold Loerie in 2016 for directing Chasing the Dragon has certainly proved his weight with this international commercial. “This was nerve wrecking for me, the amount of detail, preparation that went into this commercial was something that really challenged me,” describes SJ. “This was a very important piece for Moto as it was part of their re-launch campaign. I appreciate that Logan Allison, the creative director, trusted me as a director.

He really supported me and believed in me, which was probably one of the most rewarding parts of this shoot.”

SJ goes on to say that “The agency was very professional and had huge expectations. This opened my eyes to the expectation of this high pressure industry.

Despite the tight deadlines and pressure the client, agency and production crew worked together efficiently and effectively. I will never forget the Eloquent Elephant which was our second home in Dubai, where long lasting bonds were formed with the team in Dubai. I will hold this dearly in my heart.”

Despite the heat in Dubai being a grueling challenge for the SA teams there, they pulled off a successful shoot.

“Dubai was a whole new ball park for me.

The heat alone was something out of this world. Having to work in a different country for the first time was a new challenge for me. Inside I felt like a puppy getting released into the wild but I had to behave like a wise elephant leading the team from the front. I had to learn and adapt in a short space of time,” says SJ. “This was probably the hardest thing that I had to do but the most rewarding too.

Overcoming these challenges reminded me why I am a filmmaker. The F1 like pressure of directing this commercial forced me into a hypnotic sense of focus and satisfaction. This job made me grow tenfold as a director and for that I am grateful.”

Gratitude and greetings abound from the team of this TVC that depicts a global hi, and it too encourages viewers to show Moto how they say hello. Hello Moto have an interactive commercial as well as website and social media pages.

– Cera-Jane Catton

Key crew: Executive Producer: Lourens van Rensburg Director: SJ Myeza-Mhlambi Producer: Nina van Rensburg Production manager: Meagan Taylor Production Coordinator: Jamie Moncrieff 1st Ad: Shane Knock DOP: Kabeer Shaik Focus Puller: Luke van Rensburg Editor: Mark Ash Grade: Michelle Wilson Post Producer: Joe Erasmus

One ad can make a profound impact The Like Change viral commercial for Afrika Tikkun has changed 180 lives to date. Afrika Tikkun is a non-profit funding underprivileged children, their tagline: “Developing young people from cradle to career.” They needed to create an intensely emotive commercial to pull on viewers’ heart strings creating awareness, finding benefactors and garnering Facebook likes. Flash Forward Productions created just that. A poignant piece that won’t just have you reaching for the tissues, it will have you taking action, simply because a like can make a change.

“T

hrough the Like Change social movement, their aim was to alleviate poverty in South Africa by getting as many children as possible through the cradle to career model,” explains director and producer Ryan Peimer of Flash Forward Productions. “For the first time, social media, the media and the country at large came together to bring the much-needed change in the lives of many in South Africa. For every 200 likes achieved from watching the commercial, one life changed.” How a life changed in this case actually means that a child was fully funded through schooling,

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Behind the scenes on the Afrika Tikkun TVC

healthcare and social services from preschool to employment.

Flash Forward Productions were approached by Popimedia, a social media ad agency, to create the commercial from inception to completion. “The brief was quite vague – to create something emotive and touching that will inspire viewers to click like,” says Peimer.

“Something emotive” was taken to the next level of heart wrenching. The commercial follows a young underprivileged boy, an orphan who lives in a township and looks at life from the outside. A voiceover expresses what is important in life while we see this boy contrasted against the harsh reality of all he lacks. “We wanted to end it all off with a powerful emotive finish where the young boy is in his ragged, torn clothes sitting in the township with a graduation hat on,” says Peimer of the tear jerker ending. “In fact, this end shot was so powerful that it’s on several billboards across the country,” he adds.

Peimer scouted Johannesburg to find a series of suitable locations, “to get our message across within different innovative and contrasting environments, from a school, to a township, to a high-end restaurant, park and university,” he explains.

“We wanted to go for a grey, de-saturated, milky type look and feel in order to assist with the contrast in the beautiful optimistic voiceover,” he describes. Peimer explains that a lot of the commercial was shot in slow motion at 60pfs and 120fps. “Using an array of slow motion tracking shots, clearly plotted focus pulls, some cinéma vérité and handheld for the more grungy scenes, juxtaposed with a deeply

Still from the Afrika Tikkun TVC heart-felt voiceover, I wanted to create a beautiful mix of visual artistry that would hit the hearts of the viewers,” says Peimer.

Peimer opted to use the Sony F55, of which he says he is a big fan, claiming, “I feel it gives the Arris and Reds a go. I love the soft filmic look that F55 gives and of course its ability to shoot 120fps.” He adds that because it was mostly an outdoor shoot he used 12 X 12 scrims to bounce and diffuse natural light and with that he had four straight and four curved tracks and dolly for grips. It was shot over one and a half days and released on SABC. “Two of the biggest challenges were time and a very tight budget,” says Peimer. “It’s always a stretch to deliver a high-quality product on a shoe-string budget but I wasn’t prepared to comprise on the production value of this piece as I was in love with our script. Hence, we pulled favours, begged and borrowed, and worked closely with Popimedia to see how they could assist us in keeping the costs down.” He further adds that “being on set directing this was such an amazing experience. It was very close to my heart and I was determined to execute a powerful final piece. With TV

commercials you’re always selling something or punting a brand. But with our Like Change commercial, for the first time ever I was honoured enough to be selling change; selling individual transformation and selling the futures of our disadvantaged South African children. And for that, I’m so grateful that this project came to me.”

– Cera-Jane Catton

Key crew: Producer: Ryan Peimer Production Co-ordinator: Athini Maseti Scriptwriters: Ryan Peimer and Daniel Peimer Director: Ryan Peimer Cinematographer: Daniel Peimer Focus Puller / DIT: Willem Engelbrecht Gaffer: William Masuku Key Grip: William Mnisi Offline Edit: Daniel Peimer Online Edit:Ryan Peimer Colourist: Yoav Dagan Sound Design and Final Mix: Dean Konidaris

January 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 13

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Going underground to capture the surface A commercial about tyres wouldn’t appear to be the most stimulating brief but Bridgestone’s latest TVC, Passion, is quite compelling. The voice-over hits you with this line: “It’s not something we think about very often… the ways in which each one of us makes contact with the earth… but it’s something Bridgestone has obsessed about for many years… your connection to this planet is your journey… and that’s our passion.” All the while we see your connection from underground.

The SA companies teaming up to bring Passion to life was the agency, The DWF Collective with production company Hammersmith and Elephant, the post production house Maker Moving Pictures and Ammotech, the animation and motion capture studio.

“We decided to go underground to get a perspective not often thought about; how we all make contact with the earth’s surface on a day to day basis,” explains Byron Grant, executive producer at Hammersmith and Elephant.

“Something which is surely critical to a tyre’s functionality, safety and comfort.”

Production of the shoot was done at Hammersmith and Elephant in

Egg Films’ Sunu directs latest pan-African Standard Bank spot Advertising agency Hunt Lascaris’ new pan-African Standard Bank campaign, ‘Never Stop Moving Forward,’ is based on the understanding that in Africa necessity is the mother of invention.

Directed by Egg Films’ Sunu, the spot takes the form of a fast-paced montage made up of a collection of images that manages to be so distinctly African while still deferring from the stereotypical.

The movielike voice over, centered around seven evocative words – hot, big, fresh, dark, quiet, deep and busy – acts as the glue of the commercial, giving meaning to the visuals in a uniquely Africa-centric way.

Sunu says that the client expressed a desire for a campaign that would connect with viewers on an emotional level and be indicative of a distinctly African aesthetic.

Hunt Lascaris developed the idea of the voice over and required images that would accompany the shift in perspective 14 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

Johannesburg, motion capture was done at Foghound Studios in Midrand and post was done at Maker Moving Pictures in Durban.

“The look and feel was in many ways determined by the reality of what the world would look like through a piece of glass,” Grant describes. “Colour is simplified and it’s mainly a world or profiles and shapes. Of course there is a suspended reality yet the result is quite plausible. There is an incredible amount of detail above the glass which lends credibility to each scene.” He adds that “The sound design separates each environment and adds a layer of authenticity to each scenario.”

Louis Enslin, owner, composer and engineer at Produce Sound says this TVC was quite an interesting one, “As we had to create a soundscape of the world from below, but not end up with a dark feel.”

He explains, “So we basically created each scene as you would hear it from above ground. We did a lot of foleys as we wanted to push the realness of the scenes. We then did another layer of sound with all the close-up sound as heard from below, mainly footsteps and ground-impact sound effects. Then we

Behind the scenes on the Bridgestone TVC

experimented with various techniques, and amounts of filtering to get the balance between all the elements in terms of how muffled the sound should be, and constantly cross referencing it on TV speakers, as this is where it has to be most effective.”

The sound ties together this commercial that was created sans cameras. “There were no cameras used.

We used a motion capture system to capture performances, which was then transplanted onto CGI human assets,” explains Grant. “The whole setup, people, dogs, environments props etc are all CGI.” The motion capture of the performances was done in one day and post-production took three weeks. The footage was then edited using 3D studio

Max, Maya, Nuke and Adobe Studio.

“The ads concept and treatment from director Brett Wild landed on production’s desk as pretty much a single thought,” says Grant. Working out how to realise the concept was where the fun really began. “We contemplated building a glass stage and shooting for real but the glass needed to be clear to key, and blurry for effect at the same time. The exec and the director conjured a ridiculous process involving wireframes and people in spandex suits with motion capture nodes, the post guru said yes we can, and the rest is history. Kudos to Mike Muller, agency ECD and client Jan Maritz who sat unflinching as we told them that plans had changed and that their ad would star wireframe puppets with bad haircuts.” – Cera-Jane Catton

client’s request to showcase another side of Africa. “I believe that in a world where people are looking to express their identity and cultural relevance, people are looking to see themselves reflected on the screen, to be seen authentically, not some glamourised version. So I hope that a few frames will catch their attention and make them proud of their African heritage,” concludes Sunu.

Credits: Still from the new Standard Bank ‘Never Stop Moving Forward’ commercial prompted by the voiceover. “I liked the play on words and used images that played with perspectives of what that specific phrase was saying,” says Sunu. “It was a very open brief. I came in with the idea of doing a seamless edit, with a cohesive narrative through-line.” With the freedom to choose the images that he thought worked best, Sunu worked on conveying “the human element” on screen: “My focus right from the start was to bring the human element and make that the focus, so it wasn’t an ad that just showcased all these things that every bank does, but showed the human side.

Industry is because of people, so we focused on finding the humanity and emotion in each of the sequences; I wanted to make that the connective tissue and thread in the film.”

The feel of the spot is inherent in the rapid edit – packing 60 shots into a 45 second edit – which was executed to

reflect the pace of the African continent.

“We wanted people to see something new with repeated viewing… just like Africa. You can visit a certain place and return a year later and it’s completely different. Africa is a mercurial continent, a constantly shifting playground,” says Sunu. To enhance the sense of immediacy, everything was shot handheld using the Alexa Amira, “from the minutiae of an eye to wide landscapes with snow falling down. The art department and camera team were incredible in helping to achieve that,” he adds. “The edit was exciting because we really brought the film to life and my editor Gordon Midgley was a master at nuance and pacing. He also influenced the sound design and we kept pretty much everything he had done all the way to final mix.”

The final outcome is a spot that is authentic to Africa and the African aesthetic, while still delivering on the

Agency: Hunt Lascaris Agency producer: Sandra Gomes Chief creative officer: Peter Khoury Executive creative director: Jenny Glover, Rui Alves Creative director (art director): Shane Forbes Creative director (copywriter): George Low Director: Sunu Gonera Director of photography: Rory O’Grady Production co-art director: Keenan McAdam Production co-producer: Vjorn Du Toit Executive producer: Kerry Hosford Editing company: Deliverance, Cape Town Editor: Gordon Midgely Post-production: Sinister Studios, Johannesburg Music & music publisher: Waves Studio, London Composer & sound: Dugal MacDiarmid

| ADCETERA

Africa made magical by a drone In three minutes and 51 seconds you are transported to another world in Rhino Africa’s latest promo video. Made up of spectacular drone footage, which inimitably traverses the heights of Africa, poetically piecing together its gems as if floating on a cloud, flying through a painting, that’s the feeling you are left with after watching this Rhino Africa vid.

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long with the awe-inspiring scenery, you see elephants, leopards, lions and more wildlife than you can count, from a perspective that shows you their magnitude in their pristine settings.

The montage was three years in the making, with the team painstakingly gathering the drone footage, which whisks the viewer across the continent in less than four minutes. The stunning footage and the soundtrack portray Africa as the magnificent continent it is.

The Rhino Africa team were tasked to “Capture Africa’s beautiful and iconic landscapes and animals with a drone and in so doing take viewers where they’ve never been before and will want to go,” explains Ryan Rapaport, creative director of Rhino Africa and director of this short.

“Rhino Africa, Africa’s leading safari company, has spent the past three years exploring Africa to capture breathtaking drone footage of the continent’s most

beautiful places. Visiting iconic places such as Victoria Falls, Sossusvlei, the Okavango Delta, the Garden Route and Cape Town, the video team at Rhino Africa has managed to take viewers on an unprecedented journey through Africa from the sky,” Rapaport adds.

This is where the video takes you, the locations and the companies involved: Madikwe Game Reserve – South Africa; Vumbra North – Botswana; Jao Camp – Okavango; Delta – Botswana; Zarafa Camp – Botswana; Mombo Camp – Okavango Delta – Botswana; DumaTau – Okavango Delta – Botswana; Blouberg Beach – Cape Town; Gorah Elephant Camp – Addo National Park – South Africa; Jacks Camp – Makgadikgadi Pans in the Kalahari Desert – Botswana; The Marine – Hermanus – South Africa; Clifton Beach – Cape Town – South Africa; Dune 45 – Sossusvlei – Namibia; Knysna

Ryan Rapaport behind the scenes on the Rhino Africa piece

Capturing the soul of Africa behind the scenes on the Rhino Africa piece

Lagoon – Garden Route – South Africa; Robberg Nature Reserve – Plettenburg Bay – South Africa; Knysna Forest – South Africa; Royal Chundu – Victoria Falls – Zambia; Machaba – Okavango Delta – Botswana; Table Mountain – Cape Town – South Africa; Tsitsikamma – Garden Route – South Africa; Kwandwe Game Reserve – Eastern Cape – South Africa; Kwandwe Game Reserve – Garden Route – South Africa; Knysna Heads – Garden Route – South Africa; Delaire – Franschhoek – South Africa.

Aiming for dramatic aerial shots, Rapaport says, “The result is an aweinspiring bird’s-eye view of the immense wetlands, plains, forests, deserts, mountains and wildlife of Africa.” He explains that the drone footage was filmed using the DJI Inspire 1 and the DJI Phantom 2 and 4 with nothing but natural light.

The team of four included director, photographer, cinematographer and

certified drone pilot. Rapaport says they have been dabbling in drones for years and DJI are the best in the world. “It’s the best bang for your buck, and gives near movie-like quality.” He further explains that flying in tiny planes across southern Africa meant they need to keep equipment tight. The DJI Phantom comes with its own camera, and for the DJI Inspire they used a Micro X5 camera for its flexibility.

It was then edited and strung together like a poem using Premiere Pro and After Effects. The song was sourced from Audio Network. The crew from Rhino Africa began filming in November 2014 and the video was released on 18 October 2016.

The Rhino Africa team say they would not call the film a commercial. “It’s made from our passion and love for Africa and we want to share it with the world,” explains Rapaport. He says that “Whether you can afford a safari or not, we want to share the beauty of Africa with the world.”

– Cera-Jane Catton

January 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 15

FILM

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The Whale Caller Nine years ago filmmaker Zola Maseko began what he describes as an arduous journey toward the making of The Whale Caller – based on Zakes Mda’s novel of the same name, the film won the award for Best African Film at the inaugural Joburg Film Festival in November 2016…

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he poignant portrait of a man, his loneliness and his beloved whale, is a break from the norm for the famed filmmaker, best known for making films of a political nature, with his 2004 feature Drum having screened at La Semaine de la Critique in Cannes. On the contrary, The Whale Caller, falling under the genre of magical realism, primarily seeks not to account or teach, but to

16 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

entertain. “I’ve spent nine years of my life obsessed with trying to make this story to the detriment of all my relationships… I think that a lot of these stories choose me,” says Maseko. “But I think that with Zakes Mda’s book, what made me want to make it is that firstly it’s a fantastic story… But why I really wanted to make this film is because the story took me back to my childhood when this dream of

being a filmmaker was first born, or the seed was first planted.”

A self-described “lonely, fearful, and very introverted child” who read books a lot, Maseko says that when he saw his first movie at the drive-in in Swaziland, that was the moment that he knew he wanted to be a filmmaker, because his dream world had been actualised. “It was love at first sight,” he remarks. “A lot of my work before The Whale Caller has been very political. People that come from marginalised backgrounds or minorities have a responsibility to tell the stories of their people and it’s very easy to get stuck in that genre of trying to tell important stories or stories that retell our history, but making The Whale Caller was an opportunity for me to go back to my childhood and just dwell in a movie that was magical, that was a very big motivation…” says Maseko. “A very big lesson I’m learning right now is that people don’t only want to go to the movies to be lectured. People go the movies to escape, they want a story that

will engage, entertain and relax them.”

After reading the book and purchasing the rights to make the film – which he has spent the past nine years paying off – Maseko asked Mda to write the screenplay, a practice somewhat uncommon when adapting a book for the screen, but the visual interpretation required the writer’s whimsical voice inherent in the story. “I asked Zakes Mda to write the screenplay because he writes very poetically and very visually and I wanted the script to be as poetic and visual as his novel,” explains Maseko. “We have a very wonderful relationship. Zakes is a very generous man, generous in spirit, and generous as an artist. The film is different from the book. Obviously it is based on the book but for instance the end is different... And when I told Zakes that I needed to change the ending, never ever was he precious about his ending. He understood that these are two different art forms and he had no problem in adapting my vision. So it was a really great working relationship… he

| Film

always encouraged me saying, this is your interpretation of my book.”

Set in the Western Cape town of Hermanus, the film tells the story of the whale caller, played by Sello Maake Ka-Ncube, whose seemingly futile existence and life in seclusion is centred around the return of the southern right whales year after year. He shares a special bond, a true romance, with one such female whale, Sharisha – and she dances to the sound of his kelp-horn. This uncommon romance continues year after year until one day he meets Saluni, played

by Amrain Ismail-Essop, the eccentric town drunk, and an unusual love triangle ensues between man, whale and woman.

Maseko says that there was no casting process for the character of the whale caller as in his mind Sello Maake kaNcube has always been the title character. The difficult casting was for Saluni, who “is really the protagonist in the story,” explains Maseko, “We spent four years looking for Saluni and a week before we started shooting in came Amrain

Ismail-Essop and in typical Saluni fashion she grabbed the role by the scruff of the neck and owned it. She told me at the screening that she could identify so much with the character because she had been going through her own personal and spiritual growth that made her relate very deeply to the character. So it was serendipitous that she would walk in and grab the role weeks before we began shooting.”

A Black Roots Pictures production, shot on location in Hermanus over 19 days in November 2015, the initial plan was to capture footage of real whales for the film, but “there’s a rule in filmmaking where they say never use children or animals because they are terrible at taking direction,” Maseko laughs. After spending a month trying to film the whales with no success, the decision was taken to create Sharisha using special effects, which George Webster at Johannesburg-based Loco VFX headed up. The film underwent a lengthy post-production process, eight months

to be precise, from January to October 2016.

DOP Miles Goodall, who shot the film on the ARRI Alexa, worked together with Maseko to find a dreamlike colour palette that would reflect a world of magical realism: “I really felt that I needed to create a magical world that my characters live in and it had to be a world where it is believable that a man could be in love with a whale...”

The ARRI Alexa was selected for its likeness to a 35mm film look, which he still prefers. “When I studied we used to use film, if I could have shot this film in 35mm I would have loved to but technology has changed so much.

However they have developed digital cameras now that can give you the look and the feel. So the Arri Alexa was the camera that could come closest to giving us the look, feel and texture that we would get using 35mm film.”

When asked what he thinks the message of the film is, Maseko earnestly said that for him, films are not about

messages, they’re about storytelling. “We all bring our subjective world views when we watch a film, so everyone is going to take something different from the film.

However it is a film about loneliness, about a man that found it very difficult to integrate and form meaningful relationships because of the death of his parents when he was younger. He says in the film that ‘whales always come back just like clockwork’, which means he wanted something dependable, without the risk of loss. The minute you open your heart up to another human being you stand the chance of being hurt, of being rejected, of feeling shameful. So I think a lot of people can identify with those feelings,” he concludes.

Co-produced by Maseko and Dylan Voogt of Stage 5 Films, The Whale Caller is funded by the Industrial Development Corporation, the National Film and Video Foundation, and the Department of Trade and Industry. The film will be distributed in South Africa by SterKinekor. – Chanelle Ellaya January 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 17

FILM | KENYA

From

Kenya to the world

WALKING DEAD: Mbithi Masya’s debut feature Kati Kati

Directed by multitalented creative Mbithi Masya, Kati Kati, a film that explores the universal themes of loss and forgiveness, had its world premiere at the 2016 Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) where it won the International Federation of Film Critics (FIPRESCI) award for the Discovery programme.

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member of the alternative house/ funk/disco ensemble, Just A Band, Masya says that although he grew up a cinephile, it had never really occurred to him that he could or would be a filmmaker. But, it was his experience with Just A Band that paved a path for him in filmmaking: “My work as a member of the art collective, Just A Band, really opened up my mind to all the creative possibilities possible through film. From working on the group’s music videos, concert visuals, video art exhibition, it felt like a natural step to move into long form storytelling.”

Kati Kati is Masya’s debut feature film and is produced through One Fine Day Films – an enterprise started by German filmmaker Tom Tykwer (Run Lola Run, Cloud Atlas) and his wife, producer Marie Steinmann-Tykwer, to nurture and promote emerging filmmakers in Kenya – along with the company’s Kenyan producing partners Ginger Ink. “The film is a part of a special Master Class initiative

by One Fine Day Films and Ginger Ink Films, created to give African filmmakers a chance to create cinema and have their voices heard in spaces they might not usually be heard in. I was contacted by the producers of this initiative, and asked if I would like to develop a film project for them,” Masya explains.

Kati Kati follows Kaleche, a young woman who one day wakes up in the middle of the wilderness with a complete loss of memory – including her identity.

Lost and confused, she makes her way to a lodge in the middle of the vast open space, called Kati Kati. There she meets a miscellaneous group of residents who reveal to her that she is in fact dead.

Among the lodge’s occupants is group leader Thoma, a functioning alcoholic and Kati Kati’s longest standing resident.

Soon Kaleche and Thoma strike up an intense friendship and her forgotten past begins to unravel, as does Thoma.

Masya says that the film’s premise came to be as a result of his own sorrow while dealing with a personal loss: “Sarika Lakhani, one of the executive producers on the film, contacted me to work on the project at a time when I was grieving the loss of a close friend. And the film’s ideas were born from the meditations and thoughts I was having at the time concerning my own life and how I had been living up to that point.”

From that foundation, Masya and his co-writer Mugambi Nthiga developed the story and wrote the screenplay while receiving guidance from some of the mentors afforded to them through the project. “Our biggest challenge was time as we had about three and a half months to get the screenplay done. And as luck would have it, we had a revelation four days to shooting and ended up rewriting two thirds of the script the weekend before we left for set,” he comments.

The film was shot over three weeks in February of 2015, at a single location – the Galana Crocodile Camp – a lodge on the banks of the Galana River of Kenya in the Tsavo National Park. Masya says that the small production crew boarded at the camp for the entire period of the shoot which provided them with the opportunity to come together as a team and bond. “We had our own little Kati Kati experience,” he quips.

Primary shooting was carried out by DOP Andrew Mungai using an ARRI Alexa Plus, selected for its flexibility when working in natural light and high contrast exterior scenes, as the crew travelled with a very limited lighting and grip package.

The visual aesthetic and feel of Kati Kati was developed with the ethereal in mind.

The filmmaker wanted it to feel “otherworldly and claustrophobic,” using this to inform the majority of the film’s set ups. “And then we worked in the grading suite to push the colour of the film to a place that was colder and slightly alien,” Masya adds.

Masya says that thus far the reception to his debut feature has far exceeded any expectations he may have had for it. “I had no hopes but the film has already done way more than I could ever have dreamed and hoped for. Winning the FIPRESCI award as a first time filmmaker at TIFF is a definite highlight. Right now, my only hope is that as many people as possible see it.”

Kati Kati was picked up for world sales

by Germany’s Rushlake Media. And for now, it keeps travelling through the festival circuit. “And I hope audiences will get to see it in a cinema near them,” concludes Masya.

– Chanelle Ellaya

Credits: Director: Mbithi Masya Writer: Mbithi Masya and Mugambi Nthiga Producer: Sarika Lakhani, Ginger Wilson, Katja Lebedjewa and Tom Tykwer Cinematographer: Andrew Mungai Editor: Louizah Wanjiku Casting: Kamau Wa Ndung’u Production designer: Emmanuel Mraby Costume designer: Ayako Bertolli Makeup by Valary Mdeizi Original music score: Sean Peevers and Ibrahim Sidede

FILM | Director Speak u Gurli Ka

Executive creative director at Agni Media Concepts and company director at Media Monk, Guru Kali is an awardwinning director with more than 15 years’ experience. He works across the board from ads to doccies to features. In his own words: “There should be purpose in every film, character, script, scene, and frame – the same way that there should be purpose in every day, hour, minute, and second of one’s life.”

WHAT IS YOUR BACKGROUND AND HOW HAS THIS SHAPED YOU AS A DIRECTOR? Entertainment is a family industry, starting with my grandfather, mother, aunt, cousin… the list goes on.

DESCRIBE THE MOMENT WHEN YOU DECIDED YOU WANTED TO BECOME A DIRECTOR? Was it a decision?!

It has been more of a serendipitous series of events that led me here. I love crafting and telling stories… this is just the medium of expression.

WHERE DO YOU FIND INSPIRATION? Life seems a bit clichéd, so I’m going to say YouTube.

DO YOU HAVE ANY MENTORS? There are several people I would consider as mentors for various aspects of life, but from a work and industry perspective, I got to work closely with Danie Ferreira when I first started my career and that’s where I learnt the ropes, and if I don’t mention my mum I’ll get in trouble… so… my mum.

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LIVING WITH PURPOSE: Guru Kali

WHAT ARE YOUR PERSONAL CAREER MILESTONES? I’ve picked up a few awards along the way, but the 12 months leading up to the 2010 FIFA World Cup was epic.

WHICH PROJECTS ARE YOU CURRENTLY INVOLVED IN? TTL is still our bread and butter, and we’re also busy with a full-length documentary, feature film, and transmedia platform.

WHAT HAS BEEN YOUR FUNNIEST MOMENT ON SET? Take six of a scene that required a slap with an actor that insisted on real contact. We had it in the bag on the second take.

WHAT IS YOUR FAVOURITE ONELINER FROM MOVIE? “I have nipples Greg, could you milk me?” Meet the Fockers (I know, not very sophisticated).

WHAT SONGS MAKE UP YOUR MOST RECENT MUSIC PLAYLIST? Audiobooks and 80s hits.

IF YOU COULD PRODUCE AN AFRICAN VERSION OF A HOLLYWOOD CLASSIC, WHAT WOULD IT BE? Gladiator with Zulu warriors could be quite cool… is that a classic though?

WHAT IS YOUR DREAM SHOOT LOCATION? AND WHY? Aurora Borealis… the nature, magic, timing, and romance would all be quite amazing.

WHEN YOU’RE NOT BUSY DIRECTING HOW DO YOU SPEND YOUR DOWN TIME? Meditation, friends, and family.

WHO IN THE INDUSTRY WOULD YOU REALLY LIKE TO WORK WITH? The Rock. He looks like a riot on set.

IF YOU COULD HAVE ANY FILMMAKER SUPERPOWER, WHAT WOULD IT BE? Unlimited budget – it’s definitely a superpower.

Or the ability to control the weather – that would come in really handy on location.

Compiled by Cera-Jane Catton

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Cinematography

|

The art of

time-lapse

Time-lapse is like a video that is recorded for a long period of time, then played back in fast-forward.

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his allows viewers to see what happens in a specific scene over a longer than normal period of time.

People don’t usually stare at one thing for this long; they’d lose focus if they did.

So time-lapse gives viewers a glimpse of something that would otherwise be impossible to see. Because of this, it sits in a magical place of mystery and wonder, which makes it a powerful tool when trying to provoke emotion in a viewer.

Drones, gimbals and high-speed cameras fill a similar space; they all reveal something you wouldn’t normally see with your naked eye.

This kind of footage draws in a viewer, because it puts the audience in a place they cannot experience in their day-today lives. None of us can fly; camera movement on a gimbal can be done in such a way that does not make complete sense to the viewer; and we can’t see every detail of movement that a slow-motion video shows us.

22 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

These all have their place, but I’ve noticed a resurgence of interest in time-lapse recently, particularly for establishing shots, transition sequences and high production value.

Time-lapse is a skill that combines two visual professions. A time-lapse is normally captured in RAW on a stills camera, then later compiled and converted into a video. So you need to understand the principles of both stills photography and cinematography in order to create a good time-lapse.

Composition, focus, exposure, light changes, subject matter, weather and the effect of camera movement are all factors that need to be considered and accounted for when setting up a time-lapse.

The unique challenge is that you have to consider all of the above happening over a longer than normal period of time – and you’re only really able to see the final product once you’ve gone home and finished the lengthy

post-production processes.

With experience, this becomes much easier to manage, but it’s still impossible to accurately predict the future, which is what you are trying to capture.

I didn’t study filmmaking or photography, so I learnt everything via trial and error. I essentially wrote my own book on how things are done and how they should be done. It’s still an evolving skill, which is part of what I enjoy.

One of the initial appeals of time-lapse was the idea that I would get to travel and experience the world instead of sitting behind a desk. I’ve been able to film across South Africa and everywhere from Germany to Namibia, the Seychelles to Thailand, and Vietnam to Zambia. I enjoy being outdoors and having the time to be present and absorb and appreciate the locations I shoot at.

That said, it’s ironic that I probably spend more time at a desk now than I do shooting. Murphy – hate that guy.

This is a very expensive industry to be working in, especially when freelancing and having to buy all your own gear. It’s constantly evolving so updating equipment and staying current with everything is probably the toughest part.

I mostly use a Canon 5D MKIV with a 16-35 MKII lens. Then there’s the cost of

By Rory Allen

additional lenses, tripods, time-lapse rails, filters, and intervalometers for triggering the camera to shoot lapses at specific intervals.

If you want to get into time-lapse, shoot as much as you can. If it is something you really enjoy and are passionate about, over time everything else will fall into place, and you will have what feels like the best job in the world to me.

About Rory Allen Rory Allen recently released A Lapse In Time: Volume III, an awe-inducing compilation of his time-lapse work.

Watch it at https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=5qYSLsBt6Pk. A former digital and graphic designer, Rory is represented as a filmmaker by The Video Cartel and is the co-founder of Bob Loves Dylan, a take-away show series he shoots with local and international musicians.

For more information, visit http:// helloiamrory.com/ or follow @ helloiamrory.digital on Facebook and @helloiamrory on Instagram.

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News | Documentary | VR

www.screenafrica.com

VR documentary blazes a trail While VR is gradually taking off, the team at Deep VR have promptly produced the first documentary in virtual reality.

Exodus: The Great Wildebeest Migration was an unsuccessfully subsidised plot in August 2016 but in October, after its obstacle rich conception, Wildscreen Film Festival in Bristol asked to premiere an early edition. It received rave reviews, and the documentary will now become a series: the Exodus series.

Deep VR will produce a further five short immersive documentaries each with a different animal.

24 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

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’m getting ahead of myself; let’s go back to the making of Exodus, the first one about Wildebeest, pronounced in whichever accent you carry. Screen Africa caught up with Ulrico GrechCumbo: producer, co-director and DOP on Exodus, and CEO of Deep VR. “We tried to find funding for the project from various places. I flew to National Geographic twice to discuss the project with them. The crowdfunding was always going to be the cherry-on-top part of the funding strategy. In the end, nobody was willing to fund the project upfront because nobody had ever filmed a truly immersive narrated wildlife documentary in VR,” he explains.

They had a six week crowdfunding campaign with a flexible target of $25 000 and they raised seven per cent of that goal with $1 861, which paid for international and local flights for one crew member. “We decided in the end to self-fund the entire trip, because in VR if you’re going to do it at all, you’d better do it now,” says Ulrico. “We wanted to beat bigger, better-funded companies to the punch, and being agile and ambitious and well-schooled in VR allowed us to do that.”

The lack of funding or backup did not deter the team from the dream of immersing the viewer in the wild and forever changing the way wildlife documentaries are experienced. “Wildlife documentaries separate the viewer from the subject matter. VR, our speciality, would allow a never-seen-before perspective,” explains Ulrico. “So we chose the most epic wildlife phenomenon to immerse people in: the great wildebeest migration in East Africa. The idea was to create a 10-minute short-form documentary detailing the struggle, danger, and eventual triumph of these massive herds as they chase the rains.”

Filming took place over 11 days in August 2016. The final documentary came out of post in December 2016 and as of going to print, Deep VR is still finalising distribution. They simultaneously produced a behind-the-

scenes documentary which details the novice unique journey, and the entertaining struggles and gratifying victories.

The short was filmed using custom GoPro-based rigs. Lacking most of the necessary equipment, the Deep VR team built a lot of it from scratch. “The primary reason is that we wanted to use sensorextenders to keep the recorders safe while the lenses were the only part exposed in the event of a trampling. This would let us safeguard our footage. The cameras were modified to replace almost all plastic parts with custom aluminium to withstand the heat; we used special lenses from Japan that allowed us to dramatically reduce our nodal distances between different lenses on the rigs. We had a custom micro-processor board allowing us to trigger cameras using RF signal. And we had a custom gen-locking kit which allowed us to synchronise multiple cameras at once,” explains Ulrico, adding: “We used god’s lighting kit, the sun and only the sun.”

They used a Tetramic spatial microphone to capture 360 degree audio. “This allows us to spatially map audio in the final VR experience so that it’s recreated exactly the way you’d hear it in the wild,” Ulrico explains. They used a DJI Matrice 600 as a primary drone and a DJI Phantom 3 as a back-up. Despite this their primary drone malfunctioned a number of times and they lost it before they could use it. “We also crashed our second drone due to battery issues,” he adds.

They faced battery charging issues throughout the trip, relying solely on solar and generator power. The only time they had full batteries was on arrival. “We had to build our own VR cameras for the shoot to ensure they’d withstand trampling, heat and dust,” says Ulrico. “As the shoot progressed, there was a massive attrition rate of gear. We were field-testing at the same time as we were having to capture the project, which means we were constantly in trouble-shooting mode and never left it.”

The documentary was filmed in the Maasai Mara National Reserve in Kenya. It was no easy road for these pioneering filmmakers. They needed permission from the local authorities to run around the Maasai Mara. “The park does have a well-developed commercial filming policy but our challenge was that we needed to rig cameras, essentially walking around the Big Five plains and hippo-infested rivers every single day,” says Ulrico. They needed to do this in a park that does not allow walking safaris. They were badly hit by the doccie maker’s greatest challenger – unpredictable nature and wildlife. “The nature of filming in VR meant the cameras would need to be autonomous, i.e. free-standing. The animals were super sensitive to human presence so we had to predict where they’d go, in order to try rig cameras. We had completed 70 per cent of our shoot without really capturing anything of value. It put immense pressure on the team,” says Ulrico. Along with that pressure, everyone on the team was hit with a virus that had them bed-ridden for ten per cent of the shoot.

When fit and out in the field they were in one of the most sought after game viewing territories and therefore “A huge amount of tourists watching the migration constantly interfered with our logistics and clean wildlife-only shot goals,” he adds.

The piece was edited using Photoshop for rotomasking, After Effects, Premiere, Autopano Kolor and Giga, Nuke, and DaVinci Resolve for grading. The small team that pulled off a great feat included Telmo dos Reis as co-director, editor and DOP; Jared Reid as wildlife specialist and DOP; Josh Miller as drone pilot and DOP; and Amy Montalvo as behind-the-scenes videographer.

Ulrico concludes: “Deep VR is putting a stake in the ground with the vision of being the world’s best VR wildlife documentary production company.”

– Cera-Jane Catton

future VR

| VIRTUAL REALITY

AR

The of and with Johannesburg’s Dondoo Studios

PARTNERSHIPS IN DIGITAL SPACE: Virtual plant

James Gaydon and Divesh Naidoo, co-founders of Johannesburg-based animation, virtual and augmented reality (VR and AR) production house Dondoo Studios, both cite a lifelong love for animated films and gaming as the starting point of their foray into the world of interactive content development.

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hat seemed like a fated meeting at The Animation School (TAS) in Cape Town, which they both credit for the development of their complementary and varied skillset – though neither completed their studies – led to the start of Dondoo Studios in early 2015.

Gaydon explains that Dondoo initially began as a boutique animation studio producing content for the commercial market: “We had dreams of slowly building to a point where we would be developing our own IP in long-form animated TV series and films much like Triggerfish in Cape Town. However Divesh had another skill (that being programming) that we began to realise could be very useful when combined with our skills and passion for 3D content…

We had been keeping our eyes on developments in VR and AR for quite some time and when it became available we purchased an Oculus DK2

development kit and brought it into the country. We then began building demos of various ideas we had around VR content,” Gaydon expands.

A meeting with one of the country’s top VFX artists who then introduced the duo to Left Post Productions led to a beneficial partnership between Dondoo and Left. Dondoo has since also partnered with Oxyg3n Media. “Our partnerships with Left Post Productions and Oxyg3n Media have been nothing short of incredible and we are continuously collaborating to create the best possible work in various digital spaces,” says Naidoo.

Today, Dondoo specialises in the development of quality virtual reality and augmented reality content for a varied assortment of clients including MultiChoice, Zenprop, Sony Pictures Television and Vodacom, while continuing to develop long-form animated content with its partner company Oxyg3n Media.

Gaydon adds that the company also has big plans to develop its own mobile games.

Of particular interest and in what would be considered stepping away from the conventional world of commercial VR and AR development, Dondoo is currently working to develop systems for industrial engineering and architectural firms that will allow designers and engineers the ability to experience their designs in full scale in a way that was not possible before. “It is one thing to see a 3D rendering of your new building or mining plant on a screen and another thing altogether to be able to walk through it and experience the space and scale before any ground has been broken. It gives new insight into design choices you make and can be a very powerful tool,” says Gaydon.

In the same vein, the company is taking that concept one step further by working together with mining companies to take final engineering plans and build fully rendered, interactive, and realistic VR training simulation solutions. These simulators can be developed before the plant has been built enabling companies to train their employees beforehand so that by the time the plant has been commissioned their workers are ready to begin work. Gaydon says that a big positive that VR adds to the creation of simulation tools is that up to this point simulators have been limited to training people on heavy machinery. “VR can do that but it can go one better. With VR you can train people in processes and jobs

that require them to be on their feet and using their hands. It’s a much more personal experience,” he explains.

Naidoo and Gaydon say that while VR training simulation has been welcomed in the industrial industry, it is still too early to say if the use of these solutions will assist with safety matters in mines particularly as the systems are still being implemented and finessed. “We have noticed that VR is very good at creating a much more real sense of danger and therefore a heightened perception of the consequences that may arise if he/ she does not know how to complete the task. It’s a very new technique and it’s likely that we will only understand the full effects of VR training in the next few years. What is very encouraging is that these big companies are embracing new and very different technologies.

Mining safety is at the top of their priority list and they are actively engaging with us in developing these tools.”

The Dondoo team plan on spending the majority of their time developing their VR based training and engineering solutions to deliver them to the international market “on an even bigger scale than we are right now,” says Gaydon. At the same time the team will be working on developing their own gaming content in the VR, AR and traditional gaming market, and continuing in the development of long form animated content with their partners Oxyg3n Media and Left Post Productions. – Chanelle Ellaya January 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 25

POST-PRODUCTION | MAM

Avid powers ahead with new strategy

By James Sey

Screen Africa had the rare opportunity to sit down with Louis Hernandez Jr, the Chairman, President and CEO of listed global multimedia technology company Avid, on his whistlestop tour of the South African market, to hear more about the Avid Everywhere technology solution set, and its enabling Avid MediaCentral Platform.

LOOKING TO AN AVID FUTURE: Louis Hernandez Jr

L

ouis Hernandez Jr. is still fairly new in his role as CEO of Avid, having performed different executive roles in the business. His visit to South Africa is in order to share with existing and prospective client markets the current and future Avid strategy with regard to their previously launched Avid Everywhere solution set, and its enabling MediaCentral platform. In a wide ranging discussion, he analyses the current media market, describes the Avid strategy, and looks to the future – and South Africa’s place in it.

“In developing our current strategy, our first focus is to understand the market shifts in recent years – especially the digitisation of the connection between storyteller and consumer.

This fundamentally changes the economics of the market.

26 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

broadcasters among our clients, and specialised broadcaster like sports and news channels. In South Africa we partner with state broadcasters and e.tv, MultiChoice, and DStv, as well as the large production houses. What they all say is that they need more great content, so they need the best tools to create content across more channels and devices. That costs them money, so they need to do this more efficiently because media budgets aren’t keeping up with channels and consumption. So a big industry change is optimising the lifetime value of media content assets – which means repurposing content, and extending digital rights over it. The business challenge for media houses and broadcasters is to move from Capex to Opex. Our response has been Avid Everywhere. The connection between content and consumption can now be entirely digitised. As a consequence, the heritage processes which kept content creation and its packaging and broadcasting entirely separate is now conflated. So now, creative and content provision and the monetisation of media assets can all be fully digitised. [see diagram on opposite page]

Some key challenges facing the media industry are: • Increasing rate of content creation • Exponential growth of distribution platforms • Continued increase in content consumption • Media tech budgets lagging behind

Given these challenges, media technology solution providers need to: • Create high-quality, engaging content • Distribute to more devices and channels • Maximise and protect the value of media and content assets • Ensure operational and capital efficiency.

It’s our job to facilitate this process. The Avid Everywhere ecosystem of products enables our customers to work more efficiently, collaboratively, flexibly and securely across the new media value chain, from media creation to distribution and monetisation.

Today we’re seeing digital content providers being disproportionately rewarded for providing viewers rather than profitability to the business. The upside is the huge upswing in digital consumption, which can happen anywhere. The challenge is that there isn’t a corresponding increase in budgets and profitability. Avid operates in 140 countries, and has a major stake in 70 per cent of paid music round the world, the top 10 grossing films of last year, about 35 per cent of total film revenues. We count the vast majority of global

Like many workflows in many industries, the broadcast industry grew activities to create scale. Each step in the value chain was infused with different technology iterations. But this means the chain itself, and the media enterprise, is not flexible, and is too expensive to fundamentally change. We tried to take all that was common to the various players and links in the value chain and put them onto one platform, called MediaCentral. This acts as the operating system for any media company. The platform connects the applications we offer with anyone’s apps in one common operating system. It now offers various service suites, for example, our well-known Artist suite, then we acquired the software or organically built the Studio suite, the Media suite, as well as a Storage suite and a cloud-based

MAM

| POST-PRODUCTION

Confidential and Proprietary Information. Please do not copy, forward, redistribute, or publish. Avid ©2016.

marketplace. This last one offers real-time collaborative synchronisation, between our app stores, cloud storage, and the content marketplace. It can work on any device, any operating system and on any platform. It’s all Avid software, but once we’ve certified it, users can use any app on the platform to connect with any others. The cloud storage advantages the platform offers are ones of scale and flexibility, from individual artists right up to enterprises, even though we think large media houses and broadcasters will continue to work mostly on private cloud for proprietary and security reasons for the foreseeable future, rather than through pubic cloud. But there has been huge uptake in individuals for cloud storage – we’ve seen 400 per cent growth.

What are the services that the platform offers exactly? What does it do for all the apps that sit on top of it? No matter what app is on top of the platform, services can be shared. All the media services have an indexing capability, so any app you connect, creates a floating taxonomy so you can search across the platform for all media. This creates a taxonomy for any object on the platform, so that once you search for a media asset, the platform calls it up from its native source. With our enterprise clients the platform grew 43 per cent because of this huge efficiency gain.

The real value proposition is facilitating

the ability to monetise content at the same time as providing access to application and collaboration in order to stimulate workflow. Media houses need tools to create, to distribute, and to optimise content. So Avid offers a way for them to pick whatever they want – they can use Adobe and media composer concurrently on the same asset, and it indexes the use – artists and creative don’t have to choose one or the other. In this way the platform offers scalability and efficiency gains. We think it’s about 25 per cent in time and money. It’s in the nature of the networked world that if one vendor or organisation in a network changes an app or connection, it harms everyone connected. So we are taking all that away. Avid will certify everyone on the network, which reduces costs. We monitor the platform and its use in realtime, so can say what will work, what needs upgrading, etc.

The number of suites and services we offer on the platform is growing, and our key strategic move will be into the cloud.

At IBC this year we demo’ed a totally cloud based platform solution. The growth of uptake for the concept is rapid – sales of the platform now total 50 000 units, with 42 per cent sales growth in major media companies, who can see the scale, cost reduction and flexibility it offers. Media asset management is growing because it’s critical to optimising the value of the platform.

Avid for NBC at the Rio Olympics “The Avid MediaCentral Platform allows our team members in multiple locations to collaborate in real time, providing us with the capacity to create high-quality content quickly and efficiently.” – Darryl Jefferson, VP of Post and Digital Workflow, NBC Sports and Olympics Avid provided services to 25 of the major broadcasters covering the 2016 Rio Olympic Games. Of these 25, 19 broadcasters made use of the Avid MediaCentral Platform. America’s NBC was the largest group using the platform, and they showed how to navigate today’s media environment. The corporation brought hundreds fewer people on their broadcast operations, since they knew there would be fewer viewers. They brought many more people on their digital operations, growing their subscriber base by 16 per cent at the Games. There were as a result 100 million new viewers on its digital assets. By day three of the Games, the digital capability had produced more archived footage from all broadcasters than the entire London Games in 2012.

NBC themselves produced 2 000 hours of broadcast television across 11 networks, with 4 500 hours content produced for digital distribution, representing every single second of competition covered. This equates to 1 800 TB of storage, or 8.5 years of video! This was only possible because a global network of broadcast operations could be linked on the Avid MediaCentral platform, adding up to hundreds of users across 11 locations on two continents using Avid Media Asset Management as the backbone.

As Avid moves into selling the enterprise suite rather than point solutions, we’re dealing with more sophisticated clients. Taking over their workflow operations requires a sophisticated design and deployment model. That’s where Avid is going – we want to have the best and most complete

tools for every step of the workflow, on the most open and extensible and efficient platform in the world, with the most flexible deployment and pricing options. Clients can run it any way they want and pay for it any way they want. As we mentioned, our next big thing for us is moving everything to the cloud. Our first January 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 27

POST-PRODUCTION | MAM

Common Services and Engines Connectivity Toolkit

Media Services  Search across your entire network  Media access and playback on any device

 Tie third parties into the workflow  Platform level connection for end-to-end integration

 Centralized system configuration, management and monitoring

 Work on-prem or remotely

 Projects and media always stay in sync

Resolution Independence

System Administration

 Fluidly scale playback to bandwidth available

 Media asset store with file or block access  Standard interfaces  Defined service levels  Integrated media services

 Workflow and process automation  Flexible resource allocation

Metadata Management

 Work with any resolution

Storage Services

Orchestration Engine

Collaboration

 Persistence of metadata across apps  Dynamic data model for changing needs

Video Engine

 Content protection

 User authentication and policy-based access

Graphics Engine

 Real time video encoding and decoding  Scalable, highly responsive and flexible

Security Services

 Foundation for real-time graphics solutions

 Reliable, modular, high-

performance graphics rendering

Confidential and Proprietary Information. Please do not copy, forward, redistribute, or publish. Avid ©2016.

certified partner to do so is top European media service provider Dock 10 in Manchester, which offers all MediaCentral services in the cloud. This is offered on a managed service model, so for Dock 10 and other such partners, this is Opex, not Capex.

As a value proposition for cloud technology, we offer enterprise pricing, rather than by seat. And once you put the abstraction layer and the event bus in the cloud, all the apps on the platform are available in the cloud.

The possibilities offered by the cloud are also changing our distribution model: Many direct to consumer businesses abandon reseller networks when they move to cloud. But for us, dealing with large and complex enterprise clients, means there are lots of services around deployment that Avid doesn’t have capability in territory to do. So we really need partners – in fact, in most markets we are expanding partner networks that can offer such services. What we found in the tier3 space, selling direct to consumers or end-users, is that we need resellers to support individual users.

28 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

When we move up to tier one, large media companies deploying the platform model, we usually need more than one reseller in the same space.”

Asked about how he sees Avid developing in the local market, Hernandez concludes optimistically: “Our market reach is now 140 countries.

We’re now shifting to peer growth mode – that is, we’ve identified certain markets that we think, because of their market dynamics, fit into our strategy well. South Africa is a market in transition, so we want to help the market help us make the transition for them. It’s not an explosive growth market, but it has the opportunity to leapfrog other markets by moving immediately to Avid technology. So we’re excited about the market here, which is why it’s the first time an Avid CEO has been here in two decades!

The market in South Africa has as much sophistication in its people as anywhere in the world, and we think it will be ready for the adoption of cloud in two to five years, and partnering with the right company to do it in Avid.”

Louis Hernandez Jr Louis Hernandez Jr, President, Chairman and CEO of Avid, is a growth-oriented technology executive with expertise in operational execution and results-driven performance in a variety of complex technical fields including content management, e-commerce, workflow management and financial services. His focus and passion is to advance technology initiatives that specifically enable the active collaboration and connection between individuals, teams and businesses. Before becoming CEO, he served for five years on Avid’s board of directors, including a period as lead director. Appointed CEO in February 2013, he is now leading the company into its next phase of growth and market leadership. To that end, he oversees Avid’s strategic investments in product innovation, solutions and services that help content creators and media organisations better connect with and inspire their audiences, both now and in the future.

He is the author of two books, Saving the American Dream – Main Street’s Last Stand and Too Small to Fail, numerous articles and has received many professional distinctions for his expertise in business and technology. He has also been a featured guest on Fox Business, CNBC, ABC News and Bloomberg TV, where he discusses technology, economics, strategic planning and gloabalisation.

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

| MEDIA ASSET MANAGEMENT

Digitising archived broadcast footage – creating additional value As we replace manual and paper-based processes and methods with technological innovations and automated processes, the digital age is rapidly permeating every aspect of our world. Books, documents, sound recordings and the like are being converted for electronic storage, which is beneficial from a preservation and retrieval perspective.

One such industry that can benefit from digitisation is the broadcast industry, particularly with regard to archived footage.

I

t’s easy to imagine warehouses and storage rooms filled with thousands of reels of broadcast recordings, taking up space, gathering dust and costing money. These physical repositories pose a risk and can easily be destroyed and lost forever. If not destroyed by fire or flood, these reels of film and tape will eventually degrade over time until they are no longer usable. By converting broadcast footage into a digital format now, broadcasters will be able to store archived footage safely and easily. In addition to being able to retrieve archived footage quickly, there are a number of other benefits that broadcasters will realise, through the digitisation of their historical footage.

By Paul Divall,

Managing Director, Intelligent Technologies – The Jasco Group other demand comes in from those who wish to service or capitalise on the demand for archival TV. This can be, for example, teachers or historians and online television distributors like ShowMax and Netflix, looking to capitalise on old programming. Where the broadcaster is a public one, the argument has been made that archived material belongs to the public, because they paid for it. By digitising this content, broadcasters can make it available (on a free or pay-per-use basis) and can showcase the diversity of material that they hold, making it available to researchers and consumers in a convenient form.

It’s time to reduce the cost of your archive

DIGITISE BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE: Paul Divall

It’s time to digitise the past Southern African broadcasters host a sizeable collection of audio visual content that has specific value to our culture, society and history that has been built up as part of a mandate to document, preserve and conserve the audio-visual content for the purposes of informing, educating and developing our culture.

These collections, particularly the 1-inch and U-matic tape formats, have suffered serious deterioration. Analogue media carriers and playback machines are now outdated, so reliability and maintenance thereof is becoming a major issue.

Moreover, Video Tape Recorders (VTRs) are no longer in production and as such, there is a decline in the availability of spare parts or skilled technicians to service them. As a result, it is becoming increasingly important to digitally reproduce these creative and historic assets in order to preserve them for future generations to use, before it’s too late.

Television broadcasters are faced with two sets of demands when it comes to their archived footage. One demand is being made from within their own organisation where there is a need to archive their output and mine previous outputs as a source for re-runs or to create a free library of footage. This type of demand is echoed by other broadcast companies and production organisations that are looking for such footage. The

By transferring to a digital archive this will reduce facility costs and space requirements significantly, allowing for optimised workflows in a file-based environment. In order to keep a tape media archive for the next 10 years and beyond, the recommendations from SMTPE and the tape manufacturers is to maintain constant cold temperature and humidity requirements, which mirror the requirements of datacentres. As the data density of analogue media is low, the space and cost of maintaining the archives becomes increasingly expensive while availability of playback machines and spare parts are increasingly limited.

Transferring the archive into digital format will reduce costs of the overall facility including temperature control, a reduction in space requirements whilst optimising workflow and access in a file-based environment.

It’s time to monetise the past Once historical tapes or reels (as the case may be) and their associated metadata have been digitised, it becomes quick and easy to search for a specific broadcast, which is particularly useful in live streaming scenarios. For example, a spectacular goal from a memorable sporting match could be retrieved and inserted into a current live match. As previously mentioned, digitised broadcasts could also provide a new revenue generation stream where this archived footage could be sold to other broadcasters and production houses.

Every TV user is now accustomed to storing and retrieving programmes at home and this has been the case since

VHS recorders became common in the 1980s, which generates an increased presumption that old shows and broadcasts must be available somewhere.

Entire TV channels are built on the belief that archival material can find an audience well after its original broadcast and DVD releases of old shows continue to grow.

It’s time for broadcasters to monetise these opportunities as new channels such as YouTube or Over the Top (OTT) services provide new demand for content and new ways to engage with audiences.

Archival content is a unique asset, which could differentiate broadcasters from their competitors and reconnect them with their viewership.

How technology can help It’s time for broadcasters to put in place a solution to efficiently and effectively promote tapeless workflows from beginning to end, as well as a preservation solution that can work archived physical footage for storage in a digital file based server system.

Technology exists that makes it possible to undertake large-scale mass preservation and digitisation and migration of audio, video and film archives, automating as much of the process as possible to eliminate the opportunity for human error. This migration/digitisation is done in conjunction with restoration and treatment remedies to ensure that the digital footage is a faithful replication of analogue. Once audio visual content has been electronically converted, there are technologies that offer access solutions that are either automated or offer assisted indexation, metadata management and documentation based on open standards for interoperability. Such solutions are secure and sustainable, effectively hosting, preserving and storing for access and enabling monetisation with media distribution partners. Digitisation partners are able to train broadcast staff on how to operate and manage these solutions in order to maximise productivity and potential for additional revenue. In short, the time for broadcasters to digitise their historical broadcasts and recording is now. Not only will it simplify their processes and allow broadcasters to finally retire outdated playback technology, it will open up new potential revenue streams, and bring to light previously unconsidered opportunities for education and research as well.

January 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 29

STUDIOS AND PRODUCTION FACILITIES

Reclaiming our

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culture,

creating jobs, showcasing SA As February 2017 gets underway, Johannesburg’s newest complete production facility, SkyRink Studios, officially begins its operations, with productions taking up residence in the studio spaces in the city centre’s Carlton precinct. At the facility’s grand opening, SkyRink’s major funders explained how the launch of the new complex represents so much more than just a bolstering of the city’s studio space.

At the grand opening of SkyRink Studios: Duma Nkozi (Department of Economic Development), Ebrahim Patel (Minister of Economic Development), Frank Mohapi (executive director of SkyRink Studios), William Smith (divisional executive: High Impact and Regions at the IDC), Marvin Mathibe (executive director of SkyRink Studios), Mlamuli Buthelezi (COO of Transnet)

T

aking to the podium to deliver the keynote address, Ebrahim Patel, minister of economic development, noted that the date of the launch coincided with the birthday of former African National Congress president and struggle hero, OR Tambo. “If you had to choose a day to launch something new and something for the future, you could not choose a more auspicious day than the birthday of Oliver Reginald Tambo,” the minister said at the opening of his address.

Tying the launch of SkyRink to the birthday of one of South Africa’s most beloved political and liberation leaders, the minister set the tone for the evening’s speeches, all of which pointed towards the fact that the existence of the new facility is more far-reaching and significant than the film industry and the citizens of

30 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

Johannesburg may realise.

“I am here today because we, as government, have backed this project.

The IDC (Industrial Development Corporation) was prepared to back talent.

What this studio is about is claiming our culture and our stories. It’s about claiming our city, it’s about creating jobs and it’s about showcasing South Africa,” the minister said.

SkyRink received the backing of national government through the financial support of the IDC and the National Empowerment Fund (NEF), the former contributing about R180 million and the latter another R40 million. The project also received the support of the provincial (Gauteng Growth and Development Agency) under MEC of Economic Development and municipal tiers of government, with the Gauteng Film

Commission (GFC) and the City of Johannesburg (Economic Development Department and City Film Unit) seeing the value that SkyRink could offer both the province’s film industry and the city itself. Minister Patel explained the value government had seen in the new facility under his opening points of claiming South Africa’s culture and stories, claiming the city, creating jobs and showcasing the country.

Claiming culture and stories “We live in a globalised age where the dominant culture is that which we all watch on television, we see it in the movies, and it is a culture that originates from elsewhere,” the minister said. “Yet right here is where we should be telling our stories with confidence, with

boldness, with passion and pride. To do that we need the production capability and a film studio is a critical part of that.

But this film studio is not only about telling our stories, as important as that is.

It’s also about claiming our city. This film studio decided its location will be here, not in Sandton. It is about balanced development, it is saying we will take this part of our city and bring investment and bring jobs and bring excitement and ideas, passion and young people and turn it into a centre of development.”

The three directors of SkyRink – Frank Mohapi, Marvin Mathibe and Miles Britton – had affirmed content and talent development as a vital aspect of SkyRink’s ethos and operations, going right back to the initial design of their business model. Speaking later in the evening, Mohapi explained that the next

| STUDIOS AND PRODUCTION FACILITIES

SkyRink directors Marvin Mathibe, Frank Mohapi, Miles Britton

Minister Ebrahim Patel gives the opening address at the SkyRink launch

phase in their facility’s set-up would be to set aside two floors for the housing and collaboration of Johannesburg’s young, up-and-coming producers, writers and directors, where they can develop their content together, supported by the SkyRink infrastructure.

Creating jobs The minister explained how, for the Department of Economic Development, the film industry offers great opportunities for the creation of employment and for economic growth.

The department, as well as others in the Economic Sectors, Employment and Infrastructure Development cluster of government, have been pushing for the diversification of the economy; the film industry is an area that offers this. “We started as a mining economy,” the minister explained, “Joburg itself was the premium mining city. Over a number of years we recognised that if we are to create the kind of inclusive economy that we want to make a better life for our people, we must diversify, diversify, diversify.”

The IDC’s investment in SkyRink forms part of a much broader drive to fund development in the film and television industries. The state-owned financial institution has invested somewhere in the region of R1 billion over the past decade, including funding contributions to individual productions and to the building

of other studio facilities, such as Cape Town Film Studios.

“We do not make these investments as an act of charity; we do it because it is a legitimate economic activity that’s going to develop this country. Across government there is an effort to empower our people, to give us the facilities, to tell our stories, to claim our cities and bring with urban regeneration, to create jobs, but also to showcase this beautiful country and its enormously interesting history to the rest of the world,” the minister concluded.

Claiming the city and showcasing SA As the owner of the Carlton Centre and thus landlord to SkyRink Studios, Transnet is another major backer of the new enterprise. At the launch, COO Mlamuli Buthelezi explained that initiatives such as this benefit, not only the film industry but also the city as a whole, including, but not limited to, commerce and industry in the surrounding precinct.

“We are confident that the opening of this facility will contribute significantly to making the Carlton Centre a preferred shopping and entertainment destination in the Joburg CBD, just like in the old days when it was the place to be for the socialites and high flyers of Johannesburg,” Buthelezi said. “We will continue to do our bit to bring back the vibrancy that was once associated with

the Carlton precinct. It goes without saying that there will be more socioeconomic benefits created in the centre and surrounding areas. This opening coincides with our plans to relook the viability of the long mothballed Carlton Hotel and the redevelopment of the shopping centre to link with the Maboneng Precinct and greater Joburg. The SkyRink development is the first phase in our redevelopment of the precinct.”

Speaking after the launch, Andile Mbeki, CEO of the GFC, explained that the commission’s interest in the facility comes both from its being the first fully black-owned studio in the country and its expansion of the province’s production capacity as a means towards the ultimate end of increasing local content production. “The timing was perfect,” he said. “Digital migration is going to offer a whole range of opportunities in terms of the number of channels available for the distribution of content. Those channels will need a lot more content to fill them. If we do not have enough facilities like this one, those channels will look elsewhere and we will continue to be a dumping site for foreign content. With a facility of this magnitude, we are going to make sure that we produce a lot more of our own stories, our way and flood the channels with our own content.”

Productions will begin at SkyRink in February 2017.

January 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 31

AUDIO

|

Location Sound Nagra VI

Sound Devices 688

“The more things change the more they stay the same.”

T

his could be a motto for the audio engineering profession because while the technology, location or source may change, the fundamentals of sound stand firmly in the grounds of physics. Indeed, this is why, for an aspirant, core concepts such as the propagation of sound, how the ear/brain complex works and frequency vs. time domain are absolutely crucial to understand in order to achieve excellence, no matter what field of audio they may find themselves drawn to.

Speaking of being drawn to a field, one of the most overlooked and exciting jobs in audio engineering today is the location recordist for film and television. Here you will find men and women working long hours (shocking, I know) often in remote locations in harsh conditions and battling the elements to capture that perfect performance. Although this time the performance is not by a musician, but by an actor and the environment.

The basics What every location recordist has to understand is that you and your equipment should be neither seen nor heard. The shot is everything and in fact therein lays the art of capturing pristine sound while tackling the challenges of hiding your tools from the camera. That being said, a big mistake is that filmmakers often see audio as ancillary to the video aspects of the job. It is not. Bad sound can ruin a film faster than Donald 32 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

Trump at a liberal rally so it is also important that you are able to do your job unhindered and without prejudice.

They’ll thank you for it later.

The goal of any artistic or entertainment endeavour is to invoke an emotional response in the audience.

Visual elements in film, of course, are a big part of this, but the other half is sound. Emotional involvement is the utmost definition of entertainment and good sound is paramount in achieving this. In fact, I would go so far as to say that sound conveys emotion and visual elements convey information.

Combine the two well and you have a good production.

One thing to keep in mind is that, as in all fields of audio, it is almost impossible to fix a mistake after the fact. If a mistake registers even subliminally in the audience’s psyche you have not done your job properly so therefore it is best to attempt to achieve the best possible sound from the word go. You’ll thank yourself for it and so will the sound mixer.

Another important aspect is kit. The rule of thumb is to always use the best equipment you can afford because the resulting sound quality is only as good as your signal chain. This is a rule throughout all of the audio engineering disciplines. Equally important is effective microphone placement. You can have the most expensive microphone available but if you don’t know where to place it, it may as well have come from Cash Converters.

Microphones Despite there being a wide variety of microphones on the market today for an equally wide amount of applications, it is probably worthwhile to discuss the three most common types found on today’s film set: shotgun/hyper-cardioid, cardioid and lavaliere microphones.

A “shotgun” microphone is typically long, tube-like (similar in appearance to the barrel of a gun) and is found in two common varieties: long shotgun and short shotgun. Generally a long shotgun has a narrower axis of pickup while short shotguns will have a wider pickup pattern.

So, in essence, if you want to isolate certain sounds, such as dialogue, a long shotgun should be used and, conversely, if more ambient sound is required then a short shotgun is the mic of choice. The variation in pickup is achieved via the design of the microphone and its cardioid pickup pattern which can either be cardioid, super-cardioid or hypercardioid. These microphones are used in 90 per cent of sound for picture recording to pick up the talent and are found at the end of the boom, covered in a windsock or zeppelin, and often operated by a dedicated “boom swinger.” Even more often the boom swinger and the location recordist are one and the same person.

Common shotgun microphones seen in productions include the Sennheiser MKH416, MKH-60, Neumann KMR-81i and the Sanken CS-3.

The lavaliere microphone is the covert guerrilla of the sound for picture world and a huge aide to the location recordist.

A marvel of modern engineering, these tiny microphones have capsules smaller than the head of a match and can be hidden in the most unassuming places such as the talent’s hair or behind a neck tie. They usually come in two variants: omni-directional and directional. Omni directional picks up sound in a 360 degree pattern while directional lavalieres have a narrower pickup on-axis to the capsule, such as a cardioid variant.

Creatively placing these microphones can enhance a recording immensely, particularly when a microphone on a boom is just not filling the gap. They are also often used wirelessly via wireless UHF systems to conceal their signal path completely from the camera.

Of course, a location recordist is free to use whatever microphones he or she sees fit to capture what needs to be captured.

This includes boundary microphones for recording discussions or audience reactions, stereo microphones for capturing sound beds and ambiance and choir mics for pickup up crowds. The recordist is an artist in his or her own right and microphones are the palette.

Portable field mixers, recorders and monitoring The core of any location recordist’s rig is the field mixer, the recording medium and the monitoring system. This can be

| AUDIO Neumann KMR-81i

Sennheiser MKH 416

achieved in a variety of ways such as direct to camera, through a dedicated mixer and out to a dedicated recorder or via a mixer with an integrated recorder.

The modern advances in digital audio technology has enabled today’s location recordists to take advantage of more discrete tracks on site and downsize their rigs to more manageable proportions thanks in no small part to hard disk recording. For this reason mixers with integrated recorders from manufacturers such as Sound Devices and Nagra are common in small to medium productions.

Larger productions such as feature films will sometimes require more tracks so in that case, larger, more elaborate rigs with more dedicated components may be required to handle the workload along with multiple boom operators and a dedicated recordist.

In its most basic sense a field mixer isn’t much different from its studio counterpart. It is a device, usually battery powered, that allows you to combine signals from multiple microphones and mix them down to a stereo or mono output. It typically includes two or more integrated microphone preamps, meters and headphone monitoring outputs so the recordist can monitor the recording in real time while having quick access to the essential controls needed to keep the audio in check.

As mentioned earlier, field mixers with integrated recorders have become the norm as opposed to the exception. Units such as the Nagra VI or the Sound Devices 688 or 788 have made field recordists’ jobs easier than ever with up to 16 tracks and integrated studio-quality microphone preamps available at their

fingertips. As with dedicated recorders, they also include on-board time-code generation for mulit-camera sync options and often word clock I/O for connecting multiple devices. Synchronisation is paramount in field recording as it’s almost impossible to fix after the fact.

Lastly, headphone monitoring is the field recordists last stop for good sound.

Without a good quality pair of headphones, monitoring what you are recording can become a nightmare.

Headphones that isolate outside noise are preferable, such as the Sony MDR-7509 or Sennheiser HD-280 Pro closed-back headphones are ideal for this job. However, conceivably any good quality closed-back headphones of choice will do just as good a job and it all boils down to the preferences of the field recordist.

The wrap The field recordist’s job is diverse, dynamic and exciting. Granted, it is hard work to carry around a heavy bag full of cables, wireless microphone systems, batteries, mixers and recorders but it can be as rewarding and complex as any job in audio today.

Audio is an art form and location recording is no different. Therefore it is the location recordist’s job to take the tools at his or her disposal and perform the best capture as possible, while mitigating noise and battling the elements. At the end of it all conveying the emotive elements of the shot is key and when done correctly, the final product will be elevated beyond what the eyes can behold. – Greg Bester

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January 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 33

SATELLITE | VOD

Is satellite the solution for the expanding VOD demand?

In the past five years mobile internet subscribers have tripled to 300 million, according to statistics reflected in the mobile economy report there will be an additional 250 million by 2020. This has fueled the wireless technology explosion and the ongoing migration to digital has vastly expanded communications and information. Consumers across Africa now have 494 million smartphone connections, set to increase to 720 million by 2020.

T

he continent is not at a level where VOD content can be enjoyed by a mass audience. For this reason Eutelsat Communications has developed its SmartBeam technology to deliver video content to mobile devices via satellite, addressing challenges that include user frustration with buffering and disconnection as terrestrial mobile networks become saturated.

The technology will enable consumers to receive video services in public venues by downloading an app on their mobile devices, including smartphones and tablets using Android or iOS. Users will pick up the channels via a local Wi-Fi network connected to a compact box that receives the content direct from a satellite.

Eutelsat provides capacity on 38 satellites to clients that include broadcasters and broadcasting associations , pay-TV operators, video, data and internet service providers, enterprises and government agencies.

Eutelsat’s satellites provide global coverage of Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia-Pacific and the Americas, enabling video, data, broadband and government communications to be established irrespective of a user’s location.

Attending Africom 2016 in Cape Town, Jacques Dutronc, chief development and innovation officer at Eutelsat explains the technology and how satellite can feed a growing appetite for video on demand in Africa.

“SmartBEAM is a new IP-based video solution. It offers content providers a satellite-based solution for multiscreen video delivery to connected devices, including tablets and smartphones. It works with any WiFi-enabled device, supporting instant channel change, DRM

34 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

security, and low latency.”

Dutronc explains that SmartBEAM emerged from viewer expectation to have access to content on mobile devices when outside of the home. “In addition to enabling broadcasters to extend their relationship to their audience, SmartBeam is also an efficient last-mile delivery system for OTT services,” he adds.

The technology has been positively received as it is in effect a game changer for extending access to video content on mobile devices beyond terrestrial networks. “It has a competitive edge for mass market delivery of OTT services.

Tricolor TV, one of our key customers in Russia, is already deploying the service and we are analysing other markets, including emerging markets as a route to

offering simple access to video content on mobile devices,” he says.

“SmartBeam is designed to enable broadcasters and pay-TV operators to leverage the ubiquitous coverage of satellites to broadcast video content in IP format, creating a network that is completely dedicated to IP-native terminals,” Dutronc explains. He says the goal is to be an integral part of the

digitisation process sweeping across the African continent. “Through our experience in other regions that have completed analogue switch-off and achieved 100 per cent digital coverage, we know satellites have the core assets of reach and network availability. We can deploy digital infrastructure faster than any other technology and we can provide blanket reach of a region thereby limiting massive public investment in terrestrial towers to cover the last mile.”

He further says that “Scaling up to HD and Ultra HD are other key pillars of our video strategy in all markets for the coming years. In other areas of activity, connectivity requirements continue to grow. We believe there is a key long-term role for satellites in the connectivity business, both fixed and mobile (maritime, in-flight).”

According to the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organisation, “Broadband is not just a consequence of economic growth, it is also a cause.” This was discussed at the unveiling of Konnect Africa at Africom, a new identity for Eutelsat’s satellite broadband venture.

“Our Konnect Africa broadband venture will start providing services in SubSaharan Africa from spring 2017, marking another milestone for inclusive digital services in Africa,” adds Dutronc.

The Konnect Africa five year

development plan is built on two phases.

Firstly the start of Konnect Africa operations over key regions as soon as Q2 in 2017, and then a dedicated HTS satellite, to be launched in 2019. After five years Konnect Africa is considering the upcoming VHTS technology to further increase the performance and economics of satellite broadband.

This venture is set up to galvanise the market for satellite broadband services in Sub-Saharan Africa. With a team located in key African markets and in Europe, Konnect Africa aims to become one of the leading suppliers of new-generation services, working closely with African partners to promote high-quality broadband at affordable prices for homes and businesses, and contributing to reducing the digital divide on the continent.

Konnect Africa’s portfolio of services will be adjusted to the profiles and needs of its partners, to match their position in the value chain: data, mobile or VSAT operators, ISPs and pay-TV platforms that can bundle TV with Internet services.

Konnect Africa will offer a complete range of services, from bandwidth supply to end-to-end solutions.

There is a clear need for broadband across Sub-Saharan Africa, where 341 million people live beyond a 50km range of fibre. This is greater than the population of the United States and therefore a mix of technologies is therefore required, including fibre, 3G/4G and satellite solutions.

– Cera-Jane Catton

www.mediatech.co.za

BUSINESS, POLICY & LEGISLATION | Thought leadership

Ola! Films sheds light on SME challenges Running a Small Medium Enterprise (SME) in the current South African economy is challenging. As a growing film production company in the commercial space, Ola! Films have hit barriers to entry at almost every turn. For us the requirements to trade are not dissimilar to larger entities: we need to have a suitable corporate image, a good deal of budget must be set aside for our regulatory OPEX and tax affairs, plus we have to be BBBEE competitive – that is our rating counts as much to our clients as the bigger enterprises.

Written by Eleanor Talbot, FD of Ola! Films PTY LTD

OH LA LAA!: The team at Ola! Films

W

hen we found ourselves up against it in a recent property dispute, we asked ourselves when we would catch a break.

Surely it was not much to ask to go about our business without expectation and inconvenience from banks, council, SARS and the new BBB-EE code? Everybody seemed to want a piece of our little pie.

The new code especially rankled, as for advice from several empowerment specialists, we were informed we had to shape up. Think about your ownership structures and your skills development plans, they said, or you’re dead in the water and no use crying about it.

We cried for a bit. It felt unfair to be forced to do things we didn’t feel we had the expertise or resources to tackle.

There aren’t armies of talented professionals rolling around SMEs ready to sort out these difficult organisational commitments. But our tiny little team had to get to grips with it, and get to grips we did.

The first thing we did was start an internship programme. Basically this meant applying for funding from government to train and pay young graduates. This required months of reading, negotiation, information gathering and presentation, but eventually we got our grant approved from MICT Seta and we could begin interviewing candidates. And an unusual thing happened while we were prepping for the grant: we became excited by the programme. It suddenly made sense that we should play a part of growing the

SUPPLIED Television, Movie and Magazine work

youth and providing them with much needed paid work experience and mentorship. The candidates we spoke to were bright, enthusiastic individuals who just wanted to be given a chance to be taken seriously and learn. The feedback we got spoke to the fact that it’s one thing demanding free university education, but an even greater concern is employment and employability at the end of it. Many felt the wrong focus has been highlighted with the recent riots and that these sorts on internship programmes are vital to assisting the transition to a meaningful adult life through gaining much needed, and often inaccessible experience.

The second thing we did was look at our ownership structures. Look, no one wants to give their hard earned business away for peanuts as a lot of businesses out there presume. But there are ways to incorporate people of colour, gender and disability into white owned business and protect what has been built before and go on to build even greater things after.

Frankly, and we have always believed this, it is downright offensive to assume that people of colour or disability would want to simply be a figurehead in a business and contribute nothing – there are fewer people willing to operate like that than experience tells us. As well as this, becoming a meaningful shareholder in a business is hard work – especially in a SME, and just like any other business, if it is a viable going concern, you will have to buy your share. SME’s can’t afford to give the love away for free – it has to be paid

for and maintained, just like in any other business. Addressing ownership structures and really hammering out what can be gained from forging new relationships could in fact be a good thing and set your business in new and exciting directions. Rarely have great businesses survived or grown by doing the same thing in the same way year in and year out.

The third thing we did was change our perspective. Looking at ownership, structures, strategy and internships would certainly assist moving our business into the right space with the right credentials – indeed credentials we needed to survive. But we also needed to re-think what it is we wanted from our trade. The bottom line in any enterprise is undeniably important but in a world that is increasingly unstable, risk averse and partial to change resistance, we’ve learnt that sharing our knowledge and bringing in new talent is key to protecting that bottom line we care so much about. If we are to grow a forward thinking selfsustaining society employed and operating in a successful economy, we all need to be embrace some changes, even in businesses as small as ours. The added benefits are working in an environment with new, excited faces – talent the film industry so desperately needs but is afraid to embrace. Our new partnerships have created a refreshed work environment, a place of learning, idea sharing and opportunity seeking – and that is forward thinking worth every cent.

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M ar k etpla c e

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UPCOMING EVENTS JAN 13 – 26 Canada’s Top Ten Film Festival

Canada www.tiff.net/canadas-top-ten/ 19 – 29

Sundance Film Festival Utah www.sundance.org 25 – 5 FEB International Film Festival Rotterdam

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2–5 Cape Town International Animation Festival

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Texas www.sxsw.com/festivals/film/ 16 – 22 Luxor African Film Festival

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21 – 23 CABSAT

Dubai www.cabsat.com

APRIL 31 Mar – 2 Vancouver South African Film Festival

Canada www.vsaff.org 3–6 MIPTV

Cannes www.miptv.com 7–8 sBokeh South African International Fashion Film Festival Unit 3, Harbour Place, 1061 Schooner Road, Laser Park, Honeydew

Cape Town www.bokehfestival.co.za

January 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 37

| Harambe/ Avid dinner

Social

PHOTOS BY Warren Holden

In November 2016, Louis Hernandez Jr, president and CEO of AVID, visited South Africa. Harambe Technologies, one of the local distributors of AVID products and solutions, hosted him , as well as several high-profile South African AVID clients, at an exclusive dinner held at Signature Restaurant in Morningside, Sandton.

Adriaan Shipalana, Thomas Lebreton, Sean Shipalana

Aldred Dreyer (ETV Group CTO), Marc Eckstein (MD of MediaCloud), Gelfand Kausiyo (Head of operations, KweseTV)

Buti Seipei, Tom Cordiner

Cecil Barry (CEO Red Pepper and MediaCloud), Louis Hernandez Jr (Chairman, President and CEO Avid)

Gelfand Kausiyo (Head of Operations Kwese FreeTV), Sean Shipalana (MD Maropa Telecommunications)

Sean Shipalana, Adriaan Shipalana, Louis Hernandez Jr

Tom Cordiner (President of sales, Avid EMEA) Aldred Dreyer (ETV Group CTO)

Zaheer Mohammed (MNet GM Engineering Services), Adriaan Shipalana (CEO Harambe Technologies)

38 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

| Social

Discop Africa 2016 PHOTOS BY CERA-JANE CATTON

DISCOP Johannesburg, held in November 2016, was a packed three days of deal-making between hundreds of production companies, distributors and media platforms from across Africa and beyond. Seen at the TV and film market were‌

Alex Radnitz and Phumla Radebe

Alicia Sibanda, Asi Mathaba and Favourite Nkomo

Bola Ogidan and Nikhil Patel

Kastarine Kgola and Octavia Sonyane

Keneilo Kgatle, Mike Dearham and Chanel Reece

Khulile Mkhabela and Sandra Amadio

Lerato Moloi and Lillo Bergh

Mpho Ramathuthu and Mpho Joseph Dintwa

Nick Cloete and Stacey Pearson

Stephanie Lopepe, Raissa Mashala, Tesya Mizumi, Reneilwe Morema and Lynne Garrine

Xolani Masilela and Makitso Makgato

Xolelwa Nomgca and Neo Moretlwe January 2017 | SCREENAFRICA | 39

| PromaxBDA Africa 2016

Social

PHOTOS BY CERA-JANE CATTON

Throughout the world, the PromaxBDA Awards stand for marketing excellence in the media marketing space and collectively, through its numerous regional and sector-specific competitions, are regarded as the most prestigious awards for creative endeavour in this field. Seen at the Johannesburg event at The Maslow were‌

Claudine Hoff, Sinegugu Ziqubu, Botle Hlapane, Megan Goodyal and Boniswe Mpungose (photobombed by Sam Chirwa)

Jessica Quilliam and Justin Jacobie

Koketso Mononi, Zareena Latib and Lydia Molale

40 | SCREENAFRICA | January 2017

Gaylyn Wingate-Pearse and Fhulu Badugela

Kelebogile Madingoana and Sbahle Matsebula

Spencer Moses and Adam Geyer

George Leong and Renette Bengis

Johanna Nieuwenhuys, Smangele Mauka, Mfundo Ntsibande and Elouise Kelly

Yolisa Mayongo and Miliswa Setebe

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