THE First Cut Award, sponsored by agency Saatchi & Saatchi and On the Spot, is an important way for young directors to send the message that they are an emerging creative force to be reckoned with.

ADVERTISERS often struggle with how to make a product or service register with viewers and stand out amongst its competitors. Several companies have made viewers/consumers take notice using popular songs that sometimes become as identifiable with a product as the original artist who performed it. And it seems to work.

The Atlantic Film Festival, this year running Sept. 14-22 in Halifax, has confirmed that Canada, Spain and Latin America will be the focus of its Strategic Partners conference. …

Halifax’s Ocean Entertainment is cooking up two new series for Food Network Canada/Food Network (U.S.).
The Food Hunter (13 x 30) follows the international exploits of green grocer and CBC regular Pete Luckett as he travels the globe in search of what producer Johanna Eliot refers to as ‘exotic produce.’
‘The premise of each show is that we are going to places around the world in search of interesting fruits and vegetables and [Luckett] is our explorer,’ says Eliot. ‘Our first episode will be shooting breadfruit in Jamaica at the end of the month. He’ll be searching for the roots of breadfruit – the history of it, where it came from, how it’s distributed, what does the tree or bush look like. Also, there is going to be tons of other food information [in each episode].’

In the production industry, one needn’t wait long for a new, cooler and better piece of film gear to hit the streets and make its older incarnations seem antiquated. Lately, the biz has been buzzing over prognoses of digital video formats killing anything with a ‘mm’ suffix, but Gerd Kurz, president of Toronto camera shop Precision Camera Inc. Canada, begs to differ.
‘I think there is no threat to 35mm,’ says Kurz. ‘That image format contains far more information. As of now, digital can’t handle that much information. But if I was manufacturing 16mm or Super 16, I’d be scared.’

The term smooth sailing doesn’t always apply to productions shot on or near the water. According to Halifax’s Topsail Entertainment, producer of the new documentary series Tall Ship Chronicles, and others, the mix of water and film gear is not always easy on the nerves, or the stomach.
Tall Ship Chronicles follows the adventures of the crew of a tall ship as they sail around the world.
With a crew of 40, the cinematographer for the first leg of the voyage was Wade Cornell. He says his time on the ship was challenging, but he was very pleased with how the equipment held up.

In an industry known for its share of prima donnas and troubled actors, animals, even bugs, can be easier to work with than many humans. Naturally, there are people behind these talents, guiding their careers and providing directors with well-behaved creatures…

A team comprised of Redrover Studio’s Andy Knight, Hero Films’ Linzi Knight, Imported Artists director Richard D’Alessio and former Revolver Films producer Allan Weinrib has put together a new commercial production company known as UnpluggedTV.com.
UnpluggedTV is best described as a spot shop that helps agencies and advertisers extend their brands to the Web. In the gray area between Web ads and commercial production, UnpluggedTV plans to guide advertisers and their agencies through the confusing zeros and ones to a solid end product – a fully-produced animated or live-action broadcast spot suitable for the Web. If the client is up for exploring the new frontier, its spot can be viewed on the UnpluggedTV website, which can be linked directly to the brand’s own home on the Web. Pepsi and AT&T have already signed contracts, and the founding partners expect other major clients to follow suit when the company begins performing.

The focus of this regular section is on agencies in Canada. Looking for agency business strategies and creative teams’ secret weapons? We tell all in Ad Missions….

Former Maxx Productions executive producer Lisa Whittall has joined Toronto music video production house Oz Media to spearhead its new commercial production division.
Whittall, Oz’s VP, managing director, joins Trisha McKell, president/executive producer.
Oz has also teamed with neighbor Oasis Pictures, a film and TV producer/distributor, to create the Oz Media Group of Companies, which includes Oz’s music video and commercial divisions as well as Oz TV & Feature, a new division specializing in film and television production.

When U.S. commercial production company hungry man announced this spring it was setting up shop in Toronto under the name frozen man – repping its stellar talent roster without the benefit of a Canadian representation middleman – a chill went through the local market.
Many believe frozen man represents a threat to Toronto spot shops, which have a difficult enough time competing against one another. Others, however, say the frozen men have a long, difficult road ahead of them. But all agree the ever-increasing competition in the Toronto market will continue to keep things very interesting around these parts for the foreseeable future.

Last year at the Cannes Advertising Awards, Canada scored a Gold Lion and five Bronzes. It was a banner year for the biz in our country. This year, Canada left the Cannes awards, held June 20-23, with three Lions. Ammirati Puris…