WWW stands for Works (in progress), Wrinkles or Whoops (whenever and wherever they happen) and Wraps (completed films and projects of any kind). As always, your contributions to this feature are solicited and encouraged.
Contributors include: Dawn Haley, David S. Weiss, Steven D'Annolfo, Steve Pond, Marie Beauchamp, Silvia Candelaria, Lewis Wheeler and Karel Sloane.

Maria LoConte and Kim Daniels
team up to form Kilowatt Films.

Production veteran Kim Daniels has teamed up with Director/Designer Maria LoConte to form Boston's newest commercial production company, Kilowatt Films. Housed in National Boston's growing production umbrella, which includes National Film & Video, National Ministry of Design, Rumblestrip Audio, and LoConte 2, Kilowatt will round out the roster by focusing on live action production. Daniels will lead as Executive Producer of the organization representing commercial directors for spot production.

Prior to starting Kilowatt, Daniels spent four years at September Productions, most recently as Head of Production and prior to that working on commercial, video and movie sets in the Art and Production Departments. Clients included: General Mills, McDonald's, L'Oreal, Nickelodeon, Volkswagen, Mattel, Duncan Hines and Spalding, among others.

LoConte is legendary in the broadcast design world, and has handled the national branding efforts for clients such as ESPN Sports, The History Channel, Oxygen Networks, H&G TV, A&E, ABC, and NBC News. LoConte has recently returned from LA where she was busy shooting another series of open's for A&E's Style World featuring Vanessa Williams. Maria has won 100+ awards from the Broadcast Design Association, New York Festival, Director's Clubs of Boston and New York, The Chicago Film Festival and the International New York Video and Film Festival.

For more information about Kilowatt Films visit www.kilowattfilms.com.

President, Al Maiorano announced today that his company Visual EFX, Inc. (Milford, CT) will now offer closed captioning encoding services to broadcast and cable networks and other producers of television programs including corporate and independent video producers. Closed captioning enables people with impaired hearing capability to read the words spoken in a television program at the bottom of the television screen. Maiorano said, "Our decision to offer closed captioning was motivated by the same philosophy by which we offer all of our creative and production services, to provide our clients with the best quality at affordable prices."

Last year, the Federal Communications Commission expanded on requirements that broadcasters provide closed captioning on all programs they carry on their networks. Visual EFX has already signed up to provide closed captioning services for A&E and the History Channel cable networks.

Visual EFX uses an Evertz ProCAP transfer system and is currently receiving captioning files in NCI, Cheetah and The Caption Center formats. The company can provide both open and closed captioning for analog and digital videotape formats. For more information contact Steven D'Annolfo at 203 877-3751.

Just before Imagine went to press, Traffic, News and Sports on-air broadcasters employed by Metro/Shadow Networks in Boston voted by a 95% margin in favor of representation by the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA). An agent of the National Labor Relations Board counted the ballots at the offices of Metro/Shadow at 7 Bulfinch Place in Boston. The final count was 35-2 in favor of AFTRA.

Fifteen-year veteran broadcaster Joe Stapleton said, "We are proud to join the other broadcast professionals represented by AFTRA in Boston. We have a great working relationship with our local managers, but we had to take a stand against the corporate policies of Westwood One that inhibit wage growth and overcharge for health insurance. We are looking toward a brighter future for Metro/Shadow employees and our families."

Westwood One recently increased the employee cost of family health insurance to $4,500 per year. Metro/Shadow Networks is a subsidiary of Westwood One. Westwood One provides traffic, news, and sports reports to radio and television stations in over 80 markets in the United States. The broadcasters voting in this election are familiar to Boston-area commuters who listen to their traffic, news and sports up dates on many local radio and television stations.

The American Federation of Television and Radio Artists represents 80,000 actors and broadcasters nationwide, including Metro/Shadow employees in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington D.C., San Francisco, Seattle, San Diego and St. Louis. AFTRA has 1,300 members in New England.

Roxbury, Massachusett's own Michael Beach (well-known for his current work on Third Watch and for appearing in such films as SOUL FOOD, WAITING TO EXHALE, and the soon to be released ASUNDER) has agreed to appear at the 3rd annual Roxbury Film Festival featuring films by New England Filmmakers of Color. Nina Henderson Moore, President and CEO of BET (Black Entertainment Television) will do a workshop at the festival as well.

The Roxbury Film Festival, held on August 16-19, will screen feature length films, documentaries, and short films that are as varied in subject as the filmmakers who make them. It will be held in Roxbury at Northeastern University at Blackman Auditorium and Raytheon Amphitheater as part of Northeastern University's Artstuff: Cross-Cultural Art Fest.

The festival is co-sponsored by ACT Roxbury Consortium, The Color of Film Collaborative, The Film Shack and Cityscape Motion Picture Education. More information is available at www.actroxbury.org or by calling 617/445-1061x222.

The World Premiere of the Director's Cut of THE EMPTY MIRROR, by Boston-based writer/director Barry Hershey, screens June 10 at 9 PM at the Harvard Film Archive, as part of the Archive's Americans at Cannes series. The series marks the 40th Anniversary of International Critics' Week at Cannes, where the film premiered in 1996.

THE EMPTY MIRROR explores what might have happened inside Adolf Hitler's mind if, after World War II, he had been cut off from his role as FŸhrer and left to contemplate his deeds, the myths he created, and the man he really was. Detached from historical time, the film imagines a dreamlike subterranean environment in which Hitler confronts the demons of his psyche. The cast includes the late Norman Rodway, renowned member of the Royal Shakespeare Company, as Hitler, and Academy Award-winner Joel Grey (CABARET) as the notorious Joseph Goebbels.

As he dictates his memoirs, Hitler (Rodway) encounters apparitions of his fiendish confidant, Joseph Goebbels (Grey); his enigmatic mistress, Eva Braun (Danish actress Camilla Soeberg); the mastermind of his military campaigns, Hermann Goehring (Glenn Shadix); and legendary psychologist, Sigmund Freud (Peter Michael Goetz).

Through haunting images by cinematographer Frederick Elmes (THE ICE STORM, BLUE VELVET), and through Hitler's stream-of-consciousness soliloquies and exchanges with his phantom guests, the audience receives a terrifying primer on genius and psychosis, domination and destruction. For more info, visit www.emptymirror.com. Hershey is currently developing his next feature, VERIDICAL DREAMS, with producer Lewis Wheeler, to be filmed in Boston later this year.

Normally we think of film festivals as bastions of the very latest experimental independent films, but here's one that has a whole other perspective, another twist or wrinkle we should know about.

How does time change our perspective on the cultural landscape? That question drives Rural Places/Lost Worlds, the second annual Northeast Silent Film Festival.

The festival takes place at the Alamo Theatre in Bucksport, Maine from Friday, July 20, through the 24th. Films range from comedic gems to special-effects masterpieces. Pianist Philip Carli returns as film accompanist from Friday through Monday.

The festival's rural places range from the South America of Arthur Conan Doyle to imaginary coastal towns in Maine and in China. But, long-ago rurality doesn't equal nostalgia. These are difficult places, thorny with cultural conflicts and stereotypes, way stations on a road we're still traveling.

Newly rediscovered, CAPTAIN SALVATION (1927) stars Lars Hanson (THE WIND), and depicts the small-town hypocrisies provoked by a Boston prostitute, spectacularly played by Pauline Starke. Warner Brothers had a beautiful print, which Richard P. May, vice president of film preservation, was glad to loan.

"I'm surprised this film has not been considered one of the better of the late silent era," May says. "It is well-photographed, especially well-edited. It really moves."

According to Moving Image Review screening prints come from archives around the United States. Most are seldom seen. Short films from the Northeast Historic Film's collections and the Library of Congress will be included. For a complete list of the films being shown visit www.oldfilm.com.

This is a full-fledged twister. J CAESAR, urban Shakespeare, is a film about gangs, drugs and guns. The theme is violence in the modern age, and its impact on children. The language is Shakespeare. This Caesar wears sweat pants and carries a 22. He sends emails to Octavius and listens to rap music. The conspirators cover the city with graffiti, demanding, "Shall we stand under one man's awe? Brutus, Speak, Strike, Redress!" Portia doesn't commit suicide. She's shot by accident.

The Sixth Annual Connecticut Conference on Multicultural Education will feature J CAESAR in workshop format on Thursday, October 25th. The Connecticut State Department of Education, The University of Hartford-Education Division and The Connecticut Chapter of the National Association for Multicultural Education are sponsoring this conference. J CAESAR will also be a featured event of The International Festival of Arts and Ideas. It will screen on Saturday, June 16, at 8PM in the Community Foundation building, 70 Audubon Street, first floor, in New Haven. J CAESAR is a film that was made on location in several New Haven, Connecticut neighborhoods by youth, many of whom know what it's like to face gang violence in reality.

Surveys and discussions accompany J CAESAR screenings. So far, two in 60 children report discussing violence at home. Fifty-six of them report experiencing violence, either as witness, victim, or participant. If change is going to occur, it must being in each individual neighborhood, in each home.

J CAESAR is also being considered by several other organizations, including the Stamford Arts Festival and the Discovery Museum. For more information phone Karel Sloane, the executive producer and adapter of J CAESAR, at 203 777-8626.

Crimson Tech's big Post-NAB
Show treated attendees to the
atest products introduced at the
NAB Show in Las Vegas.

Crimson Tech, an integrator of audio visual, networking and digital media solutions, hosted its annual Post NAB trade show. This year's show featured many of the latest products direct from their recent introduction at the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) show in Las Vegas.

The show attendees were treated to the next generation of camcorders; new technology in lighting and lighting control systems; advances in non-linear editing; the future of streaming video; the dynamics of audio components; and a full range of routers, switchers and integration components. These products were represented by some of the most recognizable and respected names in the industry, including: NEC, Avid, Sony, JVC, Pinnacle, Sigma, Lutron, Genelec and dozens more.

The show was described by numerous exhibitors and attendees as the best dealer show they have ever attended. To find out more about Crimson Tech contact David Scher, Manager, Marketing Services, at 978-753-4723 or visit the Crimson Tech website at www.crimsontech.com.

Here's an agreement wrap in Boston. FableVision Studios and ActiveSky have announced their content development agreement to produce educational and entertainment applications for mobile devices using ActiveSky's wireless rich media delivery technology. This is FableVision's entrance into the emerging market for which ActiveSky provides a critical underlying encoding and distribution technology. FableVision's first ActiveSky-based offering is its BeamCard line of PDA-based, sound enabled, animated "greeting cards" which users can beam to any recipient.

Additionally, FableVision as a newly licensed encoding partner is now able to develop rich media content for use on any PDA. This is through ActiveSky's technology support for all devices running on the Palm, Windows CE and Pocket PC operating systems.

"FableVision is a trusted brand in children's educational media and offers a proven expertise in developing content for interactive platforms," says Azita Arvani, VP of Business Development and Strategy. Founder and President of FableVision Peter Reynolds said, "Content is absolutely key - we create the reason for the Player download." He further explained, "FableVision is using ActiveSky's technology to create compelling, relevant content that will draw educators, students, and families to the wireless world in ways that harness technology's potential to tell stories that move, stories that matter."

To see short animated "greeting cards" which can be downloaded for free, visit www.fablevision.com/beamcards.

Polly Bell, former news anchor at WFSB-TV and Scot Haney, on-air personality and meteorologist at WFSB-TV, Channel 3, co-hosted the 2001 Connecticut Vision Awards held May 24 at Quinnipiac University.

The Third Connecticut Vision Awards Gala, presented by the Connecticut Chapter of the Media Communications Association International (formerly ITVA), was held Thursday evening, May 24th, at Quinnipiac University's Alumni Hall. Quinnipiac University, in Hamden, CT, is the home of the Ed McMahon Mass Communications Center. Celebrating excellence in communication using electronic media were close to 100 production professionals from all over Connecticut, including members of the CT Film Commission and Robert Kesten, founder of the Directors View Film Festival, held annually in Stamford.

Over 50 Gold, Silver and Bronze awards were given out by Special Guest Host, actress Lois Chiles, and Connecticut broadcasters, Polly Bell and Scot Haney of Hartford CBS affiliate, WFSB-TV. Best-of-Show winners were Jim Nikodemski of Moving Pictures Video and Film, Inc., for Pratt & Whitney, United Way '99, an Internal Communications program designed to touch and motivate, and Dan Karlok of Eugene Chrysler Films and One Black Shoe, for Ride with Bob, a Documentary program chronicling the impact of the music of Bob Wills, legendary western swing music pioneer, on today's music scene. James Thomas of MacMillan Films in Old Greenwich won the James A. Brady Script Doctor Award for Rites of Passage, a screenplay about three adolescents on a treasure hunt with Arthurian legend parallels and Anne Marie Carson won the Gold Student Leadership Award for A Reason for Hope, a look at advances in the search for causes and effective treatment of autism. The first You Belong In Connecticut Young Mediamakers Award was given to Daryl Wein for Life is a Train.

Major sponsors for this event were The Connecticut Film, Video & Media Office through the Department of Economic and Community Development and Deloitte & Touche.