William Gibson's talk at Directors Guild of America¡¯s Digital Day, Los Angeles, May 17, 2003. "That survival, I think, is part of the key to understanding where the digital may be taking us. In terms of most of our life so far, as a species, it¡¯s not a natural thing to see the dead, or hear their voices. I believe the significance of that is still far from being understood. We can actually see what life, at least in some very basic sense, was like, one hundred years ago.

Our ancestors, when they found their way to that first stone screen, were commencing a project so vast that it only now begins to become apparent: the unthinking construction of a species-wide, time-defying, effectively immortal prosthetic memory.

Hollywood is massively and multiply plugged, and is itself a driver of new technologies. The monopoly on the means of production (at least in terms of creation) can be preserved, in this environment, as the industry itself operates on something very near the cutting edge of emergent technology. For a while, at least.

Which is to say that, no matter who you are, nor how pure your artistic intentions, nor what your budget was, your product, somewhere up the line, will eventually find itself at the mercy of people whose ordinary civilian computational capacity outstrips anything anyone has access to today.

The patterns in the heads of the ancestors have come out, over many millennia, and have come to inhabit, atemporally, this nameless, single, non-physical meta-artifact we¡¯ve been constructing. So that they form an extension of Johnny¡¯s being, and he accesses them as such, and takes them utterly for granted, and treats them with no more respect than he would the products of his own idle surmise." Heady stuff for mere entertainment. But entertainment has been the center of human survival for the longest time.

Animation World Magazine: The Disappearance of Saturday Morning "Six key factors have led to children watching less Saturday morning cartoons: more recreational sports, the introduction of cable and satellite TV, the Internet and video games, a poorer quality of animation, and a greater emphasis on family time.

Today, ¡®Saturday morning cartoons¡¯ is a phrase that emotionally means nothing to anyone under the age of twenty-five.

I know Discovery Kids¡¯ plan: they wanted a mixture of animation, reality series and live-action to reflect the breadth and complexity of kids today. It¡¯s hard to find a kid who likes just animation anymore. Kids have evolved. You don¡¯t have many boys watching cartoons when they¡¯re thirteen. That¡¯s not happening anymore. They are evolving emotionally faster. Lizzie McGuire is a live-action Ally McBeal for kids on The Disney Channel and it¡¯s a huge hit with girls, and boys oddly enough.

The animation business has always been driven by ancillary, meaning toys and games." The (cartoon) show must go on!

Anime News Network: Evangelion Live Action. Is it just me or Gainax can't come up with something original beyond Eva anymore? I wonder who will play Rei or Asuka...

New True Talent. "New True Talent (NTT) is a non-profit Korean American production group based in Los Angeles. Our goal is to provide a supportive atmosphere for aspiring and professional actors and filmmakers." Cool beans. Something like this would work in NYC, as well.

Reuters: Academic Suggests Formula for Perfect Film. "According to Clayton the blueprint for the perfect film is for it to have: 30 percent action, 17 percent comedy, 13 percent good versus evil, 12 percent sex/romance, 10 percent special effects, 10 percent plot and eight percent music." Problem solved. Let's make awesome movies according to this blueprint and we'll have media nirvana. (Yeah, right)

Bullet Time Again: The Wachowskis Reload. "I've often said that the visual effects technicians of today will be the social engineers of the future." Interesting note.

The buzz on the street is that it is good action film, no more, no less.

However, The Italian Job is getting good buzz, as a press friend told me last night it could be the biggest action film of this summer. It is all about the buzz, my friends...

NYTimes: No. 1 With a Bullet: Madonna Opens Big, and She'd Better. "The music business has become like the film business. If a record doesn't do well the opening week, people say it's dead.

In the race for first-week supremacy, labels coordinate an attack on four fronts: radio airplay, video exposure, media coverage and placement at retail stores. But radio and MTV often wait to evaluate first-week sales before committing to airplay. Yet, strong opening sales are difficult to build without radio and video exposure.

In older days, when labels were often ruled by mavericks, an artist could win prolonged support despite commercial struggles. But after the consolidation of the business into five companies, record executives can keep their jobs only by delivering regular quarterly profits to impatient bosses and trigger-fingered shareholders." If there was any evidence against media consolidation, this must be it. Diversity is the key element in media growth and success.

I just came back from a screening of The Look at Tribeca Film Festival. I didn't have a high expectation after watching rough cut of the film on crappy video, but whoa. The HD projection and the catchy soundtrack with matching fine cuts made it "look" totally different movie. People liked it enough to stay in their seats till the end and the QA session.

I met Carrie Southworth who was more beautiful in person than on the screen. She and other cast were swamped by four old men asking for autographs and pictures. It was very funny to observers.

I also met Michael Moore. He was smaller than he appears on the screen and very shy. People complimented his works and he was always little demured and spoke softly, thanking everyone. You wouldn't believe he was the same person who critized Bush at the Oscar. But, I could understand him, and relate to his behavior.

To cap off the evening, I got a surprise credit on the film as Post Production Assistant. It was really something to see my name on the big screen. One thing, though, is that I should use my almost-legal name, Calvin C. CHOI, instead Calvin CHOI, to avoid confusion and brand and identify me, me, and me. Hehehe.

I met cute Jamie-Lynn Sigler as she walked out of the elevator. I was still recovering from overnight party and couldn't place her face to her name. I knew this girl, but where? She noticed my stare and said "hi" I was dumbfounded and automatically replied "hi." That was end of our little encounter, which I will treasure for the whole day. :-D

She was cute but short, 5'5? I heard she wants to have a music career, akin to Jennifer Love Hewitt I suppose.

I also ran into Aida Turturro on Broadway. Nobody seems to recognize her but I noticed her as she seems like she just walked out of the show!

I wonder if I will see James Gandolfini in person anytime soon...

Sorry Ain't Enough finally wrapped last Sunday. It was long and ardrous journey for three months weekends but we made it. This was my first feature experience, albeit it was shot in digital, and it has been fun and great experience. Meeting and getting to know people that cared about filmmaking and the material.

We shot at in front of the Brooklyn Supreme Court without a permit that nearly got us shut down on the final day. The day was cloudy enough that we didn't have to fight against harsh direct sunlight like on Saturday party scene. (Natural diffusion works the best!) Therefore, I as a Gaffer had virtually nothing to do that I took up the behind-the-scene camcorder and interviewed people. Fortunately, almost all principle cast came for at least a scene to be interviewed by yours truly. They shared their most memorable moments like "the Slap", "the March 23rd weekend", "12 hats day", etc. Well, I guess you just had to be there. ;-)

When the final shot wrapped on 2:15pm, our time limit at the location, we gave a howler, and few women, including our director, 1st AD, and AC shed tears. Group hugs followed with a group photo. (I look like I was about to cry, but it's the bad camera angle, I assure you.)

We wrapped the day over a nice lunch at a nearby Italian restaurant and bid farewell until the next weekend's wrap party. The priniciple photography may have ended, but this film's journey is just beginning...

Red vs Blue. "We just write scripts and then use videogames to act them out." This may be the first new new cinematic movement of 21st century.

Guardian: One more hour. "And one night I got a call saying Tobey Maguire loved the book and wanted to play the main part. Even more weird, I was asked to write the adaptation. Novelists are not generally hired to adapt their own novels, and I'd never written a script. So why did they give me the job? Because I was cheap. As an absolute novice, they paid me the WGA minimum. Why did I take the job? Because they paid me the WGA minimum. It was eight times more than I earned selling the novel.

Twelve weeks later, I'd finished the first draft of the script. I handed it in to the producers and awaited their verdict. I'd been warned that script notes were torture for writers, an exercise in moronic sadism, but I got lucky. The producers gave me a concise, accurate analysis of the script's many problems. My chief mistake was following the structure of the novel too closely. I'd essentially rewritten the book with centered dialogue and capitalised character names.

A novel is a solitary endeavour; a movie is collaboration. Part of my pleasure in writing this adaptation has been surrendering to the idea of collaboration, the idea that what begins in one mind can become the work of a hundred." Word.