Land of Opportunity's Posts

By Andrea Olson
In an age of online over-sharing (we know what what most of our “friends” are watching, listening to and “liking”), Land of Opportunity has been grappling with how to achieve a major goal on this innovative project: sharing lessons learned.  How do we  effectively convey our successes and failures for those setting out to explore the intersection of film, social justice and emerging media? Read more...

By Josh Freund

Traditionally when making a documentary, filmmakers present a film that reflects only a sliver of their amassed content. We shoot and shoot and shoot some more, then edit and cut the vast majority of the content to fit the hour or 90-minute mold dictated by broadcast or theatrical release. You see one streamlined version of events: the one we’ve authored and edited, no more no less. However, this shoot, slash and sausage method is no longer the be all-end-all for documentary films. Read more...

Co-Authored by Sofie Strasser & Laine Kaplan-Levenson

It’s another week thinking about interactivity here at Land of Opportunity, especially after receiving the great news that we will be participating in the 2012 BAVC ‘Stories With Impact’ Producer’s Institute later this fall (#psyched!). As we continue to develop partnerships, design a community-focused user experience, and generally investigate the realms of transmedia storytelling, we can’t help but notice the growing backlash about being too ‘plugged in’ to the the 24/7 cyber reality that encompasses us these days. It seems the latest trend on the internet is to, well, get off the Internet… or at least resist the addictive siren call of constant connectivity for no real reason. Read more...

Co-Authored by Andrea Olson and Laine Kaplan-Levenson

How do we tell stories? We tell them on porches, around fires, over drinks, on the phone, via text (or as ‘dem kids call it, ‘sext’), and now on the Internet. We have no choice but to adjust to the online environment for storytelling, and sometimes it feels like the medium has drowned the message in a sea of slick mash-ups, verbose cats and (insert current viral meme sensation here). In our quest to tell the story of the complex and unprecedented reconstruction of New Orleans from many points of view, the Land of Opportunity project has always demanded an eventual reach beyond the boundaries of a traditional feature film.   Read more...