Check out Dave’s Iron man review!

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Let the summer blockbusters begin!  Iron Man definitely began this year’s summer blockbusters.  It’s been a while since I have seen such an amazing film. Keep in mind, though this movie is not a comedy, it was very funny.  It had the entire theater booming with laughter.  I wasn’t only enjoying this film when watching it, I was having fun with the rest of the crowd.  It was great!

Robert Downey Jr stars as Tony Stark, a billionaire weapons developer from what looks like the future. Stark is taken hostage by terrorists, and is told to build “The Jericho,” a powerful missile.  Stark knows the terrorists won’t allow him to live, so from the little scraps he has, he creates the first Iron Man suit.  From there, he goes on to build the suit everyone knows and loves.

What I love about this movie is  that Stark is human.  He hasn’t been bitten by anything radioactive.  He wasn’t caught in a nuclear explosion, he is just, plain and simple, a man.  He has no powers, and that is the beauty of it!.  Much like Batman of DC comics - though Iron Man is cooler.  He is basically invincible, if you think about it. Sure there are a lot of questionable things in the movie, like computers that talk like a human, but who cares?  The movie is based off of a comic book superhero, it can do what it wants.

I was having fun while watching this movie.  It was truly an amazing movie.  I have to give it 5 stars, and I recommend this to everyone to check out.  Peace Out.

 For more Movie Reviews check out Dave’s link in the blog roll under The Veoh Review.

By Sunny Gault, Executive Producer of Veoh’s original series, Viral.

As many of you know, our internet series, Viral, has been hiatus for the last month. Well, sort of. Actually, we’ve been working hard on the pre-production of a new version of Viral called “Viral LIVE”. This is standard procedure for us. We typically mix things up every 6-8 months. It’s our way of growing the show and adapting to a constantly evolving medium. And boy, are we stirring the pot this time!

Viral LIVE is different than anything we’ve ever done before. We’re still featuring all the same great internet content, but now, we’ll have 22 minutes to tell our stories as opposed to the typical 2-3 minutes. For those of you who prefer shorter video clips, we’ll also be releasing 5-6 minute videos of the individual segments- so no worries! In addition, I’ve recruited my good friend and follow internet producer, Cory Tyler, to co-host the show with me. You may remember Cory as the preppy producer on the internet series, Can We Do That- which happens to be the first series we featured on Viral- back in October of 2006 (see video). Cory also co-hosted an episode of Viral with me last year (see video).

For all you video/techy people out there, this version of Viral will be shot in standard definition with Panasonic HVX 200s and a DVX 200. It’s a three camera shoot (including a jib) with all feeds being mixed through a TriCaster Studio (thank you to our sponsor, Newtek). The show will be shot live-to-tape, so most of the editing will be done on the fly through the TriCaster, but any post production will happen through Final Cut 6. The TriCaster also allows us to do live keying on our green screen- just one of our four sets. We’re using basic lighting equipment from Lowell (still hoping for a studio light grid someday!) and we’re going with wired Sennheiser mics as opposed the going wireless- less room for error.

And the coolest part is that you can see all this in person, because the show will be taped in front of a live, studio audience. But don’t email me for tickets yet. Give us some time to get our feet wet and then we’ll open our doors

In the meantime, check out our new Veoh channel page. We’ve been videoblogging our whole pre-production process, including studio set-up and our co-host auditions. You can also get involved by emailing me anytime you see cool Veoh videos and we’ll include them in the show (and we’ll give you credit!)

The premiere episode of Viral LIVE launches Monday, May 12th. We’ll see you then!

OK. If, as Sunny noted below, the Emmy Awards aren’t going to share the love with made-for-Internet shows any time soon, it’s time to hand out a couple interim awards of our own.  (”The Veohies”?  Hmm… Needs work.)

Video That Almost Gave Me a Heart Attack, But Turned Out to Be OK: How to Blow Up Barack Obama.   Turns out it’s about making a balloon sculpture that looks like the presidential hopeful.  Er, whew.

Hardest Working Web Creator on Veoh: Tyler Gibb, the man behind Minushi, an epic full-length animated movie (filled with giant robots!) that he’s somehow creating virtually singlehandedly.   Congrats, Tyler.  I hope you remembered the 20/20/20 Rule while making it.

Video That Made Me Laugh Even Though I Was Trying Not To: Road Trip! by the visionaries of Studio 8.  “These eggs aren’t fresh enough. We’re going to have to New York.”  Is that actually funny?  I’m not sure.  Maybe I’ve been watching too many of these videos.

Best Song Not on Veoh or American Idol: “A Dream Come to Life” by Veoh’s metrics guru and songwriter extraordinaire, Jeff Rosenfeld.   This masterwork was somehow overlooked in the recent Idol Songwriter contest, but it’s worth a listen.  Especially if you know Jeff, who is a usually pretty cynical, indie rock kind of guy. Especially if you know that it’s actually Jeff singing on the track. *

So there’s a couple clips (and one very moving song) to check out.   Have fun on Veoh, and don’t forget to check out our new homepage!

-Oliver

I want to recommend a few movies I found on Veoh through my News Feed. Just goes to show you the benefit of adding friends with good taste. They are only available to people in the U.S. and they won’t be around forever. So if you happen to be in the U.S. and you happen to be checking the blog today then you’re in luck. Enjoy these movies:

 As an ever-astute fan, you may have noticed big changes in the Veoh search experience over the last few months. We realize that the interests of our global users are as diverse as our video database is vast, and when you are itching to see a video, you want to find it fast!  Therefore, we have ramped up our efforts to help you find exactly what you want, when you want it.

Power search at your fingertips

Gone are the days of clicking back and forth to and from advanced search, memorization of elaborate query syntax, or mucking through 15 sites to find that one video. Controls for refining, expanding, and saving your searches are now only a mouse slide away:

Need for Speed: Search Unleashed

In addition, your may have encountered in recent days a certain je ne sais quoi while searching for your favorite videos. The results return faster, page errors appear less, and navigation between pages has become more seamless. Seemingly intangible, these are a just a few improvements resulting from the overhaul of our old search system to enable quicker searches through our exponentially growing index.

This is just the beginning. Along with suggestions from those of you posting on our forums, our new platform and page design lays down a sturdy foundation for many improvements to come! 

Dave, a Veoh user for seven months, has been creating a show called The Veoh Review. Joe (Our Staff Movie Review Guy) found The Veoh Review and shared it with me. I asked Dave if we could feature his reviews - thankfully Dave said yes so here we are. We’ve added Dave’s blog to our blogroll. Check out his latest review of Street Kings below:

The Veoh Movie Review by awsumdave

Keanu Reeves, Hugh Laurie, Forest Whitaker - these are just a few big names that are in this action-packed cop drama.  When I saw this movie, I had no idea what it was about.  I had never read or watched any reviews, trailers, anything.  The only thing I knew was there was a strong male cast in this film, and one friend of mine loved it. So what did I do? I felt spontaneous - I had to see a movie, and this one was calling out my name.

This movie is about a group of vigilante cops who take matters into their own hands when it comes to doing what they believe is right. When Keanu Reeve’s ex-partner is killed, he feels it’s his duty to find the killers and take justice into his own hands - even though his boss and colleagues urge him not to.  Reeves simply cannot put the death aside and let the killers go.  An ex-partner of Reeve’s character ends up ratting him out, which brings Hugh Laurie’s character into action. Laurie plays a cop who’s out to get dirty cops, especially Reeve’s character.

The movie was pretty good and kept me interested for the most part.  They even threw some nice twists in at the end.  So, I was pretty satisfied with the whole movie.  I give this 4 stars, and wouldn’t recommend this to anyone that has a light stomach.  There are some gruesome scenes.  Peace Out.

awsumdave

Online Videos by Veoh.com

If you’re paying attention (you know who you are) you’ve already noticed we introduced a new set of icons with our recent homepage launch. Check out your News Feed if you want to see the icons in action (Nothing in your News Feed? Invite some friends and start rating and commenting on videos.). The new icons are compliments of Mark James. See more of his work at FAMFAMFAM. Thanks Mark!

 Hey Hey,

For those of you who don’t know what day it is, step away from the computer for a little bit, go outside, hug a tree and take a deep breath. Ahhhhh… It’s Earth Day!

Online Videos by Veoh.com

In honor of Earth Day I wanted to share a few ways you can help keep Mother Earth beautiful.  You may be just one person, but even one person can impact the Earth in more ways than you think. Here are some things you can do to help:

1. If you don’t have somewhere far to go to, try riding your bike or walking more often.  You can help save energy, and your body will thank you for the health kick!
2. Try  using the Sun as natural light.
3. Avoid using toooooo much water like leaving the faucet on, or try making your showers shorter.
4. Plant some seeds/trees: Who doesn’t like oxygen?
5. Doing the 3 R’s: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle!

Also… Here are a few other Earth day videos from Veoh publishers:

Earth Day Special: DIY Gardening : Thread Banger

Tuesday April 22, 2008 : Earth Day : Rocketboom

ZapRoot 033 | Earth Day! China Declares War on Weather : ZapRoot

Stay Green!

Sophinie

By Sunny Gault, Executive Producer of Veoh’s original series, Viral.

It’s been a busy month for broadband awards. The Primetime Emmys wrapped up their submission deadlines, the Daytime Emmys announced their “new approaches” categories to include web and interactive content and The Webbys announced this year’s nominees and honorees.

The big question is… how important are these awards? Should internet content creators be in constant search of that special statue to place on their mantle?

As with most things in life- I don’t think the answer is simple. Instead, I think the answer depends on your goals and what you hope to accomplish by publishing to this new medium. As the producer of Veoh’s original series, Viral, my goal is to develop personal relationships with internet publishers by promoting their content on our show. Good storytelling and solid production values are very important to me, and it’s nice when people recognize our hard work. However, receiving an Emmy or a Webby isn’t going to make our show a success. But that doesn’t stop us from trying

Last year, Viral received two Webby nominations in the Variety and Reality categories. We lost. We then submitted Viral for a Broadband Emmy Award- and we lost there too. This year, the Webbys awarded us as an “official honoree” in the Variety category, which basically means “honorable mention”. After my initial disappointment (after all, we were the only show nominated for two categories last year), I decided to re-think the situation.

The internet is full of disappointment. Trying to figure out your format is hard enough, but then you have to worry about monetization and hits. Do we really need to worry about winning awards? Of course, not winning an award could make for some compelling content- as I recently learned from reading Cracked.com’s blog post on the subject. As with most Webby honorees, Cracked was not too happy about not getting a nomination. While I don’t agree with the concept of bashing your competition, the post itself deserves a Webby for pure entertainment value.

Let’s face it, winning awards is fun. Everyone loves compliments. And if getting those compliments helps you produce better internet content- then I’m all for it. If it’s all about ego, then you’re better off working in television.

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