budget Archives — NYCPPNEWS

Snakes & Funerals

This week we hear about how the economy affects Hollywood, why we get more of the same from TV, and a technology ideal for shooting snakes and funerals.

The Past Week in Review, for April 4, 2011

The news today includes proliferating VJs, enchanting marimba sounds, and how we’ll all be using Cloud apps real soon…

MOFTB Hits Productions with Added $300 Fee

Up until now, no one has had to pay for a permit since the city established a film office in 1966.

Free Money

Well, not quite of course. Maybe I should have used “Getting Money Out of the Government”.

New eBook Aims to Help Save Money by Leveraging Film Tax Credits Etc

But gathering all the relevant info about what’s being offered–and just how to take advantage of the credit–can be difficult.

Tax Breaks Every Small Business Owner Should Know About

The Business Insider has a breezy but possibly useful look at new tax breaks cooked up last year. Aimed at small businesses, these are part of The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 .

You Knew This Already, but NYC Film Industry Second Only to California

Currently, Albany must decide whether or not to extend the tax credits and whether to expand them as Gov. Paterson wants to.

NYC Business Express Offers Biz Tool for Entrepreneurs

Mayor Bloomberg and the Department of Small Business Services Commissioner Robert W. Walsh announced today a new online app that is aimed at helping entrepreneurs find the best way through the often-bewildering thicket of city government on up. NYC Business Express offers a one stop, interactive method for identifying and taking advantage of city, state […]

City Council Pledges Tech Industry Support

…one initiative–NYC High-Tech Connect–will help connect inventors with investors, workspaces, and other resources.

Unhappy with New Permit Fee

“the new $3200 fee levied on companies filming inside municipally owned buildings is drawing complaints…”

Kami Asgar and Jessica Parks are post-production heavyweights who work with major studios, namely Sony. As a sound designer (Asgar) and as a post executive (Parks), their collective resume touches on everything from Apocalypto to Grandma’s Boy to Venom.

Parks has recently shifted her focus from supervisor to hands-on sound design, and we talk about how it’s never too late to pivot on your career path and find the thing you love doing wherever you are in life.

Click on this link to read the rest of the article on No Film School’s site.

The coronavirus relief package that Congressional leaders agreed to this week includes grant money that many small proprietors described as a last hope for survival.

For the music venue owners, theater producers and cultural institutions that have suffered through the pandemic with no business, the coronavirus relief package that Congress passed on Monday night offers the prospect of aid at last.

To read the full article on The New York Times’ site, click here.

Phase 4 production guidance is available on the Film Permit website. All production activity, whether it requires a Film Permit or not, must comply with New York Forward Industry Guidance.

For more information see, please refer to the State Department of Health’s Interim Guidance for Media Production During the COVID-19 Public Health Emergency. Please review the guidelines and FAQ before submitting permit applications. The Film Office is operating remotely, so please allow additional time for Film Permit processing.

The above paragraphs contain links to the various FAQ – just mouse over the relevant words.

NVIDIA Research has invented a way to use AI to dramatically reduce video call bandwidth while simultaneously improving quality

What the researchers have achieved has remarkable results: by replacing the traditional h.264 video codec with a neural network, they have managed to reduce the required bandwidth for a video call by an order of magnitude. In one example, the required data rate fell from 97.28 KB/frame to a measly 0.1165 KB/frame – a reduction to 0.1% of required bandwidth.

To read the rest of this article on Petapixel, click this link.

Law360 (October 9, 2020, 5:22 PM EDT) — The Motion Picture Industry Health Plan’s board can’t be sued under ERISA for allegedly flouting its duties when it relaxed plan rules in response to COVID-19, a California federal judge has ruled, nixing a proposed class action filed by two cinematographers who still couldn’t qualify for benefits.

In an order entered Thursday, U.S. District Judge R. Gary Klausner granted the board of directors’ motion to dismiss Greg Endries and Dee Nichols’ Employee Retirement Income Security Act suit accusing board members of breaching their duty to treat all plan participants fairly.

Endries and Nichols, members of Local 600 of the International Cinematographers Guild, said in July that the board left them and others “out in the cold” in its attempts to address the problems COVID-19 caused for plan participants.

But Judge Klausner agreed with the board’s contention that the case, which alleged a fiduciary breach, should be tossed because plan administrators don’t act as fiduciaries when they amend health care plans.

Read the full article on the Law360 site by clicking here.

Anthony Russo and Joseph Russo photographed at the PMC Studio in Los Angeles for the Variety Playback Podcast.

The Russo brothers, directors of the all-time top grossing film “Avengers: Endgame,” quietly secured a roughly $50 million cash infusion for their production company AGBO from Saudi Arabia earlier this year, multiple sources tell Variety.

In a deal brokered and closed at the beginning of the pandemic, the Russos received the investment from an undisclosed Saudi bank in exchange for a minority stake in the brothers’ Los Angeles-based shop.