Title says it all. Enjoy!
Well, here it is. My official 2nd project after Esha! Soooo, I know that the trailer said ‘January 2012′ (lol) but hey….sh*t happens. Really happy that this one is out though. This whole Keyz of Life project was a true labour of LOVE and this video is a culmination of that. Shouts to Burd from Burd & Keyz. I can only imagine what it must have been like to lose his best friend and production partner. I just hope Keyz is happy with what we did with the project. RIP my dude. Was an honour to have worked with you!
Thank you to EVERYONE that helped make this video happen. Really hope you enjoy it. Full credits under the hood.
#KEYZOFLIFE
Got a few projects lined up already for 2012 and this is the first one! For those that know me for my background in music / radio this is where my two worlds happily collide. “Faithful” is off an album I helped executive produce / engineer called Keyz of Life (in memory of Anthony “Durty Keyz” James from production duo Burd & Keyz). I never really thought I’d be doing music videos but this one kind of naturally came to be during the production of the album, so I went with it.
Shouts to all the great artists involved with Keyz of Life! You can download the entire album here: http://hulkshare.com/gf026sjq88ac.
What a learning experience this film has been for us! It was our first attempt at making a short film and after 7 film festivals and a year’s worth of promo I can definitely say that we’ve learned a lot more than what we expected going in. Was a great experience diving in to the film world in 2011 and I think I can speak for everyone here when I say that we are excited to take things to the next level in 2012!
Anywayas…here’s Esha in its entirety! Enjoy:).
My first official interview as a filmmaker. Shouts to Damon Campbell and everyone at HollyShorts for a great festival this year. Thanks for the hospitality and for giving new filmmakers a chance!
Check them out at http://www.hollyshorts.com!
Recorded August, 2011.
Is this real life? Shouts to David Devore.
NEW YORK — Muslims who change their names to sound more traditionally American, as immigrants have done for generations, or who adopt Arabic names as a sign of their faith are often investigated and catalogued in secret New York Police Department intelligence files, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press.
The NYPD monitors everyone in the city who changes his or her name, according to internal police documents and interviews. For those whose names sound Arabic or might be from Muslim countries, police run comprehensive background checks that include reviewing travel records, criminal histories, business licenses and immigration documents. All this is recorded in police databases for supervisors, who review the names and select a handful of people for police to visit.
The program was conceived as a tripwire for police in the difficult hunt for homegrown terrorists, where there are no widely agreed upon warning signs. Like other NYPD intelligence programs created in the past decade, this one involved monitoring behavior protected by the First Amendment.
Was forwarded this article from a friend and had to post it up here as it’s so relevant to what Esha is about. Via The Vancouver Sun.
VANCOUVER — If your name is Alison Johnson or Matthew Wilson, an inventive national study suggests you could do better in the job market than if you go by Min Liu, Samir Sharma or Lukas Minsopoulos.
A comprehensive survey of employers in Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto has discovered that job applicants with English-sounding names have a much better chance of receiving a callback than if they have Chinese, Indian or Greek names. Released Friday, the report, titled “Why do some employers prefer to interview Matthew, but not Samir?” is based on employers’ response rate to thousands of online job applications.
The study, supported by Metropolis B.C., a federally funded diversity-research agency, was conducted to find out why recent immigrants are struggling much more in the Canadian job market than immigrants in the 1970s did. To test possible discrimination by human resource officials in Canada’s largest and most multi-ethnic cities, researchers sent dozens of employers identical resumes — changing only the name of the applicant.
On average, University of Toronto researchers Philip Oreopoulos and Diane Decheif found that resumes featuring English names were more than 35 per cent more likely to receive a callback than a resume featuring Chinese, Indian or Greek names. Of the three cities surveyed in 2010, however, the study discovered Metro Vancouver employers, both large and small, were the least swayed by the ethnicity of applicants’ names.
In Vancouver, resumes featuring English names were just 20 per cent more inclined to get a callback than those with Chinese or Indian names. The Metropolis B.C. study is the first of its kind to cover ethnic hiring practices in three major Canadian cities, as well as to quiz recruiters about why they make their hiring decisions. It also suggests ways to combat possible bias.
The researchers interviewed time-pressed Canadian employers who told them they were highly concerned that job applicants with foreign backgrounds would have inadequate English-language and social skills for the Canadian marketplace. But the researchers also suspect many recruiters, who they found fearful of making a “bad hire” in a tough economic climate, were making many decisions based on “subconscious” ethnic discrimination.
“It should not be overlooked that many recruiters are clearly concerned that immigrants may lack critical language skills for performing well on the job,” concluded Oreopoulos and Decheif. “It appears that many employers’ unconditional concerns are based on real productivity worries. (However) we cannot rule out that the stated reasons for discrimination belie underlying prejudice.”
The researchers theorized that name-based discrimination may well be a factor in Canada, since recruiters did not seem to improve their callback rates if resumes emphasized that applicants with Chinese, Indian or Greek-sounding names were fluent in English or French and a mother tongue.
The extensive study for Metropolis B.C., whose federal funding will run out this year, was conducted by having researchers respond to online job ads in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver. Each sample resume said that the applicant had a bachelor’s degree and four to six years’ experience.
In a related test of Canadian hiring practices involving immigrants, the researchers sent out a series of virtually identical resumes to company recruiters — changing only the country in which the applicant had job experience. “We find that employers value Canadian experience more than Canadian education when deciding to interview applicants with international backgrounds, suggesting that employers are more interested in internationally born applicants with more Canadian experience,” wrote Oreopoulos and Decheif.
Recognizing the importance employers place on good language and communication skills, the report recommends that recruiters find ways to efficiently assess an applicant’s English or French — including by making quick phone calls to see if an interview would be worthwhile.
To counter possible ethnic discrimination in hiring, the authors also suggested that hard-pressed recruiters “consider masking names on applications before making initial interview decisions.”
This is so cool! Well, not to say that the other festivals weren’t cool (lol) but this will be our first official festival selection in Europe! Big THANKS to everyone at the festival for selecting Esha!
River to River takes place December 2nd-8th in Florence, Italy. Check out more info on the festival on their official website!
BRAVA!!!
A festival for film trailers. Who woulda thunk it…???
Well, we’re in it! Why not right? Trailer in question is above:). Here’s all the info on the festival!
As we move!!!
Really looking forward to this screening because it’s kinda like a free focus group (lol). Basically, they screen films every month and then do a live (and taped) discussion with the audience to get their feedback about what they thought about the film. Being a brand new filmmaker this is HUGE for me because the more we can learn from each audience the better. I mean, huge movies with huge budgets and huge directors and huge actors do this kind of stuff all the time. They’ll play an edit of the movie for an audience, get their feedback and based on their reactions either re-work what they’ve got or continue on as planned. So yea…def looking forward to hear what the crowd has to say and am open to any feedback (positive or negative). Here’s an example of how it all goes down…
Anyways…the screening is September 24th at 7pm at the NFB theatre (150 John St.)!
Our mandate for 2011 is to make all the events FREE for everyone. So if know anyone in the Toronto area, make sure you tell them to go to www.wildsound.ca and RSVP their ticket.
