A few pics from Comic-Con. Then I’m going cold turkey.

Our Xbox Original Content panel filled the conference hall, drawing an overcapacity crowd of 800 fans. Admittedly, I was nervous as to the reaction we’d get when we showed the trailers. There might not be a more discriminating mob than a packed Comic-Con crowd. When you’re partnering with the Imperial Microsoft and half of your audience is dressed as Jedi Knights with the intergalactic obligation to uphold the standards and practices of the Rebellion, you don’t know what to expect. Much to my relief, the crowd embraced the shows and the filmmakers. It was a great event. (more…)

Today, Safran Digital went public with the details of our partnership with Xbox. In particular, we’ve announced the directors for our slate of original web video pilots, which launch this fall to coincide with Xbox’s user-interface redesign.

The directors involved include James Wan (Saw, Death Sentence), David Slade (30 Days of Night, Hard Candy), James Gunn (Slither), Lucky McKee (May), Andrew Douglas (The Amityville Horror) and Marcus Nispel (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Friday the 13th).

I’m extremely proud of the filmmakers and their camps, the deal we’ve put together and what I believe it represents for the future of digital content economics. (more…)

If you’re involved with coordinating a promotion at next week’s San Diego Comic-Con, or you’ve ever been married, you know what it’s like to be on deadline at the nexus of a perfect storm of interwoven, critical dependencies that bear heavily upon your future state of happiness.

I’ve been married three times and been to Comic-Con once I’ve been to Comic-Con three times and married once, but it dawned on me today that putting together an event for the granddaddy of all entertainment conventions is analogous to the scheduling nightmare that is wedding planning. (more…)