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The Darklight Digital Film Festival has teamed up with one of Ireland’s leading providers of digital entertainment, Wildwave; to launch a new movie channel for 3G mobile phones entitled The Wildlight Channel.
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The Wildlight Channel will showcase fresh and original short-form film content from around the
world. The channel is initially aimed at 3G phones and will feature animations and live-action
shorts that are particularly suited to small screens and a mobile audience.
“We see a young audience who are mobile and consume media in a fragmented and on-demand
style. This audience is watching less and less TV, preferring to spend time gaming, on
the internet and increasingly, on their mobile phones. We want to provide content that connects
with this audience.” says Stephen McCormack, CEO of Wildwave and Chairman of the
Wildlight Channel, “We believe that there is a demand for innovative and entertaining films that
people can relate to.” he adds.
The Wildlight Channel has signed up an impressive catalogue of films from leading distributors
and filmmakers from around the world. Current partners that The Wildlight Channel are working
with include Billy Blob, Edinburgh Mediabase, Monster Distributes, Network Television
Ireland, Ferret Features, D.A.D.D.Y, Delicious9, Hurric Films, Bord Scannán na hÉireann/The
Irish Film Board, MacBoy and over 100 filmmakers from around the world and features a wide
range of films, from Sundance Winners to Oscar nominees to viral web animations.
“The Darklight Film Festival has built up an excellent relationship with filmmakers and production
companies over its six year history and is recognised as one of the pioneering festivals of
its type in the world. This has given us a tremendous head start in acquiring content for the
Channel.” says Nicky Gogan, Director of the Darklight Film Festival and President of The Wildlight
Channel. “ We have found that the goodwill attached to Darklight Festival translates directly
to the channel, as filmmakers and distributors like to work with a team they can trust, in
this new territory.” continues Ms. Gogan.
The Wildlight Channel is currently in advanced discussions with mobile operators and expects
to announce distribution deals for carrying the channel on 3G networks in the coming weeks.
The channel is expected to go live in Ireland initially, followed shortly after by the UK and North
America. It is envisioned that the channel will operate on a Video-on-Demand model at first,
offering ten to fifteen films a month for download or stream and will later include a “Live
Stream” continuous 3G channel offering.
Each film will be in the 1-5 minute range. Pricing is expected to be on an operator by operator basis, with subscription being the preferred model.
“Because it is very early in the development of mobile video, the optimum lengths of what
people will watch are still unknown, so we are keeping the films below five minutes for now
and will asses this on an ongoing basis as people get more comfortable with the medium.”
says Mr. McCormack, “ We are on mission to find the ideal type of content for mobile users.
We intend to try lots of styles and genres to see what works and what is popular. Not unlike
Television in the 1950s, this is a young medium searching for the right content that plays to its
strengths.The Wildlight Channel is confident that it has the right content for this medium” he
adds.
