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Today’s media landscape is radically changing along with the platforms we use to consume it. We are choosing to interact on our computers, phones and game consoles, along with an ever-increasing supply of film, music, games and social media. This division of audiences in to smaller groups supporting more media sources is called “audience fragmentation.” Fragmented, audiences have become the new gold rush for independent content producers and companies skilled at connecting the dots in the rapidly transforming digital and wireless space.
Pixofactor Entertainment, is at the edge of these new trends. President Sean Hurwitz said, “I think with the new social and digital media it’s an opportunity in today’s world to reach hundreds of millions of people on several different platforms from the mobile space the internet and other digital download opportunities.”
In September 2009, Pixofactor Entertainment set up shop in Royal Oak, Mi. The company focuses on digital games and animation for the plethora of digital platforms, and on animating graphic novels, and comic books. Some of Pixofactor’s current projects include converting a graphic novel Hunter, which is being made into a feature film and to full length episodic television shows, and a Ben Hogan Wii game and interactive DVD to be distributed worldwide.
“The social phenomenon is an interesting point to discuss, where for the first time ever, the technology allows us to interact on a playful level with people all over the world,” said Hurwitz. “I think this started with the MMO (massively multiplayer online game), and then stretched across all demographics from kids to older adults. The content has changed also, so it’s not just a war game that you’re playing…it becomes building farms and kids playing with each other’s penguins and they don’t even have to be in the same room.
Many media content developers and existing brands are paying attention to this emerging interactive phenomenon and are seeking ways to profit from it.
Hurwitz said, “The other side of this is being able to bring known brands that we are used to only seeing in a movie theatre – or on a breakfast cereal – or on a Saturday morning cartoon, to being able to interact socially with that universally known brand.”
Pixofactor fills a void where many giant developers prefer to have others do work for them. “[Large developers] have recognized there is this other opportunity through social and viral networking and marketing to monetize the same content they were developing anyway,” Hurwitz said. “So the opportunity for companies like Pixofactor is: Sony doesn’t want to do it; THQ doesn’t want to do it; UniSoft doesn’t want to do it -- but they know they have to do it. Now they see an opportunity to continue to brand and franchise their intellectual properties. There is a social audience and we believe we are becoming experts at how to monetize and develop that content.”
Pixofactor is the first company of its kind testing the Michigan film tax credit’s applicability to this booming new area. “We are working directly with the film office to help them understand what this medium is all about and we believe it will be a huge factor moving forward in bringing many jobs to the state and helping Pixofactor grow, helping local investors benefit from it, and ultimately the reason why the incentive was put in place in 2008 was to create jobs and economy here in Michigan.”
The company has created 20 jobs so far and, “look to grow feverishly over the next couple of years” said Hurwitz. “We are an art studio as well as a game programming studio so we look for coders and programmers, on the gaming side. On the art side, we are looking for artists and animators - 2d and 3d artists that Michigan is heavy on.” Pixofactor is hoping to provide hundreds of jobs in the next few years.
I think it will continue to grow,” said Hurwitz. “The ability to download content on the mobile and the internet and as larger content – movies or video games – are able to be accessed much faster through the broader digital platforms, I think it will only increase. Any type of product-- whether its entertainment content or any form of media-- is so easily accessed across all of these platforms that I think we are just tipping the iceberg right now.
Sony’s film Salt, which featured Angelina Jolie as a N.Y. based Russian Spy, is a high profile example of the multi platform strategy, Sean Hurwitz described. A couple of months prior to the picture opening in theatres, Sony launched an interactive online spy game “Day X Exists” developed by Australian company Hoodlum with Facebook interactivity and a mobile phone element. Salt gained an added boost by the real life arrests of a N.Y. based Russian spy just weeks prior to the film’s release.
“Viral is not a new concept – viral is not a new idea – technology is accelerating the viral phenomenon,” said Hurwitz. “The key to viral is how you monetize the audience.”
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