Best Movies
From one of the co-founders of Pixar Animation Studios—the Academy Award–winning studio behind Coco, Inside Out, and Toy Story —comes an incisive book about creativity in business and leadership for readers of Daniel Pink, Tom Peters, and Chip and Dan Heath. NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER | NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The Huffington Post • Financial Times • Success • Inc. • Library Journal “[ Creativity, Inc. ]. just might be the most thoughtful management book ever.”— Fast Company Creativity, Inc. is a book for managers who want to lead their employees to new heights, a manual for anyone who strives for originality, and the first-ever, all-access trip into the nerve center of Pixar Animation—into the meetings, postmortems, and “Braintrust” sessions where some of the most successful films in history are made. It is, at heart, a book about how to build a creative culture—but it is also, as Pixar co-founder and president Ed Catmull writes, “an expression of the ideas that I believe make the best in us possible.”. Praise for Creativity, Inc. “Over more than thirty years, Ed Catmull has developed methods to root out and destroy the barriers to creativity, to marry creativity to the pursuit of excellence, and, most impressive, to sustain a culture of disciplined creativity during setbacks and success.” —Jim Collins, co-author of Built to Last and author of Good to Great “Too often, we seek to keep the status quo working. “Just might be the best business book ever written.” — Forbes “Achieving enormous success while holding fast to the highest artistic standards is a nice trick—and Pixar, with its creative leadership and persistent commitment to innovation, has pulled it off. Any reader of Creativity, Inc., Catmull’s new book on the art of running creative companies, will have to agree. Catmull, president of both Pixar and Walt Disney Animation, has written what just might be the most thoughtful management book ever.” — Fast Company “It’s one thing to be creative; it’s entirely another—and much more rare—to build a great and creative culture. Over more than thirty years, Ed Catmull has developed methods to root out and destroy the barriers to creativity, to marry creativity to the pursuit of excellence, and, most impressive, to sustain a culture of disciplined creativity during setbacks and success. Catmull’s book is quickly becoming the latest bible for the show business crowd.” —The New York Times “The most practical and deep book ever written by a practitioner on the topic of innovation.” —Prof. [Catmull] uses Pixar’s triumphs and near-disasters to outline a system for managing people in creative businesses—one in which candid criticism is delivered sensitively, while individuality and autonomy are not strangled by a robotic corporate culture.” — Financial Times “A wonderful new book . An immensely readable and rewarding book that will challenge and inspire readers to make their workplaces hotbeds of creativity.” — Kirkus Reviews (starred review) “Punctuated with surprising tales of how the company’s films were developed and the company’s financial struggles, Catmull shares insights about harnessing talent, creating teams, protecting the creative process, candid communications, organizational structures, alignment, and the importance of storytelling. [ Creativity, Inc. ] will delight and inspire creative individuals and their managers, as well as anyone who wants to work ‘in an environment that fosters creativity and problem solving.’” — Publishers Weekly (starred review) “For anyone managing anything, and particularly those trying to manage creative teams, Catmull is like a kind, smart godfather guiding us toward managing wisely, without losing our souls, and in a way that works toward greatness. What Ed Catmull shares instead is his astute experience that creativity isn’t strictly a well of ideas, but an alchemy of people. In Creativity, Inc. Ed reveals, with commonsense specificity and honesty, examples of how not to get in your own way and how to realize a creative coalescence of art, business, and innovation.” —George Lucas “This is the best book ever written on what it takes to build a creative organization. Ed Catmull is co-founder of Pixar Animation Studios and president of Pixar Animation and Disney Animation.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Managers, as well as anyone who wants to better understand how companies work and what elements are necessary to make and keep them successful, will appreciate Catmull’s insight on leadership, nurturing creative environment, and protecting it from invisible threats. After reading the book, I constantly find myself quoting the concepts and examples described there when talking to my husband or friends about their jobs or my own and discussing what works, what doesn’t, and why."
"Ed shared several amusing experiences creating these magnificent movies to illustrate management concepts."
"Mr. Catmull presents an impressive analysis of how corporate culture can negatively impact creativity, even when corporate leaders proclaim their support for creativity and truly believe they are doing everything they can to foster and support it."
"Whether you're just a Pixar fan, or you're looking for ways to improve your company, you can't go wrong with this book."
"It tells of how the company was formed and the various challenges and changes along the way as well as how the people in charge are constantly attempting to maintain Pixar as a separate entity from Disney after being purchased by the latter while fixing Disney's animation studios and making Disney a world class entity itself."
"The book is definitely about creativity and the creative process, but it's equally about business and management."
From the actor who somehow lived through it all, a “sharply detailed…funny book about a cinematic comedy of errors” ( The New York Times ): the making of the cult film phenomenon The Room . But more than just a riotously funny story about cinematic hubris, “ The Disaster Artist is one of the most honest books about friendship I’ve read in years” ( Los Angeles Times ). The Room, a 2003 film written, directed, and starring the inscrutable Tommy Wiseau, was massively and enthusiastically lambasted by critics, proclaimed by some as the worst movie ever made (an insult, some movie fans might say, to Ed Wood’s Plan 9 from Outer Space). But it’s also the story of a very interesting friendship between Sestero and Wiseau (who knew each other for several years before The Room), and the story of an enigmatic and incredibly self-absorbed man who, in making his film, seemed to be trying to exorcise a troubled past and build an entirely new version of himself.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Greg Sestero has done something fantastic. I think as fans we sometimes forget that these characters we see onscreen (and yell insults to on countless midnight screenings) are portrayed by actual human beings, separate from their characters. Without this book I would never have known that I've memorized The Room better than Tommy Wiseau."
"I most disliked the file's poor audio quality, especially the very-poor-quality "This is Audible" tags on the book's beginning and ending, which shouldn't even be there, and which soured my whole experience. My absolute best-case scenario is lossless audio, like .wav or whatever file format it was originally recorded in (so long as it's not really obscure or proprietary or something), presumably/hopefully at a sample rate 48 or more kHz and a bit depth of 16 or more (one hopes)—basically a full-quality final edit of the file or files—which is why I prefer to buy audiobooks on CD. I got this sad excuse for an audiobook because I wanted to give Audible another chance, for their sheer monopolostic pervasiveness. The only thing I like about the file is it's in Audible's house format, .aax, i.e. .m4a or maybe .m4b?, with chapter markers, a handy feature in itself but one which is also genuinely helpful for navigating an audiobook."
"The book sheds insight on the friendship between Tommy and Greg while also adding also providing details of the production of The Room."
"Kooky, weird and touching, it tells the now infamous story of the making of The Room, that wonderfully terrible film that has now become a cult classic."
"Once I found out Franco was making this movie I wanted to know more."
"There is no making sense of "The Room," and little likelihood of understanding Tommy Wiseau -- but this is a fascinating, funny, and oddly moving revelation of how the Worst Serious Movie Ever Made was actually put together in all its glorious awfulnesd."
"This book is amazing I read it cover-to-cover in like two days I couldn't put it down watching the movie The Room is a experience all on its own but the things you discover in this book make the film even more obscure."
"What an incredibly fun read!"
No one better understands how all the elements of a screenplay fit together, and no one is better qualified to explain the "magic" of story construction and the relationship between structure and character than Robert McKee. ") In Story , McKee puts into book form what he has been teaching screenwriters for years in his seminar on story structure, which is considered by many to be a prerequisite to the film biz. In it, McKee offers so much sound advice, drawing from sources as wide ranging as Aristotle and Casablanca , Stanislavski and Chinatown , that it is impossible not to come away feeling immeasurably better equipped to write a screenplay and infinitely more inspired to write a brilliant one. "In difficult periods of writing, I often turn to Robert McKee's wonderful book for guidance" -- -- Dominick Dunne, Novelist. "McKee is the Stanislavski of writing." "to the people who write, direct and produce for Hollywood - or desperately wish they did - Bob McKee is a cross between E. F. Hutton and Sun Myung Moon.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Writing fiction is an incredibly personal experience, so to be clear I'm not saying that people who love this book as a writing how-to are wrong. I think if you have a certain mindset or approach to writing, this book will be extremely helpful to you. Some fiction writers employ a very methodical, intellectual approach, putting stories together like watchmakers carefully constructing a complex timepiece, creating detailed outlines first and using them as blueprints to build their stories. Some writers employ a more organic, intuitive approach, where creating a story is an unstructured process of discovery (the so-called "pantsers", because they work from "the seat of their pants"). Like I said earlier, if your writing mindset and approach are on the same wavelength as what McKee teaches, this is gonna be awesome for you and you're going to love it. But if you go about putting McKee's tools into practice and it just doesn't work for you, or you're simply not that kind of writer to begin with, don't panic if it feels like your brain has been taken over by McKee for a while."
"Engaging, in-depth exploration of what makes a good story, showing such an impressive wealth of knowledge and experience."
"Very inspiring for a new 'wannabe' author like me."
"Must read for anyone writing screenplays, novels, or stories of any kind."
"Story covers all elements of fictional script writing; themes, structure, design, dialog, and characterization; yet McKee dives so deep into each that any reader will be left with new profound ideas about the meaning of script writing."
"The writing is yours, but in McKee's Story you will find everything you need to understand about structure and deepening your thinking in relation to the construction of values, characters, conflicts and rythms of a good story."
"Better material than going to college for it."
"Good book for those who desire to make films.."
Best Amateur Movie & Video Production
Simple Guide to Over-the-Air Free TV sets itself apart by providing non-techs with over 110 pages of useful cord cutting information and a step-by-step guide to successful cord cutting. Simple Guide to Over-the-Air Free TV explains how supplementing OTA TV with streaming media players like the Roku 4, Amazon Fire TV and Chromecast, in combination with streaming media services like Netflix, Hulu, Showtime, HBO Now, Amazon Video and Sling TV, can create personalized, inexpensive options to bundled cable or satellite programming packages. If you are looking for a straightforward how-to manual to help you cut the cord, read Simple Guide to Over-the-Air Free TV and to learn how to save money and start enjoying TV on your terms today!
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I've already ordered a Mohu antenna which will have a trial run next week in my son's apartment."
"Roku 3 love the free "Crackle" channel; 3. Subscription to SlingTV (may upgrade to add HBO when that becomes available) and took advantage of their free Roku Stick offer (for MIL's TV)."
"I was thinking I wished someone had written something like this as I was crawling through the options one by one - and lucky for me, someone did."
"Applying the ideas in this book and purchasing some of the suggested products for two different homes has ended up saving a total of $2640 per year in Cable TV cost."
"Great, short overview of one way to simplify your life and still get what you need."
"Well written and informative in a language that makes it easy to understand."
"An excellent book for anyone who is considering going to a over the air antenna or who is interested in lowering the cost of TV."
"For the total newcomer to OTA use it provides many insights and links to more information."
Best Movie & Video Direction & Production
From one of the co-founders of Pixar Animation Studios—the Academy Award–winning studio behind Coco, Inside Out, and Toy Story —comes an incisive book about creativity in business and leadership for readers of Daniel Pink, Tom Peters, and Chip and Dan Heath. NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER | NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The Huffington Post • Financial Times • Success • Inc. • Library Journal “[ Creativity, Inc. ]. just might be the most thoughtful management book ever.”— Fast Company Creativity, Inc. is a book for managers who want to lead their employees to new heights, a manual for anyone who strives for originality, and the first-ever, all-access trip into the nerve center of Pixar Animation—into the meetings, postmortems, and “Braintrust” sessions where some of the most successful films in history are made. It is, at heart, a book about how to build a creative culture—but it is also, as Pixar co-founder and president Ed Catmull writes, “an expression of the ideas that I believe make the best in us possible.”. Praise for Creativity, Inc. “Over more than thirty years, Ed Catmull has developed methods to root out and destroy the barriers to creativity, to marry creativity to the pursuit of excellence, and, most impressive, to sustain a culture of disciplined creativity during setbacks and success.” —Jim Collins, co-author of Built to Last and author of Good to Great “Too often, we seek to keep the status quo working. “Just might be the best business book ever written.” — Forbes “Achieving enormous success while holding fast to the highest artistic standards is a nice trick—and Pixar, with its creative leadership and persistent commitment to innovation, has pulled it off. Any reader of Creativity, Inc., Catmull’s new book on the art of running creative companies, will have to agree. Catmull, president of both Pixar and Walt Disney Animation, has written what just might be the most thoughtful management book ever.” — Fast Company “It’s one thing to be creative; it’s entirely another—and much more rare—to build a great and creative culture. Over more than thirty years, Ed Catmull has developed methods to root out and destroy the barriers to creativity, to marry creativity to the pursuit of excellence, and, most impressive, to sustain a culture of disciplined creativity during setbacks and success. Catmull’s book is quickly becoming the latest bible for the show business crowd.” —The New York Times “The most practical and deep book ever written by a practitioner on the topic of innovation.” —Prof. [Catmull] uses Pixar’s triumphs and near-disasters to outline a system for managing people in creative businesses—one in which candid criticism is delivered sensitively, while individuality and autonomy are not strangled by a robotic corporate culture.” — Financial Times “A wonderful new book . An immensely readable and rewarding book that will challenge and inspire readers to make their workplaces hotbeds of creativity.” — Kirkus Reviews (starred review) “Punctuated with surprising tales of how the company’s films were developed and the company’s financial struggles, Catmull shares insights about harnessing talent, creating teams, protecting the creative process, candid communications, organizational structures, alignment, and the importance of storytelling. [ Creativity, Inc. ] will delight and inspire creative individuals and their managers, as well as anyone who wants to work ‘in an environment that fosters creativity and problem solving.’” — Publishers Weekly (starred review) “For anyone managing anything, and particularly those trying to manage creative teams, Catmull is like a kind, smart godfather guiding us toward managing wisely, without losing our souls, and in a way that works toward greatness. What Ed Catmull shares instead is his astute experience that creativity isn’t strictly a well of ideas, but an alchemy of people. In Creativity, Inc. Ed reveals, with commonsense specificity and honesty, examples of how not to get in your own way and how to realize a creative coalescence of art, business, and innovation.” —George Lucas “This is the best book ever written on what it takes to build a creative organization. Ed Catmull is co-founder of Pixar Animation Studios and president of Pixar Animation and Disney Animation.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Managers, as well as anyone who wants to better understand how companies work and what elements are necessary to make and keep them successful, will appreciate Catmull’s insight on leadership, nurturing creative environment, and protecting it from invisible threats. After reading the book, I constantly find myself quoting the concepts and examples described there when talking to my husband or friends about their jobs or my own and discussing what works, what doesn’t, and why."
"This book has radically altered all of my pre-existing views about what it means to be creative, to strive for quality, to lead a team, and to be passionate and persevere in the face of obstacles."
"Ed shared several amusing experiences creating these magnificent movies to illustrate management concepts."
"Mr. Catmull presents an impressive analysis of how corporate culture can negatively impact creativity, even when corporate leaders proclaim their support for creativity and truly believe they are doing everything they can to foster and support it."
"Whether you're just a Pixar fan, or you're looking for ways to improve your company, you can't go wrong with this book."
"It was about the things in this book."
Best Movie & Video Guides & Reviews
Never able to support himself from earnings as author and editor, Lovecraft saw commercial success increasingly elude him in this latter period, partly because he lacked the confidence and drive to promote himself. The foreword by Leslie S. Klinger is a highly informative history of the horror genre and a trenchant summary of Lovecraft’s life, all of which preface the primary section of this giant book, a presentation of 22 of Lovecraft’s most significant stories, each fully annotated with identifications of people and places, definitions of unfamiliar vocabulary, and background explanations of mentioned literary works. --Brad Hooper “Annotator Les Klinger is the man you want to have by your side, as you explore the Lovecraftian Darkness.”. - Neil Gaiman “ The New Annotated H. P. Lovecraft , with its astonishingly informed and detailed notes and photographs, edited by Leslie S. Klinger, is a treasure trove for Lovecraft readers, for whom it will be an essential purchase.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I wish Donovon Loucks could get a similarly sized book for his collection of photos of Lovecraftian geography. Everyone is a person of their times, and the historical context given in the author's lengthy introduction was quite valuable, often skipped over in collections of Lovecraft's stories. There is no apology for Lovecraft's racism here; in fact, it is painstakingly shown how HPL's personal views may have ruined any hope of his marriage succeeding, and how they informed a great deal of his fiction. Having said that, I am glad that, for the most part, this volume uses Joshi's corrected text for the stories, so that some egregious errors are not perpetuated. Mr. Klinger has his reasons of course, but for pity's sake, why include the entire text of "Herbert West, Reanimator?" Why not include "The Terrible Old Man" or "The Strange High House on the Mist" or "The Cats of Ulthar?" Surely "Pickman's Model," "The Music of Erich Zann" and "The Outsider" merited inclusion."
"Also the book is very heavy and backward to hold - you really need to be sitting at a desk or a table while reading it."
"But they told me this book has more notes and details inside."
"Very nice, oversized edition."
"Very interesting insights- love the annotations & updated forward by Klinger that contextualizes the collection."
"Don't buy this if your looking for the annotated edition."
Best Movie & Video History & Criticism
From the actor who somehow lived through it all, a “sharply detailed…funny book about a cinematic comedy of errors” ( The New York Times ): the making of the cult film phenomenon The Room . But more than just a riotously funny story about cinematic hubris, “ The Disaster Artist is one of the most honest books about friendship I’ve read in years” ( Los Angeles Times ). The Room, a 2003 film written, directed, and starring the inscrutable Tommy Wiseau, was massively and enthusiastically lambasted by critics, proclaimed by some as the worst movie ever made (an insult, some movie fans might say, to Ed Wood’s Plan 9 from Outer Space). But it’s also the story of a very interesting friendship between Sestero and Wiseau (who knew each other for several years before The Room), and the story of an enigmatic and incredibly self-absorbed man who, in making his film, seemed to be trying to exorcise a troubled past and build an entirely new version of himself.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Greg Sestero has done something fantastic. I think as fans we sometimes forget that these characters we see onscreen (and yell insults to on countless midnight screenings) are portrayed by actual human beings, separate from their characters. Without this book I would never have known that I've memorized The Room better than Tommy Wiseau."
"Kooky, weird and touching, it tells the now infamous story of the making of The Room, that wonderfully terrible film that has now become a cult classic."
"There is no making sense of "The Room," and little likelihood of understanding Tommy Wiseau -- but this is a fascinating, funny, and oddly moving revelation of how the Worst Serious Movie Ever Made was actually put together in all its glorious awfulnesd."
"This book is amazing I read it cover-to-cover in like two days I couldn't put it down watching the movie The Room is a experience all on its own but the things you discover in this book make the film even more obscure."
"What an incredibly fun read!"
"When I read that Greg Sestero was writing a book about his experiences working on the movie's production, I thought it would be a book full of behind the scenes disasters and stories about the film's director, Tommy Wiseau. This book is fascinating and enlightening, and anyone interested in film should read it."
"Like many people out there, I was sucked in by the myth of the famously bad movie The Room."
"As a huge fan of "The Room," I went into this book expecting to hear a first-hand account of the wackiness that must have occurred while filming and maybe a little inside info on Tommy Wiseau. In a way, Greg Sestero has created the moving, raw, true-to-life biography that "The Room" was supposed to be. Also, the book is informative and interesting as it follows Greg through the excruciating process of trying to make it as an actor in LA."
Best Movie & Video Reference
Widely acknowledged as the “bible” of video and film production, and used in courses around the world, The Filmmaker’s Handbook is now updated with the latest advances in HD and new digital formats. Billed as the authoritative guide to filmmaking from fundraising to distribution, the book achieves this in clear, accessible language using current up-to-date information. A gilt-edged investment for aspiring and beginning filmmakers and it would not be out of place in the libraries of experienced professionals either.”—James MacGregor, Netribution.co.uk. No matter what corner of the subject I poked into, looking for cogent explanations, the Handbook passed with flying colors. So please accept my admiration, appreciation and thanks.”—Pat Jackson, Associate Professor, San Francisco State University; Emmy-winning Supervising Sound Editor. Edward Pincus was a director of many films, including The Axe in the Attic and One Cut, One Life.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I feel like film school won't be worth the money by the time I'm done reading this cover to cover."
"This is a great book."
"Great book, best one yet have gotten on amazon, great price too."
"I have been making videos for friends, families, and clients for years without any type of formal training."
"The only criticism I have is with the quality of the paper and text formatting of the book."
"If you're getting this for college, let it be known that this is at a much better price than most college textbooks as well!"
"This book is perfect for film students and anyone looking to go into film."
Best Screenwriting
Inspired by the original Hogwart’s textbook by Newt Scamander, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them: The Original screenplay marks the screenwriting debut of J.K. Rowling, author of the beloved and internationally bestselling Harry Potter books. J.K. Rowling is the author of the bestselling Harry Potter series of seven books, published between 1997 and 2007, which have sold over 450 million copies worldwide, are distributed in more than 200 territories and translated into 79 languages, and have been turned into eight blockbuster films by Warner Bros. She has written three companion volumes to the series in aid of charity: Quidditch Through the Ages and Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them in aid of Comic Relief; and The Tales of Beedle the Bard in aid of her children's charity Lumos.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"For Potterheads worried that Fantastic Beasts will be another Harry Potter fan fiction that messes with your view of the original characters, fear not. While the original HP series revolved around one hero and his fight against the all powerful You Know Who, Fantastic Beasts seemed more lighthearted without being childish. And then there are Tina and Queenie, beautiful, talented, charming and kindhearted sisters, stuck in menial positions in the wizarding world and wanting more."
"I did not read this until after I had seen the movie, so I had the visuals playing in my head as I read, down to Newt's awkward lovability and Jacob's wonder."
"Once again Ms. Rowling delivers a fantastical world within our own."
"Yes, it's a screen play, but just a few pages in and already laughing at the amazing wit JK Rowling brings us."
"In whatever form, this world created by JK Rowling will always be amazing."
"Most of the time, readers dwell on missing events or wonder what the... reason something was added or changed. For those of you who read the book before seeing the movie, I'm confident that JK's writing will give you more than enough information to see it in your mind. Then, when you see the movie (which I'm sure you will), you'll no doubt be captured by the incredible visual feast it delivers, and its wonderful interpretation of what you've already read. I already know that this book will be re-read many times in the future, and I can barely wait for the next Fantastic Beasts installments from JK."
"Fantastic Beasts was exactly what I expected from the author."
"I'm a huge fan of Harry Potter, so I was definitely interested when this book came out."
Best Video
From one of the co-founders of Pixar Animation Studios—the Academy Award–winning studio behind Coco, Inside Out, and Toy Story —comes an incisive book about creativity in business and leadership for readers of Daniel Pink, Tom Peters, and Chip and Dan Heath. NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER | NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The Huffington Post • Financial Times • Success • Inc. • Library Journal “[ Creativity, Inc. ]. just might be the most thoughtful management book ever.”— Fast Company Creativity, Inc. is a book for managers who want to lead their employees to new heights, a manual for anyone who strives for originality, and the first-ever, all-access trip into the nerve center of Pixar Animation—into the meetings, postmortems, and “Braintrust” sessions where some of the most successful films in history are made. It is, at heart, a book about how to build a creative culture—but it is also, as Pixar co-founder and president Ed Catmull writes, “an expression of the ideas that I believe make the best in us possible.”. Praise for Creativity, Inc. “Over more than thirty years, Ed Catmull has developed methods to root out and destroy the barriers to creativity, to marry creativity to the pursuit of excellence, and, most impressive, to sustain a culture of disciplined creativity during setbacks and success.” —Jim Collins, co-author of Built to Last and author of Good to Great “Too often, we seek to keep the status quo working. “Just might be the best business book ever written.” — Forbes “Achieving enormous success while holding fast to the highest artistic standards is a nice trick—and Pixar, with its creative leadership and persistent commitment to innovation, has pulled it off. Any reader of Creativity, Inc., Catmull’s new book on the art of running creative companies, will have to agree. Catmull, president of both Pixar and Walt Disney Animation, has written what just might be the most thoughtful management book ever.” — Fast Company “It’s one thing to be creative; it’s entirely another—and much more rare—to build a great and creative culture. Over more than thirty years, Ed Catmull has developed methods to root out and destroy the barriers to creativity, to marry creativity to the pursuit of excellence, and, most impressive, to sustain a culture of disciplined creativity during setbacks and success. Catmull’s book is quickly becoming the latest bible for the show business crowd.” —The New York Times “The most practical and deep book ever written by a practitioner on the topic of innovation.” —Prof. [Catmull] uses Pixar’s triumphs and near-disasters to outline a system for managing people in creative businesses—one in which candid criticism is delivered sensitively, while individuality and autonomy are not strangled by a robotic corporate culture.” — Financial Times “A wonderful new book . An immensely readable and rewarding book that will challenge and inspire readers to make their workplaces hotbeds of creativity.” — Kirkus Reviews (starred review) “Punctuated with surprising tales of how the company’s films were developed and the company’s financial struggles, Catmull shares insights about harnessing talent, creating teams, protecting the creative process, candid communications, organizational structures, alignment, and the importance of storytelling. [ Creativity, Inc. ] will delight and inspire creative individuals and their managers, as well as anyone who wants to work ‘in an environment that fosters creativity and problem solving.’” — Publishers Weekly (starred review) “For anyone managing anything, and particularly those trying to manage creative teams, Catmull is like a kind, smart godfather guiding us toward managing wisely, without losing our souls, and in a way that works toward greatness. What Ed Catmull shares instead is his astute experience that creativity isn’t strictly a well of ideas, but an alchemy of people. In Creativity, Inc. Ed reveals, with commonsense specificity and honesty, examples of how not to get in your own way and how to realize a creative coalescence of art, business, and innovation.” —George Lucas “This is the best book ever written on what it takes to build a creative organization. Ed Catmull is co-founder of Pixar Animation Studios and president of Pixar Animation and Disney Animation.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"While such formidable credentials would grossly inflate many egos, he has the inner strength to recognize that he does not have all the answers, others may be more talented and mistakes will happen. Catmull argues that punishing mistakes inhibits the spirit of innovation that a manager of creatives seeks to promote. The willingness of a business leader such as Dr. Catmull to subsume his ego in search of a team’s best product and to lead others to do the same reflects, in my opinion, the power of humility. Others include The Lean Startup by Eric Ries, The Luck Factor by Max Gunther, Fooled by Randomness by Nassim Taleb, The Innovator’s Dilemma by Clayton Christensen, and Benjamin Franklin’s Autobiography."
"Managers, as well as anyone who wants to better understand how companies work and what elements are necessary to make and keep them successful, will appreciate Catmull’s insight on leadership, nurturing creative environment, and protecting it from invisible threats. After reading the book, I constantly find myself quoting the concepts and examples described there when talking to my husband or friends about their jobs or my own and discussing what works, what doesn’t, and why."
"Ed shared several amusing experiences creating these magnificent movies to illustrate management concepts."
"Mr. Catmull presents an impressive analysis of how corporate culture can negatively impact creativity, even when corporate leaders proclaim their support for creativity and truly believe they are doing everything they can to foster and support it."
Best Cinematography
How to Shoot Video That Doesn't Suck is a quick and easy guide that will make your video better instantly-- whether you read it cover to cover or just skim a few chapters. Written by Steve Stockman, the director of Two Weeks (2007), plus TV shows, music videos, and hundreds of commercials, How to Shoot Video That Doesn't Suck explains in 74 short, pithy, insightful chapters how to tell a story and entertain your audience. Accompanying the book is a website with video clips to illustrate different video production rules, techniques, and situations. "Like two years of film school in 248 pages" - Steven Pressfield, author of "The War of Art" and "The Legend of Bagger Vance" "Stockman has packed a veritable film school between the pages of this highly informative, yet entertaining book. The only thing missing is a time machine so I could reshoot fifteen years of sucky birthday party and school play videos.”. --David A. Goodman, Executive Producer/Head Writer of “Family Guy” "Like two years of film school in 248 pages" -Steven Pressfield, author of "The War of Art" and "The Legend of Bagger Vance" "Stockman has packed a veritable film school between the pages of this highly informative, yet entertaining book.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Edit: - Keep videos as short as possible; if doing a how-to, consider breaking into a series. - Edit out everything that does not need to be there. - Limit the use of graphics/text/titles; if used, make text/titles simple (ex: Helvetica) and effect-free. - Consider using a call-back to link the final shot to the initial shot. - Music & Sound: Test music that is on-story, counter-story; and unrelated and see what works; Add natural sound effects. - Rely almost completely on cuts with a rare wipe (to convey movement) and even rarer dissolve (to shift to a somber mood). - Seek feedback and address all common concerns and think about unique ideas/concerns. [UPDATE: I updated this review from 2 stars to 5 stars on Jan 14, 2013."
"The tips and tricks aren't technically difficult to execute which makes this all the more enjoyable to read and put to good use."
"I have since produced two movies of family events using the tools learned from this book and have found them to be much more enjoyable to watch."
"This book is a really unpretentious and simple guide as to how to get started shooting stuff."
"Unlike other books on filmmaking, this one does not speak about the technical side of video at all; instead, it talks at length about things that make a short video work and keep people interested and entertained. By reading Steve Stockman's book, you should be able to identify and fix all the errors you've been making (if you've been shooting video) or avoid such mistakes (if you are a beginner)."
"This is more helpful than the video production program that I'm a student of at the local tech school."
"This book contained many great tips that indeed prevent the amateur video maker from making some easy mistakes."