Santa Fe continues its
never-ending quest to become a real-life city as members of the community—including business owners, media folk, creative types and the generally wealthy—have come together to form the Santa Fe Network (SFN), a non-profit internet-based
digital video platform slated to launch on the evening of Tuesday July 11.
SFN aims
to be a Netflix-like service featuring episodic and cinematic filmed content
created in New Mexico, either by locals or not. Thus far, founding members
include the likes of MacGyver creator
Lee Zlotoff, creative agency 12FPS proprietor Adam Shaening-Pokrasso, filmmaker Michael Becker
and many others. Strategic partners include the Santa Fe Opera, Meow Wolf,
George RR Martin and even more "others."
"We got together in this room
and the question came up, 'Has there ever been a place-based network?'"
Shaening-Pokrasso, who serves as vice-president of the SFN board, tells SFR.
"And the answer was, 'No, not that I know of.'" Pokrasso points to cities like
Los Angeles and New York as the widely accepted meccas of ideas and creativity, and
says that even though Santa Fe and New Mexico at large have hosted strong below-the-line numbers (as in crew, caterers, etc.), the minds behind
SFN believe there are also actors, writers and producers ready to burst forth
from their numbers.
"The [New Mexico film tax]
incentive is working for us, but it's not really creating opportunities for
people who've worked on set for years who … maybe have some great script
in their closet," Shaening-Pokrasso says. "So, we're highlighting works from
our connections in the community—SFN is a way to aggregate, collect and
promote media made by and in the state of New Mexico."
So what does this mean, and how will you be able to watch? For now, SFN will live at
santafenetwork.tv (a site through which submissions from filmmakers or
producers can also be made) and early plans include streaming already-existing
content from its partners. "They're going to promote the existing stuff first,"
Shaening-Pokrasso explains, "but they're going to create new content, whether
it's about lowriders or culture in Northern New Mexico or health and wellness;
we can't really generate revenue until we have eyeballs, and our partners have
these their extended audiences. That's a good baseline."
For now, Shaening-Pokrasso
says there is "high potential" of the city allocating funds to support the
platform and that there's a meeting on the books with Economic Development scheduled for next week, but that the vast majority of expenses have been paid out-of-pocket
from SFN's founding members.
"We don't have it all figured
out yet, but what we do have figured out is that the pillars of our community,
like the markets or the long-standing institutions that must have unbelievable
archives, when we put those all in one place and create content around it,
Santa Fe's global brand is reinvented," Shaening-Pokrasso continues. "Then it's
no longer just a tourism destination, but a place where maybe actors or
filmmakers will move because it's happening here in Santa Fe."
For the future, SFN envisions
a possible app for streaming through devices such as the Roku or gaming consoles, but
Shaening-Pokrasso estimates about two years before the implications of such a
network might realize their full potential. "There is every intention that
filmmakers will at some point be making money," he says, "and we don't reject
people because they shot on the 'wrong' camera—we see it as another asset to
the community at large."
SFN's launch party goes down at 7 pm Tuesday July 11 at the Hotel Santa Fe (1501 Paseo de Peralta, 855-825-9876) and more details can be found here.
Santa Fe Reporter