My Dog Tulip on Blu-Ray?

[goomba478]

Hey there guys. It's my understanding that "My Dog Tulip" the movie was done in TV Paint and I've been dying to see it, but I want to see it in the best quality possible. I had pre-ordered it on Blu-Ray ages ago but never received it in August when it was supposed to come out. Now it seems no stores have it in stock (they only have the DVD) and I can't even find if it was released at all. So does anyone know for sure? Is it coming out on Blu-Ray still? If so, where can I order it? Thanks in advance! =)

[Paul Fierlinger]

Hi goomba,

I'd love to supply you with a BluRay of my own, had one been ever given to us by our producer Norman Twain at NT Productions in N.Y., or by New Yorker Films, the film's distributor. Mind you, no one has even bothered to supply us with any disks; DVDs or BluRays, but what's worse, we were not asked to participate on the design of these disks, which I believe can be ordered on Amazon (but not sure because we've been tossed out of the loop the minute the film was done.) I copied your post just now and passed it to both the producer and distributor -- and BTW, neither of these pals are sharing any revenue with us nor giving us any financial reports. As J.R.Ackerley tells Tulip in our film: Tulip dear, It's the way of the world I'm afraid.

[Paul Fierlinger]

This is what I sent to Jose Lopez, president of New Yorker Films:

From the TVP forum…. I informed the poster that I am forwarding his question to you… (quite disturbing to me, especially considering that Sandra and I have also never received any of the promised DVDs).



My Dog Tulip on Blu-Ray?
by goomba478 » Sun Sep 25, 2011 10:50 am

Hey there guys. It's my understanding that "My Dog Tulip" the movie was done in TV Paint and I've been dying to see it, but I want to see it in the best quality possible. I had pre-ordered it on Blu-Ray ages ago but never received it in August when it was supposed to come out. Now it seems no stores have it in stock (they only have the DVD) and I can't even find if it was released at all. So does anyone know for sure? Is it coming out on Blu-Ray still? If so, where can I order it? Thanks in advance! =)

[Paul Fierlinger]

A quick look on Amazon shows that New Yorker has taken down their initial offer and TULIP is being sold by a pirate "Mighty Silver".
I haven't been following any of these events (is New Yorker gone? Broke again?) because it was all so predictable and I am in no mood or shape nor have the time and stomach to challenge anyone. So I got my first theatrical release under my belt and have no desire to do anything like it again.

Sandra is now calling out all the Pirate names who are selling Tulip openly on Amazon and this with no protests from the owners (which is not us). Now that Sandra has finished her study of the situation on Amazon, it seems that no one is selling anything at all -- if you were to order, you won't get anything.

I am used to immigrating; started when I was 3 years-old and have conducted several major emigrations since -- this time I am on my way to the land of the free and the brave again; the Internet.

[masterchief]

This is all very disturbing to me...youtube is saturated with your work too, especially the Sesame Street category. Arent you entitled to compensation, royalties from sales???

How are the voice over actors receiving their compensation?

UPDATE- I have sent this email to amazon.com customer service:

My Dog Tulip is being marketed by Amazon.com, the seller being MightySilver. I am disturbed by this as I know the directors of the film personally. They are claiming that MightySilver is pirating their film and is not authorized to distribute.
I am requesting comment and what steps Amazon.com is going to take to remedy this problem.

regards,
William

[Paul Fierlinger]

Hi William,

Sandra and I got paid as we went and the pay wasn't too bad -- I'd say the way some of our better jobs have been paid in the past but since this was a longer film that covered almost three years, we had three very good three years. I never believed we would make anything after the film was released, knowing the way of the world. The actors? Isabella Rosellini did it for free and for the love of dogs, Lynn Redgrave did it for union scale and got paid upfront, and Christopher Plummer got paid upfront scale but was supposed to get a decent fee plus royalties after the release (as were we) so I guess he's on the boat with us.

As for YouTube, we never put anything of ours on YouTube and I marvel at what motivates people to do so.

Glad to see you back. If you are planning on getting TVP Pro, you will be in for many pleasant surprises -- it's a treasure trove of small gems.

EDIT: I doubt Amazon will even bother with a response. At one point someone was offering Still Room with Animated Dogs on Amazon, we wrote Amazon several such letters as you have with zero replies.

[idragosani]

I received a copy of the DVD from Amazon in early August... is the disk I received a pirated copy? I don't think it came from "Mighty Silver", though, my order says "sold by Amazon LLC". Confused!

[Paul Fierlinger]

I have no idea, to tell the truth. It used to be there on sale by New Yorker Films which promised the future release ov the BlueRay but now NY seems to be gone and replace by Mighty Silver, which makes me think New Yorker is out of business. I have reminded them in the past that they still owe me "a bunch of DVDs and BR's" in their words and never got a response. You probably still got it from New Yorker.

[idragosani]

It's all very fishy. regardless...

[Paul Fierlinger]

Like anything connected to the Independent film distribution business. Hollywood and pirates have destroyed the distribution of good, independent films and no one has figured out a recourse. I have it figured out on our part, which is to release on our own, and over the Internet, an installment program of a lengthy series of 3 to 4 minute short chapters to be released weekly to paying subscribers -- say for $ 35.00.

[idragosani]

I think that's a much more viable model. As a musician, I am never going to pay to have CDs replicated again. I went through the process once, and it's very expensive and there's no guarantee of ever making that money back (let alone make a profit). Anything else I do, whether it's music or animation or whatever, is going to be distributed through the web. Nina Paley has been very successful distributing "Site Sings the Blues" online, for many different kinds of video formats (you can even legally download a DVD ISO image and burn your own disk).

[Paul Fierlinger]

I worry about piracy of course, so to hedge that off a bit, I intend on publishing each new event with a full page of stories related to the installment piece, with sketches and other illustrations not included in the video and links to interesting related topics elsewhere on the Internet with the intention of not making the video clip of itself the complete goods. I also never plan to put the whole story out on a non-interrupted DVD.

[masterchief]

Who owns this youtube channel??

http://www.youtube.com/user/mydogtulip" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Fabrice]

Paul, if you ever heard about a (french or english) subtilted version of your film, please drop a message in the forum or an email.

[Paul Fierlinger]

Fabrice,
The only French subtitled versions were the poorly translated ones that Norman had done and then the one that was translated properly by Mr. Million's staff at Annecy, the year Tulip was screened there. This was done on just one 35 mm print and in such a way that the text ended on the flip side of the film stock thus leaving the projectionist with just two choices: either project the imagery out of focus or the subtitles out of focus... to my chagrin the festival opted for having our film projected with the imagery out of focus, which can bring a grown animator to tears. I believe that Norman still has that print. I am not sure what you mean by English subtitled -- the film is all in English...