There it was. Smack on the cover of Time Magazine.
The 2006 Person of the Year was simply: YOU — an LCD screen of reflective foil.
Martin Fisher, ODPN & Pink Buffalo CEO
As Martin Fisher gazed upon his reflection, he sensed an opportunity literally staring him in the face. “I was helping my friend start a video production company at the time,” Fisher, CEO of Vancouver-based ODPN (On Demand Production Network) and Pink Buffalo Films, told us, “and was about to leave on a trip and then I saw it, the Time cover, and I realized the future of the internet was video.”
Fisher’s vision was inspired by this 2006 cover of Time magazine
To Fisher, it was clear there was a significant void in the marketplace. “At the time, many companies were posting original video content on the web,” he said, “but much of it was crude and produced by the executives’ kids, literally. There was definitely a need for more professionally-produced content than a lot of the user-generated stuff that was running at the time.”
Hence, Fisher and his colleagues seized the opportunity and ODPN was born.
At a time when much video production is created by a crew of independent artists coming together for particular projects, ODPN cuts against the grain. “We feel that there’s a real strength in having a team that constantly works together,” said Fisher. “So we have a pretty significant crew in-house. We have producers, directors, directors of photography, editors, animators, motion graphics artists, coordinators and, of course, business people on our full time staff.”
In addition to feature films, Pink Buffalo has also ventured into documentaries, having signed-on as an Executive Producer on a film entitled “This is Congo” which should be ready for Sundance in early 2015.
With hundreds of videos and now several features and a documentary under their belts, ODPN and Pink Buffalo Films have come quite a way since that first insightful moment inspired by a piece of foil on a magazine cover.
