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Chathosts Jump Links:
SPECIAL INFORMATION FOR CHATHOSTS: |
Have you heard about iFriends HD? Supersize your Payouts with iFriends HD! (view trailer) • Turbocharge your videochat traffic • Ignite new fanclub memberships & retain existing fans • Fee-based video chathosts: Create entirely new $$$ income stream that generates income 24/7 (even while you sleep, party, or summer at the beach!) • Easier than you could ever imagine . . . • New! Leverage your iFriends HD materials into an entirely new, recurring, lifetime revenue stream (and goose your FanClub joins, too!). It's iFriends'
revolutionary DVD and HD-DVD program, a new optional feature. Read the FAQ |
Get More iFriends Exposure, Get More iFriends $$$
Chathosts who offer high-res HD video clip content, premium HD replay sessions, and live videochat through their iFriends HD-compatible camcorder, enjoy extra visibility and attention on the iFriends platform: (some Stars that use iFriends to generate extra income have boosted take-home earnings several thousand dollars per week; see details)
• Browse Listing
• Premium HD Replays
• HD Showcase
• Your FanClub Home Page
• Main FanClub Home Page
• Your FanClub "Eye Candy"
HD Showcase
Offering HD on iFriends and in your FanClub will alone boost your iFriends popularity, visibility and traffic. But there's another way to generate business, too. An entire new revenue stream, in fact!
The HD Showcase – http://apps.ifriends.net/hdshowcase.wsa– is a special area on iFriends where users can sample the vivid and exciting world of iFriends HD.
Appearing in the HD showcase is a fantastic way to call attention to yourself, build traffic, and – if you are so inclined – create an entirely new recurring iFriends revenue stream for yourself. (Like FanClubs, the HD showcase
puts money in your pocket around-the-clock, 24/7, even when you're not hosting live!)
How can the HD showcase earn revenue for you? Easy: The HD Showcase is a premium feature available as a link from your own fanclub (within the new Eye-Candy "HighDef" tab), from any other participating host's fanclub, or from elsewhere on the service. All revenues collected for the HD showcase are redistributed to the Stars that populate the showcase with their HD video clip material. That's right: iFriends doesn't keep a dime – the HD Showcase is yet another "100% payouts" area of the iFriends platform.
Hosts who appear in the HD showcase are already generating thousands – every week – in additional income.
(See Q&A below, or snapshot)
To facilitate a successful launch, iFriends is offering the HD showcase at no extra charge,
but anticipates eventually applying a standard optional monthly surcharge of between $1 and $5 for the HD Showcase add-on.
However, even though iFriends is not initially collecting revenue for the HD showcase, it is redistributing income to chathosts
as though it were.
Frequently-Asked Questions and Answers about the HD showcase: Q: What more can you tell me about how HD-Showcase revenues are collected and distributed? A: Access to the entire HD showcase, currently available for free to registered iFriends members on an introductory basis, is expected to ultimately be priced at between $1 and $5 monthly. All revenues collected for access to the full HD showcase – including $1 per user contributed by iFriends during the free introductory period – go into a "redistribution pool". At the end of the week, the redistribution pool is emptied, distributed to participating chathosts as a part of their iFriends weekly payment package, and the pool is replenished during the following week as new users join the full-access HD showcase and other members are renewed. Q: By what precise formula are HD-Showcase revenues redistributed to the chathosts that populate the showcase? A: Each week, the pool is divided evenly into two smaller pools: • Availability Pool: A comparative measurement of the amount of total outstanding HD footage that was made available by a given chathost in the HD showcase during the week (as a percentage of all such available material), and Q: What other benefits (besides ca$h) will I enjoy when I earn a high score for HD availability and popularity/consumption? A: Perhaps the second-most benefit of all: Top exposure on the most trafficked page in all of iFriends, LiveBrowse. (The "HDTV Star Spotlight" section of livebrowse lists all live HD hosts, in order of those with the highest current scores for Availability and Consumption. The more HD you offer, and the fresher the HD you offer, the better to hold on to your top LiveBrowse ranking.) Q: How much can I realistically expect to earn with iFriends HD and the HD Showcase? A: Depending on how much HD material you provide, and how popular that HD material is with users (typically, the "hotter" the material, the more popular it is with users, and the more it is viewed and download), earnings are proportional to the effort you put in. (The question of "how hot?" is decided by iFriends users, who vote on "HD Fever Index" ratings on the feedback form for each HD movie.) Detail$: As of this writing, one chathost star is taking home, on average, $2,000 more per week as an HD Star than her take-home prior to offering HD, with approximately half that amount coming from HD showcase and the other half from increased traffic to her FanClub, Live Video Chat and the new pay-per-minute HD Replay Theater. At the same time, an iFriends couple has increased earnings by $3,300 per week, across the three different VCH screennames they offer. Overall, to date, we've seen HD hosts boost their weekly earnings from $250 on the low side (when just a few average-quality HD clips are offered), to as much as $3,000 and more per week (when large amounts of high-quality HD movies are offered, and users give those HD movies high "HD Fever Index" ratings. ) . . . and those are per-week figures. Q: Does iFriends offer any advice on how to maximize my exposure and income from the HD showcase? A: Like everything else on iFriends, your success in the HD showcase
is a function of what you make of it. iFriends merely provides the platform. Those stars that take the greatest interest in the feature, and
work it the hardest, are almost always the same stars that get the most from it. However, if you keep these three words in mind, you
can't go wrong: Newer, Hotter and More.
Q: I recognize that participation in the HD Showcase can increase my weekly income substantially. But are there other benefits to offering HD content on iFriends? A: As explained elsewhere on this page, HD will improve all your activities on iFriends. HD will deliver to you – especially your FanClub and live Videochat – more: More exposure, more traffic, and for those hosts that rely on iFriends for income, more $$$. HD is the "rising tide" that lifts all boats on iFriends. HD can improve all your iFriends fortunes. Q: HD sounds great, and users will no doubt love it, but I don't know if I can afford full-blown HD video quality right now. Is there another way I can get some of the benefits of iFriends HD without turning my home into a Hollywood production studio? A: Yes. Although the HD showcase requires HD video, snapshots from those video clips appear on iFriends as regular archive images (just larger). But there's another way that you can get high-definition archive images of yourself onto iFriends: Your FanClub manager has an "upload" facility that permits you to upload jpegs and gifs of yourself. When you upload any Jpg or Gif that is "high-resolution" – i.e., at least 720 pixels tall and/or at least 960 pixels wide – iFriends labels your image-upload as "HD", and will present it as such to users who encounter your archive materials, so these users will now think of you as a "high quality" or "high definition" host. Most inexpensive digital cameras on the market today will produce jpeg and/or gif images substantially larger than 720 pixels tall. In fact, such image sizes aren't even a single "megapixel"; yet inexpensive digital cameras available from CostCo or Wal-Mart or Target offer multiple "megapixels" for a price that's less than you'd pay for dinner at a good restaurant. It may not be true HD video, but users will love you for giving them the chance to see you up-close-and-personal through high-def jpegs & gifs. |
Top 10 Reasons to Get HD
- Earn up to $3000 more per week: HD Showcase represents not only a brand new revenue stream for HD stars, but the extra exposure also drives your FanClub and Videochat traffic. Some stars have boosted weekly take-home earnings by several thousand dollars (details)
- Attract More Fans: FanClubs with HD have a higher join rate than FanClubs without HD.
- Keep your Fans Longer: The average HD Star enjoys higher FanClub retention rates than other Stars.
- More Live VideoChat Visitors: Stars who offer HD show their commitment to iFriends users, and enhance their reputation for delivering a quality experience. HD stars attract more live videochat visitors than non-HD stars.
- Enhanced FanClub Exposure: HD stars enjoy enhanced exposure on the FanClub home page and in the Live FanClub Navigator, because HD is one of the many indicators that the FanClub is actively managed and that a wealth of material is available to iFriends users who join your FanClub. For more information, see the "Stars: How to Feature More Prominently" feature on the FanClub home page.
- HD Replays: Every HD movie you make can be added to your Replay Library, and shown in the special HD Replay Theater
- iFriends Does All The Production Work: You shoot the footage, we take care of the rest. iFriends handles all the details, so you're free to concentrate on what you do best -- looking great, and managing your iFriends content and communications.
- Be An Innovator: With iFriends HD, iFriends is again setting new standards and blazing new trails, never before seen on the internet. Be among the first on earth to offer this exciting new experience!
- Differentiate Yourself. Stand out! There's a lot of competition out there for customer attention. Why settle for being just one among thousands, when HD can help you can stand out from the crowd?
- You Look GREAT in HD! Your HD movies are so vivid, so detailed, and so compelling, they showcase your personality -- and your physical beauty -- in a way no other medium can. Result: You make such a deep and lasting impact, iFriends users can't get you out of their mind!
Links
Where to learn more about Windows Media HD content:
How to get your own HD equipment for iFriends HD: |
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Before iFriends developed iFriends HD, individuals who wanted to produce HD material were required to spend – no kidding – more than $100,000 to acquire the necessary HD
equipment, including a minimum $60,000 HD camcorder
plus tens of thousands of dollars in post-production equipment. All that, just to get
HD video comparable to that available on iFriends HD.
iFriends offers four innovative programs for equipping you with all the HD camcorder equipment you need to produce HD-quality videos exactly like those seen on iFriends:
Important: While iFriends is clearly willing to do everything possible to help you get HD, it's still important to remember that iFriends HD isn't exactly light on the wallet. (A few thousand
dollars, unless you qualify for our HD loaner program). If you are still serious about offering iFriends HD, send us an email at GetHD@iFriends.net to get additional information and
consideration. In the email, indicate which of the above 4 program(s) interests you, and please
provide your VCH screenname(s) and/or ID-Card name.
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How to send your HD to iFriends: |
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If you received your HD camcorder equipment with iFriends' help, please refer to the "iFriends HD Turn-Key Package" box immediately below.
If you already have your own iFriends HD-compatible HD camera equipment, obtained through different sources, you have these options:
Questions? Email getHD@iFriends.net
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iFriends HD "Turn-Key" Package: When your iFriends-certified HD equipment is provided to you by iFriends itself, and not by an iFriends-certified retailer, it arrives at your door, via overnight courier, as a "turnkey" package.
When you unpack the box, you will find a ready-to-go professional HDTV camcorder inside a durable black camera case, ready to "point and shoot". (The battery is
fully charged, a miniDV tape is loaded, and the camera is set to HD mode. All you have to do is turn it on, press the red button to record,
and say "Action!" -- you're shooting HD video. It really is that easy.) Packing list: When you are Finished with the iFriends Turnkey HD Package If you acquired the iFriends Turnkey HD package through the Loaner program, you must return it to us when you are finished.
To do so, simply place the camera equipment only back into the camera case, and ship the case back to iFriends using the pre-printed, pre-paid overnight-courier packing slip or mailing labels. Note: iFriends has provided a separate pre-paid overnight courier packing slip for the return of your filled mini DV tapes. Please return them in a separate package from the camera using this separate label.
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Getting the most out of iFriends HD:
Production Notes & Tips:
With the incredible level of detail in HD, it magnifies everything:
Your beauty and vibrant personality will, of course, shine through in a way it never has before, favorable impression upon the viewer like never before. And that's what will draw your fans in. But watch out for the details, too. The production values of your footage are more important in HD than with a regular camcorder. Issues that might not have mattered much to you with regular camcorders – such as sound, lighting, wardrobe, makeup and even colors – now count for a lot, because in HD, your audience can see it all. Every strand of hair. Every freckle. The brightness of your smile. The twinkle in your eye. The slightly mischievous grin. No detail goes unnoticed!
Here's some tips to get you started:
• Stability: Avoid the "jitters" at all costs. We strongly recommend using a tripod, or any camera-steadying device. HD footage is so vividly detailed, even the slightest hand tremors can create a "shaky" viewing experience. It's best to shoot with a tripod; if you don't have one, position the camcorder on a sturdy chair or a dresser.
• Close-ups: Nothing showcases the magic of HD better than vivid close-ups. If you want to deliver a true "you are there" experience for your fans, be generous with close-ups.
• Light & Brightness: HD is hungry for light, and hungry for color. When you are careful to ensure ample
light and bright colors, you'll be very pleased with the result. Outdoor footage works well. Soft (yet bright) lighting, combined
with vivid colors, is best.
Avoid harsh incandescent lighting, as well as
dark and/or low light levels.
(For more information about
lighting, click here, or check out
iFriends chathost Amanda36c's lighting guide.)
(A special note to the shy and the modest: If you intend to shoot intimate HD featuring you along with a significant other, avoid the
impulse to lower the lights. Your iFriends HD footage needs
plenty of light and illumination; before filming, do whatever helps you relax and lower your inhibitions, so you can comfortably enjoy your intimacy with the bright lights on, and the camera rolling...)
• Color Richness: Use bright colors, but try to use a limited palette of solid, bright colors. Imagine watching an HD clip where the model is in the foreground, and a busy public street is in the background.
Now, imagine that same HD clip, with the same model in the foreground, but instead of a busy public street, the background is solid blue sky ... or a green field of lush grass. The second HD clip will
look substantially sharper than
the HD clip set in a public street. (The reason is technical, and involves a tradeoff in the mpeg compression technologies utilized in HD footage, whereby fewer bits are required to represent simple, single-color background
settings, which leaves more bits available to describe
the object in the foreground, making that object – you, in most cases – appear much more attractive and in focus).
• Make-up: Take your time with your makeup; HD is so clear and vivid, it can catch blemishes and flaws that other camera equipment can miss.
• Reviewing Footage: There are two ways to review your own footage. First, if you have a true HDTV set, a cable is provided for plugging your camcorder into your TV for playback purposes. However, it's usually much easier to simply use the camcorder's own viewfinder or flip-out image screen to view your own footage. When you send your tape(s) to iFriends for processing, iFriends will present all your HD footage in a special area of your fanclub where you can choose which specific footage to make available to iFriends users and which footage should be discarded or "saved for later".
Pitfalls and Mistakes to Avoid:
• No Sound: When you first capture footage, make sure you're capturing the sound, too – see the camera settings below for more information.
• Avoid taking snapshots: Although iFriends-HD compatible HD camcoders typically come with a "snapshot" feature, ignore it. For one, such snapshots are ignored by our production process. Second,
you'll find it infinitely more flexible and enjoyable to capture snapshots once the material is posted on iFriends. To post snapshots of your iFriends HD material to your fanclub, we recommend just playing your
iFriends HD movie in the "720p-HD" version, hitting Prt-Screen on your keyboard, cut-and-paste into to your
favorite image-editor software, and upload the resulting oversized HD image to your fanclub.
• Avoid the 'jitters': (This is so important, we're saying it twice!) Because the image size in iFriends HD is so large, and the resolution so detailed, try to avoid the 'jitter' that results from too much hand-holding of the camera. If
at all possible, get more stable footage by using a tripod or other firm camera support. And for those special "you-are-there" close-up moments (point-of-view footage, for example), hold that HD camcorder very steady....
• Maintain Crisp Focus during Close-Ups:
In general, iFriends recommends leaving the camcorder in auto-focus mode as much as possible. But there's one exception: If you are comfortable switching from
auto-focus to manual focus, then we recommend doing so
for extreme "motion" close-up shots, where there is body movement or motion from the hand-held HD camera. Few things are more annoying to viewers than watching an up-close-and-personal tight shot that
suddenly turns blurry, because the camcorder auto-focus can't decide which moving element before the lens to focus upon. So, if you're up for it, use the manual focus for those close-up shots.
• Avoid the 'fuzzies': Deciding whether to use the camera's autofocus feature, or set the focus manually, is a tricky question. In general, it is best to leave the camera in auto-focus mode, as it is shipped,
particularly because the viewfinder is of a significantly small size that it is difficult to tell – from the viewfinder alone – if you have a sharp focus.
Only under these two circumstances
would we advice that it's safe to use the manual focus:
1.) When you are able to
connect your HD camcorder into an HD television screen, and develop your familiarity with focus issues by watching the live camcorder image on the big-screen;
2.) If your HD camcorder
is mounted on a stationary tripod, and you maintain a fairly constant distance from the camera lens while shooting.
What Types of Content & Conduct are Advisable? |
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Your HD content is subject to all the same content regulations and restrictions as other types of iFriends archives. (See Chathost License Agreement for full details.) Except for the foregoing, iFriends itself offers no opinion or suggestions on what kind of conduct and content to present in HD. However, the chathosts of iFriends HD all tend to agree that HD archives are particularly well-suited for these two kinds of archive strategies:
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Camera Settings:
Here's a quick run-down on the most important buttons, knobs, and switches you need to make sure are set correctly on the professional HD camcorder systems used to produce iFriends HD:
Left Side:  |
Left Side (Rear):  |
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Microphone:  |
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FAQ (Frequently-Asked Questions) Q: Is there an easy way for me to make sure that the video I shot, and audio I recorded, will transfer well for iFriends? A: Sure. Just play your clip through the viewfinder (if you flip out the screen on the left side, you'll find the "Play" button underneath). If you can see and hear the action through the viewfinder (or flip-out screen), then it'll look great on iFriends. When playing back your clip using the viewfinder, make sure that the volume is turned up (see picture above), so you can confirm that sound was recorded at a high enough volume. Q: I would LOVE to appear in the multi-Chathost iFriends HD Promotional Trailers, and benefit from all that extra exposure. What do I need to do? A:
Promotional-trailer material is produced by our talented creative production team who exercises complete artistic discretion. While there are no guarantees, we can tell you what
these HD professionals tend to look for:
Q: Do I need a high-end PC to offer iFriends HD? A: No. In fact, you don't need any PC to offer iFriends HD! The only prerequisites for offering iFriends HD are: 1.) You are an active iFriends chathost and 2.) You can operate a camcorder (All the difficult computer work is handled by iFriends). You see, it doesn't take a high-end supercharged PC to make iFriends HD, it takes a high-end PC to enjoy full HD! Q: Can I offer live shows in iFriends HD? A: If you have the proper iFriends-certified HD camcorder equipment, you can use the equipment to host live videochat. However, when you do so, your camcorder will transmit live video only in "standard-def mode", and not "high-def" mode. (But even standard-def is still very impressive). While visitors to your live videochat will appreciate the high quality of your live cam image (it is an expensive camcorder after all), it won't be actual "HD" live video. (Explanation: Actual true HD video requires at least six megabits per second of bandwidth. To successfully transmit HD video live, in real time, you would need internet bandwidth that is the equivalent of four T-1 lines, or 24 cable modems. And even if you had that much bandwidth, very few on the internet have the same amount of bandwidth to consume your live video.) Note: If you're experiencing difficulty with your HD camcorder automatically turning off during live videochat, check to make sure that there is no tape inserted. The HD camcorder will not auto-powerdown when there is no tape present. Q: How is my HD footage organized in my HD library? A: The process is entirely automated; each time our technology detects a "scene break" (typically, a moment where you turned off the camcorder [or stopped recording], and then later turned it back on [or resumed recording], a new HD video clip is placed in your HD library. Example: The third scene from tape #2 is represented in your HD Library as "Clip 2.3" Q: Once my HD is available on iFriends, how do I edit the settings and control the availability of my iFriends HD movies? A: There's nothing to it. Just go to your FanClub manager, click "HighDef" under the "EyeCandy" options, and you'll see a screen that looks very much like this: screenshot Q: I'd like to produce and edit my own iFriends HD footage. How can I? A: In computer technology and entertainment, anything is possible, provided you have enough spare time and spare cash. Although HD camcorders certified for
use with iFriends HD come with their own "version 1.0" editing software, you'll find that this software has substantial limitations compared to the production values seen in iFriends-produced HD. To produce
your own footage, comparable to the quality and precision of iFriends' own HD professional studios, we recommend purchase of a Silicon Graphics Unix/Linux HD video production workstation (cost can vary between $10,000 and $50,000, depending on configuration,
and a high-end HD-compatible editing systems such as Avid (such systems start at around $10,000). Additional purchases are required for 3D-graphics rendering software and video effects software (products vary, rangin from
$500 to $5000). Note: On the Microsoft Windows front, comparable software is just becoming available, with hardware expected to follow later this year. However, only the very highest-end PC workstations running
Windows XP and XP Professional will support these HD production solutions.
Q: Can I customize the camcorder settings to get a better picture? A: We strongly recommend that you stay with the built-in defaults. The HD camcorder does a very good job at automatically adjusting to different lighting and focus conditions. Plus, if you change settings, you have to be extremely careful not to adjust any settings that affect the capture and recording onto miniDV of your footage. (The last thing you want is to send us your tapes, only to learn that we were unable to use them because they were recorded in the wrong format). If you nevertheless feel compelled to adjust the settings, we have one additional recommendation to suggest: Don't adjust any settings unless you can view your HD image on a full-size HD monitor, and can properly gauge how changes in settings will affect the final picture quality. (Judging picture quality by using only the flip-out viewfinder is a risky proposition). Q: HD sounds great, and users will no doubt love it, but I don't know if I can afford full-blown HD video quality right now. Is there another way I can get some of the benefits of iFriends HD without turning my home into a Hollywood production studio? A: Yes. Although the HD showcase and similar areas of iFriends requires HD video, snapshots from those video clips appear on iFriends as regular archive images (just larger). But there's another way that you can get high-definition archive images of yourself onto iFriends: Your FanClub manager (choose "Pics" under "Eye Candy") has an "upload" facility that permits you to upload jpegs and gifs of yourself. When you upload any Jpg or Gif that is "high-resolution" – i.e., at least 720 pixels tall and/or at least 960 pixels wide – iFriends labels your image-upload as "HD", and will present it as such to users who encounter your archive materials, so these users will now think of you as a "high quality" or "high definition" host. Most inexpensive digital cameras on the market today will produce jpeg and/or gif images substantially larger than 720 pixels tall. In fact, such image sizes aren't even a single "megapixel"; yet inexpensive digital cameras available from CostCo or Wal-Mart or Target offer multiple "megapixels" for a price that's less than you'd pay for dinner at a good restaurant. It may not be true HD video, but users will love you for giving them the chance to see you up-close-and-personal through high-def jpegs & gifs. |
