Funny that it’s a DVD called ‘The Planet‘, that sends me back into the lands of region free firmware hacking and ripping software.
The Swedes Sent It
Specifically, it was Johan Söderberg, or one of his webmonkeys, who sent the Region 2 encoded disc all the way to Australia (region 4). The Planet is a made for TV environmental documentary, from 2006, but given the quality of his earlier film, Lucky People Centre International, and Soderberg’s editing efforts in general, it seemed worth a shot. ( Sodeberg is also famous as the editor of that Iraq war related lip-synced love duet featuring Tony Blair and George W. Bush) Anyway, it had been a while since I’d bought a DVD. The disc goes in, and up pops the reminder of region encoding. Pushed by the motion picture industry so films can be released at different dates at different times, through different distributors, and only effectively managing to annoy people who have paid to watch a film. Way to drive people to piracy.
Region Free Options On Mac
Include ripping the disc to your hard-drive, and removing the region code restrictions using Mac The Ripper. Takes time and space.
Handbrake will transcode your DVD into a playable movie file. Takes even more time, but less space.
Or – for the adventurous – the mac firmware can be upgraded / de-crippled using free software and instructions from http://forum.rpc1.org/ ( see the mac section ). Once your drive’s firmware is changed to region-free, you’ll also need Region X to select a region each time.
There, aren’t you glad you bought the disc, rather than downloaded a version you could watch straight away?
While It Rips
It’s worth pointing out a few worthwhile projects, that explore some of the Lucky People styled audiovisual terrain:
Sound of Noise is a feature film that uses found objects onscreen as musical instruments, and is made by the musicians involved with ‘Music for One Apartment and Six Drummers‘. Also a Swedish enterprise, and released in Dec 2010.
Chris Cunningham has plans to deliver an audiovisual album. ( See track 1 set in New York, a remix of Gil Scott Heron )
Pogo from Perth, is developing a global collection / album / DVD by cutting new tracks to footage shot in various locations ( after funding travel there by kickstarter ).