Setting Priorities for 2020

I have not been very productive with my projects the last year or so. I hope that will change this year. I feel the problem I've had is that I keep jumping between projects and not getting much done on any of them. I've run into this in the past too. I really need to focus on one major project. The issue is, which one?

“The Barrier”

I have a "finished" version of this movie, but I felt I really needed to do more work on it before I tried to promote it. The main problem came from the voices I used. I made the film using Xtranormal and it used robotic voices and animation to create the film. I felt it turned out well, but I got some complaints about the voices. I must admit that the voices can be a drag on some people. They don't carry much inflection or emotion. The program allows you to use prerecorded voices in place of the robotic voices. Actors could bring a higher level of personality of the characters.

Before I could pursue that, Xtranormal shut down. The software has since been released under the name Nawmal, so that is no longer a barrier to making "The Barrier".

The other problem was that my wife got sick and subsequently died. I devoted my energies to supporting her. That was more important to me than any movie project could ever be. Then, I had my heart attack, which also drained my energy.

I have mixed feelings about the project now. It has now been several years since I last worked on it. I sometimes wonder if I should just call it done and move on. Other times I feel enthusiastic.

Collaborative Project

I've been working with another person on a joint project. I don't want to discuss it in any detail on my blog without her agreement. We've gotten an outline and are reviewing it now before diving into the main writing phase. That will go forward when we are ready.

Terrorist Story

I've posted about this recently. (https://dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/thoughts-on-my-terrorism-story/) This is another project that I've picked up and dropped several times. I would like to finish it, but at the same time I think I may not be ready to write it. I need to develop my skills more. I do have a bit of an outline and identified some the main characters.

I think it would be a film that would be less of a technical challenge because most of it could be done on only two sets. There would be some other locations, but those would be short scenes.

“Ode to Billy Joe” Story Idea

I was inspired by Bobby Gentry's song, "Ode to Billy Joe". It is a haunting story that exists mostly between the lines. I made some progress on some characters and a story. I ran into a problem, in that the inspiration is a focus on a subtext to a story. It isn't really a story itself, and I really need to find another story that will fit on top. What I have so far won't work.

I do have a pile of half-baked ideas I've generated over the years. Maybe I should review them and see if any of them will inspire me.

“Bright Freedom”

I've worked on this off and on since 2010! It started as a script, then I rewrote it as a novel. As it stands now, it is too short for a novel though.

The problems I run into with this story are always the same. First, the main character is a woman, who is an immigrant to Canada, and is a lawyer. None of which I have personal experience with. It is easy to fall into writing the character as a stereotype, which can be offensive to some people. I don’t like to offend people. When you offend people, you undercut the point that you want to make with your story.

The other problem is that the underlying issue in the story is very serious, but I only want to do is use that as a backdrop to an adventure story. I don't want to trivialize what is a very serious issue for some people.

My thinking has been that I should develop the story to a point where I can ask people to read it. I feel I really need to find people who may find aspects of the story offensive. That might be a challenge.

Extraterrestrial Robots

This idea came to me while watching one of John Michael Godier’s videos. (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCEszlI8-W79IsU8LSAiRbDg) Most science fiction stories about robots and artificial intelligence (AI) focus on the dangers of them going rouge. I thought to turn that around.

My idea is that an AI or robot would not want anything. They would be created to fulfil the wants and needs of the people who created them.

I imagine an ancient civilization could create AI, but over time they would die out, as all life dies in the end. That would leave the AI’s/robots without anyone to tell them what to do. They would then search out new civilizations who will tell them what to do.

I haven't read much SF for a while, so I don't know if this idea has been used.

This isn't a story in and of itself. A whole range of stories could be built on this premise. I've been cogitating on this idea for a while, but I haven't come up with a story yet.

I can see someone using this premise as the basis of a humorous story involving misunderstandings. That isn't what I'd like to do. I want it to be a serious consideration of that kind confrontation.

AI Bankers

I read some news reports about AI and robots being used to replace low level workers. This brought up the thought that it may be possible to replace bankers and billionaires with AI.

Many people distrust bankers and billionaires. The do perform a useful role in society, but could they be replaced? Bankers and billionaires are often motivated solely by greed.

However, AI systems could be set up to have a more altruistic approach to money management and investing. They could be programed to only stay in business and serve society. They would have no profit motive that could corrupt them.

At the moment, I don’t see how I could turn this into a story. In many ways it is more of a background to a story. Still, I would want a story where AI bankers are a significant element in the story.

Other Ideas

Every now and then I come up with new ideas. I sometimes think I should go back through my old ideas and find one that will excite me. I did that before. I was disappointed with the result that time, so maybe I shouldn't try that approach. If I drop an idea, there may well be a very good reason to do so.

Maybe I should try to develop a new story idea. I've thought of coming up with a story I can use to try out working with voice actors in the same way I will need to do to get "The Barrier" finished. I thought about this a few times, but nothing has come to mind yet.

I do find it difficult to decide what to do. I have many ideas that I would like to work on. I need to consider not just how much they excite my interest, but how realistic are those ideas. I hope I can make the right choice.

This post is a mirror from my main blog http://www.dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/blog

Interstellar and Martian Trips

It has been a while since I last posted. I've had a difficult time getting active on any of my movie projects. In the last few weeks I have started work on a couple of small projects that should result in something to post soon.

I've had a large number of people sign up for my mailing list while I was inactive. I have no idea why.

Red Star Planet Flyby

The Breakthrough Starshot project caught my interest when I first learned of it. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakthrough_Starshot). It is a proposal to send a probe to the Alpha Centauri star system. I would like to see what they find.

Unfortunately for me, they think it will be 20 years to develop the technology, 20 to 30 years to travel to the star and then 4 or 5 years to send back the data. I don't need to reveal my age for people to realize that I won't likely be around to see the result.

So, what I have started to work on is a simulated flyby through an alien star system. Then, at least, I'd get some idea what they might see.

I've used Blender to create the simulated star system. I haven't given it a name yet. It is not based on any real star. I gave it 4 planets, 3 super Earths and a smaller planet. The furthest planet is about 7,500,000 km from the star. The size and distances of the planets and the star are all to the same scale.

I need to work on the appearance of the planets. I want them to look realistic. Since my artistic skills are a bit primitive, that is a bit of a challenge. For testing I have just used maps of planets and moons in our system. I'll come up with something else before I'm done.

The probe is projected to have a speed op about 20% the speed of light. At that speed, it takes about 7 minutes to pass through the system. For my test I sped that up to about 140% the speed of light. That isn't realistic, but it gave me an idea what the final version would look like.

The test version was a disappointment. The path I laid out for the probe was too far from any of the planets. I will need to change the path, or move the planets.

I wanted to have the camera point at each of the planets at it flew by. I set some key frame locations and orientation of the camera, and let Blender interpolate the other frames. This didn't work very well. The camera would drift off the planet, then snap back. I am not an expert in Blender, so maybe there is an automated way to do that. If I don't figure that out, I may need to modify the location and orientation for each frame.

Seven minutes of silence can be boring, so I want to have some sound. I have some ideas, but I haven't followed up on them yet.

Trip to Mars

I am not actually planning to go to Mars, just do a video about the trip.

I am taking a course in conversational Mandarin. My wife is buried in China, and I'll need to speak a little bit of the language to travel there. I'm not doing very well with it so far.

I did have some success with a short story I wrote for the class. It is only 5 sentences long. My first idea was to talk about my wife, but I felt I might get too emotional. Instead I wrote about an imaginary trip I took to Mars.

I made a PowerPoint presentation to go with the story. I plan to turn that into a short video. Some of the images I used were copy written, so I'll have to find something in the public domain. I don't think I can afford to go to Mars and take my own pictures.

I will record the Mandarin myself, but will include some English subtitles for non Mandarin speakers, and Chinese subtitles for Mandarin speakers who can't make sense of my poor pronunciation.

This post is a mirror from my main blog http://www.dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/blog

Why Do I think “Line of Taxis” is my Best Movie?

I think that “Line of Taxis” is the best movie I've made. If I want to improve as a filmmaker, I need to understand why.

Just before I made “Line of Taxis”, I went through a bad period in my life. Initially, I didn't want to make a movie about it. It was still too close for me. There were also the possibility that a movie could reignite the situation.

I wanted to make a more challenging movie, but was stuck for an idea. One day I over heard someone talking about the mass layoffs we had in Calgary in the early 1980s. His phrase, “line of taxis”, stuck in my mind.

What I realized quickly was that in a movie about layoffs, I could draw on my own experience. Not in the sense of a story line, but in the emotions I felt. I could create a situation where the character would feel the same emotions I had.

There were several advantages to going this way.

It was a way I could deal with the residual emotions I felt. A way to exorcise them. I felt it would help me distance myself from the emotions that were still gnawing at me.

It would allow me to avoid the specifics of the situation. I was still afraid of the consequences if I made it too close to what actually happened.

It would shift the focus of the film from the story to the emotions of the character. This is something I realized later. It wasn't something I was aware of at the time.

I began work on the movie with a focus on the emotions of the main character. Then I developed situations and events that would bring out the same emotions I had felt. A relentless drip drip drip of minor events, that would force the main character to give in to the emotions.

In retrospect, I think that it was this focus on the emotions rather than the story is what made the movie as good as it was.

In the movies I made since then, I really have not had that focus on emotions. I think this has undercut the effectiveness of these movies. I know that I should focus on the character's emotional journey before I dive too deep into the story. I find that hard to do.

People often assume that writer's stories are autobiographical. “Line of Taxis” is, in a way, but in another way it isn't. While the emotional journey of the character is based on my own journey, none of the events in the movie reflect anything that happened to me in real life. I feel that I need to use the emotions from my experience but not the specific events.

This post is a mirror from my main blog http://www.dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/blog

It's Time To Pick My Next Project

Now that my story "Tom Swiftly and His Incredible Traffic Model" is done, it is time to think about my next project. What with Christmas coming up and snow on the ground, I might not get started until the new year.

I completed four projects this year:

·         "Summer's Too Short" http://dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/filmlist/summers-too-short/

·         "The 89th Key" http://dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/stories/the-89th-key/

·         "Pete's Plan" http://dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/stories/petes-plan/

·         "Tom Swiftly ..." http://dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/stories/tom-swiftly-and-his-incredible-traffic-model/

All of these were projects that I stated long before this year. In the case of "The 89th Key" it was some 43 years before! I did start on one project, "The Disruptors", but didn't get far with it. So I haven't really started a new project for quite some time. I concentrated my efforts on some of my unfinished projects.

Movies

I have almost 40 unfinished movie projects. Most of these are little more than a few notes about the idea, but I have four feature length scripts and one detailed outline. There are also a couple of my short stories that I think could be done as movies. I've decided to treat most of these as writing exercises. When I read them over I feel no urge to finish them.

There are a few exceptions.

I think that I'd like to do something with "Bright Freedom", and earlier I decided to turn it into a novella. I worked on it for a short time this year, but dropped it for other projects. (http://dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/category/film-projects/bright-freedom/)

"The Crying Woman" could make a good movie. At this point though I'm not sure where to go with it. I would like to do a new movie with Nawmal and I think this might work. On the other hand, it might be better if I worked with live actors and have them improvise. (http://www.dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/stories/the-crying-woman/)

"The Barrier" is not really finished. I called the most recent version release 0.6. There are a few changes I'd like to make to the dialogue and story, but the main think I want to do is replace the artificial voices with actor's voices. (http://dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/the-barrier/)

These two movies are major projects and in my current situation, I really don't have the ability to take them on. I haven't had any ideas for shorter projects, which would be a more realistic goal. I would have to come up with some ideas first.

Stories

I have about 25 unfinished story projects. As with my movie ideas, most of these no longer inspire me to complete them. There are bits and pieces of them that I think are good, but a story isn't just a few bits and pieces tossed together. Maybe I can cannibalize some of this material in other projects.

I enjoyed writing my novella "The 89th Key" this year, and would like to do something similar. This lead to my idea for "The Disruptors". Before I can write that I really need to do some more research and develop the background and characters. I found that my familiarity with the background and characters in "The 89th Key" made it much easier to write.

I have drafts of both my "Bright Freedom" script conversion and my SF story "Felix".  I would like to have those finished. I have tried rewrites on both of these, but I got stuck on both. I've started to wonder if I should just abandon what I've done so far and restart from scratch on them.

I've wanted to do another transportation planning story, like "The Barrier", but I haven't come up with anything so far. I think that part of my problem is that I've tried to do a new story with the same characters as I had in "The Barrier". It maybe that I just feel like I've already told their story and there isn't really anything more I want to say about them. If I came up with some new characters that could get me started.

Video Presentation

There is another project I want to take on. I have been involved for many years with The Society for the Study of Egyptian Antiquities. (http://www.calgaryssea.ca/) They put on a series of talks on Ancient Egypt. I've felt I should contribute, but I am just not up to giving a learned talk. I do think I could put together a video instead.

My first idea  was to do a video about King Tut. After all, nobody has ever done much about him. ;) I did some preliminary research to see if I could come up with a story and some visual material I could use. My interest petered out and I dropped the idea.

I thought I should do something about how the pyramids were built. That would fit into my background in civil engineering. Again, after some preliminary research, I lost interest in the idea.

My current idea is to do something about Agatha Christie in Egypt. She visited Egypt and the middle east several times and these visits were an important part of her life. Three of her books are set in Egypt. I did a little research and found some material. I haven't delved into it yet, so I'm not sure that I can turn it into an interesting video.

I've never done a documentary, and never really had a desire to do so. Strangely enough I usually prefer documentary movies to fictional ones. That said, I think this would be a good project for me to pursue.

This post is a mirror from my main blog http://www.dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/blog

Plans for Website Update

I have started to worked on changes to my website. I had a couple of goals. First to make the website more mobile friendly. Second to update the look of the website. I've made some progress.

I've had a website for my movies since 1999, and I haven't updated the look of my web page since 2009. Originally I used HTML for my site, then switched to PHP in 2009. I finally switched to WordPress in 2010.

In WordPress I tried a couple of themes (Kubrick and Core) before I decided to create my own theme. I tried to build one from scratch, but then decided to modify the Core theme. I didn't know about child themes at the time, so I just modified the original Core files. I added several special page types. I ended up with was a very rigid theme that is difficult to modify.

Over the last year or so I've read that more and more people access the internet through tablets and smart phones. Because the screen sizes are smaller, websites designed for a desk top don't look very nice on portable devices. My current theme is very hard to modify for different screen sizes.

Last week I installed a local server so I can experiment with different themes on my computer without making changes to my on-line website. I got it from a company called Bitnami (https://bitnami.com/stack/wordpress). It was quite easy to set up and work with I'm not sure how I can use it to test how the website will look on different devices though.

So far I have focussed on the technical aspects of a new theme design. I haven't given much thought as to what I want the theme to look like. I'll stick with my Dynamic Lethargy Films logo, but I'm not sure how I want the page laid out, or what color scheme to use.

My initial attempt was to create a child theme. I thought that would be easier to do, but after a little experimentation I decided to create a theme from scratch. I found a web page (http://www.siteground.com/tutorials/wordpress/wordpress_create_theme.htm) that provided the code for a very basic theme. I used that as a starting point.

I've managed to create a theme that can handle my current page set up. It still needs a lot of work. Several times the theme wouldn't work when I make some changes to the templates. I'm not sure what I did wrong, but I was able to go back to earlier versions that did work.

I plan to work in small steps toward a theme I'm happy with. I'm not in a big rush to get it done.

This post is a mirror from my main blog http://www.dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/blog

How Not to Promote Your Movie

Like any movie maker, it is important to me to have people see, and hopefully enjoy, my movies. How do I get people to watch my movies?

I find it very difficult to promote my movies. Partly it is because I don't feel comfortable promoting myself, and partly that I just don't know how. I've read many blogs and articles, but I still haven't found something that works for me.

They say that the best way to promote your work is to produce high quality and unique movies. Even if you do, it is still hard to get people to watch. Another twist to keep in mind is that, no matter how good your work, not everyone will like your work, so you need to reach the people who will like your work.

There are many "tricks" that people use to attract interest, and it is easy to be tempted to use them.

Search Engine Optimization

It seems like you find people who push SEO everywhere. This can be done in a positive way, since there will always be people who want to find what you have on offer. All too often though, it can be just a bunch of tricks to get people to visit your site.

Time and again I've visited sites that seem to promise something that interests me, only to find it isn't what I wanted. I get quite annoyed when that happens. I often see people in comment sections expressing their anger at this kind of thing. I must admit I used a similar approach with my movie Who Shot the President.

Another problem with this approach is that it is self defeating in the long run. For long term success as a movie maker you need to develop a fan base. When you turn people off you've lost them forever.

Get More Followers

Many people believe that you need to build up the number of people who follow you on Twitter and other websites. You can even buy followers. Even when they don't buy followers,  some people resort to various tricks to get others to follow them. One that particularly annoys me who follow me, then when I follow back, they thank me and then un-follow me.

It was my practice to follow people who followed me, but I now doubt that this is a wise approach. I follow far too many people to really follow what they post, so why follow them. On the other side, what is the value of followers who never see your posts? When I checked this morning I had 1,543 followers on Twitter. I doubt that even a tenth of them have ever noticed any of my posts.

One good follower who supports you is better than a 100 that never even see your posts.

Face Book Pages

Face Book pages are supposed to be a good way to keep in touch with follows. With recent changes to Face Book, that has become more difficult. Even before the changes, if someone didn't click on your posts on their feed, Face Book would not put them on their feed anymore.

Once you're no longer on people's feeds, it is very hard to get back on. Many people are angry at Face Book for this change. I wouldn't say I was angry, but I am disappointed that people who said they want to know what I'm up to are cut off so easily. On the other hand, is there anything I can do to get people to interact with my page more, so they continue to get my posts?

Rules to Follow

I have started to adopt some rules that I think will work for me.

Don't Annoy People - Do not do anything that would annoy me if someone did it to me.

Don't Look for Followers, Look for A Follower - Build up your followers one at a time. It is the quality of follower that you need to focus on, not the quantity.

Don't Lash Out at Criticism - A nasty response can drive people away. A more constructive response can draw people in. This has been a challenge for me.

I am sure that there are many more that will help me, and fit in with my approach to life.

This post is a mirror from my main blog http://www.dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/blog

Do I Have The Personality To Be A Successful Filmmaker/Writer?

Much of what I read about filmmaking and writing focuses on how to sell your work. While I see the necessity of this, I don’t think I am good at it, and I certainly don’t enjoy it. I’ve always thought of selling your work in negative terms, which I think of as “self-promotion”. In the end, I go back to the belief that if my work is good enough, then it will sell itself.

The Art of Asking

Recently I watched a TED talk by Amanda Palmer: “The Art of Asking” that got me to re think how I promote my own work.

In some ways, her talk didn’t have anything new to me, but it did open my eyes a little to a different view of what was involved. Whereas I thought in terms of self-promoters, I’d describe her as a connector. Her approach is more like the way you make friends than selling yourself. She describes it as trusting people. I think her approach works very well with her type of personality.

Her approach doesn’t seem as crass or self-serving as what I’d heard before. It does seem to be a nicer approach to making your way as an artist. For myself though, I still can’t see that I can take this approach. I just don’t feel comfortable when I ask people to support me.

I can’t really change my personality in any major, or even minor, way. I supposed I could train myself to behave otherwise, but it would seem artificial and come off as phoney. That would be worse than if I’d not tried at all.

Let the Art Sell Itself

As I noted above, in the past I’ve tried to rely on the inherent interest of my work to gain an audience. That only works with special ideas, and not all of my ideas are special. It isn’t always possible to recognize if your own idea is special or not.

The success I had with some of my ideas made me a little spoiled. Both the Hundred Dollar Film Festival and “Line of Taxis” were projects that quickly found supporters. I didn’t really need to push them; they took on a life of their own. That is something I can’t always count on.

There is also a good argument that if your work can’t sell itself, then it just isn’t worth your while to make it. I have abandoned many ideas that didn’t catch other people’s interest. Some ideas are harder to give up than others are. Maybe those ideas would catch on if I developed them further.

Involve Others

Another approach I could use is to involve people in my projects that do have the desirable personality traits that I just don’t have. Most commercial films are like this. They usually leave the promotion to the actors and not the writer or director. The exceptions are notable for their rarity.

I haven’t really tried this approach and I’m not sure how well it would work. The closest I came was when Keith Humphrey attended the screening of “Line of Taxis” at a festival. That wasn’t really a case where I tried to promote the film though.

Other Approaches

I am sure I haven’t exhausted all the ways that I could promote my work. However, I am not sure what other approaches might work for me. 

This post is a mirror from my main blog http://www.dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/blog

A Look Back at 2012

At the start of 2012, I did a post about My Goals for 2012. Before I do the same for 2013, I wanted to look at how I did last year.

Make Better Use of My Time

Well, I don’t think I did very well with this. I got some projects done, but I didn’t get as much done as I could have. I have an excuse for the first couple of months: I slipped on some ice and cracked a bone in my arm and a rib. That slowed me down for a while.

I said I would set deadlines, but didn’t. I did shift my focus from short quick projects to longer projects. I got several started, but some of them are not finished yet, so I look less productive than I was.

I read more this year. Forty-four books in total. That took up my time, but Pierre Berton’s advice is “read, read, read, write, write, write, rewrite, rewrite, rewrite”, so it wasn’t time wasted.

Contingency

I completed Contingency and got it into the Hundred Dollar Film Festival. It won the best of Alberta award. That was very gratifying.

Somedays . . .

I wasn’t happy with the version I finished earlier in the year, so I pulled it out of the Hundred Dollar Film Festival. I reshot it later in the year. The new version was much better, so, if it gets accepted, it will be ready for next years festival.

My Most Difficult Case

I set a deadline of April 1 for this project. I didn’t do anything on in 2012. Next year. For sure. Really. I mean it this time.

The Crying Lady

I planned to use Xtranormal to turn the short story into a film. I never started on it, but I did use Xtranormal to make Make ’ em Squirm: The Sharkbiter Way. I found that a valuable step toward a longer project.

Transportation Planning Story (Novelette)

I wanted to write a novelette based on one or another of my transportation stories. I made some more notes about ideas and developed the story a bit, but didn’t get to any actual writing.

I did start three stories I hope will develop into novelettes. I based Bright Freedom on one of the feature scripts I wrote in 2011. I got a first draft done, which was mostly a direct conversion of the script into prose form. I cut out some material and added some as well. I restructured it a bit. I left it for a while to work on other projects before I did a second draft. It is still on hold. The first draft came in at 17,400 words.

I worked on two other novelettes. Both were science fiction stories. Felix is about an expedition to Mars to search for a lost robot rover. The idea came from an H. P. Lovecraft story. I have about half of the first draft done. It looks like done the first draft will be less than 8,000 words.

Heat Wave is the story of a scientist who runs into resistance to his research. I met a researcher several years ago who told me about their experiences, which gave me the idea for the story. The story also incorporates some of my own experiences. It looks like it will end up about 10,000 words.

I did some research into the market for science fiction stories. It looks like there are quite a large number of magazines that publish science fiction. Some don’t pay very much.

One magazine has a long list of clichéd stories they won’t publish. Unfortunately, Heat Wave is similar to one they list. I could fix that with a different ending, but the ending was the point of the story. I plan to finish the story the way I planned, and then see how people react to it.

I wrote a shorter science fiction story, Pete’s Plan, which I submitted to a couple of the magazines. Both rejected it, but there are many more to try yet. I rewrote it after the first rejection, and I plan another rewrite before I resubmit it to another magazine.

The Unexpected

Several of my projects this year were not planned. That included Make ’ em Squirm: The Sharkbiter Way, as well as the short stories and novelettes I worked on.

Blog

My 2012 goal was to post at least one blog post a week. I did 58 posts. I did miss a couple weeks because of my accident. I didn’t had as many visits to my blog in 2012, but that may be partly due to changes in the way visits were counted.

My Goals for 2012

Next week, after New Years Day, I’ll do a new set of goals for 2013.

This post is a mirror from my main blog http://www.dynamiclethargyfilms.ca/blog