Holy Boners

Today I am thinking about the indivisibility of story and audience. Which comes first? In May 2010, Hello World and I return to the Big Lake. I’d like to start with a more robust social presence than the project had in 2009. WordPress and Twitter apps on the iPhone were swell, but there hadn’t been much outreach before the launch.

Could we start this May with a robust and attentive audience of say 5000? If so, who would they be? Who should we invite? How should time be balanced between building a following and building the story?

That last question is a doozie, it scares me. Scan back through the posts from July – August 2009 and you’ll see how much preparation was going on. That’s where I am now, just two months from launch. Do I have time to build an audience? Do I want an audience if I am ill prepared for performance?  What’s the point of having an incredible performance that nobody sees? What does an auspicious balance between audience building and story building look like?

Let’s back up and look at who the audience might be.  Content attracts an audience that can relate to it. Context diversifies the audience. Both content and context flow from my story, so what’s my story? Story -> content + context -> audience. This might all seem abstract, so here’s an example.

A guy is going to sail a small catamaran around Lake Michigan. If that’s the story, then the content would be sailboats, water, beaches, maybe some interesting weather. This content appeals to folks familiar with Lake Michigan, sailors and some outdoor enthusiasts.

Add more story and the content expands… This guy believes he can fathom the future of the human race, he thinks he can figure out how we will radically reinvent our planetary presence and avoid environmental apoocalypse. Now the content includes encounters with all manner of kooky folks with clues about the future – rocking chair philosophers, garage scientists, mad prophets, sincere visionaries, hard working fanatics, angels in brown paper bags, irascible recluses and so on. The audience now includes folks who enjoy debate, new ideas, all the friends and family of the kooky folks, folks who are themselves somewhat kooky and anyone who thinks the human race is in big trouble.

Now comes the lovely magic of context. This guy who is going to sail around Lake Michigan likes science fiction. Not the watered down low octane Hollwood fluff, but the hard core, straight to the vein hard core. Science fiction from books. His shelves are sagging with ragged paperbacks from the masters – Bradbury, Wilhelm, Le Guin, Clarke, Dick, Lethem, Swanwick, Stephanson. He’s steeped deep. We explain this to the audience and suddenly we get this guy a little more. Poor dear, his brain’s been fried from too much reading! He’s projecting his imagination into the real world, he probably thinks his catamaran is the space shuttle. What will happen to this sap, will he end up drowned after being knocked off his boat by alien Asian carp? Now the content includes the guy’s history, scenes depicting his heartbreaking literary obsession – moments that make a connection to him. The audience may not agree with who he is or what he believes, but they can relate! He is every man, every woman. He becomes a placeholder for all of us. A 21st century Don Quixote on an impossible quest. If context is pulled off properly, the audience includes all, whether or not they like boats, philosophy or give a rats ass about the earth.

So I guess the question of balance didn’t get resolved here. Hmm. I’ll be back.

Faisal dropped off his edit of DOG. In the spring of 2009 he had offered to bring out the “David Lynch ambiance” while simultaneously loping off “atrocious performance”. He felt that DOG depicted a quirky, off kilter world that was believable.

His approach was not timid – slashing out chunks of dialogue, occasionally going so far that the sense of the moment was totally lost. He had no qualms about changing the story either  – excising characters entirely and even suggesting a new ending!

On the whole, his trimming was pretty nifty. Many of his ideas will be worthy of careful consideration and the energy he has brought to the project is amazing. I owe you pal.

Timewise, the project is a misfit. It’s too long to be a short and too short to be a feature. At the end of 2008, it was 26.40 minutes – the standard length for 1/2 hour TV episode. An ideal short length would be about 13 minutes. Faisal was attempting to bring it down to the high teens, he made it to 20 something.

How do I feel? I hadn’t seen the project play out in 6 months. Watching DOG with all it’s production warts, ragged and hemoraging from it’s trip through Faisal’s brain – I felt happy. There really are some great ideas here, and the project should be finished so those ideas can live. It’s doable, it’s gonna be fun.

So when can we work on it, what’s the schedule? ALM preparedness is underway – what would have to happen to DOG before hitting the water? A working cut, long or short version would allow motion graphics to move forward while I’m gone. March is the window, I can schedule two weeks. A very focused two weeks to block out the basic structure, what’s in and what’s not…

Last thing… test screenings. Put a project online with password protection and a feedback form, then invite participation from major metro areas using craigslist. If we could somehow integrate video chat, whoa. Record reactions and facial expressions from an audience of one, by appointment.

Erica and Faisal came over for pancakes on Friday, 10/02/19. Faisal’s version of the DOG edit, ostensibly the reason for our reunion, remained untouched. Instead we talked… about advancing our craft, social presence, Around Lake Michigan, redefining projects, new collaborations and Earth. An energizing evening of scintillating conceptual improvisation.

We looked at two sections of the ALM rough cut, what is emerging as the project calling card. I asked them what artifacts of a future civilization the Ritch Branstrom interview might point to…

Everything has life, what appears to be junk or trash is just the beginning of another cycle.

This could be analogous to the Law of Conservation, which states that matter can neither be created or destroyed, just changed in form. One might postulate an analogous Law of Utility – the value of an object is contextual, usefulness can neither be created or destroyed, just reimagined. Utility promises worthy application as a remediation principle, eg mining landfills, fractionating soil to harvest nuclear contaminents, etc. In the hospice civilization of yore, Utility would have been co-opted for greenscam propaganda, eg “We’re not generating toxic waste, we’re building the future!” Thank you Monsanto. But, but, but… what if ubiquitous PCBs could be reimagined and repurposed? That’s the sort of big medicine this artifact hints at.

That last paragraph was an exploratory digression – jumping immediately to interpretation and application is not always desirable, implications take time to sink in. Here’s a couple more of their insights, sans my comments. For a deeper draught, I’d suggest imbibing at the source, cue the movie which should be posted soonish.

Bliss based big systems are worth integrating into.

Ritch’s experience of flow indicates that a sustainable civilization features redesigned time.

After a focused exchange about the ALM calling card, we discussed how Erica and Faisal might fit into version 2.0 of ALM. Erica had earlier recounted a frustrating episode as the manager of major manufacturer’s social presence feed, specifically how the company’s lack of transparency and integrity killed the conversation. I raved about Julie and her offer to take on ALM’s social presence, an unprecedented opportunity to learn at the foot of a master as we spread the ALM love. I admit to dangling Julie bait-like to draw them even further into my nefarious schemes. We’ll wait and see if they bite…

On December 13, 2008 I attended an Awakening the Dreamer symposium at Boricua College with Melanie Ida Chopko, aka Melonie Amazing. On Valentines Day weekend 2010, I trained with 34 others to be a symposium facilitator.

Fuzzy pix of the Valentine Watershed facilitators and trainers. February 12 -14, 2010

The symposium is a fascinating blend of modalities designed to activate waves of sleepy and disillusioned humans and deploy them to save our collective butts. Imagine bringing forth an environmentally sustainable, socially just and spiritually fulfilling human presence on the planet. Here’s the recipe…

2-30 new participants (the audience)
1-3  facilitators / presenters
AV equipment, DVDs
the script

The script is the key ingredient. It’s authored by various manifestations of local consciousness collectively known as Earth – aka Mother Earth, Gaia and Pachamama. Because of it’s unique origins the script acts like an energy pipe, connecting the audience directly to our fabulous starship’s forgotten super computer. This is not immediately obvious to the audience (and even some of the facilitators) as the script appears to be an ordinary stack of papers in a 3 ring binder.

If this sounds nutty then you are definitely reading the wrong blog.

In a largish room combine all ingredients for about 2-5 hours. This is called the symposium. Include non gmo snacks and drinks.

The facilitators offer the script to the audience, either by reciting it verbatim, rephrasing it into their own words or reading it directly from the binder. The results are the same regardless of how the script is offered – most of the audience enjoys a restored connection to planetary consciousness, enabling the conversion of their frustration and angst into great reservoirs of survival savvy.  Powerful shifts towards a sustainable, just and fulfilling human presence, perfectly adapted to local conditions, manifests within months. A sense of community pervades.

Some members of the audience will demonstrate a strong desire for the script. A couple of days of additional exposure will make them facilitators.  As new facilitators emerge, symposiums become more numerous and the process accelerates. A note about facilitators… angels in sackcloth, misfits and mad poets all make excellent facilitators, but there’s really no ideal type. Advertising executives and soccer moms/dads, elementary students, retirees, stock brokers – basically any articulate human has the capacity to facilitate.

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Last night my nephew texted me about my weekend of environmental training – what was it all about? I passed him the ATD trailer link but he was still baffled. I didn’t know what to tell him, how to give the gestalt. Hence the above post, my first independent assimilation exercise. ‘Script’ is my shorthand by the way, ATD folks call it the symposium materials.

Here’s one highlight. 34 of us spent the weekend working through the material and on the last day we broke into groups to practice presenting.  Nancy, Majandra, Keith, Darelyn and myself worked with Geri. As we took turns presenting, our unique talents and gifts were suddenly activated. We stumbled over the text and gaffed a bit, but underneath it all there was resonance. We had an enhanced quality of presence, we were upgraded.

Keith and I talked it over afterwards – it was the Earth. I have been actively practicing flowing Earth energy, feeling alive, being an Earth agent – but this was a new experience. The pages and pages of symposium material are the Mother’s point of presence. It’s not mere human gabble, science this and opinion that. It’s a direct connection, something I thought only existed in wilderness. My fellow presenters and I were amplified by offering it. Earth can speak to us directly, using actual symbolic language. Earth can make it’s own memes. Damn!

With three blogs, when will Dan have time to make movies?

This whole blog experience has been startling. I’ve scribbled my life away trying to sort out my feelings, document flashes of genius and decrypt the future… but my audience was always imagined. Stacks of notebooks, old letters and magentic media – one mind’s mirror.

Now I’m jamming cyberspace with my spoor, my breadcrumbs, my wild ravings. Checking my stats I see that there are actual visitors reading what I write – other people who aren’t me. Ah, to huff the heady fumes of illusory fame in the waning afternoon! My audience expands from a crowd of cognitive simulations to the entire population of wired human beings.

It actually doesn’t feel all that different. From waxing poetic with the puppets in my head to standing naked before a dark theater of flesh and blood strangers, it’s much the same. Does this mean I’ve been replaced by a android? Have I always been one?

There is a blog for each of the two movies in process, dogthemovie.com (Daughter of God) and ondesire.com (Around Lake Michigan). Holyboners.com, (Creative Power through Audacious Mistakes) is the mothership, where I do most of my blogging. If posts are relevant to the other two projects, I can crosspost to the relevant blog automatically.

holyboners.com

This is my santuary, my fortress of solitude. I am the only poster and comments are not available. Here I formulate my theories and plans of action. Posts can flow from holyboners.com to ondesire.com and dogthemovie.com through crossposting. Posts flowing back to holyboners.com from either of those blogs would likely be created by other folks. I’ve minimized confusion about where my posts originate with user accounts at each of the blogs that match the originating blog. This approach of crossposting is going to need about a month or two of testing to find out whether it really makes sense.

dogthemovie.com

This blog was my first, launched to document the making of the Daughter of God – including technical production, insights and assorted anecdotes. Currently the flow of visitors to this blog has tapered off but this may change as the project begins to ramp back up. Though incomplete the DOG project has already spun off two other projects – and one of those is finished. This might just be the year for the completion of DOG now that we’ve got a dream team.

ondesire.com

This is by far the most visited of the three, especially while Hello World and I were on the water. Ondesire.com had 23k hits while we were sailing in September from 385 unique visitors and 30k hits in October from 200 unique visitors. These are small numbers in the greater scheme of things but it’s pretty decent for a strictly word of mouth promotion campaign. The goals are to increase the amount of visitors and to turn existing visitors into contributors – generating posts that drive the project forward – such as suggestions for people to interview, places to go, ideas to consider, feedback on what’s happened so far and even productive conversations with each other.

Meanwhile on Earth…

The internet is a global conversation. A variety of strange web entities have appeared to enable this – forums, chat rooms, voice over IP, and even video conferencing – Jonathan recently posted his take on this.

The Trickster Pictures team converses in the Collaboratory, a Simple Machines forum. The Category “Business” includes several subcategories – “Latest News”, “Accounting”, “Objectives and Plans”, etc. Under each of the sub categories, members post a topic to start a conversation.

On the topic “Business/Objectives and Plans/To do – Jonathan Kelly”, Jonathan and I discuss his activity for that week.

New topics replace older topics, but all the information remains available and searchable.  As conversations evolve, forums become a rich mine of information about a project’s history, administrative logisitics, technical support, etc. Other members can check in and catch up on everything going on or just what concerns them.

There might be more robust collaboration tools out there, but a forum is easy to configure and familiar to web denizens. Also, Simple Machines forum software is mostly open source – which means it’s free.

Trickster Pictures’ projects trend toward an open source aesthetic. Though open source originally referred to software development it can be applied to processes too.  If we can share how movies are made with a wider community, it might help others to make movies who otherwise wouldn’t be able to, or make them better. I have several blogs that are information distribution points for the process. Though the collaboratory forum is closed to the public, the information generated there is edited and fed out to the blogs. Tours of the Trickster Pictures Collaboratory are available by request.

The primary lesson I learned making Daughter of God or DOG is this – finishing a movie by yourself takes forever. To complete DOG and support ALM this year, I’ve assembled a team of two knob spinning freelancers and five adhoc experts. Here’s some quick introductions.

Art Department
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Dan Kelly. Me.

Jonathan Kelly is a emerging artist working primarily in the digital domain. He’s been doing 3D modeling and game development for the past 4-5 years and has been expanding into editing and motion graphics with Premiere and After Effects respectively. He also has plans to pick up some programming to be able to extend and customize his toolkit. Jonathan has contributed significantly to the apocalyptic ambience of DOG with futuristic cars and a derelict cruise ship.
http://jonathankellyarts.com

Melonie Steffes is a painter and musician. She is also an awesome mom and no slouch with a power saw. Melonie went on location for DOG in the spring of 2006 as assistant director, fabrication specialist and set stylist. Though Melonie favors real world materials, she has been computer savvy for at least a decade and is the proud owner of a zippy new OSX platform. Melonie is going to be mixing and matching traditional and digital expression to expand the visual horizons of both DOG and ALM.
http://meloniesteffes.com

Business and Outreach
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Julie Constantin is a financier and business magus. Her venture capital career boasts a bevy of brave new start-ups and she’s raised multi-millions for nonprofit organizations. She’s seriously connected, an iconoclast and very hard to kill. She too is an amazing mom. Julie will be turbo charging our projects with her expertise on management and social marketing and blowing our minds with her visions of the post future.
http://www.constantinpartners.com/

Editorial and Story Advisors
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Faisal Azam is an editor, filmmaker and writer. Faisal has plenty of corporate clients you’ve actually heard of and though he could have sold his soul to the beast a thousand times, he remains a force of integrity and goodness in the universe. He also has bitchin’ cool long hair. He and his squeeze Erica live in some god forsaken corner of Queens, but if you show up he’ll juice you some carrots. Faisal has generously offered to recut DOG to bring out the tasty bits. He doesn’t realize it yet, but he’s going to get even more deeply entangled in our crazy schemes. With any luck, we’ll drag Erica along too.
http://www.faisalazam.com/

Jeff Gibbs is a filmmaker and composer. His hutzpah has powered such documentary blockbusters as Bowling for Columbine and Capitalism, A Love Story. In every camp he visits, his integrity and passion causes fur to bristle and minds to open. Jeff has had a profound influence on the development and philosophy of On Desire and Around Lake Michigan. His recent incarnation as a media savvy Lorax is galvanizing forest stewardship throughout Northern Michigan. He’s also rumored to be working on his own monumental cinematic expose of the human condition.

Steve Elrick is a painter, theatrical director and performer. He’s directed countless plays during his multi-decade career as the President of the Benzie County Players. Affable and gregarious, Steve is universally loved by the local arts community and anyone with half a brain would agree that he is the region’s premier arts advocate and ambassador. His acutely inquisitive nature and noble carriage merely hint at the full extent of his stellar character, a character only mildly tarnished by his crazed obsession with punning.

Andrea Maio is a filmmaker with an affinity for the experimental. She is a recent transplant to Benzie County, squatting her family’s cabin in Elberta when she’s not negotiating big deals in LA. Currently she’s pitching a food series centered around the Great Lakes region, featuring intimate portraits of cuisine artisans like the vintners of the Leelanau Pennisula. Andrea is also a gifted teacher, giving her a storytelling turbo charge. Her insightful guidance continues to inform the development of Around Lake Michigan.

But wait… Faisal is in New York, Julie’s in California, Jonathan and Melonie are in Michigan… Short of scorching the upper atmosphere with combusted kerosene, how can they effectively collaborate? Geographic and atmospheric impact are minimized by the Trickster Pictures Collaboratory.

Last year my documentary about sailing around the Hawaiian Islands morphed into a documentary about sailing around Lake Michigan. In September of 2009 I soloed 300 miles on the 16 foor catamaran Hello World, searching for sustainable civilizations.  The plan for 2010 is to sail the entire perimeter of Lake Michigan, over 1000 miles!

The name of the documentary is (appropriately) Around Lake Michigan, Search for Sustainable Civilizations. Here’s the pitch.

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If we can’t figure out how to live in accord with the global life support system, human beings are doomed. Becoming sustainable is bigger than recycling or buying low flush toilets, it’s a reimagining of our presence on the planet.

As the operations of governments and corporations are often at odds with human survival, we can’t rely on their guidance. The adventure of survival belongs to each of us.

The fragments of a sustainable civilization already exist, we have but to gather and assemble them. All over the world folks are figuring out what it looks like, inventing and rehearsing the survivable future.

In the spring of 2010 Dan Kelly resumes his expedition aboard the 16 foot catamaran Hello World, sailing Around Lake Michigan to Search for Sustainable Civilizations. Dan picked the big lake because it’s close to home, but it doesn’t matter where we start. The answers are all around us – wherever we are.

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Visit the Around Lake Michigan blog at http://ondesire.com and toss in your two cents. We’re looking for ideas – people to interview and places to check out along the shores of Michigan, Wisconsin, Indiana and Illinois.  Share your clues and rumors about sustainable civilizations. Offer feedback on the video vignettes,  comment on the posts or create your own posts about relevant issues. Blogging is fun!

Lots of visitors and activity at ondesire.com will translate into contributions of equipment, expertise and funding for Around Lake Michigan this spring.

Folks always wonder what they can do beyond insulating their homes and installing compact florescent light bulbs. Flooding On Desire with your awareness sprouts the seeds of our native weeds.

Choose one…

I can toss my two cents but I’ve never visited On Desire before. Register at http://ondesire.com

I’ve already registered and ready to contribute, let’s go! Log in at http://ondesire.com

I only want to visit On Desire for now. Visit http://ondesire.com

There was another way of doing things once, a way that has become marginalized and almost forgotten but perhaps not quite totally annihilated. A way that isn’t self destructive.

We all know the legend… the native people of several continents knew the way, lived it. Then the bad old European colonizers showed up with their plagues, organized ignorance and naked greed. The native people were nearly rubbed out and their ways lost, almost.

If the people who practiced the old way couldn’t prevail in combat, then that’s the way it goes. One culture is stronger than another. Survival of the fittest, that’s natures way, right?  One might just as well believe that dumb Poles charged their horses directly at Nazi tanks in the battle of Krojanty.

You can turn a zillion dollars into 10 zillion by making a movie about it – big blue people, lots of explosions and a happy ending this time.

Meanwhile back on earth, we’re still fehgked. Our current behavior is killing us, we need to rediscover what’s been forgotten. Is there anyone left who remembers how it worked?

I am mostly invader stock, descended from European peasants and workers.  My mom’s parents had been farmers in Austria/Hungary. My dad’s parents were a mish mash of ingredients from the British Isles – Ireland, Scotland and England, and had been in America for several generations. However, there’s a rumor that my dad’s mom had some cherokee blood. Maybe I can claim lineage.

The bottom line is that this knowledge of the way is inherent in the earth’s systems, the wilds. If we just pay attention we can get back in alignment. Lineage is good – knowledge passed down and life ways maintained, but it’s built into the planet, we need look no further than the great big beautiful planet.

Inspired by http://www.suppressedhistories.net/

What do I want to be and feel in the next 2 years? The next 5 years? The next 10?

This was the 3rd question in my coherent plan. It’s a bit odd actually to answer this question last, after projecting plans for the next year. One might assume that the logical sequence would be to project long term plans first. What motivates me right now is reaching shorter term goals because I feel a sense of urgency. Having two unfinished projects is both exciting and scary. I can’t see much beyond that. I’ve written extensively about the near term and that feels right.

Plans imply long term outcomes even if they don’t define them. I want to finish two movies so I can… make other movies, achieve my mission, to explore wider territories…

Planning without long term vision is pointless. Plans are molds for energy to flow into and eventually manifest dreams, to create a magnificent and slightly miraculous reality. Why bother otherwise?

To make a quick post before night night. I’ve been implementing the blogging structure and it… might… just… work. Three blogs all criss cross posting, logging into each other with usernames that match the blogs that the posts are coming from. When a post belongs in all three, it originates from holyboners, otherwise it starts from one of the others. For the most part, anything that has something to do with the process of making movies originates from Holy Boners. I wonder if I can keep other contributors from cross posting. Better check that.

I thought I had a plan for making the mothership blog, but not quite. Now I am confused. Here’s a little map to illustrate the flow.

FORUM collaboratory

|| feeding

BLOG Mothership (holyboners.com)

BLOG Daughter of God (dogthemovie.com)

BLOG Around Lake Michigan (ondesire.com)

BLOG Awesomeshit (artisthouse.com/fellowship)

Now this may seem silly, but I am hung up in an aesthetic snag. Holyboners is about fortunate mistakes but does this premise apply to Ondesire as well? Holyboners was a fine premise for Daughter of God, but I don’t think it flies for ALM. Not that I am giving up this wonderful principle but I think I am moving beyond fortunate mistakes as my primary strategy. What then would be the guiding force for the mothership?

TT seems a likely candidate, but there’s two problems. Though the mothership blog is not exactly public, it will be feeding the satellite blogs, and that in theory drives traffic back to the mothership unless I password protect it. I can use TT when crossposting to ondesire certainly, but it still invites exploration.

TT requires finesse. It’s not something to implement overnight.

The second problem is the guy in California owns TT.com and wants $2500 for it. It would be lovely to own the entire set and I don’t mind paying him something, but get real – he’s had the sucker since 2002. 8 years of paying for it or $80 let’s guess and then whatever other overhead he’s got. $100 if he’s savvy. I’ve offered him $200. I doubt he’ll bite, camping is his business.

The point is I’d like to launch TT eventually, but to mastermind a huge media effort just to have the traffic stolen later? The name will become a traffic magnet once I get going, increasing the value of that domain.

I probably should have not said, “I’ll check back in a few months” – it’s a contradiction to my premise of preparing to launch a media campaign for a film. If he counters my $200, perhaps I’ve got a chance.

Let’s come back to earth. I’ve configured blogs that will work as they are. I can play a bit of a waiting game with Don from California though he knows via whois I own every TT but his .com and that I am trying to create a matched set. I am motivated to assemble it. He knows he can wait me out, but he’s not even bargaining. I can always visualize his help, hee hee. That’s my kind of leverage. $400. I can play the straw man who is bidding against me, though I would need another account. It’s oh so fun to strategize, but much easier just to visualize.

So the plan is… holyboners remains the name of the mothership for now. If we want to rename the mothership later, that’s fine. In the meantime let’s just assemble the infrastructure and move forward. Let’s test for awhile – the whole mothership concept might be not be feasible.

Before we go – distill into a domain name the guiding principles of my journey, of my practice. Another time, perhaps.

Afterwards… The beauty of visualization. After an interesting exchange of emails with Don I got TT.com for $380. How about that? $20 under the visualized price! Could it be any clearer?

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On February 14, the year of the tiger begins. It’s a good year for me and to celebrate, I’m gonna reach out to the scattered tribe and connect. Perfect timing really, the contractors will be humming and all the blogs sorted out. Reinvigorate our public presence and announce the return of ALM.

It’s also a hallmark card day, but feghk that!