Yesterday I had the wonderful privilege of working with
Geek & Sundry on their Tabletop Day Special. It was a huge honor for me as a gamer, but
more importantly, as an independent artist.
Even though this blog is intended to be about independent publishing, I’m
going to talk today about independent videos on the web because it’s an
important element to freelance writers, and more importantly, an important
ingredient to independent publications and publicity.
When I first got into film, I wanted to be an independent
artist. I was excited about the whole
idea of film festivals and private investors to make heartfelt movies by real
artists. What I found in my 20 years in
the film industry was that none of this was true. The festivals were, at best, “independent”
with the word in quotation marks because, first, you couldn’t even get your
movie accepted unless you had a celebrity in it, (and you could only get those
celebrities in your film if you were part of the Hollywood system,) and
aspiring filmmakers who tried to get into the activities of these festivals
usually found themselves blocked out by red velvet ropes that separated them
from the VIPs. I found the whole process
hypocritical. There was very little
difference between the “independent” scene and the studios.
There was a first internet revolution in the late ‘90s
and early ‘00s. Several production
companies popped up and there was a central location for videos called
iFilm. At first, these were made up of
independent artists excited about pressing the reset button to create a true
independent video scene. Unfortunately,
the mentality of many of these places were the same as the studios and “independent”
film places. Some of these companies
were even run by the same people. iFilm
itself put up their own red velvet rope by deciding to stop accepting videos
they deemed “unworthy” and even kicked a lot of videos off. One of my own, a short version of The
Forgotten Grave, was one of them that was kicked off, even though it had won a
competition within iFilm’s own company.
What really killed the first internet revolution was when
major movie companies tried to create internet content. They saw real independent work being done,
and they wanted to control it, the way they had bought all the “independent”
production studios in 1999 when they swept the Academy Awards. The result of this attempted take-over was
that content became stale, and the larger companies found that there wasn’t
enough money in it for them. What should
have been a place for young artists to grow was hijacked by people who wanted
lots of money, who then threw it away because there wasn’t enough money in it
for them. The content itself was so much
like regular television that people went, why should I watch this when I have
TV at a higher quality level. (In those
days, watching on the internet meant you were watching a 2 inch screen that was
often jumpy and couldn’t play more than five minutes at a time.)
The second internet revolution has, of course, taken
hold. High internet speeds are given the
credit, and to be fair, that is a big part of it. No one has to watch tiny screens and there’s
no time limit. But the main credit
should go to Youtube, who doesn’t believe in the red velvet rope. Companies like iFilm screwed it up for
themselves by trying to follow the studio and film festival models and being
exclusionary. Everything had to be of a
certain “quality level” or have celebrities involved. This destroys innovation and experimentation,
but more importantly, it takes the power away from the audience, who should
really be deciding what plays and what does not.
This has given rise to some of the greatest entertainment
ever to be put on screens. Individuals
from all over the world can now innovate, and others can decide for themselves
what they want to watch rather than having some stuffy executive or pertinacious
film student deciding what’s “worthy.” The
concept of capitalism itself was based on the idea of competition, and that has
made entertainment on the web better.
It has also made other mediums better. The rise in quality of television shows for
programs like Breaking Bad, The Walking Dead, and Game of Thrones is due in
many ways to this rise in quality in internet entertainment. Why?
Because the competition is rising, and television executives are
realizing they now have to compete with the rest of the world, not just their
fellow executives.
What this means to writers is that many more
opportunities are arising for work on projects that are more artistic,
experimental, and innovative. Whether
searching for work with other companies, or to create product independently,
the world of visual entertainment has grown, and in favor of trying new
things. It also aids book authors as
video content is always a good way to get people to look at their books. And with programs like Hit Record, people are
sharing content that can then be used to support other artists in every medium,
including books, blogs, etc.
So meeting Wil Wheaton yesterday was the equivalent to me
of meeting a favorite author. His show
Tabletop, though it’s about gaming and not about writing, is helping every
artistic community through being innovative, independent, experimental, and
supportive. Wheaton himself would be
considered a “has been” by Hollywood, but rather than letting that get him down
and believing what the system says, he took his interest, something most people
would consider to be unimportant, and brought it to the forefront. He shows through his passion and sheer joy
how gaming brings people together. He
shows off games by both mainstream and small companies. Most importantly, rather than being aloof
from his community, he becomes a part of it through social media. He helps others be seen through his Tumblr
page, he vlogs to people that catch his attention online, and he treats people
he meets on the same level as anyone rather than acting like he’s somehow above
them. Yes, he has celebrity status, but
he’s using it to shine spotlights on subjects and people around him rather than
demanding million dollar paychecks and entitlements the way most people do.
The new celebrities of the internet are mostly that
way. Some of them were celebrities in
film and television, such as George Takei and Joseph Gorden Levitt, but I have
to give them credit as well, as they could have just stayed in the more
established film and television world, but they have been willing to make less
money on the internet in order to be part of this true independent revolution. As for non-celebrities, you have people like
the Green brothers and Jay and Mike at Red Letter Media who are all from the Midwest
and would be overlooked in traditional medias, and you have the fantastic
comedians at Screen Junkies, How it Should Have Ended, and College Humor. And if you want gaming, there are channels
that have opened up that are very much like sports, such as Tabletop, The
Prince of Macedon, World of Tanks, and my own Command Combat Battle Reports.
This democratization has opened up more venues than ever
for writers and artists of every genre.
I’m at last satisfied with the independent television and movie scene.
Here are a few of the shows I recommend:
https://www.youtube.com/user/geekandsundry
