Happy Thanksgiving!

Greetings, one and all! Due to a number of real life events, this update will be brief. Due to illnesses, there was no stunt meet this week. However, things still proceeded apace in the post production department. Chief among the events being the completion of the first drafts of the score for the last four episodes of Stormborn!

We had the assessment meet on Tuesday, and plotted the direction of the score refinements. If all goes according to plan, all the final versions will be in our hands within the next two weeks.

These next few weeks will be busy ones in the non-filmmaking side of things. First Thanksgiving, than participating in a wedding, so… we’ll keep updating you on what progress we’ve made, and we’ll see you on the other side.

Have a good week, and Happy Thanksgiving!  

Deliniations and Deadlines

Greetings, one and all! Well, this week has been… chaotic. We had a good start, with a meeting about the remainder of the score composition for Stormborn. In it, we laid out the timing and feel we were looking for in each of the remaining episodes.

We’re down to the wire, as far as availability and deadlines go, so this will be a mad dash to the end.
Sunday saw a review session for the short sword, followed by a choreography session where they put what they’d learned into practice, by incorporating the various plays into a fight scene.

It was an entertaining and energetic fight, and I was impressed by how many plays they were able to work in.

Last but not least, this last week has brought to light new information regarding the Federal regulations that YouTube creators will be required to operate under. It’s a very long and technical story, but basically the FTC is making a special exception to the COPPA law, which is only supposed to affect website owners, to prosecute YouTube creators who are making “child oriented content” that YouTube is gathering data from. The data gathering is illegal under COPPA, but it’s apparently easier to prove that the creator, who is not gathering the data, is knowingly making “child oriented content,” than it is to prove that YouTube is knowingly gathering the data from said content. The problem is, the rules that define what is and is not “child oriented” are incredibly vague, (including such things as “fantasy,” “sports,” and “videos with audio or music,”) to the point that a lawyer who specializes in this field could not tell us what it means. But mislabeling your content is still a Federal offense, and the FTC made clear that, come the New Year, it will be sweeping the platform, looking for violators.
Given all that, and so much more, as we’re working toward the January release of STORMBORN, I’m not exactly sure what I must do to obey the law, and fulfill my obligations to the audience, crew, and donors. Nor do I know what it means for the future of the channel as a whole, or even my future as a filmmaker, but I’ll keep working at it, and Lord willing, the series will come out. One way, or another.

Well, that’s about all for this week. Until next time!

Review, Refinement, and Ramifications

Greetings, one and all! Well, this has been an eventful week. We had our review session for the Episode 1 and 2 score Wednesday morning, followed by the release of the trailer that afternoon. Uncooperative internet connections made getting it out onto social media a scramble, but in the end we were successful.
After that, it’s all been organization, and refining the little things to make each episode better. For example, Monday was all about fixing the little audio artifacts that had snuck into the sound edit.

Sunday saw the team re-convening for another round of short sword training. This time we dove into some of the more complex strikes and counter strikes.

After all this, came Tuesday. Where I had once intended to be productive, instead I found myself navigating the legal ramifications of working with YouTube’s somewhat vague COPPA compliance policy. To avoid any sort of excessive complaints on the matter, I will simply say my head now hurts. Oh, the joys of knowledge…

Well, that’s about all for this week. Until next time!