Beyond the Iron Sky

Last week and weekend I was visiting in Norway, in a small village of Os that’s just few miles away from Bergen, at WT X:th Os International Film Festival. I was invited over to talk about Star Wreck, WreckAMovie and Iron Sky, the three things I love talking about. The festival is small but cozy, organized by group of film enthusiastics from Norway, some of them also members of the road crew of Immortal, one of the gretest black metal bands out there. I actually learned that Os is *the* place where a lot of the black metal movement is originated from, and it was nice to stroll around the city thinking about how this beautiful, scandinavian and idyllic view has inspired some of the most brutal music out there.

I had an opportunity to see some very interesting films in the festival, out of which I would suggest to everyone that if you haven’t seen Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer, you should. It’s pretty funny, and Robert Englund is really on fire! Also, the presentations went well, one of them was also filmed and I should be able to post a link to it once it’s online.

In the last night of the festival in Saturday, there was the grand gala to which we attended. Most of it was in Norwegian, so I didn’t understand anything, until suddenly the language changed to English. They announced that this year they wanted to give a Special Award for the work that has been done over the free culture and introduction of the collaborative production model to filmmaking. I was shocked, surprised and delighted. I even received a bronze statue and everything! Totally out of the blue, but it was a very welcome surprise! During this fall, WreckAMovie has collected 3 awards, so not a bad at all!

That’s me and my new best friend, the Bronze Idol! (Photo by Essi Suomela).

Speaking of WreckAMovie, we just set up loads of new tasks there, do check them out - we’re gonna need your help on designing the Earth fleet for Iron Sky!

Click the picture to join the development on WreckAMovie.Com.

And here’s the AWESOME music video from Immortal, shot - propably - in the woods of Os! Enjoy, and do check out the amount of views on YouTube! Most likely the world’s best known black metal video out there! :)

Today is my birthday and guess what, I got present from JJ Abrams, he unveiled the new Enterprise from the upcoming Star Trek feature film (2009). I’m not sure what to think of it - maybe it will just take some time…I have to say that I were the producer of the new Star Trek film, I wouldn’t had balls to change it so much :) I guess that’s the whole point in this film - JJ Abrams wasn’t a fan of the original show, I was :)

The proportions look a bit strange… Below: Kirk’s Enterprise from the original films.

And here’s the very original design from the sixties. The updated film version from 1979 didn’t change the design so much.

Here’s the whole article, JJ Abrams interviewed.

While visiting in Os, Norway, I was honoured to be invited by the producer Kjetil Omberg to see the Norwegian Nazi Zombie flick Død Snø in a private screening. I’ve been following the film actively ever since I heard about it through Twitch because, well, it has Nazis, zombies and it’s from Scandinavia. Before we go further, do check out the teaser poster art. With artwork this cool and a concept this strong (and don’t forget the coolest tagline ever: Ein, Zwei, DIE!), what could go wrong?

The story unfolds with a very classical setting: a group of youngsters are heading for a cabin, with the intentions to drink, party and preferably have sex through the whole weekend. But, as we are talking about a Norwegian film, the events take place during wintertime, and the cabin is located high up in the mountains, in the middle of endless fields of snow.

What starts out as a fun in the snow and sun, snowball fights, fooling around with a motor sled and a Stiga, soon turns into a gory zombie onslaught as the kids find a box full of Nazi gold that definitively doesn’t belong to them.

The unique setting in the genre gives an unforgettable flavor to the easily one of the greatest zombie films that I’ve seen in ages. Director Tommy Wirkola breaks most of the deeply-rooted Zombie traditions with Norwegian rock and metal banging in the background - the Zombies run, think and even talk (well, just one word). Død Snø manages to do what many have tried and almost as many have failed while trying: it’s entertaining, scary as shit, agonizing, bloody, fun and kicks in like a 12-pack of beer. The story is well written, actors do an awesome job and director Wirkola’s comedy timing is excellent, as is his ability to build up the horror. He seems to know exactly how scary place an outhouse can be when it’s -20 degrees outside, in the middle of the night. Added with a Nazi zombie roaming outside, it’s definitively not a place you’d like to be with your pants around your ankles.

Död Snö is a wonderful piece of film that isn’t ashamed of it’s roots and language, and stands proudly as one of the great examples of Norther horror wave that’s going strong right now (with Sauna and Let the Right One In).

And here’s the trailer:

I haven’t enjoyed watching a film this much in a long time.

Tl;dr (Too Long; Didn’t Read): 5 / 5.

It seems that the bigger distributors are taking few steps forward with modern distribution, hopefully slowly dropping the old-fashioned first cinema, then DVD -release, as well as with territoriality. A British horror flick, Mum & Dad claims to be the first film to be distributed simultaneously on Cinema, DVD, Pay-Per-View & Internet download. I don’t know what is their distribution method on the Internet will be, hopefully DRM-free pay-what-you-like, but it looks like “Internet Download” means Video-On-Demand, and sadly there’s usually some crappy DRM attached to it…

There’s not too much info on the website, but at least one can sign up for the newsletter. We’ll keep on following Mum & Dad.

Oh, all the Dads reading this - have a great Father’s Day! Here’s the trailer for Mum & Dad, enjoy:

(Via Twitch Film)

Was when Darth Vader stepped on stage to conduct the Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra playing the Imperial March - with a lightsabre.

The reason for this sight was that the Tampere Philharmonics had a concert with the theme “Space Adventure 2008″. They played themes from classic scifi movies and space themed classical music.

I have to admit that Darth Vader on stage was one thing I’d never thought I’d witness in my life. Even though considering the size of the fanbase seeing the orchestra playing the theme from Star Trek: The Next Generation with the conductor dressed in a starfleet uniform might have been even more impropable.

I have to admit I loved every second of the concert, with these kind of performances being rather rare here in Finland. One might complain a bit about it being aimed at the whole family with some, um, “funny” speeches in between chronicling the voyages of the Galaxy class starship Tampere Philharmonic. But I cant, I’ve seen the frigging Darth Vader conduct an orchestra. I’m a happy nerd.

Hotness, humidity and awesome food dominated my trip to Singapore, from where I arrived back to Finland just few hours ago. The Singapore Digital Media Festival 2008 gathered together a bunch of interesting, influental and/or impressive speakers who all dug deeper into the world of Web 2.0 - or, as the seminar’s focus this year was, Television 2.0. Not surprisingly, I was there again as the oddball guest, not quite fitting into the world of serious web entepreneurs, but not quite representing the serious filmmakers either. This time, though, I wasn’t alone - another freak of the both businesses, Hugh Hancock, the guy who directed the Machinima classic BloodSpell and actually originally invented the word Machinima - threw an awesome performance fill’d with energy and great points about why and how filmmakers do films on the Internet nowadays, and why do they distribute that stuff for free. He actually gave a very good description of the business model everybody has been trying to explain on “how to make money with something you are giving away for free”, that freaked most business-minded people out of their heads and frustrated the rest - but that’s just the way it goes. If you do something carefully and lovingly, and then put it out there for free, without any clear earning model, the money will just mysteriously show up. I kinda added to it that it’s the only way you don’t reek like dollar-thirsty businessman for miles away, and that’s the reason people love you.

Timo Vuorensola, Iolo Jones and Hugh Hancock at Blogger’s meeting. Photo from The Young Upstarts blog.

Yes, it just mysteriously materializes virtually out of thin air. Wether it’s you suddenly becoming a big time seminar speaker charging thousands of dollars an hour, wether it’s you being hired as a consultant, or people buying your self-made DVDs like hell, or you selling a website with a cool name dot com, or just get enough supporters to pay you or whatever… The money will just mysteriously shows up.

Is it sustainable? Yes. Is it scaleable? More or less. Is it predictable? Not quite. Can you convince VCs with the model? Hell, no.

There’s two requirements why this is mostly not very widely exploited model:

1) You need to spend at least five to ten years to get there, and even then the income isn’t anything phenomenal.
2) You need to create something with your own risk, out of thin air, and it needs to be awesome.

And, of course, thirdly - there’s nobody who you are able to explain the model and they’ll believe it. But what the hell, that’s the reason it’s so fun!

Hugh Hancock onstage.

Here’s a short interview posted to Seesmic video discussion service from the festival.

Timo Vuorensola - Introduction and the Role of Community in film making

I returned from my London-Stockholm-London -trip back to Finland in Saturday, and right away took a cab to Kaapelitehdas in Helsinki, to Alternative Party 2008, where the other guys from Energia were already waiting. We had been preparing to do what we called the “Hakenkreutzierungmachineworkshop”, a small workshop where we asked our people - the Iron Sky community - to help us out with a certain prop we needed for the film.

The prop, called indeed the “Hakenkreuzierungmachine”, (e. “The Swastika Machine”, f. “Hakaristeytyskone”), had been a tricky item for us for a pretty long time already. It had been written to the script, and it plays sort of a big role at least at some point of the film, but we had been debating for as long as the script has existed on how the thing would actually work, what it would look like, and how it would be operated.

Story requires that it is supposed to be sort of an “audioweapon” built by the Nazi scientist in their great wisdom during the 70 plus years they’ve been hiding in the far side of the Moon. In it, they have compressed all the speeches of Adolf Hitler and Josef Göbbels in a soundburst of one second, which is transmitted in various different wavelenghts, that are thought to affect the human brain subliminally, to the audience. See, dr. Reinhardt Richter, the developer of this awesome device, has found out that average non-Aryan human being actively only uses 10% of his or her’s brain capacity, but is capable of far more complex processing if treated the right way. Dr. Richter believes that the device will make all those that are under the influence of the soundburst to understand all the relevant messages of the National Socialism in just few seconds, thus becoming Nazificated. Obviously, he has been unable to test the theory and the machine, given the fact that all the Nazis in the Far Side of the Moon are already Nazificated.

We gathered two small groups of Iron Sky -enthusiastics, told them the above and then gave them some instructions on how to work. Basically, we wanted them to design us the Hakenkreuzierunmachine, a portable model of it.

And off they went. One hour of tight collaboration, the two groups came up with awesome results, both of them very funny, well-thought and right to the point. We had a hard time to decide which of the designs was better, but finally settled with design by the group number one.

Here’s the result, and the description:

HAKENKREUZIERUNGMACHINE

The HK Machine consists of a main unit with numerous gauges, dials and switches, two separately adjustable loudspeakers, and a fuel tank which accepts a torpedo-shaped cartridge of crystallised Helium-3. The backpack-sized contraption is so heavy it needs one person just to carry it around, who must wear a protective suit because of the heat (and noise) generated. A separate operator then prepares and activates the device. The procedure goes like this:

1. The carrier dons the protective suit and straps on the device.

2. The operator inserts a fuel cartridge and secures the tank lid.

3. The operator makes sure all the switches are in the “Off” position; checks the H3 pressure; sets the desired range; and adjusts the loudspeakers for either a wide or narrow area of effect.

4. The carrier assumes firing position. Proper bracing is important. The operator slams down the firing lever. A tape begins playing, saying “Bitte hören, bitte hören” (“hear ye, hear ye”). Studies have shown that a polite request like this improves the device’s effectiveness. The operator supports the carrier and counts aloud: “Drei… zwei… eins… feuer!” The sound blast is released. A tremendous recoil knocks the carrier back.

5. The lever is returned to the up position and a 20-second cool-down period begun (because the sonic vibration heats up the device). The fuel cartridge is good for about four blasts, after which it must be replaced. A fit, Aryan operator can carry about half a dozen cartridges.

It was very delightful to find out that the people – a totally random groups of folks – were able to pool their creativity, engineering skills and minds together and created something we desperately needed for, and the result was much better than we had ever hoped for.

In addition of providing us the crucial plans of the design of HK-machine for Iron Sky, I’m delighted to find out again how collaboration with the audience can be very effective, fun and turn into something much better than what filmmakers could’ve come up just by themselves.

This is also the whole core idea of WreckAMovie, just in analog form. We are hoping to build a forum, a gathering place for people from all different fields of life, pool their resources and enthusiasm together, and serve it for the use of filmmakers around the world.

Energia Productions would like to thank everyone who participated the workshop, as well as the organisers of he Alternative Party this year! And to the filmmakers around the world – don’t be afraid to work with your audience – your community. There’s an ocean of possibilities out there just waiting for you to use them.

The Swastika Machine Architects In Action: Juho Hartikainen, Eevi Korhonen, Lare Lekman, Joonas Mäkinen, Matti Pajunen, Jalmari Raippalinna and Osma Suominen (in no particular order) sweating their asses off to create the greatest invention in Nazi Science!

On the last day of the Power to the Pixel seminar in London we, the Internet filmmaking community, gathered together into a closed round table discussion about the future of what we are doing.

The main question was: what can we do to make what we are doing an acknowledged way to make films for the filmmakers, for those who fund filmmaking, and for the audiences out there. Also, we were there to share experiences, thoughts and beliefs on how should we, who already are “in there”, could proceed with what we are doing and maybe even join forces to help the something big take place.

I was expecting a bit more general discussion that would answer the basic questions every filmmaker has: how to do it and how to make money with it. The discussion kinda jumped around the topic a bit, but a bit surprisingly quite soon settled into an in-depth discussion on metadata.

For those who are unaware on what I’m talking about, metadata means information that’s inside a file, tied to it, giving you more information on the actual file. In Mp3 this means file info on the artist, name of the song, what year it was published – some metadata goes actually very deep, naming individual players, where it was recorded and by who etc. In film, there would be requirement for much, much more metadata, that could be filled in with WIKI apparatus to make it a community-embedded metadata.

Basically, it would mean we would have all the cast & crew info, filming locations, dates, websites, subtitles and all that embedded and easilly viewable by anyone watching the video. But what would make it more interesting are the two-sided functionalities of it: embedding a “pay”-button to the film, embedding a “buy a license for this film” -ability to it, and in general, embedding all the copyright information to each clip. With these functionalities, we would see propably much more commercially succesful films distributed via BitTorrent and other filesharing systems, when a viewer would have the possibility to download a film and pay for it if he likes it.

Arin Crumley

But metadata won’t answer to the problem of how to get filmmakers around the world start doing their films much closer to the Internet – how to make them understand than in order to survive in the coming changes, filmmakers need to start to understand what the Internet actually is – a huge community of communities – and how to find your community from there, and eventually, what good does it do to your film.

The last hour of the think tank was much more about trying to find answers to these questions. Even more, we were trying to find out how we, who already know what to do, could work together to educate filmmakers, film funders, distributors and government entities that they would be more willing to look at the alternative production and distribution options out there.

Personally, I think this is a very important question, because I believe that the only way the change will happen the way we want is working with both filmmakers and those with “soft money” for culture - government money, that is. If that happens, the distributors will follow, because they are dependant on content, and if content is going different way they are going, they’ll soon be out of business. Because, in the end, and even more nowadays, distributors are the ones who are clients of film productions, not the other way around. They are no more needed in order to get film distributed to millions of viewers around the world, and even less in the future – we can do that, we have YouTube and BitTorrent. The reason we want to use distributors still is that they are the ones who know how to get the film out there, people watching it and paying for it so that we would eventually get money for our next films. And if it seems – and it seems like that even more nowadays, when you are looking at how many distributors coping with “piracy”, that they have no clue anymore. The question remains, where do we need them? If that question strengthens too much, and too many filmmakers do “Radioheads” and find it more profitable than working with them, they are in deep shit.

So, they’d need to actually really hop onboard the wagon that’s already rolling onwards, try to regain the trust of the filmmakers and even more the trust of the new filmmakers – and, what’s even more trickier, because in the future it’s not just a filmmaker, but a filmmaker and his or her’s community of thousands of active people – and start to work the way they want.

The question a distributors and big studio heads need to ask in the future is certainly not “how to stop piracy”, but “how to make them want to pay”. (A tip to those pondering this: ass-rape is not a very good way to seduce.) They need to get over the fact that whatever they do, the films are out there, for free, and there’s nothing they can do about it. If you can’t beat them, join them, right?

Well, back to the Power to the Pixel. It was an awesome seminar that had gathered all the filmmakers with really good, fresh and brilliant ideas together, got them talking about their experiences to other people in the industry or outside the industry, maybe planting some new ideas there, and eventually got them talking together to help to find the better future.

I think that’s pretty much. An achievement not to be belittled. There’s a lot of work to do out there, but Power to the Pixel is