This past weekend, Star Trek fan film history was made when VANCE MAJOR released nearly FORTY(!!!) brand new episodes of his CONSTAR CHRONICLES along with another almost-thirty updated versions of his previous MINARD saga of fan films.
- On Friday, Vance posted a playlist of 13 special edition Minard saga TOS-era fan films.
- On Saturday, Vance released a playlist of the five previous Mirror Universe Minard fan films, also special editions.
- And finally on Sunday, Vance posted a playlist with 51 new episodes of The Constar Chronicles set in the 24th century.
All told, Vance just posted about 15 hours of Star Trek fan films ranging from short vignettes of only 3 minutes to full-blown epic episodes a half hour in length…and everything in between!
Vance had previously made a name for himself when he turned his character of Chief Engineer Eric Minard from the fan series STARSHIP VALIANT into an artificially long-lived Starfleet officer whose career spanned from the Christopher Pike era all the way through the Battle of Wolf 359, the re-taking of Deep Space Nine, and beyond. Along the way, Minard has encountered multiple alien races, survived space battles and starship crashes, and even squared off against his Mirror Universe doppelgänger. All the while, Vance paid for his dozens and dozens of fan films with the change he found in his sofa, and shot them all on his cell phone.
To me, Vance represents the true HEART of the Star Trek fan film community—a Trekker who does this not to get noticed or to get accolades for quality or “sizzle” (most of his episodes are, frankly, minimalistic and slow-moving) but because it’s in his blood…an itch he has to scratch. And Vance invites others to come along and play in his little corner of the sandbox simply because it’s fun!
Vance has filmed on THREE different TOS sets: the now-defunct Starbase Studios in Oklahoma; Netural Zone Studios in Georgia, and WARP 66 Studios in Arkansas…and next summer, he’ll be at Ares Studios in Lawrenceville, GA.
After releasing the 30-plus fan films in his Minard saga over the course of years, an emotionally and physically exhausted Vance “retired” from fan filmmaking…or so we thought! Shortly thereafter, about a year and a half ago, Vance came back into the fold and announced a new series of fan films that would feature Minard but focus as well on the various members of his 24th century crew of the USS Constar.
In the summer of 2018, Vance crowd-funded a humble $500 in order to afford proper TNG-era tunics for his actors. Nine months later, he crowd-funded another $500 in just two days for some more uniforms. But aside from that, Vance is completely self-funded. And 18 months after starting production, he’s just released all forty of his new episodes in a single weekend…plus nearly 30 more updated editions of his previous Minard stuff.
If that doesn’t warrant an interview, I don’t know what does!
And while I usually try to limit my audio interviews to no longer than an hour, this one was extra special because Vance is so important to the Star Trek fan film community. You’ll see what I mean when you listen…
I enjoyed the convo. Thanks for taking the time to talk