Category: Fan Film Features

Drawing AXANAR – an interview with “WHY WE FIGHT” artist MARK McCRARY

Last week, I premiered the first-ever AXANAR illustrated short story, “Why We Fight,” written by yours truly and illustrated by MARK McCRARY.  I met Mark through another Mark, MARK LARGENT, with whom I co-wrote and co-produced the fan parody film Prelude to Ax’d-We-Are.  Mark and Mark are buddies, and together they wrote and illustrated an awesome fan comic book about the final voyage of James T. Kirk entitled “Save What From Heaven Is with the Breezes Blown.”

You probably already know about me (and if you don’t, read some of my biography blogs here).  But my illustrator Mark McCrary is still a mystery to most fans.  Not anymore!  I felt that Mark deserved a decent interview to finally tell the fan film world a little bit about himself.

And so, without further ado, the man who made my Axanar fan fiction story look totally amazing…

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STARSHIP TRISTAN Creative Group releases their 11th fan film: “SEPULCHRE”!

The nice folks at POTEMKIN PICTURES now have five different Trek fan production teams producing new fan films, two teams with new series in post-production, and of course the completed series that started it all: PROJECT: POTEMKIN (with three dozen episodes).  You can watch everything from Potemkin Pictures on their website.

The first fan series to spin off from Project: Potemkin was STARSHIP TRISTAN, filmed in Pelham, Alabama where show-runner RANDY LANDERS is based.  It debuted in December of 2015, but six months later, the fan film guidelines prohibited ongoing fan series.  So Starship Tristan simply dropped their fan series name and began naming each new release with the title of that particular “episode.”

Their latest offering is a fan film called “Sepulchre” which runs ten and a half minutes.  Set in the post-TOS-movie-era, the series has built its own somewhat cramped bridge set and uses simplified long-sleeve shirts for uniforms.  But if you’re watching these productions for their big-budget quality, then you probably want Star Trek Continues down the hall.  These folks are more about the story, and this latest story is pretty decent.  In fact, if lengthened out and developed a little more, I could imagine “Sepulchre” easily being an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Although the first ten episodes of this fan-series-that-is-not-to-be-called-a-fan-series were released about once every 1 to 3 months, it’s actually been 7 months since the last new Tristan fan film.   However, in that time, there has been an interesting change that I noted.  Previously, all new releases were credited to the “Tristan Production Crew” or the “Potemkin Creative Team”—not really wanting to call too much undue attention to the previous fan series name.  Now the opening credits say “Produced by the STARSHIP TRISTAN Creative Group.”  Big step forward, in my opinion.  With luck, CBS won’t bat an eyelash.

And now, please enjoy Tristan’s latest fan production, “Sepulchre”…

Why you ABSOLUTELY should DONATE to this KICKSTARTER for THE HOLY CORE (from the makers of CHANCE ENCOUNTER)!

One of my favorite Star Trek fan films is CHANCE ENCOUNTER, co-written by PAUL LAIGHT and GARY O’BRIEN, and directed by Gary.  This 20-minute, TNG-era fan film was a perfectly-acted love story with wonderful music, tight editing, very nice costumes and uniforms, and even some physical TNG-era sets.  Usually for this era, fan films just shoot actors in front of green screens and composite in the complex 24th century starship interiors as background images.  But these guys built an actual shuttlepod cockpit and turbolift set.

It’s been over a year since Chance Encounter debuted, funded with the help of a Kickstarter campaign that raised £1,862 (about $2,700).  Since then, many fans have wondered when we might see another fan production from this team.  The answer was revealed last Thursday when Gary and Paul launched a new Kickstarter for their second project: THE HOLY CORE.

CLICK HERE TO DONATE!

This time, they’re trying to raise £8,700 (approximately $12,000) for a much more ambitious production.  This one will be 30-minutes long, following the fan film guidelines and split into two 15-minute parts.  Once again, there will be physical sets, this time augmented by CGI backgrounds.  Here’s a test shot that appears on their Kickstarter video:

And that’s just a TEST…wait’ll they shoot the real film!!!

And for anyone wondering if this’ll be just another love story disguised as a Star Trek: TNG episode, the answer is no.  This time, things will be much more fast-paced and filled with deep ethical and moral questions.  The crew of the USS Vigilance, a Nebula-class starship, has a mission to help the inhabitants of the planet Vita II.  But things aren’t as they first appear, and the crew must wrestle with the difficult topics of faith, science, sacrifice, and destiny itself.

Assuming Gary and Paul reach their goal (they are already 15% of the way there after just five days…including $175 from me), they intend to release the completed fan film next February or March.  I’d really like to see that happen, folks

As such, I’ll be publishing reminders about this Kickstarter over the next three and a half weeks, and I hope you’ll join me in both donating and spreading the word.  This one is really worth it!

And now, here’s a message from show-runners Gary O’Brien and Paul Laight…

Continue reading “Why you ABSOLUTELY should DONATE to this KICKSTARTER for THE HOLY CORE (from the makers of CHANCE ENCOUNTER)!”

“WHY WE FIGHT” – the first-ever AXANAR illustrated short story!

Click here to view the PDF version of “Why We Fight”

Read more about the creation of this original Axanar short story by clicking here.  And come back next week for an interview with illustrator Mark McCrary.

“Why We Fight”

An Axanar Short Story

Written by Jonathan Lane
Illustrations by Mark McCrary

Stardate: 2244.9
Location: The 602 Club, Mill Valley near San Francisco, Earth

At a table…

Continue reading ““WHY WE FIGHT” – the first-ever AXANAR illustrated short story!”

INTREPID releases their TWELFTH fan film: “THE STORY”

My favorite Scottish Trek fan series (well, the ONLY Scottish Trek fan series that I’m aware of) has finally reached an even dozen fan film releases.  This is even more amazing when you consider that STAR TREK: INTREPID released its very first fan production waaaaaaaay back in 2006 (a dozen years ago) but actually began working on that first episode as far back as 2003!  (And yeah, I’m working on a “History of Star Trek: Intrepid” blog with show-runner NICK J. COOK right now.  Look for it soon.)

Aside from the awesome accents (I love a good Scottish brogue), one of the best things about this series, making it stand out from so many American Trek fan films and series, is the wonderful scenery that Intrepid features whenever they shoot on location.  This latest episode, “The Story,” is no exception, with most of it filmed in what Nick Cook says is “…an old Limekiln in a place called Boddin Point.”  (Whatever a limekiln is!)  “It’s technically an unsafe building,” Nick continues, “because it’s quite badly eroded into the sea.  But we like to live dangerously.”

You can watch the previous eleven Intrepid episodes here on this YouTube page.

And now, please enjoy the latest offering from that magical place that brought the world the sports of both Golf and Curling, the Loch Ness Monster, and the first and best James Bond…

Coming next week: the first-ever AXANAR SHORT STORY written by…me!

Yes, folks, I wrote an Axanar short story…and you’ll get to read it in just one more week!

Inspiration hit last spring when another Axanar super-fan, Trey McElwain from Texas, announced that he would be releasing a three-page (plus cover) original Axanar comic book story.  I interviewed Trey back in June (read it here) and was really excited to see the finished product…which would debut in July.  But I also thought about how much fun it would be to write an Axanar comic book myself.

The first thing I needed to decide is what the story would be about.  Space battles with Starfleet fighting the Klingons seemed obvious…perhaps too obvious.  After all, Prelude to Axanar had already given us quite a bit of starship combat, and so had Trey’s Axanar comic book.  I didn’t want to simply do more of the same.

To me, the most interesting aspects of the Axanar tapestry were the characters themselves and also the world of the Federation a short 20 years before Captain Kirk’s five-year mission.  At the time, I hadn’t seen the script for the full Axanar feature or the two 15-minutes “mockumentary-style” fan films being planned.  So I didn’t really know what I could and couldn’t do with the characters…even if I set the story during the events of Prelude.

So that left the world of 2245 and where the United Federation of Planets was at that point in its history.  Yes, there was a four-year-long war with the Klingons going on.  But for me, there was something even more significant, and it all came from a single line from Prelude…

Continue reading “Coming next week: the first-ever AXANAR SHORT STORY written by…me!”

The first-ever ORVILLE fan film!

Yeah, I know I concentrate mainly on Star Trek fan films here, but seeing how this ORVILLE fan film was the work of VANCE MAJOR, I can make an exception.

As you’ll remember from previous blogs, Vance wrote, produced, appeared in, and in many cases directed nearly THREE DOZEN Trek fan films following the life and adventures of Starfleet officer Erick Minard.  And although Vance is stepping away from Trek fan films after having completed the multi-episodic Minard saga, he still apparently had one more fan project left in him…this time in The Orville universe.

The challenge with doing an Orville fan film, of course, is that the Planetary Union uniforms are twice as expensive (about $100-150) as the cheaper Halloween costumes available for Star Trek TOS and TNG/DS9/VOY-era uniforms.  And sets from the Orville are also very elaborate and not easily constructed.

Vance “solved” both of these problems.  For the uniforms, he simply didn’t bother.  He created a story in which the main character (Derek Minard…yeah, cute idea) is communicating from his quarters, apparently while off-duty and dressed in more leisurely wear.  As for the sets, a little green screen compositing can go a long way to making something look like it’s taking place on a futuristic spacecraft.  Throw in some original music by Vance’s close friend Dan T. Hawkins, and you’ve got yourself a short fan film.

The total run time is under nine minutes, even though Fox has no  guidelines limiting the length of a fan film the way CBS does.  Vance simply needed nine minutes to tell the story he wanted to.

And so the first Orville fan film “flag” is planted, and Vance Major now gets to be a footnote in Orville history.  Will other Orville fan films follow?  I hope so—although good luck on that Bortus make-up!  And will Fox decide to issue guidelines of their own?  Considering that Disney just acquired Fox, and the only fan film guidelines issued for Star Wars (which Disney also now owns) are simply for eligibility in their annual fan film awards competition, one would highly doubt it.  Also, Orville creator Seth MacFarlane is not exactly a stranger to fan films himself!

Anyway, enjoy the first-ever Orville fan film: THE MARIANA’S TRENCH, compliments of the now-legendary Vance Major…

At last – a NEW TRAILER for STAR TREK: TEMPORAL ANOMALY! (audio interview with SAMUEL COCKINGS)

What?  You’ve never heard of the fan film project STAR TREK: TEMPORAL ANOMALY???  Where have you been for the past five years?

Just kidding.  Most members of the fan film community have never heard of this production…even though it goes all the way back to 2013.  In fact, along with Star Trek: Renegades and Star Trek: Deception, Star Trek: Temporal Anomaly was one of the first three Trek fan films to ever fund successfully on Kickstarter.

But while the other two projects were ultimately completed (Deception later in 2013 and Renegades in 2015), Temporal Anomaly seemed to be stuck in a time loop of always appearing to be “coming soon.”  Seven months after their Kickstarter took in £1,741 (about $2,000 at the time), fans saw this pretty simple teaser:

Not much to write home about by today’s fan film standards, but back in 2013, that looked like a pretty cool green screen-based fan project.

A year later in late 2014, a new teaser promised a 60-minute long fan film (up from the original 20 minutes originally announced) coming in 2015…and the visual effects were looking much more exciting:

But 2015 did not bring the completed fan film.  However, that year brought the following newer, even more impressive 2-minute trailer that showed an increasingly impressive compositing of green screen actors against a wide range of starship interior backgrounds.  We also got to see even better VFX and brief clips of Picard and Riker on the bridge of the Enterprise-E:

That was nearly three years ago.  Since then, nothing…

…until now!

Earlier today, writer/director SAMUEL COCKINGS released a brand new trailer for Temporal Anomaly along with a promise to release the finished film NEXT MONTH!

This new trailer is the best-looking one yet and really blew me away:

So why did this project take so long to finish?  And why do so few fans even know about it?   I posed these questions and many others to Mr. Samuel Cockings during an eye-opening audio interview, which I proudly present to you below…

Look for a follow-up interview next month when Star Trek: Temporal Anomaly is released onto the Internet in its entirety!

AARON VANDERKLEY triumphs again with “GOOD MEN”! (interview)

Last October, I posted an interview with the fan film wonder from down under, Australia-based Trekker AARON VANDERKLEY.  When the fan film guidelines came out in 2016, many fans worried that it would be impossible to create a decent Star Trek fan film story in 15 minutes or less.  But Aaron had already disproven that six months earlier when he released the six-and-a-half minute NEEDS OF THE MANY, an emotionally intense NX-01 era fan film with great acting, real practical sets (not green screen), and wonderful costumes.

In September of 2017, Aaron wowed the fan film world again with yet another NX-01 era fan film, the twelve-minute THE DERELICT.  Even more intense than his first effort, Derelict cemented Aaron’s reputation as a top-notch Star Trek fan filmmaker.

But Arron wasn’t done yet!

Two weeks ago, Aaron released his third NX-01 era fan film, the nine-minute GODD MEN.  You can view it below…

After watching yet another really strong fan film, I emailed Aaron a few quick questions for the blog where I would announce the new release.  Little did I know Aaron would send me back some really fantastic, in-depth answers that turned my “simple” announcement blog into a full-on interview!

Let’s dive right in…

Continue reading “AARON VANDERKLEY triumphs again with “GOOD MEN”! (interview)”

VANCE MAJOR completes the MINARD Saga! (interview, part 2)

Yesterday, we began discussing the many fan films of MINARD saga with their creator, VANCE MAJOR.  Nearly three dozen different episodes make up this rich and expansive tapestry telling the story of Chief Engineer Erick Minard of the USS Valiant, who goes on to live a life that spans over 100 years of Star Trek time.  During that life, Minard serves under Captain Christopher Pike, marries, suffers loss, gets a command of his own, fights the Borg, meets his counterpart from the Kelvin timeline, and even battles his Mirror Universe doppelgänger.

And it all happens in series of short fan films made for little to no budget, purposefully told out of chronological order and thereby creating a viewing experience unlike anything else in the world of Trek fan films.  The Minard saga isn’t for everyone, but for fans who appreciate the storyline and the effort and dedication that went into producing it, a very rewarding journey (or should I say trek?) has just been completed with the release of Vance’s final 2-part, 25-minute episode The Best Things.

You can view ALL of the Minard episodes here in their order of release.

Later in this interview (below), Vance will introduce each of his final seven episode, and I’ll link to them from here.  But right now, let’s pick up with the conclusion of this great interview…

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