Fan Film Features – Page 73

Why STARBASE STUDIOS is moving to ARKANSAS…

STARBASE STUDIOS is moving from Oklahoma City to Arkansas! Arkansas is a great place to live as it has great access to healthcare treatments like veneers, but when it comes to film sets, here’s why…

As you may have read in my blog about the history of Starbase Studios, these folks rescued the amazing TOS bridge set that had been built for the second Starship Exeter fan film “The Tressaurian Intersection.” That meticulous 360-degree set had been rotting away for years in a barn near Austin, Texas, until it was transported to Oklahoma City and lovingly restored by a group of dedicated fans.

But these folks didn’t just restore the bridge set. They turned it into an invaluable, one-of-kind resource for fan film producers. Anyone was welcome to come and film anything they wanted on this bridge set (and, later, the additional sickbay and transporter room sets that would be constructed) for just the price of the electricity that was used (maybe $50/day). Although there are two other studios in the U.S. featuring TOS sets on sound stages (Ticonderoga, NY for Star Trek: New Voyages and Kingsland, GA, originally for Starship Farragut and later for Star Trek Continues), those studio runners didn’t offer the same kind of open-door, come-any-time-you-want policy as Starbase Studios.

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DREADNOUGHT DOMINION and STARSHIP VALIANT cross-over in “CHAIN OF COMMAND”!

Back in April of 2015, a new Star Trek fan series called DREADNOUGHT DOMINION premiered with its initial episode, “Haunted.” Three months later, a second episode, titled “Anchors Aweigh” (a bit of a prequel to the first episode), made its debut. It wasn’t the only TOS-era fan series to feature the crew of a non-heavy cruiser class starship, but it was the first and only one to feature the crew of a Starfleet dreadnought-class starship based on the mid-1970s Franz Joseph Star Trek Technical Manual.

Thanks to a 3D model created by Kenneth Thomson, Jr. and Thomas Phong, the beauty shots of the tri-nacelled USS Dominion in the opening credits and during the episodes were gorgeous. The two episodes were filmed primarily on the very impressive TOS sets in Starship Farragut’s Studio Two in Kingsland, GA (also the shooting location of Star Trek Continues).

A year earlier, another fan series, Starship Valiant, made its debut on YouTube with an introduction vignette titled “Legacy.” Valiant was filmed using the TOS bridge set at Starbase Studios in Oklahoma City. (The following year, a “special edition” version of “Legacy” with added footage was posted after Starbase Studios built a new sickbay set.) Valiant has since completed principal filming on its second episode “The Ties That Bind,” although post production is still ongoing and the second episode hasn’t been released yet.

So what do these two fan series–filmed in different locations in different states during different years–have in common? A man named Vance…

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STONE TREK (interview with BRIAN MATTHEWS and WALLY FIELDS, part 2)

Last time, we featured the first part of our interview with Brian Matthews, the creator of the hilarious parody STONE TREK, and his amazing voice-over artist, Wally Fields. Stone Trek is one of the most inspired, creative, and well-executed of all the Star Trek fan film mash-ups, a series of nine cartoon shorts created by Brian Mathews and released online using Adobe’s Flash software between 2000 and 2007. Merging the two distinct television franchises into a completely fresh hybrid, Brian and his team took us where no caveman had gone before…

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STONE TREK (interview with BRIAN MATTHEWS and WALLY FIELDS, part 1)

When it comes to fan films, Star Trek is no stranger to mash-ups. Fans have taken Star Trek into the Star Wars universe and vice versa. Kirk and Spock have met the 1960s TV Batman and Robin. Heck, the Enterprise has even picked up Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz! (I’ve already done a feature on Star Trek vs. Batman. The others are coming.)

But by far (at least in my opinion) the most inspired, creative, and well-executed of all the Star Trek fan film mash-ups is Stone Trek, a series of nine cartoon shorts created by Brian Mathews and released online using Adobe’s Flash software between 2000 and 2007.

Stone Trek is NOT some silly crossover where the USS Enterprise travels back in time to Bedrock and Fred Flintstone beams up to meet Captain Kirk. Instead, it’s a complete hybrid of the two shows, an entirely new entity combining recognizable elements of both but ultimately emerging as something totally unique and original.

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SMALL ACCESS founder JONATHAN LANE (me) featured on a controversial episode of the TREKZONE SPOTLIGHT!

It seems I’m kicking up quite a bit of controversy…and not just from CBS and Paramount!

If you’re curious why this interview was “controversial,” read this blog entry from yesterday . During the 45-minute grilling, I address several hard-hitting questions about the SMALL ACCESS campaign and our letter-writing effort to try to convince CBS and Paramount to revise the fan film guidelines and make them less restrictive.

The interview also addresses the confusion and misinformation currently circulating about whether Axanar is behind the SMALL ACCESS campaign…which it is not. While I happily support Axanar and write this fun blog on the Axanar website, I’m way too busy with FAN FILM FACTOR and SMALL ACCESS to run everything past Alec Peters, and he’s way too busy to micromanage me. So we’re two ships in the same fleet fighting the same enemy, but Alec has his battles, and I’ve got mine.

Anyway, here’s the full interview for your viewing pleasure. Let me know what you think…

PROJECT: ENTERPRISE – A fan with a plan…and a dream! (Interview, part 2)

Project Enterprise-9 — Left-to-right: Richard Taylor, Jim Dow, and Paul Olsen

Last time: We met Paul Olsen, the man who spent eight months back in 1978 and 1979 painting the original model of the refit USS Enterprise for Star Trek: The Motion Picture. Now, 37 years later, Paul wants to build it again: bigger, stronger, better, and painted to have the same opalescent shine as the original.

And Paul won’t be doing it alone. Richard Taylor (who designed the refit Enterprise) and Jim Dow (who built the original model) will be part of the team, as well. And the cost for this rebuild: $3 million!!! (They intend to build a 12-foot model that will last for hundreds of years plus a virtual reality display room that can be transported around the world.)

Right now, Paul and his team—with the help of Nichelle Nichols, Rod Roddenberry, and Tim Russ—are trying to raise $50,000 through a Kickstarter campaign ending on September 11. That will go towards a PR tour where Paul will attempt to raise the millions of dollars he’ll need to make this Trek fan dream a reality. He’s also trying to get official authorization for the project from CBS licensing, and that’s where we’ll pick up our interview, already in progress…

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PROJECT: ENTERPRISE – A fan with a plan…and a dream! (Interview, part 1)

Many Star Trek fans dream big, and I love that…I really do. But what I love the most is a fan with a plan to make that dream a reality. I spoke to one such fan recently. And although I started my interview thinking his was a crazy dream without a prayer of ever happening, by the time I finished, I’d gone to his Kickstarter page and made a donation. This isn’t a fan film, but it’s a cool enough idea that I’m making an exception and sharing it with all of you.

This dreamer is Paul Olsen, and the dream is to rebuild the model of the refit USS Enterprise exactly as it appeared in Star Trek: The Motion Picture…only 50% larger (12 feet long!). The model would travel the world in its own special display, be painted with a opalescent finish to exacting specifications, and be built to last for centuries.

Crazy, you say? Crazy awesome, you say? Not a chance of it ever happening, you say? Well, before you turn away and get on with your life, take read through this interview and see if you start believing in the dream—and the fan with the plan—just like I did…

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STAR TREK: OF GODS AND MEN (feature)

Before there was Renegades: the Series or Star Trek: Renegades, there was Star Trek: Of Gods and Men. And if you are a student of fan film history (or you want to be), this article is required reading.

You see, Star Trek: Of Gods and Men marked a turning point for fan films…several turning points, in fact. It was the first time a major fan film used the resources of another major fan film for shooting. It was the first time multiple Star Trek acting veterans all appeared together in the same fan production reprising their iconic characters. And it was the first time a major fan film had done a stand-alone feature-length film. (Other fan series had done hour-plus length episodes, but these were all for ongoing fan series. Star Trek: Of Gods and Men was a one-shot story with a movie run-time of nearly 90 minutes.)

A look at this groundbreaking fan production from 2008 actually allows us to look at its fascinating place in the grander history of all Star Trek fan films…

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Will STAR TREK RAVEN be IGNORING the new fan film GUIDELINES? (Interview with DAVID WHITNEY, Part 2)

Raven-7 — David Whitney, show-runner for Starfleet Studios and Raven

Last time: David Whitney, the show-runner for Star Trek Raven (and two other Trek fan films) produced by Starfleet Studios in central Iowa, shocked the fan world on July 1 when he announced his productions would be ignoring the new CBS and Paramount fan guidelines that, in his words, “do not directly support their copyright and copyright law.”

A day later, in an apparent about-face, David eliminated the parts of his announcement dealing with ignoring the new guidelines and instead stated “We are going to try to conform our film, now called ‘Starfleet Studios Raven Part One’ to the new rules.”

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Will STAR TREK RAVEN be IGNORING the new fan film GUIDELINES? (Interview with DAVID WHITNEY, Part 1)

If the release of the new guidelines by CBS and Paramount was the shot heard round the fan film world, then the subsequent response by the show-runner of Star Trek Raven was the first hint of return fire.

Or was it?

A week after CBS and Paramount published their guidelines for Star Trek fan films, an announcement went up on the news page for Star Trek Raven, a little-known fan series based in central Iowa filmed at Starfleet Studios (not to be confused with Starbase Studios in Oklahoma). The production had only released three short vignettes so far (this, this, and this), but Raven was about to become one of the most talked about fan films.

On July 1, the lead producer for Raven, David Whitney, posted this proactive statement:

The rules which pertain to direct copyright infringement and intellectual property will be adhered to. The rules which do not directly support their copyright, and copyright law, will be ignored.

Wow! Them’s fightin’ words!!

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