Ray Myers – Fan Film Factor

JOSHUA IRWIN sings (well, writes) the praises of TEAM AVALON!

Did you ever wonder why we use the term “PAYING a compliment”? After all, compliments have no monetary value. You can’t use a compliment to put gas in you tank or cover your rent. And it certainly doesn’t cost anything to “pay” someone a compliment. Compliments are 100% free! And yet, compliments do have value, especially in today’s world when so many of us often feel unacknowledged and taken for granted.

The Star Trek fan film guidelines state that the people working on fan productions can’t be professional. Since many professionals in the entertainment industry do work on fan films—including JOSHUA IRWIN, the force behind the AVALON UNIVERSE fan series—most showrunners interpret that rule as meaning you can’t pay people to work on your fan film (other than covering gas, lodging, meals, and/or traveling costs). So if you can’t pay your cast and crew in money, how about at least paying them in compliments?

Many showrunners do praise their teams in interviews that I feature here on Fan Film Factor, often calling out individuals by name for their contributions. But recently, Josh Irwin took the concept one step further. After a series of grueling shoots for multiple fan films, including one during the cold-snap in January where the mercury dropped to 25 degrees inside the WARP 66 studio facility(!!!), Josh decided to thank each member of his team one-by-one in personalized Facebook posts accompanied with some very cool images.

Josh wrote a number of very nice things about each one of them, and as I read those posts, I thought that they were special enough to deserve a little “extra” coverage here on the blog. Credit where it’s due, right? Actually, Josh said it best in this quote he asked me to include with the blog: “No one wants to work really hard on a project and feel like what they did wasn’t noticed or appreciated. Films are made by the efforts of A LOT of people, and everyone has an important part to play. To me, it’s personal—they’re helping me make a dream come true, and I’m never not going to express my gratitude.”

In addition to writing all these complimentary posts, Josh also included a selection of still frames from the three upcoming Avalon Universe films plus some behind-the-scenes photos. So while I certainly hope you folks will take the time to read what Josh wrote (as his team really does deserve to have others know more about them and their efforts), at the very least, you’ll have a chance to scan through these amazing images to get a good idea of how awesome these new three episodes will look!

So as not to play favorites, I’ll present Josh’s posts (both text and images) in alphabetical order…

INTERLUDE Confidential #24: We just won our NINTH film festival award!

It’s been a little over a year since I’ve written an INTERLUDE CONFIDENTIAL blog. It’s not that I was finished with them (I was almost finished)—I still had a few left to do, including an interview with our musical composer KEVIN CROXTON, a blog about sound-editing, and a video compilation of the second day of filming. And I was also planning to write a blog about entering fan productions into film festivals…and that’s what I’m writing about today.

This past weekend, Interlude won it’s ninth film festival award (not counting those contests exclusively open to fan films). Our latest award was won this past weekend at the Austin Indie Fest for “BEST FAN FILM,” a category which is appearing ever more often in mainstream film festivals. In fact, one of Interlude‘s other three wins was the EUROPA PRIZE for “Best Fan Film” in the L.A. Sci-Fi & Horror Festival. And if you’re curious, Interlude also won these six awards in the following two film festivals…

Cult Critic Movie Awards
• Short Film
• Best Cinematography (Fiction & Documentary)
• Best Sound Designing (Fiction & Documentary)
• Best VFX Artist

Venice Shorts
• Best Science Fiction Film
• Best Short Film Cinematographer

There were five festivals we entered where Interlude was NOT selected:
Film Invasion Los Angeles, Etheria Film Festival – Genre Films Directed by Women, Under Worlds Film Fest, Cannes Short Film Festival, and Cannes Independent Film Festival. Interlude was also a selection but didn’t win the Tri-Cities International Film Festival…and there’s three film festivals I entered that will be choosing winners next month.

But what I’ve come to realize is that entering film festivals is a bit of a financial black hole. There are literally hundreds of them each year! And they all cost money to enter. Granted, I limited myself primarily to those offering special 50% discounts on submission fees, but that still started adding up, and by late last summer, I went cold turkey on entering any more film festivals.

But honestly, they make it just so darn easy to enter!

When I say “they,” I mean the people at Film Freeway. Just about every film festival uses that website to advertise their show and collect entrance fees. So if you’ve produced an independent film, all you have to do is set up a Film Freeway page like I have for Interlude (click here to see it). A film’s Film Freeway page contains everything a film festival needs to judge it:

The film itself
The trailer
Summary overview
Director(s) bio and statement
Behind-the-scenes stills
Link to the film’s website
News and reviews
Credits
Specifications (like country of origin, runtime, color or black and white, genre, completion date, and budget)

As long as you have a Film Freeway account and page, you can enter any contest as easily as you make a purchase from Amazon.

Big donations take the AVALON UNIVERSE Indiegogo from STALLED to STELLAR!

For the past two weeks, the Indiegogo crowd-funding campaign for CRISIS ON INFINITE EXCALIBURS from THE AVALON UNIVERSE was going nowhere fast. Prior to that, there’s had been doing well for the first four weeks, with donations nearing the halfway point to their $8,000 goal. But then Star Trek Last Vegas and DragonCon began to suck up all the oxygen in the fan community for two consecutive weeks, and it was hard to generate enough attention in all of the excitement to promote a fan film crowd-funding campaign.

But the timing worked out well in the end, as the middle weeks of any crowd-funder are typically the slowest, and over the past several days, a healthy influx of new donations has brought Team Avalon up to $6,430—only 20% short of their goal—with two weeks left.

Most of that recent jump came from two mega-donors, one of them choosing a $1,000 Producer-level package (which includes an optional voice-over as background “bridge chatter” in the final film), and the other selecting a $1,500 Executive Producer donation, qualifying that supporter for a walk-on role. Since showrunner JOSHUA IRWIN already made the announcement on Facebook, I can likewise reveal that Executive Producer to be none other than RAY MYERS, who was also my top donor on INTERLUDE and appeared on camera as the first officer of the ill-fated U.S.S. Artemis. In Crisis on Infinite Excaliburs, Ray will be playing the character of Captain Jennings of the Excalibur. The only question is: WHICH Excalibur?

*Soon-to-be Executive Producer for AVALON, this is RAY MYERS on the set of INTERLUDE.*

While online promotion for the campaign slowed for a couple of weeks, it will kick back into high gear for the duration of the Indiegogo, which will continue through September 26. Josh is preparing for a special partnership with the Star Trek-themed Lore Reloaded YouTube channel, which has 115K subscribers and will be posting some new Avalon content over the coming weeks.

Josh is also working to set up a podcast interview with a widely-viewed prominent member of the professional Star Trek fan community. (Is there such a thing as a “professional Star Trek fan”? Yes, as a matter of fact, there is! Assuming it happens, I’ll share the name in an upcoming blog.)

And finally, Josh informs me that he is planning to purchase a YouTube boost for his “ask” video, which has been very effective in generating donations (including his first Executive Producer $1,500 package from a first-time contributor). The boost is supposed to provide an additional 7,500 views of the video. Even if only a tiny fraction of those people decide to donate, it should easily cost of the cost of the boost. Here’s the “ask” video if you’d like to see it…

And of course, if you’re able to donate, that’s just peachy-keen, too! The Indiegogo link is below…

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/crisis-on-infinite-excaliburs-a-star-trek-fan-film#

As always, I’ll keep you all posted on how the campaign is doing as it reaches its finale.

“STAR TREK IS REAL” and so is PIXI NEREID…real AWESOME, that is! (video interview with PIXI)

Finally! I get a chance to interview PIXI NEREID and share it with all of you…and it’s a really FANtastic interview.

Last week, I was supposed to interview Pixi along with AVALON UNIVERSE showrunner JOSHUA IRWIN and angel-supporter RAY MYERS, who donated $3,000 to their current GoFundMe campaign as a match for $3,000 in fan donations that came in last week. The Zoom call interview was supposed to accompany the released of Pixi’s new Avalon Universe music video STAR TREK IS REAL (edited by Josh), which debuted last Friday. You can watch it below…

Catchy, ain’t it? Yeah, you’re gonna be hearing that song in your head for hours!

Pixi (whose real name is Ilia McNeil—“Pixi Nereid” is her stage name when she’s appearing at children’s birthday parties as a mermaid…and yes, that’s a thing) is a very busy woman, teaching high school, working on a Masters degree, teaching improv classes, and of course, the mermaid gig…all while starring in the next major Avalon fan film release AGENT OF NEW WORLDS (coming out October 31) and serving as producer on the fan series.

Unfortunately, Pixi’s schedule unexpectedly exploded just before our Zoom call was supposed to start, and she felt so sorry that she had to bail at the last second. However, Josh was able to get Avalon actor TYLER DUNIVAN to fill in for Pixi, and we still managed to have a great interview discussion with the three of them (Josh, Ray, and Tyler). You can watch it here, if you’d like.

Speaking of Tyler, Josh released this fun “Shatneresque” interpretation of Star Trek Is Real sung by lounge lizard Tyler and his vape pen (hey, at least it wasn’t an actual cigarette like Shatner smoked on Rocket Man). Have a look…

But I was still determined to interview Pixi…mainly because she is just so darn awesome! I know this because I’ve gotten to be friendly with her since she “drafted” me onto Team Avalon to help guide their crowd-funding efforts. It’s tough to say no to Pixi—even if you’re NOT looking at that irresistible smile! Anyway, I kept hounding Pixi for that interview, and I finally got it on Saturday afternoon.

It’s hard to say why, but sometimes an interview just fires on all cylinders. This is not to disparage the interviews I’ve done with other fan filmmakers, but when you watch the recorded Zoom call below, you’ll see what I mean. Pixi herself is fascinating to learn about, full of surprises that I never even imagined! We learn about her theater, acting, and dance background, musical albums she’s released, and her oh-so-positive way to deal with her critics (not that there are many!).

Pixi also managed to draw out of me an unexpected 15-minute detour into my own background experiences with film production—which include some photos of when I stuck onto the sets of Star Trek: Voyager in 1996! Pixi and I just have a wonderful back-and-fourth, and I think you’ll find her enthusiasm to to be absolutely infectious…

And remember that you can still donate to their campaign here:

https://www.gofundme.com/f/zdn4p-AvalonUniverse2021

“STAR TREK IS REAL” – the next AVALON UNIVERSE song that will get stuck in your head (video interview JOSHUA IRWIN, TYLER DUNIVAN, and RAY MYERS)

On Monday of this past week, showrunner JOSH IRWIN and the folks in the AVALON UNIVERSE got the song “It’s in the Way that You Use It” by ERIC CLAPTON stuck in our heads when they released this hilarious blooper-filled video announcing the kick-off of their donor-dollar-matching promotion week. However, the “week” ended up lasting only two and a half days, as that was all the time it took for fans to donate a whopping $3,000 to their GoFundMe campaign, the maximum that angel-supporter RAY MYERS had offered to match. That brought the total raised so far up over $11,500!

The campaign goes on, by the way, as it still has about $8,100 (40%) to go to reach its overall goal of $20,000. You can donate here…

https://www.gofundme.com/f/zdn4p-AvalonUniverse2021

After seeing the announcement video, Avalon supporters requested a longer blooper reel, and Josh obliged on Wednesday when he posted this expanded video filled with even more bloopers and outtakes. Once again, fans got a healthy dose of Eric Clapton’s hit from 1986 (and later from Rick & Morty‘s fourth season).

On Friday, Avalon released yet another new video, but this one isn’t a blooper reel. Instead, it’s a full-fledged MUSIC VIDEO, shot on the TOS sets at WARP 66 STUDIOS in northern Arkansas. However, you’re STILL going to come out of watching it humming a song for the rest of the day!

In this case, the song is “Star Trek Is Real,” written and performed by Avalon star and producer (and part-time mermaid) PIXI NEREID. Pixi wrote this song 15 years ago, but it’s still pretty fun and upbeat—just like Pixi herself! Take a look and a listen…

(It’s already echoing in your head, isn’t it? Go on, sing!)

This little firecracker has only been in the fan film community for a few months and hasn’t even appeared in her first full fan film yet (that’ll be October!). But nonetheless, she’s taken our little fiefdom by storm, spreading her unbridled energy and enthusiasm far and wide.

That said, I need to apologize to all of you reading this blog today expecting to see a video interview with this effervescent little elf. I was supposed to interview Pixi, but she got buried in work and had to bail on our Wednesday night Zoom call. That left Josh Irwin and Ray Myers as my 2-out-of-3, and Josh quickly reached out to TYLER DUNIVAN, another star of Avalon, and asked if he could fill in for Pixi, and Tyler joined us.

It seemed strange to talk about Pixi’s new music video without Pixi, so we ended up talking about the campaign, finding out more about Ray Myers and why he’s been so generous to fan filmmakers, and discussing how Josh has ended up having driven his car over 5,500 MILES TOTAL just for one fan film! We also have an exclusive sneak peek at a never-before-scene from the upcoming Avalon release AGENT OF NEW WORLDS (at 38:10) plus more info on what’s coming after.

Enjoy…

AVALON UNIVERSE reaches their $3,000 dollar match in just TWO AND A HALF DAYS!!!

I certainly didn’t see THIS coming! I mean, I was initially feeling hopeful that the AVALON UNIVERSE GoFundMe campaign would be able to reach (and maybe even surpass) the $3,000 maximum that wonder-supporter RAY MYERS was offering as a dollar-for-dollar match to any donations that came in this week between Monday and Sunday. That would double that maximum to $6,000—and more-than-double their total from where the week had started (which was just over $5,500 raised in about two and a half months).

I figured that Team Avalon (and I) would need to pull out all the stops and really talk up the dollar-match promotion as much as possible for the entire week to even have a snowball’s chance of reaching that $3,000 maximum. Instead, it only took two and a half days to get there, and good as his word, Ray donated a whopping $3,000 to the campaign earlier this morning…

As I write this, the total shown on Avalon‘s GoFundMe page reads $11,572…about 57.8% of the way to their $20,000 goal. This is, by far, the most ambitious Star Trek fan film crowd-funder to come along in a couple of years, and it’s not nearly as easy to reach into the five-figures as it used to be!

I chatted with showrunner JOSHUA IRWIN last night, wondering whether or not to publish this blog today announcing the good news. On the one hand…YAY! On the other hand, to point out that the $3,000 maximum had been reached runs the risk of potential donors thinking, “Well, if my donation isn’t going to get doubled anymore, why bother?” Likewise, some folks might be confused and assume that the goal was only $3,000 and say, “Great, mission accomplished.” But the overall goal for the ENTIRE campaign is still about $8,400 away.

In the end, we decided share the good news. After all, this will be my fourth Avalon Universe blog in four days, so why ruin the streak, right? And if all goes well, tomorrow will be my fifth, as I just completed an awesome video interview with Josh, actor TYLER DUNIVAN, and this angel donor Ray (who also donated more than $3,000 to my fan film INTERLUDE). Fans have seen multiple interviews with Josh and Tyler, but who is this Ray Myers guy, and why is he being SO generous? Is he just super-rich, or is his wife gonna kill him for throwing their nest-egg away on a couple of silly Star Trek fan films?

And in the meantime, remember that the Avalon GoFundMe is still VERY much alive and active—and still aiming for a $20,000 goal. So if you haven’t donated yet, even though your dollars won’t be doubled, this is still a wonderful group of fan filmmakers and very deserving of our support….just ask Ray Myers!

Here’s the link:

https://www.gofundme.com/f/zdn4p-AvalonUniverse2021

AVALON UNIVERSE releases a new EXPANDED Blooper Reel!

Welcome to day three of “Jonathan-is-talking-about-nothing-other-than-THE-AVALON-UNIVERSE-all-week” week!

Actually, I hadn’t planned on blogging about Avalon each day, but so far, there’s been at least one newsworthy thing every 24 hours. On Monday, of course, it was the launch of a week-long promotion during which every dollar donated to the current Avalon GoFundMe campaign is being matched by super-supporter RAY MYERS (up to $3,000). Then yesterday, I was shocked and amazed that a whopping $2,135 had been donated just in the first day alone—which doubles to $4,270…all on day one!

Day two wasn’t quite as explosive, but nevertheless, a solid $675 more was raised, doubling to an impressive $1,350 to help fund the production of three (possibly four!) new Avalon Universe fan films. At this point, their grand total raised now stands at $11,132 (including matched dollars), and that’s 55.5% of their $20,000 goal. Can they reach that ambitious number this week? I suppose we’ll find out in five more days!

In the meantime, to keep things fresh and interesting, showrunner JOSHUA IRWIN has listened to requests from fans and supporters both on YouTube and Facebook to provide even more fun Avalon bloopers. So he has expanded the blooper reel from Monday that announced this week’s donation-dollar-match promotion, and this new one has even MORE fun moments with the cast and crew…

(For those of you born after the awesome 80s, that background song is “It’s in the Way that You Use It” by ERIC CLAPTON from 1986, originally written as part of the soundtrack to the film The Color of Money, starring PAUL NEWMAN and TOM CRUISE and directed by MARTIN SCORSESE.)

For me—and I think for many fans in our community—those outtakes are part of the reason why we love this sub-sub-sub genre niche of ours. It’s all about the FUN! Yeah, we like our fan films and playing in the Star Trek sandbox, but if we’re not enjoying the filmmaking process at least a little, why bother going through all the hassle?

So the Avalon Universe folks, who are such a wonderful group of people, show us all how enjoyable making fan films can be, and what a wonderful bonding experience it can be among old friends AND new friends. Granted, it can also be a lot of hard work, frustrating at times, frantic at other times, and sometimes downright exhausting, but if you can keep a smile on your face through all the long hours and have a good time, that just makes the finished product all the sweeter.

And if you want to see more of those finished products from these great people, please consider making a donation to the Avalon GoFundMe campaign at this link…

https://www.gofundme.com/f/zdn4p-AvalonUniverse2021

AVALON UNIVERSE GoFundMe takes in $2,135 in 24 hours!!!

I have to admit that I was pretty shocked at the unexpectedly enthusiastic fan response to yesterday’s announcement of that all donations to the AVALON UNIVERSE GoFundMe for this week would be matched dollar-for-dollar by super-supporter RAY MYERS. Ray’s upper limit for matching donations is $3,000, but I honestly expected that the Avalon folks would need to push really hard to reach that big number in only a week.

After all, the campaign has been running for two and a half months, and during that time, donations had only reached a little over $5,500. To expect more than half that amount in new donations in just seven days was being quite optimistic.

Then yesterday happened.

I must give showrunner JOSHUA IRWIN credit for editing together an awesome new crowd-funding “ask” video making the announcement. Likewise, Avalon stars TYLER DUNIVAN and PIXI NEREID have an electric chemistry and charm that comes across not only in their performances but also in their bloopers. Take a look if you haven’t watched the video already…

Reaction to the video was wonderfully positive on both Facebook and YouTube. In fact, Josh has received multiple requests for more Avalon bloopers, and he just might be willing to oblige if Tuesday’s donations come close to Monday’s (hint, hint).

And what were Monday’s donations, you ask?

In just 24 hours, the Avalon GoFundMe campaign was able to pull in $2,135 from 40 donors!!! Adding Ray Myers’ dollar matching, and that brings the total donations raised so far up to a whopping $9,800…or 49% of the final $20,000 goal! Folks, that is friggin’ amazing!!!

So what’s their secret? Well, in addition to the fun new video and sending an update to their existing donors, Team Avalon got by with a little help from their friends. I published yesterday’s blog and shared it to a dozen different Facebook groups. ALEC PETERS blasted the AXANAR donor list with a e-mail announcing of the dollar-match week-long promotion and encouraging Axanar supporters to also become Avalon supporters…as the recent Avalon release COSMIC STREAM featured a cameo by Garth, and an upcoming Avalon production is slated to be filmed at ARES STUDIOS. And finally, $800 came in a single donation from C.W. THOMPSON, who donated a couple of months ago to this same Avalon campaign and, before that, was one of the biggest donors to my fan film INTERLUDE. C.W. is very, very generous.

Anyway, that was the first 24 hours. But this week is full of promotional events for Avalon, so who knows how far they can get? They…could…go…all…the…way! And even if they don’t make it this week, GoFundMe campaigns have no time limit. And I suspect that, once their next major release, AGENT OF NEW WORLDS, premieres on October 31, fan excitement and donor support will pick up all over again.

But fans and supporters appear to be very excited right now, too! If you’re one of them and want to help with a donation—big or small—here is the link…

https://www.gofundme.com/f/zdn4p-AvalonUniverse2021

Mystery revealed: AVALON UNIVERSE angel-donor announces DOLLAR-MATCHING for a week!

Last Friday, JOSHUA IRWIN, showrunner for the very impressive fan series known as the AVALON UNIVERSE, surprised and confused fans and supporters by posting a video telling viewers NOT to donate to their current GoFundMe campaign—at least, not until Monday…

This fun-yet-intriguing video was followed by a shorter one on Saturday…

And a third one on Sunday…

The videos have done their job, as commenters on Facebook have generally expressed interest in finding out what’s going on. After all, when you’re trying to crowd-fund THREE different upcoming episodes of your series by raising $20,000 in donations from fans, you kinda WANT people to donate. So…what gives?

Well, wonder no more—as earlier today the big reveal was, er, revealed. A few clever folks actually guessed correctly: Monday begins a seven-day DONATION MATCH WEEK where every dollar donated to the current Avalon Universe will be DOUBLED (up to $3,000)…thanks to the generosity of angel-supporter RAY MYERS.

Take a look at today’s awesome video…

And here’s the link to the campaign…

https://www.gofundme.com/f/zdn4p-AvalonUniverse2021

If the name Ray Myers sounds familiar, you might remember him from my own fan film INTERLUDE, where Josh Irwin was director of photography. Back in the summer of 2019, I’d launched a similarly ambitious GoFundMe with an $18K goal. A few weeks into the campaign, I woke up one morning to discover that at some point the previous night, someone had donated a whopping $3K to my project—someone I’d never even met before!

Ray and I went on to become friends, and in addition to getting listed in the Interlude credits as associate producer and getting his name on the Game of Thrones memorial coffee cup in the engineering scene, Ray also got to play the first officer of the ill-fated U.S.S. Artemis.

*Ray Myers as the first officer of the U.S.S. Artemis in Interlude*

Ray has maintained a friendship with Josh as well as with me. And when he saw a few weeks ago that the Avalon GoFundMe was slowing down a bit at a level about a quarter of the way there, Ray reached out to Josh with an offer to do a dollar-matching donation promotion for a week whenever Josh was ready to do so.

With the Creation Las Vegas con and then the 55th anniversary of Star Trek sucking up most of the oxygen in fandom, it was decided that this week would be the best opportunity to build up to a big reveal and then pull out all the stops for the next seven days…so expect me to be talking up Avalon quite a lot this week! In fact, I’ve got a special Zoom video interview coming up (hopefully) on Friday to coincide with a brand new release from Avalon and also an exclusive sneak peek at the upcoming AGENT OF NEW WORLDS Avalon fan film…the first to be funded using donations from this current campaign.

INTERLUDE Confidential #11.2 – Jonathan’s favorite memories from the November shoot (part 2)

INTERLUDE is nearly complete, and this is likely my final “Interlude Confidential” before the release. Last week, I began reminiscing about the big two-day shoot last November at ARES STUDIOS in Lawrenceville, GA. For me, it was truly the culmination of the filmmaking experience…even though there would still be another eight months of intense work. But the shoot itself—that was pure magic.

Nearly 50 people came together that weekend with a single goal in mind: to produce a top-quality Star Trek fan film. They weren’t making gobs of money; they simply wanted to be a part of something fun, creative, exciting and dynamic.

A lot of things had the potential to go wrong. The most effective teams work and train together for weeks, months, or even years to maximize their effectiveness. Our team, with a few exceptions, was mostly strangers who had only met for the first time that weekend. Would they mesh together like a well-oiled machine, or would there be friction? Would one or more people with egos grate against the others, show an attitude, or be uncooperative? I’ve been told it can (and often does) happen, and even one bad apple can cripple a production.

And last but not least—in addition to the thousand other things that could could go wrong—there was me. I’d never been a producer before! It was my job to take care of a seemingly endless list of items to ensure the set would be ready for VICTORIA FOX and JOSHUA IRWIN to film on: everything from making sure all the actors, extras, and production team knew where and when to show up to getting measurements for uniforms to the seamstress to ordering the rental camera equipment to finding the caterer and making sure there were tables and chairs for the food plus a hundred other little details. I needed to make sure everything was prepared so my directors and production crew could focus on making an awesome fan film.

Was I up to the task?