The Avalon Universe – Page 2

JOSH IRWIN discusses THE TEST OF TIME…and just about everything else, too! (interview, part 2)

Yesterday in Part 1, I began talking to JOSHUA IRWIN about the latest release from TALES FROM THE NEUTRAL ZONE, an ambitious fan film titled THE TEST OF TIME.

Or rather, we almost talked about it!

Y’see, Josh burst onto the Star Trek fan film stage back in late 2018 with the first of his high quality AVALON UNIVERSE fan films, GHOST SHIP. And the reason for the professional look and feel of Avalon releases is that Josh is himself a professional in the film industry, having graduated from film school and worked on countless projects from short commercials to full-length feature films cast with major celebrities. In other words, Josh knows what he’s doing, and you can watch all nearly-dozen Avalon releases here on this YouTube playlist.

But this blog isn’t about Avalon. It’s about Tales from the Neutral Zone, which Josh is also now working on regularly. In fact, beginning with their next release, Josh will be taking over as director, after having worked as cinematographer on both this latest fan film as well as the previous one, DOOMSDAY, which he also ended up co-directing with RAY TESI, the showrunner and owner of the TOS sets down in Kingsland, GA. But it’s not just NEUTRAL ZONE STUDIOS that Josh is helping out. He’s begun working in various capacities on numerous other fan films and series, as well.

And that ended up becoming the focus of most of the first half of our interview, conducted via phone as Josh was driving from Arkansas to Maryland to help shoot some stuff for FARRAGUT FORWARD. We discussed the growing cooperation among various fan filmmakers in the community, sharing talents and resources. We also chatted about what exactly Josh does on all of these other non-Avalon projects and how he deals with so much driving and getting time off from work for this hobby that he loves so much.

Anyway, the moment has finally come to discuss The Test of Time. And if you haven’t seen it yet, give it a viewing first…

And now, the conclusion of my interview with Josh Irwin…

JOSH IRWIN discusses THE TEST OF TIME…and just about everything else, too! (interview, part 1)

A funny thing happened on the way to a discussion of THE TEST OF TIME, the latest TALES FROM THE NEUTRAL ZONE fan film release from NEUTRAL ZONE STUDIOS in Kingsland, GA. Those are the Star Trek TOS sets that were originally used for STARSHIP FARRAGUT and STAR TREK CONTINUES. Now owned by super-fan RAY TESI (who pays thousands of dollars of his own money each month to rent the location that houses the sets), Neutral Zone Studios is available to any fan production wanting to film there. Among the fan series that shoot at the studio regularly are DREADNOUGHT DOMINION, AVALON UNIVERSE, and of course the aforementioned Tales from the Neutral Zone. And even more fan projects are slated to shoot there in the coming months.

Typically, I interview Ray Tesi about new Neutral Zone episodes, although for the previous release, the wildly popular DOOMSDAY, Ray tag-teamed with JOSHUA IRWIN on the interview , as Josh had stepped up to co-direct, along with being director of photography as well as editor. And with their latest release, Josh was once again director of photography…with VIC MIGNOGNA returning to Star Trek fan films for the first time since the end of STC to direct. With Ray’s approval, this time I reached out to Josh to field the questions, and so we began our interview.

Now, Josh is one of the busiest filmmakers in our community, serving not only as showrunner for the Avalon Universe fan series but also helping out on a whole slew of other productions in all sorts of different capacities. As such, it was probably appropriate that I ended up interviewing Josh via a recorded phone conversation while he was driving more than 1,000 miles from his home in Bentonville, Arkansas to Frederick, Maryland to help shoot some videos for FARRAGUT FORWARD!

So naturally, I began the interview asking Josh about all of these other projects he’s been working on, and…well…sometimes interviews just go in unexpected directions. So please accept my apologies that Josh and I don’t start discussing The Test of Time until PART 2 of this interview! But trust me, the stuff in PART 1 is just as fascinating, and I really do recommend that you read the whole interview. You won’t be disappointed.

And speaking of not being disappointed, take a look at The Test of Time, as it turned out REALLY well…

And now, here’s Josh Irwin…

Oh, yeah? Well, who asked YOU…?!?! (editorial)

I don’t usually write blogs about trolls, but I’m not entirely certain that “CHUCK IN TEXAS” knows he’s a troll. It’s possible that he actually believes he’s being helpful in some way. So in an attempt to be “helpful” to this fellow myself—in the same way he was—I am writing this blog with the hope that somehow, some way, Chuck will read it.

Wait, who the heck is Chuck???

Last week, “Chuck in Texas” posted a separate criticizing comment on nearly every fan film on the AVALON UNIVERSE YouTube Channel. I have a screen cap of one of them…

The other comments were of a similar tone, critiquing everything from the quality of the wig worn by the Vulcan nurse T’Prin to the type of lenses that JOSHUA IRWIN was using to the shoot those films. After a few of these comments, Josh responded that he felt that Chuck was being rude. Chuck ignored Josh’s responses and kept right on posting.

“He was addressing me like I was a teenager who had never made a film before,” Josh told me, “saying obvious things like ‘Choreograph your fight scenes!!’ and ‘Invest in a real makeup crew!!’ and telling me to shoot more than one take….like I’m not already doing that.”

Eventually, after being ignored and just seeing more and more belittling posts popping up like mushrooms, Josh blocked “Chuck from Texas”—which effectively removed all of Chuck’s comments from the videos. “I don’t mind constructive criticism,” ” says Josh, “and in fact, if you look at the comments on my fan films, you’ll see a lot of that. But if someone is being rude or nasty, that’s just uncalled for.”

Normally, I’d completely ignore a story like this because such condescending criticism is a fact of life on social media, and Josh dispatched this guy quickly and without incident. But then I thought about it a bit more and realized that this could become a “teachable moment”…possibly for Chuck in Texas if he reads this but at least for others who watch Star Trek fan films and decide to be armchair filmmakers themselves.

Am I saying that no one should ever be allowed to express negative feedback of a fan film? Of course not! The world is full of people, and people have opinions. My issue is with the sanctimonious approach to telling someone how to “fix” their fan film. In short, unless you’ve made a better fan film yourself, you really don’t have a right to tell others how they should have made theirs. And you wanna know something funny? People who have made fan films do NOT offer unsolicited and condescending advice like that. They just don’t.

People who manage to produce fan films of their own realize what it takes to complete a project, and they (typically) offer their respect to other filmmakers. The anonymous “Chuck in Texas” offered no such respect, which leads me to conjecture that he has never completed a film production of his own. And perhaps that’s why he wanted to “help” with advice rather than doing any real work or having to make hard choices.

What kind of hard choices, you ask…?

AVALON UNIVERSE releases THE TRUTH WITHIN and then shoots THREE new fan films SIMULTANEOUSLY! (video interview with JOSH IRWIN, TYLER DUNIVAN, and VANCE MAJOR)

if showrunner JOSHUA IRWIN and his team from THE AVALON UNIVERSE can shoot three different and highly complex fan films simultaneously, then I can definitely do a blog that covers two things at the same time, right?

Those two things are 1) the release late last year of a new Avalon Universe fan film THE TRUTH WITHIN, starring CHUCK MERÉ as Captain Lance Ramirez and VANCE MAJOR as Engineer Erick Minard, and 2) Team Avalon’s current efforts to wrap up their fan series by tackling not one, not two, but THREE ambitious fan films all at once!

First, let me show you their latest fan film…

For those unfamiliar with the Avalon Universe, Chuck Meré joined the cast for their second episode, AVALON LOST, which also marked the departure of series lead TYLER DUNIVAN. Chuck stayed for two additional episodes, DEMONS and AIR AND DARKNESS, before departing the series along with co-star VICTORIA FOX. Tyler Dunivan returned to the series shortly thereafter with the episode COSMIC STREAM.

Meanwhile, Vance Major is a bit of a legend of Star Trek fan films, having written, produced,edited, directed, and/or starred in a total of 146(!!!) Star Trek fan films featuring his character of Erick Minard and the U.S.S. Constar. Many of his fan films feature interstellar “Facetime calls” between two or more characters, which are pretty easy to shoot (just record your lines into your computer or camera phone at home!). And indeed, The Truth Within looks more like a Minard/CONSTAR CHRONICLES fan film than a typical Avalon production.

Lots of questions abound, like why that simplified format, and does this mean that Chuck Meré is returning to Avalon or just making a cameo appearance? I ask both of those questions during this blog’s video interview below.

The second thing we chat about is something that I personally find even more intriguing. As some Avalon fans know (and are a little saddened by), the series will soon be coming to an end. The Truth Within marks the eleventh Avalon fan film (watch them all on this playlist), and only three more episodes remain: KNIGHTS OF THE VOID, CRISIS ON INFINITE EXCALBURS, and THE ONCE AND FUTURE CAPTAIN. (Dontcha just love the Arthurian titles?)

And these aren’t “little” episodes!

Knights is full of action and adventure. Crisis is a huge undertaking crossing realities with the same actors playing multiple characters from different universes and sci-fi franchises. (And thanks to Josh for letting me add a couple of fun characters to the script, including a “Space Elvis” tribute to STAR TREK: NEW VOYAGES‘s show-runner JAMES CAWLEY. You’re all going to love this character!) And Once and Future Captain is a gripping and poignant series finale with a huge cast.

But rather than shooting these three films one at a time, Josh has decided to produce them all simultaneously. And we’re not talking about taking a long weekend to work on the first film Friday, the second on Saturday, and the third on Sunday. No, sir!

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…

Now there are TWO crowd-funding campaigns in “IN DEMAND” status: AVALON and FARRAGUT FORWARD!

For anyone who’s curious, the 2-month long crowd-funding campaign for the AVALON UNIVERSE’s ambitious new multiversal crossover fan film, CRISIS ON INFINITE EXCALIBURS, finished up with $11,605. Since it surpassed its initial $8K goal (by 45%, in fact!), Indiegogo allows the the campaign to shift into “In Demand” status, meaning showrunner JOSHUA IRWIN can continue to crowd-fund beyond this past Monday’s deadline.

Oh course, if you’re talking AMBITIOUS fan films that are still crowd-funding using “In Demand” Indiegogos, you have to enthusiastically include FARRAGUT FORWARD from showrunner JOHN BROUGHTON and director JOHNNY K. They already released a short teaser trailer back in February that blew people’s socks off with the quality of the monster maroon uniforms, Klingon armor and make-up, and overall production quality. Take a look…

At the same time, they launched an Indiegogo to raise $30K intended to complete the full film, a sequel to their long-running STARSHIP FARRAGUT fan series. At the start of their campaign, I interviewed John and Johnny about the new project, which you can watch here…

Like Avalon, the Farragut Forward Indiegogo managed to surpass their goal, finishing at $33K on April 2 and shifting into “In Demand” status. And since then, they’ve managed to add 11 more backers and an extra $1.5K on top of their previous total. Johnny K. confirmed to me that the campaign is still very much active…

Our crowd-funder on Indiegogo is still open, and additional funds will give us even more options for Klingon sets, and maybe even a few surprises. So please keep the donations coming, and help spread the word that we’re still funding. Now is a perfect time to jump on board and help be a part of this project.

Here’s the link to donate:

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/farragut-forward-a-star-trek-fan-production

Johnny continued…

There’s so much passion and genuine love for Star Trek, and we all know that we’re creating something special. You can just feel it. Dozens of very talented people are taking time away from their personal lives and families to bring this vision to life, and we’re incredibly grateful for that.

In the meantime, John Broughton continues to supervise the creation of the costumes, the construction of the sets and props, and a whole bunch of other pre-production tasks. And he’s been chronicling these efforts in a series of updates posted to their Indiegogo page. Speaking of sets, take a look at this…!

Impressed? Johnny K. sure is…

I was blown away when I saw the mocked-up sets for the first time. It just reinforces how massive this undertaking really is. From the sets, to the top-tier costumes, props, SFX and VFX, the time and energy poured into this production is unbelievable.

Filming kicks off on October 8, and we’ll be shooting off and on in several stages for many months and into next year. It’s a huge story to tell and we’re taking our time with it to make the best film we can possibly make.

AVALON Indiegogo surges past its $8K goal to $11.5K and announces stretch goal!

A friend is someone who will lend you his lawnmower. But a GOOD friend is someone who will lend you his 18,000 donor e-mailing list!

Early this past Wednesday morning, ALEC PETERS sent out an e-mail request to all previous Axanar donors to please help JOSHUA IRWIN and TEAM AVALON raise the last 20% of their $8K goal to fund their ambitious multiversal crossover fan film CRISIS ON INFINITE EXCALIBURS that’s scheduled to go into production early next year. Within a few hours, the Avalon Indiegogo had crossed the $8K level thanks to about ten new donors, including one $1,500 executive producer package donor (who has asked to remain anonymous). And then yesterday, another executive producer-level donation came in, bringing the total number of highest-tier supporters to FOUR and a staggering $6K donated just from them!

There’s also been a $1,000 donation for a producer level (they get to do a voice-over of background bridge chatter in the episode), as well as a $700 associate producer donation…all since Wednesday’s e-mail blast. So never underestimate the value of e-mailing potential donors, folks!

As it happens, the e-mail blast couldn’t have come at a better time, as the Avalon campaign had essentially slowed to a trickle over the previous week or so, and some of Josh’s plans to promote the campaign had failed to materialize…including a series of Avalon videos that were supposed to post on the 115K-subscriber Lore Reloaded YouTube channel, as well as an interview with Star Trek podcaster LARRY NEMECEK.

But now that the campaign has surpassed its $8K goal, it is now eligible to enter Indiegogo’s “In Demand” status, meaning this specific crowd0funder can remain active beyond its original deadline. Other fan film campaigns have also gone into “In Demand” status, including THE ROMULAN WAR, which managed to get a couple thousand dollars extra after the initial deadline of the campaign.

For this reason, Josh has announced his intention to set a stretch goal at $14,000. He hasn’t yet revealed what the perk will be—only that it will be a downloadable digital file that every backer will be able to access. He also mentioned that that last sentence contains a hidden clue to what the perk will be.

Josh explained where the extra money would be going…

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.

AVALON UNIVERSE takes on Pon Farr in THE NEEDS OF THE ONE… (part 3: video interview with JOSHUA IRWIN and TYLER DUNIVAN)

About six weeks ago, I published a blog including the first of three video interviews spotlighting the latest release from THE AVALON UNIVERSE, an impressive 30-minute fan film titled THE NEEDS OF THE ONE. If you haven’t seen it yet, check it out below…

That first interview was with the new lead actress for the series, ALEXANDRA REXFORD, who plays Commander Mikeala Allenby, the first officer of the U.S.S. Excalibur. Two and a half weeks later, I posted the second video interview with CORA WILSON and WADE KING, who played the adorable shipboard couple of Vulcan Nurse T’Prin and Security Officer Williams.

And now it’s three weeks after that, and I’ve finally completed the hat trick with my third and last interview, this time with showrunner JOSHUA IRWIN and actor TYLER DUNIVAN…the Butch and Sundance (or perhaps Bill and Ted) of fan films! And why the long delays between interviews? Busy people, busy schedules—and it’s much more challenging coordinating two interviewees than one!

However, before we dive into the chat-fest, a quick update on the Indiegogo crowd-funder for CRISIS ON INFINITE EXCALIBURS. You are welcome (and encouraged) to donate here…

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

I’ve actually been contacted by a few members of our fan community asking if I was concerned that the campaign has “stalled out” a bit over the last two weeks, stuck just short of the halfway point with only 21 days left, and if I had any ideas why donations had seemingly dried up.

Here’s a few answers…

I know that a couple of larger supporters haven’t donated yet but are still planning to. By my estimates, this will potentially bring in another 20%.
The middle weeks of a crowd-funding campaign are typically the weakest for donations. Add to this that, for the past two weeks, Star Trek Las Vegas and Dragoncon have sucked up a lot of oxygen in the fan world, leaving it harder to promote a crowd-funder.
Beginning this week, Josh is planning to release the first in a series of videos on both the Avalon YouTube channel as well as Lore Reloaded, which has 115K subscribers. The latter will expose Avalon to many new potential donors that may not have ben aware of the fan series before this.

So no, not terribly worried yet. Let’s see what happens over the next couple of weeks.

In the meantime, today’s video chat with Josh and Tyler begins with a discussion of the upcoming project, with new details revealed.

Then we hit a delicate subject that Josh and Tyler wanted to address personally, and that is the departure from the series of a few team members, including executive producer and lead actress PIXI NEREID, who had been so prominent last year both during crowd-funding for and then starring in the ambitious AGENT OF NEW WORLDS. Now she and two other actresses have been recast. So…what happened? We’ll be talking about this, as well.

And of course, we’ll also be taking about The Needs of the One!

Coming up with PERK IDEAS for the AVALON UNIVERSE crowd-funder…

To perk or not to perk?

Crowd-funder perks are a great motivator for donations, but they come with a few drawbacks. First of all, physical perks that cost money to produce and ship can nibble away (or even gobble away) significant chunks of what you raise. And of course, keeping track of who ordered what, tracking down correct mailing addresses, boxing and shipping, and dealing with undelivered merchandise can be a royal pain in the butt.

Going perkless isn’t necessarily a donation-killer. INTERLUDE‘s GoFundMe offered no perks and took in $25K. And last year, AVALON UNIVERSE‘s GoFundMe likewise offered no perks and raised more than $13K. That money has gone into producing four new fan films: AGENT OF NEW WORLDS, the just-released THE NEEDS OF THE ONE, and the upcoming KNIGHTS OF THE VOID and THE TRUTH WITHIN.

And so, when Avalon showrunner JOSH IRWIN asked me for advice about his new crowd-funding campaign for next year’s ambitious CRISIS ON INFINITE EXCALIBURS multiverse crossover fan film, the first question we needed to answer was “To perk or not to perk?”

After weighing the pros and cons, Josh decided to perk…which meant switching over from GoFundMe to Indiegogo, since the former doesn’t allow for perks. You can watch the ask video below (it’s quite good!)…

With just about 5 weeks left, the Indiegogo is doing pretty well at $$3,620, or about 45% of the $8K goal. And of course, I encourage anyone who can afford a few bucks to support this project by clicking the link below because Team Avalon produces some really top quality Star Trek fan productions, and there’s some very nice perks…

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

Today’s blog is going to discuss those perks and how Josh and I came up with them—as some of them might inspire other fan filmmakers with ideas for their own perks. Let’s dive in…