I'm delighted to welcome superb writing talent to the Parasites team in the form of Shad Clark. Not only does Shad have a number of optioned sci-fi and horror scripts under his belt but he's also contract writer at EA Games, developing narratives for The Sims and working most recently with Spore.
Shad is a wonderful guy and his involvement really strengthens the project.
As the integration between script, game and live events thickens... stay tuned for more announcements :)
In creating the Parasites transmedia story, it's important for the online game to dovetail with the movie & live events (screenings) in an elegant way. That means not overly complicated, not contrived and not an irrelevant add-on. The movie, events and online game need to offer parts of the whole and yet be satisfying in themselves.
The best approach I'm finding to achieve this seems to be to take an idea through successive iterations of each media. The good ideas snowball - reinforcing their merit with each pass - while single-media ideas melt away.
Note that each media has its own demands. For example, for the movie to work, the audience should allow the director to guide them through the story and in doing so have the drama unfold. Whilst for the game it's the player that finds his/her own drama. Both complete parts of a larger story but the method of engagement is different.
In working through my ideas for the feature film and webseries, I created this first installment of a graphic novel. Although the character Simon Newbry might make an appearance, the feature film isn't about him. Hence the graphic novel allows further exploration of what it's like being a "King" in the world of Parasites.
Parasites Graphic Novel
The gaming component of Parasites creates key relationships between:
the audience and the story
members of the audience.
It has the power to transform enjoyment of the storyworld from a passive experience to an active experience. It offers investors and sponsers two key benefits:
Engagement. Movies have always been a sit-back experience. Not completely passive because the best movies invoke an emotional response but the audience is at the mercy of the movie. They can't re-cut it on the fly or investigate other story paths that might interest them. All this, of course, is available in the best games. And while a movie may last anywhere between 30 seconds and 3 hours, the best games are captivating audiences for 8 to 24 hours and upwards
Revenue. This article compares the profitability of Grand Theft Auto 4 and Spiderman 3 and concludes that games are where the action and the money is. So there is massive untapped potential in the game development. However, our revenue model assumes a rather modest contribution because at this time alhough we'd like a game on the scale of Eve Online or WoW it's a little too ambitious even for us (unless of course you can help!). Note that the game is free to play and revenue comes from in-game trading.
Our plan is to start with the Parasites game on a social network because it's faster & cheaper to implement than other game patforms (and the feature film) and it offers a chance to spread awareness and interest of the Parasites project ahead of implementing more costly transmedia components. It's hoped that the social game will stimulate participation in the project and offer insights into the development of the feature and web series.
The Parasite's game is not a lame, cynical extension of the movie, it's a core part of the relationship between the audience and the storyworld.
The following manifesto is intended to inform and inspire the Parasites collaborative community.
PROJECT GOALS
#1: To create an open-source, transmedia storyworld that belongs to everyone#2: To help those who contribute find what they need in life: recognition, reward (emotional, financial), friendship
#3: To pay back the financial investors, plus an acceptable return, then use the money that's left to have the biggest wrap party(ies) in history with simultaneous drinking and live link-ups in five continents
#4: To find a successful (i.e. profitable, repeatable) business model for filmmakers and those who contribute to their work
RULES and GUIDELINES
#1: There is no absolute truth, only the search for truth. Multiple explanations and stories can exist within the same world. You don't have to ask permission to create a new character, a new location or a new story and you can build on other people's ideas without permission. There's no right answers, only answers that might take us more quickly to a version of a truth#2: Lurking, reading, watching is active participation and we thank you. Linking, digging, forwarding and recommending is participating too and comes with increased good karma. Commenting, collaborating, creating is the highest endorsement you can give us and we hope you'll get a creative high... but we can't promise nirvana
#3: If you create something for Parasites we hope you'll give it away for free. But if you want to sell it, it must only be sold on our marketplace where we'll take a commission to help repay the project
#4: Less is more. Try to focus your thoughts, your words, your work and your creative energy - you will have a bigger impact and it's respectful of other people's time
#5: Don't be a dickhead. While we'll try hard not to censor, if you post something to a website we control that's racist or nasty in other ways, it's gonna get pulled. Only give constructive, specific criticism if you have to - and after re-reading Rule #1 - but better is to show how you think it should be done. Be considerate of other people's feelings - you'll find the love will be returned to you (The Beatles: “the love you take is equal to the love you make”)
Parasites is sci-fi thriller with psychological horror elements. It is shot in a tech-noir style with high contrast and lots of shadows; unsaturated colour and a green-blue haze. This is a dark and murky near-future dystopian Britain.
The parasitic imagery brings to mind Shinya Tsukamoto’s Tetsuo and David Cronenberg’s Crash.
The feature film focuses on the central character, Ellie, while additional material will be shot for the web series to explore other characters and reveal additional game clues, codes and information.
The premise of the movie is “modern life is rubbish” and explores the ideas expressed in the essays of John Gray. This creates a rich complexity for the storyworld that can be discussed more fully outside the feature film (e.g. online and in the game rules & lore).
Some scenes and props, where appropriate, will be shot greenscreen allowing us, fans and sponsors to create personalized locations and artifacts. This also allows items to change over time depending on gameplay and audience voting (this week’s Webisode 1 might not be the same webisode next week!).
Short Synopsis
England, 2012. Ellie Pitney is a new media producer and host of a popular web show, XtrmeTV.
But when Ellie contracts a contagious flesh-eating parasite that converts human cells into metal, it partially incapacitates her inducing alternate waves of pleasurable hallucinations and frightening paranoia. A female Government agent places Ellie under house arrest, further exacerbating her mental deterioration, and compels her use her web celebrity to preach the benefits of contracting the parasite.
When a buddy helps Ellie break free of her home, they go in search of a cure and find ParaMachinErotica gangs and woodland anarchists with opposing views and explanations. But Ellie is recaptured by police and, returned to home, subjected to intensive re-education and forced parasitic assimilation. In a terrifying and enlightening conclusion, a disillusioned and dying Ellie sees the world as it really is.
Long Synopsis
England, 2012. Ellie Pitney is a new media producer and host of a popular web show, XtrmeTV.Ellie finishes her last UK rock climb knowing that tomorrow the sport becomes illegal: the Government has banned all dangerous sports, pursuing their goal to extend the nation's life expectancy by 2 years.
Returning home that night, Ellie broadcasts her final show and prepares to climb outside the UK. But something insider her is changing..and growing. ELLIE HAS CAUGHT A PARASITIC DISEASE THAT EATS AT HER BODY REPLACING FLESH WITH METALLIC STRUCTURES.
Ellie broadcasts news of her infection to her Internet audience. The news is detected by the Government who sends an Agent to Ellie to explain what is happening and why she will now be confined to her home. The Agent compels Ellie to woo her Internet fan base with broadcasts extolling the virtues of the parasite and encouraging others to succumb to its invasion.
Now under house arrest and partially incapacitated, the DISEASE CAUSES ELLIE'S MIND TO SWING WILDLY BETWEEN PLEASURABLE HALLUCINATIONS AND FRIGHTENING PARANOIA. Searching for a solution she turns to an XtrmeTV buddy Steve who says he knows someone who might be able to help. Together they break out of the house and head for the countryside in search of Vikram - an anti-government protester living a technology-free life.
While on the run they encounter the PME (ParaMachinErotica). A cult living in a metal shanty town inside a disused breakers yard. They believe the parasites should be worshiped and have developed a community and rituals dedicated to stimulating parasitic growth and enjoyment of the hallucinations.
Rejecting the PME, Ellie and Steve continue their quest and find Vikram hiding in a forest. Vikram teaches Ellie meditation - instructing her that ONLY HER MIND WILL FREE HER FROM THE PARASITE. But Ellie is too important to the Government - they need her web-celebrity to further their cause and promote their message of progress & better living through technology. They send special police to recapture her and ransack Vikram's camping community imprisoning Steve and returning Ellie to house arrest.
Back home Ellie undergoes intensive "education" at the hands of the Agent and the parasite consumes what remains of her body, transforming her so completely that all that's left is one side of her face. With Ellie’s life almost at an end, the Agent allows her to see Steve for one last time and she discovers the parasites have got him too.
Incapacitated, psychotic and demoralized, Ellie turns to meditation in her final fight and discovers that maybe she is the only sane person in a world of insane technological evangelism.
This is a monster blog posting! Our full Power to the Pixel competition entry plus all the supplementary materials.
Our competition entry is called Parasites: it's an open-source transmedia project that spans a feature film, live interactive screenings, gaming, a web series, collaboration and an online marketplace. It's exciting, audacious, provocative and it's important to our industry because we want to prove new business models for indie filmmakers.
Parasite Project Links
View more documents from ZenFilms
Roll CallIn addition to the formal Parasites partners, Johannes Bhakdi at Klatcher, Christoper Allen at Skotos and Helen Grace at Left Films, I'd like to thank:
Rachel Mizsei-Ward for her valuable feedback and suggestions (which I adopted) in developing the Parasites Online Game. Her paper "Underworld vs the World of Darkness: Players and Filmgoers Respond to a Legal Battle" can be found here.
Tim Clague for sharing his experience with his movie Circumference. His popular comedy web series Mr Vista can be found here and his informative blog here.
And last but not least, thanks to William Scheinman and Michael Davidson for their feedback on the Manifesto and proposal.
We welcome interest from any potential partner - particularly those able to offer finance or development resources. However, our PTTP proposal identifies three types of partner with whom we feel there are particular synergies:
Digital Agency
Advertising is Dead, Long Live Branded Entertainment
Our revenue model identifies sponsorship as a source of financing. This could be a simple product placement but the real value to the client comes from engagement with the Parasites audience and association with a cool, audacious, provocative, leading-edge, creative project.
This report from IBM (which is one such report among many) discusses the death of advertising - consumers don't believe it, avoid it and fast-forward through it. But then you know this. Although we're anticipating more than 6 million downloads and millions more eyeballs - Parasites isn't about the CPM, it's about demonstrating that brands can connect to consumers in meaningful ways.
Parasites is an opportunity to experiement with branded content that makes an engaging emotional connection to the consumer and for our digital agency partner Parasites could be a sandbox, a proving ground and a reputation enhancer.
Formula One motor racing is a test bed for technologies that will find their way into production vehicles. Parasites could be a Formula One vehicle for the future of marketing.
For digital agencies that want to experiment with new concepts and ideas, we're open for business. Parasites is a chance to demonstrate that provocative, edgy ideas work.
Oh, and brand managers are welcome to contact us directly too ;)
Social Network
For the social network partner, Parasites is an opportunity to move beyond offering clients an advertising platform that's differentiated by the number of subscribers, the type of targeting and the analytics. Involvement in Parasites will lead to the development of value-added tools and a new consumer-engagement platform that extends beyond current social media capabilities.
Established Media: TV/Cable & National Newspapers
With audiences time-shifting the viewing of shows or abandoning TV altogether in favor of the web and console games, Parasites offers a chance to engage with audiences and incentivize live viewing through:
interactive voting that extends the online gameplay
delivery of game-related information (clues, unlock codes, information)
access to professional media & assets created by the TV/cable show.
Parasites need not be a full, stand-alone TV show but rather a segment within an existing show. At its simplest, this could mean displaying a Microsoft Tag on screen for viewers to capture with their mobile phone. The tag directs their mobile browser to a URL that can capture response rate and demographics.
Open access to Parasites media & intellectual property allows remix & original content competitions, screening of the web series and other content.
For national newspapers, Parasites offers the chance to run promotions with game clues & unlock codes (printed in Microsoft Tags?)
Again, using the mobile tagging allows capture of readership analytics but let's say it's hidden within an advertisement requiring the gamer to scan the ad to find the codes.
In the past posts of this blog you'll find someone complaining that the future of independent films is not how he had envisaged it would be!
My fear and insecurity of a future in which filmmakers couldn't make a living from their work because of piracy and attention scarcity created a crippling attachment to the past.
In (belatedly) recognizing my attachment to the old ways and then choosing to now truly see the world as it is, I have discovered an amazing wealth of creative ideas and opportunities.
On Friday I'll present a transmedia project born from the creative energy unleashed when I accepted that the world has changed.
It's time to embrace the uncertainties of a future shaped by seismic technological, economic and social change.
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