January 25, 2008

Primary shooting of GET LAMP has completed. Over 80 interviews were conducted across three countries to capture some amount of the massive story of the text adventure. While I certainly don't consider it comprehensive, I definitely think that the final film will have representatives from all the major expected touchpoints of this story. From there, the even more curious will find plenty to look up and read about, which is a better medium for some information anyway.

Dozens of trips were made, and I hauled my new equipment bags through an awful lot of airports, lobbies and homes. I thank everyone who I interviewed for spending the time with me and letting me ask them all sorts of things, and I intend for the final work to be worth all the effort.

If you think I seriously missed someone, I expect to do one or two "pick-up" interviews during editing, so don't hesitate to contact me.

I hope to be done with this by June of 2008, but as I often have said, quality trumps time.

August 19, 2007

When a site, especially one working on a "project", doesn't update for a long time, that's usually bad news. In my case, that's actually good news - I've been humming along, doing interviews, culling footage, arranging trips and making decisions on who's left to get on camera. I had hoped shooting would be done for September but it is likely to go into October; lots of cool folks are left to interview.

There is now a more informative photos page showing the range of people interviewed for this project, and I'm happy to release the first teaser trailer both for download and on YouTube.

More information soon!

February 3, 2007

Work continues on the documentary. I believe we should be done with filming by August of 2007, and have a finished DVD set for you to purchase in early 2008. Instead of going with HD-DVD or Blu-Ray, it will likely be a two DVD set with one having the movie and features and the other having primarily HD versions on DVD-ROM form. Thanks, movie industry! You made my final choice much easier.

There is now a screenshots page with some basic grabs from the interviews (before digital cleanup) so you can see the range of faces already filmed. Over time, I hope we'll hit 100 interviews for this. I'm in contact with a large amount of people and still arranging interviews by the truckload. I hope to be at the Game Developers' Conference, as well as travelling one more time to Europe to get more folks.

Steady as she goes!

November 20, 2006

The documentary now has roughly 30 interviews completed, totalling roughly the same amount of hours. I have interviewed people from text adventure companies large and small, interviewed teachers who use interactive fiction in their classrooms, people who happened to use text adventures, and a variety of modern writers and experts. I've done a lot of flying (which more to come) and I've been collecting a wide set of artifacts, information and stories. In other words, it's going very well.

I continue to invite people to mail me with suggestions or offers to be interviewed, because that's often how things get done. I'm doing my best to get this story right but can always stand to be educated.

People ask the same questions about when it'll be done, and I'm currently assuming beginning of 2008. I have to disclaim that anything can happen, and if I have to extend the production to get a vital interview or make the final work that much better, I will do so. It's about quality, not rushing it out the door.

In current Interactive Fiction news, the winners of the 12th annual Interactive Fiction Competition have been announced. If you want to see what's the latest in text adventures, interactive fiction, and similar literary forms, here's your big chance.

August 17, 2006

A mention about this production in Wired News has caused a burstlet of interest in what's going on from people who didn't know this was being worked on. Since the last news entry was in April, I figured it might be a good idea to talk about how this is all going.

...very well! As of this writing I have a dozen interviews in the can or about to be in the can, with dozens more either scheduled or in preparatory discussions. I've got plans to go to Europe, to Canada, and of course all around the United States (I've already gone to Florida, Pennsylvania, California, Washington, Oregon and Massachusetts in support of this film) in finding everyone I can. It's great fun and I'm meeting a lot of personal heroes along the way.

I never get tired of discussing this stuff, so please write me if you were either involved with this project or have ideas for me. I'm moving slowly through my list and trying have complete conversations with future interview subjects before moving on to new ground, so if you did text adventures and I didn't reach you yet, reach out to me first! I won't mind.

And for those who were wondering, there is a movie here. A great, great movie. I can't wait to share it with the world.

April 28, 2006

Interviewing begins in earnest next week (beginning of May) and continues until I think we're done. It's quite open-ended because that's what you do when a subject grows and shifts underneath you, and the past few months have definitely opened my eyes to all the different aspects of text adventures and interactive fiction that reach back quite a way and come up to the present day. It has been a wonderful educational ride and I'm just starting!

The final bits of equipment for my camera have arrived just a few days ago and I've been shooting additional test footage to make sure everything works, and I've been contacting a range of folks about this subject, with many more to go.

Once again, I am shooting this documentary in HIGH DEFINITION, so that has presented both some amazing images and also a lot of difficulty in getting off the ground. The resulting work should definitely look great.... now it's just a matter of making it a well-done documentary as well.

March 4, 2006

Filming began at the end of February in Florida, where I interviewed Mike Berlyn (Infocom Implementor and Game-Maker), Alexis Adams (Co-Founder of Adventure International) and Jon Meyers (Teacher who has used text adventure games as a teaching tool).

Mike Berlyn was leaving the country for an indefinite time, so I moved up the interviews and added a couple to take advantage of the trip; the rest of the filming should commence at the end of March and continue through to the end of the year (at least).

I appreciate all the letters and requests people have sent to me about this project, and the memories I've been told of. If you were involved with text adventures of any type and want to either discuss an interview or provide material that might help, please don't hesitate to mail me. I always like hearing from people.

That's 3 hours of interview down.... ??? to go!

February 15, 2006

It has been a busy couple of months. First of all, I've been doing a ton of research; not just playing the games, but tracking down people, verifying information, assembling a list of interviews, putting out some feelers for musicians and artists, and doing all the little things that go into a "production". The net has grown a little since I started out, so I'm talking to people, in some cases, with tangential relevance to the documentary's main subject, but following all the leads and looking at the subject from as many angles as possible is what a person should do. It's been very informative.

The Adventurers' Club, my experiment in asking for "pre-orders" in return for some credit and items, is now closed to new members. 50 people signed up while it was around, giving me roughly five thousand dollars of "seed" money which has gone into upgrading equipment (sound and video). The results will be dramatic, I can promise. All the people in the club are thanked on the club page, and will also appear in the credits of the finished production.

As mentioned below, the first interviews will begin in roughly a week in Florida, where I am interviewing an Infocom Implementor, a Co-Founder of an Adventure Game company, and a teacher who uses text adventures in his classroom as a teaching tool. From there, I go where the subject takes me, and will have pages up with my progress.

Onward!

December 7, 2005

The documentary has been announced to the world, and reactions have been pretty favorable. Some people, of course, wonder how this could possibly be an interesting movie to make, but I experienced that question before and I think I came out all right, so mostly the focus is just on getting all the information I can, contacting the right people or having them contact me, and generally moving forward with this.

Current plans are that actual "camera" shooting begins in February of 2006, so right now I'm just allocating funds, and doing the research phase so I know the subject and the people as well as I can before moving forward. If you're someone who created text adventures and wonders why I haven't contacted you yet, don't be shy, step right up. It's likely just because I'm methodically researching stuff as well as authors and just haven't gotten a hold of your e-mail address.

Interactive Fiction is alive and well, by the way: there was just a really nice competition that just concluded with a bunch entries, winners, and awards. Well worth checking out, and the page explains all you need to know to get started.

One of the people giving me advice and help with this production (and there are a lot of them) is Nick Montfort, author of Twisty Little Passages, a book about Interactive Fiction from an academic perspective. He also just finished his own neat work called Book and Volume, which has been getting some nice reviews.

I mention Nick this time, but will tell you in the coming months about others involved in the production or giving me advice, and how this subject which at first blush might not seem something to make a documentary about turns out to be really amazing.

Oh, one other thing. In a fun little experiment, I've opened up pre-ordering for this documentary, as a way to help fund it. I figure it can't hurt. The page gives much more detail on what's involved there. If this whole thing interests you, you might like the offer. Either way, thanks for reading.