Freyburg

Following up on my previous Portal posts, here’s Escape from City 17 part 2, a Half Life which boasts a city in ruins, striders, zombies, headcrabs and more. THe creators of this film claim they spent less than $1,000, which sounds doubtful given what’s on screen.

Portal is a fantastic series of games, and it’s built up such an interesting world that several fan films have sprung up to expand upon its themes of imprisonment, quantum physics and puzzle solving.

Dan Trachtenberg of Totally Rad Show fame has upped the bar with his Portal fan film, entitled “The Escape,” which you can see below:

Others have also put together Portal fan films. My favorite is this one, which eschews action for something a little more moody and introspective:

I’m sure there are more fine fan films out there, but these, in my opinion, are the true standouts.

Jim Munroe is the multimedia genius behind No Media Kings, which started as a way for him to self-publish his work but has since morphed into a DIY mini-empire featuring comics, games, film and books.

A few years ago he and several collaborators made “Infest Wisely“, a lo-fi sci-fi film that they broke into chapters and filmed separately with a overarching story written by Munroe. You could watch it online in segments or as a feature.

Jump to several years later and Munroe and friends have created
“Ghosts with Shit Jobs,” a near-future extrapolation of what happens when North America goes bankrupt and China outsources all the jobs they don’t want to us. It’s being done with the same low-fi ethos as Infest Wisely but with better equipment and a little more money ($4,000 this time as opposed to the $700 they spent on the previous film.)

I’m looking forward to seeing what Munroe hss in store with this latest film…it looks like they’ve upped their game visually while hewing to the same approach of ideas over pointless spectacle. Keep watching here and nomediakings.org for further news on the film.

Lately I’ve been looking into the web series phenomenon, given my proclivities towards sticking it to the man and/or making cool things with video and computers. Here’s a few good ones to whet your appetite.

First of, here’s the Guild, the gold standard by which all other web series are judged….

and here’s Standard Action, which is filmed right here in Vancouver…

and for something a little less fantasy-oriented, here’s Andy and Chaz Bugger Off to America, a sort of Guy Ritchie meets Entourage tale of two hapless and murderous criminals from the UK who cause trouble in LA…

And finally here’s some sci-fi goodness in the form of the Mercury Men. Unfortunately, you can’t watch the series unless you’re in the US or have a proxy, so here’s the trailer.

Got any more favourites? Tell me about them in the comments!

Despite a dearth of interesting news this week, Warren, Todd and Chip all managed to ponder such important matters as the legacy of LCD Game n’ Watch systems, Amiga fanaticism, and Apple’s possible alliance with Square. They also delved into the quite serious matter of where our gadgets come from, given the recent explosion in a Foxconn factory in China. Also, Chip has reached near OCD levels of Infinity Blade.

Tweet This Post

Our first episode shot on my new iPhone 4 wherein Todd and Warren discuss media creation, replacing your Xbox 360 with Boot Camp, the Verizon iPhone, and much much more!

note: the sound on this episode could be better, but hey, it was shot on an iPhone 4.

Tweet This Post

Precisely none of you may be wondering how we make FruityGamer here at Freyburg Media. Well, I’m here to tell you the thinking, process and methodology I used. My methods and tools may differ from what’s available to you, but you’ll at least get a general idea as to how to pull of your own video podcasts.

When myself and my business partner made “This is Yaletown” we did so thinking the internet would soon push up its production values to the levels of television, and that we’d better be ahead of the curve. But in fact this has not proven to be the case. People watch internet shows for many reasons, but slick production values (to a point) doesn’t seem to be a necessary part of the equation.

I figured that given my experience creating Radio Free Skaro there was no reason I couldn’t create similar podcasts on video and in audio form, and do so in such a way that they’re quick and easy to make.

(more…)

This Monday I appeared on Hey! with Dane Golden. I met Dane in 2008 at Macworld, and then again when he came up to help with a “Lab with Leo Laporte” shoot. Dane went on to help Leo form TWIT, and worked as president of the TWIT Network until this year.

Dane’s now concentrating on HEY!, his new interview show. Usually it consists of both video and audio, but technical difficulties meant my wordsmithing will have to be listened to and not witnessed in the full audiovisual glory that is the Tokyo Hacker Space. Anyway, give it a listen and feel free to comment below or at Hey.com.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

New Macbook Airs? OS X 10.7? John Sculley taps out? EA in Tokyo? Yes!

BTW, we planned to do this episode on video as well as audio, but technology conspired against us. Next week for (maybe) sure!

AKB48 is a super popular group in Japan of young girls who croon at otakus, who then swoon at the attention from real live females. The group’s creator decided that this formula is successful enough to take it in a bold new direction, and so he’s created OJS48, the world’s first supergroup composed of old retired Japanese detectives. Pure genius.