Let’s all agree to disagree, that The Story Lab has been (mostly) about transmedia. Transmedia is important, don’t get me wrong. It has and will be, a crucial element to storytelling. Such examples include a post I wrote earlier in this course, the Matrix franchise, The Dark Knight’s marketing strategy, etc. What I am trying to say is, the concept of transmedia is easily grasped, but it isn’t the same in terms of application.
I only came to realise that there was so much more planning required to transmedia storytelling in the later stages of our preproduction. It was then too late for us, to implement any sort of strategy to execute a successful transmedia story. Thus, the transmedia element in our final project, which was a Facebook page, merely acted as an entry point for our viewers, and it did not contribute much to the narrative as much as we hoped it would.
The end of the world seems like a nightmare to Ben. A memory of a past life that doesn’t belong to him. When Ben starts to remember Isabelle, the only love he’s ever known, he realises she’s missing in his life. An existential descent into confusion and the desperate need to find out the truth begins. This reality depicts a stunning, surprising and dark world. A world that is clearly not his.
I stumbled upon this particular video on Vimeo. Being a sci-fi fan myself, I think that Sundays has set a new benchmark for most proof-of-concept shorts out there, like Leviathan. (which is also amazing, don’t get me wrong) With a budget of just over 50k USD, Sundays has successfully set the path for what I think would be an amazing feature film.
We recently finalised the script for our final project. Jamie has been working on this relentlessly and it is safe to say that we are all happy with the outcome and the direction that this is headed.
The time is six in the morning and the sound of an alarm goes off. The ringing and buzzing sound fills the room as KEITH, in his mid forties and overweight, stares at the ceiling, ignoring his ringing alarm. His hand slowly reaches for the alarm and turns it off. Keith sets the alarm at this time so that he can get some exercise. He stares in thin air for a few seconds and ponder the possibility of getting out of bed, but he finally snaps out of it and goes back to sleep
Keith is making breakfast to get ready for work. After he indulges in a breakfast composed of fried eggs he fights the temptation to make more but eventually loses his will power. Keith is now in the shower with water cascading over his back as he hangs his head down. He then moves to groom himself but since he is displeased with his appearance he has a sorrow expression on his face.
Keith in now at his cubicle talking on the phone. Keith has worked as telemarketer for the last sixteen years of his life at The Foil People. He repeats the line given to him over and over again and has to deal with repeated abuse from people that do not want to be called.
Keith walks into the company tearoom. There he finds BRENDA, a recent employee at this company and always with a warm smile. Keith opts to sit at the corner of the table instead of next to Brenda. As he opens his candy bar, RYAN, a health freak that pushes his lifestyle onto others enters the tearoom. There Ryan starts to lecture Keith about his poor health to which Keith insulted Ryan numerous time in his head but opted to contain these feeling of animosity towards him.
Ryan felt that the conversation was not going to bear fruit so he asked Keith to up to the roof with him as a gesture of good faith. The mention of the room brings up fantasies in Keith’s head about him edging closer and closer to the edge until he falls down. This makes Keith panic so he declines Ryan’s offer. Ryan walks out of the team room rejected as he is soon followed by Keith. Brenda witnesses all this and starts to wonder about Keith’s odd behaviour.
The shift in over so Keith walks out of the office building and suddenly gets tapped on the shoulder. He frantically turns around to find it was Brenda. She asks him if he was able to give her a ride home since the trains in her line weren’t running for a couple of hours. He timidly agrees to take her so they walk to his car.
Upon their arrival at her house she gets out of his car. After she apologises for any inconveniences, she asks him about his irregular behaviour in the tea room. Keith is put off by this line of questioning so Brenda garbs his arm to his surprise. She admits that she may not know him very well so she doesn’t get the full picture but she expresses her desire to get to know him better. This causes Keith to smile as she thanks him again for the ride and sends off.
Keith’s love for videogames and junk food are at full display as he is playing on the couch with an empty bag of chips and an empty pizza box for company. While still playing images of his exchange with Brenda flood his mind. He pauses the game and reflects back on his life and if there was any chance for him to escape his tedious reality.
Keith suddenly jumps off the couch and heads for the exit. Once outside he starts to jog. With new found determination, he is able to attempt to change his life. Keith has hopes for tomorrow, hopes that he has given up on for many years as he continues to jog into the sunset.
Our project is very much a linear story of an introvert who seems to be on the brink of insanity, as he is portrayed to be constantly playing out scenarios in his mind along with his incessant monologues and dark jokes. Just when he thinks that his self-esteem has hit a record low, he stumbles upon a fellow female coworker who finally becomes a reason for him to be optimistic about life.
My role in this project would be to visualise and carry out the narrative in such a way that it is both aesthetic and relatable to our audience. The transmedia element of this project would be the main character’s Facebook profile, as well as the Facebook page of the company that he works for. These elements further emphasise the dark undertones in the film, where all these supposedly motivational posts on the company Facebook page have a more reversed effect on the main character.
The general theme revolves around escapism, humor, and hope. We would want to give the impression that the main character (Keith) often wanders off in his own imagination and has constant monologues, therefore giving the film a feeling where reality is off-kilter. Therefore, the color style that we would implement in our film is a greenish/bluish filter that provides a somewhat ambiguous and ingenuous undertone. A large part of the film will be dismal and gloomy and the mood will lift up progressively. A scene in David Fincher’s “Fight Club” where Edward Norton is shown contemplating accurately depicts the tone that we wish to convey in our film.
Image credit: Fight Club – 20th Century Fox
Image credit: Fight Club – 20th Century Fox
There are some movies that have applied a greenish filter for scenes that were slightly dark and grim. Timur Bekmambetov’s “Wanted” share some similar themes, where the character exhibits escapism in the form of consuming anxiety pills, and the scenes that follow compliment it with it’s dark humor. The color tone of this office scene is comparable to our film where it shows monotonous work and workplace relationships.
Image credit: Wanted – Universal Pictures
Image credit: Wanted – Universal Pictures
The Wachowski’s Matrix (a.k.a one of the greenest movies ever made) would also be a good example here. Their use of a greenish and bluish tint throughout the entire Matrix trilogy was so that the audience could distinct which was reality and which was the Matrix. (bluish for reality, greenish for the Matrix)
Image credit: The Matrix – Warner Bros
Image credit: The Matrix – Warner Bros
The mood of the film lightens up as it approaches the end, and it will have a warmer tone to it as to accommodate the theme of hope, where the main character finds his love interest and finally finds something to be optimistic about.
Image credit: The Secret Life of Walter Mitty – 20th Century Fox
Image credit: The Secret Life of Walter Mitty – 20th Century Fox
Image credit: The Secret Life of Walter Mitty – 20th Century Fox
I have written about transmedia in my previous post.
In this post, however, I would like to implement Henry Jenkin’s interpretation of it here as I think I have a better understanding of it now as I had previously. It is, as follows:
the art of telling one story over multiple media, where each medium is making a unique contribution to the whole.
At the heart of transmedia storytelling, lies imaginative universes that are governed by their own rules. (Giovagnoli, 2011) ‘How I Met Your Mother’ is a world that employs transmedia elements that has, over the years, ensured the show’s relevancy in modern pop culture. These elements kept the show interesting both on and off-air for audiences, which adheres to the core goal of transmedia storytelling – to create a compelling story. (Phillips, 2012) Even as attention spans are shortening and media consumption is fragmenting, fans are still willing to participate and immerse themselves in this storyworld, and even extend it through their contributions.
HIMYM became increasingly transmedia in it’s aesthetic, and in such it allowed viewers to view it not as a linear narrative, but a multi-platform immersive experience. Characters in the show would occasionally mention websites, made-up holidays, and even have their own products, like the infamous “Playbook“. Fans can actually purchase these tie-in books, which are all penned by Barney Stinson. Like most transmedia elements, all these pieces contribute to the narrative at some point, one way or another. For example, Barney is the promiscuous bachelor who proudly upholds “The Bro Code“, and also bears the identity of the prodigal Lorenzo Von Matterhorn. Another example is the occasional mentions of Robin Sparkle in the narrative. The character’s backstory involvesmusic videos that she made when she was a Canadian pop star:
According to Giovagnoli, one of the four essential guidelines to rouse audience participation is to provide a clear explanation of the relationships among the different media, suggesting descriptive areas and expressions that can be shared by the audience. The Slapbet Countdown, for example, engages the audience in a real-time countdown towards one of the many major events that will occur in the story. The Twitter account of Barney Stinson, is another prominent element that contributes to the narrative, and also acts as a link between the media involved in the project:
If you have extra money, you should donate it to charity. If you have EXTRA extra money, buy this Robin Sparkles track! http://t.co/rUFc8y4U
According to Christy Dena, the Australian pioneer of cross-media studies, said that a project with many different media platforms, also offers many entry points for the audience. Jenkins argues that each franchise entry needs to be self-contained and the viewer does not have to have knowledge of the film or story to understand them. I, however, coincide with Giovagnoli, where he says that an audience should not reach a story’s primary point of entry in an unsuspecting way, but rather by consciously moving towards it.
HIMYM, in my opinion, has perfectly executed its narrative in terms of slowly expanding different elements, all without affecting the story’s fundamental moments of navigation.
Giovagnoli, Max. (2011). ‘Chapter 2: Plan Transmedia.’ In Transmedia Storytelling: Imagery, shapes and techniques, pp. 34-54. Halifax, Canada: ETC Press.
The app will have a few elements to it. It will be quite a simple set-up like maybe birds eye view. Pretty much exercises your stalker skills. You will play Leo the stalker, who’s goal in the game is to win Steve’s heart. There will be a bar in the game representing steve’s heart and there are a few ways to fill up the bar. The best way to do this is by learning as much as you can about steve so you can impress him. On of the missions is breaking into steve’s house and maybe read his diary. Easier ways is to serf the wb, enroll into his classes so you can watch his mannerisms in person. When you’ve gotten past the half way mar of the game a notification will appear on your facebook and you see rose and steve are talking. Your progress shown on the Steve’s heart bar dramatically decreases and to prevent losing anymore your final goal is to prevent the agent ding this and hence kill rose. Do this successfully without getting caught and the game will end with you swooping in and impressing steve in his vulnerable state.
“The purpose being to not only reach a wider audience by expanding the target market pool, but to expand the narrative itself.” – Andrea Phillips, 2012
The Internet has provided platforms like Facebook, Youtube, or Instagram for modern individuals to engage, communicate, and interact with a pool of shared intelligence and potentially propagate information into different mediums. A good example here would be the viral marketing campaign that was launched by 42 Entertainment to promote Nolan’s 2008 film ‘The Dark Knight’.
“Who is Harvey Dent?” was the question that instilled a deep sense of fascination and curiosity in the public. By transcending the boundaries of multi platform interactivity, the viral marketing campaign not only intensified the interest of existing fans, it also introduced the movie to a demographic that would have otherwise not had an interest. Fake newspapers, scavenger hunts, and even a campaign for Harvey Dent for District Attorney, were all put into motion that further promotes the story of the movie instead of the otherwise unpopular preconceived notion of ‘official release date of an upcoming movie’. The campaign ironically provided fans an immersive sense of “reality”, basically by providing them with an “alternate reality”.
