Saturday, 22 June 2013

Cataclyst is now closed.

I'm shutting down the ol' rudimentary google blog and shifting to my very own, shiny website! I may transpose a few of the posts here to a new home, give them a facelift, see how they like their new digs.

If you're looking for me now, you can find me over at www.mitchsullivan.com

Come on over! There's pictures and stories and all sorts of interesting stuff.

Wednesday, 8 May 2013

Why I'm Worried About Zach Braff's Kickstarter



I want to start by saying that I’m not a Zach Braff fan. I didn’t like Garden State, and I liked scrubs insofar as it was a funny ensemble piece that he wasn’t necessarily the funniest member of. This disclaimer comes at the risk of derailing what I’m about to say, but I have to say it in the interests of disclosure.

With that in mind, understand this: I do not think Zach Braff is a bad person for trying to use Kickstarter to fund his new movie. I think he is well within his rights to do so, and a lot of people were happy to contribute. Adults can use their money however they like, it’s true, and they clearly have voted with their wallets here. Sure, he could have funded it some other way, but he chose Kickstarter and nobody was killed as a result.

All fine. Dandy.

None of these things are reasons why we should be worried about the Garden State Kickstarter.
The real reason is to do with exploitation, and greed, the inevitable corporatisation of a process that is supposed to be for unknowns and passionate creation engines to get their otherwise impossible ideas off the ground.


Point One – Barriers to Access Ensure Quality

There’s a reason why it’s hard to get a film made and distributed. It’s the same reason that it’s hard to get a book published, or that it’s hard to get your band noticed, or it’s hard to get a gallery showing of your art. That is; cinemas and publishing houses and record labels and galleries have a reputation for producing and distributing a quality product, and throwing open the gates is no way to ensure the audience gets that.

Take a look at YouTube as a fine example. It’s a prime exemplar of what happens when the barriers to entry are lowered to nil. You can find some absolute gems in amongst the sea of total crap, but it is a swamp through which we must wade. It’s like trying to find your soul mate on chatroulette, but having to power through millions of fat, hairy, naked men first. You could do it, if you were persistent and lucky, but most people won’t. And so, YouTube is a fine enough platform for its purpose: allowing people to upload whatever they like, occasionally make something thought-provoking, and generally exist as its own entity

Kickstarter is worrisome for the film industry because it lowers the barriers to entry a whole lot. Great filmmakers are forged in a gauntlet of red tape, studio interference, the constant threat of cancellation and contract binning...it’s a crucible. It’s the kind of thing that only a very passionate and very talented type of person could survive through and still produce a quality product. Those that really don’t have the drive or energy to tough it out are weeded out in the process. What you end up with is someone who knows how to tackle adversity and still get things done. You get a filmmaker, is what I mean.

Kickstarter is a means for people who otherwise wouldn’t have dealt with that kind of pressure to circumvent it and produce whatever film they want. They are not answerable to anyone for the end result. There is absolutely nothing to stop them knocking off a shit pile and calling it a day. They’re not required to test themselves, to make cuts and sacrifices. They just do it, without bumping into any strong opposition. It’s a lot like circumventing the editor to put out your own e-book because that mean old lady with a red pen kept criticising your passive voice

Kickstarter was  meant to be used by those for whom the process of raising money is the gauntlet, not the way to avoid it. Kickstarter’s own test of a filmmakers mettle is in their persistence in trying to raise the money from scratch, not by default receive more money than they could possibly know what to do with. It will not result in better films. It will result in something similar to amazon’s .99c e-book store, but with movies. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it’s not that great, either. It will mean an influx in film quantity at the expense of quality. 

I think that’s the opposite effect that Kickstarter wants to have on the world.


Point Two – Exploitation of Crowdfunding

People get extremely excited about the possibilities of Kickstarter. I don’t blame them. It has the potential to bring a lot of projects to life that otherwise would never exist. But if it’s used in this manner—to raise enough money to rival large film projects on sheer force of celebrity charisma—then I think we need to be prepared for the inevitable integration of Kickstarter into the film funding model.

Hollywood will not be the least interested party in what goes on with this Garden State Kickstart. If it’s successful, and yet more celebrities come along and generate enough cash to make their own projects, the studios will catch on.

I foresee a future whereby any film project (perhaps other than the AAA summer blockbusters) that is presented before a studio is subject to a quota of crowfunding cash that has to be presented up front. Kind of a means test to see if the film will be popular enough before it’s made. A way for Hollywood to mitigate its costs and get people to pay for the films they see twice. It is a super, super sweet deal for the studios, and I can’t see a way around it.

It’s been pointed out to me that Kickstarter would never allow their platform to be used in such a way, to which I respond: who says it has to be Kickstarter? Hollywood is perfectly able to create its own crowdfunding model that it can direct its potential filmmakers to use. A crowdfunding platform that would go directly to the coffers of the studios, no less. 

Imagine it. Anyone with a twitter account and a desire to make a film becomes a begger. People will be beset by an endless tsunami of Kickstarter requests. Remember the online petition fad that still hasn’t completely died? Remember how annoying it was that you signed one petition and were then inundated by scores of emails asking you to sign different petitions? Remember how annoying that was? Now imagine it with Kickstarter. Your favourite celebrities asking you for money every other day to get their projects off the ground, because that’s the only way to get a movie made anymore.
It’s not a good thought. And if you can’t imagine it happening, you need to look beyond the end of your nose. If someone in each major studio hasn’t already thought of this, they will very soon.


Point Three – Populist Saturation

Finally, here’s the worst problem.

Open up film making to Kickstarter and the cult of celebrity will dictate which films get made and which ones don’t. Thoughtful independent projects that make poignant and valuable contributions to the world will be skipped over in favour of Kim Kardashian’s next big high-heels-and-makeup romp. Dane Cook will become an auteur of comedy by virtue of his massive following. One Direction and Justin Bieber will dominate the entire record industry by virtue of the Kickstarters they decide to endorse.

Twitter is a good proxy. Take a look at all the thousands of truly thoughtful, smart, independent and self-made contributors to the Twittersphere exist. There are a lot of them, and they each of them possess the potential to change the world with their ideas, wit and communication. All of that gives way, however, in proportion to how much of a celebrity the twitterer is in real life. Imagine that! Turns out that online or off, your popularity is largely determined by the amount of people who think you’re pretty, hot, fuckable, or sometimes, in the minority, funny. It’s not merit-based at all. It’s facile. Shallow. 

There will be no room for the initial intention of Kickstarter – to bring the talented but needy into play. To create an environment in which niche and independent productions are celebrated and rewarded.

We’ll be living in a world where the popular become more popular while quality of independent production slips further and further away. The irony being that, as in real life, the word ‘democracy’ is used to describe this process of a widening gap between the ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’.


Back to Zach...

I don’t think Zach Braff is a bad person. I don’t think that he is looking to gouge people. I don’t think he has any malicious intentions or is trying to exploit Kickstarter. But I do think he is showing people how to exploit it. And I do think it will lead to a general lessening of filmmaking quality in the years to come.

It’s a shame, in a way, that this whole argument has gotten swept up in a war over whether or not Zach Braff is a nice guy. All of the commentary I’ve heard about it has either been to personally attack Braff or to viciously defend him. As I said, I’m not his biggest fan, but I don’t for a moment imagine that this is all about him. His Kickstarter is done. He has his money. He’ll make his film.
This is about something bigger, though. And I’m not quite sure how we’re going to put the brakes onto the process that these Kickstarters have...kickstarted. 

Mark this blog post in your memory, though. When the first reports of requisite crowdfunding quotas come out of hollywood, and internet forums the world over go up in arms? Link them here. Called it.


An Obligatory ‘I Could Be Wrong’...

By the way, I’m no insider. I’m no economist. I don’t have any qualification or basis for this other than what I’ve seen and what I’ve extrapolated in my head. If I’m wrong, so be it. Be sure to tell me so in the comments. Link a bunch of other people here to tell me I’m wrong. If we’re going to have the conversation, let’s do it right, and let’s focus it on something other than Zach Braff.

Tuesday, 7 May 2013

What Should NOT be in Star Wars VII

Forgive me a little diversion to pure nerdistry while I compile a little list.

There will, for better or worse (I think better), soon be new installments in the Star Wars franchise. This is a big deal for someone like me. I don't care who sees me in my thick-rimmed glasses and ironic bow-tie when I say I have been a fan since well before the 'Special Editions' of the original trilogy were released.

I've written in the past about how Star Wars taught me how to read and write. It inspired me to want to be a writer myself. There are few people who hold that old set of three films closer to their heart than I do. Now, with a new set of films looming, it occurs to me that this could be the latest in a very long line of disappointing additions to a great space opera.

That in mind, I've compiled a helpful list of things that can help mitigate the chances of the next movie being an absolute balls-up. You may roll your eyes, dear reader, and wonder at what the point of this is. But let me assure you, there are people out there much less sensible than I am. They are constructing effigies of JJ Abrams as we speak, and their match-strikin' fingers are already itchy.


1 - Please, no more 'new' species or locations!

The Galaxy Far, Far Away is enormous. Like, I'm not even joking - it has been built on and added to and mutated and evolved in more ways than a supercomputer could chart. You should absolutely not take my word for this, either. Just take a look.

The story so far...
Holy balls! That's a lot of places, right? Well, here is the list of species that live on them. There are over two hundred.

There is absolutely no need to go crowding up that image with yet more fake-sounding place and race names. With all that wealth of location and Species data available to him, George Lucas had to go ahead and come up with Naboo, Gungans, Mustafar and Count Dooku. I am going to intentionally avoid saying 'Kit Fisto', 'Plo Koon' and Jar Jar Binks (whoops).

You get my point, right? There are plenty of pre-existing, non-terrible places and beings in the galaxy. Let's go and visit them!

... before we have to suffer going to planet Bogalogalog to meet Jimbaroonalon deDarkDarkness.


2 - We're done with Superweapons

Okay?

Hear that, JJ? Superweapons have had their day. They are over-used even in some of the excellent Extended Universe books. The bad guys, this time around, don't have to be quite so hilariously comic-book evil in their approach to things.

This is the list of Superweapons we've had so far. It might only be twelve, but that is like...eleven more than Star Wars really needed in the first place. I guess that, when you're talking about a place as big as an entire galaxy, the temptation to raise the stakes by being able to annihilate large portions of it in one go must be huge.

But to lose one Death Star is tragic, to lose two seems like carelessness. Losing three makes me think the Empire just really needs the insurance money.


3 - Ease up on the Jedi

The prequels proved that doing stories about Jedi Knights is absolutely, 100% boring.

They can't love. They can't get mad. If they do either, they flip the Dark Side switch and became dastardly cads in a matter of screen seconds. They are omnisciently powerful god creatures who are never really in any danger, besides that of their own existential making. 

They're whingers, in other words. Their problems are like first world problems, only way more annoying. "Oh, my super powers weren't good enough to save my mother and now I'm evil. Why can't I have better super powers??"

BOO HOO >:-/

Either give us a complex, singular Jedi who has to learn things and overcome stuff and grow as a person, or push them to the background altogether.


4 - Less Slapstick, More Wit

I'm talking less Benny Hill, more The Avengers.

Less Steve Martin, more Joss Whedon.

Make it funny, by all means. But make it funny for both kids and adults.



5 - Fresh is Best


You see these three floppy-haired muppets?

They don't run the galaxy.

The entirety of that big map up there isn't all managed by a cabal of the same 12 characters over a period of several decades. Nor will it be managed by their direct descendants in the future. We do not need to see another Skywalker, or Solo. We don't need to check in with everyone we've met in the previous films, either.

The smuggler doesn't have to be Han and Leia's daughter. The Jedi doesn't have to be Luke's kid. The Alliance fleet doesn't have to be steered by John Ackbar, the Admiral's more optimistic nephew.


'No way is this a trap.'
Keep it fresh, if you ask me. Part of maturing the franchise ought to be having the guts to break  away from the stale stuff and try something new. Or someone new, in this case. Which brings me to the last point...


6 - Narrow the Focus

Narrow the bejesus out of it. Star Wars' original trilogy held as its stakes the destruction of all freedom and the enslavement of all non-human life in the galaxy. You can't really go bigger than that. You can't one-up the guy who built two (TWO!!!) planet-sized death machines.

'Fire at puppies, Commander.'
We need to focus for a while. What Star Wars is crying out for is a personal story. There have to be stakes that are significant for the players involved but don't necessarily end in galactic decimation and puppycide. The galaxy had it's saviour. Luke Skywalker did all the work there. To have another one in the same story space would be like JK Rowling writing eight more Harry Potter books with a new main character tasked with defeating Voldemort once and for all. It's been done! No more.

Zoom in for a minute. Tell me a heartwrenching story of triumph and heroism.



So there you have it. A geek's list of ways to help guard against the worst of what a new Star Wars film could be. I'll have you know that my qualifications were hard earned on many viewings, readings and playthroughs of the Star Wars canon.

I love the old girl. I think she's still got some surprises left in her, sweetheart.

I hope I'm right.

Thursday, 2 May 2013

More Crisis Generation Art

I'm beginning to develop a new website! Soon this blog will be a thing of the past in favour of something a little more polished.

Anyway, I'm making some art assets for the new page, including some tidier character art. Here's the latest.


Dominick Costigan

Geoffrey Saturevic




Genevieve Wrens


Zeke Hatzilakos

Lacey & Wanda Gabel

Laura Mereton

Wednesday, 10 April 2013

Inspiration will kill your book

Or,

'Why you should never listen to writing advice, including this - part 1.'

The title is wordy enough, so I didn't have time to be as specific as I wanted to be. If I were to properly title this series it would probably be something like this:

'A look at the kinds of writing advice that you may commonly receive but can safely ignore if you aren't a bit stupid.'

So if you aren't a bit stupid and you've ever been given sage advice about writing -- even from extremely successful writers --, read on. If you do consider yourself a bit stupid, well...geez. Buck up, pal. I don't think you're stupid! :-)


The 140 Characters Rule

Before I go on, you'll notice that a lot of this advice comes in a very specific form. It's catch phrase advice. Sound byte advice. You can fit it neatly into a tweet. Think of it as a 140 characters rule. If you can tweet it, be sceptical of it.

You'll come across writing advice that is much longer than this, of course. Stephen King wrote an entire book about writing, because he's meta like that, and extensive author interviews will often delve a little deeper than a pithy one-liner. When it comes to this kind of advice, always read it if you have the time and interest. Comprehensive advice is good. Lap that stuff up.

As for the other stuff, well. Let's have a look.



On Inspiration


I don't think it's a coincidence that advice about finding inspiration usually turns out to be full of the most uninspiring bullshit known to man. It's a thing that interviewers ask about a lot, and hence a thing that children and aspiring authors want to know a lot about. They don't want to be ogres when they answer these questions, and so they do what any rational adult does when backed into a corner by earnest, naive belief:

They make stuff up.

They're writers, they're good at it. This is when you start hearing a bunch of nonsense about walks in the woods, sunsets over oceans and -- WORST of all -- the dreaded 'muse'.

It's all waffle. It doesn't mean anything.

Here's a typical kind of quote you might see:

I sit in the dark and wait for a little flame to appear at the end of my pencil.
                                                       - Billy Collins

Oh, cool. That's nice, I suppose. Let's see what else there is.

You never have to change anything you got up in the middle of the night to write.
                                                     ― Saul Bellow

Hmm. I don't know that that's true. Well, how about this! It's a 20 minute TED talk by Elizabeth Gilbert, the writer of 'Eat, Pray, Love', and it's a kind of rambling speech about how creativity shouldn't be in the hands of creative people, but rather some undefined, vaguely extra-bodily thing called a Genius. If you have time, give it a listen. It's nice enough.



...Oh.

Well...uh, I suppose there's a lot to take away from this sort of thing. Like the...um. Huh. Well, maybe that...there...is...hm. Actually, you know what? There's nothing to take away. It's literally useless advice, packaged in such a way so that a non-discerning listener can nod and smile and think they've heard something profound.

There might be an existential level on which this vaguely makes sense, but that is not a plane on which an author can conduct the business of actually writing a novel. See? It's the perfect storm of uselessness. To make head or tail out of the topic of inspiration, you have to take yourself to a headspace that is completely non-conducive to being able to write.

The Unintended Consequences of Bad Advice

The net result of all of this is that new and aspiring writers will get off to a false start. They'll sit down and begin to write. They might last fifteen minutes or so, and then discover something odd. They aren't being struck by the inspiration that everyone was talking about. There's no fire at the end of their pencil. They haven't woken up in the middle of the night once to write anything. And though they have spent thousands of dollars demolishing their walls, they didn't find a thing that could be called a 'Genius' in there.

They will wonder what is wrong with them. They will assume that maybe this whole writing game isn't for them. If they were any good, after all, they'd have written a perfect first draft by now in the middle of the night with a fire pencil and gone out for shots with their Genius.

If this is you, reader, then please...don't listen to these inspiration addicts. I promise you, they are making it all up as they go along.

Who should I listen to about inspiration, then? 

Listen to the people who seem to have their head screwed on right. Thankfully, on this particular topic, it many of the most successful and admired writers tend to agree that hard work is the key. If you are lucky enough to be, or become, a successful author, don't do others the disservice of perpetuating the myth of inspiration. It's unhelpful. It will put newcomers off. There is just no good outcome. It's all lies.

Don't lie to children. Don't lie to people who look up to you. Be one of the good guys. Be Picasso. Yes, that's right. We've entered a parallel dimension in which Pablo Picasso, world famous painter of things that are on the extremity of nonsensical, is offering the most salient of advice on the topic.

'Inspiration exists,' he said, 'but it must find you working.'

Not on a bolt from the blue. Not injected into your veins by a sallow-faced, drug pushing muse. Not at the bottom of a basket of kittens and rainbows and sunshine.

Working. Turning an empty page into a full one. If there's inspiration to be found, it is there.

And once we admit that, well. Isn't it time we just gave the idea away entirely? It saves a step.

Friday, 5 April 2013

Stephen King and the Wadsworth Constant

In the spring of my senior year at Lisbon High—1966, this would have been—I got a scribbled comment that changed the way I rewrote my fiction once and forever. Jotted below the machine-generated signature of the editor was this mot: "Not bad, but PUFFY. You need to revise for length. Formula: 2nd Draft = 1st Draft – 10%. Good luck."
               - Stephen King, On Writing

For EVERY youtube video, I always open the video and then immediately punch the slider bar to about 30 percent. For example, in this video, it should have just started at :40. Everything before :40 was a waste. This holds true for nearly every video in the universe.
                                                 - Reddit user Wadsworth



The expression goes 'less is more'. It's a cliche, and it's as often applied to cooking as it is to interior decorating as it is to drawing as it is to writing. But I think this might just be one of those good cliches, you know? One of those ones that became a cliche because it was so relentlessly true and applicable. Kind of like 'always let the Wookie win'.

Winner! ... again.



I was very intrigued a while ago when I was on the huge internet-dredging, high-tech collating service known as reddit and stumbled across reference to a thing called the Wadsworth Constant. You can find out all about it at that link, but it is basically the principle that any YouTube video can be skipped by about 30% and lose none of its intended purpose. And not just because everyone insists on shoving boring, loud and annoying intro graphics at the beginning of their videos.

Fascinating, isn't it, that it coincides so closely to all the advice about skipping the early parts of your novel? Stephen King advocates 10%, Ernest Hemingway said something along the lines of turning your first fifty pages into five. 'In late, out early' is another way I've heard it put.

I read a little while ago that it's more common than not for a first-time author to have their first chapter cut entirely from their manuscript. That's what made the Wadsworth Constant seem so universal to me. YouTubers are generally not professionals. They've found success in an amatuer medium, where nobody was around to tell them that they must cut the first thirty percent of their video because oh my gosh it is just SO BORING.

I've yet to be told by any industry professionals that I need to lose my first chapter, but if that day comes I will listen without question. I know the rule is true. I know it makes sense. It must, because it has sprung into existence in two entirely different realms, utterly independent of each other. That's called universality, and it applies in force to beginnings.

This whole movie should have been cut from the trilogy!
So, my advice for the day is this: if you're struggling with pace, or aren't getting any traction with your MS as it stands, snip the first chapter. Or two. Pepper the important stuff through the later ones, and see what happens.

And if it doesn't work out, blame Stephen King and Wadsworth. They're the ones you want, not me.

The Vogel Award

It's the time of year that publisher Allen & Unwin run the The Australian/Vogel's Literary Award, which is an exciting time of the year if you happen to be an unpublished author living in Australia under the age of thirty-five. As I happen to fit into that narrow corridor of eligibility, colour me excited!

Honestly, it's a good award run as a joint venture between two publishing giants, has a minimal entry fee, and results in a prize payout of $20,000 and a publishing contract with Allen and Unwin. I'll post the submission guidelines below.

The deadline is the 31st of May this year, so if you've got a manuscript you're ready to submit you might want to consider entering. This has been a public service announcement by me.


Submission Guidelines


•    Entrants must be aged under 35 years of age on 31 May 2013 (that is born after 31 May 1978).
•    Entries must be lodged by 31 May 2013.
•    Entrants must normally be residents of Australia.
•    The manuscript submitted with the entry form should be a work of fiction, Australian history or biography.
•    It must be a minimum length of 30,000 words and a maximum of 100,000 words.
•    The manuscript must be an original work, entirely by the entrant and it must be written in English.
•    It cannot be under consideration to any other publisher or entered into any other award.
•    No more than 10% of the manuscript can have been previously published in print form, or in electronic form, on a commercial basis.
•    Allen & Unwin will publish the winning entry, and will have exclusive worldwide publishing rights to it, and to any other entry they feel is of sufficient merit.
•    Entry fee of $25 is applicable to each manuscript entered.
•    The judges’ decision is final and no correspondence will be entered into.
•    The judges shall have the discretion to divide the prize equally between authors of entries they consider to be of equal merit. If, in their opinion, no entry is worthy of the prize, no winner shall be chosen. No entrant may win the prize in successive years.
•    The winner will be told in strict confidence during September 2013, at which time the winner must agree to keep this news absolutely confidential until the simultaneous announcement and publication of the winning entry in 2014.
•    Each entrant is required to agree to the above conditions of entry.
•    Breach of any conditions of entry will render an entry invalid.