Major update!
Geek Field Guide is going to Europe!
We have received enough funding via this Indiegogo campaign and outside sources that we will be proceeding on the project.
Now any additional funding we get lengthens the duration of the trip, and improves our ability to provide more photos and reference material for you.
If you haven't seen already, we added two perk tiers for those who wanted a photo book.
Back us now to help select where we go!
What is Geek Field Guide?
We want to create a comprehensive texture, reference photo, video, audio, and photogrammetry library of locations throughout Europe.
We will be working with Indiegogo individual backers, game studios and outsource shops, writers, artists, and more to create a massive media library of Europe.
As an example of what we will create for you, we made a two-hour trip to Duke Chapel, in Durham, NC.
View the gallery here, or download the entire photo set: (Password: geekfieldguide)
http://gallery.geekfieldguide.com/gallery-collection/Duke-Chapel/C0000HraT9OKhK44
To further help you immerse yourself in the environment, we will release 3D models or Synths on Photosynth:
Photogrammetry-based sample models:
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/y8zswr0bsn2aptx/l4W3T_hjEh
Photosynth:
Duke Chapel Interior:
http://photosynth.net/view.aspx?cid=9652bade-784c-48a1-b1b9-b7cd5c652b97
Duke Chapel Exterior:
http://photosynth.net/view.aspx?cid=69b18ebb-5fa1-41f7-b202-1a960b228648
In March, we traveled to Bryce Canyon National Park, in Utah, as the first ‘proof of concept’ for this project.
View the Gallery here:
http://geekfieldguide.photoshelter.com/gallery/2013-Bryce-Canyon-in-Winter/G0000EGoNfvUYkXE/C0000Xzww6x0LeJk
View the blogs here:
http://geekfieldguide.com/
We also plan to blog, video blog, provide audio commentaries, and otherwise document the journey from a narrative standpoint for writers and designers. As you can see in the pitch video, we aren’t limiting this project to environments. If you need us to go and experience something, while documenting it via head-mounted camera, we can make it happen.
For more updates and materials, see our Facebook page here:
https://www.facebook.com/GeekFieldGuide
How will backers be involved?
All backers at the $10 or higher level will get access to private forums where we will discuss our itinerary.
We do not know which locations we are going to yet. That is up to our backers. (You!)
Lower-level backers get to provide requests for where we go. We’ll run polls to see the most popular suggestions and help us decide our route.
Backers at the director or studio levels get a full day of our time (subject to legal, political, safety, and other restrictions. See the FAQ for further details).
What does Geek Field Guide offer that isn’t attainable through a photo texture site?
There are a number of really high-quality texture sites out there. We do not feel that we compete with them, but actually complement their offerings.
They offer a wide variety of art for an equally-diverse number of settings.
We offer focused packages of a region that is documented so that you can know that you are accurately replicating the environment you create (whether for games, writing, art, or any other creative project you work on) with certainty.
Europe is our first destination. We plan to provide our services on-demand in the future.
Why are you doing this?
We looked at the current offerings for content creators, and found that while there are many offerings of high quality texture photos available, we found no evidence of providing a full set of reference materials on demand for specific locations.
We both have a passion for learning and sharing that knowledge with others, whether it is via photography, storytelling, or writing. For a number of years, I have considered a project like this, but the costs to run it properly were prohibitive for a small company. Modern technology allows a team of two to travel across the globe and provide customized information to supporters with rapid iteration and feedback with high fidelity.
Why video blogs and focus on Adventure in the promotional video?
There are a lot of things that you miss about an environment by simply taking photos of it.
We could simply write terse, analytical notes about the location, or we could show you and tell you. We decided on a travel documentary format, in the vein of Michael West, would be far more useful to our supporters. By mixing written, video, and audio commentary, we are able to show you what it means to walk down the streets of some ancient place, or engage in a martial art from a first-person perspective. (See the video for a demonstration.)
If a picture is worth a thousand words, at 30 frames per second, that’s a lot of words.
Who is Geek Field Guide:
Warren Schultz: Photographer, Game Developer, Writer, Artist, Tinkerer. Game Industry veteran since 1999, who has worked for some of the best-known studios in the industry. Currently lives in North Carolina.
Cynthia Kazanis: Anthropologist, Archaeologist, Martial Artist, Researcher, Photographer. Currently assistant instructor at a martial arts school in Michigan.
Special Thanks:
Brian Lee and Micah Moore of Beat Down Boogie for their martial arts work, check out their films here: http://beatdownboogie.com/
Stretch goals!
Stretch goal #1: $60,000. Creative Commons Astronomy Unlock!
In collaboration with Dr. Pamela L. Gay, we will take 185-degree panorama photos of the night sky. These photos are ideal for use in planetarium shows, and will be donated to the Science on the Half-Sphere project at Cosmoquest (http://cosmoquest.org) for education use by all under the Creative Commons (Attribution-NonCommercial) license.
What is Cosmoquest? From their site:
“Our goal is to create a community of people bent on together advancing our understanding of the universe; a community of people who are participating in doing science, who can explain why what they do matters, and what questions they are helping to answer. We want to create a community, and here is where we invite all of you to be a part of what we’re doing.”
Stretch goal #2: ???? Unlock stretch goal #1 to find out!
See the Updates page for the answers to your Frequently Asked Questions!