We're making a comedy movie
We've been working on a movie script for the last couple of years. Now it's time for us to make it!
Our plan is to make a feature length 90-minute comedy movie. We have a script that has been edited and refined over the last year, we're now ready to start production. We already have plans to add additional movies to the series if we're able to make this one.
We're releasing our movie, along with unedited footage and audio under a Creative Commons license (Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0) too, allowing for remixes and fan-dubbed translations, and more.
- We've already raised a few thousand dollars in private donations, we've also been spending our own money on buying some equipment.
- We have extensive experience working on open/freely licensed projects.
- Help us make this movie into a reality.
What we already have
- We have a script, it has been edited and reviewed by a dozen or so of our friends, as well as the movie team.
- We have some equipment: GoPro camera, a couple HD cameras and some microphones.
- We already have the experience needed to produce the movie, keeping it DRM-free and 100% Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike licensed (compatible with Wikipedia!)
- Most importantly: we have an orangutan costume. Here's a GIF of Ryan wearing it and scaring some passers-by:
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About us
We're a bunch of friends who've been working on this movie for a while now. In 2011, we made a chat show pilot with our friend, Bob. Bob will play James the Orangutan in Orang-U.
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Matt and Ryan have written the movie and will be working on the majority of the production, while Rob, Steven and Donald work to help us raise money for the movie and other behind the scenes affairs. Our friend Justin has already kindly donated some money to help us buy initial equipment for the movie, and our UK-based friends Mark C and Mark S worked on the script, and have previously worked with Matt on other projects which were used to make Orang-U a reality.
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Matt Lee previously wrote and produced the short movie "Happy Birthday to GNU" for the Free Software Foundation in 2008. He previously wrote and directed the pilot episode of "Good Call, Bad Call (with Bob Call)" -- he wrote the movie with Ryan Dougherty and will direct Orang-U. Matt works at Creative Commons as the technical lead, with Rob Myers co-founded the music platform, Libre.fm.
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Ryan Dougherty wrote Orang-U with Matt Lee, edited "Good Call, Bad Call (with Bob Call)" and is a talented illustrator and musician. Ryan will be the principal producer of Orang-U.
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Donald Robertson is a lawyer and works for the Free Software Foundation on the licensing team. He previously co-wrote and produced "Good Call, Bad Call (with Bob Call)" as well as providing additional material for Orang-U.
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Rob Myers is a free culture expert, who previously worked on a Creative Commons licensed web-series and had the first exhibition of Creative Commons licensed artwork in the world. He works as a software developer, and is the co-founder of Libre.fm.
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Steven DuBois is a software developer and recent graduate of Rochester Institute of Technology. He previously worked at the Free Software Foundation in the summer of 2010 and helped start the distributed social network, GNU social.
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Mark Cousens is a musician and writer from the UK. He has worked with the team on a number of projects in the last fifteen years and plays all the real instruments in the internet sensation, Furny. He script-edited the movie, as well as providing additional material.
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Mark Stephenson is a comedy writer and voice over artist in the UK. He collaborated on the script with the group and will assist with the final editing and production of the movie.
We need about $6000 to complete this movie project.
- Most of our budget is on extra equipment and paying our actors.
- We'd like to include you in our project -- join us at the higher levels and get a sneak peak of footage as we shoot.
- Our final movie will be freely available on sites like YouTube, Wikimedia Commons and the Internet Archive, but backers will get early access to the movie, extensive notes on the filming and unique access to the film makers.
- We're also releasing the raw footage and the Blender project files to enable future reuse of the movie. All under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike.
Risks & Challenges
We've budgeted fairly conservatively for the movie, so we don't expect any major hurdles in this area.
- Editing the movie will take some time, we don't expect to have the movie ready for several months after the filming ends. However, we will communicate regularly with our backers.
- We are already talking to people experienced using Blender for movie production.
Other Ways You Can Help
Follow us on social media and help spread the word:
- We're on Twitter and Facebook, and we'll be building a website for the company that features in the movie, adding our executive producers and talking about the movie.
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Use the Indiegogo share tools to help spread awareness of the movie.
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