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Quick Overview
Sojourners’ Trails is a queer horror/fantasy pirate audio drama written by Tim Faulkner. The first season, Suit of Wands, is 22 episodes long, with each episode being dedicated to one of the Major Arcana. The story explores themes of family, faith, the supernatural, and the trust we place in one another.
The Story
The story follows the crew of the Sojourner: Captain James-Elizabeth, on the run from her past Unaj, the First Mate, searching for their father lost at sea, the Stowaway, a self-proclaimed prophet trying to understand his god’s cryptic messages in order to guide the Sojourner and her crew, and Kion, a young sailor down on his luck, who has just recently turned to piracy.
As they journey on, the crew discovers that their independent goals are more interrelated than they first appeared. Between questionable reliability of the prophecies distributed over the radio, trouble brought aboard from haunted islands they visit, and the conspiracies and schemes that envelope them along the way, tensions mount between the members of the Sojourner’s crew as they realize they can’t trust anything but the cards they have to play.
What to Expect?
There are a lot of amazing full-cast, high-production audio dramas out there - here are a few of our favorite things about Sojourner’s Trails!
- Tarot!
- Queer pirates played by queer actors!!
- An absolute disaster of a found family (in a good way)
- Lots of waxing poetics about the sea.
- Haunted islands!
- Haunted radio!
- Blackout poetry in audio format
- Spooky gods!
- Ghosts!
- Crabfolk!
- And so much more...
Perks and Rewards
Here's the list of our perks! Each includes all previous rewards in addition to what's listed here.
$5 - Watch the Sojourner set sail!
Credit on Website: you will be permanently credited on our website sojournerstrails.carrd.co in the Hall of Fame section.
Shoutout on Social Media: We will make a tweet thanking you specifically for helping us.
$12 - Stow Away In The Hold
Discord Role with 24 hour early access: upon joining the official discord server you’ll be granted a role with access to episodes 24 hours prior to their official release.
Access to annotated Season 1 Script: You will receive a digital copy of annotated Season 1 Script.
$20 - Join the Sojourner's Crew
A Thank You Message recorded by the VA of your choice: A short thank you message personalized and recorded just for you.
$30 - Hoist the Colors!
Stickers! (1 BallaDeer Logo, 1 Concept Sojourner Sticker, 1 mystery sticker) + a handwritten note from the writer (Tim): Physical Reward. Stickers and a handwritten thank you note will be sent to you.
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The Sojourner – sticker design by Jasper Locke (@horrorlocke on Twitter)
$45 - A Wind Our Sails
Credit in notes and audio: for all Season 1 episodes you will be credited in the show's notes and your name will be read out at the end of one episode.
$60 - Explore the Outer Waters
Name a character or a place (island or city-state) in the Archipelago! The name will be said in the show at least once.(Terms apply. We will contact you and work with you to ensure the name fits within the world. Absolutely no offensive names / real life slurs etc. We may also refuse a name for other reasons but generally most names should be fine!)
$75 - A Pirate's Life For Me
Print signed by the writer (Tim): Physical Reward. If you want to, Tim can also include a short message for you!
[print design to be revealed soon]
$150 - The Hero From the Shanties!
Tim will write a Sea Shanty for you (3 verses + chorus): You will be able to choose a general theme of the shanty (the artist reserves the right to refuse to write / sing about certain topics.). Just like in the case of naming a character or island, Tim will work with you to ensure both parties are comfortable and satisfied with the end product.
$250 - A Guest in Captain's Quarters
(limited to 5 slots)
Play a TTRPG one-shot with some of the Cast & Crew: Limited to 5 slots. Some of our cast and crew are TTRPG players and are willing to play a one-shot. The TTRPG system and schedules will be discussed privately.
$500 - Chart the Course!
Executive Producer Credit: Limited to 3 slots. You will be credited as Executive Producer in show notes and in audio of every episode. You will be able to choose a theme / adventure and we will produce a mini-episode about it (15-20 mins) (Once again, terms apply. We will contact you and work with you to make sure everything is up to our standards and your satisfaction.)
Why are we asking for so much?
Creating an audio drama is expensive! Let’s take a look at the numbers. With our Pilot being out, we have 21 episodes left in the season. While episode costs vary from episode to episode, we prepared some rough estimates of what it may cost to produce this audio drama.
Taking what we pay the actors based on what we put in the casting call, take a look at how the costs add up:
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$50 x 4 – Main 4, appears in most episodes.
$30 x 2-3 – Usually 2, sometimes 3 Secondary characters will also make an appearance.
$20-40 – compensation for the guest roles.
$15-20 x1-2 – In some episodes, 1 or 2 Minor Characters also appear.
Taking an example of 4 main characters + 3 Secondary Characters we get $290 for actors in an episode.
Or we could go for Main 4 + 2 Secondary characters + 1 guest character for a full $300 in VA compensation for one episode.
Or 3 of the Main 4 + 3 secondary characters + 1 Minor Character for $255 in an episode. We rounded it up to $300 per episode as there sometimes are additional costs to each of the episodes (needing to purchase very specific sounds, for example).
We have a team of 3 sound designers, usually 2 out of the 3 work on any given episode. Depending on factors like soundscape complexity and episode length, sound design costs vary, but on average sound design of an episode costs $125.
Now, there are additional costs aside from general production, so let’s look at the data.
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The entirety of this season’s production is estimated to cost us $10,150. We are only asking for $7000 to help us offset a portion of the costs.
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If we manage to reach our main goal (with no stretch goals), that will mean only $3,150 will go on this podcast out of our pockets.
Risks & Challenges
This is a Flexible Goal campaign, so that means we keep all the money we raise, whether we reach our goal or not, as this audio drama is getting produced no matter what. But if we manage to reach our goal that would help us produce the episodes of better quality and make sure everyone involved in working on this audio drama is compensated fairly.
If we reach our goal, we will be able to pay at least our actors upfront! And the more we raise, the sooner we'll be able to start the production of Season 2. (Sojourners' Trails is planned to have 4 seasons in total: one for each suit of Minor Arcana)
Stretch Goals
We're hopeful! And have prepared a couple nice little stretch goals for this campaign as well.
$10,000 - at this point we will be almost fully crowdfunded!! (we’ll get $9500 out of this one). With that we will be able to use the money currently set aside to increase the pay of our cast and crew!
$12,000 - We will release a digital artbook, featuring the fully illustrated Major Arcana!! (With each card being an illustration for one of the episodes). The artbook will be available for sale at our shop in general and available for free for all the supporters!
It will feature not only the art, but also in-depth exploration of themes and inspirations behind each episode as well.
Other Ways You Can Help
Of course, we understand that not everyone is in the position to help financially, and that's totally okay! There are other ways you can help us.
Listen to our pilot episode "Fools of the Night" on the podcatcher of your choice! We are on places like Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts and PocketCasts!
Get the word out! Word-of-mouth is very powerful. Tell your friends or share the campaign on your social media. If you don't know what to write, here are a few suggestions you can copy and paste!
- Sojourners' Trails is an exciting new audio drama crowdfunding now! Support the show at igg.me/at/sojourners-trails-s1-suit-of-wands
- Support queer creators making a spooky pirate podcast! igg.me/at/sojourners-trails-s1-suit-of-wands
- Help support indie audio dramas! Sojourners' Trails season 1 is crowdfunding now! igg.me/at/sojourners-trails-s1-suit-of-wands
