Howdy Storytellers 🤠!
Up top is an update on the Creatorwood platform, then a full deep dive into one film’s success story that may just change how you think about making your own films with AI.
Dispatch: Things are moving faster than ever at Creatorwood HQ. We have some of the team in the NYC area making an AI musical a with Broadway composer and writer. More to come on this.
And we have shipped endless updates to the platform including:
Support for lipsyncing (you can now import your own audio and lipsync it to characters)
Faster and better export of media (video and audio) from Creatorwood
Camera movements and action that align much more closely with great cinema so you need to make less changes in the storyboard and way less regenerations
Many quality of life updates including easier coin refills, updated look to the Director’s Notes, etc.
AND SO much more…
Here’s a pic of us all working together 😊.
The amount of produced shows on Creatorwood is about to explode as we head into Q1 and we can’t wait to work hands on with more of you to help you bring your visions to life.
Together we are creating a place where Storytellers Rule the World. We’ll be announcing some exciting partnerships as we enter the new year to help many more creatives thrive in this new industry.
But that’s not the real reason I’m reaching out to you today.
Instead, it’s with a really important lesson that was internalized for me this week.
So many people ask us about the quality of films made with the Movie Machine.
We are in a public beta because we are proud of the quality and believe it’s truly engaging for viewers, but we are still working to improve quality and make the process of going from story to movie even faster and easier.
Of course, this will forever be our mission, but we expect to make major strides next couple weeks just as we have made huge strides over the last couple months
Note: folks who are signing up for the latest round of our VIP Production Service where we make your films for you will get all these improvements baked into their production. You can reply INTERESTED to this email or schedule a free consultation call HERE. We make your entire film for you for just $100 per finished minute (and you get all the rights and can distribute anywhere 😊).
When you compare the production quality of the Movie Machine to the films on DramaBox (downloaded more times in US in the last year than Netflix) or ReelShorts… which are filmed with human actors on real-life production sets… it’s my view (although I’m biased 😂) that the Movie Machine makes it possible to produce AI films at a fidelity that is good-enough to sell to viewers (and the Movie Machine is only rapidly getting better with each passing month).
Despite the fact that AI films on the Movie Machine now have consistent characters + settings + voices, photorealistic looks (or any other style), and the ability to show complex camera movements and action… none of this matters without a story that viewers will love.
A great story and the meaning behind it can take imperfect shots (of which many shots in traditional filmmaking weren’t the final cut directors hoped for) and turn it into a cohesive film that people can’t stop watching and thinking about.
I’ll prove it to you…
The Story of The Blair Witch Project
I was recently in Austin, Texas, hanging with one of my best author friends David Viergutz.
He’s the creator of Scaremail, a horror epistolary story (stories told through letters in the mail). He was shocked when I said I had never watched The Blair Witch Project.
Naturally, we watched the film together.
The entire feature-length film was produced for just $35,000 and had a couple hundred thousand dollar marketing budget BEFORE the rise of social media (paltry by Hollywood standards).
It grossed $250 million in the box office!
Yep, a found-footage horror film that made nearly 10,000x the money that it cost to produce it 🤯.
There’s a few things that stuck out to me about The Blair Witch Project:
The story was simple, but captivating. A witch was rumored to be living in the Maryland woods and 3 film students go on an adventure to explore this myth.
They blurred the lines between fiction and reality. The beginning of the film included interviews with people from the town of Burkittsville, Maryland, asking them what they thought about the myth of The Blair Witch. This not only made an engaging call to adventure – but allowed them to engage in a viral marketing campaign where they put missing person posters and more around the town to make people think the movie was real.
They leaned into their limitations to invent a new genre. If you watch the film, one thing is clear… the production quality isn’t exactly high. No expensive sets. The lighting is literally just the sun in the woods and a flashlight at night. Some of the shots feel awkward. But that’s the entire point. The Blair Witch Project pioneered a new genre of found-footage. The entire film was framed around the footage being taken directly from the lost student filmmakers’ camera footage – adding to the suspense and lore from the get go. They turned what many would think is a production limitation into something that enhanced their story.
There’s so much to learn from this film.
My biggest take away?
Creativity is cheap.
It’s possible to do so much with so little – and this has never been more true now that we have AI and tools like the Movie Machine to help us.
You don’t even need a distributor anymore to monetize your films! Keep your rights on Creatorwood and sell directly on our streaming platform where you get 80% of the gross revenue and all the emails of your viewers and followers. It’s truly a place where Storytellers Rule the World.
So as everyone lets the pursuit of perfection paralyze them, the creators who win will follow a set of 3 simple rules.
#1: They put their Viewers First, not vanity. You might hyperfocus over getting every shot just “right”. In a world of AI filmmaking and traditional filmmaking that is usually not the best approach unless you have unlimited time and budget. What will move the story along and give your viewers a great experience? That’s all that matters.
#2: They experiment and move fast. We are in a land where ideas have never been more valuable as the friction to go from idea to story and finished film is lower than ever. Those who embrace the possibilities will win.
#3: It’s all about the story you are creating and how you share it with the world. Often times the narrative is that we need multi-million dollar production budgets and equally large marketing budgets to make a film successful. Now you just need your laptop, your story, and your passion. Welcome to the world of Creatorwood.
I’ll be in touch with more updates soon as we kick-off our next round of VIP Productions for the new year.
Remember, you can use the Movie Machine yourself HERE and pay $20 per minute of produced video to turn your story into a film.
OR you can pay $100 per finished minute of film (includes all AI costs and service costs) and work with our VIP Production Team to bring your story to life with AI.
It’s the best deal you’ll find out there! If you want to learn more just reply INTERESTED to schedule a free call with our VIP Production Team or schedule a call here. We can’t wait to begin production with so many of you!
And as always don’t forget…
Storytellers Rule the World,
Michael and the Creatorwood Team
