The Scoop: September - Doing It Backwards

Screenshot of "Wraiths and Shadow" before any effects

Stranger Things Studios is now officially back in action!  Last Friday we made our long overdue return to YouTube with “Wraiths and Shadow.”  If you haven’t had the chance to check it out yet, stop reading this, hop over to our YouTube channel, watch it, and then come back. (www.YouTube.com/StrangerThingsFilms)

There’s plenty more coming down the pipeline, too!  The only problem is we’ve been going at it completely backwards.  Here’s what I mean:

The Scoop: August - Team Assembled

Yep, we're back.

We're just weeks away from releasing our first video in almost 2 years!  That's right - not months anymore, but weeks.

The team's been reassembled.  The S.T.S. Facebook page has been active since June.  Summer filming has been going strong for a month and a half now.  By the end of August Stranger Things Studios will have new material appearing on its YouTube channel.

So, let's get right down to it.

The Scoop: July 2016 - Time Capsule

Two years have passed since the Age of Banak the Brave.  Not a word has been heard, nor sign of activity seen of Stranger Things Studios since.  It was as though the company had folded, gone under, gave up, disbanded, vanished without a trace.

But now there are whispers, rumors that the lights down at the old abandoned studios have been on in the dead of the  night.  Someone has been stoking the furnace, and the black smoke of production has been seen lifting into the twilight.

Stranger Things Studios is coming back.

Clocking Film Hours

Have you ever wondered what kind of time commitment goes into making a movie?  Or where most of the man hours go?  How much time is actually spent filming?  What kind of behind-the-scene tasks do people never think about?

I use to record how much time I dumped into each movie I made.  The STS Debut Film, for example, took me 6-8 hours over the course of two days to make.  As productions got more involved I stopped keeping track of the time.  I found it was more self-indulgent than useful.

"Banak the Brave (The Half-Orc II)" - Director's Notes

A crew of gamers meet up in one guy’s nerdy man cave for a session of Dungeons & Dragons.  On this fateful day, a newcomer has joined their midst, and his outlandish character, named Banak the Brave, brings gaming to a screeching halt.  As they argue among themselves, their collective vision of the confrontation plays out with cinematic flare.

“Banak the Brave” is the second installment of the party’s adventure.  However, it works as a stand-alone tale.  If you like it, go back and watch the prequel.