This post is about the transmedia project LowLifes I'm developing with Simon Wood.
Where we are now is we have 5 chapters written for the novella and an outline of 5 videos. That means we’re less than 20% through but progress should gather pace now and hopefully complete the first draft in the next two weeks.
In part 1 I revealed the business model and the following “design constraints”:
- we have three characters and each character’s perspective is told in a different media
- each media has to stand alone as entertainment without requiring the audience to read/view all three
- anyone that does read/view more than one media receives heightened benefits/pleasure/rewards
Some transmedia stories might place each media at a particular time in the story’s history – for example, the comic book tells the prequel, the movie presents today’s events and the toys tell the future story (what happened after the movie ended). This seems to be the most typical approach.
We’ve chosen not to do this. All the perspectives are told concurrently across the same time period. Each media starts the story on the same day #1 and ends on the same day #x.
Each perspective (and hence media) has its own protagonist: detective Larry Hayes is the hero of the novella but he’s a supporting character in the web series. It’s Lauren Ortega who’s the protagonist in the web series. This is important if each media is to be self-supporting and have its own arc without relying on the other media.
So far, although the characters share the same world (the location, other characters) they don’t actually share the same moment in time and place. What I mean by this is, if Hayes is at the crime scene then Ortega isn’t. She may talk to a SOCO (scene of crime officer) at a later time but she doesn’t witness Hayes at the crime scene. To do this would create repetition and in a 1 to 3 minute video episode it’s something I’ve been keen to avoid.
Another consideration we hope to complete successfully is that the story time in the novella chapters doesn’t directly match the web series. Hence there isn’t a one-to-one relationship between media and there’s no concept of a “story bridge” as there is in Level 26 where the reader has to watch video clips before reading the next chapter.
Spoiler…
I mentioned in Part 1 that we hoped not to have explicit calls-to-action from one media to another and we’re trying to get the plot to do that work. That is, the whole project is presented to readers/views as a three-media experience so the savvy reader will think that if an event begs a question, chances are that the answer lies in another media. It seems like it could work.
In one scene Hayes visits his drug dealer and we discover that an unnamed woman has already paid the dealer a visit and killed his dog. I wonder who the woman might be? Could it be Ortega or the ex-wife? The answer lies in the other media. It sounds a little prosaic here on the blog but when the event occurs in the novella it’s one of those OMG! moments that make you want to read on… or in this case switch media.
What Else?
The community site for LowLifes is now up and running and there’s a sample opening chapter should you care to read it. Please feel free to sign-up and ask questions or add comments. I don’t expect the site to get much traction yet while we have very little content but I felt it was important to provide a home for the readership as early as possible.
I’ve actually copied a similar structure to the one I developed for an adventure game I’m doing the transmedia for – you can check that out too to compare, if you fancy. The transmedia is still in development and the game site is quite new but we have several hundred Kickstarter patrons to migrate over soon so hopefully that’ll gain momentum much more quickly!
There seems to have been a lot of Twitter and email activity recently about how to actually go about developing a transmedia project so I thought I’d share my approach to a project I’m producing right now.
This is a work in progress so this is only part 1!
Background & Objectives
I have a suspicion that many readers and viewers – I’ll collectively call them the audience – aren’t as demanding... or as knowledgeable... or as willing... to consume stories as much as the technology will allow. Hence, with so many platforms and so many things that can be done I wanted to scale everything back to do something very simple.
I want to reach as wide an audience as possible.
Step 1 - Keep it Simple.
I started with a high concept: One story, three perspectives – each point of view told across a different media. That’s hopefully easy to understand, right? Hmm.. time will tell :)
Step 2 – What’s the Business Model?
I wanted to employ the CwF+RtB model so that I could give away all the digital content for free but still get paid.
I'm also assuming the audience is fickle. Make it easy for them to consume and buy with minimal effort in a way that they decide. When I have their fleeting attention, maximize the benefit to both of us.
Step 3 – Story Synopsis
A decorated San Francisco homicide detective, Larry Hayes, wakes up in a gutter in the Tenderloin after coming round from a drug-induced coma. His radio beeps – there’s been a murder two blocks away. How long has he been out? Could he have done it?
His story is told in text in a novella.
Hayes’ wife is fighting for custody of their 12 year old daughter and has hired a private detective to dig the dirty on Hayes to use against him in court.
The wife’s story is told on her blog.
The private detective’s story is told across a series of videos (webisodes).
At this point lots of ideas start jumping off – a MySpace page for the daughter, webcam clips for the wife’s blog, a web page for the private detective, a Google map with murder victims on it etc. BUT I want to keep it simple and cheap. Each media adds another layer of time and energy. I can always come back and develop these later or – better still – they’re sandpits for the audience to play in.
Step 4a - Mesh the Story with the Business Model
To meet my requirement that the audience be able to consume the story as easy and as convenient as possible, I wanted each media to be stand alone without requiring the audience to jump from media to media. I wanted someone to be able to buy the book to read on a journey and not worry that they didn’t have an Internet connection to watch the videos, for example.
It’s not a requirement for the audience to consume all media – only that they enjoy whichever one they have right now. Now, given all the attention we’re giving to the fact that there are three media and that they represent three perspectives on the same story, if someone enjoys the novella I think it’s likely they’ll watch the webisodes and vice verse.
So, there are no particular calls-to-action within each media except the plot points and the twists and turns of a great story which I think will motivate people to get a different perspective on events – who’s telling the truth?
The story is being written by the award-winning crime thriller writer Simon Wood and I’ve left him alone now to continue writing while I’ve turned my attention to the money.
Step 4b - Getting Paid
All the media will be free to read and watch online. It will be released episodically – possibly two episodes a week (Tues and Thurs) maybe weekly... But from the first episode we’ll be selling the whole story so you don’t have to wait.
I believe that reading a book (or Kindle) or watching a DVD on the TV is still very popular and often more convenient than doing the same online. I’m hoping that audiences are going to pay for that.
Pillow Talk is a project aiming to connect long distance lovers. Each person has a pillow for their bed and a chest sensor which they wear to sleep at night. The chest sensor wirelessly communicates with the other person’s pillow; when one person goes to bed, their lover’s pillow begins to glow softly to indicate their presence. Placing your head on the pillow allows you to hear the real-time heartbeat of your loved one.
The result is an intimate interaction between two lovers, regardless of the distance between them.
Grazie JawboneTV!
When Twitter announced in April that it was donating its archives to the Library of Congress, the first reaction of many scholars and archivists was excitement at the recognition - by both a federal institution and by a major technology company - that our digital streams are worthy of archiving. This was followed quickly with questions about the exact processes by which the Twitter archives would be created, organized, and funded.