You know what I forgot to do? I was suppose report back on what I thought of Kill Cam, an interactive horror story that I checked out over a few weeks. It was interesting to say the least. The live web cam turned into a webcam orgy of bored Australian nerds. The story did have a twist but was kind of predictable. To say the least it tried to hard but it did have it's moments. It also didn't go viral like I thought it would within the horror universe.But you know what Kill Cam was missing?
Star power. A creative genius that had the imagination, funds and scope to make interactive horror on the web a real reality. That's when I stumbled upon Daniel Knauf's Bxx Haunted. Knauf is the creative mastermind behind HBO's Carnivale, Spartacus and Supernatural. So what's Bxx: Haunted? Well it's a non linear interactive movie which after watching the video below, I'm kind of intrigued.
Like a Choose Your Own Adventure tale, you get to choose which characters you want to follow, investigate rooms and check in on cams throughout an house. The story goes that a group of paranormal investigators become trapped in a house that's gone a little Poltergeisty. The Box Narrative is an interesting new way of storytelling and dammit, I'm pretty psyched. 6 characters in one house for 48 hours and we can take any path we want to reveal the narrative.
We're the filmmaker so to speak.
I'm all for new ways to watch horror and this is definitely the most creative gimmick I've seen in a while.
Sign up now as the first 5,000 people get an invitation and then it closes!
Full access will be available online 11:26 PM PST Friday 2/24 by invite only. Check out the teaser with Knauf and the trailers below. Also follow on Twitter.
The Box-Narrative from Daniel Knauf on Vimeo.
Bxx:HAUNTED Teaser #1 from Daniel Knauf on Vimeo.
Bxx: HAUNTED Teaser #2 from Daniel Knauf on Vimeo.
What do you think of this? Do you think this will work as a format to tell a story? Share your thoughts!
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Color me intrigued.
ReplyDeleteYou got everything wrong except the "funds" part. I pitched this all over town, and after getting a lot of blank stares, decided to just bootstrap it with my own personal savings. Ultra-low-budg all the way, shot without permits. Total guerrilla operation. I did, however, have a lot of very talented friends pitch in and help. This thing is hand-made as hell. Not an executive or Hollywood slicker in sight.
ReplyDeleteWith Haunted, I was going for a beta, so I'd have something I could use to get financing for the original project, Mars (a box-narrative about a group of marooned astronauts). What we got was a lot more. The tech is rough; sound, not so good; picture, standard def; but what me, the cast and the team managed to do surpassed my highest expectations.
I don't know how to describe the end result. All I can tell you is that we captured something in which reality and artifice intersected to seamlessly that the lines are blurred between the two and it's intensely compelling. Like nothing anybody's seen before. I guess that's because nobody's ever attempted it.
Hopefully, the passion, creativity and sheer commitment of the cast and crew will make up for the fact that we had a very limited budget. You have 5,456 six-minute clips, plus text, audio and supplementary videos to decide whether I'm crazy, or Haunted is the initial baby-step in the first new narrative form to be devised since Edison invented the Vitascope.
For more about Bxx (and the Vitascope) check my blog at http://blackbxx.blogspot.com/2011/11/why-another-freaking-paranormal-deal.html
Daniel Knauf
Sorry I got my facts missed up Daniel. In any case, I'm still excited for Bxx Haunted. Seems like a great concept that I definitely wanna check out. I hope its mega successful.
ReplyDelete