Good afternoon, Steemfolk!

There has been a lot going on over here for the development of The Tear. They're small, but important on the journey to our crowdfunding efforts.

First, we have secured the domain www.thetearsees.com and set up a very rudimentary landing page. We've got a lot of work to do on this site, but at least it's up and running.

However, we've also generated a "Link Tree" page for The Tear sees at address here.

For the most part, I think we'll be using the link tree to spread the word. It's a fast loading, no frills page that gives you all the pertinent links to The Tear and its campaign. I've even got a short link and QR code for it. I'm going to be throwing it on business cards and put it in all the emails real, real soon. Not all the links are functioning the way they should because not all of it has been built, but it will be soon. As you can see we've got the @fundition link there too!

One thing you might notice is the new artwork I'm using across the page and social accounts, even on the new Instagram page. It's this wonderful piece of art for desktop wallpapers but it's not mine.

To remedy this, I'm commissioning a poster for the film with an artist on Fiverr.com. He's got a pretty good track record of nice poster design, but I don't want to say too much until we've got something concrete. The last artist I commissioned bailed last minute, so the poster was never even started. Thankfully there are more than one poster artist on the site.

NEW DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY

I finally started making some phone calls for finding a new DP. The trauma - I use that word lightly - of losing my first one due to what I will euphemistically call creative differences was hard on me, but I managed to get over it and I'm excited to be moving forward with Michael Ojeda, the DP that photographed I Love You (shameless link to my short film below).

I feel very lucky to have Michael on board. We work very well together and he's directed a couple of VFX heavy horror movies, so he's got a lot of experience accounting for VFX and creating some pretty great moments in the world of Action Horror, which The Tear is not, but I feel the skills are transferrable. I just have to be very clear with just how "anti-action" 'this is going to be and direct accordingly.

THE CROWDFUNDING VIDEO

If you're following me on DS's Instagram, you've already seen this image, but it's worth noting here what's going on for this.

I've got a near, ten minute version of the crowdfund pitch video strung out. Ten minutes is way, way too long for a pitch video, but the fact that it's laid out has given me a lot to work with regarding my b-roll and VFX planning. I can start pacing everything out and adding music, and let me tell you, the new track composed by Taylor is spectacular. I WILL be uploading it to @dsound today sometime. If you haven't heard any of his other tracks, head on over to my DSound page and have a listen. If those links are too slow, I've also set up a SoundCloud account as a backup host for the tracks.

The new track isn't in the playlist yet, but I assure you, it will be. It will be.

SOME FINAL THOUGHTS

I'm working on how to better build an audience for The Tear before we even get to crowdfunding the thing, and I can't tell which is more difficult. Making a film or crowdfunding / social media building. One filmmaker who I've been following for sometime now is Rachel Stephens who built a pretty impressive audience on Instagram for her film Alaska. She even released a book on how she raised $60,000. If you're crowdfunding, I recommend having a look at what she did to build her following and raise her capital.

Here's a little video she made with some of her thoughts on the matter:

Haven't seen her film yet as I don't think she's finished it, but I am eager to see the completed product.

That said, I'm thinking of focusing on the "stories" aspect of Instagram and YouTube to better build an audience with short videos instead of the long, laborious videos I was doing before. I think less editing and more storytelling is in order. I'll still produce longer vids in the vein of a vlog, but will wait until I have more footage to tell something interesting visually and not just with my head in frame.

What do you think? Would you be interested in a format like that?

Alright, back to real life.

Stay tuned,

Phil

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WHO DIS IS

If you want to know who I am and what Distant Signal is, check this out. It's sort of a manifesto. The TL;DR is that I've won an award for producing, make a lot of reality TV, live in LA and think that artist and media incentives are misaligned and serve large corporations and not independent artists.

The fist horror / thriller film made on and with the Steem blockchain. Use this hashtag to find out all about it!

DISTANT SIGNAL SOCIAL:

WEBSITE: https://www.thesignalisstrong.com
YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/adistantsignal
LBRY: Direct LBRY App Link!
INSTAGRAM: https://instagram.com/distant_signal/
GAB: https://gab.com/Distant_Signal
MINDS: https://www.minds.com/DistantSignal

MISSION

In 2019 the goal is to produce the short horror film, Changelings, the world of that story and to build a community of filmmakers that are enthusiastic about filmmaking and crypto currency.

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PHIL ABATECOLA'S PERSONAL SITES:
INSTAGRAM: https://instagram.com/abatecolasan/
WEBSITE: http://www.philabatecola.com