This is a place where I collect the things that I <3. It's a mashup of tech, culture, music, films, games and anything else that catches my attention. My name is Lance Weiler. I enjoy telling stories across mediums and devices. I've written, built, directed, designed and run various film, tv, and gaming projects. I also write a regular column for Filmmaker Magazine about the impact of tech on entertainment entitled "Culture Hacker."
Why Text of Light?
The name is a reference to experimental filmmaker Stan Brakhage. "Text of Light" (1974) is a wonderful film by Brakhage who during his forty year career made over 200 films of varying length.
RADAR a mobile and web series that I co-created and produce enters its' fourth season. New episodes ever Wed for the next 12 weeks www.babelgum.com/radar
DIY DAYS NYC comes to the New School on Saturday March 3rd for a full day of talks, workshops, networking and special set of open design experiences. Tickets are FREE but space is limited. Registration is NOW OPEN. ***Full speaker list and program coming mid February. We are still looking for projects and speakers. Those interested please send a description […]
Welcome to Transmedia Talk, a podcast covering all things Story. Transmedia Talk is co-hosted by Nick Braccia, Dee Cook, and Haley Moore and looks to shed light on the topic of transmedia storytelling with commentary, interviews and tips on how storytelling is moving into the 21st century. Download | Subscribe with RSS |Subscribe with iTunes Jan Libby, the c […]
Welcome to Transmedia Talk, a podcast covering all things Story. Transmedia Talk is co-hosted by Nick Braccia, Dee Cook, and Haley Moore and looks to shed light on the topic of transmedia storytelling with commentary, interviews and tips on how storytelling is moving into the 21st century. Download | Subscribe with RSS |Subscribe with iTunes Yomi Ayeni, crea […]
Welcome to Transmedia Talk, a podcast covering all things Story. Transmedia Talk is co-hosted by Nick Braccia, Dee Cook, and Haley Moore and looks to shed light on the topic of transmedia storytelling with commentary, interviews and tips on how storytelling is moving into the 21st century. Download | Subscribe with RSS |Subscribe with iTunes Lucas J.W. Johns […]
Welcome to Transmedia Talk, a podcast covering all things Story. Transmedia Talk is co-hosted by Nick Braccia, Dee Cook, and Haley Moore and looks to shed light on the topic of transmedia storytelling with commentary, interviews and tips on how storytelling is moving into the 21st century. Download | Subscribe with RSS |Subscribe with iTunes Janine Saunders, […]
Welcome to Transmedia Talk, a podcast covering all things Story. Transmedia Talk is co-hosted by Nick Braccia, Dee Cook, and Haley Moore and looks to shed light on the topic of transmedia storytelling with commentary, interviews and tips on how storytelling is moving into the 21st century. Download | Subscribe with RSS |Subscribe with iTunes Storyworld Confe […]
Welcome to Transmedia Talk, a podcast covering all things Story. Transmedia Talk is co-hosted by Nick Braccia, Dee Cook, and Haley Moore and looks to shed light on the topic of transmedia storytelling with commentary, interviews and tips on how storytelling is moving into the 21st century. Download | Subscribe with RSS |Subscribe with iTunes USC provost prof […]
Welcome to Transmedia Talk, a podcast covering all things Story. Transmedia Talk is co-hosted by Nick Braccia, Dee Cook, and Haley Moore and looks to shed light on the topic of transmedia storytelling with commentary, interviews and tips on how storytelling is moving into the 21st century. Download | Subscribe with RSS |Subscribe with iTunes Jeff Watson from […]
New York-based creative professionals take note! Odds are, you’re familiar with 3rd Ward, the massive workspace in Bushwick full of all sorts of resources, supplies and classes for any creative project that interests you, from woodworking to filmmaking. And if not I just told you the gist of it, so there you go. But aside from being a great place to learn, c […]
Welcome to Transmedia Talk, a podcast covering all things Story. Transmedia Talk is co-hosted by Nick Braccia, Dee Cook, and Haley Moore and looks to shed light on the topic of transmedia storytelling with commentary, interviews and tips on how storytelling is moving into the 21st century. Download | Subscribe with RSS |Subscribe with iTunes Author and trans […]
Using knives, tweezers and surgical tools, Brian Dettmer carves one page at a time. Nothing inside the out-of-date encyclopedias, medical journals, illustration books, or dictionaries is relocated or implanted, only removed.
Dettmer manipulates the pages and spines to form the shape of his sculptures. He also folds, bends, rolls, and stacks multiple books to create completely original sculptural forms.
“My work is a collaboration with the existing material and its past creators and the completed pieces expose new relationships of the book’s internal elements exactly where they have been since their original conception,” he says.
I’m a fan of people caught in real moments and especially ones that leave room for interpretation. Martin Parr worked for over a decade to photograph bored couples all of which he had no relationship to. The photos where released in a book in 1993 called Bored Couples.
Alice in Wonderland meets the iPad. The other day I had a meeting at a major publisher to discuss this very thing. Not Alice in Wonderland but the way in which books can become more interactive, social and engaging across devices. Alice for the iPad just scratches the surface.
That’s interesting. There’s also vook.com where they incorporate video right into the book but it’s only available online.
I think they have an ipad app for it. I’m also working on something where authors write a book online and can record their narration and add YouTube videos to broaden the experience of the book at http://www.rimmix.com
I think these ideas are huge for everyone involved in multimedia. I think too many filmmakers are still thinking too traditionally.
It’s ok for Hollywood to take it’s time because once they decide they could roll out whatever they want in an instant.
Indie filmmakers however need to be more diligent in what they spend their energy on and how the distribute their ideas.
With the excitement building around Apple’s announcement of a tablet device rumored to be called the iSlate – I hope in 2010 we’ll see digital magazines and books step into the transmedia fold. The integration between apps, APIs, and a strong movement towards standardizing “activity streams” across social services present fertile ground for transmedia storytelling. Character extensions, augmented reality, supporting materials, back stories, experience hyperlinking that ties into online / offline events not to mention real-time interactions between readers all are fuel for rich transmedia experiences. A re-design of what a book and / or magazine experience can be, have the potential to shake some of the issues that the publishing industry has been struggling with lately. Could Apple’s announcement and new tablet usher in a next gen of a print experience? Hardware has the potential to change consumption behavior. It also has the opportunity to establish new revenue streams something that the publishing industry desperately needs. But the content needs to be something that readers will seek out and most importantly something that creates a quality experience while containing a strong value proposition. Only time will tell if readers are ready and if the publishing industry is up for the challenge of innovating a print experience that defies convention.
The following vid shows some nice design concepts around a tablet and the rethinking of a magazine. What I’d like to see is a rethink on the content, interactions and transmedia extensions – it seems like this could be the prefect time to rethink the digital print experience. To me the real excitement is how a tablet can become a storyworld gateway and in many cases it won’t be what the editor places on screen – it will be the connections between.
The folks at Smashing – an amazing resource site / community for web design and developers have just released a comprehensive resource in book form.
The Smashing Book is a printed book about best practices in modern Web design. The book shares technical tips and best practices on coding, usability and optimization and explores how to create successful user interfaces and apply marketing principles to increase conversion rates. It also shows how to get the most out of typography, color and branding so that you end up with intuitive and effective Web designs. And lastly, you will also get a peek behind the curtains of Smashing Magazine.
“We Feel Fine” an expansive project that has mined the web since 2005 for the phrase “I Feel” has expanded to include a beautiful book that captures the project.
I’ve been following the “We Feel Fine” project and a number of collaborations between Jonathan Harris and Sep Kamvar that harness data in interesting and artistic ways.
Here’s how Sep Kamvar describes the project on his site.
“Since August 2005, We Feel Fine has been harvesting human feelings from a large number of weblogs. Every few minutes, the system searches the world’s newly posted blog entries for occurrences of the phrases “I feel” and “I am feeling”. When it finds such a phrase, it records the full sentence, up to the period, and identifies the “feeling” expressed in that sentence (e.g. sad, happy, depressed, etc.).
Because blogs are structured in largely standard ways, the age, gender, and geographical location of the author can often be extracted and saved along with the sentence, as can the local weather conditions at the time the sentence was written. All of this information is saved.”
From the book’s site Futuretainment is about the world transformed by consumer connectedness. Futuretainment is about the world transformed by consumer connectedness. It is an indispensable handbook for anyone wanting to understand the future of media and marketing, and explains what it will take for companies and brands to thrive in this challenging new environment. With a unique focus on the dynamic markets of Japan, China and Korea – Futuretainment tells the story of disruptive consumer innovation at the cutting edge of social media.
Institute for the future of the book – interesting project that examines the evolution of story, writing and the role that the written word has in the digital age.
Omar elbaga is discussing. 
dean haspiel is discussing. 
Omar elbaga 2:23 pm on April 28, 2010 Permalink
That’s interesting. There’s also vook.com where they incorporate video right into the book but it’s only available online.
I think they have an ipad app for it. I’m also working on something where authors write a book online and can record their narration and add YouTube videos to broaden the experience of the book at http://www.rimmix.com
I think these ideas are huge for everyone involved in multimedia. I think too many filmmakers are still thinking too traditionally.
It’s ok for Hollywood to take it’s time because once they decide they could roll out whatever they want in an instant.
Indie filmmakers however need to be more diligent in what they spend their energy on and how the distribute their ideas.