IFH 797: From Instagram Mysteries to Indie Horror: The Bold Experiments of Joe Kowalski

Alex Ferrari 1:50
Enjoy today's episode with guest host Dave Bullis.

Dave Bullis 1:55
On this episode, we have a Cleveland, Ohio based filmmaker who recently made I am the doorway, a Stephen King Dollar Baby short film, and he's hitting the film festival circuit with another film of his called PRISM, with guest Joe Kowalski. No problem. And remember, the first time you were here, I butchered your last name and I called you something completely different. I don't remember what it was, and I compared it to a deal the team when John Travolta called, you know, again, he called her a delta,

Joe Kowalski 2:24
Right! I do remember this.

Dave Bullis 2:29
Yeah, it was, I was like, What the hell happened there? I was like, I knew his last name, and I called you something else. I was like, Wait, what the hell did I just do there? So I understand how John Travolta feels, but, but, but, but, since you've been on here, Joe, I think you were episode 84 I want to say, so that was actually, you know what, Joe, we're getting close to over 100 episodes ago, because I'm up to, like, one, yeah, right. It's like 160 whatever I'm up to now. And, you know, it's just, you know, it's almost 100 episodes ago. We're like, we're like, less than 20 away. And so, you know, Joe, I wanted to reconnect with you, because you're always up to something really cool. And I wanted to ask about a couple of things, you know, and as we sort of get rolling on this so, you know, since we've last talked, you've done, one, you've done $1 Baby Stephen King short film. Two, you've graduated from college, and three, you have started an Instagram murder mystery type interactive game. So I'm probably missed a couple other things. So I wanted to ask about all that, all that stuff, because I think it's awesome, and particularly about your Stephen King short story, the Dollar Baby. For those listeners, I've touched on this too. I had, I actually got $1 Baby done once. And I'll tell just real quick. I don't want to eat up all the time. Joe with talking about me, I'm trying to talk to you about your stuff, but you know, I actually did the Dollar Baby too, and I did in the death room. We actually shot an Eastern State Penitentiary here in Philadelphia. I got us a location for a pretty discounted rate. They wouldn't, they they also just let us skip down on the insurance bond. We actually had one, but it wasn't, wasn't the one that they usually recommend. It was, or ask for. It was a was a lower one that allowed us to, sort of, you know, make the production a little cheaper. We shot for that in that in there for like, a day. We shot at Ridley Creek State Park, here, right down the street from me, for here in media, and we kind of like put all this together, and at the end of it all the the editor just lost all the footage. And when about it, they were like, they were like, are you gonna sue that guy? And I said, he's a lunatic, as he came recommended to me by somebody, right? And we, were working with him, and he just kept sitting on the footage. I was like, What do you because he, you know, what happened with Joe? He had a Facebook addiction, and he would just scroll on Facebook rather than doing and I kept saying, I'm like, Just give me the footage back and I'll go to somewhere else. Well, finally, he got it together and we were gonna make all these adjustments. We were so close to having the final product done. And then he sends me this message that his Mac was dying. And I said, Look, I hope you pay for it. And then he's like, Oh, well, I don't know what I'm gonna do about this and blah, blah, this or that. And basically, that was the end of it. And he said that although his Mac finally died, and all the footage went with it, and I couldn't get a hold of him, you know, a lot of crazy editors out there. So honestly, here's my advice. Anyone listening to this, always have a backup of your footage, because my DP just gave him. My DP just gave him the actual fucking hard drive with everything on it, and said, Here you go, edit the footage. And I was like, Dude, I go. I can't believe you did that without giving it to me first and letting me copy all this crap, but, but, that was my Dollar Baby adventure. It's another horror story that I have about filmmaking, Joe. It's somebody else pointed out. They're like, Dave, all your stories are all end in, like, heartbreak and, and, you know, down on March, stuff like that. And I go, Yeah, it's the truth, man, because I have so many crazy people, but, uh, but, but, no, but, I want to hear about your experience. Joe, you know, how did you pick the story that you picked? You know, What story did you actually pick? You know, how did you shoot all this? How did you shoot everything? You know, being as it's, you know, it's very limited to being what you can do, because obviously you can't get investors for it, stuff like that. So you have to kind of work in a very shoestring budget, unless you have a ton of money, you know what I mean. But I want to hear all this about, all about this jokes. I'm fascinated. So What story did you pick from, from the Dollar Baby collection?

Joe Kowalski 6:32
And just to, just to clarify for the audience, the Dollar Baby setup is something that Stephen King has done whereby he has a select number of his short stories, a lot of older ones in the 70s and early 80s that are available to use, as long as you pay $1 to him. So there's probably about maybe 20 short stories on the list. And it's really cool, because people like me who don't have huge budgets and stuff, can technically make even King film without having to pay ridiculous sums of money. So I had chosen I am the doorway. This kind of came about because the girl I was dating at the time was a huge Stephen King fan, and she had heard of this before, and I had heard of it before, and we were putting together a film called PRISM that I that I released last year, that was a half an hour film. And we were thinking like, Well, half an hour is kind of short to bring in a whole audience and stuff. So we ended up doing is we kind of made a film festival event, and we featured some other short films from around the world in this theater in Cleveland. And I am the doorway, which is the one we ended up going with, was one of those we it was kind of another way to kind of make the ticket worth it for people you know and and kind of give them a full experience. So it was chosen by the girl I was dating at the time. We went through a whole bunch of them, though, and we read a bunch of them. We were trying to figure out, like, what is something that we could do having almost no budget and having only about a month's worth of time before this big event. And what we did was choose that one, because a lot of what the supernaturalness, as you see in a lot of Stephen King short stories, was kind of taking place off screen, and you were seeing more the results of what was happening, because you get this astronaut who comes back to Earth and starts getting these eyes that pop up on his body. And we kind of created a framework story where we had these two guys talking in a bar about this whole situation and and they kind of tie into the story. So it was, it was kind of cool doing that, because typically, I'm used to starting stories from scratch and building upon those and and working upon that with friends, but it was really interesting to take someone else's work, especially someone as you know, prolific as Stephen King, and try to adapt that To like a 10 minute short film.

Dave Bullis 9:22
Yeah, you see, I just as a filmmaker standpoint, I'm sorry, as a filmmaker standpoint, I just kind of think, even just trying to do something like that, Joe, we have an astro come back down to earth. I mean, it just sounds expensive. We're just wearing my producer hat, you know, even with doing with with death room, you know, I had that whole prisons, you know, a location, and even just paying for that, I was like, you know, what they're gonna charge us, you know, whatever they charge us. It was, you know, I think probably a grand or something, even for that day, even back then, I was like, Jesus Christ, a grand. And, you know, we got to make sure everything's set, so many problems that you know or and ended up being my fault because I to do this. I listened to too many people, and that was my fault for doing it. I've learned a lot of things on each and every project. That project was me listening to too many people, and I tried to sort of do everything that everyone was recommending. And I just, I, you know, we had, we had too much time being wasted, and there was a lot of production issues that could have been ironed out if I had not listened to all those people. If you know what I'm trying to say, like I that didn't even need to be there, that we could have just went. We went, we went, you know what? We don't even need this fucking thing. Fuck it, and let's just get rid of it. You know?

Joe Kowalski 10:46
Yeah, and I've worked with directors who have skewed one way or the other, and, and some of them are very well meaning, but yeah, you do have some people who will literally waste all the time on set. They see it just like, like, a party, you know? They got all their friends together. They're gonna, oh, wouldn't be cool if we did this and they take an hour. Oh, we gotta find a rope and takes another hour. Let's, let's just eat. We're gonna eat people like that. And then you do have the people who are like so anal about trying to, this is my masterpiece, you know, I gotta get every single detail right. Oh, more of a tiny little smirk in that performance and stuff. And so, one thing that I've learned over the years, and I'm trying, to always get better at, is finding the balance between like, I want this set to be enjoyable. I want people to be having a good time and not feel like they're miserable doing this, but at the same time, we also do have to keep, like, a tight schedule on this. And I there are some things I do want to be kind of specific about, and that I'm very certain that I went but I also have to know when it when to compromise on that, like if it's not going to work out, find another way around. If someone has a great suggestion, be willing and open to all suggestions if they're going to make the story better or help move things along better for everybody. So it is a really hard balance. It is very tough. So I can understand falling into that trap entirely, because I've been there before.

Dave Bullis 12:10
Yeah, it was funny too, because, well, funny now, but, but it was just because, you know, somebody was, who was a worked at, at a film festival, contacted me, and he, he actually was a local Philly guy, and we met, and I'll never forget this. I forget his name, but I never forget where we met. We actually met, and he asked me to meet up with him at the at the Philly anarchist paper headquarters. And I said, first off, I didn't even know Phil Yeah, I didn't even know Philadelphia had an anarchist newspaper. I didn't even know when anarchist newspaper was a thing we walk in, Joe, and I'm not kidding you, there's a big sign on the wall that says, Please no drug use allowed or sorry, please do not use drugs while on the premises. And in parentheses, yes, this includes weed and parentheses. And I, and I'm just laughing, going, you have to put a board up like that. Like, what the fuck is going on in here? Oh, man, I started talking to this guy. And as this guy was talking and, I mean, I'm sure he met, well, like, I'm like, first off, the neighborhood was terrible, and I'm sitting there going, Why the hell are we even like, Why? Why did I have to meet for them? This is another thing, Joe that always kind of like grinds my gears. People always ask to meet me in person, or they want to meet up for coffee or something. I go, why? Why don't we just do a Skype message? Or, why don't you just shoot me an email? Why do we have to meet face to face? Like, I don't get it, like, honestly, I gotta waste my time, get put gas in my car, drive up all the way into the city or wherever the hell you are, and then we gotta meet. And it never, nothing ever gets resolved, because we just go back and forth. And it's the same thing with that Stephen King Guy. We could have done that over a Skype interview with Sharon screen share and had the same exact thing. And we both could have just been in the comfort of our own homes. It just, you know what I mean? It just, I just, I'm not saying I'm like, gonna become some obese shut in or anything like that, like the mom from Gilbert Grape, but, but, but, well, I'm getting there, though, Joe. But, like, to me, if you're gonna meet somebody, you should have a clear objective, because everyone's I'm at the point in my life now where I just think time is money now, and I'm always, you know, when I was I mean, how old are you Joe, 24?

Joe Kowalski 14:19
I'm only 22 I'm a baby,

Dave Bullis 14:23
22 years young, and I'm sorry, and I'm cursing up a storm at you, sir. But okay, so you're 22 so I'm 10 years older than you are, and so basically I'm at the point now Joe, where, like, I've become, like, That guy I always didn't want to be where I'm just like, you know, everything's time is money, you know. But when I was when I was your age, Joe, again, I'm sounding old as shit right now, when I was your age, Joe, I actually, I would go out and I would go on random film sets, I would meet new people, and I would just, you know what, I'm just gonna treat everything like an adventure. I'm gonna treat everything like a learning experience, and I'm just gonna go out there and. Going to see whatever happens. And when I made my Stephen King Dollar Baby, I think I was 24 or 25 and then I used that experience to parlay that into making a TV pilot, which I won't go into because, you know, listeners of this show know that story inside and out, but with with the whole with that, what I did there was, I was always looking at everything as like a learning experience. And when, you know, meeting all these different people on the course of actually making this Stephen King Dollar Baby, I've met so many interesting people for both good and bad. But like, you know, I think, as a filmmaker, when you're that age, you know, 22 23 24 you know, you have to go out there and see all these, you know, make all these mistakes, and then when you're like, 28 29 that's kind of like you're, you're starting to be getting your prime. That's the age Quentin Tarantino make Reservoir Dogs. I think that was the age when, when Rodriguez made Rebel Without a crew, El Mariachi. I'm not sure. Though, that's the age where Damien Chazz made whiplash, and I, you know what I mean, so right? I kind of look at those experiences as kind of molding me, because that's what I'm sure that's the whole point of what I'm trying to say here is, you know, and you know, treating this as knowing the when these opportunities come down, knowing what is going to be a good opportunity and what's gonna just be a waste of your time. It's almost like doing me like, when somebody like, when a producer comes to you and says, Hey, listen, I got this. You know, a producer, quote, unquote, comes to you and says, Hey, listen, Joe, I gotta, I got this, you know, whole, whole TV pilot ready to roll. I need someone to direct it. Would you want to direct it? And in your at first, you're like, Okay, I'll talk to you about it. And you start to meet, and you go, Oh, crap, there's so many holes in this. It's unbelievable. You know what I mean? You start, you start seeing between the lines, if you know what I'm trying to say,

Joe Kowalski 16:49
Right! I think a big part of it too, is that I think time is the most important thing for everybody on set, not just because of how the schedule is and everything, but ultimately, especially on an independent film, and you don't have the ability to pay people, that's the biggest thing they're giving you, and that's the biggest thing they can give you, is just that time to be there and help make your thing come to life. And so I just find it so incredibly disrespectful when people don't value that time and don't take into account that, you know, these people don't have to be there. They're not, you know, they're not being paid to be there or anything. They don't have any obligation to you, other than the sense that maybe they care about this project too, or maybe they want to see you succeed. So I definitely don't, you mean when it comes to a lot of the points that you've made. And I I just, I try to respect that time, and I want people to get a full experience out of it. So like, like I said when I was trying to put together this festival event, I wanted to make sure that if people were going to come and and we didn't have a set price, but we just were kind of taking donations in general, but people are going to come and donate money. I want them to come out seeing like, an hour and 15 minutes of really top notch short films and and it's tough when you have friends who come up and say, Hey, can you include my film in this? And I go, I don't think I can. It doesn't quite meet the expectations of what we're trying to do with this. It's tough to be able to do that, and to be able to say like, you know, and I, I think you worked hard on this, but you know, deep down, you know that it's not quite the quality that you want, and it's a hard thing to do that, because you want to make everyone happen. You want to have all those contexts. But you're right. You do have to start getting more selective about how you spend your time and and what you choose to work on, right?

Dave Bullis 18:42
Yeah, you know, somebody once told me, Joe, that life is is all about creating a bubble around yourself and you, and you start to understand what you like and don't like inside of that bubble, and anything and everybody that's not within that confines, you push out of that bubble. And basically that's, you know what I mean. And I started to realize that over the years, and when I, when I meet people, and it's just like, hey, you know, because I, because I do this podcast, and I'll get an email, probably, maybe once, I don't, maybe once a week, saying, Hey, Dave, would you ever, you know, if you're ever up in New Jersey or in New York, or you want to come in Philly or whatever, why don't you come and we'll have coffee or whatever? And I just go, You know what? I just don't know, why? Like, you know what I mean? Like, I don't want to sound like a jerk. I don't want to sound like a jerk. I really don't like, I don't want to be like, Oh, I'm Dave bulls, but no, I'm just like, you know, why would you want to talk to me? Like, what, you know what I mean? And it's just like, I want, I want to make sure that we're each getting something out of it. And it's not just going to be, you know, turning to a pitch meeting, which, by the way, Joe has happened. I've had people meet me and they go, they're just like, hey, yeah. And there's like, Hey, Dave, you know, would you want to join this project? And I go, No, like, when they he was heartbroken. He goes, he looks at me, he goes, why not? And I go, Well, it's and it's like you were just saying you you try to, you know, you want to see people succeed, but you just want to. You know, you want to say, Well, it's because it's not going to work, dude. There's so many holes in this, in production, like, Hey, can we can we shoot a and you and I talked about this before, about shooting period pieces on a budget, like, hey, I want to shoot a civil war. I want to shoot a Civil War period piece with 500 bucks. Oh, okay, good luck. You know,

Joe Kowalski 20:34
I know what. I mean, yeah, absolutely. And you get the you get a lot of that too, and, and, you know what, if they do have a substantial amount of money, then those things are realistic, but otherwise I that's a big part of it too, is knowing what realistically can accomplish. And that's something I always try to take into mind when I when I write, the projects that I do, is I know the resources I have to work with primarily. I know the people I have to work with primarily, and and be smart about how you do it, because people will be so much more impressed if you make a really good film within your limits than if you try to reach too far. And that doesn't say that doesn't mean you shouldn't challenge yourself, and that doesn't mean that you know you might throw in something that might that might be a little more expensive, it might be a little bit more complicated, that you're going to have to figure out. You got to give yourself those challenges, but at the same time, don't, like you said, try to make like, a period piece of like this crazy futuristic sci fi, when you know that realistically, if you try to do that, you're only going to get like 20% of the way there, and people are just going to see it as a little silly,

Dave Bullis 21:44
Yeah and it's just going to be, you know, if you want to do, yeah, do all that stuff. And, you know, hey, do you have somebody that knows or rents period piece costumes? Because five, you know, even if I bumped up to $5,000 budget, like, you're going to eat through that in no time. Just, just the setting up the world, and it is gonna, and you're right, it's gonna end up looking just silly, you know, and it's just gonna end up looking, just look crazy. I'll give you another example, and then we'll get back to what you were talking about. Again. I don't wanna, I wanted to talk about your stuff, but like, you know, I had a guy before come to me, and he wanted to shoot a zombie film for, like, I think he said, like, 500 bucks. And I said, you know, it's possible. Because I said, if you look at Colin, and I actually had the director and writer, Mark V Prince, on this podcast, and we talked about how he did it for 50 bucks or and really did he shot for 50 bucks, shot a full length zombie feature called Colin, which is actually really freaking cool. And basically, with Colin, it's a he get this guy gets bit by zombie in the beginning of the film, and he becomes a zombie, and for the rest of the film, you follow this shambling zombie throughout the rest of the film. It's actually really cool. And in fact, the fact that he shot it, yeah, honestly, it was a phenomenal idea, and the fact that he got it, did it for 50 bucks. Makes even better, because I told him, I said it, Mark, if you had shot this for, like, let's just say somebody gave you a million dollars. I said you would have shot yourself in the foot. And you know what I mean, because you would have been like, holy shit. Now we can have a building explode, you know what I mean? And I think that's sometimes, you know, as again, we were talking about, you know, you got to weigh your opportunities, but, but Mark, you know, he was able to do whatever he wanted because he, you know, obviously 50 bucks is 50 bucks, but, um, but anyways. But, you know, as we talk about that, that guy was someone with a zombie feature. He wanted to shoot it for 500 bucks. And he basically was, was, like, real adamant about shooting this thing. And Joe, I am not kidding around with you. He wanted to shoot it in at three o'clock in the morning. He wanted to shoot this one scene at three o'clock in the morning, and I'm looking on Google Maps, and I said, What's this building right across the street from where we're gonna film? He goes, Oh, that's the police station. I said, are we gonna have permits? He goes, No, no. This is all gonna be guerrilla stuff. I said, so we're gonna run across from the police station with the army of zombies, and you don't think anyone's gonna say anything. And he looks at me, he goes, No, do you think they will? I go, Yeah, dude, I think the police are gonna look out their window and go, Hey, here's somebody filming without a permit. Yeah, oh, boy. So yeah, it's stuff like that, man. But you know, as as we go back to talking about your stuff, Joe, so what were some of the biggest production issues you had on making your dollar baby? I mean, did you start a crowdfunding campaign for it?

Joe Kowalski 24:28
No, like I said, this was kind of more of a side thing that we could show off for the festival. So we actually shot pretty much most of it all in one weekend. And one of the locations was a restaurant that I do some media work for that I got permission, then we filmed at a beach that was public, you know, just public property, and, yeah, it was just a lot of like, again, like using your resources and saying. Here I have this. So why don't I throw this in here, you know, and working with it and making it work within the stories context, a far bigger project was the film prism that I mentioned that we were kind of showcasing around this whole festival event. And that was that film basically took a year from the first first typing it to actually showing it off. And I could talk a little bit about that, if you'd like me to at all.

Dave Bullis 25:33
Yeah, absolutely.

Joe Kowalski 25:35
Basically, the movie is about six people from two different families, and each character is represented by a separate color. So that while the most the film you see is in black and white, when that character is on screen, you see their color pop out of the black and white. So like, if you remember, like, in Schindler's List, there's like, the girl red dress and and that photo effect comes up a lot, you know, you see, like, yellow highlights come out of a, you know, a picture of somebody or something like that. We basically did that with the whole movie. So like, when you our character Green was on screen, his shirt would come out because he was wearing green. But also the trees in the background, you would see them. And that was a very interesting challenge, from a storytelling standpoint, from a technical standpoint, because all that, I think if you're going to do something like that, each of the colors have to have a meaning to them. So that was something we were very certain about. And also the story kind of weaves in and out of these characters lives and how they relate to each other. And this person's cheating on this person, and this person's it has a crush on this person and and one thing I really had to learn from this film was really to just outline everything. And that's not something I'm very used to doing. I kind of like diving in and then just seeing where it goes. And sometimes that works, but it's a lot of work after the fact to try to make that into something cohesive, but particularly in relation to the families, we had to, like, sit down and write out a family tree and and figure out the relation of each character to the other. And that was something that was kind of difficult, because then we would say, well, this doesn't really work, because this character wouldn't interact with this person. It was a very unusual process for this whole movie, and we aren't really able to show it off yet because we're trying to get in some film festivals, and we haven't had any luck yet, but we're gonna keep trying. But the trailer is online, if anyone wants to check it out, if you look up like prism 2016 or prism short film 2016 or even on my channel, Pogie Joe, that's P, O, G, I, E, Joe. There's a couple trailers on there, so you can kind of get an idea of what I'm talking about with this color thing.

Dave Bullis 27:54
You know, Joe, I actually have some film festivals. I would recommend that you entered into number one being the Delco Film Festival. I think they that would be a good film festival for you to enter it into. That's actually right by my house as well. But if you'd like, I can actually introduce you. I can actually introduce you to the guy who runs it.

Joe Kowalski 28:12
Oh, that'd be, that would be amazing. And you know, if I was ever in that area, we could meet up and have some coffee. And I have this great pitch I want to sell you.

Dave Bullis 28:20
Yeah, yeah, no, go, Joe, no way. No, no, I'm just kidding. Yeah, no, I would see like, like, somebody that I've actually met and talked to. I would be down for that. And the funny the founders Chris Pier miniko, and he's actually been on the podcast before. And Chris is, Chris is a very good guy, and before we got on the podcast, he said to me, he's like, please try not to curse too much, because I'm going to recommend this to my students, and don't tell any weird stories. And I go, that's all I have in life. Is weird stories and cursing. That's it. It's like, you take that away from me. I'm not I'm nothing anymore, right? You're a show. But, yeah, exactly. I'm just, like, a shell of a man. I'm not even, I'm not even my George Costanza self, but I will introduce you to him, and right after this podcast, and I'm sure Chris would love to talk to you about having that film there. And you know, so as you may know, your dollar baby too, because I'll link to everything in the show notes as well everybody. I'll link to the Delco Film Festival and every and Joe's channel and everything else. But when you're talking about, you know, your dollar baby, and you actually just, you shot it into a weekend, did you have any, like, real huge production issues come up that that, like, anything like we were talking about, or anything like, completely unexpected, like, hey, it rained on a Sunday when we thought it was going to be clear skies, anything like that.

Joe Kowalski 29:40
Um, actually, that was surprisingly straightforward. We were actually kind of marveling that it came out as well as it did. And the nice part about it is that the people we cast in it were people that we were considering for the other film prism that were really good, but they just didn't quite fit the parts we were looking for. So we're like, what's a. Capacity that we can use these people we were able to get four of these actors who were really, really good that I still wanted to work with into this film, and, you know, get to spend a couple days filming with them. And the thing about that, it was just basically a skeleton crew of me, my and my, my girlfriend at the time, and so I guess we didn't really have to worry too much about other casting crew members. It wasn't like the other film where we had, like a full cast and everything. It was kind of just us just going at it. And it was, it was almost a fun relief side project after having that massive project, like I said, kind of churning into that for a year. So actually, I'm really, really glad I did the Dollar Baby, because it was just such a nice, like, on what's the word I'm looking for? It wasn't, it wasn't a high level stress thing. It was something that we, we planned out and really just kind of had fun doing.

Dave Bullis 31:12
And, you know, that's something to, you know, I talked to Alex Ferrari about, Indie Film Hustle, and we were talking about that as well where, you know, at some points, and I mean, you you, and it's good that you learn at the age of 22 sometimes when you're making something, you just get this obsession with it, like everything has to be perfect. And then you start, you know, and everything that stress starts to get on you. And then you, by the end of it, you're like, I just can't wait to get this thing done, and I'll never talk about it again. And you're like, and honestly, that's what happened to me in my short, my student film. I By the end Joe, I was like, I just want to get these last shots I'm going to do the last day I was doing my short, my student film, I actually said I everybody. I said, we're doing one take of everything, that's it, and then I'm and then we're just going to call it a day. And everybody was just burned out from it. So we ended up doing more than one take on a lot of stuff. But still, it ended up and we're like, look, that's it. We're done. I don't want to talk about this ever again, but it's, you know, and then you want to do something fun where you just can have fun while you're actually shooting. Because, you know, at the end of the day, this is supposed to be fun, right?

Joe Kowalski 32:15
Yeah, yeah. And that's why I think you really, really have to care about the story you're telling with a big, long term production, because it is very easy to get tired of it, but you have to know deep down that when you finish it, it's going to be so rewarding, because it's a story you really care about. And in a way, you never quite leave it, because even after you show it, at least in my case, we did like crowdfunding, so you still have to go in and, you know, make the DVDs and the blu rays and the bonus material, and you still have to promote it for film festivals if you're trying to get into that whole realm and, and, and then you have to try to get the movie to various people and who didn't get chance to see it, and, and you forever are always kind of attached to it and and Pushing it and trying to get it out to people. So that's the thing. I think that's really important, and that's why I try to come up with good stories that are that I can care about even when I don't feel like caring about them.

Dave Bullis 33:18
Yeah, it is, you know, and when you're trying to have, you know, just a good time with this stuff. And you know, you want to be able to see, you know, have fun while you're making it. And then you see it up on the screen and something everyone can be proud of. And you because, you know, you all did your best. And you it's that feeling you get, you know, you okay, we've, you know, it was, it was a little tough. It was a little frustrating. We're all tired, but we all did our best. And now the the proofs in the pudding. Now it's all up on up on up on screen there. And, you know, some days you watch it and you like, oh, man, there's a mistake. There's another mistake, yeah. And, you know, and sort of, you know that, you know what I mean, like that, that that sort of seeps in after a while too. But, you know, at the end of the day, I think some of the best filmmaking advice is by Mark Duplass, where he said, literally, every weekend, go out and for 100 bucks, make a short film with your friends. He said, don't spend more than 100 bucks, and it'll teach you more about filmmaking. Then, then, then anything else could because you're actually out there doing it, and you're actually out there, actually making stuff. And you can, you know, and if you don't, and honestly, if it sucks, hey, we spent 100 bucks, if it's good you put up on YouTube.

Joe Kowalski 34:23
Yeah, absolutely. And, and that's one thing I'm really grateful for with things like YouTube, is because since I've been doing it for seven years now, fairly regularly, it is that kind of experience where I always am trying new things and and making cool stuff with friends and and you're right, like, you know, even if you're not even spending that much money, you're still getting the experience you're you're making something that can be a sort of time capsule. Like, I remember when I was hanging out with that friend in Cleveland, you know, years, years later. And I think, honestly, I think. That's how I got to where I am. It's not like I'm I'm not trying to brag or anything. I'm not saying that I'm, like, at the top of the top, or anything like that. But I think I've done more than a lot of peers my age because of that experience, and because I've always been interested in creating things, and I can't stop,

Dave Bullis 35:18
Yeah, yeah, exactly, you know. And you know you, I think artists more than anybody else, obviously, because they have this desire to create. It's like this desire, this innate desire, you're kind of born with, and you have this desire to create. And sometimes you're when you're younger, you don't really know what it is. You just kind of do it. You know what I mean, whether it be like an arts and crafts or something like that. And then some people pick up a video camera if they're, if they're, you know, if they that's what they're, if their adolescence is filled with, if their parents had a video camera. And you, you sort of, you know, you start doing all this stuff. And, I mean, you know, because you're born with this life, and it's almost like this feeling of, we have to create something of value at all times. And it's something I feel too. And it's almost like this feeling of, okay, I'm here now. What should I do? Well, you know, and if you're an artist, you say, Well, I'm gonna create some more. I got this desire to create. And, you know, maybe other people are like chefs, and they just want to make, make food. And that's that sort of desire to create. And you know, when we start putting all these projects out there. And you know, you've been doing YouTube for seven years, I think that's phenomenal, honestly, Joe, I hope you keep doing it. Because honestly, I you know you're obviously, I know you're getting better. You're getting better and better and better. And also because I just think it's a great outlet too. Because again, like we were just saying, if you make a film for 100 bucks, and if you don't like at the end of the day, hey, look, I spent 100 bucks. But if you do like it, hey, put it on, up on YouTube, and who knows what could happen.

Joe Kowalski 36:49
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And there's, there's, I think there's a lot of merit you were saying about having those, those projects that are just something fun. And one thing for me too, besides just the YouTube stuff, is also our podcast, which, which you've actually been on once before, and we're not, that's right, yeah, have Yeah, we're not as far along as you are, but we're getting pretty close to 70 episodes. And that's like a fun thing where, like, just me and a few of my friends can get together once a week and just have a good time. And it's not something, you know, I'll have it edited in a couple hours, and you still have to post it and promote it a little bit, get sponsors occasionally and stuff like that. But at the same time, when we're just sitting there recording it, it's just an hour where we can just just have a good time and talk whether it be about deep things or maybe it's just goofy, light hearted stuff. But that's been a really cool project to collaborate with my friends on, because it is that little kind of low stress relieving kind of project.

Dave Bullis 38:00
Yeah, it's, you know, the podcast is fun. You know, that's why I do my podcast. I actually made a promise to myself. I said, the day it stops becoming fun, I'm gonna stop doing it. I've broken that promise a few times. But, you know, I was listening, I was listening to Tim Ferriss one time, and he said, the whole idea, the whole concept of his podcast, was, he goes, I just want to edit it myself, but I want to make editing no more than 10 minutes. He goes, if I had to sit here and edit out stuff, he goes, I hate doing that. He goes, I think it's pointless. He goes. I just want to have a conversation and put it up online. And, I mean, look at his fan base. It's unfreaking believable. And you know that that's kind of like, what I wanted to was, you know, just having, not having to sit here for, you know, four hours a night going, Okay, let me edit this podcast and do all this stuff. I mean, I do do some editing to it, but I try to keep it as pure with the conversation as possible. Most of my editing involves like, I'm gonna boost your maybe I'll boost your audio a little bit, or maybe I'll put like, a de Hiser effect in there, just to sort of take out any sort of like that, that static noise, or D Hummer, something like that, you know. But, yeah, I mean, a podcast is a really cool way just to, sort of, you know, just it's another form of media, because the the the gatekeepers are all non existent. Because, I mean, literally, you can create a podcast with your phone now and upload it to like something like podbean.

Joe Kowalski 39:20
Yeah, absolutely. And I already had all the equipment I needed to to make something like this, because I already have a bunch of audio and video equipment from doing all the other work that I do. So it wasn't like I needed to go out and get some special stuff. I mean, eventually we did get, like, a nicer microphone, and, you know, we'd like to eventually save up to do more live shows, to kind of have the equipment to do that. But, I mean, most of the stuff was already there. All we needed was each other and an idea. So I totally see the appeal and and while I edit it in like 10 minutes, I do take out some things. And you. You know, we bleep out a couple words and stuff like that.

For the most part. It's, it is a pretty low stress project compared to a lot of other things that that I'm trying to do.

Dave Bullis 40:22
And, you know, actually, it's something else I want to talk about too, is, you know, what else are you trying to do? Because I know you did the Instagram murder mystery game. So I want to hear about this because, like, you know, I purposely don't know anything about it, because I wanted to actually talk to you about it. So, like, what is it like a game? It's a game that anybody can play, right?

Joe Kowalski 40:39
Yeah, yeah. As long as long as you have an Instagram account, you should be able to play it. And this is actually I was trying to make a capstone for an interactive media class that I was taking before I graduated this past semester. And you know, a lot of people were doing a lot of cool stuff with, like VR and with like, some interactive videos, but I was trying to think of something that I hadn't tried before, because I had done a little bit of both those things. And I was thinking a lot about how people use Instagram sometimes to create these picture grids of sorts. You know, if you upload the pictures in the right order, all of a sudden, if you go to that person's page, you know, one big picture can be made out of, like, nine pictures. And I just thought that was really cool. So I was wondering, like, Could you do something with that, like, how do you, how do you make something that feels self contained, you know, not like, it's like, like, it's like, you're inside this little experience through Instagram. And so what I did is I used those kind of picture grids, and I used the tagging system, whereas, like, if you, if you tap on a picture, it will come up with, like, a tag and that person's account. So I between those two features. Again, Instagram isn't designed for something like this. But I kind of, yeah, created a game of sorts. And if you go to the account murder mystery game, all one word, people can check that out. I mean, you start out with, like a map of Cleveland, and then if you go to the individual pictures, there are those tags where you can go to other parts of Cleveland and look for clues, and then you get the testimony from all these different characters. And you, if you tap on more of the pictures within those accounts, you can sometimes see these fake characters accounts and just little clues that are hidden throughout. And like I said, the whole idea is that you're trying to solve this, this murder mystery of this, this girl who was killed. So it was a very unusual project, because it's, it's not a linear thing where you just set out like, Okay, I have this scene and I have this scene, but at the same time, I was utilizing a lot of things I had learned from doing video and filmmaking and stuff like that. Whereas, you know, if you set up a schedule a meeting with this person at this time, we're going to record video of them. We're gonna stage a bunch of pictures with them, and then later on, we're moving to this person and and planning it out like that made it a much less scarier process, because I got way in over my head. One of the things I faced too was that for every new Instagram account, you have to have an email address attached to it. So I was just making all these Gmail accounts that were associating with all the different accounts. But then Gmail was like, Hey, you can't make that many accounts. And I was like, okay, so then I went to Yahoo, and I started making all these big Yahoo accounts to try to make more Instagram accounts. And Yahoo was like, Hey, you can't make that many Yahoo accounts, so I ended up going to like seven different email servers to try to create all these fake email accounts. I could make all these different Instagram accounts, which is just yet another way that proves that Instagram wasn't really designed to work like that. You know,

Dave Bullis 43:59
Yeah, definitely, you know, Instagram is cool and all, but there's a lot of things that are like limiting with it. I know they want to make like, for instance, the mobile uploading, you know, I tried to like post things. I can post things to my desktop, but you know what I mean? And sometimes they make it so difficult to just post, you know, stuff like that. But because I, hey, I want to take a photo, and I want to do some stuff to it, then put it then put it to Instagram. You know what I mean? Yeah, no, I understand completely. Were you?

Joe Kowalski 44:28
Oh, no, I'm sorry. It's a little bit of a lag. So that's that leads to some of it. I was just gonna say I did run into that problem a lot too, especially given that I have a very cheap phone that doesn't have a whole lot of memory, so anytime I had to, like, download all these pictures, or, God forbid, when I had to download the actual video clips, it would take up so much room on my phone that I would have to, like, delete a bunch of apps on my phone, download the pictures and footage, upload them to this Instagram account, and then re download my apps again.

Dave Bullis 45:03
It's, I mean, I know there was a slight lag on your side. I don't know, you know, I think I might be just our recording host, Skype, but, but with your phone and you had to do back up all that stuff. I've been there before I used to have, like, I bought, when the I bought one of the smart, first smartphones that came out, called the LG revolution, Joe was one of the worst freaking fans I've ever had. It was so I bought it into 2006 or seven. It was little, literally garbage. And I kept having to, like, back up on every everything else I would try to, you know, it was so I've been there, man, but, um, but no, I so it's so, if somebody wanted to, like, solve the murder mystery, Joe. So if I had an Instagram account, let's just say, right now I say I want to check out Joe's murder mystery game. I went to that Insta. I have an Instagram account. I went to your Instagram account. So we're, how do I how would I go about, like, solving my first clue to see, you know, to seeing who, you know, obviously, we find out who was murdered. How do we go about, you know, sort of doing this? Or do you provide any clues? Or are they supposed to, sort of have to solve it themselves?

Joe Kowalski 46:09
It's very much on the on the user's own volition, that they have to find the clues. But there are a lot of clues sprinkled throughout, but there's a lot of red herrings throughout and dead ends. And basically when most of the accounts start with murder mystery and then end with a word. So like when you're at the beach, it's murder mystery beach, and when you're downtown, it's murder mystery downtown. So to figure out if they solve right, you have to go to an account that starts with murder mystery and ends with the the murder weapon used to kill the victim. So and then on that page, you get to, kind of see if you were right, and you get a little, kind of set of pictures and a little video clip, kind of explaining how that went down. So if you look around and you go to all these different accounts, you'll you should be able to find out what the murder weapon was, and not everyone I've shown it to has figured it out. Some people needed a little extra help, but I did have quite a few people who were able to get to the end successfully. So that was the one thing I was nervous about. Like, did I make this too hard? Like, are people going to be able to figure this out? But there are, there are some people who were able to get to the end.

Dave Bullis 47:22
So without done, Joe, just, just to sort of ask, when you get to the end, is there any sort of like, like, I don't want to say prize, but is there anything that, like, a little trophy, or something that, like, people would like, you know what I mean, like they could sort of bragging rights. Or, you know what I mean, is there anything at the end where people know it's the end, and is there any type of like prize, so to speak, as I'm trying tosay,

Joe Kowalski 47:43
Um, not so much, any external prize. But like I said, when you when you get to the account, when you solve it, there is, like a set of pictures and like a video clip that kind of explained how, exactly how it happened. You get to see how that how the murder happened. And I that's, that's, that's pretty much it.

Dave Bullis 48:07
No, I just wanted to ask, you know, I imagine would be like, you know, cool bragging rights in it. And it is a really cool idea. So I'm glad, you know, honestly, using social media that way, where, you know, it's very creative, and, you know, it's a lot of interactivity, which I which, you know, I think is becoming big now, especially with, you know, stuff like advances in VR and stuff like that,

Joe Kowalski 48:28
Yeah, and that's the thing, is that all these interactive methods are constantly evolving. You're never going to have the same technology used, you know, even two or three years later, I went to the Cleveland Film Festival this year, which is a pretty, pretty big festival, for those who don't know anything about it, and they I went to a whole VR demonstration. And I've always kind of had a cattle interest in VR. I've gone to some meetings where I've got to try out the Oculus and and some of the other more elaborate ones where you get, like, the full body experience, which is really, really, really cool. And I, and I really believe, especially, that virtual reality is going to continue to be a bigger and bigger factor in our lives. I think, not only in terms of gaming, but in terms of of how we learn and things used in schools and and how we promote ideas, and it's can be such an immersive experience. But, yeah, some of these films at the Cleveland Film Festival, it's really interesting to see how they used virtual reality, because I think some of them nailed it really well. And some of them were like, you know, like, there was, I saw this documentary where they took you to an area where malaria was really active, and it was about this family trying to move to a new area where they could have tents that had mosquito nets on them and being and like seeing and be able to look around in these environments really, really connected you with this family in a way that I don't think I would have felt quite as strongly if it was just a regular 2d image that I was watching. And of course, at the end, it was for an organization where you could donate to help these families. And that was like a really exciting use of VR that I think that could be really useful in the future. But then I also watched another one where the whole idea was that you died and you got, like, buried. And that sounds really cool in theory, but it was not done in a way that I felt was, like it just felt really gimmicky, like it was telling, like, a really compelling story. I think it would be more interesting, but it was kind of grainy, and it was to the factor that, like, I think within two or three years, the technology is going to make something like that a little less likely to hold up than this really engaging documentary. And I also got to see too, there's a short film called Pearl that was nominated for an Academy Award, and it was a really big deal because it was the first virtual reality project to be nominated for an Academy Award. And that was another one like it was, yeah, maybe the technology will evolve. And it this, this short film won't be as immersive or as as high tech as it is right now, but it was such an endearing story that I think, I think it will hold up. It was about this, this father and daughter playing music together and traveling in the same band across across the country, and it was, it was just very, very touching. So I think, I think the more and more people use this kind of technology, and the more it evolves, I think we'll keep finding what works and what doesn't and what will hold up and what won't.

Dave Bullis 51:57
Yeah, you know, you touched on something there that I feel about, about, about VR, and sometimes I just feel that they're using it as sort of like a gimmick, where it's like, it's not really about a story, it's about, like, it's an exp, it's a pure experience. It's almost like a roller coaster. Yeah, you get on the roller coaster and you're not being you're not asking to be told a story. It's just like, here's an experience. And if, and if that, honestly, if that's what somebody wants to do. Hey, more power tone. Because, you know, I think, you know, you can't really tell somebody, you know, if that's what experience that you want to have. Hey, man, you know, go for it. But like, as far as storytelling goes, I think VR is gonna fall short. I just, I just don't think see it actually, where people are gonna sit there, honestly, Joe, if, like, maybe two hours, maybe four hours, even with, like, a video game. I'm talking about video games right now, worth like, if I had a video game with the VR headset on, with a controller in my hand, and it was like a first person shooter, and I'm, you know, zombies are coming in, I honestly can't see anybody. I can't see like, a main portion of the population anywhere in the world wanting to do that for more than, like, 20 minutes. I honestly, man, I think VR has a lot of lot of things it's going to share with 3d I think where VR is going to come into play. And I mentioned this with Jamie Buckner, who was on the podcast three episodes ago, as we were talking about this as well. I think the big thing with VR is is going to be education. Because yeah, because I actually used to work in higher ed, and I got to see a lot of different stuff. And I think one of the big things is going to be, is going to be like you, your textbook isn't going to be an actual book anymore. It's going to be almost like a tablet that, you know, when you're learning about the human body, you're going to, well, now we're gonna kind of get an AR, but, but the there's just gonna be an image of, like, Hey, we're studying the human brain, and then image of the human brain will come up out of this tablet, and, yeah, to actually interact with it, and touch and touch, okay, well, this is, this is your cerebellum, and this is gonna be your, you know, frontal cortex and stuff like that. And you're and you're like, oh, okay, that's where this is in the brain and shit like that. And I think that's where I think VR is going to be very huge. By the way, you want to hear something really cool that I was shown in higher ed, and it never got to I've never seen it anywhere, and I don't think, I don't think it's ever going to be approved. They had a special paint that had nanotechnology in it that actually blocked cell phones. So, like, you were like, Yeah, and actually, except for to dial 911, that was the only thing that it allowed. I never heard anything about it since I honestly passed, because I good, because probably, there's probably gonna be some issue where, like, it probably what. Well, they said it did it block nine. It didn't block 911, but they probably ended up did blocking 911, or something. And I couldn't and I couldn't figure out how to get it passed or, or maybe some, you know what I mean, because, because, if something ever did happen at a school, God forbid, you would sit there and say, Oh, well, they didn't have their cell phones because, then, because of the pain on the walls, yeah, so you don't want to be, you know, a. You don't want to be in that situation and then be like, well, the pain in the walls, you know, stop them. But, but, yeah, I but, but it's a cool idea, though. I mean, honestly, it sounds like a really good idea, but, but I get why it wouldn't be too mainstream, and maybe, maybe they're gonna roll it out later on. Maybe it's one of those things that takes a few years to come out, but, but, but, yeah, that's where I see VR going, as far as VR and movies go. I just don't think it's ever gonna happen. I honestly, I think we're at the point now where, I mean, there's a video game that's out right now that somebody was telling me, like, Hey, Dave, look at this. You could make a movie out of this someday. And I took a look at it, and I said, this thing is so far from a movie, I don't even know where to begin. And it was, it was this big war game where you could have these two armies battle into each other. And I said there's no, there's no detail to the characters. Every character has the same exact stabbing motion. I said it's really cool in scope. But I mean in in when you actually get down to it, it's not really, it's impressive from a coding standpoint, but from a movie standpoint, I said this would be, you know, people would tune out after a minute. You know, there's no story to it. There's no, there's no there's nothing that that's being told and you know that that's again, when we when we're differentiating between a story and an experience.

Joe Kowalski 56:15
Yeah, I think, um, I think there's a way they could still coexist, though, because I do kind of agree with you. I don't think it's going to take over movies, that all movie theaters are going to be VR experiences or anything, because I think it does offer a different thing. And the thing I'm starting to notice is that when you're directing a VR film, you direct it more like a stage show or like a play, because you with a movie, you have the choice of like. I'm going to put the pic to the camera here, and this is what the the audience sees. Whereas, like, with with a VR film, you have to think more of like, what do I what do I want to lead the audience toward? Like? If I want to look over this way, I'll have something flashy over here, you know? Or if I I'll have them follow this character as they walk across the way, and it presents an interesting challenge that I think doesn't replace movies, but could be a very interesting thing in and of itself. And I have to say, when it comes to gaming and stuff, there was a really cool game I tried at one of these VR demonstrations where you were on top of Castle and you had to knock over these little Minecraft like figures from getting into your fort. And I have to say, after, after about a minute of being there with this bow and arrow on top of this, this tower, you know, shooting at these little guys trying to get into your castle, not only do you, first of all, forget that you're pressing a button that's in your hand to unleash this bow and arrow, you kind of forget that you're not in this environment and and I think that's the thing where I don't know if I entirely agree that I don't, I don't think it will take I take over. Game may be the only thing available, but it was such an incredible experience for me to do this that if I think, if it's cheap enough, and I think it gets, it gets into enough hands, I can't see a future where this isn't a huge part of gaming personally,

Dave Bullis 58:12
Yeah, I, you know, I think it goes back to how people want to play their games. I know a lot of people want to like stream and it, you know, and they can wear their viewer headset and stream at the same time. I mean, like, for example, PewDiePie, if he were to do something like that, you know? I think also it depends upon sometimes, honestly, Joe, I feel like I'm staring at a screen every second of my day. Some days, which I probably am, I'm staring at either a laptop. I have four different laptops I have to use. I have two, two cell phones. And I'm just like, when I drive, I also have a an onboard computer that's my GPS, and also collect cell phone stuff for me. And it's just like, you know, I just, I don't have to look at that, but like, driving is probably the only time left. I'm not staring at a screen. And I'm just, you know, do I really want to do? I really want to, you know, just keep staring at a screen that's now gonna be like, two inches from my face. You know, I actually played, when I played that Batman game, it was actually for for PS four. It was actually really cool to look around the Bat Cave and everything like that. And, you know, take a look at this or that. And, and my friend had that exercise bike thing where you can put the VR headset on, and you can, you know you're in the Alps or whatever, really cool. But I just wonder if it's something where you're going to want to use it every day for the most and I know there's people out there who would use it every day, but for other people, I wonder if it's just something that would what I'm trying to say is I wonder if VR would end up just becoming a real niche market, almost like 3d became what I think 4k blu rays might become, because I hear 4k blu rays, and I honestly, you know, I mean, how many people if I, if I gave them, and, you know, a screen, I said, pick up the 4k version. Could actually find it if it was the same TV with the same players with, you know what I mean? Yeah, and it's just, Because, I mean, if it's not shot in 4k I mean, it's not going to look like 4k I mean, honestly, mad, Max Fury, road shot in 2k I see a 4k release of it, and I'm like, Why? Because it's not even, was even shot in 4k I mean, I know they could do upscaling and stuff like that, but I mean, really, you know what I mean? Like, I think a lot of this stuff's gonna end up becoming a niche sort of market, if that's just my prediction.

Joe Kowalski 1:00:36
Oh, VR will definitely have to cross that hurdle. Very similar to what you said, like 3d where I think one of the big reasons 3d didn't catch on as big as it did in a home market, is because of the glasses situation, you know, if you wanted to get together, because, like, I saw like, demonstrations of like, 3d sports games, and those are really cool. It just looked like these little tiny people, literally on your screen, running around. But, you know, like, if someone's trying to get together a group of friends and watch a like a like a basketball game or a football game or something like that, I highly doubt they're going to want to put on a bunch of glasses and fiddle with that. Now, let's get the settings right and stuff. So I think you're right to a certain degree. I think if VR wants to not just become that little niche thing, they're gonna have to find a way to, A, make it more financially available to everybody, and B, find a way that maybe they won't have to have these big, clunky headsets on the entire time, and make it more of a maybe a more integrated experience where it's it seemed like less hassle. You know.

Dave Bullis 1:01:38
Yes, that is, that is exactly right. Man, with those 3d glasses, I had a friend of mine who actually bought actually bought a 3d TV, and he bought four pairs of glasses. He bought it on one Black Friday. He had, you know, we went over there, we put on the glasses. We watched avatar, well, it's really cool. And I was like, you know, but after, and I'm like, you know, by the end, I'm less like, I'd rather just watch a regular 2d movie. Like, I honestly, man, I'm old school in that method where I'm just like, I'd rather watch an 80s horror slasher like Jason. Jason for the Friday 13th part three. He tried, they tried to make that 3d and I was like, Yeah, it's cool. And everything where, you know, the arrows are coming at you, the with the one shot and this and that another thing. But I'm like, at the end, you know, somebody once told me, good 3d goes in, bad, 3d comes out. So if you're constantly, like, dodging stuff that's, you know, okay, that's almost like a wake up to the audience, or that's like a cool effect, or whatever. But good 3d like Avatar was, it goes in and you can actually just see as far as you can, actually, as the eye can see, literally, because it's just an immersive world back there. You know what I mean? And, and, you know, that's one of the things why I actually did like Avatar. I actually was dating a girl at the time. I went to go see it, and she goes, That was terrible. That was terrible. I was like. I was like, shut up. What do you know about Shut up. What do you know about movies? I said, I'll tell you if it's good or not. No, I'm just kidding around. But, but, but, but, she said she didn't like it. We were just talking about it, and I was like, you know, I'm a sucker for James Cameron, but, but just to get back, we were talking about, you know, with, with all this stuff, you know, I just think, yeah, having people having to put on, like, headsets and stuff like that, it, it becomes like a, almost like a, like, you know, because some people are gonna say, oh, Greg, I put on this headset again. Or I gotta put it away, and you gotta find it again. Or it's just like something, like, they misplace it, they may or, you know what? I mean, it's just more things that are the moving parts to a situation. You know what I mean?

Joe Kowalski 1:03:25
Yeah, I think it's a very akin to something. I mean, it could go either way. Because, I mean, look at something like a, like a computer tablet, right? Like, like, when the iPad came out, people were scoffing because people been trying to pitch tablets for years. I mean, there have been, there have been tablets that came out in the 90s, and it just never connected with the public. You know, it just wasn't. They were too pricey, they were too clunky. But Apple managed to make something that people wanted and found a usage for. They brought back an old idea and made it in a way that was consumable, and made it in a way that people really, really liked. So, yeah, I completely agree, I think, with VR. And I think there are, I agree that there are some good uses of 3d but I don't think there was enough of a of a of a difference, like, um, I think one movie that used it really well that I saw in 3d was Pixar. Is up because, like, at the beginning of the film, the 3d was very flat, because you're living in his life where he's cooped up and and he's just this old guy, this widower and, and he's lonely. And then, like, when he's out there in the middle of South America, like, gets really deep, and he's up in the clouds, and it feels big and vast. So I think people are gonna have to use VR like that, you know, like I said, don't just tell a story about, look, you're dying and now you're in a coffin. Like, take the gimmick out of it and really focus on the exciting storytelling potential of this medium and what can be done with it, and, and, and that doesn't mean you have to play it safe, but, but be smart about how you use. It and use it in a way that that people connect to,

Dave Bullis 1:05:05
Yeah, exactly right, Joe, it always comes back to the story. It always comes back to, you know, what kind of story are you telling and what kind of emotional core are we going with here? You know what I mean? Because character, because people have to care about these characters. They have to be, you know, not sympathetic, but empathetic. We have to empathize with them and you know, and with the story you're telling. You know, it's just we have to become hooked. And that's why I always get pissed off Joe and people say you got to hook them in the first 10 pages. No, you have to hook them the whole freaking story, not the first 10 pages. Maybe the reader, maybe the maybe some reader, the gatekeeper, has to hook for the first 10 pages, for he or she passes. But for when I gather most, most gatekeepers, who are script readers, who have to read those scripts. They have to read everything cover to cover. They can't read the first 10 pages and say, CF, you know, forget this and and you know what I mean. And they have to read, report it, about it. Afterwards. They through their weekend reads and as well. And from what I gather, they have to read every script cover to cover. So you have to hook them the whole script. And you know, you have to hook them the whole whole time, no matter what you're doing. And you know, as you talk about the experiences that too, has a hook to it. You know, even if you ride a roller coaster, there has to be something special about it that sets it apart, whether you put all the extra loops in, whether twists and turns, whether you sit down like the Superman roller coaster, all that good stuff. And, yeah, I mean, you know, so, yeah, you know, everything has to have, you know, it's its speciality. It's, you know, what makes it special? And, you know, because Joe, I mean, we, you know, we've been talking for about over an hour now, and I want to ask, you know, Joe, is there anything we could talk about that you wanted to discuss now, or anything you wanted to say to put a period the end of this whole conversation?

Joe Kowalski 1:06:44
No, I guess just as a whole, like it's, it's really good to talk about this kind of stuff with people who who share your interests and and also care about creating. And I think it's important to to connect with with people who are doing stuff similar to us. And I think you just, you do that so wonderfully on your show and and you create this conversation, because there are all these people out there who are making such cool stuff, and it's so cool that you bring a light to those things. And I just want to thank you for for creating that conversation.

Dave Bullis 1:07:23
Oh, thank you so much, Joe. I try my best. I, you know, with this podcast and everything like that. And one of the reasons I started this was because I wanted to actually talk to filmmakers out there. And I got to meet Greenough, great people like you. I've got to, you know, I honestly got to meet so many great people. And I just look at it as, like, this is the tip of the iceberg, and I actually want to keep, just keep moving forward with this and in a lot of different ways, and, you know, and start doing a couple more things. And people, people actually, you know, not to segue too far away. But somebody once said to me, what are you working on now? You know, you haven't worked on anything in probably a few years, and honestly, it's, it's, I've been taking a step back, to take Stu to take two steps forward. And, you know, that's something I'm working on now, is I'm working on a ton of stuff, and a lot of cool podcasting stuff as well, that that I've been talking a few people about. And hopefully, you know, I'm gonna hope, hopefully, do a bunch of stuff with that soon and, but I also got other, a couple other things planned, but, but, yo, Joe, thank you so much, you know for coming on and work. Where can people find you out online?

Speaker 1 1:08:24
If you go to pogiejoe.com P, O, G, I, E, joe.com you can see all the things that I've talked about. We have our prism trailer on there. There's, I think I just put a thing about the murder mystery game. There's links to our podcast. And we're on all different kinds of podcasting apps and sources and everything. My YouTube stuff is on there, so if you want to see any of this stuff I've mentioned at all during the show, that's probably the best place to go.

Dave Bullis 1:08:54
And I will link to all that in the show notes. Everyone Joe does some really, really cool stuff. And I like that nickname too, poji Joe. And, you know, and, and he does some really cool stuff, and I'm gonna link to that all in the show notes. Joe Kowalski, poji Joe, I want to say thank you so much for coming on my friend.

Joe Kowalski 1:09:14
Hey, thank you so much. It's always a joy to talk to you.

Dave Bullis 1:09:19
Oh, thank you. And, you know, I appreciate at least one person wants to talk to me, but, but, but, thank you so much, Joe. No, it's really great. And honestly, man, I can't wait to see what you're gonna do next. And I also will introduce you to that guy who runs that film festival right now. I will shoot, I will make a Facebook message introduction and get you two talking.

Joe Kowalski 1:09:38
Thank you. That would be brilliant. I would really like to talk to him.

Dave Bullis 1:09:42
Sure, no problem, Joe. Joe, have a great day, and I will talk to you very soon my friend.