The emotional core of the story – part 1 of 2

The emotional core of the story – part 1 of 2

The emotional core of the story – part 1 of 2

Should we write only what we know? Play it safe and approach matters that we have lived through. Or should we take a wild chance, put everything on some fierce card, anything to blast our way out of the safe and comfy shell of ours. Out of our comfort zone. And what does that mean? Might it bring something deeper with it? Something which will bubble up from our subconscious, our heart(?), and attempt to enlighten our essence? To expand our inner cosmos?

This story appeared originally on my blog focusing on Narratives in technology and spirituality shaping our future:  Storygeist.

Confronted with the unease within

When asked about my novel “A child made to order”,  I would summarise it was a psychological drama/thriller about a woman’s inner struggle with her infertility. Upon this statement, I would mostly receive blank stares, followed by an uneasy silence, and the person in question would hurriedly skip to the next subject at hand. Anything which would brush over this anomaly.

Though sometimes, and maybe lucky for me, the more honest ones would spit it right out: “What (the fuck) do you, a 40+ year old male, think you know about infertility?”

Yes, what do I know about something as serious and life-debilitating as the Mitochondrial disease?  A rare genetic disorder which renders a woman’s offspring crippled. But even more to the point, what do I know about the long-term repercussions this disease has on these women’s psyche?

Although this question stung right at my insecurites, being as uncomfortable as it can get, it was also necessary to hear it. This was not only a perfectly valid question, it was a question which struck right at the heart of what we storytellers are trying to do. It demanded answers, why am I doing what I do, writing what I write and telling this story, instead of any other story.

And ultimately it also pushed me further into a confrontation with something which most of all attempt to run away from. Our inner unease.

The inquiry

So with this in mind, I would like to circle around the following questions.

Should we write only what we know? Play it safe and approach matters that we have lived through.  Or maybe it’s the other way around? We should only write what we don’t know? Take a wild chance, put everything on some wild card, anything to blast our way out of the safe and comfy shell of ours, out of our comfort zone.

And if we choose to go down this troubled path, why do we do it in the first place? What drives us into this great black, yawning chasm of this unknown? Why do we write about something which we have no emotional prerequisite to understand?  Is it only naive curiosity driven by our sheer stupidity, or is it some random chance? A quantum crap shoot of the universe?

And then maybe, just maybe, it might be something deeper? Something which bubbles up from our subconsious, our heart(?), and attempts to tell us something, to comprehend ourselves better, to expand our inner cosmos?

“It’s a myth that writers write what they know. We write what it is that we need to know. What keeps me sitting at my desk, hour after hour, year after year, is that I do not know something, and I must write in order to find my way to an understanding. This is the essence of all writing, to find a way to an understanding.” – Marcie Hershman

Digging for the core

It is easy as a writer to get caught up in the bells and whistles of the story.  The exquisite intricacies of the thrillerish plot, the suespenseful twists and turns, the amazing hook at the beginning, and the stunning revelations at the end. Or even the beautiful theme which might become the inititating point of the story. I certainly do it more often than not and get so fired up, it becomes notorieusly difficult to drag me down to mother earth.

There is nothing wrong with enjoying these skills manifested in our stories. All of them are able to add up to some nifty storytelling. They are the muscles, tendons, eyes, even intellect of the story told. But to get at the core of the story, that part which will not only flabberghast the recepient, but wrench their heart inside out, I believe we need to do some heavy lifting inside ourselves.

We need to dig for the emotional core of our story.

We are all broken

I used the better part of writing my novel  to come to terms with why I was writing it in the first place.

There was the initial infatuation with the theme of the current state of Genetics. And it still is. After all, we have a revolution in the making. We are right on the brink of a mile stone in humanity’s history, a point where we will be able to rewrite the most basic fibre of our existence, our DNA.  This theme sparked off the idea for the book. But this theme, or any other theme ofr that matter, won’t cut it for 80.000 words which have to push and pull the reader into a trance-like emotional rollercoaster.

So the writing process ended up being a journey, a self-ransacking. What did I have emotionally in common with such a protagonist like Viola? What was the resonating frequency between us?  Or to be more exact, what kind of flaws did I share with my character? What conscious wants did we have in common? And what uncioncious needs overlapped in our characters?

And most of all, why did the writing process about such a woman come so naturally for me? What issues were bleeding over from my personality over to the fictitious universe of my protagonist?

From my experience, only through this uncomfortable digging into our own psyche, do we have a chance at creating a story which will reverberate in someone else. In other words, have a shot at becoming universal. Or to put it in in a different manner: The more I write, and make conscious why I write, the more precise and pinpointed my underlying message becomes.

There are some people, writers, artists, etc, who, in a self exclamatory manner, claim they’ve conquered their demons. They’ve become their own Supermen/women, the master’s of their own universe.

And it might even be true, I wish that for them.  But personally, I believe this process, the confrontation with what’s inside us,  is never finished. Not because I enjoy the anguish it brings, but because it carries with it a constant self-inquiry. And this is what makes us grow. This mental destress and misery is what pushes us to transcend beyond what we are now.

For me Ernest Hemingway’s words bring with them a deep psychological and spiritual truth. They strike right at the heart of the cracks which never quite mend inside us, but intead help us evolve and ascend.

“We are all broken, that’s how the Light gets in.” – Ernest Hemingway

Please come back in two weeks time for the next installment of this article.  I will touch more upon the process, my conclusions and what kind of healing role art is able to fulifll.

Finally, I would also like to extend deep gratitude to Laura Makabresku for letting me use her photos for this story. For me personally, few others epitomize the psychological anguish which lurks just beneath our surface.

Latest News

Łukasz Maciejewski recommends I AM REN

Łukasz Maciejewski recommends I AM REN

I am proud to announce that the well-known french Film Sales Agent outfit Reel Suspects has taken on our feature film project I am REN (Panacea). Reel Suspects will be responsible for the world sales and will already start with private screenings of a rough-cut of REN at Festival de Cannes 2019.

read more

Storygeist blog

Storygeist – a bird’s eye view

Storygeist – a bird’s eye view

As the Sciences plunge into the impossibilities of Quantum physics, decipher the world of vibrations and frequencies, technology closes in on the ancient truths which the mystical traditions have spoken to us from the dawn of time. And as our world is hurled into a wrenching acceleration of change, we believe that stories are essential to our inner development. A ritual which passes timeless values from one generation to the next. And encapsulate not only intellectual meaning, but also a beating heart which can feed our souls. Join us and read this to get a bird’s eye view of our stories.

read more
Agatha unravelled – part 2 of 2

Agatha unravelled – part 2 of 2

What if the current multi-million venture to break out of the Matrix succeeded? What if we got our answers during a world upending event named The Fissure? But they turned out to be not the ones we wished for.
“Agatha Unravelled” is a short story which revolves around one man’s need to come to terms with his grief, while he attempts to unravel the secret behind his wife’s death and how it connects with the Fissure.

read more
Agatha unravelled – part 1 of 2

Agatha unravelled – part 1 of 2

What if the current multi-million venture to break out of the Matrix succeeded? What if we got our answers during a world upending event named The Fissure? But they turned out to be not the ones we wished for.
“Agatha Unravelled” is a short story which revolves around one man’s need to come to terms with his grief, while he attempts to unravel the secret behind his wife’s death and how it connects with the Fissure.

read more
Venture me out of the Matrix

Venture me out of the Matrix

Two of the Silicon Valley’s moguls latest project is to break us out of the Matrix, which they strongly believe exists and has the humanity enslaved. This is a perfect opportunity to look at the intersection of Technology and Spirituality and identify why these tech-billionaires have come to such a conclusion and what lies behind all of this, according to several ancient spiritual traditions.

read more
Virtual Reality and the reimagining of Story – part 5

Virtual Reality and the reimagining of Story – part 5

So you grab his hand, and scramble for the sliding doors. You shoulder your way across the jeering crowd. You are almost there, the way out to freedom, but as you reach the doors, they are gone. You whip your head around and realize you’ve been pushing the wrong way. But you are 100% certain the doors were on this side. No matter. So you make a valiant effort, and crash your way onto the other side of the subway. All this time Markus begs you to hurry. He is about to capsize, and every second counts. It’s your son goddamnit, and those bastards are everywhere, standing between you and your son’s life.

read more

Films & Books

The emotional core of the story – part 2 of 2

The emotional core of the story – part 2 of 2

The emotional core of the story – part 2 of 2

Innocuous questions posed?

The questions that kicked off the story “The emotional core of the story”  two weeks ago were simple enough.

Should we write what we know? Or  should we take a wild chance, put everything on some wild card, a complete unknown, anything to blast our way out of the safe and comfy shell of ours, out of our comfort zone.

These questions, although seemingly innocent, open up a slew of themes which beg to be queried.

Last time, I concluded at how important it is to arrive at a deeper emotional connection between us, the writers, and the characters in our stories. The true stuff of life, our hard earned emotional experience which has burnt its way into our subconscious, and made us into who we are.

This time around I would like to go deeper into the process of writing my novel “A child made to order”. Into my own experience of enquiry about the main character of this novel and the emotional connection I developed with Viola. A protoganist which was as far away from my own personality as I could possibly imagine. Or so I thought initially.

But more importantly I would like to break down my process of enquiry into some more manageable steps and conclusions.  So  others might hopefully take away something of value from this.

But first let’s look at the origin of the process itself.

 

(This story appeared originally on my blog focusing on Narratives in technology and spirituality shaping our future:  Storygeist.)

Self-enquiry, its true meaning and ultimate goal

Self-enquiry is a well known spiritual process, used by Buddhists to arrive at deeper truths about what is hidden within us. The divine part which is hidden in us. It can be as simple as a prolonged focus on the question “Who am I?”. When done with scrutiny and vigor, it can uncover our ego and mind as illusions. Bear in mind, this enquiry takes an incessant effort and patience on our part. Think of this process not in terms of months, but a life-time.

The people who are familiar with this process in practice might object to it immediately. They would say it is not aimed at things in this world, not at our psychology, our wounds, and our subcouncious.

I think differently of this matter. I do believe that given a meditative mind, cleansed of the incessant chatter of our thoughts, we are able to uncover some groundbreaking truths about ourselves and the world around us. You might ask, what has this to do with writing? Surely spiritual practice and its immaterial rigor has nothing in common with the creative process.

Well, I think otherwise.

I believe most of us are already doing this process, more or less consciously. Regardless if we are a hardcore spritual practitioner or hate the mere thought of meditation.

Just think about it. Isn’t writing a very active form of meditation? Many artists describe the process of creation, the inspired flow, as a hyper-focused union with something so much larger than our own personality. As a blissful state, a place we disappear into. A swallowing of our whole essence into the immanent.

That’s why I think that by writing, we are able to arrive at these truths. The same way spiritual self-enquiry is able to do. Be it psychological or spiritual questioning.  And by writing a lot, we vibrate ever higher with our mind, our focus, reaching for ever more refined and universal answers.

The protagonist’s fragmented psyche

With this in mind, let’s get more specific about my experience of this process. And how this can translate into our writing.

Viola, the main character of “A child made to order” is a 42 year old woman who has been through eleven gruelling IVF cycles. This emotional rollercoaster of high hopes and crushed dreams have laid her psyche in ruins. A short quote from the novel sums up the inner resentment and frustration so havily experienced by Viola and other infertile women.

It’s also an ample illustration of how many years of emotional battering can distort these women’s self-image and project their inner drama, and low self-esteem, onto others.

The protagonist

Having done several months of research, collecting a mountain of notes, read countless recounts, and consulted with a psychologist who has dealt with infertile women, I chose deliberately to enter the story as late as possible, just about when Viola was turning 42.

This is the time, when given an opportunity to surface, the motherly instinct can overwhelm a woman’s otherwise completely rational life. I thought this was the perfect opportunity to have the protagonist go completely off the rails. You just don’t get a more fascinating character than this.

An immense potential for engaging drama.

“Some stuff can be learned from others, some stuff can be read, and some stuff can be learned the hard way, through experience, but the deepest truths about ourselves, the universal truths about what it means to be a human, they are rarely arrived at by our mind. They are given to us by Grace. If we are willing to receive them. – Piotr Ryczko

Enquiry as a process

With this character and the process of self inquiry in mind, I focused in on the classical model of the main character’s need and want. I also formulated a few simple questions.

What is the one thing Viola needs so most dearly in the world? The thing without which her world would never be complete.

I knew she wanted a baby, but I needed to go deeper than that. Was it the love which she would be able to give to her child? Or was it, more egoistically angled, the love she would receive from that child?

And did any of this resonate with my self?

I found out that the answers didn’t come at first. It was a struggle. Sometimes they didn’t surface for several weeks. This may  be one of the the hardest part of our work as writers. To identify what is truly ours in our writing. Or why it is the way it is.

And often, the answered remained elusive. Because the real issues, our own flaws, and wounds, they would do just about everything to stay concealed in our own subcionscious.

Still, if we keep at it, formulate the question, re-focus on this matter while we write, I believe our true nature surfaces sooner or later.

For me personally I learned that my inner being didn’t necessarily need a child like Viola did, but there was a deep need for unconditional love in my persona. In other words love which wasn’t asking for something in return. But was sufficient in itself and was rather a spiritual search.

I also found out that our needs, can often turn toxic. They can overwhelm us, and lead us to destructive behaviour. That is if we let them, and we are not mindful of ourselves. This is exactly what happens to my protagonist. And this is what happened to me in the past where my spiritual path, an uncompromising search for the transcendent, laid my life into a wasteland.

And if you think about it, this is what happens in every gripping story. This experience is the real ammo for our storytelling.

This was the case with Viola where her life goes off the bend when she suddenly gets the opportunity at the impossible. To give birth to a child.  This spins her unquenched desire into an emotional storm which blinds her rationality, where she burns all the bridges in her life, fires herself from her own dream job, and puts her in an uncanny mental territory, where she is able to kidnap a stranger’s child on a subway.

The writing, the enquiry led me to the conclusion that even the most beatiful things, or maybe especially the most beatiful things in our life can be such a double edged sword. Being so crucial to our own existence,  they also hold immeasurable power over us.

A power strong enough to derail our normal existence into an emotional war zone.

Tapping into our psyche

I continued to tap into my emotional past. Not in a literal sense, I wasn’t writing a biography, but I pulled at the raw emotions of it all. A fountain of untapped feelings which gave the narrative the rawness it required.

I soon realised that although the research is critical, the facts aren’t so important as the raw energy of the emotions in the story. I wasn’t writing a clinical account of an infertile women, and this wasn’t a non-fiction book. What I was after was rather the vibrant and relentless emotional battering of the reader’s senses. And the best scenes were the ones, where the protagonist’s hurt, and pain overlapped with my own. Emotionally and metaphorically.

I repeated this process for other areas of the Viola’s character. And found such an interweaved web of character traits, mirror images which reflected back some fragments of myself. As the process became second nature, a fountain of questions welled up.

What is the thing that Viola detested most about herself? Why does she detest vulnerability so much? What did others to her?  How far would she go to conceal her wounds? What woud she do? Would she be willing to sacrifice her relationship, even the most trusted people? And what would it take for her to break through that shell?  To free her from her past.

These questions were aimed at the main character of the novel, but there was no escaping it,  they were also always gunned at myself. To test what resonated and what didn’t. What my mind was bored by. What it was frightened by, or what it rebelled at. The rebellion and the fear were always good signs. The right direction.

I also found out that the hardest truths about ourselves, our flaws which cause our most destructive patterns, are  the ones which are the most elusive to our own mind. And when you think about it, they are like our blind side, right in front of our nose, staring right into our face, and so obvious for everyone else, except us.  Rarely made conscious by our own eyes and mind.

And that is also the reason why self-enquiry is so challenging. Maybe the most challenging part about writing.  To keep at it, and uncover hidden, often painful truths about ourselves.

But on the other hand, it is also why this process can be so wonderfully fruitful, because many times we won’t have any clue why we write what we do. But in due time, with patience, some consideration for our neurotic nature, something deep wells up from our inside. It opens up, and makes us conscious of what is inbetween those seemingly empty lines – universal truths about ourselves.

I believe that to tap into this well, launch into this self-discovery, can elevate our writing, from the mundane to the sublime.

Lastly, we do this not only so we can write better drama, but also so we can hopefully become just a little bit more human. Towards one another.

This was the second and last part of  “The emotional core of the story”. If you want to read the first installment of this article, please go HERE.

I would also like to extend deep gratitude to Laura Makabresku for letting me use her photos for this story. For me personally, few others epitomize the psychological anguish which lurks just beneath our surface.

And finally I want to leave you with a few well chosen words from Paul Shrader, the screenwriter of the Taxi Driver fame, who touches upon the very same issues of my story, accessing our own emotional history, our pain, as the source for our stories.  But what he does, is to add his own two cents. Words which carry with them such great wisdom.

“Yeah, that’s a well (the emotional wounds) that you can go back to. There won’t always be water in it, but you can go back and check. As your life moves on you start to say, “What am I really confronting now? Is there a metaphor, is there a story metaphor that will express what I’m trying to understand about my life?” You have to be very calculated about how you access that pain. It’s no fun being at the mercy of destructive impulses, and the one thing that art does is it allows us to put a leash on them. I think you learn that pretty quick. Otherwise you end up going to jail or overdosing…” – Paul Shrader

Latest News

Łukasz Maciejewski recommends I AM REN

Łukasz Maciejewski recommends I AM REN

I am proud to announce that the well-known french Film Sales Agent outfit Reel Suspects has taken on our feature film project I am REN (Panacea). Reel Suspects will be responsible for the world sales and will already start with private screenings of a rough-cut of REN at Festival de Cannes 2019.

read more

Storygeist blog

Storygeist – a bird’s eye view

Storygeist – a bird’s eye view

As the Sciences plunge into the impossibilities of Quantum physics, decipher the world of vibrations and frequencies, technology closes in on the ancient truths which the mystical traditions have spoken to us from the dawn of time. And as our world is hurled into a wrenching acceleration of change, we believe that stories are essential to our inner development. A ritual which passes timeless values from one generation to the next. And encapsulate not only intellectual meaning, but also a beating heart which can feed our souls. Join us and read this to get a bird’s eye view of our stories.

read more
Agatha unravelled – part 2 of 2

Agatha unravelled – part 2 of 2

What if the current multi-million venture to break out of the Matrix succeeded? What if we got our answers during a world upending event named The Fissure? But they turned out to be not the ones we wished for.
“Agatha Unravelled” is a short story which revolves around one man’s need to come to terms with his grief, while he attempts to unravel the secret behind his wife’s death and how it connects with the Fissure.

read more
Agatha unravelled – part 1 of 2

Agatha unravelled – part 1 of 2

What if the current multi-million venture to break out of the Matrix succeeded? What if we got our answers during a world upending event named The Fissure? But they turned out to be not the ones we wished for.
“Agatha Unravelled” is a short story which revolves around one man’s need to come to terms with his grief, while he attempts to unravel the secret behind his wife’s death and how it connects with the Fissure.

read more
Venture me out of the Matrix

Venture me out of the Matrix

Two of the Silicon Valley’s moguls latest project is to break us out of the Matrix, which they strongly believe exists and has the humanity enslaved. This is a perfect opportunity to look at the intersection of Technology and Spirituality and identify why these tech-billionaires have come to such a conclusion and what lies behind all of this, according to several ancient spiritual traditions.

read more
Virtual Reality and the reimagining of Story – part 5

Virtual Reality and the reimagining of Story – part 5

So you grab his hand, and scramble for the sliding doors. You shoulder your way across the jeering crowd. You are almost there, the way out to freedom, but as you reach the doors, they are gone. You whip your head around and realize you’ve been pushing the wrong way. But you are 100% certain the doors were on this side. No matter. So you make a valiant effort, and crash your way onto the other side of the subway. All this time Markus begs you to hurry. He is about to capsize, and every second counts. It’s your son goddamnit, and those bastards are everywhere, standing between you and your son’s life.

read more

Films & Books

The future of the filmmaker Auteur

The future of the filmmaker Auteur

The future of the filmmaker Auteur

(This story appeared originally on my blog focusing on Narratives in technology and spirituality shaping our future:  Storygeist.)

Recently, Paul Shrader of the Taxi driver fame has spoken out what he thinks about the state of film. More specifically, he pointed out that Film as a storytelling medium is no longer culturally relevant. What Paul means by Film is the iconoclastic cinema made in the US in the 70s or the tradition of the intellectual European cinema. Simply put, Cinema as a work of Art.

I would like to take a closer look at the impact the social media has had on the movie going public, the entropy of the intellectual cinema due to the market forces and the perpetual problem of monetization of a work of art that cinema should be.

And where is the story/cinema auteur in all of this? I think there will alwayas be a public for sensitive cinema made as an art-experience, as there will always exist a public for fine literature. 

But I also see the emergence of a few trends which might change the way we make movies in the coming decade. And I believe this coming 10-15 years will bring forth new ways to tell stories, unlike anything we’ve seen before, and it will be more accessible than it has ever been before. All of this will have a major impact on the Auteur Filmmaker/Storyteller. In the most profound way.

Let’s go!

“True social interaction in Virtual Reality can be created in two ways: A. multiplayer interactions connecting live users synchronously, and B. through true AI actors that interact and respond naturally based on the user’s nuanced interactions and cues. (I’m referring to pure, deep AI in this case, not the simple AI of playing against the game itself, which is quite common today).” – Jacob Mullins  –  “VR + AI: the very real reality of virtual artificial intelligence”

The entropy of the experience of the story

I think what Paul Shrader is communicating is both provocative and most probably highly unpopular.

Mr. Shrader makes a point that net’s all encompassing nature has given us access to the whole world’s catalog of films. All of this with barely a flick of the finger. How many thousands of hours of beating can our conscious/subconscious mind take before it screams from nausea and begs us to stop? Is the media overload unavoidable in our times? How many Narcos, House of Cards, The killings, can our brain assimilate? All of them amazing mini-series in their own rights, but when the occasional binge becomes a full-tme habit, what then? Are we destined to become media junkies without any harder fix around the corner?

It’s not only the sense that we’ve seen everything. Every possible configuration of the story.

But it’s also the social media’s immediacy, the constant interaction, around the clock availability, and general amount of noise which it generates. This is so intense, that I believe our patience has deteriorated into a five year olds kiddo. And this kid has no idea what good manners are.  Being plugged into the matrix, 24/7, is not only giving us our fix, but it’s also rewiring our brain, psychology, perception of reality, and what goes with it, our behaviour.

As the tempo of our lives is accelerated, so are our expectations of the next short snippet of story or anything that will amuse us, frighten us or just jerk us into tears. Unfortunately, this bombardement of our senses and emotions also leads to numbing down of our sensitivity.

We not only demand more, but we become full-baked connoisseurs of the cinema. And when that doesn’t work, we throw fits, and unload our fury all over Facebook why the latest movie didn’t give us the instant gratification we expected from it.

So where do we go from here? How can the artist hope to flourish and satiate the insatiable audience? Are there any alternatives in the near-future?

The emergence of the new Auteurs

I believe that no matter how you look at it, film will always be prohibitive because of the costs involved. I should know, I am a filmmaker, and after many short films, I am now preparing my feature film debut, an indie film on a small scale budget.

No matter how you look at it, all of the production costs add up very quickly, and unless you are aiming for a low quality, b-movie type of thing, you need professional and skilled actors who  understand and feel the psychology of your story’s characters.

You need a small team of trusty people around you, and for them to be consistent, and dependable, they need to be paid so they don’t have to worry about paying their bills for a month, or even two.

Taking into account all of this, film means investement, and often also involves high risk. With no firm guarantees for succces, ciritical or financial success.

But I believe that how we make movies will potentially change in the nearest decade. They will not be done as live action, but rather fully digitally.  With the help of  highly sophisticated A.I. agents to generate these new kind of stories, they will be amazingly visual, they will represent uncanny worlds, and will be done only by a handful of people, if not even a single person.

And since this will be done with a much smaller team than even a low budget movie, they will become accessible to many more budding creators. And thus might also become a very personal experience. Just like books have been, and will always be, a one man’s vision.

How is this possible? Let’s take a closer look.

“Film is a medium where someone can share the story of an experience, whereas Virtual Reality is a medium where you can give someone an experience that they can generate their own stories from.” – Eric Darnell – Baobab Studio

Building and inhabiting the Virtual World

I come from a professional 3D animation background where we used 3D software Maya to design the world, the character’s, the textures and finally the animation. It was all done in a highly painstaking manner, designed, modelled, skinned and animated by a number of people to output the first norwegian 3D animated TV series (1998-2000). It’s been almost twenty years since we did that series, but the process hasn’t changed dramatically since then.

Of course there is better software, higher quality renders, real time tools like Unreal Engine which are going the VR route now. But for the most part, the approach and design philosophy is still the same. And what goes with it, the incredible amount of time it takes to arrive at the finished product. High-quality 3D animation.

Take a tool like Unreal Engine, where you, after importing the models, have to painstakingly specify all the interactive rules of the world. Although quite accessible, even to a non-programmer, it’s still an arduous process, to specify all the what ifs, and don’ts of this world.

But I belive this is about to change. With the advent of A.I., and a “What You See is What You Get” WYSIWYG approach, a small team, or even a single person, will be able to create worlds unlike anything we’ve seen before.

I believe that these tools will evolve, into high-level, easily accessible and intutive front-ends. And this will make it possible to build enourmous worlds without an army of highly specialised people.

Take a look at the evolution of HTML design. WordPress is one example where the focus, and necessity of coding, has been lifted away by such front-ends as the Visual Composer or Divi Builder. Both of them allow a WYSIWYG approach to HTML-design. This allows a speedy process, without any guesswork, of the design for the website. And if you want complexity, you can at any time dig deeper into the code, in any of the modules of these front-ends.

One can argue that the process of designing a 3D world, building the models with artistic integrity and texturing them with flare, rigging and skinning the models for animation, is so much more complex of a process. And yes, it certainly is, but this is where Artificial Intelligence algorithms will do the heavy lifting in the very near future.

These agents, which will be under the hood of every sophisticated software, will make possible a new form of communciation between the storyteller, and the tools creating the world.

Imagine the real world, now.  A dialog between the production designer and the Film Director on their next project. The Film Director brings to the table the characters, the story, and how to tell it visually. While the Production Designer does everything possible to support this story, and the characters’ psychology, through the space they inhabit. Both of them have a back and forth dialog, where often the Production Designer, brings some moodboards, sketches and inspirations. Ideally the Film Director will give feedback to the Production Designer, what works, what doesn’t, and why. When they have homed in on the final design, the Production Designer will manage a team of people to realise that vision.

And now replace the Production Designer with an Artificial Intelligence agent, akin to Apple’s Siri, but inherently way more sophisticated. This agent will take propositions from the Director, or suggest something of its own accord. And then it will adjust the models, the textures and the 3d characters, all in real time, based on the Director’s input.  Fine level control will always be possible, but I think the tools will get there, that it will be lightning fast, to change the physique of the characters and the appearance of the surroundings.

Change the character’s skin color, make her just a little bit older, give her more freckles on that side of the face, give her a summer dress and a hat. Now take this character and put her in this scene of where she been in a mild car crash. Rip up her clothes, give her scars, here and there, and so on and on.  All of this done in real time, in a conversational manner, in VR space.

Ultimately, I am not saying that the modeler, the texturer and all these noble, and highly specialized jobs will become superfluous. Far from it, but with the use of these highly evolved A.I. agents, the coarse part of the job might be both greatly simplified, and accelerated.

“This is a sophisticated audience that processes multiple streams of information faster than ever before, and craves a deeper connection to the content that can be shared across social profiles. The virtual experience is the new theatrical experience, whereby the 21st century viewer is unable to distract themselves with the second (and third, and fourth) screen. Here exists an outlet to control and capture their undivided attention. A new means for escapism.” – David Beard

Redefining the narrative

I’ve looked at the visual side of this potential narrative. And although this represents a huge challenge, I believe that the biggest hurdles are the narrative itself, and the characters’ psychology populating this story. How openy or closed do we tell the story? How much control do we give over to the person experiencing this dramatic narrative?

Just to get this out of the way first. There will be countless approaches to the narrative itself in VR. But what I am interested, and will propose, is sometimes labeled as “The Participant Active” experience.

What this means is that the person enjoying this story exists in this world as a character, and influences her own story, as well as the world around her. Yet this is done in a framework of a story’s structure. For convenience sake, just let’s use the classic 3-act structure which has an inciting incident, several psychologically crucial turning points, and an ending.

Let’s talk about the structure. This will be created by the dramatic spine of the story, a 3-act structure. Even though an A.I. agent will steer the characters and the turning points in this story, it will become an artform in itself, to predefine this story.  A deep understanding of storytelling and its careful planning will be just as important as ever.

In other words, what kind of characters and their traits, do I need to accomplish a certain kind of story?

For example, let’s take a look at a thriller narrative and its structure. This type of genre is driven by the antagonist with the main protagonist mostly doing the reacting. Actually the whole structure of this kind of story is the master plan of the antagonist.

So for this purpose, I need an antagonist which will drive this thriller narrative in such a way, that he will always extort, pressure, and use whatever means to get what he wants, with predefined methods. And at each major turning point he will drive our main character into even more intense dramatic action. Until it will climax in a final stand-off, where the protagonist will either win or not.

The creation process of this story would be done again in a coversational manner with an A.I. agent who would represent the characters itself. It would be a learning process. And just as within the movie “Her”, a woman A.I. springs to life and grows, so would each of the storyteller’s characters evolve into mature A.I. beings, who would then interact with the human participant in the narrative itself.

Growing the appropriate characters for this story, or any other kind of story, will become a crucial part of the development process.

And just as important as predefining this story correctly, so will be finetuning it.

I imagine the author/VR director would playtest out his story many times and would look at the different outcomes generated by the character interactions. He would lock down on some predefined dramatic spines, and tweak the characters and the story points, until he arrives at a certain amount of possible story ednings. The main point being is that the turning points and the possible, and finite outcomes would be wholly controlled by the human Auteur. This is to keep the artistic integrity of this work as personal and pure as possible.

The future reinvented

And to come back full circle to the current state of film. Especially the social media, and how it is evaporating the attention span and the filmmaker’s potential public.

I think as technology progresses, the public will demand much more than a passive experience. It goes without saying that Facebook’s success is based on humans’ need for mutual interaction.  For the millenial generation who is always hooked up, active and interacting with each other, I believe that passive mediums which require focus, reflection, will become a thinbg of the past. Surely there will be the ones uniquely interested, but they will be a minority.

Eventually it will come down to two sorts of storytelling experiences, one inhabited by human players who interact, and share an experience, or a story. And the second one where they will interact with intelligent, emotional A.I.’s specifically constructed to drive forward a certain narrative, preferably predefined and created by a skilled human storyteller.

And when this will be solved in a believable and natural way, it will create new forms of narratives, unlike anything we’ve ever seen before.

Just imagine an Amazon Kindle format, available for the masses, just as readily as Amazon`s book format is, but in VR and populated by intelligent, quirky, fascinating characters, and incredible flexible, real-time processed narratives, with visuals just as stunning as the latest Valerian or Marvel Comic cinema behemoth. But all of this done with unique personal integrity, and sensitivity of current filmmakers of the art-house cinema or the beatiful european cinema of the 70s.

“Suddenly one day some little fat girl in Ohio is going to be the new Mozart… and make a beautiful film with her father’s little camera-recorder, and for once this whole professionalism about movies will be destroyed forever and it will become an art form.” – Francis Ford Coppola

Latest News

Łukasz Maciejewski recommends I AM REN

Łukasz Maciejewski recommends I AM REN

I am proud to announce that the well-known french Film Sales Agent outfit Reel Suspects has taken on our feature film project I am REN (Panacea). Reel Suspects will be responsible for the world sales and will already start with private screenings of a rough-cut of REN at Festival de Cannes 2019.

read more

Storygeist blog

Storygeist – a bird’s eye view

Storygeist – a bird’s eye view

As the Sciences plunge into the impossibilities of Quantum physics, decipher the world of vibrations and frequencies, technology closes in on the ancient truths which the mystical traditions have spoken to us from the dawn of time. And as our world is hurled into a wrenching acceleration of change, we believe that stories are essential to our inner development. A ritual which passes timeless values from one generation to the next. And encapsulate not only intellectual meaning, but also a beating heart which can feed our souls. Join us and read this to get a bird’s eye view of our stories.

read more
Agatha unravelled – part 2 of 2

Agatha unravelled – part 2 of 2

What if the current multi-million venture to break out of the Matrix succeeded? What if we got our answers during a world upending event named The Fissure? But they turned out to be not the ones we wished for.
“Agatha Unravelled” is a short story which revolves around one man’s need to come to terms with his grief, while he attempts to unravel the secret behind his wife’s death and how it connects with the Fissure.

read more
Agatha unravelled – part 1 of 2

Agatha unravelled – part 1 of 2

What if the current multi-million venture to break out of the Matrix succeeded? What if we got our answers during a world upending event named The Fissure? But they turned out to be not the ones we wished for.
“Agatha Unravelled” is a short story which revolves around one man’s need to come to terms with his grief, while he attempts to unravel the secret behind his wife’s death and how it connects with the Fissure.

read more
Venture me out of the Matrix

Venture me out of the Matrix

Two of the Silicon Valley’s moguls latest project is to break us out of the Matrix, which they strongly believe exists and has the humanity enslaved. This is a perfect opportunity to look at the intersection of Technology and Spirituality and identify why these tech-billionaires have come to such a conclusion and what lies behind all of this, according to several ancient spiritual traditions.

read more
Virtual Reality and the reimagining of Story – part 5

Virtual Reality and the reimagining of Story – part 5

So you grab his hand, and scramble for the sliding doors. You shoulder your way across the jeering crowd. You are almost there, the way out to freedom, but as you reach the doors, they are gone. You whip your head around and realize you’ve been pushing the wrong way. But you are 100% certain the doors were on this side. No matter. So you make a valiant effort, and crash your way onto the other side of the subway. All this time Markus begs you to hurry. He is about to capsize, and every second counts. It’s your son goddamnit, and those bastards are everywhere, standing between you and your son’s life.

read more

Films & Books

Reviews for the novel A CHILD MADE TO ORDER

Reviews for the novel A CHILD MADE TO ORDER

Reviews for the novel A CHILD MADE TO ORDER

The reviews for the novel “A child made to order” on Amazon

The reviews for the novel are in and I would like to share some of the reactions with  you below.

I would like to extend gratitude to everyone who has read the novel, and contributed with a few words on the Goodreads, Amazon US and UK. 

And if you haven’t read the novel yet, it’s available on paperback and Kindle on AMAZON.

For more info on the book please see “A child made to order”.

To read more about the publishing house behind it, please go HERE.

book-folks

“Superb psychological thriller. We stay with Viola all the way through her ordeal. Powerful and at times a bit chilling. Well worth the read.”

Amazon customer about the novel – A child made to order

Norwegian filmmaker and author Piotr Ryczko offers the literary world something unique. He has written a quality enigma/thriller novel. I do recommend reading this dark tale…it’s a trip

Rick Ohlarik – Book reviewer and blogger 

An incredible journey can be joined in this book, as you accompany Viola on a journey of self-discovery and healing, as well as spine-tingling suspense, while she works to uncover the mystery of a missing person’s case that everyone else seems to have pushed from their minds. While struggling with the loss of her own child–a pain no parent should ever have to endure–Viola puts her own life on the line to help a woman with whom she has a special thing in common. As the tension mounted with each page, I found myself conflicted, not even sure whom I should be rooting for in some places. An exploration of one of the world’s most sensitive subjects, this book made me think about things in a way that I may not have otherwise.

BookChick blogger about the novel – A child made to order

This book is based on a subject many hope not to experience, but many do. How far would you go to have a healthy child. This book looks at this subject and unless you have been there many readers may not understand the desperation this book portrays and how close you can come to losing your mind. This is a very complex, controversial and heartbroken book. It is sensitively and carefully constructed and you need to read it with an open mind. It is a brilliant book well worth reading.

Mrs. Margaret Jelfs about the novel – A child made to order

A Child Made to Order is a well-paced thriller investigating fascinating ethical issues from a personal perspective. While it is well plotted and confidently written, I found Ryczko’s particular strength lay in characterisation. Whether a main or minor character, each character’s motivations and idiosyncrasies were extremely well thought-out, and delivered subtly to the reader. The question of genetically modifying children is a very interesting one, but it’s particularly interesting here because we get to see the issues as they affect individuals.  It’s a personal story, not a story about ethical issues. Viola’s personal connection to her investigation in particular makes the subject matter relatable. 

Anouska, Goodreads reviewer about the novel – A child made to order

The stories character development was good. The story believable! The twisting plot was a surprise! Good read! I loved it !!

Barbara B. (Amazon customer) about the novel – A child made to order

“A child made to order” is Piotr Ryczko’s first novel, although he has been writing screenplays and made a number of short films. What works well within the novel is the sensitive attention paid to the psychology of the main character and Viola’s inner journey. Without giving away too much, the protagonist, a succesful journalist, slowly lays her stable life in ruins, and her professional success in favour of an obsessive/destructive need for a child. The chaos which she wrecks upon herself and others is of such magnitude that we are left emotionally purged. Finally, leading us up to an ending which undermines everything Viola fought for.

I was engaged by the philosophical underpinnings of the book. The whole genetic engineering debate is a hot topic now. I am glad there are more stories willing to handle this matter in a more subtle and realistic way. This also carries over to another theme which the author has put in focus. It is the inner and outer struggle of infertile women. It was touching to see how being unwillingly childless impacts different women’s life. What are their struggles, and how far some are willing to go to give birth to a child.

Iif you like vulnerable, flawed characters, and true to life drama within a tightly constructed thriller plot, then this is a recommeded read. Viola’s investigation, the secrets, and the Scandinavian setting are all things quite similar to the Millenium trilogy. What the author adds to the mix is the moral debate of the gene therapies, a perceptive character study of a flawed woman, and how our our deep-seated needs can take control of our life.

Mrs. Eve Parish, Amazon reviewer about the novel – A child made to order

Gripping psychological suspense. Vlog 165th entry 2.9. 2014 Marianne suffers from mitochondrial disease. A baby could be born with nervous malfunction muscle dystrophy dementia. What makes this story heartbreaking it’s the loneliness moment in ones life is having so much love to give and then realising that it will never be yours to give. Marianne was a public figure she was a known personality in the blogosphere. Viola worked for one of the biggest newspapers as a Middle East correspondent. Stine’s daughter, Marianne had gone missing and Viola Voss offered to help find her. And why is the police about to blow wide open a fertility clinic ? A Child Made To Order is high up on the drama! (less)

IReadNovels book blogger about the novel – A child made to order


It’s that kind of books that leaves you with many intricate questions. The kind of questions which provoke you to look for an answer inside you. “What I would do in Viola’s place…?”; “Why did she behave like this?”; “Why did she make this decision…?” And so on…

This book is like a long journey in which nothing goes the way you expect. You feel lost. You want your answers. But the only thing you can do is to keep going. This existential anxiety that book evokes is, in my opinion, one of the big achievements of this book.

Another achievement is the creation of the main character – Viola. I imagine that most of readers – like me – were irritated and angry at her so many times. We got so involved in her story, her life, that we really wanted her to find some solutions!

If only it would be that easy… Her life is a mess and for the reader it is hard to bear it that way. We do not know how it happened, but suddenly we realized that we are inside the book’s reality, engaged with Viola’s problems, as if they were ours. That’s how this book gives us a real experience and as every experience it is sometimes painful, sometimes helps us to discover something new and important, sometimes it confronts us, and rarely gives us relief.

What is it that the book shows? What topics does it touch upon? What was for me very authentic and powerful was in what manner Viola behaved – her limitations, the structure of her personality. All the time she is struggling with herself. She tries to break through this (through her mother’s expectations, through memories of her son, through fears connected to her boyfriend Ronny) but instead of this, she is reproducing her destructive patterns, she is doing what she feels she has to do. Strong inner compulsion and conflict.

I see it as a strong image of a human being who is so much imprisoned in his or her defending mechanisms but still trying to find a place for free choices. To change something. To behave in a different way. And he/she is failing, but each time trying again….

The last thing I would like to stress: subject of women and motherhood.

In the book the main issue is the relationship between women and a child: Can women be fulfilled without a child? Can a mother give space to a child, to be separate? In Viola’s life mother’s love is controlling and ambivalent: mother attracts the child and then she pushes it away. Viola can never be herself, be accepted by her mother. At the same time nearly the only thing she desires is to be a mother. And she is not thinking about the relationship with the child she would be able to have. No, the child is simply an object of desire and as an object it has to be given to her. World created by Viola – in which no genuine relationship is possible – is really scary. It shows how people brought up in some structures try to liberate themselves, but they can never succeed. Their struggle is however an important one and worth seeing. In a way every one of us has this kind of life path. This book is about this struggle.

Sonia R., Amazon reviewer about the novel – A child made to order

I’m a big fan of this genre and this book doesn’t let me down. The suspense builds and flows in an engaging manner throughout and keeps you wanting to read on.  Ryczko is very good at portraying the characters with enough depth and flaws to make them feel believable.

Another thing Ryczko does well is to keep the story reined in enough to keep it on course. It could easily have gotten lost in the heartache of the characters and the morality aspects. As it is I feel he’s kept the balance just right.  The ending felt perhaps ever so slightly a little rushed to me, but that doens’t take away from the fact that I really enjoyed this first novel by Piotr Ryczko and I really look forward to more.

Cathrine Farsett, Amazon reviewer about the novel – A child made to order

Good book. Kept me glued. Didn’t wanna put it down. You can feel some of the struggles of the women. Great Reading

Sarah Watkins. (Amazon customer) about the novel – A child made to order

„A child made to order” is a suspense story, that keeps the reader on the edge of her seat. Author touches upon the problem of genetic engineering, skillfully interweaving it with childless women’s issues – exposing perfectly their feelings, fears and hopes at the same time. Great thriller, certainly one to recommend.

Emily. S. (Amazon customer) about the novel – A child made to order

Latest News

CINEUROPA director’s interview about I AM REN

CINEUROPA director’s interview about I AM REN

I am proud to announce that the well-known french Film Sales Agent outfit Reel Suspects has taken on our feature film project I am REN (Panacea). Reel Suspects will be responsible for the world sales and will already start with private screenings of a rough-cut of REN at Festival de Cannes 2019.

read more
Festival Wiosna Filmów screening I AM REN in Poland

Festival Wiosna Filmów screening I AM REN in Poland

I am proud to announce that the well-known french Film Sales Agent outfit Reel Suspects has taken on our feature film project I am REN (Panacea). Reel Suspects will be responsible for the world sales and will already start with private screenings of a rough-cut of REN at Festival de Cannes 2019.

read more

Storygeist blog

The future of the filmmaker Auteur

The future of the filmmaker Auteur

I think there will alwayas be a public for sensitive cinema made as an art-experience, as there will always exist a public for fine literature. But I also see the emergence of a few trends which might change the way we make movies in the coming decade. And I believe this coming 10-15 years will bring forth new ways to tell stories, unlike anything we’ve seen before, and it will be more accessible than it has ever been before. All of this will have a major impact on the Auteur Filmmaker/Storyteller. In the most profound way.

read more
Rene v3.2 – part 2

Rene v3.2 – part 2

“Rene v3.2” – a short story about a female robot companion. A woman made only to fulfill other’s needs. Seen through Rene’s eyes, the story takes the worn cliche of the dangerous Artificial Intelligence, and turns it on its head. It asks if A.I.’s will be able to replace true human relationships? Especially the ones of the intimate kind. How might we treat them? How will the Robot Companion react emotionally? What rights will she have if abused? And is she less of a human if artificially made?

read more

Films & Books

The trailer for the novel A CHILD MADE TO ORDER is live

The trailer for the novel A CHILD MADE TO ORDER is live

The trailer for the novel A CHILD MADE TO ORDER is live

The London based publishing house releases the novel “A child made to order” on Amazon KINDLE.

The trailer for the novel “A child made to order” is available below.

The book is live on Amazon KINDLE.

“The Book Folks” specialize in genre fiction and are geared mainly towards Kindle.

LOGLINE

“When an investigative journalist’s search for a missing woman turns up illegal gene therapy treatments, she has to choose if she wants to reveal the story publicly or fulfill her lifelong desire of being a mother.

 

For more info on the project please see “A child made to order”.

To read more about the publishing house go HERE.

 

book-folks

 

 

A child made to order – publisher’s blurb

A finely-crafted psychological suspense thriller set in Norway’s capital city, Oslo, that will appeal to fans of Stieg Larsson.

When a women’s fertility rights campaigner, Marianne Stine, mysteriously disappears, it hardly reaches the news. Only investigative journalist Viola Voss, harried by the blogger’s mother, shows any interest in finding out what happened to the young woman. Yet years pass and there is no further sign of Marianne.

However, on the eve of taking up a prestigious senior post in Norway’s largest newspaper, Voss is once again reminded of Marianne’s disappearance. In fact, Voss is soon presented with a tantalising clue that not only is Marianne is alive, she has a healthy young child.

Part of Voss’s fascination with Marianne is because they share the same rare genetic condition that would be passed on to any child. Haunted by having lost her own child due to this hereditary disease, Voss determines – against the strong wishes of her own over-powering mother – to put her new job on hold, try to find Marianne, and an explanation.

Enlisting the help of an ex-police sergeant, the clues point to a fertility clinic on the outskirts of town. But this is where Voss’s problems begin. The clinic’s claim of a 100% fertility treatment success rate is beguiling and, with her inner world in turmoil, she decides to take a risk that will force her to confront her own fears, deal with her loss and decide between right and wrong.

If you enjoy psychological mysteries with intense drama, look no further than A CHILD MADE TO ORDER

The issue of genetic manipulation of human embryos, of children literally made to order, is increasingly becoming one of the most important ethical and medical issues of our time. With delicacy, and emotional sensitivity, the author makes you think about the matter like you never have before, in a novel where the tension increases on every page, and ends with a stunning climax.

Piotr Ryczko is a Polish/Norwegian writer and film maker. A CHILD MADE TO ORDER is his first novel.

 

Latest News

CINEUROPA director’s interview about I AM REN

CINEUROPA director’s interview about I AM REN

I am proud to announce that the well-known french Film Sales Agent outfit Reel Suspects has taken on our feature film project I am REN (Panacea). Reel Suspects will be responsible for the world sales and will already start with private screenings of a rough-cut of REN at Festival de Cannes 2019.

read more
Festival Wiosna Filmów screening I AM REN in Poland

Festival Wiosna Filmów screening I AM REN in Poland

I am proud to announce that the well-known french Film Sales Agent outfit Reel Suspects has taken on our feature film project I am REN (Panacea). Reel Suspects will be responsible for the world sales and will already start with private screenings of a rough-cut of REN at Festival de Cannes 2019.

read more

Storygeist blog

The future of the filmmaker Auteur

The future of the filmmaker Auteur

I think there will alwayas be a public for sensitive cinema made as an art-experience, as there will always exist a public for fine literature. But I also see the emergence of a few trends which might change the way we make movies in the coming decade. And I believe this coming 10-15 years will bring forth new ways to tell stories, unlike anything we’ve seen before, and it will be more accessible than it has ever been before. All of this will have a major impact on the Auteur Filmmaker/Storyteller. In the most profound way.

read more
Rene v3.2 – part 2

Rene v3.2 – part 2

“Rene v3.2” – a short story about a female robot companion. A woman made only to fulfill other’s needs. Seen through Rene’s eyes, the story takes the worn cliche of the dangerous Artificial Intelligence, and turns it on its head. It asks if A.I.’s will be able to replace true human relationships? Especially the ones of the intimate kind. How might we treat them? How will the Robot Companion react emotionally? What rights will she have if abused? And is she less of a human if artificially made?

read more

Films & Books