So I finally read Just a Geek by Wil Wheaton and it was one
hell of a great read. The guy is warm, witty, honest and insightful and quite
frankly what more could you want from an autobiographical account of one’s
journey through post-childstardom? The man has done well for himself and it’s
genuinely been a pleasure going along for the latter part of the ride as I’ve followed
his blog, Wil Wheaton Dot Net, for the last 10 or 11 years. I couldn’t be
happier that he not only discovered his calling to the Writerhood but was able
to so wonderfully re-establish himself and his life in a way that has clearly
made him a happy and fulfilled guy, particularly after everything he went
through.
Seriously, read it and grab a copy of Dancing Barefoot as
well. That collection of blog entry derived memoirs also makes for some very
entertaining reading.
Meanwhile, I wrote what’s below almost 3 years ago now. Why
the repost? Well admittedly, if you’re able to suppress the tl;dr urge inside
you and get to the end, you’ll see that I was next planning to write about Wil
Wheaton. Having touched upon that a little above, I actually found myself
wanting to share about another onliner who has only continued to impress me
over the years and having already articulated my admiration, I decided
27-year-old me could take the reins on that one.
So voila!
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Posted by MJ at 1:00 AM - Tuesday, July 27, 2010
So I’ve been doing the online thing for nearly 12 years now
(which is, funnily enough, also how long I’ve been honing my writing skills…
skills that will likely not make an appearance in this entry) and along the way
- what with its ever widening reaches and its providing wonderfully artistic
people with more tools than ever before - I’ve encountered some amazingly
talented people during my billions of hours floating through cyberspace.
Whittling the list down so that this entry doesn’t end up
ridiculously long won’t really be that easy, but I’ll do what I can. Some of
them will certainly be familiar, while others will only have been known to
select pockets of people with certain common interests (however dorky those
interests may be. Or are). In order to simplify the process for myself, I’m
going to approach this chronologically.
On second thought… I’ve decided I’ll make this a series of
entries. I know I should reign in my inner rambler, but I just can’t and
there’s so much to say.
Back in 2001, while attempting to find more info on a TV
show that I had recently become rather obsessed with and that had been
cancelled, I came across a place called Fanforum. The show was Young Americans
and my friend, Mel, had introduced it to me and, despite the show’s complete
lack of substance, talent or good writing (seriously!), we both kind of fell in
TV love. It was genuinely pathetic (and only she and I will ever know just how
far into the depths that pathetic plunged), however, in stumbling quite by
accident upon the YA forum on Fanforum, I not only got to catch up on what
Aussie TV had not bothered to air, but I also came across an amazing bunch of
people and this marked the beginning of some of the most important friendships
in my life.
As all this also marked my most thorough attempt at fanfic
to date, an area left completely open due to a single season cancellation, I
became acquainted with some extremely talented writers who had done incredible
jobs of continuing a show that we hadn’t wanted to end. Nicky was one of those
people.
Funnily enough, it wasn’t her alternate second season that
made her catch my eye. In fact, it was a crossover fic she had written,
combining YA with Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Pretty left field combination, huh?
But it was so well done. Never mind how well this girl knew how to visualise
scenes that sprang to life in my mind, but her representations of the BtVS
characters were so on point, I could hear the dialogue so clearly in my head -
Buffy, Xander, Willow… seriously, I couldn’t get over it. So, I told her so.
After that, we were in touch pretty often, reading each
others work and sort of beta-ing them as well. She was one of the first people
to read my then developing YA fic and her encouragement was one of the few
things that got me to the 100 and something pages that I eventually punched
out. I couldn’t have been more grateful, especially considering how delicate my
life’s relationship with writing was at the time. In fact, she was one of the
first people in my life to really encourage me to keep writing, and she did
this all the way from where she lives in NZ.
Her work, meanwhile, never ceased to amaze me. She wrote
each episode in prose, but with some minor cinematic direction, providing
teasers, voiceovers and location changes. Her use of language never failed to
impress me and, as I said before, everything she wrote lived and breathed in my
mind’s little TV set. Not to mention her handle on plot and continuity and her
grasp of character, something so often lacking in other fic writers’ works.
Admittedly, an 8-episode season only provided the most basic of introductions
to character, but she took those introductions and developed them amazingly.
Furthermore, she kept in style to the genre, only ‘failing’ in that her
characters swore, unlike their real TV-world counterparts. Not only did she
‘resurrect’ the show for those of us who missed it, but she made it her own,
breathing depth and life into it that hadn’t actually been achieved by the
original creators. She gained a substantial audience and even created new fans
for the show, also managing to pick up a stack of online awards in the process.
Inevitably, as time went on and studies and life demanded
more attention, both our communication and our writing slowly began to wane
and, although I kept up with her work, we lost touch. Yes, the sad thing about
online relationships of any kind… more often than not, they end up petering out
in this very way.
A couple of years passed and one day, I decided to look her
up again. I found that she had continued the series and had gotten to Season 4
so every so often, I would check it out, still marvelling at her writing
ability and enjoying the way the ‘show’ had evolved. Then, I noticed she had a
‘Progress Journal’ on her site so I checked it out. It brought me to her
Livejournal which allowed me a little insight into what she was now up to,
aside from the writing and the study, and it was here, that I found her work in
vidding. Her vids revealed that her talent for creating such vivid tapestries
in her writing, also spilled into the realm of visual media and I discovered a
whole new level of admiration for her creativity and vision.
Now, although my memory is a little hazy on this, I am
certain that by this time, I had already seen some fan vids on other fansites
and on a site that, back in good ol’ 2005, was still slowly expanding
(You-what?). Fan vids, at the time, were gradually developing as a form of
fanart, which prior to that point had mostly consisted of Photoshop artworks
and animations, and I had seen a few - albeit a poorly edited and clunky few,
mostly consisting of some cheesy song playing to some chopped clips. Some had certainly
stood out (one that comes to mind was a vid exploring the Harry/Hermione
relationship after the release of the third Harry Potter movie. It was to
Everytime by Britney Spears, which might sound kind of lame, but actually
worked well with the vid), but for the most part, they weren’t much to talk
about.
Nicky’s YA-Think Twice vid blew my mind. While it may be overdoing to say I thought it looked like a professional vid, it was not far from that at all. She had created a study of the Scout/Bella/Sean conflict to Eve 6’s Think Twice (an awesome song that I’m happy she introduced me to) and her manipulation of those clips to the music and lyrics was phenomenal. She was able to not only create faux-flashbacks, but her transitions were all on beat, well paced and matching the rapidity of the drums. One section that completely slayed me had an overlay of rapidly changing scenes on one scene, all perfectly in time with the song building up between the bridge and the next verse. It was unbelievable. I had never, ever seen a fan vid quite like it.
Having found one vid, I, of course, sought out more and her
other clips were all just as amazing and even better. I’m sure it’s safe to say
that Think Twice was an extremely well done amateur production, but it only meant
that she developed her skill and created even more amazing vids after. She had
also linked to some other talented vidders, notably Becky of Tired-Eyes.net,
and my appreciation of the art only grew. Vidders (and I mean REAL vidders, not
those people who just lump a bunch of clips and effects together with a song,
but people who actually delve into character studies and even tell new stories)
are a group of little known talents who are, thanks to the growth of the net,
slowly getting their due (check out Vividcon 2010). Nicky herself appears to
have gained an even bigger audience (hell, she’s actually had people create
vids for her writing. Yourstreetserenade’s vids are particularly awesome) and a
stack of accolades and I couldn’t be happier for her. She’s incredibly talented
and she deserves it all.
Anyway, if you’re up for checking out her work, just have a
peek at the link above. If you’re a fan of the vastly developing world of
online art, I highly recommend it.
Although I still haven’t actually attempted to get back in
touch with her personally (due to a dillemma along the lines of the ‘Do I say
hi or not?’ persuasion), I’ve checked back in to her work every so often over
the years and have only continued to be astounded by her visiotivity (thanks Barney).
I remember back when we used to email, I once told her that I reckoned she
could have shot and directed the YA episodes better than the original creators.
I guess I was onto something there.
Coming up next: he portrayed a few of my favourite characters
- Gordie Lachance, Wesley Crusher and Joey Trotta - and was the reason I even
thought of starting a blog back in 2003.
