White Lightning HQ

New Site, New Beginnings

noreply@blogger.com (Door Monster) — Mon, 15 Dec 2014 03:20:00 +0000

Hey everybody!

I've gone ahead and completely updated the website, as of the date of this news post. I will now stop updating it. We're going to be implementing a completely new site, hopefully relatively soon, and so I'm going to go ahead and stop messing with this one. But since it looks like we're getting a bit more traffic than usual from our new Youtube videos, I just wanted to let everyone know what was going on.

This site was the first one I made after learning how to build websites properly, and I've since built a lot of much better ones for a lot of people who aren't me. So now, I'm finally going to create one that looks better, runs smoother, and is much easier to update. I'm also going to try to add some more interactivity into it, and I'm thinking about even featuring other people's work - the idea is that fans/users will be able to submit comedy videos they've made, and we'll display the best ones alongside our own. We'll see how it goes, though. Just making weekly videos is taking quite a bit of focus, so I'm not sure how much extra time I'll have to build a big, interactive website, at least right away.

In the meantime, take the opportunity for one last look around this old place. We're moving on to bigger and better things.

-Kyle

Whoops, I Have a Website...

noreply@blogger.com (Door Monster) — Fri, 04 Oct 2013 16:56:00 +0000

Well hi!

I know I've been away a while, so I just wanted to drop in and give an update on what's going on. Basically, we've been working on The Guards Themselves every day, all day, for the entire year. I've literally had zero time to work on anything else, which is why A Fable III Experience, the Minecraft server, and any kind of site update have been mysteriously absent. But I'm happy to say that our project is finally drawing to a close! Now, granted, it will still probably be a few months before we really start releasing things again, but in 2014, we will return from our adventure into feature-filmmaking with beautiful, shiny treasure! It's really turning out to be an awesome film, and I can't wait to share it with everyone!

In other news, I'm graduating from college this December! I will finally be done with all school ever. I'll have to have a job and stuff, sure, but it will still be a big shock to go from totally busy all the time to nearly nothing. So starting next year, we will be cranking out everything that's been building up during 2013: animations, videos, a new interactive site, and even a video game!

Thank you all for your patience over this year. I really appreciate you sticking around, and I promise to make sure the wait was worth it!

2012 In Review

noreply@blogger.com (Door Monster) — Wed, 02 Jan 2013 19:00:00 +0000

Happy 2013, everyone!

We've had an awesome year, and I would like to take a moment to highlight the highlights. 2012 saw the release of No Service, I got to visit the Newgrounds office, we released more podcast episodes than Chaos Pony, we made five other animated and live-action videos, started on A Fable III Experience, and raised $4,000 for our web series on Kickstarter!

So what's next? Well, after failing to meet my one deadline of the entire last year, my promise privileges have officially been revoked by the universe, so I can't give too much detail. What I can say is that they will involve awesome-looking anarchists, Rodriguez and a 3D printer, hipster pirates, people eating shoes, random dancing, major Minecraft server overhauls, a new season of only a few peoples' favorite podcast, and the completed Fable III Experience! I'm looking forward to a productive new year, and I can't wait to get started!

Anarchists on Kickstarter

noreply@blogger.com (Door Monster) — Mon, 05 Nov 2012 20:46:00 +0000

As some of you know, my crew and I are running a Kickstarter campaign for a live-action web series about real-life super villains and superheroes (in this world known as anarchists and crimefighters) who aren't so much super and really just put on protective gear and beat each other up as each group alternately tries to protect and control the city.

I really think this project has the potential to be something great. Unfortunately, we're currently halfway through the campaign and we only have $460 of the $3,500 that we need. So, I'd like to enlist your preferably though not necessarily willing help. The more people who know about the project, the better. I'm very grateful for the help some of you have given so far, and feel bad asking for more, but if you can take the time to even just post the link on Facebook, it could make all the difference. Especially if you have, say, a super-large internet fan base or something... just sayin.

Oh, also, money. If you could actually donate something, that would be an even bigger help.

In an attempt to shoot web traffic through the roof near the end of the campaign, I swear to God I'm going to release SOMETHING Fable III related next week, even if it's just the opening scene as a second teaser. I cannot believe how long this thing is taking me, and I'm going to try my hardest to release Part 1, but I can't guarantee anything. In case you're disappointed by the idea of splitting A Fable III Experience into two pieces, just know that each piece will still be longer than any of the other videos in the series.

Thanks for your help and support.

FIIIE Progress

noreply@blogger.com (Door Monster) — Mon, 24 Sep 2012 21:37:00 +0000

UUUUUUUUUUGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH, I hate animating... animating sucks. Don't ever do it. Know why everyone on Newgrounds is a miserable sociopath? Because animating, that's why.

Anyway, I put up a countdown to the release of A Fable III Experience here, because apparently I just love being wrong. I've already had to extend it one week, but hopefully that'll be the last time. I've caught a few lucky breaks, like the video turning out 6 minutes shorter than I expected and having a friend to animate the mouths for me while I work on other things.

I have all the dialogue in its place, right along side a full animatic. With some help from Jazza, I was able to solve a couple of stupid Flash problems early on, so I don't have those to worry about anymore. I've also been allowed to use the beta of Swivel, Newgrounds's special flash to video converter, so the finished product should even look great on Youtube. Right now, I'm still in the artwork stage, drawing all of the backgrounds and enough of the characters to get started moving them, which is A LOT.

What I'd love to do is have an online "launch party" of sorts, which I can at least say will be a Wednesday at midnight, eastern american time. Basically, I'll just be streaming myself from my site here as I upload the video, but then we can all share in the joyous occasion of me never having to animate Fable-related things again! You can follow my facebook page to get a sufficiently early notice on when I'll be releasing it.

Anyway, that's all for now. The current date is October 10th, so hopefully I'll see you all then!

Videos! Videos Everywhere!

noreply@blogger.com (Door Monster) — Fri, 03 Aug 2012 01:24:00 +0000

Greetings everyone! Many exciting things are happening, probably RIGHT AS YOU'RE READING THIS SENTENCE!! Actually, probably not, but at some point before or after, they will be! Let's get right to the list, shall we?

Firstly, voice recording for A Fable III Experience is practically done! The final count is TEN cast members, which is far greater than my usual cast list, which is me. Some of the actors are Newgrounds stars and others are just now making their debut, but all of the performances are fantastic, and I can't wait to start animating! Which is a thing that I will indeed be doing soon, because...

Our Kickstarter page is ready to go! The only thing missing is a video, but we still aren't going to launch the project until FIIIE is done. That way we can use the near-guaranteed success of Rodriguez ElCazorro to funnel views into the Kickstarter project. Thankfully, you can still see the page even though you can't donate yet, so click here to read up on it!

In between our bigger projects, we're also putting great effort into releasing short videos much more consistently. Right now, this only includes live-action shorts, but once I have Fable out of the way, I'll try to toss in some more animations as well. We're also setting our podcast aside for a bit so that we can concentrate more on videos and also because I don't think anyone really cares all that much at the moment.

Anyway, that's pretty much it for this update, so check back next month for more! The best of days to you all!

Summer Fun

noreply@blogger.com (Door Monster) — Mon, 18 Jun 2012 19:32:00 +0000

Well, I finished yet another quarter at the Art Institute, which means I've only got about a year left, which also means I've only got a few months until I'll need to start working on my senior project. We still don't have a name for it, but it's going to be our first official film (as opposed to an internet skit or animated short like we usually do). We'll have a fundraising page set up on either Kickstarter or IndieGoGo very soon, so watch for updates!

To make sure I'm funneling in the maximum amount of attention for the project, I'm timing it with the release of A Fable III Experience! The entire 16-page script has been written, and the voices are being recorded now. I've also collected an awesome cast of popular Newgrounds stars, including JAZZA, RicePirate, and DonkeysBazooka!

I'm leaving for a family trip to Washington D.C. in a couple of days, and then I should be able to start animation pretty soon after I get back. I also made a few slight adjustments to the website; most of the changes aren't visible, but it loads way faster.

Off to Philly!

noreply@blogger.com (Door Monster) — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 00:09:00 +0000

Well, I successfully wrapped up all my school work, and I leave for Philadelphia tomorrow!! How do I manage a spontaneous vacation when I'm still in college worrying about things like school work? My dad is awesome, that's how. I'll be bringing my recently resuscitated Flip video camera (if you own a Flip, you'll know that "recently resuscitated" is a perpetual state), and I'll post up a video of the trip when I get back!

In other news, Ian finishes his... second? Maybe third... year at Baylor, and will be back in Austin, so we can work on more stuff. I actually have a stack of scripts written up (seriously, it's like four complete video ideas), but I just haven't found the time to get started on any of them. I'll be sure to make time after this trip, though, and get started on at least one of 'em (oh, wait, five. Just remembered another one).

Then there's my senior project film that we'll be starting this fall, and we're gonna have a Kickstarter page up soon. It'll be about an hour long, and we need some costumes and things. We'll be posting a lot more about that in a few months, but I want to go ahead and get the word out now. You have been warned.

I still can't believe I actually get to go to Newgrounds. Just last year I was seeing other people's photos on Facebook and thinking, "maybe I'll get to do that someday." I sure didn't think it would be so soon! I get to meet Jazza in real life, which is still a weird sentence no matter how long the internet has been around, and I'll probably have an interesting conversation with RicePirate, since he was my hate target for a few months...

Anyway, thanks to everyone for supporting my videos so much! I try hard, so it's nice to know I'm doing something right!

Pico Day and Big New Projects

noreply@blogger.com (Door Monster) — Sun, 11 Mar 2012 01:11:00 +0000

So I've started a few fun, big projects: one is the new Yoda's Christmas. I've finished writing the final version of the script, and just began casting and sketching out the new characters and locations for reference. The more I work on it for the second time, the more I realize just how odd of an idea it is. It's technically a Star Wars parody, but other than sharing visual similarities, the characters and themes really show no resemblance to any of the established laws or personalities of the Star Wars universe. In fact, I think it almost falls into the fan fiction category. It's purely my imagination at age 13, as edited by my imagination at age 19.

I've also finally strung together all the loose ends of the Last Ditch Grenades plot into a complete story, and I'm so excited about it! I'm writing up the story outline now, which is the last step before writing the actual script! I've never been so close to writing the final version of such an awesome idea (for those who haven't been following, this isn't just another comedy sketch; it's a super complex animated mini-series). More on that to come.

In the miscellaneous category, Ian, Ethan and I came up with an awesome idea for a funny music video about a hipster pirate, so hopefully we'll be able to put that together soon. We've also shortened the White Noise episodes to 30 minutes each, making them much more manageable for you and much more frequent in terms of release, since we can record several in one sitting. Lastly, I get to attend the PICO DAY PARTY at the Newgrounds office this year!! *This smiley is too happy to display properly on your monitor* Ian's going to record a play-by-play (as he watches over their Livestream feed) that we'll release in a future podcast.

Anyway, guess that's it for now. It's awfully nice being able to update my entire site like this just by hitting a submit button :] So, until next time, the best of days to you all!

New Site! ...Again!

noreply@blogger.com (Door Monster) — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 04:41:00 +0000

Hello fans and future fans! Welcome to my completely new, completely W3C approved website layout! It's shiny and filled with lovely automated things that will make my e-life a little easier. Kind of like this news post. Used to, I had to manually update the list whenever I made a post. But now I just type it here into Blogger, and it puts it on my home page and news page immediately! PROGRESS!

If you're a web designer, stop laughing.

Anyway, I...well, uh...kinda earned everything Newgrounds has to offer for a single video other than a golden tank trophy because of No Service. I mean, just...good lord, HOW? It never even seemed like that phenomenal of an idea. Guess that just verifies that I have absolutely no idea what I'm actually doing. Thanks so much to everyone for supporting it! I guess I'll have to use the prize money for more productions. That, and maybe Minecraft server hosting.

So everyone enjoy the new site! Drop me an email to let me know what you think!

Last Thoughts for 2011

noreply@blogger.com (Door Monster) — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 22:25:00 +0000

Alrighty, looks like this year is pretty much wrapped up. I am going to release one more short Youtube video advertising our Minecraft server, which will bring this year's video total up to ten! That's a whole three more videos than last year, which was five more than the year before that! So see, I am speeding up! Just very slowly...

Also, within the past few days, I've managed to release episode 15 of White Noise, available now, bringing us to 14 episodes for 2011. It seems small, but I have a crafty excuse for that one too: you may recall that at the beginning of the year, we stated that until we got a big enough audience, we would release an episode every month. Now, we certainly didn't do that, but we do have two more episodes than there are months, so I think that says something.

As for 2012, Ian and I are going to start it off right by deciding on and writing several videos, live-action and cartoon, about a week after Christmas, and I'm gonna get started on them all right away as I try to beat this year's video record. I'm also not going to mention ANY specific release dates this year, because I suck at it. The only one I'm nailing down is the Yoda's Christmas remake, which I've set as December 1, 2012.

So, that said, I'm more or less retiring for this year. Thanks to everyone for all their support over the months! I really appreciate it. In fact, as a bonus gift, here's a link to the last thing I've done this month: it's a webcomic I've started for leftover jokes :)

Merry Wintertime Holidays to All!

Captain Spectacular

noreply@blogger.com (Door Monster) — Tue, 30 Aug 2011 14:48:00 +0000

August is my magic month, eh? Last year it was the month of my accidentally awesome Fable II Experience, and now I've FINALLY finished Captain Spectacular. Since I live a couple hours behind New York, which is where the Newgrounds offices are located, I technically uploaded the video around 1:00 this morning, and so have the entire day to gather points. Hope I get front page again at least! After I take a breather, I'm going to be working on Trailer Month, which will be exactly what the name implies. What videos will the trailers be for? You'll have to wait and see :) When will they be out? I'm not even gonna try...Before those, though, should be our live-action Portal-based fight scene, which I'm doubling the usefulness of by turning it in for a class.

Anyway, glad to be back on Newgrounds, and hopefully I'll stay a little longer this time. Everyone enjoy the videos!

Nmbfting

noreply@blogger.com (Door Monster) — Thu, 21 Jul 2011 23:04:00 +0000

Alright, so here's the deal. A few months ago I was totally doing tons of work on various projects when I was suddenly sucked through a swirling vortex in my computer moniter and into a mystical land called Nmbfting. I quickly learned that it was almost impossible to escape from this alternate dimension, the portal to which can only be accidentally activated by totally being super productive and getting a lot of work done. The curse of this world is that, once inside, it's also impossible to ever be super productive and get a lot of work done on anything. It's just some kind of mystical force in the atmosphere, and is the reason why you can't escape, because that would involve being productive. Anyway, long story short, I finally discovered the way out, which I believe involved a marimba and a ferret, but the portal must wipe your memory when you exit because it's all very fuzzy.

So, now that I'm free, I'm one little recording session away from releasing Zucchini and Rhubarb, well into animating Captain Spectacular, have released episode 10 of White Noise, recorded episodes 11, 12, and 13, and will top it all off with trailer month, which will be four trailers of different videos I'll be releasing relatively soon (most within the year). I've also come up with a bunch more ideas, with the help of Ian.

So there. Valid excuse. No complaining.

Upgrades

noreply@blogger.com (Door Monster) — Sat, 14 May 2011 19:37:00 +0000

The crew and I are going full force into summer this year. I'm still updating every bit of the site, we've spread to the Twitter (follow with the link up top), we have a LiveStream, and we will be getting together soon (and often) to start writing and shooting out videos faster than ever. We have a list of about 15 individual ideas so far and we'll be releasing them as fast as possible. Granted, the animations will probably still come along at the same pace. But the live-action stuff is going to improve and speed up A LOT. And you may notice that the name is migrating towards White Lightning HQ everywhere rather than just my standalone self as White Lightning.

Also, sorry for the lack of White Noise episodes lately. We've had an off couple of weeks, but we should begin recording again this week with Episode 9.

The Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Door Monster) — Sat, 07 May 2011 15:02:00 +0000

I'm now using a Blogger for more convenient commenting on news posts. The forum is still there, however, so you can continue to enjoy its emptiness.