Things are Moving!

Well hey there foxy fresh viewers. We're still not dead and we're actually, seriously, for realsies seriously no-foolin' gearing up to send out your incredibly, very very long overdue rewards! 

We had a very productive and awesome edit session last night with our resident editor-in-chief Danny Fogarty. Danny is working on a feature with the most tight of deadlines and yet is still managing to throw together amazing shit like this tag for the beginning and ends of our videos:

Doesn't that just stir up inspiration in your heart? And make you so excited for your treats (Kickstarter donors)? You should have seen him work his magic last night, folks. He moves so fast he's, like, one step away from Minority Report. I think I was watching the actual video less than watching him move like a damn wizard.
So Danny and I have been playing around with the format of the series and have finally come to a conclusion: no traditional 'episodes'. Who watches anything over three minutes on YouTube these days anyway?
Here's what we're going to do: collections. Each theme has its own collection of interviews, animations, stories, etc. Youtube will have playlists. Vimeo will have channels. You can watch all the clips in a row, or pick and choose what you want.
And kickstarter donors, rather than getting a DVD, will get a thumb drive with exclusive extended interview clips that won't be available anywhere else. Because it's 2014 not 2002 and who really uses DVDs anymore? Not even my grandma, that's who.
Once we get the exclusive clips and upload them to all of the thumb drives, your kickstarter rewards will be well on their way.
I'll be emailing all of you backers to confirm your addresses since my list is a year and a half old now. I know, I know. I'm a terrible kickstarter-reward-distributor. But they are on their way. I swear.
[keep you posted]
Love,
Your Fabulous Producer

Life and such

The Big Idea is not dead. I swear.
Back right before rewards were supposed to come out, as you know, things changed drastically. I had a total life overhaul, going from working 35 hours a week to upwards of 70, and sadly, this project fell by the wayside. Most of the animators dropped out, the experiment shoots were pushed back, and everything was at a standstill for months. The longer things have gone, the harder it is to kick things back into gear.
Hard to believe it's been over a year since the kickstarter was funded, but we're looking down that barrel now, and I know if I don't get shit stirred up real soon it'll never happen. So, here we are. Most of the rewards have come in.
In the meantime, we are taking a hard look at retooling the series. Sadly, we had to pull an episode due to the fact that we had a serious lack of content for it. So sorry for anyone who was really looking forward to angles. It was impossible to find the people we needed to interview for it.
We are also taking a good, hard look at doing an overhaul of the structure of the series. I've been meeting with our new editor, Danny Fogarty, over how exactly we are going to structure the footage we have. This weekend we will be solidifying that structure, which will likely be more experimental in nature than originally planned. Updates will be coming on that.
However, one thing is troubling me. The DVD reward -- does anyone really want this? The entire series will be available online for free and fair use. We were thinking instead about going with a flash drive to load the series onto, and are getting quotes and mockups of drives right now. We figured this would generally be more useful. But if any of our backers are against this and still want a DVD, please send me a message, because I am very happy to do so. Otherwise, if you donated at the $25 level, you will receive a thumb drive rather than a DVD.
That's all for now, I will leave you with a picture of the Big Idea instagram prints you will be receiving.
Again, many apologies for the extreme delay in your rewards. They are coming, I swear!!! I PROMISE! I LOVE YOU ALL!!!!

Here's the Deal...

Hello, friends of the Big Idea. This is your producer speaking. Hi there.

I have good and bad news for you.

Good: I got two jobs! 

Bad: I got two jobs.

What does this mean for you?

Big Idea Interviewee of the Week, Part Two: Morgan Marshall

BEER, you guys.

BEEEEEEER.

BEEEEEER.

Big Idea Interviewee of the week, part one: Amy Rourke Wasserman

Last Tuesday we finally interviewed midwife Amy Rourke Wasserman, an interview that has been over a year in the making. Sometimes getting schedules coordinated takes a lot of time!

Our new camera operator Jayson DeLeon came with us up to the northwest side of Chicago, edging close to O'Hare, to shoot our interview with Nurse Wasserman, who sat down with us in her home so we could ask her about her job.

Animation Alert!

Hey there Big Idea Friends,

Check it out. Valencia Spates just sent us her animation of a strong salad for Episode 105 (Nourishment). Watch it after the jump or check it out on our YouTube page.

Interviewee of the Week: Dr. Marsha Rosner

We're back, everyone!
And as always, don't think that just because we're not updating means we're not up to much. A few weeks ago we returned to Mimi's Garden to talk to Amy Fowler about the harsh winter and long spring effects on her garden. We also talked about honey bees and what they mean to us as a species. Heavy stuff, considering their recent disappearances.
Speaking of bees, one of our animators, Jeremy Wiss, has been working on a stop-motion animation of a bee going through a garden.
That's just the start of it. More animations are starting to roll in, and interviews are starting to build up. We're inching ever closer to the end of production, which should wrap in September.

Yesterday was a great day. We headed down the University of Chicago to interview Dr. Marsha Rosner, a cancer research expert.