Introduce Yourself : Are you a storyteller? by Ben Sledge

I've been drawn to storytelling through film my entire life. As a kid, I would use my parents VHS camcorder to make narrative stories using live action recording mixed with the best stop motion animation I could pull off. Then I would edit manually by hooking the camcorder up to a VCR and using REC/PLAY! In college my school had a New Media class which was the closest I could get to film. While other students would make abstract art video pieces, I'd make Star Wars inspired scifi short films. Complete with light sabers, spaceships, and droids! Post school, when a friend told me about a funny dream he had of a guy dressed as a Ninja doing everyday things, I responded, "That's funny! Want to make it a movie?" We went on to make a feature length mockumentary... making a ton of mistakes, and creating a film hard to watch from a technical pov, but which had great characters and a great story, and went on to win Best Film at a small festival. That compelled us to do more. Which resulted in some TV commercials, corporate videos, and a short narrative film. Then, about ten years ago, I was thrown off course when I moved to a new state, losing the team I had built up for years. A month after moving my wife and I learned she was pregnant with the first of our two kids. We moved for her career, so I also lost my day job and was looking for work. Then, on top of moving, losing my film crew, losing my job, and preparing to be a father... I went in to see a doctor about an ear infection I was struggling with and came away having been informed I was in stage 5 renal failure. I had a few months to live without a transplant or dialysis. The rest of that year is a blurry nightmare. My wife would have an ultrasound one week, and I'd have one the next. I was in and out of clinics being poked, prodded, tested, and having surgery to prepare my body for dialysis. My family members were being tested as well. It turns out my sister was a 100% tissue match and was willing to give me one of her kidneys. It's hard to ask that from a sibling knowing they may feel like they don't really have a choice. It's something that will always hang over me. Especially if it ever causes her medical problems. Flash forward a few months later, I'm in the hospital recovering from transplant surgery. The first two days went exceedingly well, but then I took a turn downhill. Doctors weren't sure why, and it wasn't clear that I'd make it. All I know is I had gone to feeling great to experiencing the worst pain I'd ever known. I also couldn't keep any food or water down. The only way I could rest at all was if they injected heavy painkillers into my veins. I remember wanting to die just to get out of the pain. The stress caused my now very pregnant wife to go into labor early. Still in the hospital with me, she was taken upstairs. All the planning and hospital visits we had done were out the window. My son wasn't supposed to be born in this place with me lying next to them in a bed, hooked to machines with an Ng tube running up my nose and down my throat. I barely got to meet him before having to return to my own room. They went home a couple days later. And eventually I recovered and went home as well. The first year after was rough. I needed time to heal. I couldn't work full time and film was a luxury I didn't even dream about anymore. Plus, I was busy being a new father as best I could. It wasn't until a few years later, when I was back to being healthy, had a job, and both my kids were out of diapers and more independent that the film bug started biting again. I knew it would mean a lot of work. Starting over from scratch. Finding and building a new team. But I couldn't resist. Two years ago we started production on a Twilight Zone inspired short, The Recursion Theorem. Ironically, the story I wrote was about the necessity and value of struggle. I gathered a team and we got to work. We ended up building a set in a warehouse when we couldn't find a location we could afford. Nothing was going to stand in my way. We found a great actor and cobbled together a dedicated crew and had an amazing production experience. That was followed by a year and s half in post production hell. So after all this time and struggle, I finally have another film ready to share. I hope to do more. I really want to do more. But I realized in this project that I'm not sure I can do it this way. With no budget. No support. So I'm hoping to have enough success with this project to make the next one more reasonable. To make the next one possible. If you are interested, you can view the trailer for Recursion at https://youtu.be/ZGfQ2kv_MFA (I believe promotion is allowed here but if not I apologize) Thank you for reading. I'd love to connect with you as we pursue this journey together. Feel free to add me here. You can also find me on twitter @sledgeweb and at http://www.facebook.com/RecursionTheorem I appreciate anything you can do to help share about our film and get the word out, and I'd love to return the favor for you. Thank you, Ben