I have a lot of respect for the people who work in the film medium, but knew that I would never have the time and patience to learn it. Then along came video, so far, nowhere near as good as film, but still an artistic challenge and the instant gratification that matches my short attention span. I make videos mostly for fun and sometimes enter them in contests. A frequent subject is Kayaking and white water, above left is a frame from a documented trip through the Grand Canyon on the Colorado river. A short version of this Video was shown at the 1998 National Paddling Film Fest at U of Kentucky, see http://www.surfbwa.org/npff (a link is provided below). Above right is a frame from "31" a short Sci-fi work in progress. Where can you get actors willing to work for nothing? A great resource is the LARP community which is the next topic on this page.

A very good magazine for video makers is "Videomaker" magazine. There are a number of news groups, but I recommend rec.video.production. The Oklahoma Theater link will take you to a site where a couple of guys are trying to produce a feature length "movie" using digital video technology.

I also Pro Bono produce the Video tape lecture series for the International Fortean Organization. For more about this go to my Fortean Video Link below.

Some day there may be Virtual Reality as good as the Holo-Deck, but until then, the closest thing is LARP (Live Action Role Playing). Somewhere between theater and a free form kid's game of "Cops and Robbers", LARP gives one the opportunity to explore different personae. No stage, no script and no audience just a group of people getting together at a hotel for a weekend with each person spending their entire time assuming the part of some character. Since there may be as many as 100 people involved in a LARP event another thing that makes it different from a play is that "scenes" take place in parallel. Its lots of fun and can get pretty intense at times.

The theme of a Live Action game can be just about anything. Sci Fi, Magick and Intrigue are popular formats, but I once helped create a Game in which players were personifications of Archetypes. For more information there is a link to the "Interactive Literature Foundation" below. There are also links to my LARP Photo Gallery and the home pages of some LARPer friends. My LARP Photo Gallery has pictures from some of the Classic Role Playing Games, including Village, Adam's Family, NewKlone, Titanic, Lone Star, MASKS, Small Town, Vagabond, Gilbert & Silicon, Terror on the Thames, Greater Trumps, Cafe Casablanca and others.