Here are all the stories for this Month’s Contest in one easy to consume place. This is our first storytelling contest and we’ve learned a lot on how to listen, tell, and promote an events like this. (Link to the FB invite to the March 31st show.)
And therefore we are happy to announce season two will start May 1st. We will be accepting entries from May 1st to June 15th. We will have a giant 99 second celebrations show on June 30th.
Today, we say thank you to the eight who took the time to enter a contest. It’s a brave thing to be the first. Here’s Torrey!
Almost first on our list is a story by Andrew Shelffo.
Next is a story from Jeff Stein. A Chicago Toastmaster and storyteller. Each of these 99 second stories does a good job at differentiating in tone. Each of the tellers who submitted have their unique personal brand. When discussing this story with our Ai, it pointed out that Jeff likes to end with weight. There’s a heavy sense in the images at the end of his stories.
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Almost all of the storytellers who posted are 99 second storytellers. They go to Sean Wellington’s 99 second slam, and win! Still, one of the notes we received, was how hard it is to film a 99 second story. It takes some planning, and a lot of reshoots. Our next teller is Walt Belcher. He and I had a laugh as I let him know, I did about 100 takes of this story.
There’s something about doing it live, and off the cuff that changes when you have to stare into the abyss of that lone camera eye. The lens. One trick I use on myself is to really try to envision the camera as one of my friends. Pretend I’m speaking to a real person who can see me on the other side.
I bring this up in part because Nadia is a friend of mine and so when I practice stories I often get to imagine that lens as her smiling face. Or the quizzical look gives when she’s not so sure about something I said. Here she talks about growing up in Romania.
Jay Rohr is our next storyteller. And I’m just going to go ahead and say it out loud. This one is my favorite. I love his style of storytelling. He reminds me of my good friend At0m Smyth.
Camera angles. Congratulations, Richard Munchkin. This is a masterwork in storytelling. Whether it gets everyone’s vote or not, it’s something he should be proud of. He’s the only teller who had a change of location and in some places, a non static camera! Color us #impressed.
Now, I’ve big upped a lot of the stories but the truth is, my favorite story, is rarely the “best” and the “best” is subjective to the whims of the crowd.
This final story is another one of those, end with weight stories. That’s something David Sedaris likes to do. Melissa Reaves is in a bunch of story swaps with me, and I’m always trying to pin her down on what mysticism means to her. There’s something in her stories that always leaves me wondering… does she believe in magic? Or is it a put on?
I’ll probably keep asking her… but… I’m going to admit now, I like that she’s been cagey.
Join us on twitch.tv/storyluck Wed March 31st 6pm. You’ll be able to vote and decide on the winner.
