Source: Cointelegraph.com NewsWhen Zach Ingrasci and Chris Temple had the idea to make the documentary film Vitalik: An Ethereum Story, they were actually filming another documentary, and over the course of their filmmaking journey, they ended up capturing both a deeper, human look at the world of crypto and an end product that serves as a use case for the future of crypto filmmaking.
\nWhen crafting a documentary, filmmakers will typically start with a vision of what they\u2019d like to explore, a vision often saddled with a set of assumptions, only to shatter that vision once filming begins, creating an entirely new direction for the project.
\nIt\u2019s a creative evolution that filmmakers Zach Ingrasci and Chris Temple also experienced while making the documentary feature This Is Not Financial Advice, during which they realized they had an entirely different film on their hands.
\n\u201cWhile we were making that film, we wanted to interview Vitalik Buterin,\u201d Ingrasci said to me during a recent interview. \u201cWe got connected to him, but as soon as we met him, we were really inspired by his unique form of tech optimism and how he broke stereotypes we\u2019d had of the crypto space. He was a billionaire but very humble, funny, quirky and truly committed to his values of decentralization. That was very inspiring for us \u2014 so much so, we thought we should make a piece about Vitalik or about the Ethereum community at large.\u201d<\/p>\n
Temple and Ingrasci (left to right) while filming their PBS feature \u201cFive Years North.\u201d Source: OptimistBut Ingrasci and Temple weren\u2019t crypto-native filmmakers \u2014 rather, they were individuals interested in technology and communities using technology in new ways, and Vitalik and Ethereum just happened to check both of those boxes.
\nThe human touch in tech
\nIngrasci and Temple then went out and launched a non-fungible token (NFT) crowdfunding campaign, raising almost $2 million in 50 hours, allowing them to get started quickly in the summer of 2021 during the height of the NFT boom.
\n\u201cIt allowed us to own the film without being beholden to any stakeholder, platform or middleman who would otherwise be directing the content of the film,\u201d Temple said. \u201cIt was an amazing opportunity to spend over two years following Vitalik \u2014 a global nomad \u2014 all around the world.\u201d
\nTemple and Ingrasci followed Buterin to Ukraine, Montenegro, Toronto and Colombia, trying to understand the man behind the technology. They even spent time with Buterin\u2019s father and his family members, diving into the history of his family emigrating from Russia to Canada.
\n\u201cWe wanted to understand how Vitalik\u2019s upbringing had affected his values,\u201d Temple said. \u201cWe spent time talking with folks in the Ethereum community, with Vitalik\u2019s friends and others, trying to paint this deeper picture and understand how the creators of crypto technologies affect the end product. How are they coding their values, blindspots and interests into the end result?\u201d
\n\u2018Vitalik: An Ethereum Story\u2019 premiered globally on April 15. Source: OptimistFrom the beginning, Temple and Ingrasci\u2019s main goal was to create a piece that would be accessible to a mainstream audience, one that could help translate some of the values and interesting things they were seeing in the Ethereum community in a way that a non-crypto native person could understand.
\nBut they didn\u2019t really know what that meant or what it would lead to initially since they were following different stories and different people within the Ethereum ecosystem. As they were editing the documentary together, they started testing it with people who knew nothing about crypto, who, as expected, were very confused.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s so difficult to create a documentary that\u2019s accessible and entertaining for people who know nothing about the crypto space, but we saw very clearly in the feedback from these early screenings that when people could connect to someone \u2014 especially Vitalik, who is so likeable and inspiring \u2014 it creates an entry point to then get into these more abstract concepts,\u201d Ingrasci said.
\n\u201cWe did not set out to make the film only about Vitalik, and I don\u2019t think the film is only about Vitalik,\u201d Ingrasci told Cointelegraph.
\n\u201cVitalik is our human hook, our human story about someone who is going to surprise you, break your stereotypes about crypto, and leave you a little more excited than you thought you would be after watching this film.\u201d
\nAccording to Ingrasci, Buterin\u2019s favorite scenes in the film were when he was drinking tea or making breakfast \u2014 being his normal, quirky, funny self.
\n\u201cThat\u2019s what makes this film entertaining, watchable and human,\u201d Ingrasci said. \u201cWhen someone is willing to be natural on camera with us as filmmakers, it creates a much more human story rather than this very intellectual version of Vitalik that we were already very aware of.\u201d
\nRelated: Institutions break up with Ethereum but keep ETH on the hook<\/p>\n
Developing a crypto use case for film
\nDuring the filming of Vitalik, Buterin\u2019s father talked to the filmmakers about how, growing up, Buterin\u2019s favorite toy was the computer, and his favorite thing was to play with Excel.\u00a0
\n\u201cWhen he was seven years old, he actually built a 100-page manifesto that was an imaginary world for bunnies,\u201d Temple said. \u201cIt had their financial systems, energy systems and was full of graphs and tables \u2014 an amazing creation for a seven-year-old\u2019s mind. I think to so many of the people we shared this with, it helps people connect to the world of Ethereum as a new world being built. If you can imagine Vitalik as a seven-year-old building this whole new imaginary world, that\u2019s what he\u2019s trying to build again with Ethereum.\u201d
\nIt\u2019s all part of Buterin\u2019s hope for Ethereum creating real utility in the world, something Ingrasci felt was epitomized when Buterin visited Ukraine.
\n\u201cWhen he went to Ukraine, he was talking to the vice prime minister, Fedorov, and it quickly became apparent that the banking system at the beginning of the war was in shambles,\u201d Ingrasci said. \u201cWithout crypto, thousands of lives in the military would have been lost because crypto was able to get money very quickly to the front lines and was able to mobilize across borders, raising over $130 million for Ukraine to resist this invasion. When Vitalik was there visiting Kyiv during the war, he got to see this thing he helped create being used in this incredibly important way, and that\u2019s where that world-building came into reality. It was an emotional moment to witness just how powerful it was.\u201d
\nIn many ways it\u2019s because Buterin is simply a child at play, tapping into his inner youthful creativity, only now with an adult mind and body and the relationships and resources to execute on his ideas.
\n\u201cVitalik has said he\u2019s a builder and a thinker first and foremost,\u201d Temple said. \u201cAn interesting tension for him during filming was how people looked to him to be something more, to be this leader and representative of the entire crypto movement. Throughout the film, he wrestles with how much to use his voice, how much to become a leader and how much to speak out against things he doesn\u2019t always agree with. He eventually does decide to speak out against speculation and say that he doesn\u2019t think Ethereum was designed to trade million-dollar monkeys and that there\u2019s a lot more we can do to fix systems and help people.\u201d
\nIt\u2019s a humanizing element of a pedestaled tech founder, epitomizing how at times we all struggle with speaking up on our values \u2014 especially when those values are different or run counter to the dynamics of our own social circles and society at large.
\nAnd that\u2019s the power of Vitalik. The film is not just about crypto; it\u2019s about the human stories that can resonate beyond the immediate environment the film is in \u2014 crypto just happens to be the backdrop.
\nQuite a bold story to tell by a couple of \u201cnon-native\u201d crypto filmmakers.
\n\u201cWe\u2019ve actually used crypto for a lot of elements in the distribution process for this film, which is exciting because the documentary space is broken,\u201d Ingrasci said. \u201cFor an independent documentary to happen, it\u2019s just so difficult these days. A lot of streamers have a lot of control over the film you ultimately make, but because we were able to crypto-crowdfund in the beginning on Mirror, we were able to have creative control over the film.\u201d
\nRelated: Dark Knight & Superman writer launches AI-powered crypto film universe
\nIngrasci and Temple executed a movie trailer drop through Zora and an early onchain release of the film this past September on Bonfire, both powered by Web3, which helped raise the funds the duo is currently using to market the documentary to mainstream audiences.
\n\u201cA lot of independent filmmakers have zero marketing budget; there\u2019s very little money in documentaries. But instead [because of our crypto-crowdfunding], we\u2019re able to really make sure the trailer, the message and the film gets out there.\u201d
\nIn this way, Ingrasci and Temple have created a sub-narrative around the making of a film using crypto-native tools, providing a real-world use case for other filmmakers on how they, too, might find success by utilizing blockchain platforms for the creation of their own film projects.
\n\u201cI think there\u2019s so much potential for these tools to have a big impact on filmmakers, though we\u2019re still at the beginning,\u201d said Ingrasci. \u201cIt\u2019s still difficult to understand, and the complexities are not abstracted away enough. The short initial onchain release of the film \u2014 while a testament \u2014 was very difficult for people who were not in crypto to access it.\u201d
\nBut ultimately, the decentralized theatrical release of the film occurred in 24 countries and 30 cities all around the world, all on the same night.
\n\u201cAt the premiere in New York where we were, somebody came up to me and was, like, \u2018I feel like I can share this with someone, and they\u2019ll finally understand what I do for a living and why I do it,\u2019\u201d Temple said. \u201cThose kinds of reactions \u2014 the \u2018I feel seen\u2019 and \u2018I feel understood as a technologist\u2019 \u2014 as a filmmaker, hearing those reactions from people who are trying to build new systems is the dream.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ingrasci, producer Jenna Kelly, co-producer Linda Xie, producer Carrie Weprin, and Temple at the premiere in New York. Source: OptimistFor Ingrasci and Temple, the dream continues to evolve, with their film now available all around the world on mainstream platforms such as Apple and Prime Video. Source: Cointelegraph.com NewsWhen Zach Ingrasci and Chris Temple had the idea to make the documentary film Vitalik: An Ethereum Story, they were actually filming another documentary, and over the course… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127947"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=127947"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127947\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=127947"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=127947"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/cryptospotters.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=127947"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n\u201cIf the goal is to be able to make a film you can send to your mom \u2014 while she might not understand what Ethereum is, she\u2019ll understand why you\u2019re interested in this thing \u2014 so I think we did that,\u201d Ingrasci said.
\n\u201cVitalik believes technology can be used to make our lives better, especially today when there\u2019s a lot of polarization and cynicism surrounding blockchain tech and questions around if it\u2019s worth it. If we use these technologies in good ways and invest the energy into finding real use cases for them, it can make our lives better, and Vitalik showed us these are questions worth asking.\u201d
\nMagazine: 3 reasons Ethereum could turn a corner: Kain Warwick, X Hall of FlameRead More<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"