1. What sort of impact / effect do you believe this medium will have on society in general?
The webseries as a medium is in its infancy as a whole.
Hopefully, this medium will get to spread its legs a bit and have the chance to stay around awhile before new technology may intercede it. With television and film already setting the groundwork for sequential visual media, the webseries is its child (whether, prodigy, step-child, or bastard) and depending on how the webseries is raised and optimized, it could become a powerful tool. Unlike the other industries, the webseries is much more open to entrepreneurial and indie film artists due to it having less pressure for people to move to Los Angeles and other network communities; at this point it has the leverage of being above the censorship standards and conventional standards of television and film allowing for a much more experimental medium. However, experimentation should not be taken over narrative otherwise the webseries will struggle (and continue to struggle) to be recognized as a credible medium.
Eventually, some type of censorship may be employed, but I think it will be more to the creators to identify their audience and create visuals that compel them and keep them as an audience rather than set aside discretion. In fact, that brings question, who is our target audience? Are we going for educators and scientists alike? How can we broaden our target audience?
From 2000-2010 the advent of videos being streamed online rose to powerful heights both enabling artists and hurting pockets left and right. Newgrounds.com has brought the proclivity of animators and flash video game artists back into blood; and thereupon are a great number of animated webseries which have become the sole careers of the artists involved. Due to the large amount of animations that have been produced over the years, I would dare to say this medium is expanding and producing a plethora of outstanding as well as humorous amounts of art: from Xombie, Saladfingers, Blockhead, the Jerry series, and Brackenwood (to name a few). Yeah, sure some of these are ridiculous, Brackenwood however is one of the best flash animations I've ever seen that's completely of its own Australian universe and has some of the most beautifully slick animation to date. The kind of appeal here is so strong, that not only can it help amateurs to make art when in a hiring freeze, but setting up your own work and it gaining popularity online also looks fantastic on any resume and makes a person that much more desired for a company.
I believe animation is actually ahead to some degree in building up artists and helping them to get noticed; perchance that's because many of the people behind these animations are doing everything, including the music, voices, story, etc.
For a webseries to standout and have the same appeal as a film, it will take a ton of crew, an intelligent crew at that. It's easy to get attention for one fluke video, but to keep that consistency and actually create a meaningful story is no simple task. I've followed certain people online for a number of years due to things they consistently produce, not having enough quantity will push you to the wayside in this industry. It's about consistently putting out quantity that has quality: neither of these two terms should be neglected.
I seriously doubt that webserieses as a whole will take in more cash flow than either film or television in a given year, but perhaps it has the chance to glow and perhaps networks will start pushing for this style so as to survive in a world gone digital.
2. What sort of impact / effect do you believe our webseries will have on society?
We have a couple of huge advantages: 1.) We should have some of the best writing a webseries has seen up to date, which is on par with traditional narrative theories, making it slick as a story and compelling automatically. 2.) I don't know of any other academic institution that is working toward making a webseries, one that also has government science agencies supporting it and so forth.
Now with that being said, we will need as much prep work in the production and post-production teams that either equals or surpasses the creative merits of the writing group or else, we'll have a great story, but -- terrible visual development all around. I have no doubt our framework will be outstanding, but the questions continue onto the next departments, which takes a great amount of faith.
*And I highly recommend that whoever will be editing, should get the chance to do so continued on into the summer... when said student(s) will be much more free to sit at editbays for real industry type shifts instead of having to mix it with school, graduation, finals, and all the other variables. Being a student who has been in that process and seen others do so -- summer editing is important to both the MJF and EA departments as a whole (and should probably be mentioned more to students). ANYWAY, with that little commercial being said, I think where it will have the most influence is for the university being recognized as an actual player in film schools. It's innovative, as well as shows a high amount of collaboration within the community with outstanding students who have somehow, and in many cases, quite literally come from the woods. It will also be great for all the students involved if its does in turn become successful, at a bare minimum a point on a resume, an actual script and Bible in hand for portfolios, and the actual end product itself. That's pretty cool.
The sky's the limit, really. If we market this right, we should put ourselves into magazines, be in the competitions, and of course, the website itself -- which will need to be slick, alluring, and as graceful as can be. No one likes clumsy websites.
Perhaps this too can show that Missouri State students are capable of research that's even outside their supposed field, such as science and time travel, and that they can have educated opinions as well as creative ways of approaching critical problems -- as well as tying together the knot for literary themes and their philosophical implications with the flesh and blood of the mechanics of science. Simply put, that's a dream come true.
One last note, Tarboy is an animated flash that was entirely made by a college class, and is one of the more revered flash cartoons that has been made to date.
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