2,901,158 views

Getting close to 3 million views. Thought that was worth a mention, and a blog post. And yes, I still update here from time to time.

I secretly dream that we’ll get to do a bluray release of the film. It was shot in HD, but uploaded to youtube in SD. The only thing that stopped us was the lack of interest from the festival submissions. But bluray pricing has come down quit a bit, so I may bite the bullet and do it myself… and probably wind up with a couple hundred copies of the movie sitting in my basement… but we’ll see. Check back when we hit 3 million views.

If you didn’t know, Mike and I have been doing movie reviews since lock down. You can check us out at Tony and Mike Watch the World Burn.

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2 Million Views

I’m still rather gobsmacked by this.  When we made our little movie a few years ago I would never have imagined this.

After numerous rejections from film festivals, and finally deciding to post the movie to YouTube, I would have been happy with a few thousand views.  So to hit 2 million views is mind boggling to me.

Thank you so much to all of the fans that have watched the movie, shared the movie, and kept spreading the movie. We would never have reached this milestone without you!  I don’t think you’ll ever understand how truly grateful I am, and humbling getting here has been.

There is an animation project that we are working on currently.  More news on that another time.  For now, I’m just going to celebrate this milestone with Mike, and do a couple of shots.

Last year we had a big health issue with one of my children.  That took all my energy for the year.  But I have put together a HD version of the movie (it was shot in 1920×1080) and if there is ever a way to monetize that, it will be released.  Frankly, monetized videos on YouTube generate next to nothing .

Here’s to 3 million! And please, keep sharing our little movie.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqziPSVIsmE

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1 Million and the Blooper Reel

So we did it…. we finally broke a million views (actually we broke it back in the second week of October, and we’re almost to 1.1 million).  I’m trying to find a good quality version of the behind the scenes video we played at the wrap party, but I have only been able to locate snippets.  As soon as I track a copy of the complete video down, I will post it.

On another note, we did a rebuild of the website, to make it more mobile friendly.  So thanks for continuing to visit the site, and yes, we’ve been paying attention to the traffic.

On a related note, based on the number of views, I can assume most viewers don’t know this is floating around out there.

Take a look.

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Email issues

If you’ve tried to contact us, via the email on the contact us page, please try again.  Unbeknownst to us, their was an issue with the info@ email address.  We’ve fixed it, but we don’t know how many emails we missed.

Thanks

 

 

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Questions Answered

Behind the scenes shot of Kelly standing in for Roy, for the last shot of Spring.
Behind the scenes shot of Anna (Trinka) and Kelly standing in for Roy, for the last shot of Spring, sporting the Roy’s Towing logo on the back of his shirt.

Still trying to figure out how it all ties together? Have you  asked, “What happened to So-and-so?”, have you figured out that the four stories are actually all one single story?

Have you figured out the fate of the “survivors” in each season.

Ready to find out if your theories about the film are correct?

Massive Spoilers ahead… turn back now.

Alright, here it goes:

The short answer: There is only 1 survivor at the end of the film.

The long answer:

We start in Spring, ending with just Anna and Roy. (“Roy” is the tow truck driver that came to help when Anna hit the deer, and she call’s him Roy because the logo on the back of his shirt is for a company named Roy’s Towing)

Behind the scenes shot of Madison and Gary, after Gary’s demise.

At the end of  Summer we see Gary and Madison are the only survivors of the attempted float trip to Muncie.

So what happened to Gary and Madison?

During Fall we get to see Gary and Madison and find out what happened to them.

In one of Doc’s flashback sequences, we see that Madison contracted, and died of pneumonia. Not realizing she had turned, Gary goes into the vault to check  on her, where he is attacked and has his throat torn out.

During Fall, we also catch a glimpse of Marcus.  He’s at the foot of the bed in the opening scene, and he helps carry the bed with Don’s body out at the beginning.

Marcus, Marianne, and the pregnant woman who killed them all.
Behind the scenes, of the Fall intro, with Marcus, Marianne, and the pregnant woman who killed them all.

In the final scene of Fall, a man brings a woman in labor to Doc.  One of the big themes of fall is the things that will kill you pretty easily, that we don’t even think about in the modern world.  Giving birth with little medical equipment, no medication, and few surgical tools is a risky business.  She dies giving birth, and everyone in the building does too.

Marcus manages to escape the building, and at the beginning of Winter, we find Marcus traveling while it’s still cold and safe.

Thanks again to all the fans.  We’re nearing a million!

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900,000 views

900,000 views.  WOW!
As we close in on a million views, I wanted to share some more behind the scenes stuff.
To celebrate another milestone, here are more poster concepts that we opted not to use before we did the final concepts and photo shoots for the posters.  These were never intended to be final designs,  just mock ups used to pick the direction we were going.

If you’re interested in seeing the final design you can see it here:
final poster design

Also, if you haven’t seen it already, there is the blooper reel from the production of the film.

There was a behind the scenes documentary that Kelly had put together for the wrap party.  It has only been shown there.  When we hit a million, we may celebrate by adding that to the Youtube channel.

Thanks again so much to everyone that has watched and shared the film!!!  Please keep spreading the word about TYAI.  And don’t forget to like and subscribe to the youtube channel.

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700,000 views

A new year!  A new milestone.  On January 3rd we crossed another milestone with 700k views.
Another 50k and we’ve hit 3/4 of a million!

If you enjoy the film, please like and share it!

 

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600,000 views

This morning at 10:04 AM, the Year After Infection broke 600,000 views.
It’s a proud moment for us as film makers.

When we were submitting the film to festivals, and distributors, we heard over again… “too weird”, “too different”, “too complicated”, “too slow”, “too depressing”.

Here we are 600,000 views later, and TYAI did find it’s audience. It’s still being watched and spread to others.  We still get subscribers and comments.  I confess I don’t read them.

I’m still proud of it. I got to make the film I set out to make, with no compromises.  Some people love it.  Some people hate it.  And that’s exactly the kind of film we set out to make.  No playing it safe.  No middle ground.  You either get it, or you don’t.

In retrospect, it’s weird to look back and realize that we were halfway into principal photography when they announced “The Walking Dead” on AMC.  (No, I’m not a fan… SURPRISE!).  Mike and I were standing on the bridge where we shot the climax of Summer, and when discussing it I told him “This is either very good, or very bad for us.”  I’m still not sure which it is.  We were making a niche film.  Walking Dead made zombies mainstream.

So at the end of the day, it was a successful failure as a film.  I don’t quite know how to feel about that.

Not too bad for a film that was rejected from over 22 festivals.  Each one costing $25-100.  Each rejection was a soul crushing experience.  The problem is you start to believe them.

When it was all said and done, we never got our theater premiere.  We never got to put an “Official Selection Smitty’s Backyard Old Time Film Festival” on the poster.  We never bothered to press the DVDs, or print the sleeves, even though all the artwork was done, and the DVDs mastered.

When we finally decided to post it on YouTube, just to get it out there, I would have been happy if 5,000 people watched it.  And when we posted it, I wasn’t sure it would reach 5,000.  So to reach 600,000 is a great feeling.

Being an actor and getting rejected is tough, but being the guy who wrote, directed, and edited a film and getting rejected is a gut punch.  So work on your core fellow film makers.  A gut punch is what killed Houdini.

And if you plan on getting rich on YouTube with a feature… well you can set that thought aside.  Our ad revenues have only left us about 96.5% in the hole.

I should have bought the Lotus.

I’m sure part of the reason we haven’t dove into another feature film is because I’m still a bit raw over the experience of the last one.   We will make another film.  I just don’t know if it’s going to be the labor of love that TYAI was.  It’s like dating after your first real relationship.  You want to love again, but this time you’re far more cautious, far less trusting, and far more critical.

I had planned a long time ago to do a series of posts about in jokes that were peppered throughout the film, but, when you don’t think anyone is going to see the film to appreciate the joke, it just seems like a waste of time.  Well, you proved me wrong. I may just do that series of posts when we hit a million.  That seems like an appropriate landmark. (We still have all the props and wardrobe)

So do me, the cast, the crew, and everyone involved in the film a favor.  If you watched the film, and you liked it, pass it on to a friend.  Word of mouth has been what got us this far, and I don’t see any reason that it shouldn’t continue that way:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqziPSVIsmE
https://www.facebook.com/yearafterinfection?ref=bookmarks

Much love to the fans.  Thanks for making it all better.
And to the folks that kept telling us “no”, we still have the film in HD if you’re with Netflix, Amazon or a distributor that is interested.

 

 

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Congrats to Colby Raines

Congratulations to Colby Raines (Matt in Summer) for his upcoming Nat Geo Appearance on Remote Survival

Each episode features two new ‘Remote Survivors’, or contestants. One is guided by Cliff Hodges, the other by Alex Coker. Contestants must follow the experts’ instruction to travel from a drop point to an extraction point of a period of several days (exact length unspecified) while performing various survival skills along the way. Contestants have the option to be evacuated at any time by using an emergency GPS transponder located on their shoulder strap.

Find out more:
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4457950/plotsummary/?ref_=tt_ov_pl

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400,00 views

Another milestone has been passed, as we pass 400,000 views.  Thanks to everybody who has watched and shared our little movie.  Please keep watching and sharing!

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250,000 Viewers and Posters

A major milestone for the film, as it passes a quarter million viewers.

We have a very limited supply of movie posters that we are offering for sale for $30.oo plus shipping.
These were done to help promote the film, and we have fewer than 10 of each poster.

The posters  are uncut, and some have mild discoloration on the edge from being stored, but this will be invisible when framed, or matted.
You can view and purchase all 5 posters on our store page.

We’re also debating on getting DVDs done.  If you would be interested in getting a DVD, please let us know using the poll to the left.

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