Oklahoma Contemporary commissioned me to film this guided tour of their exhibition, Open World. Featuring nearly 70 works across both traditional and digital disciplines, this showstopper exhibition offers something surprising around every corner. Open World will engage gamers, pop culture enthusiasts, art aficionados, and casual fans of all ages alike.
I got to use my big camera stabilizer for this tour, which I’m still getting used to setting up and using for videos. The tool was great for walking around the gallery.
If you can make the trip to Oklahoma Contemporary, go visit Open World before they close on February 21, 2022.
A morning news show host receives three tips on his phone about the future as he spends time with his sister.
Ever since our parents died, my sister and I made a point to take a weekend vacation around their wedding anniversary as our way of honoring them. We lived in separate states, living separate lives, so getting together once a year – just the two of us, no spouses – would’ve made our parents happy.
This year was my sister’s turn to pick a destination. She watched a travel video showcasing the moonshine, mountain gondolas, and food in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. When she suggested Gatlinburg, I was surprised as the city was nowhere near a beach like she favored, but after doing some research, I was excited to visit too.
Weekends were easy for me to take off but tricky for Sarah. My sister was the Operations Director for a lake resort while I was a co-host for a morning news show. Our parents’ anniversary was toward the end of March, which was a slow period for her work.
After breakfast at the hotel, we visited one of the local moonshine distilleries. We tried Friday night when we first arrived, but we didn’t have the patience to deal with the crowd. Plus, we’d figured we would have better luck in the morning. Gatlinburg’s walkability motivated us to leave our cars at the hotel. (Side tip: you should do the same as parking is hard to come by.)
The winter season still had a grip on the trees, but the skies were clear and sunny, although cold enough to warrant jackets for us as Sarah led us into Ole Smoky Moonshine. Marcus (I think that was his name) entertained us with jokes and samples of six different moonshines. I liked the sour lime while she favored the apple pie flavor. The pickle was…interesting.
My phone buzzed as my sister stepped away to use the restroom. There was a notification that read, “You Have 3 Unread Prophecies.” I had no idea what app of mine would display such a message. I opened the notification, which brought up an app I didn’t own with a mail-like interface.
The first message said, “Bring cash for donuts.” I didn’t have any cash on me at the moment, but I remembered seeing an ATM outside the building.
“That’s a good tip,” I said as I swiped open the following prophecy.
“Go to Clingmans Dome when prompted.”
When I drove through the Smokey Mountains to get to Gatlinburg, I saw a sign for Clingmans Dome. I didn’t know anything about the place, but the name and location made me think this dome would be like an observation post. I was game to visit. I figured I could get some breathtaking photos.
The last message was the most crypt and eyebrow-raising one. “When you arrive, have your video camera ready, but be safe and don’t get caught.”
This is all so weird, I thought. I bet my sister sent these. She knows of my affection for donuts and exploring.
I tried to re-read the messages, but the app disappeared.
My sister returned. “You ready for our next stop?”
“Sure,” I said. “Just let me hit up this ATM for some cash.”
“Good idea,” Sarah said with a straight face.
With cash now in my wallet, we strolled over to The Village, which had German architectural motifs in a cute, walkable shopping district. The place was like nothing I’d experienced before. Buildings weaved all over the place, not following any sort of grid pattern like a standard city block. Since there were no streets, delivery people hauled packages on handcarts, which I’m sure was also quite the workout for them. There were hardly any flat surfaces. I took picture after picture with my iPhone.
Then as the prophecy foretold, we discovered the donut shop that only accepted cash. The warmth and smell of fresh donuts in the tiny cottage-like business brought a wide grin to my face. Using the money I pulled out, I paid for our treats.
“Good thing I got some cash,” I said with a wink to my sister as we each enjoyed a chocolate long john.
“Yeah, good thing.” Her casual reply and straight face made me wonder if she did indeed send me those prophecies. She changed the subject. “What do you want to do after lunch, Lucas?”
I thought for a moment. From the corner of my eye, I thought I saw a woman with long, vibrant blue hair starring at me, but she turned away and around a building. I shrugged the watched feeling off. “Maybe we can drive around or go hiking.”
“How about Clingmans Dome?” my sister asked. “I saw a photo taken out there in the hotel lobby and thought you would like to take some pictures yourself.”
I laughed.
Sarah crossed her arms. “What’s so funny?”
In my big brother teasing voice, I said, “Nothing.”
She repeated “nothing” in a mocking tone and then asked what I wanted for lunch. I told her anything, and she suggested we walk around some more and eat wherever caught out attention. We settled for a small burger joint, which I thought was okay. Every summer, we would do a special on creative burgers on our morning show, so I was spoiled. Technically, I’m spoiled on excellent food because of my job, but I appreciate all food, and I didn’t nitpick. My sister liked the place, and that was good for me.
Then as planned, or prophesied, we took my car and made the hour-long drive to Clingmans Dome. The information we found online warned that the road to Clingmans Dome may be closed for the season, but the gate was open for us. Despite being the weekend, the parking lot for the vantage point was empty. We chalked the lack of visitors as luck, or maybe this was the first day they opened for the season? We weren’t going to complain.
We didn’t get far into the hike when we saw a woman dressed like a spy with a long, black trench coat talking to a blue, reptilian alien creature. The alien had on this black leather outfit that made me think he needed extra warmth while also being ready to fight. I yanked my sister down, and we hid behind some rocks.
“What’s going on?” she whispered.
“You tell me,” I mocked, keeping my voice low as I pulled out my cellphone. “This was your plan for me to film this, huh?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
I believed her. But who sent me those messages?
My phone had full cell service, which I thought was odd as I didn’t have any bars on the way up. I started a live stream on my Instagram. I positioned my phone like a periscope to watch without them seeing me.
“This is an interesting location you picked.” The woman’s tone didn’t seem too enthusiastic about the location. She pulled in on her jacket.
The alien checked his surroundings. “I wanted to make sure we would be alone.”
“Of course,” said the woman. “I understand.”
The alien brought up the briefcase to his chest. “See, I don’t think you do understand. My sources told me that some other people who tried to sell to your group are never heard from again.”
The woman scoffed. “Don’t believe in rumors. Do you have the artifact?”
“My price has doubled.”
“Don’t be obscene. Give me the item at our original price.” The woman snapped her fingers, signaling the alien to bring over the briefcase.
“And cut!” I about dropped my phone from the sharp, booming voice. The voice seemed to startle the people, too, because they both jumped. A woman with a long, flowing red scarf marched from around the corner and straight toward the two people. “I think we’re done here.”
I looked around for any other film crew, but I only saw the director. My only explanation was that they were on wireless mics, and this was a drone shot, so everyone was out of sight. At least, that’s how my brain processed their setup at first.
A fire truck honked its horn as they pulled up behind us.
The woman with the alien held up both hands like she was trouble. “Director Lux. This isn’t what you think-”
The director turned and looked at us. “Hey, how did you two get on this set?”
I stepped forward and sort of explained. “The front gate was open.”
“That gate should’ve been locked. Now, get out of here,” the director ordered. “I better not see any footage online.”
“Right, sorry.” My sister had a good laugh at the situation. I turned off the live stream and deleted the clip.
The firetruck pulled in front of us, blocking the path. People dressed in uniforms like no other firefighter I had ever seen got out from the vehicle. I shrugged them off as actors. Before we returned to my car, Sarah said she needed to use the restroom. Luckily, there was an outhouse next to us in the parking lot.
I listened to the film crew on the other side as I waited.
I heard the alien character complain. “I should’ve known you would’ve double-crossed me.”
“I’m in cuffs too,” the spy snapped back. “Hey, how did you find us anyway?”
“Lucas was live-streaming you, idiots,” the director said. “Our V.I. monitor caught the feed and dispatched us. You got a lot of explaining to do.”
The spy grumbled something I didn’t understand, but I understood when she said, “I bet he got a text message disguised as a prophecy.”
In the fall, my wife and I, along with my parents and sister, visited Gatlinburg. We didn’t even spend a full day there, but we knew we all had to come back (during a warmer month). I used the location as inspiration for the third unread prophecy stories, which are connected by the end-timer, Veritas, working to anonymously expose the illegal activities of a rouge fraction of Unity.
Thanks to Janine De Guzman and Mikey Marchan for bringing the scene at The Village to life. Thank you for reading my December short story. I got another one coming for January. Been busy with the holidays, client work, and sickness last month.
A profile article on Michael Basch, Nathaniel Harding, and Matt Wilson written for the Oklahoma Venture Forum on the subject of The Future of Oklahoma’s Venture Ecosystem.
Atento Capital, Cortado Ventures, and Victorum Capital Club each have their criteria and types of companies for investments. Atento’s focus is on generating excellent risk-adjusted returns and making a lasting economic impact through stimulating entrepreneurial activity in the community. Cortado invests in capital-efficient businesses that leverage technology to scale in the Fintech, Biotech, Aerospace, Ag Tech, Energy Tech, Manufacturing, and Logistics sectors. The Victorum Capital Club is a membership network of accredited investors focused on entrepreneurship, investment, and business development to generate a return on investment and promote community and economic development.
Basch’s advice is cash is a relative commodity for companies looking for investors.
“I think, doing the work to understand your customer and the problem you’re solving before you raise any money where you would completely understand the problem and the willingness to pay,” said Michael Basch, Managing Partner at Atento Capital. “I think it’s doing the work on customer discovery ahead of time and not raising money for the sake of raising money but raising money. Cause you have to raise money. Not every business needs to raise money.”
Over at Cortado Ventures, Harding said they invest in business-to-business technology that “you can put a moat around.”
“That’s defendable where that company can either have an advantage because they have patents or either intellectual property that’s difficult to, to replicate, or their strategy involves, a key partnership with a large company that can help them scale very quickly,” said Nathaniel Harding, Managing Partner at Cortado Ventures. “There’s other ways of having a moat, besides having patents or trade secrets, but we look for defendable, unique, novel technology.”
Victorum Capital Club works the same way as any other venture capital firm, but while they don’t currently fund, they have a network of investors from across the country they pool together.
“Each of those investors gets to decide if they want to invest and if not, and if they do how much they want to invest, then when we have everybody’s commitments, we just group everybody together into a single entity and make an investment,” said Matt Wilson, Managing Partner at Victorum Capital Club. “Historically, venture capital has only been available to the wealthy elite pension funds, insurance companies, things like that. And what our business model does is it brings access to high-quality investment opportunities to everybody that is an accredited investor.”
Wilson said a venture capital firm will generically tell potential companies that they look for are “team, team, team, market size, and traction.”
“It’s a joke, but it’s a very serious point that the people are arguably the most important thing,” said Wilson. “One of the unique things about it that is particularly interesting to us and where we’ve found ourselves gravitating to is a CEO that has a real reason, like a real differentiated reason to be successful. So somebody that grew up in the industry or was the market already, like they have some unique reason that differentiates themselves from just any other guy off the street to be successful in their industry, focused on their customers, with their product, things like that.”
People who are trying to make a quick buck, who don’t have a good sense of why they’re building their business, and don’t want to collaborate are some red flags in a CEO Basch said. Basch also watches for how they take feedback, how they respond to adversity, and how they problem-solve.
“Don’t start a company or raise money because you want to, but do it because you have to,” said Basch.
Harding said one of the benefits of doing business in Oklahoma is fewer gatekeepers here.
“If you’re a first-time founder, you may not have a track record,” said Harding. “You may not have like the network or the keys to the city, but you can get meetings with the people that are going to help you, and they’re going to be willing to help you. That’s really special and powerful. I think if that is embraced and that entrepreneurs and founders know that, then they should be not afraid to reach out to people that may be able to give them great advice or they’ve had experienced that sector. If we all leverage that as a community, we can scale and grow the venture capital and entrepreneurial community much faster.”
Michael Basch, Nathaniel Harding, and Matt Wilson will be part of a special panel discussion at the Oklahoma Venture Forum Power Lunch on Wednesday, January 12, 2022. The event will be open to guests both in-person and virtually via ZOOM.
“You don’t have to be any particular thing to be involved in this ecosystem system and support founders and support businesses,” said Wilson. “There’s a lot of different ways to do that. And so I think everybody should find ways to be active and build the future of our state, build the future businesses that are kind, and going to drive us for the next 50 years.”
The day before Thanksgiving, I was hired by Graham Colton to live-stream and film his big 20 Year Homecoming Concert. He’s released the edited video to share with everyone as a showcase piece.
I had a blast filming and editing the video together. I hope you enjoy this concert too.
A mysterious man offers a woman dressed as a witch a device that allows her to cast real spells on Halloween.
“Hey, Witch.”
Jill spun around with the box of wines wine she held, about to punch some guy for calling her a nasty name, but lowered her fist when the gentleman in a white suit and pink ascents continued. “I love your costume.”
“Oh, thanks,” Jill replied, her face flushed red in embarrassment from the misunderstanding. She was outside the liquor store, about to get her car after picking up some last-minute alcohol for her and her husband’s Halloween party tonight. She was dressed as a witch – decked out with a pointy purple hat, black corset, ripped leggings, and red heels for the occasion.
“It’s missing an accessory,” the man commented as he looked her over.
Jill clenched her tongue, bracing for whatever line he would give.
The man shook a finger at the sky when he realized his answer. “Real spells.”
Jill tilted her head back in unexpected confusion. “Real spells?”
“Or, more specifically, the ability to cast real spells,” he elaborated in a manner of an eccentric billionaire.
The man in the white suit reached behind himself and impossibly pulled forward a green metal chest the size of a watermelon. Before Jill could respond, the man opened the case, revealing a glowing green fog surrounding a crystal ball.
“Trade me one of your bottles of wine, and this device is yours,” the stranger offered.
Jill leaned forward and stared into the box. “How does it work?”
“Simply hold the crystal and say, ‘I cast,’ and what you want casted. Although, this device will only work until midnight, and you’ll have to live with whatever you created.”
Jill thought the deal over. Even if the crystal ball weren’t magical, the item would make for an excellent display prop or an accessory for her Halloween outfit. The exchange may be more in favor of the stranger, especially if the ball was mass-produced. Besides, she could always go back inside the liquor store and get another bottle of wine. She was grateful she was able to buy booze on a Sunday now.
Jill held out the case of wines. “I accept your offer.”
Without studying the selection, the man pulled out one of the wines. He reviewed the label for a moment – not long enough to read everything – before holding the chest forward for Jill. Jill picked up the crystal ball, losing herself as stars and planets swirled around inside. The display consumed her focus until the liquor store door dinged from someone entering did she snap out of her trance. Jill looked around for the stranger, but he was nowhere. She shrugged.
“I wonder,” Jill said as she held out the crystal. “I cast five boxes of red wine.”
The crystal glowed red before unleashing a spark of purple lighting at the pavement. Jill closed her eyes and jumped back but held tight onto the crystal. When she felt the danger pass, she saw five cases of premium boxed wine sitting before her.
“Holy shit!” Jill cussed. “It fucking worked!”
Jill glanced around to see if anyone else saw what happened, but no one was around. She loaded up the wine in her black Jeep. After buckling in, Jill grabbed her iPhone from the phone mount and texted her husband. She told him to meet her in the garage as soon as she pulled inside.
Upon arriving home, her husband followed her instructions. The garage door closed as Jill jumped out of her car.
“You won’t believe what I got,” Jill said, her voice racing as she pulled out the crystal ball from her pocket.
Her husband, Mike, took the crystal. “Neat. Where did you get this?”
“I traded a bottle of wine for it to this weird guy in a white suit,” Jill explained, still in a hurry. “It’s magically.”
Mike flipped up his eye patch for his pirate costume as he studied the crystal ball against the garage light. “I’d say.”
Jill yanked the crystal ball from him. “No, I mean, this is really magically. Watch. I cast a vanilla cake the shape and size of a human skull on a silver plate.”
The crystal glowed red before and then unleashed a spark of purple lighting at the ground, creating a vanilla skull cake. Jill smiled, proud of herself for holding steady during the spell casting this time. When she noticed Mike hadn’t said anything, she saw his face was drooped down and whiter. She picked up the cake.
“Don’t you think this is cool?” Jill asked, her voice soft.
“I’m worried,” he responded softly. “Remember that old Simpson’s Halloween special where the things they wished for had negative side effects?”
“Oh,” Jill uttered but then perked up. “But what’s wrong with this cake then?”
“I bet the cake has that fondant icing I hate,” Mike said.
Jill nabbed a tiny piece of icing from the back of the skull for a taste test. “Damn. It is fondant. But I bet other people will enjoy it.”
Mike shrugged. “I guess small spells have small consequences, so how about we keep it that way?”
Jill huffed. “I suppose you have a point. Besides, the guy said this would stop working at midnight anyway.”
“Of course he did. Typically spooky wares guy. Was he dressed in a black robe?”
“No, I said he wore a white suit with pink accents.”
“Oh, that’s right. You did say that.”
“Yeah, and he also had this strange, pink tie with white swirls,” Jill added. “The pattern made me think of Norse mythology or something like that. He wasn’t an old man either. He looked about our age.”
“Well, we should get this stuff inside,” Mike said. “We do have guests.”
“Right, you go back inside, and I’ll bring in the wine. I might have cast a spell for more wine earlier.”
Following the recommendations of her husband, Jill kept the spells small throughout the night. Whenever she wanted something, she went to the garage to create the item, which made for the perfect cover. She casted spells for things like more food, new wine glasses after being broken by a guest, full-size candy bars for the trick-or-treaters, additional Halloween decor, and other small items that wouldn’t raise suspicions.
The party lasted until almost midnight. As Jill and Mike cleaned the living room with the house to themselves, a thud hit their window. Jill thought nothing of the sound until she heard another one. She peeked out behind the curtain. A group of teenagers was throwing eggs and toilet paper at their house.
Jill pulled out the crystal from her pocket. “Oh, I’ll teach you a lesson.”
Jill stormed outside, prompting her husband to stop vacuuming and follow her. The teens laughed and started to run away. Jill’s eyebrows lowered and pulled closer together as she aimed the crystal ball.
“I cast a giant black widow to scare them!”
The crystal glowed and sparked to life a 10-foot tall black widow spider. The pranksters screamed in terror while Jill laughed in delight. The spider chased after them, knocking over her mailbox and some streetlights in the chase. The spider spewed webs, capturing the teenagers.
“Okay, this is going to have some major consequences,” her husband said.
“You’re right, you’re right,” Jill agreed with a sigh. “I cast spider be-gone.”
The crystal did not respond. Jill shook the device and tried again, but with no result.
“It’s 12:02,” Mike said while looking at his watch. “Didn’t you say everything would go away at midnight?”
“Yeah, I thought it would be like Cinderella, and everything would turn to normal, but I guess that’s not what he meant. He did say I would have to live with whatever I created.”
The black widow returned with the three teenagers, dropping them off like a cat offering a mouse. From above, three firetrucks landed like flying saucers, surrounding the spider and their home. Troops of humans in bright white and yellow uniforms poured out from the firetrucks. One with a rifle fired at the spider, stunning the creature and causing her to collapse. Another group rushed over to the teenagers and proceeded to free them.
Jill and Mike stood close together as a short woman with a yellow overcoat approached them. The couple read the name Captain Mists on her silver name tag. The leader glanced over the couple, spotting the crystal ball in Jill’s hand.
“May I see that,” Captain Mists formally requested, pointing at the crystal ball. Jill handed over the spell casting device without saying a word. The woman grunted in frustration. “Not another one.”
Captain Mists whistled, getting the attention of her team. “We got another spell caster situation. Standard procedure. Clear out anything that’s not theirs and wipe their memories.”
This short story was triggered by my random logic process. As I was leaving a convenience/gas store, I saw a woman dressed as a witch leaving, which got me thinking of how witch rhymes with another word and what if someone offered the power to cast real spells. I’ve written a story with just Raven, so I wrote this one to feature Loki by himself.
