How Optimist Raised $2M In Two Days For Cryptocurrency Documentary ‘Ethereum: The Infinite Garden’
Optimist, filmmakers behind the GameStop project now working-titled The Meme Economy, is illuminating another trending corner of the financial ecosystem with Ethereum: The Infinite Garden, a doc it just fully and speedily financed by donations of said cryptocurrency.
Optimist raised just under $2 million worth of Ethereum in just over 48 hours last week by crowdfunding on the platform Mirror. Some donors received producer credits and NFTs created by digital artist pplpleaser. All donors of at least one ETH (worth about $1,800 today) got a non-fungible token titled “Bloom.” The top 20 were sent an animated version of the film’s poster.
Cryptocurrencies are notoriously volatile and Optimist’s principals told Deadline they pretty quickly converted the ETHs to dollars to lock in the funding.
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Optimist
The film is in early preproduction. It follows Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin, head of The Ethereum Foundation, Aya Miyaguchi and a vibrant community of developers, entrepreneurs, artists and crypto enthusiasts to chart the future of the Ethereum blockchain as it experiences unprecedented growth. In particular, it looks at what’s being called a cryto “merge” as Ethereum attempts to become more energy efficient and accessible.
The film is directed by Zach Ingrasci and Chris Temple. Carrie Weprin is the lead producer. Jenna Kelly is also producing with Linda Xie a co-producer.
Optimist is aiming for the film to have a festival premiere in winter of 2023, Temple said from LA. Ingrasci also weighed in from Paris where is shooting at the fourth edition of EthCC, a big European Ethereum conference.
Temple and Ingrasci, not surprisingly, studied economics at college and before founding Optimist both worked in microfinance, a field that helps individuals and small businesses lacking access to conventional financial services.
They met Buterin through work on The Meme Economy. That film, with XTR, was announced in February after the Reddit-fueled meme-stock-trading phenomenon upended financial markets the month before. One of several films and TV projects in the works on the topic, it should be ready for festival play early next year.
Funding for Ethereum: The Infinite Garden opened at 11:30 am PT last Wednesday and closed at 3:00 pm PT Friday (so 51.5 hours).
Temple acknowledged that getting Ethereum users and fans to back a movie basically about themselves may be an easier sell than other subjects, but he’s going to try to tap them again.
“We plan to test it with other films to see if this would be a way to help get indie filmmakers off the ground,” he said.
It’s worth a shot. It took four years to raise financing for Five Years North (Optimist’s coming-of-age story of an undocumented Guatemalan boy arriving alone in New York City), he noted. “This took two days.”
Click on NFTs below:
Ethereum Documentary Featuring Vitalik Buterin Raises 1,036 ETH
The documentary “Ethereum: The Infinite Garden,” which will feature Vitalik Buterin, has raised a total of 1,035.96 ETH ($1.9 million), surpassing its funding target of 750 ETH.
The filmmakers say the project will be the first feature-length documentary about Ethereum, and will include interviews with people involved in the development of the world computer, including Buterin and Aya Miyaguchi, the executive director of the Ethereum Foundation.
Fundraising for the documentary took place over three days on the crowdfunding site Mirror and ended July 16.
Producers will also be working with pplpleasr to drop a series of Infinite Garden non-fungible tokens (NFT) tied to select on-screen credits in the film.
Film production company Optimist is behind the documentary.
Read more: Vitalik Buterin Is Involved in a New Documentary About Ethereum
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Cinema Time: Ethereum Documentary Starring Vitalik Buterin Raised $1.9M in Several Days By DailyCoin
Cinema Time: Ethereum Documentary Starring Vitalik Buterin Raised $1.9M in Several Days
An documentary raised $1.9 million, surpassing its initial funding goal
The documentary will feature Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin
Funds were raised through the decentralized crowdfunding platform Mirror over three days.
Blockchain’s disruptive native gave precedent to a new type of immersion into an industry many rooted for, to disrupt existing practices. was the first digital instrument to give users a sense of autonomy in front of centralized institutions. Subsequently, Ethereum developed the smart contract functionality, increasing blockchain usability to account for more use cases. Now, the history and story of Ethereum see the light of day through a motion picture documentary.
Ethereum – The Motion Picture
Ethereum’s popularity as the leading smart contract platform motivated director Zach Ingrasci to pursue the narrative of the momentum-shifting blockchain. Ethereum: The Infinite Garden is a documentary film showcasing ” the innovative real-world applications of the Ethereum blockchain, the die-hard community of enthusiasts and developers, and its creator.”
The movie creators used Mirror, the decentralized crowdfunding platform, as a gateway to making The Infinite Garden a reality. The director highlighted they sought to use the platform to retain the creative vision and have the freedom to express their views without third-party intrusion.
Initially, the goal of the campaign was to raise 750 ETH. However, within three days of launching the campaign, the movie raised 1,035 ETH, amounting to $1.9 million. The campaign started on Wednesday, and by Friday, the creators announced the funding was already completed.
Over 662 backers contributing to the film’s creation are waiting for the release of The Infinite Garden, which is scheduled to release in the winter of 2023.
Ethereum: The Infinite Garden is the first feature film documentary about the Ethereum network. The movie will feature co-founder Vitalik Buterin as well as Ethereum Foundation Executive Director Aya Miyaguchi. Additionally, it is stated that the film will possibly include community members and other community figures that helped Ethereum grow.
On The Flipside
The film’s total budget will vary depending on Ethereum’s price action over the course of production.
Community involvement means the movie will be heavily subjected to their agenda, and their appraisal of the network.
Charitable Causes and NFTs
Participating in the movie’s creation and funding has provided backers with a series of incentives. As such, pplpleasr, who has previously worked on big titles, such as Wonder Woman and Star Trek, will be creating a series of NFTs.
The top three project backers have each been awarded with a unique NFT. Furthermore, over 2000 NFT will be made available “exclusively for backers.”
As part of the movie’s ethos, a percentage of funds will be allocated to two different causes. As communicated through the film’s official Twitter page, 31.8 ETH, or 3%, will be distributed to Gitcoin grants, and support open-source Ethereum projects. A further 20.72 ETH, or 2%, will be donated to Carbonfund.org, an initiative to reduce humanity’s carbon footprint.
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