CAMPFIRE CHRONICLES: Special Feature.
The night draws near and the shadows stir. You’re alone in the woods. Dead leaves crunch underfoot and the wind bites at your neck. You feel a chill down your spine as the fog ushers you deeper into the darkness. A darkness full of eyes that watch and whispers of stories…
Campfire Chronicles is an audio project that has been nearly two years in the making. It stemmed from the pandemic, and the inability to go out and create films so we thought “well what else could we create?” That’s when we decided to try our hand at some audio content. Liam & Richard already had experience working with audio content, with the No Ghouls Allowed Podcast, so we weren’t going into it completely blind.
But these things take time, and by the time we have finished the first series of this project, we are well out of lockdown, the pandemic is becoming a thing of the past, and we are almost at total normality on that front.With that comes the excitement of going out and creating film content! So the audio project took a little bit of a back seat during filming. We knew it was something we still wanted to create but, as with every project, when multiple people are involved it can take a while for everything to pull together.
So our idea was to have a narrative storytelling podcast, a bit like Are You Afraid of the Dark? and Goosebumps, where a storyteller tells you a dark, horrifying tale. The USP of Campfire Chronicles is that it has the impression of being told by (you guessed it!) the campfire in the woods.
We intended from the off for this to be a 6-part series and each episode would be a different story, each written by a different writer. This has been one of SuperfreakMedia’s more inclusive projects by pulling people from outside of the company to create content with us. And although it is exciting, this too also came with it’s own challenges.
Liam, Richard, and I spent a lot of time in many meetings going back and forth with drafts of stories and sending constructive notes back to the writers. Each time this happened, a few weeks might go by, sometimes a month or two before we saw another draft. Living such busy lives outside of SuperfreakMedia, it was often difficult to always get together to discuss the next steps. But working with so many writers has been incredibly enjoyable! There’s a freshness to reading other people’s material and working together to create something that we are all proud of.
With all of the stories written and locked in, it was time to get in front of the microphone.
One thing we underestimated in the recording process was the environmental noise. Dogs barking, cars revving, planes flying overhead. Wind, rain, children playing outside. Small knocks or bangs either in the house or next door. Pigeons. Bloody pigeons! The number of times we had to stop, open a window, shoo a pigeon and try again… We couldn’t count it on all of our hands. Before coming into it we knew we needed a quiet space to record the stories, and we spent a lot of time making dens for myself to sit under as I read aloud, but the microphone was so eager to pick up all other noises. It started to grind our gears a bit. It frustrated us. There was nothing we could do about outdoor noise, and it was difficult to try and find a space to record that worked on all of our timetables. We initially started with a weekend to record all six stories. We managed to get three done in that time, slowly. Then it took even longer to get the fourth one done as it was so difficult to find time and space and SILENCE. If there’s one thing we’ve learned from all of this it’s that we need to have our own recording studio!
But somehow, we got there. All six stories were recorded and all six entered the editing stage. What else could go wrong…?
RELEASE SCHEDULE:
Cleaning House – By Tommy Draper (September 19th)
Sticks & Stones – By Liam James (September 26th)
Luke – By Aaron J Booth (October 3rd)
Control – By Adei Bundy (October 10th)
Why I No Longer Play the Games of Children – By Mitchell Robbins (October 17th)
The Matron of Lowcrest House – By Charlie Brentnall (October 24th)
*UPDATE - All episodes are now available - click on the thumbnails above or use the playlist linked below…if you dare!
With this being such a collaborative project it’s only right we have one more trick up our sleeves. We may or may not have an exciting collaboration in place with our good friends over at THE SCENT CORVUS. Releasing Oct 12th we have come up with the perfect crackling candle to light up and fill the room with a smokey scent as you listen to (or tell your own) Scary Stories in the dark! – More details will be released soon!
We are so very excited to release Campfire Chronicles on the 19th September and have all of you listen to the spooky stories we have in store. You’ll be able to find it on Spotify, Soundcloud,YouTube, Apple & Google podcasts. Remember to follow us on Social Media and hit that SUBSCRIBE button on YouTube, it all goes a long way to bringing you even more creepy content!
As proud as we are to bring this to you, I’m sure you’ll enjoy listening to Campfire Chronicles more than me… I absolutely hate listening to my own voice…
