New State of the Wall post! I talk about the Blip shutdown, upcoming episodes, a delay on History of Power Rangers, and more.

Blip Shutdown & What Would You Like To See on the Site?
In case you haven’t heard, Blip has formally announced that it will be shutting down on August 20th. Let’s go over a few things first, since of course I’ve gotten a ton of questions from people about how this is going to go down, particularly since other video producers are talking about the issues they’re having with it.

First and foremost: I do not need to download my backlog again. I keep EVERYTHING nowadays. I have raw footage of cameos from others from six years ago. I have my own storage server and backups of all my videos just in the event of some catastrophic failure. The only things I don’t keep are raw footage of AT4W episodes (aside from storyline footage nowadays) since I don’t really need the raw footage of episodes where I’m reviewing some random Image comic or the like. It’s not like there are any bloopers in them. I screw up, I just do the take over.

Secondly, all of my videos that were on Blip are on Screenwave already. It was part of the deal when I started using them as my primary video host – I didn’t want to have to reupload almost 800 videos. Now, a mass transfer like that means that not all videos made it through. Fortunately, Screenwave does have a thing on their dashboard that informs me which videos did not convert over to their systems and it’s about 27 videos or so. It’s a mixture of AT4W episodes, Longboxes, History of Power Rangers, some vlogs… but the important thing to note is that 27 is a lot easier to reupload than 800.

And this brings me to my next point – obviously, with Blip going down, the embed codes for those videos will no longer work. Which means what I DO have to do is replace over 800 embeds. And that’s not just videos *I* produce, but crossovers hosted by other producers, some of whom are having difficulty of their own finding new hosts. Needless to say, this is going to be a bit of a transition period for some videos.

However, what concerns us today is what to do about the 800 or so videos that DO exist on the site and need to be dealt with. The reason I’ve cross-posted to Blip for so long despite Screenwave being my primary player is because people have had difficulty with the Screenwave player. A common solution people have had with the issues concerning it is to click the HD button and lower the settings on it, since it’s otherwise defaulting to what it THINKS your computer can handle, but not necessarily what it actually can. However, if you are still having other problems, I suggest you contact Screenwave HERE to try to work out the problems with the player, since I’m not going to stop using it and until it’s resolved, you may not be able to watch Atop the Fourth Wall or other videos until then.

However, this still creates an issue for binge-watchers, particularly archive-bingers, since Screenwave won’t necessarily work on other devices and for reasons that elude my brain, people like to watch my show on tiny screens they carry with them or through gaming devices instead of on a computer. As I have been stating for several months now, I have been uploading my backlog to youtube, two videos per week to help establish a new audience over there. And in case you haven’t checked it out yet, my youtube account is RIGHT HERE. The idea was to keep it a year behind so the incentive was always to come to my site and watch it on whatever my primary player was if you wanted to see RECENT stuff. However, that is no longer viable with the loss of Blip. I’ll still be uploading to youtube at the rate I’m going at, but obviously some changes need to occur, particularly since I rely on Patreon early-access stuff and I just CAN’T post embed codes at Patreon from Screenwave (I’ve been test posting unlisted videos there via Longbox episodes after Blip had a major malfunction a week or two ago).

And now you see my quandary. If people would prefer, the backlog of episodes can be youtube posts for everything that IS there (History of Power Rangers is not there and cannot go there – I got MAJOR copyright strikes the last time I tried to post them there and I still haven’t finished working on youtube-safe versions, assuming they even work at all). At the time of this posting, I have JUST uploaded the 200th episode, so at LEAST up until the One More Day review can be posted in my archive. I COULD post regular AT4W episodes onto youtube as unlisted videos, as well, as the backup if you still have Screenwave troubles… but there’s a bit of an issue there. While occasionally the copyright strikes are against something much more severe, the majority of the time the problem is the end-credits music, since I’m usually using a full minute of a copyrighted song. If I’m going to be posting new episodes as unlisted youtube videos, that means I can’t keep worrying about the end-credits song.

Here are the options and I want to hear what people have to say:
-All of the backlog is Screenwave, with alternate links to youtube videos for ones that are up there.
-The backlog is youtube up until the point where I don’t have youtube anymore, then it’s Screenwave with links to youtube (it should be noted that some youtube episodes are more edited than others due to copyright issues with clips here or there).

-No new episodes put to youtube, JUST use the Screenwave player until youtube catches up, using the edited versions.
-New episodes can be put on youtube as unlisted videos, but they require either the instrumentals of the theme song for the end credits… OR a new theme song specifically FOR end credits. An option there would be to contact people from the original Theme Song Contest from years ago and see if they’d be okay with me using that music for it, assuming they still CAN be contacted.

So start posting your opinions and thoughts, because I want to hear them.

List of Upcoming Episodes
8/3 – PATREON: Zyuranger episodes 17-22
8/10 – Tandy Computer Whiz Kids: The Computer Trap
8/17 – Trouble #2
8/24 – PATREON: Pokemon Reburst, chapter 1
8/31 – PATREON: Green Lantern #23.1
9/7 – Team Youngblood #1
9/14 – US-1 #5
9/21 – The Star Wars #2
9/28 – PATREON: Power Man and Iron Fist #79

As always, the schedule is subject to change due to unforeseen issues.

History of Power Rangers
These are the currently planned release dates for the next two History of Power Rangers, finally catching up on the series currently being made and release. As you may have noticed, I have pushed back Power Rangers Samurai by a week. Why? Well, with all the other projects going on (and now including the Blip stuff), I have not had time to start my rewatch of Samurai. The good news is that since I’ve watched Samurai once before, I’ll have an easier time getting through 40 episodes than I would before, since I know already what’s happening and what episodes are more relevant than others, similar to how it was back in the early History videos. Hopefully I will not have to push it back any further than that, but stuff happens.

8/13 – Power Rangers Samurai
12/24 – Power Rangers Megaforce
TBA – Power Rangers DinoCharge

Longbox of the Damned
I’m happy that everyone seems to have enjoyed the first Midsummer’s Nightmare so far! And because I need to keep emphasizing this:

THERE WILL STILL BE OCTOBER LONGBOX EPISODES.

The Midsummer’s Nightmare was done because it was the last Patreon milestone to be fulfilled at the $2000 level. I will continue to do them every summer now (maybe June, maybe July, we’ll see) until the Patreon drops below $2000. The summer ones will focus on different themes and have different hosts (Moarte hosted this one to act as a transitional period for them and because he worked best as the host, next year’s will have a different host). As is often the case with my providence, the original plan was to have the Midsummer’s Nightmare cover all Marvel Zombies comics… buuuut then Marvel decided to release a few more in conjunction with Secret Wars, neither of which are done as of this writing, so they will not be covered during this run and will likely just get regular Longbox appearances.

And yes, regular Longboxes will remain without a theme and instead cover a wide variety of horror-themed comics and will cover the full 31 days of October, though obviously you can look forward to that in a few months.

Patreon
First of all I’d like to apologize for the lack of behind the scenes posts for $5+ patrons lately. Just been overwhelmed with work and not thinking any of the episodes really warranted any interesting behind the scenes details for you guys. I’ll try to correct that this week with some more behind the scenes of the movie, including some stuff for the Caelestis.

Otherwise, the only other things I want to talk about are a thing for patrons in general – the thing is, with Blip going under and our constant reminder that video hosting sites can be a fickle bunch, I rely upon Patreon as my new primary source of income. As such, it breaks my heart when a good chunk of pledges don’t go through for one reason or another. This latest month’s worth of Patreon had almost $200 worth of material not go out. I keep meaning to actually clean out people who haven’t had pledges go through for a while, but, well, busy and all. PLEASE make sure your patronage is still working properly and retype the information if it failed to go through last month.

Next up, Team Four Star recently had a VERY successful launch to their Patreon, getting over $10,000 to bring in more people full-time for them as well as work on getting their own production studio. It’s something I myself have been thinking about, I admit. The cost of doing Atop the Fourth Wall, especially with storylines, is always going up as I try to top myself with props and sets. The physical set for Comicron One is currently in storage, which I DO have to pay for, but it’s not an easy thing to pull out and put away, so while I want to keep it after all the time and money put into it, I’d prefer it have a place to stay set up permanently. Now, I have no idea how much such a thing would cost, but I do wonder if people would be interested in seeing that happen, as well as a permanent Longbox of the Damned set or other such things to make things more interesting around here.

I just want to hear what people think of that as well as hear suggestions for other future Milestones. Please don’t tell me to set up joke Milestones or the like. While it’s amusing and I don’t mind if others do it, but this is my BUSINESS so I want to try to treat it seriously.

I also have been talking about this for a while and had originally planned to do it this month, but got distracted by working on other things. However, starting in August, the $40 Patreon level for review requests will be increased to $80. It’s not against anyone specifically, but after a year of doing this, I’ve come to realize that a lot of Patreon-requested content that’s not just a single issue of a comic book requires a lot more time investment than a regular episode, so I’d like proper compensation.

However, the trade-off for that increased price is that I will be altering how the Patreon works. In the past, I’ve been saying that the review requests are limited to once a year for a specific patron, but I’ll be happy to switch that to once every six months for that. Riffs will remain once per year due to the long turn-around time it’s taken for producing them. In addition, the $30 patron level, wherein you have me promote your work, will be changed so that it will go for once a month for as long as you are a continued patron at that level.

AT4W Movie
Progress continues to be made on the movie! If you’re going to ConBravo this weekend (or watching Radio Dead Air on Monday night), I’ll be showing a preview of the movie. Not the full thing, obviously, but a good chunk of the first part. We’re still hoping for an October release to coincide with Atop the Fourth Wall’s seventh anniversary. I’m into editing the third part at the moment, and while the other two parts are not FULLY complete (still waiting on special effects and color correction stuff to do), the main editing is what’s happening right now and progress is coming along nicely.

If you’re looking for a few behind the scenes bits, I’ve been posting some of those on my Patreon for $5+ patrons (which I really need to do again in a little bit), as well as following my twitter for the occasional retweet of the Bloodgun comic that will be making a brief appearance in the movie, and just for a storyboard sequence of the film, you can check that out on tumblr HERE.

Conventions
ConBravo – For yet another year I shall be attending ConBravo in CANADA! Aside from the fact that there will be a CRAPTON of Channel Awesome producers there, you should be heading up there for the con simply because I’ll be showing an exclusive preview of the AT4W Movie there! We’ll likely have a panel with the other cast/crew members who will be there, so that’s even more reason to go! July 24-26 in Hamilton, Ontario!

I’m PLANNING on attending Youmacon 2015, as well, but I don’t think there has been any official announcement as of yet, so I prefer not to make the announcement just yet.

Please Keep Circulating the Links
As many have noticed, I’ve put a thing at the end of the credits asking people to “Keep Circulating the Links” and they’ve been wondering what that means exactly. It’s pretty simple – you like Atop the Fourth Wall? You think there are others who would like it? Circulate the links! Share the site, share the videos, and encourage people to check it out and become viewers. Hell, if it’s easier on them, share the links to the youtube page. Let’s get some new people interested in this little show about an idiot reviewing awful comic books (and sometimes Power Rangers)!

That’s all I’ve got for now. I’m eager to hear your feedback!