Machinima film-maker and poet Celestial Elf interviewed for Wizzley

by BardofEly

Celestial Elf is a very talented video film-maker who creates magical stories using narrative, images and music and Machinima technology.

Introduction to Celestial Elf
Please introduce yourself to my readers.
My name is Celestial Elf, I am a poet and machinima film maker focusing on the Elven and the Ancient Ways.
Celestial, because this denotes the heavens, the freedom of the skies and the beyond,
Elf, because of my affinity with the ancient origins of the term, describing semi-divine beings endowed with magical powers which they use for the benefit of mankind.
How would you describe your work?
My poetry and films serve the purpose of inviting people in a non confrontational way via info-tainment, to think about this life and the other ways that it might be lived.
By showing that there are other and more worthy values than the ones our current and world destroying societies are practicing, I contribute towards a movement of consciousness raising, by changing the stories that we see and hear, allowing ourselves to explore more caring and compassionate alternatives.
Reaching across issues such as the nature of religion, environment and society, of how we may remember and celebrate our place as a part of the amazing gift of this life, rather than as users locked in a materialistic system set aside from our world, alienated from our inner selves and from nature. Specifically, I plant seeds of light, love and freedom in all of my works, to uplift and change the world about us. My belief is that even small changes in perspective culminate to create greater changes in the wider world, that still waters run deep, that slow oaks grow tall....

Celestial Elf

Image of an Elf
elf

What is Machinima?

Find out all about Machinima
Terminator Salvation Machinima Series: Season 1

Warner Home Video
$5.0  $2.25

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Machinima: The Art and Practice of Virtual Filmmaking

McFarland & Company
Only $28.0

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Episode 3

Only $0.99

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Celestial Elf screenshot

A chosen image
screenshot

The Mermaid Queen - Lisa Thiel

Mermaids

Butterfly thinks

An image created by Celestial Elf
elf 3

Celestial Elf's poetry

Verses by Celestial Elf

I include here an example of my poetry:

High Elven tasks I have in mind,
To reach beyond, above divine,
To establish perspectives true and fine,
Of hearts now centered, outside of time.
***
Of dancing souls, both thine and mine,
Starclad in moonshine, insight sublime,
To share the song of sacred circle,
As Far life whirls in joy internal.
***
To learn the truth of being free,
As love's light flows eternally,
To give of patient, gentle care,
As ultimate soul smiles through our stare.
***
Awake and laughing with delight,
look now and celebrate the endless height,
The softest brightest purest light,
The path that knows no end or start,
The secret of the opened heart.

The Butterfly's Tale by Celestial Elf

An important story about butterflies

Celestial Elf's videos and films

Videos and movies made by Celestial Elf

Please say a bit about your videos?

My films are machinima films, which is to say that they are machine-cinema, cinema which is filmed within the machine of an online virtual world.
This medium is a wonderful vehicle for exploring all sorts of environments and creating films that would be beyond any manageable budget in the 'real' world, in terms of locations and costumes, in terms of hiring actors and of the time involved in setting up, filming and editing films.
Filmed within a machine, but imbued with the spirit of the content creators who have made the animations and environments which I use, and blessed by the very real people at the other end of the link, wherever they may be around the world in day or night, sharing the moment with me and then via film with you, wherever you may be, its a very magical process.
For example of this magic I share here The Mermaid Queen, which features The Mermaid Queen song by and used with permission of Lisa Thiel.

In a very powerful way, the stories that we see in our modern media are partisan, written and created to valorise and homogenize specific ways of viewing the world and the world affairs of our times, they prescribe our culturally determined set of responses. I consider these perspectives as largely corporate endeavors to control the individuality of humanity and conform us all to best market practices, its not a personal thing, its about business... Despite the rise of internet led individualist media that allows people to communicate outside the box, the path from cultural corporate think to individual freedom and social cohesion within that new stance is still obstructed in my opinion by the habituated forms of expression; corporate medias have to a large extent replaced any alternative methods of representation, storytelling and communication. In response to such an occlusion of the wonderful and diverse perspectives of our natural spirits and the ensuing personal, cultural, social, spiritual, environmental and ecological damage that we see around us resulting from such monocultural shortsightedness, I see the approach of simply subverting the genres of entertainment towards a new info-tainment, creating new stories and cognitive parameters. Independent films such as mine, I consider a small step to opening such gateways towards a more inclusive and cooperative society in spiritual and material harmony with each other, the environment and the world.
In terms of content then, my films explore themes of nature, the pagan traditions and the sacred, gifting an insight of how we may become aware of these aspects and in being aware of them, we may remember them in our normal daily lives.
By way of an example of such alternative perspectives, I share here my butterfly's tale, which sets out the ecological cause of butterflies.

Inspiration

Where does Celestial Elf get his ideas?

What inspires your poetry?

Is this a trick question? I think that creative people may have a problem in limiting their inspirations, I certainly do because I find everything to be so amazing.
In terms of inspiration, the list is long, perhaps it includes everything that i ever saw-read-heard-thought and felt...
Certainly creatures, clouds, stone circles, lightning, the sky, the earth, my heart, your heart, birds, ravens, crows, owls, butterflies, beetles, bats, pagan festivals, norse mythology, the traffic jam, randomness, old friends, new friends, lightness, the sun, darkness, the stars and moon, modern art, ancient art, that fly which just flew past my ear haha, corn, frogs, that look in your eye just now as you read this list :D
In terms of authors the list is a little more manageable, I would include the visceral power of Allan Ginsberg in Howl, the indefatigable infinity in Jack Kerouac's lesser known work The Scripture of the Golden Eternity, the wisdom of Khalil Gibran's Prophet, The Crazy Beautiful buddhist wisdom embodied in Glenn H. Mullin's translation of the Second Dalai Lama's poetry Mystical Verses of a Mad Dalai Lama (he was also known as the Melodious Laughing Vajra), along with nearly everything by Allan Watts, Ram Dass's insightful Be Here Now, and Peter Berefsord Ellis's great book on The Druids.

My poetry then follows spiritual themes, of a non denominational nature, although tending towards the pagan and the nature based, to recognize and embrace the divine nature within all of us. My poems are keys, sometimes to unlock a closed situation and allow new light to show a path out of life's confusing avenues, other times to unlock the gateways to the inner worlds, to lead an inquiring soul onwards towards their next step...

King Arthur's Summer Solstice

Features the voice of King Arthur Pendragon

The Trials of Arrthur

Best book about King Arthur Pendragon
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King Arthur Pendragon

Druid leader of the Loyal Arthurian Warband

What are your influences in general?

Following a persistent leaning towards the spirits of nature and the spirits beyond nature as a child, I went on to develop an interest in comparative religion, later spent a year chanting mantras under the tuition of a Tibetan Lama before escaping from orthodoxy into the beyond definition of Zen. These interests have all contributed to a developing sense of compassion and of the Unity and Oneness of creation which I am happy to see born out by modern science with its butterfly effect theories and the simple recognition of interdependence, that every act has a consequence, which in itself is not a final state but becomes the act for a new consequence and so on.
More recently I find myself drawn towards the ancient pagan and nature reverencing traditions of Europe, the magic of these lands that I could not see for many years because I looked within, without and far away. In these traditions I find a celebration of nature, the season, the sacredness of life and the importance of family life, of community and of society.
I have also been deeply inspired by the holistic and socio-environmental traditions and practices of the Druids, delighted to join the Druids of The Second Realm, which is a seed group of the Order Of Ovates Bards and Druids (OBOD) within Second Life, and most recently to read the absolutely inspiring The Trials of Arthur: The Life and Times of a Modern-Day King about and co-written by King Arthur, the Raised Druid King of Britain.
For an example of my more local European spiritual and cultural concerns, I share here King Arthur's Summer Solstice, which features King Arthur's own poems narrated by himself and set at Stonehenge, the ancient site for which he successfully campaigned over many years for public access at the times of Solstice and ancient religious festivals

Copyright © 2012 Steve Andrews. All Rights Reserved.

Find out more about Celestial Elf

Celestial Elf websites
  • Heart Songs
    The Spiritual Poems of Celestial Elf I am a poet, member of Druids of the Second Realm, a seedgroup in SL formed by members of the RL Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids and a machinima film maker f... by celestial_elf in Poetry, Creative Writing, and
  • YouTube - CelestialElf's Channel
    Celestial Elf Machinima Maker ~
  • Incompatible Browser | Facebook
    Facebook is a social utility that connects people with friends and others who work, study and live around them. People use Facebook to keep up with friends, upload an unlimited number of photos, post links and videos, and learn more about the people
  • celestial elf - Google Profile
    celestial elf - - this - here - May the long time sun shine upon you All love surround you And the pure light within you Guide you all the way on.
  • http://twitter.com/CelestialElff
Updated: 11/07/2012, BardofEly
 
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