January 4 2019
So 2020 is now picking up speed and now that means there is news.
The word from FFF is that Alec Peters has acquired sets from the First Frontier gang and they are at Ares Studios now.
All the stuff that was sitting on shelves at Ares Studios are now in Alec’s basement so now they’ve got more space than they did previously.
Meanwhile the October shoot fundraiser is at $45,170 and the Patreon campaign is at $2,590 per month.
Unless the Ares Studios store is going well, Axanar isn’t really making any money to cover bills based on the fundraiser and Patreon and don’t forget there are future fundraisers and if they’re struggling to complete fundraiser #1 then fundraiser #2 will be even harder.
Here’s the most interesting piece of news, there are plans for Ares Studios to eventually leave its location and find some inexpensive location away from the noise distractions that traffic brings and set up there.
The big question is who is going to pay for it? Alec Peters has said he is broke so there’s no possible way he can do it unless he’s got some really nice friends (Axanar fans) or he sells up everything valuable he’s got and runs for the end of the rainbow.
What an amazing turn of events considering that around twelve months ago they were set to move to a smaller and cheaper location next door because they couldn’t pay the rent and all the rest.
The plans for moving doesn’t make much sense considering that money isn’t exactly raining down on Alec Peters and the Axanar production.
It seems to be an endless cycle of needing more of something from needing more sets to needing more money and so on and so forth.
How long will fans continue to throw money into the production and studio? how much is a fan production truly worth?
Until next time, be good to each other.
Mentioning Trekkie Mentions 
Actually it does make sense. You can get land, and build a building big enough to house all the sets, for around $250K down there. If he does a standard 30 year mortgage, he will most likely be paying less than $2K a month for it, which means since he is getting roughly $2550 a month in his patreon, his mortgage, and utilities are paid. Now yep, I know he will probably lose some donors over time from donor “churn”, but the additional space, and sets will allow him to offer even more things for films to shoot on. It makes sense for Alec to own the building, instead if putting money in a landlords pocket.
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He might need somebody younger to do the 30 year loan because he will be pretty old by the time it is finished.
Why should fans be paying the mortgage etc for Ares Studios and all the rest of them? It’s their businesses, their hobby, their dreams and most fan film studio makers forget those things.
In the future, Alec will be moving away from Star Trek, will fans still have to pay the mortgage etc or will they take it on themselves?
Fan Film Studios are money pits because the owners cannot make a dime so it is either pay it themselves or get others to carry them over the line again and again.
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Not to mention, I doubt Alec would have a credit rating, or have a stable income, to be able to get any sort of loan,. Especially if he relies on donations to fund his ways.
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Now the October shoot fundraiser has been shortened to $50,000 it won’t be too long before success is crowed about.
Everything related to the future to Ares Studios seems to depend on the generosity of others until the studio makes money and that is reliant on people coming in.
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I suspect that in the long run the only way to preserve large physical sets for Trek fan films is by storing them on land that a fan of some sort owns. Warp 66 Studio of course is an example of this template (Jonathan Lane mentions it in a FFF article). We’ll have to see if Ares Studios’ application to the IRS for tax-exempt status is successful, how that process affects the number of patrons, and if the current patrons are agreeable to paying mortgage plus utilities on privately held land. Neutral Zone Studio faces a similar dilemma in future as we patrons are at best covering half of Mr Tesi’s monthly cost to preserve the sets.
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That’s the only way really, you can’t make a dime from them so they gotta be where they are of little financial burden to owners.
Ares is different to the others because they’re going to branch out to do other Sci-Fi stuff and they can profit from those etc whilst NZS etc are on the one track.
Would you happily pay any fan film group month after month if they can make money themselves?
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