Crew sign inThe series, indexed
The daily build diary that carried the trailer to the August 15 submission: one day, one action, no outsourced thinking. Every episode below, what it covers, and the decision that came out of it. The pivots and the bookends carry cleaned transcripts; the rest link to the video. Machine-readable at /series.json.
- Day 1Jul 19 · 12 min
Series launch
Inaugural announcement: Garrett reveals LEOM (working title The Year of LEOM), a sci-fi trilogy script he has carried since middle school, and commits to a 21-day public sprint to build a 2 to 3 minute trailer for the Future Vision XPRIZE. He lays out the plan (week one lock story and shot plan, week two a two-day green screen shoot with real stunt rigging, week three post) and frames the project as a bucket-list regret-minimization move made possible by AI tools. The thesis is set: optimistic future, agency, intentional movement and stillness, PG rating, real performances with generated backgrounds.
“This is all a regret minimization game in my view. So making the kid version of myself happy, proud of the follow through, super super super important.”
- Day 2Jul 21 · 9 min
Day 2
Recorded first call with a director of photography about the green screen shoot: motion control versus gimbal versus slider, why lighting must be designed to the intended background for clean compositing, and the need to scout the studio before a lighting plan. The DP agrees to quote a day rate, camera package, a DJI Ronin, plus a gaffer and a swing; Garrett commits to delivering a detailed storyboard and shot list by the weekend and asks for one shoot day by the following Friday so VFX can start.
“I want to have it one day as the goal, really, but we're budgeting for two days to get any of that catch-up, just to be on the total safe side.”
- Day 3Jul 22 · 2 min
Day 3 | Trailer direction for Future Vision XPrize
Short story session defining what the trailer owes the script: the world is in post-scarcity abundance and a holding pattern, so the characters ask what the next frontier is. Garrett articulates the three pillars of an optimistic future (resource abundance, AI that does not go rogue with long-term safety, no social strife or war) and clarifies that agency means not delegating your thinking to AI, using it intentionally.
“The trailer doesn't need to be one-to-one with the script.”
- Day 4Jul 23 · 10 minpivot
Day 4 | Medtech research for Visuals
Recorded from the couch the day after foot surgery, Garrett realizes the trailer has no medical or life-sciences visual despite abundance being a core theme. He runs a live voice-prompted brainstorm on first-principles vectors for ending human suffering (energy first, then biomaterials, genomics, robotics, neurotech, post-scarcity systems) to source a visual beat, and ties it to his habit of context loading personal data (WHOOP, time, finances).
Adds a medical or life-sciences beat to the trailer that the shot list did not have.
“I think of energy as like the core resource that proves and enables abundance.”
- Day 5Jul 24 · 8 min
Day 5 | Shot list
First pass walkthrough of the shot list spreadsheet (sequence, framing, movement, priority, capture method, DP and compositing notes). Garrett explains that the trailer is shaped for the XPRIZE audience and judges rather than for LEOM alone, then narrates the story arc: a kid preparing for his first Neolax rite of passage, a dream montage of the abundant world, morning flight, stunt sequences, the Oklahoma drill clash, and a closing cityscape. Voice over will be real performance, not AI; the list mixes fully generated, composite, and practical shots and goes to the DP next.
“If not for this Future Vision XPRIZE competition, I wouldn't be framing this trailer the same way that I would if it was just LEOM as its own independent project.”
- Day 6-9Jul 29 · 30 minpivot
Days 6-9 | Multiple workflows/styles & proof of concept Background
The first big pivot episode. Garrett applies the 'eye test' to his original plan (live actors on green screen composited onto generated backgrounds) and, with no directing experience and an Aug 7 self-imposed deadline, decides to run three parallel tracks: the live composite shoot, a fully generated stylized animated version, and a fully generated photoreal version. He also gives the history of the proof of concept (the 2024 'Space Ad' Cybertruck toolbox idea that was killed over a $20k locking prototype and shipping logistics) and builds a weighted eye-test score formula.
Moves from one live-composite plan to three parallel workflows (live composite, generated animated, generated photoreal) after doubting the original plan would pass the eye test.
“It's not bad to pivot, man.”
- Day 10Jul 29 · 14 min
Day 10 | Basketball x Neolax
A reflective episode built around a never-posted basketball highlight reel from five years ago (edited in Premiere, After Effects, Blender). Garrett introduces Neolax (neo plus lacrosse), the jetpack-and-scythe sport derived from starship maintenance mechanics, and explains how his 12-year athletic run and the chip-away mentality feed the story's themes of agency and willpower. He positions the XPRIZE sprint as one of many sprints toward the full feature.
“It's been a someday goal. The tools are here today. There's no reason to keep putting it off.”
- Day 11Aug 1 · 22 min
Day 11 | Trailer Storyboard
Director review of the first full animated storyboard (166 frames, rendered locally and with Google models) frame by frame, flagging consistency errors, off-brand jetpacks, and accidental Star Wars lookalikes, while confirming the trailer flow. Garrett lays out his vision for pre-visualizing an entire feature in software (layered shots, crew login, watch the film in shoot order) and the lesson that crew must be context loaded as deliberately as an agent. Shoot dates are confirmed for the following week after the surgery delay.
“All the heavy lifting can be done early on, before bringing anyone on board. The whole movie can be made, feasibility tested.”
- Day 12Aug 3 · 23 min
Day 12 | Costume Design: Measure to Print
Costume design session: race suits from Marketplace as the base, PLA versus TPU 3D prints for armor pieces, dirt bike gear as the lived-in combat reference, and green screen constraints (no green, low reflectivity). Garrett describes the measure-to-print pipeline (inventory, measurements, STLs from concept art and from Wabbit-ranked generations) and credits his sister with sewing and assembly. Half the episode is a broader argument that the same context-loading workflow applies to fabric, code, and everything else.
“You got to know when to delegate.”
- Day 13Aug 3 · 6 min
Day 13 | Stunts and Insurance 101
Quick overview of the wire-stunt shot packet sent to riggers, coordinators, and performers: spreader bars, hip and foot pick points, swivel pulleys, 2:1 and 3:1 hand hauls, never more than two performers rigged at once. Garrett covers the insurance side (a payroll service, height exposure, excess liability, workers comp, broker briefing to meet the studio's threshold).
“There's a wild risk element if done improperly or not thought through.”
- Day 14Aug 5 · 20 minpivot
Day 14 | Losing Crew Days Before the Shoot
The night before prelight, an actor and a gaffer drop out over the AI and VFX pipeline that was disclosed in the materials from the start; prelight is cancelled and the shoot slides to the weekend, leaving roughly five days of post before the deadline. Garrett processes the industry pushback (cliquish, group think) against his 'computers used to be people' abstraction argument, asks the XPRIZE Slack for VFX help, and introduces the /jury agent that seats every team member and surfaces their questions before each meeting.
Actor and gaffer exit days before the shoot; prelight cancelled, dates pushed, and the full VFX load lands back on Garrett.
“Some people did not read over the materials. What are you going to do? You can't do anything but laugh.”
- Day 15Aug 12 · 12 minpivot
Day 15 | Going Fully Generative
The 180: the live-action green screen shoot is shelved because costs ballooned past what the output would be worth, and the submission goes fully generative on two parallel tracks (photoreal and stylized animated). Garrett frames it as bummer turned excitement, says the story will be told regardless of the XPRIZE timing, restarts livestreams for the crunch, and plugs the Sept 25 Moonshots live event.
Live-action green screen shoot cancelled; submission becomes 100 percent generative (photoreal plus animated).
“Bummer turned excitement.”
- Day 16Aug 12 · 22 min
Day 16 | Ranking Movement Shots on wabb.ai
Live demo of wabb.ai, the gesture-ranking tool built alongside the film: Garrett ranks 55 Iron Man and Spider-Man flight clips 1 to 10 on his phone, pulls the leaderboard from the terminal via CLI/MCP, and plans to feed the top slice into a 3D-capable model for Blender blockouts that diffusion models then paint over. He explains Wabbit's origin (daily cron-generated logos ranked in downtime), its broader use cases, local-hardware ambitions on an M2 Ultra, and invites beta signups and feedback.
“If you're going to be doom scrolling, you might as well be giving feedback to your own productivity assistants.”
Transcripts are YouTube auto-captions, cleaned of filler and obvious mishearings, otherwise verbatim. They are a build diary spoken to camera, not the film's script.