A Journey - Two people. Two years. One dream

We want to take you on a journey to africa like you've never seen it before. That's why we're planning on producing the movie "A Journey - Two people. Two year. One dream". Help us to carry out this dream.

Initially we aimed on driving from Hamburg to South Africa within six months. That didn't work so well. Six months became 22 months. And we never reached our destination. Instead we drove, walked and surfed more than 29.000 miles through 14 west african countries. Got to know each country as intensive as our visas allowed us to. We filmed the whole thing. Mainly to make little videos for our friends and family back home. To calm the minds of the careworn ones left at home. Now we returned to Germany and brought 3000 GB of movie raw material with us. With this we want to make a movie that shows a different africa. An africa that has more to offer than starving children, war, AIDS, terror and ebola. The real africa, authentic, the way we encountered it. Wonderful but yet not sugarcoated.

On our blog we already told some of the stories. But so much more happened. It was all so much more intense. Many things that were stressful and trying. Things that pushed us to our limits. We're gonna show them in the movie. You can look forward to a film that will get under you skin.

On our way we got to know many inspiring people with exciting and awesome projects. Each one of you who supports us by buying one of the movie versions upfront will automatically donate 2 Euros to one of the projects. We will present them one by one on our homepage during the campaign.

It is our goal to apply for the big european film festivals like "Berlinale" and "Cannes" with the movie. You ask why? Pretty easy: we want to reach as many people as possible with the movie and its message. The big festivals will give us the platform for that. This film will tell a great story about dreams. About courage and philantropy. About life. A story that dismantles borders and broadens the mind. Which tries to change our perception of africa and its people. And to lessen the distance between us humans.

The international version of the film will be in original spoken languages with english subtitles.

All you travel addicts, globetrotters, documentary and movie lovers, small or big - doesn't matter - you can look forward to some exciting, entertaining and stirring hours while we take you on a journey more than one time around the world.

Our film and our talk aim to encourage each one of you who has a personal dream to just go for it. No matter if it is traveling, change your job, have a family or whatever else. Just break out of your daily life and challenge your own status quo.

Approximately until April 2018 we will sit and labour in our creativity roof tent near Hamburg and produce the film "A Journey". That means we'll be busy screening all the material we brought back. Do the editing, sound design, mixing, subtitles, and all the other little things that are part of a movie production. We want to show africa from a different angle than we are used to see in the media. Because on our journey we experienced it a whole lot different. Without a sugarcoat but beautiful as the day. With this film we want to say thank you for the life changing experience that this journey has been for us.

This is why we will apply for german and european film festivals with the film as soon as we finish post production. We believe devoutly that the story we want to tell is reflecting the feelings of many people. Optimism spirit, leaving the daily routine and change something, personal fulfilment and adventure.

In the end of spring the sun will hopefully be out there again and we will start to go on a tour through germany with an exciting interactive talk about our journey. We want to spread our message in personal and close way. And answer all the questions the audience might have.

Be honest, how often do you dream of simply tossing everything aside. To quit the job and leave all the stress, anger or whatever is bothering behind. To escape to, let's say, a lonely beach. To a place where time stands still. Where you can dream, where you can travel, where you can be.

We want to take you on a journey to the beautiful, the laughing, the crying, the real africa. See it from an angle you won't get in the media: close, human and without this bad feeling in your tummy. It's going to be a journey that will inspire you. And show you that your dreams become reality when you have the courage to let go.

If you want to be adventurous or if you simply want to dream for a while we invite you to join us. With your support of our project you secure yourself a copy of the movie in advance. Or you take it even one step further and help us to get "A Journey" to festivals and the small indi cinemas in your neighbourhood.

Are you a globetrotter and drowning in preparations and planning? Then you can get some exclusive information material from two people who were on the road for a long time. It'll make your preparations a lot easier. And who knows maybe even prevent your roof tent from rotting.

When we reach the first funding goal we will order the soft- and hardware we need for a project of this dimension. We can rent the software but the hardware we need to buy. A movie of this length is not easily stored on your everyday hard drive. We need literally a mass storage: 20 Terabyte (20.000 GB) plus a second one as backup.
Furthermore we will secure food and accomodation for our little team. The team members for editing and music will work app. 8 to 10 weeks full time on the production of the movie. Because they have to stop their normal work for this project we want and we will compensate the guys. For each one of us "A Journey" is an affair of the heart so we based our calculation on the money you need for food and to pay your rent.

When we reach the second funding goal we will take it even further. We will make the movie even more beautiful, more atmospheric and more radiating. Because then we want to take it to film festivals and it needs to be bulletproof cinema compliant. To be able to do so we need some external work done on top of our own work: professional color grading and sound editing/mixing. The necessary hardware for that is simply unaffordable for us not to mention the know how. This is why we have to take this part to specialized studios. In the end picture and audio quality will be on the same level like your favourite movies in cinema.

2 Euro of each copy of the movie we sell here will be donated to one of the awesome projects we discovered on our journey. You can find more information on these projects on www.abgefahrenderfilm.de/projekte/.

We want to produce "A Journey" independently. That means we want to everything from scratch on our own (except the enhancements at the end). To decide every matter from story to music on our own. We do not simply want to hand out our material to a big studio and then leave it be. This is why we had an intense preparation phase in which we calculated and planned every aspect of a movie post production in detail. For that we had the awesome support of friends and colleagues who are experienced in the film business. Our funding goals are based on these preparations and will ensure an unendangered independent post production. It is a reliable and realistic calculation so that we do not fall into the "oh, the movie will be much more expensive than anticipated"-trap.

The collected money will be used to 100% for the funding of the post production of "A Journey - Two people. Two years. One dream". That includes expenses for production material and compensation for the team. Working time of Lena and Ulli is not included.

Important: Some film festivals insist on the right of exclusive premiere. That means that the release date of the sold movie versions (DVD, Bluray, download, ... ) might be after the festival premiere.