Instagram story viewer> @itsnateeckman> Posts

Nate Eckman

@itsnateeckman

1K

followers

926

following

Writing books. Making films. Designing games.
MIA | NYC

POSTS STORIES REELS TAGGED

Scenes from set of this little movie called Diagnosed. In April I hope to announce which dream film-festival I’ll get to premiere this short. Until then, I’m editing, preparing submissions, and starting to write the next movie I hope to bring to screen.

Photos shot and developed by THE @matt.r.stryker taken in Austin, Texas by @itsnateeckman

146

9

2 years ago

For the past couple of months, I’ve been building a daily literary puzzle called Verbatim.

The concept is to unscramble a phrase within the allotted time, in three tries or less.

My hope is that when you play, you feel connected to the phenomenon of thought — how it is we make worlds out of words.

It’s an ode to my love of both literature and games. This month’s theme is illusions of being: replenishment, harvest, facades, and the images we sustain to understand ourselves.

I hope you give it a try. You can play now via the link in my bio :) taken in Miami, Florida by @itsnateeckman

64

4

13 days ago

I went to grad school to learn how to tell stories with technology. While some of my classmates literally invented new mediums to match their artistic visions, I found myself playing in the conventional space of games.

This direction felt like an evolution of my early identity as a writer. Now I call myself a narrative artist: someone who builds stories through words, visuals, and experiences.

Since I’ve often shared my writing here, I’d love for you to play the first game I made in Berlin earlier this year, alongside two wonderful classmates, @annadeckoff and @levivillarreal.

It’s an arcade-style remake of the classic snake game, called Ouroboros. In this two-player face-off, one player is a pilgrim — represented by a machete — hunting their next meal. The other is a snake who, in order to survive the pilgrim’s onslaught, must eat its own tail to make itself harder to kill.

All you need is a friend AND a keyboard to play this web-based, two-player game (via link in bio).

I’ve got another game in production that I’m excited to share soon, plus a studio-sized game in early development based on my unreleased second novel. Can’t wait to tell you more about both in the coming months! taken in Berlin, Germany by @itsnateeckman

91

12

a month ago

Six months in this new hometown, and I’ve lost a lot — that’s for sure.

In this void, I’ve stopped chasing things and circumstances forever trapped in some distant future, as if the life I have right now isn’t enough.

Because in the end, I know the greatest things I’ve lost are the seconds I wished away; so many days wasted by treating the present as a means to a never-nearing end.

It’s taken more tears than I care to count, more silence than I dare endure again, and prolonged exposure to deep-seated wounds I’d long ignored. But through all of it I’ve become, for the first time in a long time — maybe ever — immensely happy for my life that’s happening now.

And yeah, if I could do it all over again, I’d do a lot differently. But that’s the paradoxical beauty of all this, I suppose. taken in Miami, Florida by @itsnateeckman

124

4

2 months ago

Things on my mind as of late:

1. Entropy seeps into every vein and cell. Protect the energy of your heart and mind.
2. Often, the best choice is the hardest.
3. A little whimsy and serendipity changes everything.
4. Lie to yourself and inevitably you will lie to others.
5. Change — even if necessary, even if good — is hard.
6. If you know exactly where you’re heading, you’re walking on someone else’s path.
7. In a single story you might play both protagonist and antagonist.
8. It will never be convenient to reach out to old friends, so do it now. It’s also okay to let old friends go.
9. Naysayers, double-talkers, and critics: fuck ‘em.
10. Make more art. And when you make, don’t for a second believe you’ll make a dollar from it, and if you still love it — if it still captures you — you’ve found something special. Nurture its life.
11. The best memories lie behind, the best days remain ahead. taken in IMA, Tisch, NYU by @itsnateeckman

76

18

3 months ago

My debut short-film, Diagnosed, follows a couple facing the man’s sudden loss of sex drive—and the extremes he’ll go to fix it.

I made this film because I noticed that over the last few years every platform with a male audience became inundated with ads about erectile dysfunction.

But there’s no epidemic of erections. No mass hormonal crisis among men in their 20s and 30s. What we’re actually deficient in—what I know from experience—is intimacy.

A pill can’t teach you to care for your body, to be vulnerable about uncomfortable thoughts, to ask genuine questions, or to understand that desire builds over days, not moments. So we operate in extremes, fully there or not at all.

This lie—that manhood is measured by the strength of sexual performance—preys on primal insecurities while ignoring something far more powerful: the only depth that leads to intimacy is of the character. And this is what frustrates me most, in promising men their best performance, these pills circumvent the need for men to show-up in any meaningful way at all. No wonder our relationships are suffering.

Ultimately, this short asks one question: what is a man without a hard-on? The answer, at least from what these ads want us to think, is in the very last scene.

Watch Diagnosed now until the end of the year via link in bio. taken in Austin, Texas by @itsnateeckman

142

22

a year ago

I started grad school this summer to study how to develop and apply technologies to change the way we interact with stories. Think cinematic games, branch narrative movies, location-based entertainment, mixed-reality storytelling — and their interfaces. The program is as much art as it is tech. One hour I’m coding, the next I’m writing a scene for motion-capture. It’s exhilarating.

But beyond the curriculum, I’ve had the chance to join what I think is the most inspiring community I’ve had the privilege of joining, people, who, in such a short time together, already feel like friends for life.

It’s the niche nature of the program - no doubt. Despite all our differences, hailing from six+ countries, with identities as varied as sound, book, and fashion designers, drag queens, programmers, animators, environmentalists, engineers, journalists, writers, dancers, and architects, we’re a group dedicated to fostering a more creative future. They’re challenging the norms of gender and racial identities and depictions of both on screen, rewriting the definitions of music, reimagining our relationship with nature, the ways we dress, and design public spaces. In this one group, it’s like the whole world is up for reinvention. It’s a lofty set of visions. That’s what makes them all artists.

Anyways, I guess this is part life-update, and part PSA. If you’ve ever had an interest in a similar program I’d love to tell you more about it. And since this is instagram I guess I should share a few pictures too. So here are a few of my favorites from the summer term in NYC. taken in Brooklyn, New York by @itsnateeckman

99

10

a year ago

Coming back to the city starting this summer to start a masters at NYU! Can’t wait to show yall what kind of stories I bring to screen next. taken in New York, New York by @itsnateeckman

74

24

2 years ago

Live anywhere for seven years and you’re bound to make plenty of memories and friends. But no one warned me that I was going to be given the best of both.

I’m forever grateful to you wild bunch. You know who you are. You gamblers and techies. Pole dancers and two steppers. Fly fishers and fitness enthusiasts. Entrepreneurs and local billiard stars. Rappers and pitbull mommies. Country singers and karaoke feins. Trans men and women. All you gays - so many gays. You loyal friends who celebrate things like a friendiversary. You readers who made my first book possible. Cinephiles who encouraged and helped me to make my first short film. Old lovers who mended my heart, just in time to meet my soul mate. You, Austinites, who beautifully excavated these seven years from a bleak and short line of time, and shaped them into something beautiful.

I’m not in Austin anymore. And I’d be lying if I said I knew what was next. At times thats been scary. But when I feel this fear or regret creep up I grasp to the memories of your inspiring lives and in that moment I’m no longer afraid, because I’m home again.

So I guess for now it’s so long and till next time, y’all. taken in Logan Circle by @itsnateeckman

60

22

2 years ago

This summer, after another round of MFA applications ended with rejection, I dug into my pile of unfinished scripts and committed to bringing one to screen.

I’d been thinking of making a movie since 2019, when a filmmaker, producer, and now dear-friend, commissioned me to write a feature about a veteran struggling to transition back into civilian life.

I was hooked. But couldn’t find the momentum to find another project. Covid started. Then a divorce. Then a change of jobs. My life was starting over. Creative projects would have to wait. But in the interim I kept watching films, and reading just as much about movies and their makers.

One of the greats I studied with particular acuity was Paul Schrader. He’s a fellow midwesterner, who spent his early life steeped in the church, and went on to study philosophy and history. As the broad-stroked similarities multiplied I started imagining myself as an asymptote to his life’s trajectory, following its traces in my own way. Hoping that my unconventional twists and turns also lead me to a fulfilling life in making movies.

Time will tell.

But last week I had the immense pleasure of reading through his papers at the Ransom Center in Austin, TX. There’s an indescribable power to touching the physical works of a person, to see the coffee stained edges, nonsensical scribbles in the margin, and early rough drafts. There’s a realness to the works which, despite all the internet’s pronouncement for authenticity, cannot be rivaled by anything published online.

I left their contemplating about all that’s changed since 2019, proud to have made my first short film, and brimming with ideas about my second. taken in Austin, Texas by @itsnateeckman

51

3

2 years ago

Script is production ready. Crew is starting to come aboard. Casting calls begin Friday. This thing is really starting to come together. And yeah I’m excited to one day share it, but I’m especially loving the process of making my first film. #shortfilm #filmmaking #atx #austinfilm #script #atxfilm #movies #casting taken in Austin, Texas by @itsnateeckman

80

11

2 years ago

Loop daddy @marcrebillet once asked if it’s android or iPhone. In my love for literature, I’ve found myself asking a similar question: the book or movie? In tomorrow’s newsletter I invite readers to experience Murakami’s short story and Hamaguchi’s film, Drive My Car. Join the fun by subscribing via link in bio. #adaptation #murakami #film #criterion #literature #text #cinema #books #hamaguchi #drivemycar #reader #cinephile taken in Austin, Texas by @itsnateeckman

11

1

3 years ago