Canberra filmmaker Taylor Thomson traces his love of storytelling to a spot few administrators would: the tabletop. Years earlier than he was crafting brief movies that performed at festivals like “Yeh! Nah! Horror,” Thomson was huddled round a desk with mates, rolling cube and weaving improvised tales in video games like Dungeons & Dragons. These periods, he says, taught him as a lot about character, pacing, and pressure as any movie course may.
“D&D is humorous sufficient—humorous you convey that up,” Thomson stated in a podcast interview. “That is among the issues that helped me understand I adored storytelling, that entire aspect of it. D&D and different tabletop video games are, I feel, a wonderful software to assist folks—younger folks particularly—develop second tales for characters.”
From Dungeon Grasp to Director
Thomson’s gaming background runs deeper than informal play. He’s been working campaigns for greater than a yr and a half, usually in darkish, gothic settings of his personal design. “I’m a bizarre contrarian,” he stated. “I refused to make use of the default setting. I made my very own world, realized that was too onerous, then began utilizing a third-party setting.”
That first try drew inspiration from the online game Bloodborne, with its bleak structure and creeping dread. The aesthetic left a mark that might later floor in his psychological thrillers Communicate to Me and Empty Home.
Quite than conventional fantasy journey, Thomson’s campaigns leaned into darker materials. “It was gothic horror and darkish German fairy tales,” he defined. “That’s at all times been what I gravitate towards.”
Classes in Improvisation
Tabletop gaming, Thomson argues, is a perfect rehearsal area for filmmaking. Operating a sport teaches fast considering, adaptability, and collaboration—expertise each director wants on set. “It may assist quite a bit with considering in your toes. Completely. Improvisation,” he stated. “You’ve received gamers doing unpredictable issues, and you need to adapt. It’s the identical when one thing goes mistaken on set.”
When a lightweight fails or a location adjustments, Thomson treats it like a plot twist in a sport: a chance to improvise. That flexibility, he says, retains the artistic course of alive.
“Filmmaking isn’t one thing one particular person can do,” he added. “It’s inherently a crew exercise. Not like portray or no matter, you can not go at it alone—and in case you suppose you’ll be able to, you’re a dumb fuck to place it kindly.”
World-Constructing for the Display
What begins round a gaming desk usually finally ends up on display screen. Thomson’s consideration to delusion, folklore, and spiritual symbolism provides his movies a lived-in realism that grounds the horror. He treats supernatural parts not as spectacle, however as extensions of perception techniques that would plausibly exist.
That mindset was formed partially by Lamentations of the Flame Princess, a grim, unforgiving tabletop system that punishes reckless play. “It’s the sort of sport the place demise is actually, actually, very easy and fast,” he stated. “In case you don’t play it good, you’ll get exploded—and I like that grounded aspect, that sense {that a} peasant with a pitchfork can simply kill you.”
That very same sense of vulnerability carries into his movies, the place characters face real hazard somewhat than narrative security nets.
Shared Worlds, On and Off the Desk
Thomson now performs beneath the steering of his gaming companion Sarah, who additionally co-founded Evil Gazebo Media with him. The pair produce music movies and documentary tasks, mixing their shared storytelling sensibilities into their skilled work.
For Taylor Thomson, tabletop gaming is greater than a pastime. It’s an incubator for creativity, collaboration, and world-building—the identical expertise that drive his filmmaking profession.
“Communicate to Me,” which earned a Greatest Quick Screenplay nomination on the 2024 “Yeh! Nah! Horror” pageant, stands as proof that good storytelling can start wherever—even with a handful of cube and an concept.