Benjamin Tomson / Films & other worlds

01

Sell Your Microdrama

Venture

01 / Venture

Sell Your Microdrama

3 images

Distinctive vertical stories, connected with platforms, distributors and audiences.

The actual Sell Your Microdrama homepage — Sell Your Microdrama / Website

SYM visual-identity artwork: a woman looks through a circular space-station window — SYM / Visual identity / Science fiction

SYM visual-identity artwork of a man in a rain-soaked industrial landscape — SYM / Visual identity / Action

Project notes

Benjamin Tomson / A founder and the CEO

Visit Sell Your Microdrama ↗

02

Shift

Feature film

02 / Feature film

Shift

7 images

A father searches for his daughter across the boundary between realities.

Lookbook aesthetic

Ordinary Midwestern spaces are overlaid with an intrusive digital world. The lookbook calls for wide-angle photography, restrained close-ups and occasional tilt-shift or split-diopter effects as realities overlap. Simulated environments become fully convincing traps, while doubled birdsong and traffic make the fracture audible. Electronic reinterpretations of classical music support a visual language that is cool, layered and increasingly unstable.

Based on Shift lookbook pages 3–7

Shift key art: a father reaches toward an empty chair as his daughter appears beyond the glass — Shift / Key art

Original lookbook title treatment

A double-exposure city street with a distant figure seen from behind — Shift / cinematic mood reference / Deck background, page 11

Highway and overcast landscape with the deck’s augmented-reality overlay — Shift / lookbook visual reference / Deck background, page 5

Green reflection and shadow, extracted from the lookbook background — Shift / cinematic mood reference / Deck background, page 12

Glass architecture, plants and dotted light isolated from the design reference — Shift / edited lookbook-reference detail / Supplied deck, page 3

Blue-gray corridor lighting and reflected glass isolated from the photography reference — Shift / edited lookbook-reference detail / Supplied deck, page 4

Project notes

A grieving father uses augmented reality to reconnect with his daughter, then discovers a parallel world where she may still be alive.

Screenplay & development materials
Writer & director: Benjamin Tomson

03

Ashes

Short film

03 / Short film

Ashes

14 images

A young woman searches her father’s ashes for proof that she’s finally free.

Lookbook aesthetic

Soot black, bone gray and worn domestic neutrals give Ashes a tactile, restrained world. The lookbook proposes Super 16mm, cold mortuary light and still framing that leaves doorways open behind Ezra. Oxblood red belongs to the cult; unstable amber arrives with the father’s return. Practical makeup, charred surfaces and sparse sound keep the supernatural rooted in ordinary rooms and damaged flesh.

Based on Ashes lookbook pages 7–15, with concept-image designation on page 18

Ashes key art: a dark figure in a charred corridor — Ashes / Key art / 01

Ashes key art of a shadowed doorway opening onto a mortuary — Ashes / Key art / 02

Ashes key art showing fire on a charred wall — Ashes / Key art / 03

Urn on a worn kitchen table with a dark doorway beyond. — Ashes / Apartment lookbook artwork

Mourners sit in two rows inside a dim funeral chapel. — Ashes / Followers lookbook artwork

A covered body lies in a cold fluorescent-lit mortuary. — Ashes / Mortuary lookbook artwork

An overhead view of hands reaching toward ashes on a wooden table. — Ashes / Ritual lookbook artwork

A shadowed figure stands at the end of a scorched corridor in amber light. — Ashes / Return lookbook artwork

A dental plate among the ashes — Ashes / original concept imagery / Deck background, page 3

A thread of light beneath a dark doorway — Ashes / original concept imagery / Deck background, page 15

A charred corridor with an amber-lit room beyond — Ashes / original concept imagery / Supplied deck, page 1

Ezra in a dim kitchen — Ashes / original concept imagery / Supplied deck, page 4

The father laid out in his coffin — Ashes / original concept imagery / Supplied deck, page 5

A fresh handprint on Ezra’s neck — Ashes / original concept imagery / Supplied deck, page 13

Project notes

After surviving her father’s captivity, Ezra takes a job at the mortuary where his body awaits cremation. She needs proof that he can never hurt her again. But the silent, red-clad mourners at his funeral have no intention of letting him go.

In development

04

The Mirror and the Comb

Feature film

04 / Feature film

The Mirror and the Comb

13 images

A missing brother. Family secrets. Neo-fantasy meets brutalism.

Lookbook textures and current direction

The lookbook starts with controlled framing and naturalistic urban light, then lets inherited spaces become weathered, fragmented and strange. Broken studio windows, old canvases, fog and deep forest shadows connect family memory to folklore. Its sound world uses distant traffic, old radios, wind and uneasy silence. Those textures carry into the current neo-fantasy direction, where Novi Belgrade’s brutalist forms meet the uncanny.

Based on Mirror pitch deck pages 4–12; Current Novi Belgrade / brutalist neo-fantasy direction

A documentarian overlooks a brutalist courtyard whose dark water reflects a winter forest. — The Mirror and the Comb / Brutalist world key art

Low-angle view of Genex Tower’s concrete cylindrical core and repeated apartment balconies against a blue sky. — Genex Tower, New Belgrade / Architectural mood reference; not a film still or confirmed shooting location.Photo: kallerna / Wikimedia Commons · Source · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Resized for web; framing may vary by layout. Photo adaptations retain this license.

An ornate mirror and comb on a painter’s workbench, with a snowbound forest reflected in the glass. — The Mirror and the Comb / Enchanted objects key art

A lone documentarian stands in a decaying painter’s studio beside an impossible second shadow. — The Mirror and the Comb / Inherited studio key art

Broken studio windows, weathered walls and old canvases — The Mirror and the Comb / supplied concept imagery / Deck background, page 8

A path disappearing into a fog-filled forest — The Mirror and the Comb / lookbook landscape reference / Deck background, page 12

An antique mirror and comb on a dark ground — The Mirror and the Comb / supplied concept imagery / Supplied deck, page 2

An aerial view of Belgrade at the meeting of the rivers — The Mirror and the Comb / lookbook location reference / Supplied deck, page 5

A misty wooded valley with a mountain cottage — The Mirror and the Comb / lookbook landscape reference / Supplied deck, page 7

A dark cabin and mountains in a thickly painted landscape — The Mirror and the Comb / supplied concept imagery / Supplied deck, page 10

A weathered folktale book and mountain-village image — The Mirror and the Comb / supplied lookbook reference / Supplied deck, page 4

A shepherd and flock in a muted field — The Mirror and the Comb / supplied landscape reference / Supplied deck, page 9

A witch moving through the woods in a folktale painting — The Mirror and the Comb / supplied folklore reference / Supplied deck, page 15

Project notes

A documentarian investigating his brother’s disappearance follows buried family secrets toward an ancient supernatural threat. In the film’s second half, the story moves into the brutalist architecture of Novi Belgrade, blending neo-fantasy and brutalism with historic and conflict-driven undertones.

In development
Writer & director: Benjamin Tomson

05

Bingo!

Feature film

05 / Feature film

Bingo!

9 images

Small-town rivalries. A West Michigan bingo night. A turn for the worse.

Lookbook aesthetic and current direction

Bingo’s lookbooks pair small-town familiarity with warm, exaggerated ensemble comedy. The hall is the social center: patterned chairs, close-packed tables, numbered cards and bright red chips make its everyday rituals feel tactile and lived-in. Color and character quirks carry the humor, while the story keeps returning to community, responsibility and belonging. The approved knitted poster and Michigan winter imagery extend that contrast between warmth inside and the world outside.

Based on Original Bingo pitch deck pages 2, 5, 13, 15 and 19; Enhanced Bingo pitch deck pages 3 and 8; Current knitted-poster and Michigan imagery

Bingo! key art with knitted lettering, a wool ski mask on a bingo table, and an elderly player ignoring a masked man in the doorway — Bingo! / Key art

Snow-covered main street in Pentwater, Michigan, with modest storefronts and a red parked car. — Pentwater, Michigan, after snowfall. Contextual location photography for Bingo.Photo: Luensu1959 / Wikimedia Commons · Source · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Resized for web; framing may vary by layout. Photo adaptations retain this license.

Wide gray winter panorama of the icy Muskegon channel and red pier light on Lake Michigan. — Winter on the Muskegon channel, Michigan. Contextual location photography for Bingo.Photo: Courtesy D. Hiddema / NOAA Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory · Source · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Resized for web; framing may vary by layout. Photo adaptations retain this license.

Aerial view of snow-covered houses, roads, and wooded hills in Harrietta, Michigan. — Harrietta, Michigan, in winter. Contextual rural-location photography for Bingo.Photo: RomanKahler / Wikimedia Commons · Source · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Resized for web; framing may vary by layout. Photo adaptations retain this license.

Winter sunset over Lake Michigan, with snow-covered dunes and a weathered wooden sand fence. — Lake Michigan in winter at Van Buren State Park. Contextual location photography for Bingo.Photo: Wasrts / Wikimedia Commons · Source · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Resized for web; framing may vary by layout. Photo adaptations retain this license.

Rows of blue tables and patterned chairs in an empty bingo hall — Bingo / lookbook venue reference / Deck background, page 13

Red bingo chips on numbered cards — Bingo / lookbook detail reference / Deck background, page 15

A low brick bingo venue with a red roof — Bingo / lookbook venue reference / Deck background, page 19

A crowded bingo hall at play — Bingo / supplied venue reference / Supplied deck, page 2

Project notes

A down-home, darkly comic story set in West Michigan, where community, rivalry, and a bingo night spiral into chaos.

Screenplay & pitch materials
Written by Benjamin Tomson

Michigan location studies: small-town streets, winter light, open land, and the lake. Context for the film’s down-home, darkly comic tone.

These are contextual Michigan photographs, not film stills or confirmed shooting locations.

06

Maniacs

Feature film

06 / Feature film

Maniacs

4 images

Family trouble, on an entirely different scale.

Pitch-deck visual direction

The deck builds a hard-edged siege world around an isolated Oklahoma farm: long, weapon-bearing shadows, sour yellow-green grass, scorched ochres and an amber-red glow. Its references lean toward contained, physical genre filmmaking, where tactical precision meets unstable personalities. The visual mood is abrasive and tense, shaped by a family home becoming a last stand and old violence arriving at the door.

Based on The Maniacs deck pages 1–5: supplied imagery, synopsis and named film comparisons

Maniacs development artwork showing four armed shadows across a lawn — Maniacs / Development artwork

Cartridge-base detail isolated from the cast-reference background — The Maniacs / edited lookbook-reference detail / Supplied deck, page 3

Barn, fence and wagon detail isolated from the supplied cinematic reference — The Maniacs / edited lookbook-reference detail / Supplied deck, page 4

Amber haze, ceiling lights and handrail isolated from the supplied cinematic reference — The Maniacs / edited lookbook-reference detail / Supplied deck, page 5

Project notes

A former special-operations soldier’s remote family farm becomes a battleground when his estranged father’s crimes bring a ruthless cartel to their door.

In development

07

Resonant

Action / Sci-fi

07 / Contained action / Sci-fi

Resonant

2 images

Abducted into a secret sonic-therapy facility, an ex-soldier becomes the only weapon capable of stopping the man who built its mind-control system.

Synopsis and supplied visual direction

Sound becomes architecture in Resonant: a sterile soundproof chamber, a disguised rehabilitation prison and an environment that inflicts pain through frequency. The supplied images contrast clinical white acoustic foam with a blue-black nocturnal world, both organized around a tuning fork. The synopsis pitches contained action and sci-fi, combining bodily control, prison-break pressure and a violent struggle to reclaim silence.

Based on Resonant synopsis pages 1–2; Supplied Resonant poster and chamber concept image

Resonant concept poster with a luminous tuning fork in a dark sonic field — Resonant / Supplied concept poster

A man seated in a sound-treated chamber with a large tuning fork — Resonant / Sonic-chamber concept image

Project notes

Written by Benjamin Tomson

08

Rundown

Feature thriller

08 / Feature thriller

Rundown

1 image

Three friends travel to Belgrade, where a nighttime run becomes a deadly hunt staged for wealthy spectators.

Treatment and supplied visual direction

Belgrade moves from invitation to trap: night streets, crowded cafés, river light and a running tour that becomes a sustained chase. The treatment specifies a roughly thirty-minute pursuit built from frenetic handheld work, drone photography, body-mounted cameras and static whip pans. The supplied red-orange poster adds torn-paper texture and watchful eyes, echoing a story in which the runners are always being observed.

Based on Rundown treatment pages 1–3; Supplied Rundown poster

Rundown project poster combining running figures, city streets and fragmented eye close-ups — Rundown / Supplied project poster

Project notes

Written by Mac Cappuccino Development: Benjamin Tomson

09

As I Lie Awake

Super 16

09 / Earlier work / Super 16

As I Lie Awake

3 images

Nightmares crossing into waking life.

An office scene from As I Lie Awake — As I Lie Awake / Film still

As I Lie Awake poster with a vertical wood-grain design — As I Lie Awake / Poster

Silhouetted crew and film equipment in a bright hazy interior during As I Lie Awake production — As I Lie Awake / Behind the scenes

Project notes

Shot on Super 16.

Writer / director: Benjamin Tomson
Producer / cinematographer: Ben Mannarino
Editor: Michael Thompson

Screening enquiries ↗

10

Brenda Xu / Flying

Music video

10 / Earlier work / Music video

Brenda Xu / Flying

2 images

A song from Overflow, made into a moving image.

A reclining bearded man in Brenda Xu’s Flying — Brenda Xu / Flying / Film still

Brenda Xu’s Flying title over a sideways dark-water image — Brenda Xu / Flying / Title frame

Project notes

Direction / cinematography: Benjamin Tomson
Produced by Coward Films

Watch Flying on YouTube ↗

11

Shokoufeh

Portrait

11 / Earlier work / Portrait

Shokoufeh

4 images

A jazz singer’s journey, told in her own voice.

Shokoufeh Shadabi beside a sunlit window — Shokoufeh / Film still

Shokoufeh seen from behind under red and blue stage lights — Shokoufeh / Film still

Shokoufeh singing into a microphone with a double bassist behind her — Shokoufeh / Film still

Shokoufeh on a long sunlit exterior veranda — Shokoufeh / Film still

Project notes

A portrait of Iranian-born jazz singer Shokoufeh Shadabi and her journey to the United States.

Direction / cinematography: Benjamin Tomson

Original project page ↗

12

Gavel

Documentary

12 / Earlier work / Documentary

Gavel

3 images

The legal system, from the other side of the story.

A woman speaking in an interview for Gavel — Gavel / Film still

Gavel title over an institutional exterior — Gavel / Title artwork

A razor-wire fence photographed in shallow focus for Gavel — Gavel / Location image / Centralia, Washington

Project notes

American legal procedure from the defendant’s perspective, and the consequences that extend into families and communities.

Director: Benjamin Tomson

Watch an excerpt on YouTube ↗

54-second excerpt

Films &other worlds.

Sell Your Microdrama

Shift

Ashes

The Mirror and the Comb

Bingo!

Maniacs

Resonant

Rundown

As I Lie Awake

Brenda Xu / Flying

Shokoufeh

Gavel

The index.

Sell Your Microdrama

Sell Your Microdrama

Project notes

Shift

Shift

Lookbook aesthetic

Project notes

Ashes

Ashes

Lookbook aesthetic

Project notes

The Mirror and the Comb

The Mirror and the Comb

Lookbook textures and current direction

Project notes

Bingo!

Bingo!

Lookbook aesthetic and current direction

Project notes

Maniacs

Maniacs

Pitch-deck visual direction

Project notes

Resonant

Resonant

Synopsis and supplied visual direction

Project notes

Rundown

Rundown

Treatment and supplied visual direction

Project notes

As I Lie Awake

As I Lie Awake

Project notes

Brenda Xu / Flying

Brenda Xu / Flying

Project notes

Shokoufeh

Shokoufeh

Project notes

Gavel

Gavel

Project notes

BenjaminTomson.

Films &
other worlds.

Benjamin
Tomson.