Viral 'The Oddersy on iMacs' Joke Becomes Full-Scale Film Made Entirely on iMacs

London filmmaker Will Norman has released The Oddersy, a 10-minute short film shot entirely on iMac webcams, after the original parody behind the project received 14 million views online.

The short film recently had its world premiere at Close-Up Cinema in London, hosted by filmmaker and critic Jack Howard.

The Oddersy began as a joke about Christopher Nolan’s devotion to shooting The Odyssey entirely on IMAX. Under the alter ego 'Christopher Notlan,' Will attempted to make cinema 'shot on iMac' using the built-in webcam of an ageing desktop computer.

After the original video went viral, people began offering their time, equipment and increasingly elaborate ideas. What should have remained a one-off sketch grew into a full production involving more than 30 cast and crew members.

The film was shot using a 2009, 21-inch iMac bought on eBay for £15. The Uber journey to collect it cost more than the computer itself.

The production treated the iMac like a genuine cinema camera. It was modified with screw holes drilled into the base plate so it could be mounted on a tripod, powered on location using a camping battery and eventually attached to a 25ft Technocrane to capture sweeping shots of an Ithacan warship, represented in the film by a rubber dinghy sailing across an Essex lake.

Elsewhere, Lime bikes were repurposed as camera dollies, detachable phone lenses were placed over the webcam and Photo Booth supplied the film’s practical visual effects.

Because the 17-year-old computer struggled to record its own webcam without freezing, the team cable-tied an iPad to its back and transmitted the iMac’s video feed to the tablet. The footage was then captured by screen-recording the iPad, meaning that sometimes good takes could be scuppered by visible mouse cursors or software update notifications.

Will Norman, director of The Oddersy, said, “The first video was only meant to be a silly one-off joke. Then people started offering their time, equipment and increasingly ridiculous ways of moving an iMac. Before long, we had more than 30 people treating a £15 computer with the seriousness normally reserved for a Hollywood production.”

“The limitations became the most exciting part. The camera has no control over focus, extremely limited dynamic range and occasionally decides your face should be purple, so every scene required us to invent a completely impractical solution.”

The resulting film retells Homer’s Odyssey through this deliberately absurd restriction, combining forced-perspective giants, miniature horses, Photo Booth backgrounds and an epic voyage across the lakes of Essex.

At its London premiere, Jack Howard described The Oddersy as 'spectacular' and 'pure cinema,' adding, “I’m not sure I’ll see anything like that again. I’m not sure I want to see anything like that again.”

To mark the online release, viewers are invited to watch the film on an iMac and share a photograph on Instagram Stories, tagging @willnormanfilms and using #AsNotlanIntended. Everyone who takes part will receive a personally dedicated digital headshot signed by filmmaker and craftsman Christopher Notlan.