Born in Racine, Wisconsin, but raised in Tucson, Arizona, Greg Stuetze began making animated films with stick figures at the age of twelve using what was then a state-of-the-art computer: the Apple II GS! While he would eventually graduate to making films using real people, he never lost his infatuation with technology…
While studying Media Arts and History at the University of Arizona, Greg was cast as the lead in the film IDLEHEIST. His involvement in that film, his wonderment at the process that is filmmaking, what he came to know of director Joshua M. Dragotta-- It all inspired Greg to get in the saddle himself and commit ideas to film once again.
In the months leading up to his graduation, Greg became fascinated with the impending release of the online role-playing game that would become known worldwide as the "World of Warcraft." Equally as captivating as the game was how this particular game wholly monopolized the imaginations of a core group of individuals Greg knew all too well.
So Greg began to film World of Warcraft gamers he knew intimately: friends, fanatics, family members, anyone within close proximity was fair game. Greg graduated with honors from the University of Arizona and found himself entrenched in his first major film project, unaware of just how the journey would come to shape him as a filmmaker, let alone as an individual.
/AFK – AWAY FROM KEYBOARD is Greg Stuetze’s directorial film debut. Hoping to reach beyond the contemporary dialog surrounding online gaming, /AFK addresses the realities of the gaming world, what it offers and takes away from those it seizes hold of and, in so doing, exposes the very real phenomenon of video game addiction.
Filmed over six years, /AFK takes the viewer on a quest to understand the appeal of the virtual world while challenging some twelve million gamers to spend more time away from the computer... Away From Keyboard.