“Every movie has three things you have to do,” Pixar Studio Chief John Lasseter once said. “You have to have a compelling story that keeps people on the edge of their seats, you have to populate that story with memorable and appealing characters and you have to put that story and those characters in a believable world.”

The filmmakers whose work was featured in Transient Visions: Festival of the Moving Image, are happy to ignore that advice. The event at Spool Mfg. in Johnson City, screened multiple experimental films over the weekend at its second-annual film festival.

Transient Visions showcases a variety of experimental films from around the world. These types typically lack a traditional narrative and are often seen as avant-garde. The experimental movement focuses more on the creative portion of a film, rather than the story behind it.

Spool Mfg. is an art space that exhibits, according to its website, “the existential, personal, social and political dimensions of the contemporary moment.” From the outside, the space — a warehouse — looks like a serial killer’s lair, until the smell of figs with Gorgonzola cheese and red wine permeated the air, cementing the artistic environment.

Friday and Saturday’s repertoires consisted of three programs each — two for film screenings and one for performances. Friday’s screening programs included “trav-e-logue” and “A mind flies, and a memory stays,” the latter of which was curated by the award winning Binghamton University professor, Tomonari Nishikawa. The highlights of “trav-e-logue” were two films from this year — “Rimbaud” (directed by Péter Lichter), the eclectic Hungarian-made home-video montage with multi-lingual narrations and the film montage “Traveling Shots: NYC” (directed by Diane Nerwen). Scored with ambient noise and smooth jazz, it exemplified the heart of a true New Yorker.

While the excitement of experimental film has conquered the art scene in Downtown Binghamton, this trend has not carried over into the student body — not even students interested in cinema. For the majority of BU students — even those housed in Harpur — the cinema department remains an elusive area of study. The department is rooted in the traditional teachings of experimental film, with acclaimed professors hailing from around the globe, including Nishikawa.

The department, esteemed as it is, has reached a standstill with some of Binghamton’s more conservative film buffs, who have been dissuaded from declaring the major. Many have noted the lack of screenwriting instruction — there is neither a course devoted to the craft, nor lessons given in general filmmaking. The department’s heady encouragement of sticking to experimental filmmaking is the basis for such trepidation.

Also screened during “trav-e-logue” was a “Dreaming Mao” (2014) — a seven-minute tribute to the general Chinese populace with a motif of “The Forbidden Kingdom’s” Chairman Mao poster. Dan Anderson, the director of the film, was in attendance to take questions on his film and shed some light on what inspired him to create it. He noted his lack of media equipment on his 2013 trip to China and his fascination with “The Forbidden Kingdom.” With a limited amount of film stock, he tried to portray the environment as he saw it — still rooted in its past.

A 2013 film, “The Blue Record,” directed by Jeremy Moss and Erik Anderson, opened up the second program of the evening. The film was shot at the Eastern State Penitentiary — a prison turned museum — in Pennsylvania, and was accompanied by a voice over of Erik Anderson reading prose.

Moss, like Dan Anderson, was at the event to explain the film’s creation process, answer questions and thank all contributors. Other high points included two more 2014 films: “La mar salada,” directed by Elena Duque, a Spanish stop-motion film of all things ocean-themed and “Model Fifty-One Fifty-Six,” directed by Josh Weissbach. The latter of which “chronicles the physical changes of the maker’s heart, which displays a movement from human to cyborg.” The film is scored by Brad Fiedel’s “The Terminator Theme” from “The Terminator: Original Soundtrack.” Sirens, bright lights and all, it was certainly a piece to remember.