Slashdot Mirror
On-line Documentary on Machinima
Hugh "Nomad" Hancock writes "Over at Machinima.com we've released "Artery: Machinima", a 22-minute broadcast TV program on the Machinima movement- film-making in real-time 3D. Originally broadcast on Scottish TV station STV, this documentary includes interviews with Uwe Girlich, the guy who got the whole thing started, sci-fi writer Charlie Stross, who is working with the Machinima group Strange Company, award-winning film director Peter Rasmussen, and Machinima makers including the Ill Clan (Hardly Workin'), Strange Company (Eschaton) and Nanoflix. Plus, lots of swords!" There's also a BitTorrent link to the documentary, courtesy GameTab.
I am a writer of alternative worlds, a sculptor of different realities and narratives taking place in such realities. I also do music that helps to describe these environments. However, I've always thought that the next logical step is film, and after that whatever comes beyond--immersive virtual environments. And yet, it is very difficult to get ahold of the technology and creative teams who would want to do this purely for the love of art, for the drive to create something new.
Are there any resources for the "imagineers" out there, like myself? Where we can contact those who are more technically oriented and feed them ideas, worlds, concepts, and general feelings and allow them to aid us realizing such visions? I've often seen that very good computer animators/modelers, etc. are without GREAT ideas at the core, and thus while technically adept, their creations are more pale than they could be.
In other words, where do animators looking for material and starting points "hang out" on the internet? Where can I start proposing my ideas to turn into realities?
d. Taylor Singletary,
reality technician techra.el
Machinima is (as I understand it) the creation of film or movies through the use of game engines, such as the Quake III engine, or Unreal Tournament engine.
the blood has stopped pumping, and he's left to decay
the me that you know is now made up of wires
Videogame cutscenes, without the videogame.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Without PAYING for it? What about the dinners, the flowers, the movies (the really really really BAD girlie crap movies, like Snow Falling On Cedars ::shudders::), the bad hair days, the "does this make me look fat" arguments, etc, etc...
No, sir, you are obviously dating Rosy Palms.
And for what its worth, there are some of us who do get with real women and knew what Machi-whatever was.
This is my sig. Its pathetic.
don't forget, its not possible to click on the link and see for yourself.
This guy is posting to several boards now, hyping this up. I don't have a problem with claiming machinima is cool, but words like "new art form" and "the first real-time 3D movies" are definitely over the top.
If you define "machinima" as using real-time 3D to make movies, it's been done since 1994 (at least) and even done professionally. There was a project at Disney that used 3D graphics hardware to play movies in real-time, with characters, dialog, and everything. It was even interactive if you wanted (or automatic, if you did nothing). You could watch on a monitor if you didn't like the VR gear that went along with the official ride. But it was not a game and the "engine," called the "player," was custom-built. Disney had other examples of movies rendered using real-time, like the Cyberspace Mountain ride. The 3D hardware was essentially a big decompressor and video-mixer, giving better compression ratios using polygons than any block encoder ever did.
A third example, from the game community itself, is Dungeon Keeper II, which used its own 3D engine to animate the ends of the levels with some semblance of story. I don't even expect it was the first or the best, but it was the first I remember.
Now, if you want to define "Machinima" as using Game Engines and their free (sometimes open source) editors as the "tools," then we're in the realm of reason. As an art form, it is essentially defined by the styles and restrictions the game engines impose, just as any art form is shaped by the tools it uses. But lose the game engine and it's just a relatively poor (compared to pixar) animated movie.
But then to ship the resulting movies as AVI files? That's the biggest cop out I've ever seen in any art form. If no one was allowed to see a great painting except as a photograph, we'd call it photography, not painting.
Ultimately, for machinima to be a real art-form, it needs to deliver the goods in the form they're created. Otherwise, who cares whether you used Maya or Quake to make your animation and who can even prove it was rendered in real-time and not frame-by-frame?
That's the one application that actually benefits from a good-ol slashdot effect
"...traditional CGI (Computer Ganerated Imagery) techniques... productions can be dsitributed over the internet..."
Sadly, due to the mind-blowing resources needed to do this, we had to leave something out of our PCs. We 86'd the spel-chekur.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
It's not. I clicked on the links and saw some random screen shots of various garbage. I looked for a 'FAQ' or 'what are we about' to no avail.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
She don't like flowers, I cook dinners, and she likes movies that don't suck. She's never burdened me with a bad hair day, and the only time she asked if she looked fat, I said "all pregnant women look that way".
No, sir, you are obviously dating Rosy Palms.
I'm married, of course I'm dating Rosy Palms.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
As an early Quake movie maker, I have to say, I really hate the word "Machinema". I mean, I really hate that word. It's such a lame word, I won't touch game-engine movies because my work would be classified as "Machinema".
To put it another way, would Steven Speilburg make movies if they were called dingleberries? He can get a Grammy for Best Drama Dingleberry. He'll be featured in documentaries called Dingleberry Magic.
I really hate that word.
I'm as mimsy as the next borogove but your mome raths are completely outgrabe.
1) Error detection - zip has a built in CRC check.
.avi and the like.
2) Firewalls that block
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Get it straight: I'm too lazy to use Google.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
Because they use flawed operating systems that don't have tar with the -j option?
Mod parent down, or mod it as "funny", but certianly not "informative".
Thx
It's the equivallent of rendering Star Wars in ASCII. It's time consuming. It looks like crap. And for a brief second, it's geeky cool. But the question is still: why bother?
[*]Because enemas for machines just don't make sense.
That's always a good sign =)
/.'ed...
You know what would be cool? If this "Introducing Machinma with Interviews" *was* a machinma... like UT2003 engined or whatever.
Of course, it might actually be that way, I didn't WTFMachima, it seems to be
[SIG] It's like putting a moose in the blender -- a recipe for disaster!
Because you can't open a zip file if the end of the file is not present. Its a built in safeguard to make sure you ("you" in this case is you average idiot trying to download something off of the "interweb") get the entire file.
oops
[SIG] It's like putting a moose in the blender -- a recipe for disaster!
I disagree.
I teach OS concepts at a major college.
What I've experienced with Linux is thus.
It's for sure an inferior OS to UNIX and Windows because...
1)It's really hard to use
2)Not very stable
3)Has little real security
It's for sure dangerous to businesses and business computing in general because...
1)It's source code is basically stolen from others work.
2)It is free and has no market(money) driving it's development so therefore it's not good for the economy and the public interest in general
3)The philosophy behind the distribution of Linux is Un-American and more like communism.
This cannot be good for our country.
It allows terrorists just enough encryption and power to aid them in their efforts to KILL us.
4)The source is provided so ANYONE can create scripts and such to slam a linux system.
It's role should just be for teaching OS concepts.
In that role Linux is great. We use it in our classroom but I certainly explain to my students that it is not a real OS like Sun, SCO or Windows.
If a student writes in a paper in my class and lists Linux as one of the OS's that make up the major market then they get an F on that paper.
The reason is because Linux is not in the major Market it is in the minor market - the second rate
special purpose OS's. Linux is not general enough
to be considered an universal OS.
In it's current state Linux is not ready for primetime. It will never be until Linus Torvalds
does the following.
1) Settle disputes with the IP holder of UNIX (SCO).
2) Restricted source license.
3) Make it a TRUE commercail OS
4) Single source for distributing.(No SUSE, NO RH)
After a couple of years of that you will see
Linux become a first tier OS instead of a novelty
OS.
All I am saying is let's be realistic about what Linux is and is not.
I am in the middle of an experiment.
With the release of RH8 I decided to make it
my exclusive Desktop OS to do all my work on it
for one year.
I bought RH 8 when it came out and the thing I noticed was I had to do about 6 weeks of almost constant tweeking and refining and reinstalling
I finaly had it about 15% as productive as Windows 98! Think about that!
It is also much much slower that Windows98.
Even though I only load the absolutley minimum processes.
1)It is not faster than Windows
2)Does not manage memory better than NT or XP.
3)The GUI is much less stable and crashes much more than winNT, XP or 98.
These are just facts.
Unfortunately, not knowing what machinima is represents merely the tip of the iceberg for you. With the passage of time you'll find yourself lagging behind on more important matters.
There's only 24 hours in the day. If you spend a proportion of them with a partner and maybe kids, those are hours during which others without that committment inevitably move ahead of you.
Just arithmetic. We each make our choices, and have to live with them.
Re-create this documentary as an in-game machinima-animated movie in unreal tournament or something.
And pardon me for saying, but until you work out a less offensive manner in which to approach the 'labor' on a project, you probably also need to work further on your writing skills. Understanding the why's and wherefore's of social graces is to understand the human condition. And if writers don't understand the human condition, they're no place.
But anyway. .
Unfortunately, most of the labour will never get the opportunity, nor will they be able to raise their own energy level to a point where they can begin to realize their ambitions. They usually end up by default, working for others. And this is where the media industry comes from.
Enter Machinima. Dirt cheep. Fast. Low quality.
Three things can happen;
1. The technically able people will FINALLY be able to work on their own projects.
2. The technically able people will see the low quality and say, "Pass."
3. The technically able will be faced again with having to come up with new excuses for their lack of motivation.
Now finally. .
If your work is amazing and provocative enough, then you should be able draw to you people who will be willing to set aside their own goals and who will want to work on yours; to make your goals their own. --But make no mistake; your work has to be big and bright, or you will only draw to you the lower-end of craftspeople. So get some of your stuff published. Get it out there. There are millions of ways. --Build a browsable webpage version of your world/s. Heck, if it's really that important to you, you might even consider learning some of the technical craft yourself.
There now. --Aren't you sorry you solicited advice from a legion of keyboard jockies?
-FL
1) The movie codecs are error resistant - if I get a one byte error the zip will force me to download, but the movie will just look a little odd for at most a couple of frames.
.avix extension or something
2) Give it a
oooooh, Slashdotted it 3D!
--
Does anyone remember
The SomethingAwful photoshop thread is that-a-way ==>
What if game engines and machinima are the first step in this 'do it yourself' movie? Now all someone needs to release is software that makes the directing and editing of such a movie very simple, and BAM! new generation of home movie making. I wonder what kind of software can be used to simplify this work and enable Joe Everybody to get their hands dirty in the wonderful world of home video production.
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
also, bittorrent does a crc check too, so that's not even useful
Yes! Slashdot now has a room on AOL Instant Messenger. Join chat room "Slashdot" or use this AIM hyperlink: Click Here . Click Here now .
I have a difficult time imagining a person with a strong enough stomach to edit the goatse guy's hands out of the original image to paste them onto something new.
You know what I mean?
nobody wants to spend their efforts on projects that you want to take credit for
....
That is indeed insightful, I wish I had a mod point to give you, but I don't. However
Ideas are cheap. Everybody has them, and yours are no better than anyone else's.
Sure, everyone that's alive has ideas, but that's not a very useful comment, because the vast majority of people adhere incredibly closely to the accepted memes of the time and are led by the nose by TV and popular culture. It's pretty pathetic actually. In contrast, ideas that are both worthwhile and original are pretty rare, and that's why we admire their originators when we witness an exceptional one.
Who knows, the poster's ideas may be in the latter category, no matter how unlikely. Your first point was a good one and addressed his apparent conceit or blinkers, but the subsequent put-down wasn't accurate nor necessary.
These are definitely not "facts."
Your first grouping:
1)It's really hard to use
2)Not very stable
3)Has little real security
1) For whom? Not me.
2) None of my 4 Linux boxes has ever crashed, and I have never lost work due to an app failure. Can't make either of those comments about Windows 95-XP
3) What would you call "real" security? Whose is better?
Your next group is my favorite:
1)It's source code is basically stolen from others work.
2)It is free and has no market(money) driving it's development so therefore it's not good for the economy and the public interest in general
3)The philosophy behind the distribution of Linux is Un-American and more like communism.
This cannot be good for our country.
It allows terrorists just enough encryption and power to aid them in their efforts to KILL us.
4)The source is provided so ANYONE can create scripts and such to slam a linux system.
1. Baloney. Who are these people? Can other people see them or just you?
2. Huh? Why? Are you insane?
3. OK, this I had to read again, because I definitely thought that you must be joking. I might consider modding this up actually, because this is funny.
4. Or anyone might BUILD and a Linux system and IMPROVE the codebase. That's the point.
You're next grouping isn't worth answering because Linus obviously does not need your advice. It would seem that he's doing just fine without it. I should also point out that SCO has yet to articulate the "dispute," and it is not Linus' responsibility to drag it out of them.
I too use RH8 for all of my work and have been much more productive as a result, due to the huge amount of software that I can download and start using without going out to the store and spending money. I don't know why you had so many problems, but to take your inividual experience, which obviously is not typical, and act like teh entire operating system is at fault is just not at all appropriate. Do some benchmarks or cite some published studies. I rely on Linux and am very happy -- much moreso than I ever was with Windows. I won't criticize your OS if you prfer it, but I have to say something when you start talking about "facts" after typing up a bunch of speculation and unconfirmable anecdotes.
Is it just me, or are these Strange Company characters more than a little full of themselves? Other than the Ill Clan, I can't think of any Machinima I've seen that has been worth half a damn. Plus, for such a "fast" system of filmmaking, most of these machinima producers seem to take their own sweet time actually coming out with any real product. When they do, its a victim of its own hype. For example, look at the Matrix series. "You have to see it for yourself", the banner declares. Well, I did, and here's what I thought: Amazing. Trinity runs across a room, and a computer explodes. That's just about the most innovative thing ever. Whoop. I don't think Hollywood has anything to worry about in the near future.
I can't believe that no one has talked about the success of red vs. blue. It would seem to be machinima (Halo) and it is hilarious and original. Although is does not seem to diverge very much from the game I could easily see the concept taken in many directions from what they have done. I think that it is an emerging field.
Responding as AC to an intelligent reply to his post.
Enter Machinima. Dirt cheep. Fast. Low quality.
You may have to reevaluate that before long. This is one area where progress hugely exceeds good ol' Moore rate, simply because (according to nVidia) the problem is massively parallelizable.
Truly photorealistic real-time 3D imagery is literally just around the corner, and scene-graph hardware assist will be getting attention once further improvements at the vertex and pixel level hit the law of diminishing returns in a few years. And at that point, any business model that is unconcerned by the rise of machinima because of "low quality" is in for a shock, a la RIAA.
It happened to the entire horse transport industry, it happened to low-volume publishing, it's happening to music, it will happen to movies and games.
These have been made since about 1910 onwards....
even soccer mums with cam corders can do it now.
As I believe the article to mean is real time computer generated 3D movies. Well I'm really don't know enough about that
hello clueless retard without an idea in your head. no doubt you'll be paying me some nice cash as an unknowing consumer of my ideas since you don't have any of your own
It always surprises me when people talk about machinima, they always mention stuff from machinima.com, but the thing is, their stuff isin't really that good at all.
:-)
Whats even more surprising is that nobody ever mentions militia 2 by The_Family_God. It's the 2nd part of a 2 part movie based in the map cs_militia. This is the by FAR best machinima I've seen on the net, and arguably better than Red vs. Blue.
TFG has started working on Pre/Selection a machinima in the Natural Selection universe which also promises to be a great movie.
Militia 2: definitely worth the d/l... so D/L it now!
haha, you seem a nice guy.
therefore i will disclose my source of cheap-trolls (though my original ones are more fun!):
http://nero-online.org/troll/
They're getting a little old, but nothing beats these interactive xena machinima
If I ever build a robot that gives enemas, I'll name it "machinima".
I especially liked the part about your students getting an F for mentioning Linux. :)
Actually, I think the simplest answer is that, amazing as it sounds, they can be compressed further by using zip. For example, I just downloaded the Militia 2 movie that people have been mentioning, and it looks like they reduced the WMV file size another 10% by zipping it. I have noticed this before with other formats too. Makes you wonder why these formats don't have this final compression built into them.
m.
Photography, technology, and my dog Scout - http://mattstratton.com
Arguably the most professional and widely viewed machinima so far is the music video for Zero 7's "In the Waiting Line", produced by my wife's company,
Fountainhead Entertainment. This was a real, commercial production using machinima tools.
It was neat to see the Q3 engine playing on MTV, but it made me greatly regret the quantized normals in Q3 models, which resulted in a noticeable popping on the environment maps. This was largely my motivation for adding per-pixel environment map calculation to the new Doom engine (under the ARB2 path, at least).
John Carmack
... I dont understand why this story made front page while a huge huge cisco security exploit and patch was released today. (More or less offering the ability to disable traffic from flowing anywhere across the world.)
For those who remember this old article about Quake done Quick, they are also hosted and part of machinima.com.
"I have to say, I really hate the word "Machinema". I mean, I really hate that word."
a /2 002/02/20/MNnewjersey.DTL
yeah, i hate it too, reminds me of the words "New Jersey," "Snickers," "Mars" and "Wisconsin", among others.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/
IIIIII am the Anonymous Coward who saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaays....
NEE!
Brevity, dude. Ideas may be a dime a dozen, but it's the most tangible currency I have. You may not think my ideas are revolutionary, just by the very fact that I am here, posting on slashdot, apparently appearing as some arrogant fuck, but I never claimed that they were. Don't judge someone by three paragraphs they write in a comment on slashdot. That's ridiculous. I hope you don't think I'm an arrogant fuck for criticizing your writing on Slashdot, but I understand if you do.
if you want to define "Machinima" as using Game Engines and their free (sometimes open source) editors as the "tools," then we're in the realm of reason.
I can confirm that when I coined the term, that was what it meant. People were beginning to make stuff in Unreal, Half-Life, etc. as well as pieces that didn't use the original games as the basis for their plots - but they were still describing such things as "Quake movies".
That term was inaccurate, and likely to put off creative people who wanted to make something other than recammed deathmatches. It seemed we needed a new word and I cobbled one together.
Of course semantics evolve with use, and these days the people claiming to make "machinima" do tend to include stuff made in real-time engines that are not game engines.
But the interesting stuff is not the gradual increase in the use of real-time rendering at some (e.g. previewing) stage in a traditional animation process.
The key aspect to contemporary machinima is that one takes well-established techniques (e.g. live performance recordings later edited together) from traditional real-world film-making, and applies them to work in a virtual (and digital) environment. You also skew said techniques to take advantage of things you can do better in that environment - you are less constrained by real-world physics or expenses during filming, and you have more powerful and expressive representations to work with in post-production.
The result is something substantially different than either traditional film or animation. Their illegitimate offspring is a new production technique, and the groups doing machinima claim it can be significantly cheaper and more flexible.
But then to ship the resulting movies as AVI files? That's the biggest cop out I've ever seen in any art form.
Personally I'd love to see more machinima distributed in a way that allows client-side rendering. It offers exciting quality/file-size ratios (framerate and resolution increase with the client's processing power, think 3D Flash) and also interesting story-telling techniques (e.g. allow the viewer limited control over playback without letting them escape the overall narrative.)
But in practice people have found that "native" machinima is as yet difficult to distribute in an easy-to-run manner. It's simpler for the viewer to play an AVI than to install a new playback engine.
I continue to hope we will see more native machinima, but the form of distribution doesn't need to change for film-making in a virtual digital environment to matter as a production technique.
--Anthony.