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Valve Hands Over Its Own Movie-Making Tools To Gamers
cylonlover writes "Valve has gained a reputation over the years not just for consistently putting out great games, but also for the slick trailers and promo videos that go along with them. But now the developer is turning the tables and handing over its own video-making tools to fans free of charge. With the Source Filmmaker, gamers will be able to direct, animate, and record their own videos as if they were shooting on location inside a video game."
They're not opensourcing, they're just making it free to use.
The tool is not open source, and it is not entirely free of restrictions either (cannot commercialize created videos if they include any Valve assets). This is not a jab at the tool though, it appears to be a wonderful tool from what is a generally wonderful company.
Although it would be nice if Valve would allow their assets to be used in commercial videos (say you wanted to make a cutscene for an indie game), but it is understandable for them to restrict this. You can still use the tool to make such a scene, it would just have to only use your own assets.