Done!

I think most the animations are pretty much done and all in place.
The machinima is 1min 8sec right now (yeah the last hour was just precise, short animations) but I know its going to get longer as the title, credits, and a few images are still missing. (Those will be added when I polish it)
And the machinima requires quite a lot of polishing. Quite a huge lot.
With that said I will take a short break and come back to sounds later!

Work friday!

Yes, it's time to work on the machinima!
From the last time I have 1 minute and 1 second done!
This means that another 20-30 seconds today and the editing part is done! *oh joyous day*
Right, and now to get on with the work!

Meeting w. Mr. Rawson

Updated Timeline:  (reverse Chronological)

Feb 1:  Completely Due
Jan 28:  Final report/writeup
Jan 14:  2nd Draft to Rawson
Jan 07:  1st FULL Draft to Rawson (EVERYTHING complete)
Jan 04:  Family/Friends Leave
Dec 21:  Leave Basel
Dec 18 - 20: Backgrounds / Polish
Dec 17:  Sounds / Voice / Music
Dec 16:  Finish Animations

Publish the Machinima through Youtube, Machinima.com, etc, and then ask for feedback. 

Hey everyone, I've finally finished the product!
Please take a moment to watch it and give it some feed back!
Feedback: I am specifically looking for ways that I could have improved, things I could have done differently, or a "new perspective that might be considered", as my PP advisor suggested that I put this is my written report. Please give constructive feedback, not simply "Well done!"  (better) 
 For your Process Journal, take 20 of your best posts / sketches / etc.   organize it and have it ready.

Make sure you check the Frog page for any questions on content/organization

Screenshot of my work

A screenshot of my working space. As you can see 43 seconds are done, and you can see what it´s like working on a machinima (It gets boring... trust me!) Anyway, just wanted to show the program Sony Vegas Pro and the good quality the movie will have (you can see on the top right, crystal clear!)

Story

As my sister walked in and asked me what the story was, I got the absolutely perfect idea.
Not to boast or anything but the story I just said makes me really happy and I quite like it.
I'll write it down below in white (spoiler!) so if you want to read it, highlight the text!


There is a group of people known as "Storytellers" who create stories, myths, legends, tales, etc to educate and entertain the people.
As new technologies start arising (I'll have pictures of WoW characters playing on laptops, listening to iPods, etc) the government wants to earn money from these products, so they (government) order the killing of Storytellers. They get slaughtered but one of them escapes (The Last Storyteller ;)) he runs away and settles in some place, hidden and safe.
As he walks one day he hears the sobs of an orphan whose parents have been mugged and killed. He takes him as his own child and takes care of the child. One day the troops arrive, they found the storyteller. He gets taken away from the child. At this point the screen goes black and you hear the sounds of dragging, dramatic music and an axe falling down. At this point my voice acting stops. The Storyteller has been killed.
But here is the twist! The whole story, the machinima, all the voice acting is being spoken right before the Storytellers execution. So he tells what happened, and as the axe kills him (the screen is black) you his words rising like magic and flowing through the wind, they float around until they reach the child. The child looks up at the words telling the tale of his adopted father that he never knew. The machinima ends with "dramatic" music as the camera zooms in on the child's face.

This will not change anything due to editing or the time it will take. The machinima will still be around 2 minutes long (I have 36 seconds of animations DONE (that's 20 seconds in 35 minutes of work)) and yeah. So there's the story if you want to read the spoiler. I just had to write it down in case I forgot it!

Today's plan!

It is 12:00 which means that work on personal project can officially start for this sunday!
I have sony vegas open (and running smoothly) all my animations are there, and the first 16 seconds are also safely in the timeline (some bits need editing/polishing) I plan to do maybe half or over of the animations done today!
Like I said in my previous post, when all animations are done, the next step will be backgrounds, then sounds and music then voice acting and then final polish. This shouldn't take more than 4 days of work (Christmas break I love you)
With that said, it's off to work!

*happy Jacek is happy*

In reply to Mr. Rawson's awesome comment (especially the last bit :))

I know now that everything will work, even if it doesn't want to. I have all the files on our old windows (which I will call windows 7 from now on) So basically what I have to do is take all the files, put them on my 32gb mem stick, copy them onto the new windows vista (on which sony vegas pro 11 is installed and WORKING.) and then just copy, paste and edit!
This actually makes me happy. Because technology would have to try really hard to make something go wrong now!
Starting saturday (since I'm away friday) I can just re-open my "Last Storyteller" file, which will already have 20 seconds done (as stated before) paste into the media browser all my clips recorded with FRAPS, and then edit (editing is miraculously boring but oh well..) add sounds and voice acting and done!
I can probably get half the editing done this weekend (hopefully) since I have to babysit later during saturday, I'll try to work saturday, but then there is always sunday, and christmas holidays starting with friday will be
Friday - editing
Saturday - editing / adding backgrounds
Sunday - Adding backgrounds / adding sounds
Monday - Adding sounds / voice acting
And then its done!
So there's that, the explanation that there shouldn't be any more issues!
Hip hip hooray!

Perfect solution for all my problems!

Just like the title says, I have found a fantastic solution!
Before I share it though, some background information/story is needed.
My friend asked me a month ago whether I wanted to buy his gaming PC. I obviously replied yes and he gave me the amazing price of 400chf. Now the idea didn't really work too well with my parents, they decided me having another computer is ridiculous and that was pretty much it. I told him to keep the PC in case I get them to change their mind.
Now here we are, The Avid Studio program sucked (couldn't move objects around the screen, chroma key looked awful.) 220chf for such program would be a waste of money, just like the $700 Sony program.
My mum asks "Can't you install it again?" I said that no, the program remembers the computer, leaves traces and you can't use it twice on the same machine. So my mum asks "What about our other windows?" (one very old pc (around 15 years) and my sisters laptop which crashes when you turn it on) I tell her that they wouldn't run the program as their too weak. So I tell my mum about my friends computer again, hoping she will agree.
And she did! So tomorrow or thursday I will go round his house, pick up the PC, take it home, install it, download sony vegas for 30 days AND FINISH MY MACHINIMA!
This is perfect as I already have all the movies, I have the started project (around 20 seconds of it) I literally have everything and now I just need to put it together, which I'll be able to do very very soon!
This is also great for me, because however much I love my mac, it is not a gaming device. And now I'll be able to play all the hottest games again!
Everyone wins, I finish my product on time, and we save about 400chf.
*Happy Jacek is happy*

HALLELUJAH! :D

I have found a program in Media Markt while searching for Sony Vegas Pro 11 today called Avid Studio. It costed 219CHF and seemed to have very similar functions to SVP11.
I told my mum that there is a trial available, so I will go home and download it, see if it works and if it does I can use the 30 day trial (and finish my product) without having to buy it.
I went home full of hopes and dreams of it working and me being happy. Unfortunately installation took me ~2 hours, and by then my hopes weren't quite as high. And I was right. Upon trying to add all the video clips I had, none of the avi files would load.
I researched on the internet, and their forum to find out why, and it turned out this "professional program" supports only MPEG movies.
I was furious, and in this madness downloaded and .avi to .mpeg converter. I converted the movies, but the quality sucked and it was only 70% of the video (honestly, what a stupid company... I wonder how many people BOUGHT their product with such awful quality and the millions of free converters out there.) Anyway, I downloaded another one which produced a crystal clear quality mpeg movie.
I added it to Avid and Hallelujah I was able to view it. I then proceeded to add the chroma key (remove greenscreen) and in this part the quality took a major hit in the face. You can see that this chroma keyer isn't even 50% as good as the Sony one :(
One thing left to see is whether I can move the object on the screen (zoom in, zoom out, position) if not, this program is pretty much useless.. If I can, I'll stick with this to finish my product. The quality may not be a $700 Sony product, but at least it works.

Sony Vegas Pro 11

Looking around on all websites & shops to find the cheapest deal.
I prefer a CD as internet downstairs doesn't work and I don't want to buy it and not be able to use it...
Plus $700 is a tad ridiculous, since you can get it on ebay for $200...
Searching and searching, will have it for next weekend, possibly earlier!

Unfortunately.

Unfortunately however great and simple trakAx is to use, it doesn't support the Chroma Keyer (the effect which takes away all sorts of green screen etc.) And WoW Model Viewer doesn't support a transparent background.
*facepalm* *rage*
I have to wait for my dad to get home to continue VIDEO EDITING.
Before that happens, I'll just record the script and the sound effects. >.>

Just throwing this out there!

http://trakax.com/software/pc/download/
Installing right now, I'll see just how good this is/whether I can use it at all!

Setback/software issues (again!)

I woke up an hour ago with one purpose:
Go downstairs and finish your machinima. Or work on it as much as possible, no facebook, no movies nothing. And so I walk downstairs, sit at my desk, double click "The Last Storyteller" and out of nowhere a pop up comes up saying "Your free trail is up, buy now to continue using" Well played Sony. Well played. No reminders, no such information (maybe somewhere written in font 8) to let me know how long the "trail" is. The full program costs 599$. This will be a fun conversation with my dad.
But before he gets home ill try and do anything else I can on this. I'm definitely not giving up and not letting software bring me down.
Oh and also:

Explanation and more progress

Just came home from Oklahoma (which was a great performance!) and maybe it would be best to explain the short notes I've written.
This is not an outline, nor is it the style of writing I will use in my final write-up!

I simply work much better if I have a sheet with a few key bullet points written down (obviously this required more than that, but you get the idea) and so below this post are the notes for each of the key areas I will explain in my write-up.

Progress - the first 20sec are 70% done (this was after 2 and a bit hours of work) and so this weekend I will try and work my "bum" off to finish as much as I can. If I get over 70% of the project done, I'll be a very happy bunny. I'll try to aim at the full 100% although that would be very difficult.
Right now I'm just taking all the animations, cutting them to appropriate length, adding them to a black background and making one appear after the other.
Once that is done, I will add backgrounds. With the backgrounds added I will fine tune anything that needs to be fine tuned (cut down more, moved around a bit, etc) afterwards simply adding sounds and the spoken track (which will be the shortest step) will result in a completed machinima!
But for now, sleep it is. My eyes feel rather heavy!

(SPOILER: I'm actually really proud of the script)

Rough Notes for Final Write-Up

Notes for Write-Up

Introduction

-Clearly state your goal; to make a movie using the recent developed technique of machinima.

-Talk about new and upcoming style of film making; machinima, mention your research and it’s beginnings.

-Inspiration: Since I watched TotP3 I was inspired to one day make a machinima. As I verged deeper and found more machinimators and more movies that made me laugh or that I really enjoyed, I simply knew that for a personal project a machinima would be my product.

-AoI: Human Ingenuity (I fully explained this on a handout, thus a small bullet point) Movie making is all about human ingenuity. The script, the actors, the costumes, the voices, they are all created to find a new form of entertainment for us as every movie varies, either in plot, special effects, actors, etc. Not only is machinima a totally new way of movie making on its own, my movie also focuses on the art of creating such stories and what impact it has on people!

-The format I selected is a machinima movie, and this was for a couple of reasons. Normal movies take too long and are too difficult to make over such a short period of time, I was fascinated by machinima since a year or two, allows me easy access to a later career (machinimators get payed quite a fine amount and their work is enjoyable) and because I love video games and anything relates to them, therefore the idea of a machinima excites me!

-changes: I had to change my script a several times. The main reason for this was time, there wasn’t enough time to make an advanced, fully voice acted machinima without any prior knowledge on the subject. After changing the script, I also abandoned the idea of a “live-action voice acted movie” meaning that the story would be told as a flashback by just one voice (me!) This is far easier and faster then having multiple characters acted by various people. There were also changes in the software, I ended up using other programs than I primarily thought I would use due to most of them not functioning correctly!

Description of Process

-       In here include the various youtube links, the guide from buffed (magazine) and interview with TauriMovies to clearly show how I found out how to machinimate, what it means and how it works.

-       From the various techniques that exist for machinima making, I used the WoW Model Viewer to extract models from the game, dress them up however I want and animate them with their preset animations from within the game against a green screen. Afterwards I put it together in Sony Vegas Pro, which is a very tricky and time taking process. I recorded sound with Garage Band, extracted it and added it onto the machinima. I then took sounds from the WoW folder using an MPQ extractor and added actual in-game sounds to the machinima. Lastly I took backgrounds from WoW Map Viewer and added them behind all the scenes.

-       There were many other techniques to use, but in my personal opinion none of them looked as good as the one I used in the end result. There was the WoW machinima tool which allows you to change around the game world while you’re playing the game, but I found that rather annoying as there is a very limited amount as to what you can do with your actual character in the actual place he’s in. Also you can’t equip him with any clothing, he must have the gear that you obtained in game. (And picking the clothing can take up to an hour per character)

-       AoI links, as mentioned above these are all listed on a piece of paper, I can scan it in and upload it to my process journal

Analysis

-Inspiration: TotP3, Oxhorn’s short shorts, Druidboyz, GiGi, Nyhm, The Hunt, and various other small comedy machinima skits (Who’s the tank, Do you speak English, how to not be seen)

-Reflect on methods used: I think that the method I used has a lot of positive sides but also some negative side effects. The positive sides are that this is the most widely used method for machinima making (WoW machinima at least), it is recognized as a standard if one wants to work for machinima. It is also the simplest way, where the user barely needs to research to know what he’s doing. The side effects are that most of the software one uses in this method are created by very small group of hardcore game fans and so the software will often have bugs and not function properly as the small teams do not have enough resources to spend on constantly improving their programs. That is definitely a major setback but nothing that can’t be worked out.

-I had to do a lot of changes to my original idea and I’m quite glad I did! My first idea for a script wasn’t as good as this one (in my opinion) and the various software changes I did, either from programs used or how I used them also surprised me in a positive way!

-Why I did things the way I did them: I wanted to create a machinima that would be enjoyed not only by gamers and young kids but also by adults. This required an interesting story and no gaming references. I needed to make the viewer feel as if he was watching a short movie, and not a video game montage. Therefore I have written a script, which in my opinion would interest people of all ages. The software doesn’t really require much explanation, I needed to put the machinima together, make it look good but also make sure it doesn’t take too long! I made sure to choose the fastest and most efficient ways to do so, with software I used previously (WoW Model Viewer) or software with plenty of online tutorials and such, so I wouldn’t need to buy a book or read the instructions manual.

Conclusion

-What I found difficult in my project was actually quite surprising. It wasn’t the multitude of software issues, or the fact that at first nothing wanted to work and a lot of time and money was spent on something which ended up a bummer. The biggest problem for me was to sit down and edit the entire machinima. Video editors know what it’s like. When all you do for several hours is stare at long, thin strips (timelines) and move them left to right, cut bits and pieces out, stick them together, etc, etc, it gets pretty boring. A machinimator has an even more dull task as the video he is editing has nothing already put together. This means he must add the backgrounds, add the characters, place the characters where he wants them, move the characters where he wants them to be, then edit all of that together and add sounds. It’s not necessarily more difficult, just very time taking and over a long period of time; dull. And that was the biggest issue for me, the rest I found easy, as creating a good scene or cut was quite fun, to play around with camera angles and feel like a director. But the repetitive nature of the production period kept putting me off slightly from continuing my work.

-AoI – once again, it’s all on a piece of paper!

-Strengths and weaknesses: As my first try in machinima (not in movie making!) I have to say that I’m quite pleased with how it’s turning out. Although as mentioned above, quite dull and repetitive, I think that it’s not the worst machinima I’ve seen. It could of course be improved and it isn’t on a level of Oxhorn or TauriMovies (two famous WoW machinimators) but for a beginner I’m quite pleased. To be honest I’m also happy about the script that I’ve written, and the response I get when I tell people my story or the script is always very positive and the person seems interested!

The weaknesses are definitely the short period of time I had to this (blaming myself and software) (although software just slightly) without such a time restriction I could study more on lighting, camera angels, successful usage of Sony Vegas and so on. This is the tricky part in machinimating, not only do you need to know how to machinimate, you should know everything a good director knows as well as you’re creating a movie. Other than that the only other weakness I have is that I wasn’t able to use all the settings that I wanted to, since WoW map viewer doesn’t work right for over a year now, and was never fixed.

-I always wondered what it would be like to be a machinimator as a career, and I found it interesting enough to consider a career (at least at a young age) but after looking at the general response YouTube has towards WoW machinima, the amount of time and resources it takes (forcing me to use a windows computer, ugh) I was put off slightly from the idea. I’ll see what my subscribers and fans think of the machinima, and if it receives positive feedback I might make another and submit it to machinima to earn money. I do not however see this as a career choice anymore, although I still believe that it is a very interesting, new and developing art. A new art form that is just rising and will be fascinating to observe how it evolves in the future.

Progress!

Since I've come back on late Sunday morning, I didn't have much time to work on my personal project. Monday was taken up by a chemistry write-up, and during the four day weekend I had no access to a computer or anything I've done so far. But today was spent straight on working on personal project, and I'm actually quite pleased with how much worked out!
I have the first 20 seconds of the video 80% DONE! All the animations are in place, one or two of them need a bit of editing (very easy, which is why I focused on other things) and I think they will fit quite nicely with my voice acting!
Right now I only have the characters moving to a black background, and the scenes are literally just chunks (shows one guy talking, then 4 people casting a spell, then some characters dying, etc, etc) but using movie transitions (lighting, speed of movie) it will look fantastic when done with it!
I will then add backgrounds and sounds (plus of course voice acting!)
I am now sure I can finish this before christmas!
For the past 30 minutes I have also been working on notes for my report.
Now notes because I hate writing things twice (I barely ever edit any of my work.... even essays and such) This is why I'm making notes which will be a huge help to me in writing my final report!
Maybe not everyone would say the same, but when I have simple and general notes based on a subject I know a lot about, it's very easy for me to hugely expand on them, add detail, refer to my knowledge and research, etc.
Therefore, notes.
Right now I have the goal and the AoI done, meaning I still have some work before uploading the notes on here on Thursday!
With this small entry, back to work it is!

Aaaaaand here's the video

(Once again sorry for the backwards playback!)

Short video showing what creating machinima is all about!

I spent about an hour trying to figure out how to film this... Fraps wouldn't exactly do the magic since it always recorded WoW Model Viewer in full screen, thus making the other applications... not show.
Quitting it wasn't an option FYI.
Finally after many youtube videos (which didnt really help) I decided to just take my macbook and record my pc's screen.... which worked... except the video is backwards. Meaning everything on the screen is the other way around. *sigh*
Ah well it was the best one I've done from the 5 different tries, and I think it explains everything very simply. (Mr. Rawson if you advise me to film it again properly, I will figure out a way)
The video is currently extracting and ill upload it here as soon as it's done.
I also have all the animations finished (as mentioned before) They are all added to the "project library" awaiting editing.
To be honest though, I think I'll record the sound first (Just 2 minutes of me speaking basically) and then over that add the animations... This because I will be able to focus more on what the characters are meant to do, Ill be able to make them move during what I say, and instead of having to fit in the whole story component (talking) to the video, I think it's better to have the whole story told, and on that add video footage... Simply easier!
I guess this means my task for now is write a monologue... Well off I go to do just that!

Small checklist:

• Animations [x]
• Sounds [x]
• Background []
• Voice-over (story) []
• All programs working [x]
• Research [x] <-- most likely done, I keep adding new links to my bibliography but yeah.

I think that's pretty much it except for

• PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER []

Well, off to write the monologue!

(I'll upload the video upon completion!)

sounds -> success!

I got the sounds! They work! You can listen to them and they work!
Downloaded two different programs till it worked, but at least its all good now. I looked through the sounds and they all seem to be there! So that's a success for sure!
WoW map viewer still isn't working however and that makes me very angry.
Jacek smash!

hair pulling.

Im about to do what it says in the title.
For no reason now, WoW map viewer won't start.
sweet jesus have mercy,

Technology, Y U NO WORK?
grrrrrr.
Right. Erm. sounds. that's it.
Ignore the backgrounds atm.

more on the map viewer story

Since the last post been looking for ways to get map viewer to work.
I also have a list of all the *small* maps that work:

• Stormwind Jail - a jail
• Wailing Cavers - large caves
• Uldaman - an old "egyptian" like ruined city
• Gnomeregan - a very techy, lots of cogs and mechanisms, etc place
• Sunken Temple - fairly obvious, a temple underwater
• Blackrockspire/blackrockdepths - a huge underground scary dungeon place... yeah.
• Onyxia - another large underground cave
• Mauradon - underwater and underground caves and tunnels
• Deeprun tram - similar to gnomeregan-> a very techy tram station
• Orgrimmar instance - a fiery cave connected to the lower, underground part of orgrimmar (the horde's main city) has a few small huts and houses MIGHT could MAYBE be useful
• Diremaul - a large jungle arena with a few tunnels -> could be useful
• Alliance PVP barracks - a part of a human town -> could be very useful, but has a lot of "black holes" i.e. the map is incomplete.
• Horde PVP barracks - just like the one above except in more of huts, desert style. If I use orgrimmar instance this could be useful. More likely to stick to alliance pvp barracks though.

Here is what I found on the official map viewer forum as a response on how to get it to work:

Map viewer isn't usable with 4.x content, and it wasn't great with the 3.x content... It's really buggy, and hard to use. You'd be better off going in-game to get your backgrounds.

And this was posted on friday. 2 days ago.

^**#&!%)@%..1!!

Rage.

Right so unless I can make my machinima using these few background (which aren't exactly great for my script but they could work...) I will have to use the WoW machinima tool. Which means that when you open up WoW, the machinima tool allows you to control all the background, characters, fog, flying, etc. inside the game. The only weak point is you have to physically be there with your character, then you can fly around the area. I however only have one character I really play and if he tries to go to the place that I need for filming, I would get *pwned* by the other side.

I could always make a second character and walk him there (won't take more then 15 minutes) and from there film, except that I would have to do this on my mac as my windows internet still doesn't work and you can't play WoW offline. The issue with that is I have no clue how to record on mac without spending money.....

WAIT! no! 

Ahh the joy! WoW on mac has built in recording for machinima!

This could be a way to do it....

*joy joy joy happy tears*

And the WoW machinima tool DOES work, 100% and is constantly updated with new features!

...but does it work on mac?

Let's check...

No. Seems not.

Oh my god.

*rage*

I swear I'll get this to work.

/log off

*sigh*

After a lot of googling, forum searching and downloads I managed to get a version of WoW Map Viewer that actually opens up.
Now the first map I clicked on opened immediately and I was really happy that I managed to get it to work.
I exited that map and tried a different zone, unfortunately the only thing that showed up was the skybox and a vague outline of the mountains.
My excitement died out and I started looking for ways to fix this issue.
On the official issue forum for the program I found that a lot of users are having this problem since October. And that it hasn't been fixed *stabs self* There are a few maps that work and that I could use, so if I can't get it to work, and it doesn't suddenly, magically get updated, I can still do the film (thank the lord!) However this is a huge pain you know where.
Argh.
I hope Im more lucky with the sound program....

Animating...

I am currently in the process of animating the characters.
And for once I have good news as it's taking way less time then I thought it would take.
Besides if I notice that I need an animation while putting the footage together, nothing is simpler than opening up WMV and animating it within seconds.
Happy Jacek is happy!
Now let's think...

I have all animations for the slaughtered storytellers
I have all the kid's animations
I have the animations for the Storyteller's capture
I have the storyteller walking, crying, begging, casting spells...

Ah! I need the other storytellers casting
I need books
I need the spells they cast
I need the government created and animated
And I think those could possibly be all the animations I need! :D
I'll write a script after breakfast *final final version* as it has been going through my mind for a while. It will be ~1.5 minutes of me talking (I'll record it to check) and over my talking I'll add the animations, sounds and background. Once I finish the animations today I'll get map viewer to work and then I'll get all the WoW sounds!
Back to work it is!

Cool stop picture video

Nov 4th meeting with Mr. Rawson

A look at timeline (reverse chronogical):

• Feb 1st = Final Draft due
• Jan 1st = MUST start writing at latest!! 
• Dec 31st = product must be done
• Today we have 2 months left 

How can we cut down on production time?

• no voice actors, 1st person reflection voiceover
• less characters 
• more audio, less visual 
• what are the only movements that I need?
• what can I reuse / duplicate / loop?  
• can I cut some flashbacks? and make it simply a voice comment?

The harsh truth is that we WANT to make a great machinima, and we want to finish the story, but if timeline runs out, we will have less time to write our report, which CANNOT come second.   The report must take priority.  SO, we've got to be very careful as to how much time we devote to the product.

Better to have a shortened product and a better report

1. what about a trailer?

human ingenuity

WOW map viewer isn't working ... hmmmmm grrrrrr .  OK another software issue ... how many software issues have we had by this point?   5 -- ish?  Probably?  How long has the software set back my productivity?  1 month / 2 months?  This is an element for reflection .... ahhhh yes. 

Without map viewer, we can do the animations of teh charactres, but it won't have any background.   Can we create the whole character animations bit, and INSERT backgrounds later?  YES.  OK good, so what we're going to do is focus on the character animation and deal with the backgrounds later.    SO -- conclusion, we are doing animations and NOT backgrounds.  done.

Sounds - another program?  Getting the sounds will hopefully take 1 hour.  After 1 hour I should be able to play/insert any sound I want.  I'll blog about this once it's done.

Steps/Goals.  Today is Nov 4th :    Hope to have ______ done by ______:

1.  Animations,  Mon, Nov 14th
2. Put together in Vegas  :  before I leave for England 
3. Sounds:  Dec 5th
4. Voice over (not perfect)   Dec. 12th
5. Titles, final edits (possibly subtitles): By START of christmas break.

All of this is A LOT to do before Christmas break.   But if all of this isn't done by Christmas break, chances are that we're just going to fall too far behind. 

Christmas break is the production HARD deadline.  Product is second to the report.

Video footage from the first 20 minutes of using Sony Vegas.

I'll be honest. I opened up Sony Vegas and was clueless. I didn't know anything. There were a lot of options, a lot of buttons, moving thingies and STUFF. I was lost. Very lost.
But I looked up 2 tutorials and boom, this is what I "created" in 20 minutes.

Basically now that I have the characters animated and ready for one scene (this is not it, this has 3 people, the original scene has 6 and a background)
So, I imported the 3 character animations and a spell animation. I removed the green screen from the background of each animation. Then I moved the object where I wanted it to go, and then I played around with the time till everything was correct.
Now, I talked to my mum and she said buying fraps is not a problem (yay) so I will get rid of that annoying little white writing above EVERYTHING.
For some reason, I can't get WoW Map Viewer to work, so in this particular teaser there is no background.
This was a first, rough try.... without further adieu, here it is

Like I said very simple, very basic, no sound effect and no background. Just to see how the program feels.
And I must say it feels good, it's a joy using it!
I also have a bunch of annotated pieces of paper with character placing, how long each animation has to be for a scene to work with the voice acting, etc.
I can also tell the the guy on the left (the storyteller with the blue hat) is moving slower then the other two. But I'd have to re-record the animation and I just wanted to get this first try off my chest!
This wasn't as hard as I feared it would be... Thank the lord!
Now bibliography for the videos I used (in case I need them later)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdSLDD7RWyA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxhNf175I9I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZy2KuwPQmM

Not all of them are great quality, but hey, they were on top of the list!

Sorry for mistake!

Kept saying Adobe Professional when in fact it's called Premiere.... it's been a long day!

Also working on the first scene as we speak! I will have something very small to post here soon, I just need to figure one thing out!

And now video editing...

So it turns out that I can't edit my video with Adobe Professional... my windows is 32-bit, and said program requires 64-bit. Is all hope lost? No!
There are two.. competing programs on this market (for windows) Adobe Professional and Sony Vegas. Thank god sony vegas runs on both windows, AND has a free trail too! And now thanks to my fast internet the download is done.... let's see how this will work out!

Video recording

Right, after a couple of mishaps with the WeGame client (basically it had to be online to save the videos, and the internet downstairs isn't working causing the videos to... not work.) I decided to go classical and simply download fraps. Now there is a minus using this software. The file sizes of the movies it creates are MASSIVE. A 5 second clip is 10MB, which might not sound like much but get a whole movie of several characters and environments and you have lost many GB's.
The other minus is the writing on top of the movie (www.fraps.com) is always there. Perhaps there is a way to edit it out, but if there isn't I could always buy fraps (27 euros..)
Other then that the software is extremely easy to use and it should be easy to edit as well.
So, let's put some green screen magic to work and record our characters! I'll post a sample on here when I have a couple!

Ugh! *frustrated*

Nevermind what I said about our internet downstairs, it still won't work... *deep long sigh* thats working with memory sticks then... at least it's an okay speed on my laptop.
Right, back to downloading the recording software then...

Long silence, but good news!

Haven't been updating/working on my personal project for longer then I would have liked to.
There are some personal reasons, but now that the issue is over and done with I can say what's new, what I plan to do and when!

What's new, well finally we have fast internet! Instead of 25kb/s, the speed is now ~8mb/s which is a MASSIVE improvement. (I love it.) This might sound like little news, but the fact is that the computer (Windows 7) downstairs on which I must do my project used to have no internet at all, no idea why, but it simply would not work. Now the issue with that is that I would need to have a laptop or some iOS device with me whenever working because I couldn't check anything or download necessary software. Now that this is fixed, I can freely work downstairs with no issue (the connection still gets disconnected sometimes but hey ho..)

What's coming up;
Wednesday, Friday and the weekend (Sunday at least, I'm away Saturday) will be Personal Project dedicated days (in this week) Meaning that I will start recording every single animation. I have a list of which animations I will need from every character, so now all I have to do is the easiest thing.
I select the movement I want my character to do from a drop-down list
I record the movement
Aaaaand that's it. How simple is that? When all the movements are done, I will open the video editing software, insert background, which I will get from this handy program: http://wowmapview.sourceforge.net/ Then I can simply add the animated character, move him into the place I want him to be (my machinima has no big fight sequences or action filled moments) and then as a last step add the music and voice acting. (MAYBE I'll add subtitles too, as I know that voice acting can often be a pain to viewers...) If however I don't have enough time (I don't know how long this process will take) I will only add subtitles and no voice acting, making this a "musical" piece.
Because however simple it sounds, it's a tedious, time taking process. Ah well.
Also, dear Mr. Rawson when would you be available for a meeting? I'm good on wednesday and thursday and friday... Basically the rest of the week!
A little note aside from personal project; I think I might continue to make machinima when this is done... I just.. like it!


So there's that.. Off to work now!

Back from the brake, screenshots of final characters

Finally back home from a fantastic holiday in Ticino, was sunny and inspiring :)

No onto personal project; below are screenshots of the final characters that will appear in the movie.
(The number of extras might change, but that's not very important, extra's just brighten up the scene if necessary)
The script is.. being worked on, I don't want to share it till I have the final version. I'll make sure to improve it until it can't be improved anymore; since the machinima will only be ~2-4 minutes long, I need a perfect script to make sure those few minutes have a big impact and fully use up my abilities!
Through the weekend ill download the Adobe program (T-mobile STILL haven't granted us fast internet. *sigh*

So without further adieu, here are the characters!

Bar Keeper

Child (important character!)

Female Extra 1

Female Extra 2

Female Extra 3

Female extra 4

Female Extra 5

Female Storyteller 1

Female Storyteller 2

Female Storyteller 3

Guard

The Last Storyteller

Male Extra 1

Male Extra 2

Male Extra 3

Male Extra 4

Male Extra 5

Male Storyteller 1

Male Storyteller 2

"The Evil" (not actually an evil character...)

So there they are! Now back to work on the script...

What's your favorite character?

Meeting before the break

Not only do we have to have a meeting before the October break, but I also have quite a bit to discuss;
The script!
If it is okay for Mr Rawson, a meeting sometime tomorrow (Tuesday October 11th) would be amazing to discuss my script, it's strong points and it's weak points.
I'm quite proud of it and I think it would work really well and wouldn't be too hard or wouldn't make the movie too long either.
We'll see.

Script!

Downloaded myself a little handy program onto my macbook called producteev. Its basically an online/computer/advanced homework diary.

It will help me stay organized, but thats besides the point.

I started writing the script, and it should be done this friday. I am really pleased with it so far, and I hope I can finish it and still be proud of it!

Screenshots! (finally...)

Sorry for the lack of the screenshots, the last few days have been hectic and confusing.
Anyway, here are 3 screenshots from each of the two characters

• Storyteller
• The evil

There is place for improvement, as you see the storytellers hair through the hat. This obviously won't be the case in the machinima, but I have to find out a way to stop this from happening. 

Another problem is the kid's model wouldn't load properly, for some reason his feet were missing. The model viewer is still in beta, therefore bugs occur. The model always worked before, so I hope this will be the case here as well... Anyway, here are the two characters!

Sorry for lack of screenshots!

In the previous post I promised some screenshots, but before I got to it, I realized that I was missing an important part in my Geography essay, and therefore forgot completely about the screenshots.
I will upload them when I get home today!

Screenies...coming soon!

Just a very short update, to let you know that ill be uploading the screenshots of the storyteller, the kid and the evil in about 15-20 minutes!

Time time time... Is an issue.

Wow, I never imagined making models (or "dressing up" characters) would take this long!
An hour and a half resulted in 2 models done for the movie...
I was thinking what would speeded up the process, but I can't think of anything!
I thought that having a basic idea in my head what the character should look like would help, his race, the color and style of clothing, the weaponry, etc...
But If this is what I was thinking:

Mysterious human, dressed in dark blue robes, face covered by a dark blue/black hat

In WoWmodelviewer, isn't so easy.
See WMV has the entire database of WoW inside it, every model, every armor (with several categories) so you choose a race, then gender and then click on one of the slots you would like to equip to your character
(head, shoulder, shirt, chest, belt, legs, bracers, gloves, feet, right hand, left hand, cape, tabard, quiver... I THINK that's all of them)
When you select which items you want to look at, a list pops up with all the items you have in WoW for that slot (e.g. every armory piece which can be equipped on the "Head")
You also get tick boxes for which category you want to be displayed in the list (cloth, leather, mail, plate, etc) Then you have the list. Simple list in order, with a search box... Now the search box WOULD be great, as I simply type in
"blue"
Hoping to find all the blue head items, to help me quickly "equip" them onto my model.
Nope.
5-6 items show up... The thing is, they keep the names from WoW, so instead of being called
"mysterious looking blue hat"
It would be something like
"The Everlasting Anguish of Agony"
So I had to skip through all the items, to see which would truly fit in with the character, which ones fitted together, etc. And that takes a lot of time...

Anyway, the two important characters are done (It WOULD be three, but the third important character is a child, and WoW has a pre-set, average looking child, so no gear fitting on him...)
If it helps, the two characters are
"The storyteller"
and
"The evil"
(Very innovative names......)
The names will most likely change later, this is just for me right now...
That's pretty much what I accomplished today, I'll see whether I'll upload some screenshots today or tomorrow...
Once that's done, I can write up my script (I usually don't write down things like this, as I get better ideas on the go, but I can make an exception...)
And get to some serious work! This weekend is pretty much full up though, so I'll see how that goes.
I have to figure out a way to work faster with WoWmodelviewer... It will be really useful if I did...
For now, good night!

Busy weekend!

During this weekend I will try to create the basic 4 characters I need for my machinima;
-The storyteller
-A young child
-"The evil"
-Possibly a couple by-passers/extras
I do not know if I will be able to do it this weekend, as I am literally drowning in homework and projects... I will try! :D

Erm...prezi?

Well I have done quite some plot, and I am actually proud of it!
*surprise*
However, on Prezi when I pressed save, it changed into saving... and won't change back or let me know it's saved! D: I think it's been stuck on it for like.. 5-6 minutes now.
I hope I will be able to save and not loose all the work or I will not be a happy person at all.
*crosses fingers*

But hey! If it doesn't work, I'll use something else, thanks to prezi I actually managed to make a plot so meh.


[EDIT]
After waiting for 3 minutes, I closed and reopened the prezi... Took another 3 minutes to open.
It saved pretty much half of what I've done. Odd. *sigh*
Internet Y U NO FAST?
Apparently our village is getting faster internet on the 22nd... please. Please? PLEASE.
Right so that's my rage for the day.

Maybe I'll just make a powerpoint (which I don't have YET on my macbook)... but the couch is so comfy :3

Prezi

Currently using prezi...
Well like I feared, it is rather laggy and annoying due to my internet. but hey, it works... just need to get used to it!
Working on the plot right now, will post a link as soon as it's doing a bit better and neater!

Plot coming soon!

Well hello there,
(writing this from my new macbook ;))

Like the title says, I'll be able to start working on the plot right after dinner (should be in about 30 minutes). Till then I am setting up my new laptop, making it ready for school; which is the purpose of me buying this. Schoolwork. Just transferring all my research and files, etc. onto the laptop so I can work on my project from both (come to think of it... I might just make a network between the two so I can quickly share PP files... hmm...)
Anyway, that's it for now!
Stay tuned!

Awful ailing and amazing alliteration!

(for those unknowing, ailing means sick or ill)
Like you can guess from the title of this blog entry, I am amazing in alliteration.
But the important thing is, I'm ill.
It's sunday today, so I'll update this blog with a quick rundown of everything that happened in this weekend!

• Friday:
• Had a meeting with my supervisor, we discussed the plot of the machinima, the tools, the people who will voice act for it, and a timetable/schedule.
• He showed me prezi (a program with which I could more easily set-up and organize the plot of the movie, which is still in the works. Prezi is a simple program kinda-ish like powerpoint, which creates a huge canvas, and lets you make small notes (images, text, video etc) which can all be laid out as a presentation, or to zoom around it.
• This will help me organize all my thoughts, possible plot ideas, characters and settings
• We then discussed the voice actors, so far four people will voice act
• Me (main character(s))
• My sister (female characters)
• My dad (narrating voice)
• Lorenzo (villain)
• All the people agreed to do so, and the basic character voices are set (note, characters have NOT yet been created)
• We also set a time plan for the project:
• September: finish plot and script
• October (there is a 2 week brake): create all the characters in WoWMV, possibly save every animation required as a file
• November: in Adobe Premiere add all the animations, with the backgrounds, special effects, animate, make it look good!!!!
• December: Record voice acting, sound effects, music and add to the machinima
• January: TRY HAVE IT FINISHED!!!
• So yeah, then I came home really excited to do the plot...and ended up with Tonsillitis. It is pretty damn painful, but only in your throat.. Unfortunately along with it came 39 degrees of fever and an exploding headache, forcing me to stay in bed all for the remainder of the day.
• Saturday:
• Woke up still in pain everywhere, went to the doctor, confirmed Tonsillitis, ordered by my parental unit to stay in bed, no electronics.
• Sunday:
• Now its only my throat, headache comes and goes, but today was the day I had to install our new router which arrived in the mail a couple days ago, finished that half an hour ago (it is currently 16:35) and now updating this blog before lunch/dinner.

I'll try to get the plot onto Prezi as soon as possible, I know I'm not going to school on monday, so I have today and at least tomorrow to do so! A good thing though, is that on monday my macbook pro (which I ordered) will arrive, allowing me to work on it from anywhere! THE COMFORT! I can finally work from my bed, so I'm sure I'll be more productive there (as most good ideas come when you are in bed. True fact. Or shower, but I'm not taking my laptop there!)

That's pretty much it so far, I'll keep you updated as soon as I know anything!

Cheers!