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.
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