Here I present, in crappy YouTubeVision (it’s imbeddable, unfortunately) a machinima film I created, third in my Snacky’s Journal series, that swept the Blizzcon (Blizzard Entertainment’s Gaming Convention) Machinima Contest over this past weekend and took home the Grand Prize. Yes, you heard right. I beat the pants off of everyone else. I was a little surprised. Anyway, the film was screened for a huge convention audience - about 4,000 or so people I would guess.

You’ll notice some actual animation in there. Perhaps this is cheating? I don’t know the rules any more. I’m creating a sort of hybrid entertainment. I gotta have SOMEthing to do while waiting for my Nickelodeon short to air….!

Anyway, the convention was awesome and I met (and drank with) many of my fellow machinima-makers, and also a lot of talented Blizzard employees. Blizzard is pretty much the most successful gaming company in the world right [Read more…]]]>

Here I present, in crappy YouTubeVision (it’s imbeddable, unfortunately) a machinima film I created, third in my Snacky’s Journal series, that swept the Blizzcon (Blizzard Entertainment’s Gaming Convention) Machinima Contest over this past weekend and took home the Grand Prize. Yes, you heard right. I beat the pants off of everyone else. I was a little surprised. Anyway, the film was screened for a huge convention audience - about 4,000 or so people I would guess.

You’ll notice some actual animation in there. Perhaps this is cheating? I don’t know the rules any more. I’m creating a sort of hybrid entertainment. I gotta have SOMEthing to do while waiting for my Nickelodeon short to air….!

Anyway, the convention was awesome and I met (and drank with) many of my fellow machinima-makers, and also a lot of talented Blizzard employees. Blizzard is pretty much the most successful gaming company in the world right now (if you are living under a rock and don’t know), and their design style and artistry is appealing and borrows a lot from the animation industry.

Also, the hybrid South Park episode that featured Blizzard’s World of Warcraft game was just nominated for an Emmy.

…And this machinima series continues, for as long as I have the time to keep on making em! There’s some…gasp…ACTUAL ANIMATION in this episode. Well, a little bit. You can also catch this show, in all its high-resolution-streaming glory, on the excellent DivX Stage 6 streaming site. You might have to download a plug-in, but believe me, it’s worth it. It makes this YouTube version look like, well, cat poop.

First off, here is a silly 2 minute piece I created, a fictional movie trailer for a 60’s teen beach type thing.

Next, another trailer, this one dramatic, from Terran and Ezra at Rufus Cubed Productions. They really show what you can do with the medium. Terran went on to work at Blizzard, and also on the South Park Warcraft episode.

A commercial [Read more…]]]> I’ve been hardcore dabbling in machinima for over a year now, as those who have visited my website have perhaps figured out. Since Floyd recently shared a Sims machinima he found, I would like to share with you some of the great World of Warcraft machinima pieces that I and my fellow filmmakers have created, that, if you’re not tapped into the machinima community, you may have missed. World of Warcraft is not only a hugely popular online MMORPG worldwide, but has one of, if not the, largest machinima communities on the internet.

First off, here is a silly 2 minute piece I created, a fictional movie trailer for a 60’s teen beach type thing.

Next, another trailer, this one dramatic, from Terran and Ezra at Rufus Cubed Productions. They really show what you can do with the medium. Terran went on to work at Blizzard, and also on the South Park Warcraft episode.

A commercial for Xfire, from Clint and DW at Dementia/Myndflame, a couple of very popular machinima creators.

Jason Choi’s Edge of Remorse, a multiple award winner.

“The Ballad of the Noob”, a music video in a Johnny Cash folk style that I threw together. It has a few WoW gaming in-jokes, but most non-gamers seem to get it anyway.

While these films are officially classified as machinima, they all have been enhanced with programs like Adobe After Effects and extra added frame by frame animation to bump up their production value. Does this start to push their classification into actual animation? I have a feeling that the lines will become blurred.

The advantage of machinima is that it is, so far, a medium that is accessible to everyone. Even if a person doesn’t feel like they have the artistic or design capability to create animation from scratch, they can still create a machinima. For filmmakers like myself, the advantage is time and money – so long as you accept the limitations, capturing pre-rendered animation in real time is fast, and cheap – I can get an idea out into the world very quickly. And for the people who play these games – when they see a film made with a game that they play, they feel a sense of familiarity and interest when they watch said film. In other words, there is a built in audience, just like when a film is created from a popular book or graphic novel.

So, what do people think? Is machinima a viable new medium?

Like so many that have come before, Kyle + Rosemary, the short, is wrapped. We mixed it at Oracle Post last Thursday.

Did I mention my composer, Klaus Badelt? No, I didn’t, but he did an awesome job with the music. It’s really romantic and beautiful. I’ve always wanted to work with Klaus on a film, and although we nearly did in 2004, that didn’t end up working out. I’m glad he agreed to score my short, and I hope we can work together on something longer in the future.

Time for more thanks: First off, I’d like to thank the incomparable Larry Huber, for being there for me at H-B and back again at Nick. Thanks to Fred Seibert and Claudia Spinelli for being the executives that artists always dream about. Thanks to the production folk, Eric, Melissa, Kevin, Therese, Jack, Mac, Scott, and Eric for putting up with my smart assery. [Read more…]]]>

Like so many that have come before, Kyle + Rosemary, the short, is wrapped. We mixed it at Oracle Post last Thursday.

Did I mention my composer, Klaus Badelt? No, I didn’t, but he did an awesome job with the music. It’s really romantic and beautiful. I’ve always wanted to work with Klaus on a film, and although we nearly did in 2004, that didn’t end up working out. I’m glad he agreed to score my short, and I hope we can work together on something longer in the future.

Time for more thanks: First off, I’d like to thank the incomparable Larry Huber, for being there for me at H-B and back again at Nick. Thanks to Fred Seibert and Claudia Spinelli for being the executives that artists always dream about. Thanks to the production folk, Eric, Melissa, Kevin, Therese, Jack, Mac, Scott, and Eric for putting up with my smart assery. Thanks to the pre-and post teams: Molly, Bodie, Justin, Michael, and the editors whose names I’ve forgotten, gulp! Thanks to the artists who helped my film become reality - Alan, Steve, Ruben, Debbie, Ron, and Michael and his crew at Synergy Animation. Thanks to Meredith and my cast - Wil, Jentle, Alex, Charlie, and Aliki, whom I also must thank for keeping me silly. And thanks to my fellow shorts creators for keeping it real and being inspirations! It takes a village…

Jun

P.S. Our IMDB site looks like it’s up. All you creators should go over there and fill in the credits for your cast and crew!

OK, so I’m a bad blogger. Well, the main reason, besides the fact that I’m doing a hundred different things extra-curricularly, is that I have ANOTHER blog, my REAL BLOG, on my website. Well, it’s not so much of a blog as a what’s happenin’ updater kind of thing. But I guess, so is this, if you think about it. I consider the ‘purist’ blog to be more like an online diary of a person’s life, and their feelings and stuff like that. Isn’t that what started the whole blog craze?

ANYway, Kyle+Rosemary is PICTURE LOCKED. Whoah! When did that happen? A big thankyou to Michael Benet and SYNERGY ANIMATION for really coming through for me on both the 2-d and the 3-d, at the same time, in the same studio. It was like the 2-d and the 3-d were, um, holding hands! And skipping down the street! And living [Read more…]]]>

OK, so I’m a bad blogger. Well, the main reason, besides the fact that I’m doing a hundred different things extra-curricularly, is that I have ANOTHER blog, my REAL BLOG, on my website. Well, it’s not so much of a blog as a what’s happenin’ updater kind of thing. But I guess, so is this, if you think about it. I consider the ‘purist’ blog to be more like an online diary of a person’s life, and their feelings and stuff like that. Isn’t that what started the whole blog craze?

ANYway, Kyle+Rosemary is PICTURE LOCKED. Whoah! When did that happen? A big thankyou to Michael Benet and SYNERGY ANIMATION for really coming through for me on both the 2-d and the 3-d, at the same time, in the same studio. It was like the 2-d and the 3-d were, um, holding hands! And skipping down the street! And living side by side in harmony! Is there a life lesson here? Hmmm.

Coming soon: POST! MUSIC! SOUND EFFECTS! I’m excited. Can’t you tell by the capital letters?

I whipped out the above picture on my tablet PC at work. If I ever work somewhere where I am not assigned a tablet PC, I am totally gonna buy one. It is so choice.

This is great. Someone’s master’s thesis in animation. Just sharing.

Kyle gets ready to enter a magical realm of magical-ness.

[Read more…]]]> Enjoy some screenshots! At this point, Synergy Animation has sent over a whole lot of great stuff, both traditional and tradigital. I’m really interested to see what the reaction will be to the final film!

Kyle gets ready to enter a magical realm of magical-ness.

Sir Horace makes dopey excuses.

Rosemary tries to look innocent. Not easy to do in black makeup.

Lunarella perks up when Horace stops acting like a dork.

Rosemary overhears something interesting. Something on which the whole plot line of the film HINGES! Not telling what.

Once again, locations were designed and colored by Alan Bodner, Steve Lewis, Ruben Chavez. I’m totally impressed by the way the colors are turning out.

Plug: “The Virgin Show”, a group exhibiton of industry artists and animators making their gallery debut, begins Oct. 27. Should be very cool! Click on the link for more information.

Ditto! What Mike said below!

Oh yeah, if you look closely, you can see what some of the game characters look like [Read more…]]]>

Ditto! What Mike said below!

Oh yeah, if you look closely, you can see what some of the game characters look like Thanks so far to Synergy Animation.

Meanwhile, I’ve up and created two new pieces of Machinima. These are currently entries in a contest over at Xfire, and you do have to download their client in order to view them (contest rules, I’m afraid), but it is free.

Beach Party 2

[Read more…]]]> Kyle + Rosemary is coming along very nicely over at Synergy Animation, and I promise that I will post some new images soon. I also promise to update the ‘official’ website that I made.

Meanwhile, I’ve up and created two new pieces of Machinima. These are currently entries in a contest over at Xfire, and you do have to download their client in order to view them (contest rules, I’m afraid), but it is free.

Beach Party 2

The Ballad of the Noob

Did anyone catch that South Park episode that was made in conjunction with Blizzard/World of Warcraft? I ROFL’d! I was also a tiny bit peeved because they were depicting a similar concept to Kyle + Rosemary. But ultimately, it’s a good thing for everyone like me who likes to create films in/about the gaming community - it’s bringing these worlds into the mainstream consciousness.