Blog Post #13: Machinima

Reading the last chapter of the text for this week (titled “the rest of the story” or something similar) made me think about how far animation has come in the 20 or so years since the book was published. Normally, 20 years isnt that long in historical terms, but with the advent of computers and everything else that’s happened recently, there are some surprising jumps. Back on topic, however, is all the new ways people are using technology to do things that were never feasible at this level before, like making animated films.  One such technique, that is relatively new, is called Machinima.

I offer this video: (warning! this is not safe for work, thanks to cursing!)

First, I’ll explain the technique. The film makers set up a multi-player video game (in this case, Halo for Xbox) and use their in-game characters to act out the action. They use one player as the “camera,” who is unseen and in this case doesn’t have any lines. (That explains the cross-hairs in the center the whole time). They then edit and add a sound track and effects in post-production. This innovative way of making an film is at most a decade old, now that technology has progressed where we can have multiple characters interacting in an environment such as the ones in these games.

This particular short (the first episode of what became a multi-year series) is also interesting story-wise, as they break the fourth wall by having the two red soldiers debate why they are in the situation they’re in, and the blue soldiers discussing the futility of their surveillance. The creators use a similar theme to that of Toy Story, in that the characters don’t realize they’re not “real” as it were. A well made film, on all accounts, no doubt.

This new film making form does pose questions, however. The characters are all “acted” by players, moving them at the appropriate times, and the “animation” is actually performed real-time by the game systems processor. But seeing as that is essentially a stripped down version of motion-tracking used in most animated films nowadays (Avatar, anyone?) it seems moot now. Regardless, viewing these sorts of films shows the ways that people are innovating to make art, and how far the genre has come since Gertie the Dinosaur.

Here are a few more Machinima films I enjoyed, to close out the post:

(This one is also not work-safe)

This one has quite a few inside jokes, but still is pretty funny!

And one last one:

My comments for this week are here and here.

Advertisement