Sorry for the confusion, MrVH. I thought you were saying Marino defined machinima as real-time recording not rendering. Actually, defining it as rendering in real time is an even worse definition and gives it a rather finite shelf life. It defines an entire filmmaking genre by the limitations of current hardware. The day will come when home computers will be able to render in real time games that look even better than the film Beowulf. In fact, South Park could probably be rendered in real time right now, and that's not machinima. Also, one day companies like ILM and Pixar will be able to render films like Transformers and The Incredibles in real time. I have no idea when that will happen, but as I said to Deepo, the one thing you can bet on with technology is that it will get more powerful with time. Home PC's today can outperform computers that filled a warehouse a few decades ago. Imagine what PC's will be capable of in a couple more decades. Defining machinima by the limitations of today's computer hardware is shortsighted and hardly captures the spirit of what machinima is all about.
Machinima should be defined along the lines of filmmaking that uses (predominantly) video captured from premade computer games or graphics programs (like Moviestorm and whatever was used to make Second Life). Filmmakers act sort of as puppeteers in manipulating the objects within those programs. Video of those manipulations is captured and edited into a film. I would allow for some use of custom CGI to enhance/embellish the video, but the bulk should be from the game/graphics program. (Too much CGI and you really have, well, CGI.) That's a more future-proof definition and one that strikes much closer to the heart of what this brand of filmmaking is all about. There will always be computer games. From this point out, I'm sure there will always be people manipulating the objects in those games and capturing the video in order to make movies with it. That sort of filmmaking is the essence of machinima...to me.
As Joe said, there's no need to get too hung up on words. We've probably hashed this topic out more than it needed. Joe may be right in that you may be better off presenting your work to some people as just ˜filmmaking' so as not to confuse them with the term machinima. If they want to know how you made your film, you can explain it however you like.
Deepo, it's definitely coming whether you want it to or not!There are countless independent filmmakers out there already making live-action films that they hope to sell or get distribution for. A few of them are of sufficient quality that they are able to sell their movies. That's what I mean when I say films made on a computer can compete with professional films. They won't necessarily be better in quality than a film like Transformers or Beowulf, but they will be able to break into the realm of movie theaters and DVD's. Maybe they'll still be live action but with a level of special effects that today you would only see in a professionally made film or TV show. There will be future filmmakers who discover and use the same or similar techniques as are used today in the making of their indy films. Of course, with copyright laws, they will be limited to using royalty-free programs. I don't know if Moviestorm is such a program, but if it's not someone will make one eventually. There are already programs that generate royalty-free music. Eventually, there will be low-budget computer-made equivalents of the Blair Witch Project and Desperado. Once you've made it big, you might no longer be considered an ˜amateur,' but the point is, amateurs will be able to break through, just as some do now with their live action films.
hi gl2,
i think, i may be using the wrong words...
i don't bother, if big or low budget will have success or not, whether now or tomorrow.
i bother, if easy output will have any place in cinema!
i don't bother, if tools available for everyone will be used for innovation - innovation, which is by now hard to see for it is not easy and cheap to accomplish. and because the (self-restricting) business is prohibiting such output in many aspects.
i bother, if tools available for everyone are just used for 'cinematography, blocking, lightning, etc.', imitating the traditions of cinema. i bother, if tools available for everyone won't result in creativity, but just following old footsteps.
available for everyone doesn't mean at all, there is positive result. you mentioned 'blair witch project' or 'desperado' (i am not sure, if you weren't thinking of 'el mariachi'?). both quite remarkable in different ways. where 'blair witch project' was innovative, 'mariachi' was more intelligent use of traditional patterns in a low budget production. and for me, rodriguez has bever shown anything more - he remained so far at well (even excellent) picturizing single scenes, but none of his movies is anything mentionable seen as a whole.
'final fantasy', long discussed before released, was an extraordinary bad movie in it's genre. the sensational 'acting' turned out to be pretty neat in some parts, however it shows exactly what i mean... using something very new to create something very counterrevolutionary.
please don't misunderstand me: i am in no way against possibilities for more people to be creative, however i doubt it will be a step forward in art. or better, i fear so...
i believe, that not the possibility of creation will give the world new lights (it hasn't succeeded in music either), but a change in commercialisation would do so! take away some power of global business, at least concerning art products, support the distribution and publishing of new ways and open minds for the unconventional.
sure it will be easier to produce for many more, but mass never equalled quality and even less progress. in that way i agree with you by saying, that the possibilities will be there for more, i am just not sure, it will show results, which i think are needed now already.
Whatever happend to the term "Virtual"?
For a lot of years, everything and anything having to do with computers was labelled "Virtual this", Virtual that", "Virtual reality", etc etc... We even had around these here parts a "Virtual War Cinema" site.
SO...what would the terms "Virtual Movie-Making" or "Virtual Movie Festival" or "FlightSim Virtual Movie" or say, a "Second-Life Virtual Movie" or a "Halo-3 Virtual Movie" connotate? Wouldn't that cover the use of a PC(or X-Box) game engine as a core resource? Would it cover CGI?Dictionary Usage Note: When virtual was first introduced in the computational sense, it applied to things simulated by the computer, like virtual memory"”that is, memory that is not actually built into the processor. Over time, though, the adjective has been applied to things that really exist and are created or carried on by means of computers. Virtual conversations are conversations that take place over computer networks, and virtual communities are genuine social groups that assemble around the use of e-mail, webpages, and other networked resources. · The adjectives virtual and digital and the prefixes e- and cyber- are all used in various ways to denote things, activities, and organizations that are realized or carried out chiefly in an electronic medium. There is considerable overlap in the use of these items: people may speak either of virtual communities or of cybercommunities and of e-cash or cybercash. To a certain extent the choice of one or another of these is a matter of use or convention (or in some cases, of finding an unregistered brand name). But there are certain tendencies. Digital is the most comprehensive of the words, and can be used for almost any device or activity that makes use of or is based on computer technology, such as a digital camera or a digital network. <span class="ev_code_RED">Virtual</span> tends to be used in reference to <span class="ev_code_RED">things that mimic their "real" equivalents</span>. Thus a digital library would be simply a library that involves information technology, whether a brick-and-mortar library equipped with networked computers or a library that exists exclusively in electronic form, whereas a virtual library could only be the latter of these. The prefix e- is generally preferred when speaking of the commercial applications of the Web, as in e-commerce, e-cash, and e-business, whereas cyber- tends to be used when speaking of the computer or of networks from a broader cultural point of view, as in cybersex, cyberchurch, and cyberspace. But like everything else in this field, such usages are evolving rapidly, and it would be rash to try to predict how these expressions will be used in the future
I've always thought the term "machinima" to be laughable...and a grossly inappropriate term to have gained favor. It reminds me of something that either H.G.Wells or Jules Verne would have dreamed up!
In that regard:From Wikipedia: The Analytical Engine...It wasn't until Charles Babbage, considered the "father of computing," that the modern computer began to take shape with his work on the Analytical Engine. The device, though never successfully built, had all of the functionality in its design of a modern computer. He first described it in 1837 -- more than 100 years before any similar device was successfully constructed. The difference between Babbage's Engine and preceding devices is simple - he designed his to be programmed.
Birth of computer science
...
After the 1920s, the expression computing machine referred to any machine that performed the work of a human computer...
...The phrase computing machine gradually gave away, after the late 1940s, to just computer as the onset of electronic digital machinery became common.
So, the guy who coined the term "machinima" brought us back to the pre-computer era of the first half of the 20th century...idiocy, imho.
Deepo, I don't even like most of the movies made by Hollywood, so it's a given amateur films won't fare any better with me. I'm sure the same applies to you. Giving power to create films to more people is no guarantee of any measure of quality, but to be commercially viable--which I think at least some 'virtual films' will be--the film has to appeal to someone, although that doesn't necessarily mean you and me.
Wiley, there are a lot of names we could use that would make more sense to a newb. I used to call the films around here IL-2 filmmaking. I didn't start using the word 'machinima' until about a year ago. To be honest, I never really liked the word 'machinima' anyway. Then again, I never really liked 'Generation X' either...or 'KFC' (instead of the old Kentucky Fried Chicken). I'm just old school that way.
Hey, my posts are getting smaller. That must mean this horse is close to death!![]()
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For the historical record, a copy of the actual correspondence between Anthony Bailey who coined the term, and Hugh Hancock who screwed up the spelling
http://anthonybailey.net/blog/2007/0...ord-machinima/