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S6 E203 genAI: Arido Taurajo (Nov 2025)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes November 27, 2025 Leave a reply

In this episode of Completely Machinima, hosts Phil Rice, Tracy Harwood, and Damien Valentine explore the stunning AI-powered operatic machinima “Arido Taurajo” — a groundbreaking short film created by Chantal Harvey (aka Mamachinima) in collaboration with digital artist James Morgan, AI composer Roboccini and soprano/AI researcher Maya Ackerman, among others.

🎮 About the Film:
Set in the World of Warcraft universe, Arido Taurajo tells the story of Dahlia, a female warrior torn between family life and adventure. The film combines AI-generated music with human performance, blending digital game visuals and classical opera in a visually rich and emotionally resonant experience.

💡 Discussion Highlights:

The role of AI in creative filmmaking and music generation.
How Roboccini, trained on Puccini operas, composed the film’s aria.
Chantal Harvey’s filmmaking process inside World of Warcraft.
Insights into AI ethics, creative authorship, and collaboration.
The film’s connection to the EU COST Action Grassroots of Digital Europe (GRADE) project, celebrating women and minorities in creative technology.

✨ Whether you’re into AI art, machinima, digital filmmaking, or World of Warcraft, this episode dives deep into the fusion of technology, music, and storytelling.



YouTube Version of This Episode

Show Notes & Links

Film, by Chantal Harvey –

ALYSIA http://tryalysia.com/ stands for Automated LYrical SongwrIting Application

An interesting recent Video interview with Maya Ackerman on her predictions for the future of creative AI

An interview with James and Maya about the Arido project, here

You can find the ALYSIA app here https://www.withalysia.com/

Phil’s Making Dr Krispia documentary –

S5 E192 Machinima News Omnibus (July 2025)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes July 30, 2025 Leave a reply

This week, we cover a lot of things this month, as usual, but start with a tribute to a machinima pioneer who has sadly crossed the bridge into an unknown world – Tutsy NAvArAthnA. We then go through some more fascinating projects that we want to share, more about genAI and machinima, a bunch of new tools and techniques, some wise words from some great artists, latest games and relevant updates. All links below.



YouTube Version of This Episode

Show Notes & Links

Celebrating Tutsy NAvArAthAa / Basile Vignes’ Life

RIP Tutsy

Completely Machinima Interview with Tutsy Navarathna here https://completelymachinima.com/cm-interview-tutsy-navarathna/

Flowers of Evil filmed by Tutsy Navarathna, discussed on our episode here https://completelymachinima.com/s4-e121-cosmic-flowers-of-evil-mar-2024/

Glasz DeCuir’s tribute here –

and an interview with the man himself, recorded for the Machinima Expo –

Projects

A RDR2 inspired Minecraft animation made using Blender

An Egyptian Renaissance cinematic made in Unreal Engine –

A trailer for an upcoming movie which the creators are trying to fund and involve the original voice actors from Team Fortress 2 –

An intro to an updated game, Back to the Future 2025, made in Unreal Engine –

And a webcam test for metahuman, also in Unreal Engine –

genAI projects worth looking at –

Interesting Convos

Darren Aronofsky and Demis Hassabis on storytelling in the age of AI –

AIFF 2025, update here

Judge backs AI gen firm called Anthropic over use of copyrighted books, here

I turned down a [REDACTED] show –

New tools, techniques & how tos

Meta’s Worlds creator tool for VR, here

Eleven Labs – another update!

Creating a crowd of metahumans in Unreal –

Character Creator 5 update and connection to Unreal –

Fender Studio release for creating audio for 8 tracks, here

Martin Bell’s Unreal tutorial series –

How one detail completely changed a scene –

A LoRA for a Pierson’s Puppeteer –

NaturalVision Enhanced – release trailer –

Game Release

Dune Awakening –

Cyberpunk 2077 –

And finally…

Fortnite definition of machinima states: ‘the use of real-time computer graphics engines, like that used with Fortnite, to create a cinematic production.  The word machinima is a portmanteau of the words machine and cinema.’ 

Take a look at the interview Tracy did with Epic’s Chief Tech Officer Kim Libreri in Pioneers in Machinima!

S5 E187 Machinima News Omnibus (June 2025)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes June 25, 2025 Leave a reply

Another packed month of updates – lots of projects, a few games releases, the usual genAI avalanche and Predator, the world’s first BIG BUDGET machinima! Click the links, check out our comments and do add your own.


https://dashboard.transistor.fm/shows/and-now-for-something-completely-machinima/episodes/s5-e187-machinima-news-omnibus-june-2025/edit

YouTube Version of This Episode

Show Notes & Links

Machinima projects –

I spent 30 days in a dead game by Globert –

The GTA6 trailer but made in GTA5 by Gu1maz –

I Modded Fast Traffic Into RDR2. Now It’s a Horror Game by Blurbs –

Cyberpunk 2077: POV Hyper-Realistic Motorbike Ride on RTX 5090 with DreamPunk 3.1.1 Graphics in 8K by NextGen Dreams –

Haruki made in UE5 by Bad Decisions Studio –

IMicky Mouse by Mickey Mouse, made by J C Thornton –

Not machinima

Solstice 5: Forgotten archives by Paul Chadeisson –

generative AI projects

Corporation War by Solo Films –

Purely artistic using an aesthetic of origami by Kelly Boesch AI Art –

Where’s Alice by Aaron Sims Creative –

On genAI developments

Eleven Labs launched v3, check out the video update –

v3: 70+ languages from 33 with coverage from 60% to 90% of the world’s population; Dialogue Mode: Handles natural interruptions, tone shifts, and emotional flow across multiple speakers; Audio tags: Guide delivery with tags like [whispers], [angry], [laughs], or [door creaks]—controlling performance in fine detail. Its impressive stuff!

Veo3 about here and demo vid here –

A bit of Game News

The Elden Ring Nightreign DLC came out in the last month and was downloaded a record 3.5M times in 5 days… I wonder how many of those were Ricky? And, what’s the verdict on it?

007 First Light put out a first trailer –

A big budget machinima?

Predator: Killer of Killers, released June 2025 –

and discussion at State of Unreal 2025 –

S5 E178 Machinima News Omnibus (Apr 2025)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes April 16, 2025 Leave a reply

This week is yet another packed episode of updates and things we think you’ll find relevant to creating great machinima content, including more great projects to be inspired by, genAIs we’ve spotted, Steam’s rip off, inZOI’s challenge to Sims and the phenomenon known as the ‘Minecraft Movie’. Check out our discussion and do add comments.



YouTube Version of This Episode

Show Notes & Links

Projects

A GTA5 Zombie Movie, called Survive by Gabrian Films –

Cuco – A Love Letter to LA by Paul Trillo, created in 2D and AI –

Neural Viz released episode 485: Pog Corto of Tigg Talk – all about tariffs –

Anomidae on making a game, an explainer –

Another WoW documentary, thanks to Ben Grussi for sending this over to us –

A GTA6 mAIchinima, made with Cursor and Claude Sonnet 3.7, released on X, link here.

genAI updates

A conversational AI voice synthesiser by Sesame.com worth looking at.

ElevenLabs launched its Actor Mode, here’s the show & tell video –

Runway released Gen 4 which enables you to precisely generate consistent characters, locations and objects across scenes –

chatGPTs 4.o image generator launched and immediately took backlash from a Studio Ghibli meme – here’s the post that seemed to start it all off. Link here.

A method for aligning 3D generators with simulation feedback for physical soundness – generates 3D assets that are stable under gravity and faithful to the conditioning images, meaning they don’t fall over so easily, and can also be used for 3D print models. Link here.

A recamming tool called Recammaster, which takes a video file as input and then generates a breadth of different perspectives on it.  Link to Github here.

An AI assisted VTubing tool, called AIWarper/WarpTuber, which allows you to animate portraits or character images by mapping your facial expressions and movements to them in real-time. It supports both static images and video animations, making it perfect for virtual avatars, content creation, and streaming. Link here. YouTube tutorial here –

And in Other News

How Steam works – a review of the algorithmic problems that Steam perpetuates –

Apple Arts Studios, nothing to do with Apple Inc. has launched Animation Shopee – an intriguing competitor to Reallusion’s character animations. Link here.

Nintendo Switch 2 launched, link here.

John Robertson’s gamer show called The Dark Room, link here and promo here –

Nvidia’s GeForce RTX 5060 Ti releases on 15 Apr, link here.

InZOI game, a competitor for Sims(?), out now on Steam. Link here and trailer here –

The Minecraft Movie, trailer here –

and article questioning its success in The Guardian here!

S5 E174 creativeAI: The Glurons (Mar 2025)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes March 20, 2025 Leave a reply

One of the most extraordinary picks we’ve made, probably ever, on the show! This week, we review an emergent absurdist talk show, focussing on the life of the Glurons – a post-human race of critters set in a future world, but most creatively uses generative AI tools. Its outstanding quality is, however, the writing. Check out our review and pick up the links mentioned on our show notes below.



YouTube Version of This Episode

Show Notes & Links

Unanswered Oddities by Neural Viz released on 9 Dec 2024, made using MidJourney, Runway Act One and ElevenLabs and Premiere for editing

Fandom page here and here

Reddit comments on ‘the full story theory’ here

Reddit comments on The Cop Files crime series – also brilliant!

JWallyman51’s Reddit link here – just in case you want to connect and read up further!

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Tracy Harwood and Ben Grussi’s Machinima Book, On Sale Now!