GTA5

S4 E140 This is one of the craziest videos I have ever made… (GTA5) (Aug 2024)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes July 31, 2024 Leave a reply

Crazy, it is certainly that – and more. If you enjoy slasher horror, we think you’ll love this – and its definitely not for U18s! The film is by Toaster and is a music video for Code Mistake, a deathcore metal spectacular by CORPSE and Bring Me the Horizon. We examine Toaster’s GTA5 machinima, reflect on its anime qualities, and conclude its significantly better than the official music video: Ricky discusses it in the context of Stan Brakhage’s Dog Star Man, but Phil, Tracy & Damien feel the inspiration is much closer to home.



YouTube Version of This Episode

Show Notes & Links

This is one of the craziest videos I have ever made in my life (gta5 machinima) by Toaster, released 5 July –

Official video directed and animated by Tristan Zammit, and released 8 July 2023 –

Stan Brakhage’s Dog Star Man –

S4 E136 GTA5: Los Santos police throw themselves into offering box (July 2024)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes July 3, 2024 Leave a reply

This week’s film review is of [GTA5] 賽銭箱に身を投げる ロスサントス市警察, made by  @mzanku  – its absurdist humor but also deeply disturbing, which hits us all in different ways around half way through watching the film. Following our discussions, we conclude the creator probably didn’t intend for the work to be culturally appropriated as an interpretation of US police brutality, but that interpretation was nonetheless possible. In closing out the ep, Ricky discusses the new DLC for Elden Ring and the role cheese plays in enjoying it.



YouTube Version of This Episode

Show Notes & Links

[GTA5] 賽銭箱に身を投げる ロスサントス市警察 or Los Santos police throw themselves into offering box by mzankurow, released 14 April 2024 –


Elden Ring DLC available to download from Steam here

S4 E124 Machinima News Omnibus (Apr 2024)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes April 10, 2024 Leave a reply

A packed review this month, with some sad 🙁 better 😐 and happy news 🙂



YouTube Version of this Episode

Show Notes and Links

Endings

The long-anticipated demise of Rooster Teeth and has been announced – as has the much anticipated final season of Red Vs Blue in this trailer –

If you are a die hard RTer, here’s a link to the Rooster Teeth team response to Warner’s announcement, its ‘Not a Final Goodbye’ –

Tracy and Ben’s Pioneers in Machinima book chapter is here too, Chapter 4: Rooster Teeth Bites.

Here’s the link to the 2007 Special Ep, Going Global, released at the First European Machinima Festival in 2007 (in Leicester, UK) –

Articles, Variety, Deadline and IGN.

Another ending, Draxtor Dupres’ Second Life series supported by Linden Labs, Drax Files: World Makers. Here’s his final report and here’s a link to a livestream he did to celebrate the achievements of the show –

Accolades

Sam Crane’s Hamlet in GTA5 won a Jury prize for best documentary at SXSW 2024, link to news coverage here, and the distribution deal awarded here.

Electro League and Weta’s War is Over has become the first UE5 film to win an Oscar, Best Animated Short –

Aye AI AI…

YouTube has updated its T&Cs, a nice article here

ConvAI has announced a partnership with Unity for NPCs, and also teamed up with Second Life. Here’s a link to Wagner James Au’s New World Notes blog – and here’s a couple of useful links –

Stability AI has introduced a 3D video generator, information here

RunwayML has partnered with Musixmatch to generate video to lyrics, link to information here

and it has also announced a new lipsync feature for generative audio, currently on early access to its creators programme members

Hume has a demo of a voice-to-voice generator, described as an Empathic Voice Interface – link to sign-up for early access here

and if you need a little overview of how all things generative AI are developing, here’s a nice video summary by Henrik Kniberg

Inspiration

To celebrate the phenomenal success of Gozilla Minus One at the 2024 Oscars, Nelson Escobar, the VFX creator of the Godzilla model, has released it as a free download for Blender. Link here –

Blockbuster Inc has announced its release date: 6 June 2024. Here’s the official gameplay trailer –

and here’s the link to Prologue on Steam

Finally, here’s the link to the interview with Denis Villeneuve, discussing his approach to making the latest Dune films –

Post Script

We are super excited to see our Podcast make the Top 3 listing of indie filmmaking podcasts on Goodpods in March 2024 – how cool is that?!

S4 E122 M/F Toxic Relationships: Vigilante | Flite (Mar 2024)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes March 28, 2024 Leave a reply

In this ep, we discuss two machinima films dealing with thematically similar issues, albeit presented with different treatments: Vigilante is made in GTA5 and tells the shocking story of how the lead character became cyberpunk. The second is a futuristic yet somehow more traditional gender-based story made in UE5. It is presented as a proof of concept for a proprietary tool made by its creator, who is none other than the VFX Oscar-winner Tim Webber in his directorial debut.



YouTube Version of This Episode

Show Notes & Links

GTAV – Vigilante | Episode 1 | Cyberpunk Machinima by Weedens, released 25 March 2023

FLITE | Hyper Realistic CGI Sci Fi Short Using Unreal Engine, released 1 Dec 2023

An interesting video featuring Tim Webber, talking about his approach to visual effects

And a ‘making of’ interview here –

S4 E116 GTA5: Danser Encore | Escape Game (Feb 2024)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes February 14, 2024 1 Comment

This week’s review is of a self-contained excerpt from a larger film, called Escape Game by  @CrisUberman. This part of the film is the final chapter of the story, Danser Encore, voiced by  @lionelmazari1990 with a song by  @hksaltimbank. We delve into the inspiration for the themes in the film, which draws on the philosophy of Empedocles and Rosset, although we perhaps lower the tone a little with reference to Oscar Wilde! 



YouTube Version of This Episode

Show Notes & Links

Excerpt of full film, Danser Encore by Cris Uberman –

Full film, released 28 Nov 2023, featuring Louis Fouche –

Artist website and blog link here

I’m Still Seeing Breen by Paul Marino, originally released in 2004

Journey into the Metaverse by Tutsy NAvArAthnA, released 2011