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!
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Show Notes & Links
Excerpt of full film, Danser Encore by Cris Uberman –
Full film, released 28 Nov 2023, featuring Louis Fouche –
This week, we spend some time talking about new tools, emergent topics, AI and copyright (again), with some interesting links for you below. Check out the episode here –
YouTube Version of This Episode
Show Notes & Links
New tool releases
iClone’s ‘clumsy moves’ pack, available at $70, can be downloaded here
Crowd simulation tools, including Reallusion’s sim bundle for CC4 and social groups for iClone 8, link here and a nice video here –
and Kenneth MacLean’s MegaHumans plugin WIP. No link for the latter, but here’s a neat show and tell video –
A free new VR mod by Praydog for Unreal Engine – here’s an overview about it –
Mickey and AI discussion
Disney’s Mickey in a horror game called Infestation Origins that will be released later this year –
and an interesting AI generated short that seems to confirm Mickey’s transmogrification into a horror character –
Princeton’s Public Domain Project released an annual report – check it out here for 2024.
Improving the quality of your machinima films with AI, check out Pryda Parx suggestions here –
and you can also check out the restored machinimas Phil did for the Machiniplex channel here, and here’s the trailer for the body of work too –
Google’s VideoPoet that turns prompts into animations without the interim stage of an image and a separate tool like Runway to animate it. Here’s a neat example of its capabilities, focussing on a travelling raccoon –
Mods and Cockers!
The Convergence mod for Elden Ring (and many others), v 1.4 – a nice overview here –
A case of corporate bullying? Check out the situation this Minecrafter is facing and if you’re a legal expert, do please get in touch with him to help out!
Made with Sims 4 characters although animated in Blender to great effect, this is a short short at under one minute long by @tricoufamily. It is also all about the title, and interesting to reflect on how we have all seen similar things in the film but interpreted them differently. We conclude this is masterfully done, but check out how we get to that!
YouTube Version of This Episode
Show Notes & Links
After the Robbery Goes Wrong | A Sims 4 Machinima Mini, by Zombietrait, released 12 Oct 2022
Joker scene on subway (on Flashback FM’s channel) here
This week we discuss two very different films, both reflecting a bygone era of classic entertainment. Firstly, an interpretation of the 1954 Japanese classic Godzilla, made in Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. Its unusual for a couple of reasons: its been made on a handheld Nintendo Switch in a game not really known for its creative application, and its been released only on X (Twitter). Its timing is perfect to capitalize on all the film and TV series hype at the moment so it was always going to find an appreciative audience – definitely one to check out. Secondly, Phil has created an iClone and AI-based video to the Tom Lehrer song, Lobachevsky – its the ultimate accompaniment to this well-known political satire. Phil discusses his creative process in its making and we also discuss how the original song came to be made at a time when Lehrer was walking a tightrope for a few reasons, so we reflect on its timing and impact.
YouTube Version of This Episode
Show Notes & Links
Shinto Ritual by Sumoguri2323, released 23 Nov 2023 –
We take a look at one of the best machinima series we’ve ever seen this week… from the annals of history. The Fixer series was a crime drama created by Todd Stallkamp (aka Burnt Coffee Productions aka TodNYC28) made in Sims 2 and originally released in 2006. Todd was part of the first brain drain from the world of machinima, and shortly after the release of this series was snapped up by EA Games as a content creator where he still is, ironically now in charge of the Sims amongst other games in its portfolio. We revisit the series in our review, discuss how well its stacked up against contemporary machinima and why its still one of the greatest machinima series we’ve ever seen! Ricky concludes, if Todd hadn’t gone to EA, he’d now be making TV shows and films: ‘… you could take this series, make it live action, use all of the shots that Todd made and put it on Amazon as a series.’
YouTube Version of This Episode
Show Notes & Links
The Fixer, Chapters 1, 2 and 3, by Burnt Coffee Productions (Todd Stallkamp) – remastered versions on Phil’s Vimeo channel for the Machiniplex classics –
The Fixer, Ep 1 – Fat Men Run
The Fixer, Ep 2 – Guns, Ghandi and Getting Some
The Fixer, Chapt 3 – One Digit Off
Todd Stallkamp talking about the importance of machinima –
An example of Todd’s machinima projects for EA expansion packs –
The first part of the ITV Westcountry news documentary filmed by Todd and Trace Sanderson –
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