Peter Rasmussen

S5 E176 Red Faction Guerilla: Optimism Bias

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes April 2, 2025 Leave a reply

A viewer nominated series, this week’s ep is another great example of brilliant writing. Optimism Bias was directed by  @AndrewGoodKnight  and originally released in 2013 having been showcased at the Melbourne International Animation Festival  @melbourneinternationalanim3991  – its Australian comedy, deeply rooted in game lore, at its very best.



YouTube Version of This Episode

Show Notes & Links

Optimism Bias by Andrew Knight of Recycled Media was released originally as a 20 minutes film for the Melbourne International Animation Festival in 2014, but later re-released as a series in 2015 on their youtube channel – episode 1 is here but do take the time to watch the whole series –

Interview with Andrew Knight

You can also check out the interview Tracy did with Andrew, released at the same time as our review. Audio version only of Tracy’s interview with Andrew –



YouTube version –

Courtesy (and copyright) of Andrew, here are a selection of shots from the making of Optimism Bias and the early days of machinima in Melbourne.

LAN party at Andrew’s place –

Creating the frame for the film –

Production challenges! Cooling off the kit –

Voice recording (dodgy looking tash there…) –

On the programme, Melbourne International Animation Festival 2014 –

The early days at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACMI) circa 2004-5 with RoosterTeeth crew members Burnie Burns and Gus Sarola and Academy of Machinima Arts & Sciences CEO Paul Marino, and friends –

S5 E155 Beyond the Dust (Nov 2024)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes November 6, 2024 Leave a reply

This week’s ep we dedicate to a 3D animation by a French student collective made in their final year of studies, streamed through  @TheRookiesCo  channel. It is not technically machinima as its made using traditional animation tools but nonetheless we absolutely loved it – and its a recommendation by one of our channel’s regular followers @3dchick. The film is a post-apocaylptic robot tale, inspired by Zaha Hadid’s architectonic style.



YouTube Version of This Episode

Show Notes & Links

Beyond the Dust by Alexia AMELINE, Marin BENITEZ, Lucien BIGEY, Marine DUPUY, Benjamin HACK, Matteo MICHEL, Salomé QUILLIEN, Juliette VIGNOLLET at ESMA Toulouse, France with an original score by Gregory ALLISON https://www.therookies.co/entries/27421 

Film was released on 17 Sept 2024 and is a graduation short film made during their final year –

Check out Phil’s remastered collection of Peter Rasmussen’s work here, especially Stolen Life, feature-length machinima –

and if you want to find out more about the ground-breaking work Peter did, there is a chapter dedicated to his work in the Pioneers in Machinima book by Tracy and Ben Grussi.

Completely Machinima History with Ben Grussi (December)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes December 23, 2021 Leave a reply

In this episode of the podcast, Ben recalls some more of the great all time classics that got this whole movement rolling, events all taking place in December (1993 to 2005 inclusive).



Show notes and links –

Ranger Gone Bad 2: Assault on Gloom Keep (1996) https://archive.org/details/ranger-gone-bad-ii-assault-on-gloom-keep

Torn Apart 2: Ranger Down! one of the first Quake (1996) movies with voiced dialog https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NX75VLzin2I

Walking Wounded/Strange Company releases trailer for Eschaton: Darkness Twilight in Quake (1997) 

Blahbalicious by Avatar and Wendigo (1997) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yC7o5pt-lA

screencap: Blahbalicious

Fountainhead Entertainment’s Katherine Anna Kang announces Sidrial.  Slated to be the first Machinima film to be put on the big-screen as a commercial venture https://archive.org/details/sidrial_promo even made a total conversion mod for Quake 3 Arena (2000)

Bender ‘n Stein by Ken ‘3dfilmmaker’ Thain https://archive.org/details/bender_stein and Bender Strikes Back Part 1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQCcVfwpChM (2001)

Anthony Bailey releases a patch for integration into Quake 1 engine code bases to enable capture of AVIs (audio/video, any resolution, frame rate and codec) on Win32 GL platforms http://quakecapture.sourceforge.net/ (2002)

Teaser for Stardate: Night Time by Dr Nemesis (Leo Lucien-Bay) https://archive.org/details/stardate-night-time-teaser (2002)

The Final Chapter (6) to the Killer Robot Saga by Nanoflix (Peter Rasmussen)  https://archive.org/details/killer-robot-machinima (2003)

Shadows of Auraxis Chapter 1 by Malvision in Planetscape https://archive.org/details/soa-e-1 (2003)

Remedy and Rockstar Games official Max Payne 2 Mod contest ‘Non-Interactive Movie’ winner Payne to the Max https://archive.org/details/payne-2-the-max (2003)

Canadian live-action/animated kids TV series ‘Zixx Level One’ is the first show for broadcast to contain animation created by a game engine, made using the Lithtech engine https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtwhiFHOPQs (2003)

10th Anniversary of id Software’s Doom, Doomworld complied an extensive article about the early forms of demo recording featuring Uwe Girich https://www.doomworld.com/10years/demos/demos01.php (2003)

Epic Games revealed the winners of Phase 4 Real-Time Non-Interactive Movie contest (2004)

  • 1st Place: Bot (Eggman)
  • 2nd Place: Journey (Fitz)
  • 3rd Place: Infiltrators
  • 4th Place: Sparked Memory (CSWAT)
  • 5th Place: The Editor Has You (Angel_Mapper)

ATI and Crytek, creators of Far Cry, made a real-time interactive CGI movie called The Project, that harnessed the capabilities of the ATI RADEON® X800 XT and PLATINUM EDITION for Hollywood style machinima, demonstrating photorealistic cinematic computing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9Uxc5rqbBI (2004)

Screencap: The Project

Just a Game by Mu Productions, a live action/machinima hybrid https://archive.org/details/Mu-just-a-game (2005)

SSPH Pre-Episode Part 2 The Healers by Amanda ‘AmandaJ3162’ Stanley https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHZfJG0CgMU, I Got My Gmail https://archive.org/details/IGotMyGmail-MV and SSPH Pre-Episode 1 The Draftee https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzAbyxe2mj4 were all selected for front page showcase status on Machinima.com – a first in its 5+ year history that three films created by one person are featured (2005)

screencap: Pre-Episode Part 2 The Healers

DigitalPhil and Dr. Nemesis’s  MachinimaLive! Episode 1 released entitled The Evolution of Machinima  https://archive.org/details/mlive12dec05 (2005)

The Machinima Reader book announced by Henry Lowood and Michael Nitsche https://www.amazon.com/Machinima-Reader-MIT-Press/dp/0262015331/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=The+Machinima+Reader&qid=1639549609&sr=8-1 (2005)

Trailer for PG-13 series Adventures in Dating by Decorgal released https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykAxPDze0R0 (2005)

Completely Machinima in History with Ben Grussi (September)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes September 30, 2021 Leave a reply

Ben gives us the rundown on notable highlights from the beginnings of machinima that happened during September between 1997 and 2006.



Show Notes & Links

Phil Rice’s Male Restroom Etiquette

Zerstorer (Quake Total Conversion with in-game cinematics) in-game trailer by Nihilism Unlimited https://archive.org/details/zerdem_202109 

Circus Life-Part 1 for Quake 2 by Donnovan http://www.archive.org/details/ciruslife202109/ 

Apartment Huntin’ by ILL Clan https://archive.org/details/apt_hunting/

Rendezvous released by Peter Rasmussen, Nanoflix https://vimeo.com/89817936/

Discreet’s Gmax free modeling package for games first edition release https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dgCObbUr5s/

EA’s Battlefield 1942 release https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0npQ6sdbqw/ – Foundation for creating No Licsense and other notables, Ours Again, Blabberfield 1999 series and Soldats San Merci, see Internet Archive Search: collection:”animationandcartoons” AND (mediatype:movies AND subject:”Battlefield 1942″) 

Fake Science by Dead On Que https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmyUALJZoBQ/ 

Halo PC release https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9kdq7r3JcI/

Unreal Tournament 2003 release https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjyPbtlIs04/

Red Vs Blue: PSA #4 Microsoft Professional Development Conference (PDC) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMcuxW6QzBM/

Swiss Army Bot Part 1 by Nabih Saliba  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LgxhZUrRQZ8/

Swiss Army Bot Part 2 by Nabih Saliba https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euzd_5WEJb0/

Unreal Technology Demo by Epic Games release (shown at Game Developers Conference https://youtu.be/gfGNClgwk8M/

Scourge Done Quick Toon Edition by QDQ https://archive.org/details/sd-stoon-web-smooth-div-x/

Halo Matrix “Film” (Halo re-enactment with sound from the movie) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vi_6oDYUpmM

First Doom 3 machinima cinematic released is ‘Last Ten’ created by ‘Oneofthe8devilz’ https://archive.org/details/last-ten-machinima-doom-3/ 

Artemis Software releases Nesmut via Machinima.com https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4OUNJ8ZlnM  (official selection of the 2005 Machinima Film Festival) 

The second Doom3 ‘scripted” machinima, cinematic example for a scripting tutorial at Doom3World.org! by ‘indianajonesilm’  https://modwiki.dhewm3.org/doom3world/index.php?thread_id=6176/

P.A.N.I.C.S by Rooster Teeth Productions https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsAcF1s4Pr4

A Different Song by Britannica Dreams  https://archive.org/details/BritannicaDreamsProductions_21

Stolen Life trailer by Peter Rasmussen, Nanoflix https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umtuFToCzrI/

Interview with Frank Dellario and Matt Dominiani on This Spartan life https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umtuFToCzrI

The Awakening Atlas Productions final episode https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zr2mR3-zbTQ/

MTV.com presents a feature about Rooster Teeth entitled “Machinima Pros Make a Living Playing Halo with their feet” https://www.mtv.com/news/1510551/machinima-pros-make-a-living-playing-halo-with-their-feet/

Male Restroom Etiquette by ZS Oveman aka Phil Rice https://archive.org/details/Male_Restroom_Etiquette/

Paul Marino interview with Steve Sullivan (ILM ZVis) for VFXWorld by Barbara Robertson https://www.awn.com/vfxworld/zviz-ilm-goes-interactive-previs/

Completely Machinima History with Ben Grussi (June)

Phil Rice Podcast Episodes June 19, 2021 Leave a reply



Ben Grussi, machinima’s historian, tells us about significant events in machinima’s timeline that occurred during the month of June.