Valve

S4 E120 Machinima News Omnibus (Mar 2024)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes March 14, 2024 Leave a reply

This week’s podcast episode is our curated news omnibus for this month.  We cover lots, and enjoy reflecting on the significance of the stories we highlight for the world of machinima and virtual production. 

btw, the international internet pipes failed and microwaves fried our apps during this recording session, video corrupted and monsters ran loose among us, so enjoy the voice data we’ve managed to resurrect and video clips we’ve added – we’ll be back next week in full glory!



YouTube Version of This Episode

Show Notes & Links

Fan communities under pressure?

Valve’s Steam policy and recent take downs for Team Fortress 2 and Portal fan projects – article on Games Radar here

Half Life 3 aka Entropy Zero (and 2) projects – Fandom.com overview here and video –

New Moviemaking Toolsets

Blockbuster Inc, Prologue version now on Steam here

Demo by Orbital Potato here –

Replikant now in free beta on the Unreal Marketplace.

Replikant has a Youtube channel with plenty of tutorials on it already, and there’s a great demo of it which gives you a sense of the animation quality it produces –

And for those wanting a quick and dirty tutorial on UE5, check this out –

Steamboatin’ Along!

Minecraft Steamboat Willie which is a fun take on it, made by Red and Blue –

Fewture Studios’ trailer for The Return of Steamboat Willie, made in Unreal Engine –

Screams

The origins and impact of the Wilhelm Scream – BBC shorts here

More about Sheb Wooley here

And another video about it here –

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNvZYzg7o68

AI Genies Rising

Community action against deepfakes of Taylor Swift – link to story on BBC site here

Jae Solina has done a nice overview of OpenAI’s SORA here –

and this is a link to RunwayML’s video controller toolset (and our feature image for this post) –

The Suno model, released by ElevenLabs, for music composition – here is a fun example on X –

S4 E119 Feature Length: Emesis Blue (Mar 2024)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes March 7, 2024 Leave a reply

In all our years of involvement with machinima (over 75 years between us!), feature length has been something we’ve rarely found watchable… but with this week’s pick, we were proven wrong, mostly! Emesis Blue, made in Source Filmmaker using the Team Fortress 2 characterisations by Fortress Films, is an incredibly well-made if very complex story that was crafted over many years.



YouTube Version of This Episode

Show Notes and Links

Film, by Fortress Films, released 21 Feb 2023 –

Another review here, by Durham College Chronicle.

Ricky discusses pulp fiction, not the Tarantino film, but the style – here’s a useful source to find out more

Phil compares the film to Nolan’s style of filmmaking – more on that here

S4 E103 Longest Walkable Distances (in a game) | UE: The Alchemist’s Confession (Nov 2023

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes November 16, 2023 Leave a reply

This week we present a critique of two very contrasting machinima productions – one took literally months to make and the other just a few days. In our first pick, the creator has asked: just how big are the maps in games these days? Well, vast actually – and quite frankly it blows our minds to think that so much effort has gone into answering the question. The film is called Longest Walkable Distances in a Video Game, by How Big is the Map. Our second film is a review of a creative experiment in Unreal Engine, called The Alchemist’s Confession by Cory Williams – it was inspired by a found marketplace asset and is experimental in a number of ways, not least in the five days it took to make it. Ricky highlights the weakness in the writing albeit the film is technically masterfully produced and acted, using mocap and LinkedIn (yep, you heard that correctly!). We also start this episode with some links we hope you enjoy and a discussion about the voice characterisation of G Man in the Half Life series.



YouTube Version of This Episode

Show Notes & Links

Longest Walkable Distances in a Video Game / Maps Size Comparison by How Big is the Map, released 2 Sept 2023

An Alchemist’s Confession by Cory Williams, released 27 September

and he’s also created a how to, Behind the Scenes

Fractal Pi video mentioned by Tracy, by Chirag Dudat –

All G Man’s speeches, by No Click –

S3 E83 Half Life: HEV Suit (June 2023)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes June 29, 2023 Leave a reply

This week, Phil has selected a short that will make all those H&S and Half Lifers smile equally… HEV Suit by  @Zapper770 … because we all need more head crabs in our lives. The film is an example of great comedy timing.



YouTube Version of this Episode

Show Notes & Links

Film, by Zapper770, released 26 April 2021

Paul Marino, director of the Academy of Machinima Arts and Sciences and author of one of the first books written on how to make machinima, called The Art of Machinima (2009) (actually its pretty outdated in terms of advice, but good for ‘ole’ time’s sake’!

S3 E64 Film Review: Half Life 3 (Honest Game Trailers) by Fandom Games (Feb 2023)

Tracy Harwood Podcast Episodes February 9, 2023 Leave a reply

This week’s episode reviews a film by Fandom Games called Half Life 3: Honest Game Trailers, released 31 March 2015. The film is a throwback style of satire and even if you’ve not been following Valve’s Half Life developments, you’ll enjoy this. For those less in the know, HL3 is a game that never made it beyond the hype, despite its avid fan base waiting patiently (or impatiently) to play it for 20 years! We reflect on Fandom Games origins in Jimmy Wale’s Wiki technology. We also discuss our approach to ‘healthy criticism’ on the podcast.



YouTube Version of this Episode

Show Notes and Links

The film –

The Fandom wiki site link here

Video Game Leak’s commentary on the expectation for HL3 –

Article by Eurogamer on the recent leak of Valve’s video game assets