This week Ricky goes all out Halloween for us. His selection is an old-style machinima (think Chaplin or Keaton) by one of the most prolific Warcraft movie makers from back in the day… actually 2008 for this one. The tale by Olibith has been made in World of Warcraft and has shades of Lovecraft, the grimmest of Grimms’ fairy tales and The Flintstones! We also discuss a bonus Lovecraftian film for all you Halloween buffs, It Lives Within the Sea by Orange Squadron (dir. Dominic Edwards) made in RDR2.
YouTube Version of this Episode
Links and Notes
Little White Poney Inn by Olibith, rel 22 September 2008
Olibith’s Warcraft movies page with tutorials on how to make machinima (from 2010)
Have a look at Olibith’s other work (Vimeo channel here), such as Le Terroriste
After we had recorded this show, we went looking for Olibith on social media and were dismayed to find that he passed away earlier this year. We were all very saddened by this news and of course extend our deepest condolences to his family. We dedicate this episode to his memory.
It Lives Within the Sea by Squadron Orange (Dir. Dominic Edwards), rel 28 Aug 2021
In this episode, Phil, Ricky, Damien and Tracy discuss a range of films that riff off Guardians of the Galaxy, well apart from Phil’s whose pick is an astonishing map size comparison review! Discussion explores experimental filmmaking reviewing a machinima made in World of Warcraft; the possibilities of machinima as a pre-market concept testing tool for TV series; and, the influence of fans generally.
32:26 Star Trek Pike – Fan Made Opening | Made in Star Trek Online by ZEFilms Productions released 1 July 2019 and the possibilities for using machinima as a pre-market concept testing tool
41:36 It just a virtual kiss by Juan Poyuan (World of Warcraft) released 19 Nov 2021 (log into Vimeo to watch)
53:00 Discussion: What is experimental machinima and why do it?
Ben reviews some of the major happenings during the month of January in the early days of machinima. Starting with 1997 there’s Operation Bay-Shield. 1998 has the First Quake 2 movie – The Mad Bomber. Rematic, a machinima tool by Anthony Bailey is released in 1999. Also in this year Phil Rice released his notable film, Father Frags Best – a machinima classic. 2000 sees Machinima.com founded and Quad God film was released along with several other notable films. 2002 saw the Reel-Time Challenge contest along with Psyk’s Popcorn Jungle retiring (a big machinima review site). 2003 Anachronox the Movie Part 1 was released. 2004 Red vs Blue second season launched. In 2005 the first noveletta about machinima was written by Mike Hoefflinger called Moving Pictures. In 2006, Hugh Hancock, founder of Machinima.com stepped away from the site to focus on his filmmaking.
Rebel Vs Thug (2003) by Ken “3DFilmmaker” Thain – a commercial project with Public Enemy’s Chuck D side project
The Gamer’s Benchmark (2003) by Futuremark released a teaser movies for 3DMark03 – the link is to the full movie after release
Bang the Machine: Computer Gaming Art and Artifacts (17 Jan to 4 April 2004) and The Game Scenes exhibition was created by Stanford Humanities Laboratory and the Cantor Center for Visual Arts at Stanford University presented on ‘the pervasive influence of computer game culture’, curated by Galen Davis and Henry Lowood.
Lenny and Larry Lumberjack (2004) by The ILL Clan – a video of excerpts from their premiere performance of On The Campaign Trail at Void in New York City
“Moving Pictures” (2005), a novelette by Mike Hoefflinger, published by Packet Switched Press – the novel is about a group of people who start their own machinima production with the desire to make it to the big time!
I Surrender (2005) by Tristan Pope is mentioned on Blizzard’s World of Warcraft main website page
The Los Angeles Machinima Collective (LAMC) announces their first machinima production William Shakespear’s Mechbeth – the film was never produced! Ricky was here?!
Epic Games’ winners of the Grand Finals of the Make Something Unreal Contest (MSUC) for the Non-Interactive Movie Category 2005 –
– The Journey, 1st Place ($25,000)
– Bot, 2nd Place ($15,000)
– Sparked Memory, 3rd Place ($5,000)
– Scrap, 4th Place ($3,000)
– Damnation, 5th Place ($1,500)
Adventures in Dating, first episode (PG13 series) entitled Frustration (2005) by Decorgal
In this episode, Ricky, Phil, Tracy, and Damien discuss five very different recently released film selections, highlighting the importance of story-making in machinima. Alongside this, the team discusses some observations on the future scope of creativity, reflecting on comments made by Keanu Reeves on the release of the Matrix Awakens Experience made in Unreal 5.
Tracy, Ricky, Damien and Phil discuss metaverse and open world games, an episode inspired by Captain Grim’s short machinima called “Did Classic WOW Live Up to Expectations?” released on 15 May 2021.
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