Lord Komo is machinima based on the MMORPG SWTOR, which I am still playing at the time of writing this. I am a sucker for story-driven games so this was right up my alley. SWTOR was also a source of inspiration for Aronoke, the Star Wars fan-fic flotsam I am currently addicted to writing.
Lord Komo originated when Jord and I were adventuring on Taris, wreaking destruction and havoc and generally getting quests done, when we happened on the NPC Lord Komo. And with one thing or another, we were soon singing that Beach Boys song, Kokomo…
Everyone else in Universal Exports refused to sing it. I considered hiring someone, but decided it was too bothersome. And so, a terrible exercise in self-torture and vocal expression was born. Especially since Kokomo is not happily inside my vocal range. It is far too squeaky. I can’t watch the video now, it makes me wince too much. *hides under pile of MMO subscriptions*.
Since making the movie I (and the rest of Universal Exports et al) decided to swap servers, due to the dwindling popularity of the game, so some of the characters involved in the film are no longer named the same thing.
My second attempt at LoTRO machinima. This one still has some IClone4 models in it (Sauron’s milk herd, anyone?) and lots of IClone effects, but it is heavily based on snippets of movie taken directly from the game. It was inspired by an excellent (dreadful, by most people’s standards, no doubt) pun made by Wingwoz (who stars in the film). This one was a great deal of fun to make, although I did have the song stuck in my head for about three months during and afterwards.
This is a much more recent video project, one I made when I first got IClone4. I learned lot of things while making it. Mainly that realistic looking animations are really hard to create without expensive equipment. Now I have IClone5 and some other cool stuff to record animations from live actors, I will have to make another animated movie, although at the moment, I feel a bit wilted at the thought of how much work that would be….
Anyway, Orcs is a short screenplay based upon the MMORPG LoTRO which I played for far too many years, and will probably play again. You will probably not get some of the jokes if you have not played the game. The IClone characters are made to try and look a bit like the LoTRO toons they are based on. Which was hard for a nooblet like me, since all the armour and things had to be modelled and built in IClone or adapted from existing things.
Another The Movies video I made. This one was much harder, because it is a music video for the Spit song of the same name. Took a long time, if I remember. It turned out rather surreal, and the (simple) plot seems not too clear now I look back at it. Of course, the Spit song had nothing to do with people in Cowboy hats, but hey, there were lots of good props for that sort of thing in the game.
I tired to make the main characters in the video look like two members of Spit, as they looked at the time the song was originally recorded. So, yes, I guess they are based on people living or dead, in this case.
The Movies – it was a game brought out by Lionhead Studios in 2005, partly a Sims style game where you ran your own movie studio, but the actual fun bit was that you could customise and glue together video clips to make your own films. The system was rather clunky and there were certain drawbacks, especially in trying to time the pictures to the sound, which was especially frustrating for me, because one of the things I tried to make with it was a music video.
Anyway, the first thing I actually finished while testing it out was a short skit about Coffee, done entirely with subtitles.
It was a bright clear day, a good day. Any day you could see the ground clearly from the flier was a good day. Quasper was piloting as usual, Aronoke slouched in the passenger seat looking idly out the window. It had been a good haul, no problems, and Careful Kras would be pleased.
It was important that Careful Kras was pleased. Aronoke had good reason to want to avoid Careful Kras’s attention.
It had been some time since the incident with the mouthy duros kid, the little hostage who had given Aronoke so much trouble. He had been asking to be beaten up. You didn’t give the higher-up skimmers or beaters a hard time if you fancied having all your teeth in your mouth, if you liked your face the colour it was. The duros kid had only been a hostage, not even a valuable hostage. Careful Kras had wanted him undamaged, had ordered Aronoke to lay off him, but Aronoke hadn’t listened. The duros kid was very mouthy and thought he could order Aronoke around, so he had lost his temper and pounded him just a little.
Maybe it had been asking for trouble, Aronoke thought, but what followed had been all out of proportion for what was merely a minor case of insubordination. The hours of cutting and burning with liquid fumes, the scarring of Aronoke’s face.
Aronoke shuddered slightly as he thought of it, pulled his over-robe more tightly about himself. Concentrated on staring out the flier window so Quasper couldn’t see his expression.
Quasper Jowl wasn’t a bad sort as Fumers went. Had decided once, a long time ago when Aronoke had only just started skimming, that Aronoke was his luck. Said that it was only Aronoke’s luck that had got them through that sudden sandstorm and back to base without passing through the middle of a mountain along the way. Aronoke flew with Quasper a lot after that.
They were just flying over the place where the arconans’ speeder was – a relatively recent wreck. Aronoke had been assistant skimmer for Amicable Ozenari, more commonly known as Mill, the day the arconans had arrived. They were relatively new. Green miners. Mill’s flier was having battery problems and he had been worried it wouldn’t make it back to base. There was the radio. They could have used it to call for help if necessary, but Mill had landed and taken the arconan’s battery instead. It was a low thing to do, a malicious thing to do. Would have been kinder to shoot them dead. Next time they passed that way and every time since, the speeder had still been there. Aronoke didn’t know what had happened to the arconans. Bodies didn’t last long in the desert.
Today Aronoke straightened with interest in his seat, just as Quasper saw it too. Another flier, not a Fumer flier, but one from back in Tarbsosk. A Quell flier, that was it, with two strangers outside on the dirt investigating the arconan speeder. A couple of duros engineers loitered closer to the flier. Four then, at least.
“Should we go see what they’re up to?” asked Quasper. Continue reading