By Osprey Therian
Part 1 of a four part machinima I made archiving the 2007 The Show Must go On! variety show which performed around the grid (which the 2008 show is doing now). Yes, yes, it’s shameful of me since it’s my own troupe of players, but it’s fun and what we all need is more fun. Now that we are in the Age of Pragmatists silliness might be hard to come by.
By Osprey Therian
Komuso Tokugawa /Japan and Hathead Rickenbacker /Canada perform live on this machinima. The Second Life music scene is vibrant and varied, ranging from traditional to ZOMGWTF!11!!1.
By Osprey Therian
Komuso and MoShang are currently beta testing SynaesthAsia – but when it goes public go and see it if you can. This is my machinima record of one of their live music jam and biofeedback particle beta performances.
MoKo LoCo
Real time Internet/SL music jam
Komuso Tokugawa/Japan
http://music.sonicviz.com
MoShang Zhao/Taiwan
http://moshang.net/
By Osprey Therian
Sine Wave is developing something they call actorbots – bots with a bit of AI which can perform tasks in machinima or in other roles such as greeters, and Easy Babcock demonstrated the alpha stage project on Sunday. Read the rest of this entry ?
By Osprey Therian
Twelve teams started, nine finished, but only six got in before the deadline. See the films on 48.tv Congratulations to everyone – details after the fold. Read the rest of this entry ?
By Osprey Therian
The real life 48 Hour Film Project has come to Second Life. This coming weekend 13 machinima teams will create, from scratch, a 1-4 minute long machinima piece – entirely inside Second Life. Read the rest of this entry ?
by Onder Skall
As Osprey recently mentioned, Windlight is back. This means that if you download the First Look Viewer you’ll be treated to some great views. This brings much realism, but there are problems too.
I’ve taken a few pictures to illustrate the point. Click on any of the thumbnails for a higher-res version.
When I was looking for a place to take some test photos, my first thought was of the newly minted City of Lost Angels sim. Do check it out, it’s an artistic masterpiece.
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As you can see the architecture looks impressive both facing and away from the camera. Everything is really dramatic, and the light looks like real sunlight. I used a trick to get these pictures though. Can you spot it? I’ll show you what it is in just a moment.
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In close quarters things look great, hands down. When sunlight hits things they really seem lit up, as opposed to just brighter. One might think this is going to immediately make people feel like they’re really “in” the game… but… there are problems with that. Big ones.
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Here I am in my “Mr. Generic” avatar standing by the water. Yes, that big blue block behind me is supposed to be water. That’s what it looks like when there’s no actual sim occupying the space you’re looking into. In order to get those impressive pictures at the top of this article I had to turn off rendering water by going to Client ->Rendering ->Types ->Water. You’ll notice another problem with this picture: contrast.
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Boy does THAT look wrong. The thing is, in the real world with a real camera people will often photograph this way as well. Being backlit with no light source or reflection in front of you will black out your face entirely. In the picture above you can see that half of my face is dark, half is lit. That would happen with a normal camera in the real world as well. It doesn’t matter so much with my cybergoth av because his skin is bleach white anyhow, but if we’re striving for realism we’re going to have to deal with realistic problems.
Fortunately, the fix is pretty easy.
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I created a big block, gave it a completely transparent texture, and made it a light source. I attached it to my nose and bam, problem solved. If we were REALLY going to do this right, I’d place the light source off-camera to the right, and create another on the left. The color needs tweaking too in order to really look like a reflection of the sun, rather than just white light sources…
Actually I could fill volumes and volumes on lighting, but I suppose that’s the punchline here: conventional lighting techniques that have been honed by industry professionals for years now matter in Second Life. If you’re a virtual world photographer or machinima producer, it’s time to up-skill!
Havok 4 is going to change gaming in a HUGE way in SL. Meanwhile, here’s a vid from AshtonJX. And another one from Dizzy Banjo (extremely cool guy by the way, you should meet him!).
Bad intro, but it warms up to awesome.
Thanks to Akela Talamasca for Tweeting this one my way.
By Osprey Therian
Patch Lamington has been around for close to 2 years, now, and almost all of that time he has been making doodle-things.
He started with a 
doodle house, then became a doodle avatar. You probably know his doodle pads, and anyone who has seen The Show Must Go On! has seen the master of ceremonies – a doodle bot from Patch. Patch is escalating his doodle-ness to take in new realms, now, and if doodles take over the world, why, I’m sure humanity will be a lot happier than they are now. Read the rest of this entry ?
by Onder Skall
I’ve received an urgent transmission and need your help! Beware the pink pony-tailed menace!
BEGIN TRANSMISSION 1 (07.31.07). S.O.S. – S.O.S. – IBM CODESTATION is breached. Infiltrator appears to be horrible pink beast with devastating pony-tails. Our defender, SENTINEL, is defeated – broken in four and scattered across Second Life. [See attached movie.] You are our last hope. Find the four parts and rebuild SENTINEL. The black boxes will lead the way. Prizes and glory await all those who complete the challenge… END TRANSMISSION 1 (07.31.07).
Details after the jump!
By Osprey Therian
Last chance – once WindLight takes over mms is gone.
By Osprey Therian
Doc Boffin and I have decided to hold the Combat Cards movie premiere on Sunday as it’s Combat Cards 1st Birthday! Come over for a look, trade a few cards, and have a couple of games. Watch the movie carefully just in case you spot someone you know in a fight scene!
Sunday, 15 July at 2 pm
at
Spangle Aerial Arenas
We’ll premiere the movie once everyone has arrived, then explain the rules for the tournaments to run until Hallowe’en using the newish leagues system (and spiffy new scoring). The big prize is in the constructed decks league, so if you haven’t built one yet give it a try. It takes some thought to balance them, and looking at the cards webpage or the mini cards webtab in my profile can be helpful.
Word has it Doc may be moved to give out cards to everyone who turns up. After that we’ll have some slashy fun. Bring your coolest weaponry and wear your meanest-looking av!
By Osprey Therian
The current First Look viewer lets us see the early stages of the incorporation of WindLight into Second Life.
