Talk:Machinima/Archive 1

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Structure

How should the article be structured? Currently it's a mess with random examples of machinima through into the article in roughly chronological order. Any suggestions on how to break this into sections? Or may be someone can be cool enough to just do it? :)

=====> Since the evolution of machinima was a relatively linear process (mostly starting with Stunt Island), and it basically is still in its infancy, tracing its development chronologically is probably best. Perhaps breaking it up by year may be effective, but establishing the major milestones chronologically really does help outline the progression.

Paranoid 22:14, 18 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Microsoft doesnt offically support Red Vs Blue. Does it?

Yes Microsoft had a deal with Red vs Blue to support Halo and the Xbox. -- Psi edit

I tried to help. "Notable examples" fits well with notable production companies, and examples are usually found at the end of the article. The other sections still need work. MaxVeers 20:46, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Halo Machinima

I was thinking Halo Machinima should get its own article since if you look around the internet you can find lots of it. -- Psi edit

But other games have huge amounts of machinima too. CSS for example. Talk User:Fissionfox 12:16, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Machinima Infobox

I just created Template:Infobox Machinima, adapted from the television infobox. Use it in articles for machinima productions. I've adapted Red vs Blue and The Strangerhood thus far.--DooMDrat 05:57, July 17, 2005 (UTC)

External links...

Can people review external links added? This is not a link depository. Just because someone made some 'OMG MATRICKS!!!1!" film in some MMORPG doesn't mean it belongs.--DooMDrat 08:59, August 14, 2005 (UTC)

  • MachinimaHQ, a Machinima community/portal. It contains videos, articles, and forums. Probably my personal favourite machinima site. I'm not sure of how this submission process works, but I was notified to talk about "External Links" in this discussion area before they go up.
It only gets one google hit, and it's only been around since the 14th of February. Hell, the forums only have 7 members at the moment. I don't see how it could be your favourite site already unless you are personally involved in it. Wikipedia is not for self-promotion.--Drat (Talk) 10:13, 25 February 2006 (UTC)
  • The Codex, a Halo-based action/drama series. Added by a longterm vandal. Relevant? --Wetman 05:02, 7 October 2005 (UTC)
It's relevant. It's the correct URL for The Codex.--DooMDrat 06:16, 7 October 2005 (UTC)
  • I reverted to remove a link to another individual series, Neverending Nights. In my opinion, the external links section should not be a directory for individual series. (Just for the record, I incorrectly labeled my revert as rvv in my edit summary). --Muchness 00:49, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm going to suggest a few links here - currently the links section seems pretty old to me. I'll add them in a few days if I don't get any "aargh, no" comments:

  • Machinima Premiere - very large and active Machinima site, probably the premiere Machinima site at the moment.
  • Warcraft Movies - thousands of Machinima movies and a very active community here.
  • Sims99 - Another engine-specific site, again, very active (at least as active as Machinima.com)
  • Machinima for Dummies The book of reference for Machinima as of 2007, supported by an active and (I'm told) highly-regarded blog. FULL DISCLOSURE - I'm one of the authors.

- All of this from Hugh Hancock

I think they're probably fine. The last could be seen as slightly promotional, but objectively the release of Machinima for Dummies is pretty big news. Once our coverage of machinima expands enough, I hope to have engine-specific pages (World of Warcraft machinima, Halo machinima, The Sims machinima, etc.), so the engine specific links could be moved there in due time. — TKD::Talk 16:30, 5 September 2007 (UTC)
Thinking about this further, one thing that crossed my mind is that a couple of those links (as well as others) can be found at the Open Directory Project, so we could link to that as a neutral resource to reduce the links that are listed individually here. — TKD::Talk 10:44, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Just some pointers

The section for Quake seems amazingly scant, only mentioning speed runs. But from memory, Quake was where machinima really took off, with Eschaton: Darkening Twilight generating a lot of buzz within the community. It was made by Strange Company, the guys behind www.machinima.com. Anyway, I think more should be made of them, I mean, they even had Roger Ebert comment on one of their projects. - Hahnchen 03:01, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

Definitely. I also feel articles should be made for the biggest and best of the old Quake Movies. Namely Devil's Covenant and The Seal of Nehahra.-DooMDrat 11:59, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

If you'd like, I can expand the various info pages for Strange Company - I'm sure other people will cheerfully tear out any points where I tip over into self-promotion - Hugh Hancock —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.46.237.228 (talk) 13:08, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, there's never a shortage of things to do. Making non-controversial changes is fine (but see Wikipedia:Conflict of interest for the full guideline that Wikipedia has on this issue). Just be careful that there have been so many bad instances of people writing about subjects with a vested interest that the community tends to be wary of these things by default; it happens many, many times daily. One thing to keep in mind is that everything on Wikipedia needs to be verifiable and neutral point of view. This means that you can't draw on things known only by personal knowledge that couldn't be verified by an uninvolved reader. If in doubt, you can always propose changes first. Even if you don't edit the article directly, one thing that helps in almost all cases is to point out reliable sources; even that much helps out everyone else. — TKD::Talk 17:04, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I'll hack this stuff in. An obvious early addition would be the mention of BloodSpell under a new section on NWN Machinima (which should probably also include Neverending Nights, which is getting on for being the second longest-running Machinima series ever). Might take a few days, or more, but I'll get around to it. - Hugh Hancock —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.46.237.228 (talk) 10:49, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I've just added a couple of those details in. I'm afraid I'm clueless on how to add references, but all the press references I mention can be found on the BloodSpell press page (which is woefully out of date and I really should update!) - Hugh Hancock —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.46.237.228 (talk) 11:07, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

The section is at least a starting point. Over time, I was planning to try to refactor the "Notable examples" section by integrating relevant examples into other sections (such as films notable simply for their place in history, for production techniques, for noted legal issues, etc.), and let list of machinima productions (which needs some updating in itself!) take care of being a broader list of examples organized by engine, so as not to dominate the bulk of this article with examples for every engine used. List of machinima productions could probably stand to have some more annotations. I've also tried a couple of times to find more reliable sources (other than the interview on Bioware's site) for Neverending Nights, but no luck with that so far. It'd be nice to have a usable citation that it's the second-longest-running series. (The thing that you have to remember about Wikipedia is that there is a strong emphasis on third-party sources.) — TKD::Talk 11:42, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I think that this is a bit of a proof by lack of counter-assertion. I don't imagine that it's listed as such anywhere, but I can't think of a longer-running series other than RvB off the top of my head. If you like, I'll do a search on that using my sources, and if I can't come up with an older still-running series, I'll go on the record as saying it's the second longest-running. Would that work, given I am probably a credible authority for this? - Hugh Hancock —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.46.237.228 (talk) 13:35, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, self-published sources (e.g. blogs) of published experts in their field of expertise are admissible in some cases; we'd just need to be careful about relying on them too heavily and frequently. In this case, I think it's reasonable, given that you don't have a connection to NEN and are willing to do some fact-checking (which is highly appreciated). — TKD::Talk 16:19, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Nominated for CVG Improvement drive

I don't want to collectively badmouth everyone here, but I nominated it for the CVG Improvement drive as you can see above. I'm not sure how dead or alive that collaboration is, but hopefully a few more people will see this article. Anyway, I think this article could be greatly improved, but I personally won't be doing too much because I'm writing up various articles on FPS games. Anyway, here's a few points.

  • Quake Machinima is almost ignored as I noted in further up this page.
  • There's a lot of advertising and vanity like comments and sections. For example, who are Chairleg Productions? And how many external links?! These should be trimmed down to only the most popular production studios and machinima collectives/communities.
  • I think on further expansion of certain sections, they could be moved out onto their own article. ie, Quake and Halo. Did Half-Life engine machinima take off at all? I remember seeing a few CS ones, like the militia one, which I thought was rubbish, but still.
  • A general section on the tools needed to make machinima, editors needed, skills needed. Not too in depth, being that wiki is not a FAQ, but I think it'd still be useful.
  • Some outside references to the machinima world? I know machinima may still be a very closed community, but what have other people said about machinima? Film critics for example?

Anyway, there's enough ideas there to improve the article, happy editing. - Hahnchen 14:14, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

I'm writing here, as it's pretty much the same thing.
I don't want to sound like I'm complaining, but it appears that there's a surprising lack of information about Machinima as-it-was with Strange Company and their efforts through machinima.com (2000 - 2003?) -- a lot of stuff happened then:
  • Quake machinima, and such things [KeyGrip...]
  • Quake II/III machinima [and, later, modified versions of QI and QII]... at the time, they included Hardly Workin' (of course) and Rebel vs. Thug
  • Pre-UT2003 Unreal machinima (Team Frame, UnFramed Productions), of which I added a line
  • Half-Life is worth mentioning, as it was introduced as a viable engine at this time
  • Lithtech Film Producer [and Machinimation]
  • Things mentioned in the 'Artery' Machinima documentary [quite a bit]
  • The earliest Machinima Film Festivals
Much more to list, of course. Anyway, the article right now seems greatly emphasize Halo et al, which makes for a rather awkward view. Unfortunately, I'm not exactly the best person for the aforementioned time period, as I was mostly an observer back then. (I know of these things...) Anyone? 69.169.49.12 07:31, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

More people putting in their pet projects

I removed the massive amount of external links from the article a while ago. I took a look in the Machinima category last night, to see a number of articles have been added for various productions, some of which haven't been released yet. It seems highly likely that they were added by the creators. I'll nominate the articles for deletion as I see fit.--Drat (Talk)

I've added List of machinima series to the See Also section of this article, with some trepidation, as it will likely encourage more people to list their stupid little non-notable and/or unreleased productions. That said, the visible link to the article will also allow us to be more vigilant in removing crap.--Drat (Talk) 09:11, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
I've put together a rudimentary guideline for additions on Talk:List of machinima series.--Drat (Talk) 00:05, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

I guess I'm one of the "pet project" pushers. But I object to the stripping of ALL external links from the entry. If there are no examples cited, how is anyone supposed to get an idea of the breadth of machinima productions? The List of machinima series page is a step in the right direction, but like the Machinima page's focus on specific game engines, is very limiting. Today I added a "Notable Examples by genre" section and inserted Abstract Machinima, which was previous entirely unrepresented on this page. I also stuck some external links in there, which is way better than nothing. Feel free to reorganize and repurpose, of course.--Reign of Toads 21:41, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

The links I removed were mainly used for promotional purposes. This article is on the to do list for WikiProject Machinima. Also has been the consensus among project members that productions should only be added that have been shown to be notable by reliable sources independent to that production.--Drat (Talk) 22:00, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

City of Heroes Machinima

Added a short section & a few links on City of Heroes machinima & some examples thereof.

Images Needed

This article os too bland, it needs some images, maybe some screencaps from popular Machinima.

I added an image from the Red vs Blue article.--Drat (Talk) 04:34, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Red vs Blue peer review

Several others and I have been working on getting Red vs Blue to featured article quality. Please check the page, and leave any feedback on how we may further improve it on Wikipedia:Peer review/Red vs Blue/archive1.--Drat (Talk) 08:07, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

{{User machinima}}

In case anyone likes userboxes, I've created {{user machinima}}, which automatically categorizes you under Category:Wikipedians interested in machinima. — TKD::Talk 09:29, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Demoscene

Is there a better source for the "many" comment other than a forum? Per Wikipedia's guidelines on reliable sources, bulletin boards and forums generally aren't considered reliable sources because there is no way to verify who actually wrote the information. — TKD::Talk 02:04, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

I don't think this is about factual information but opinions, and the pouet thread seems to reflect quite well what kinds of opinions exist about machinima in demoscene contexts. Anyway, I removed some of the less obvious statements and changed "many" to "some". Happy now? --Viznut 06:32, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
I understand that it's a matter of opinion, but the argument is that forum posts are still not an indicator that an opinion truly has any weight. For now, what we have will do, I guess, but if a better source can be found for this, then it should take precedence. — TKD::Talk 22:18, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

WikiProject Machinima

(crossposted to Talk:Red vs Blue)

Just out of curiosity, would anyone be interested in helping to form a WikiProject Machinima? The purpose of the project would be to foster the improvement, expansion, and maintenance of machinima-related articles on Wikipedia. While getting Red vs Blue up to featured status is a great accomplishment, there's a lot more that could theoretically be done for other articles. If you take a look at Category:Machinima, you'll see that there's a fair amount of ground to cover, even for what most would consider a "niche" topic, and I think that, if we have enough interested people, it'd be beneficial to have a WikiProject to facilitate collaboration.

By the way, in case anyone's interested, I've written up some tentative thoughts based on my experiences working on the Red vs Blue articles: User:TKD/Writing about machinima.--—The preceding unsigned comment was added by TKD (talk • contribs) .

I'm in, of course.--Drat (Talk)
I'll help do what I can, though I generally stick to Rooster Teeth Productions for the most part. -- Viewdrix 02:12, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
That's perfectly fine. There's no shortage of editing to be done in that area, and Category:Rooster Teeth Productions currently comprises at least half of machinima-related articles. And copyediting generally doesn't require specialized knowledge. :) — TKD::Talk 02:33, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
I'm interested, I'll have to read up on how we go about this. But I really like the idea. The Filmaker 02:16, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
I'm looking into that more closely now that we have a handful of interested editors. — TKD::Talk 02:33, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
Project page is now live at Wikipedia:WikiProject Machinima. I'm working on creating the standard talk page template. — TKD::Talk 05:44, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

A better outline for this article

I'm starting to think about what we need to do to push this to GA/FA status. Reading this over, there's too much focus on modern examples of machinima and not enuough coverage on techniques. Ideally, the examples should be interspersed with more context within the bigger picture. Here's what I propose as an outline:

  1. History (possibly its own article)
    1. Precedent (demoscene, earlyspeedruns)
    2. Quake movie era
    3. Modern era (including increasing commercial use)
  2. Techniques (possibly its own article)
    1. Relation to traditional filmmaking and animation
    2. Character control (digital puppetry versus scripting versus dependence on AI)
    3. Filming techniques (notable exploitation of glitches, etc.)
    4. Post-production (editing [Keygrip, LMPC], etc.)
  3. Reception
    1. Academic
    2. Commercial (including licensing issues)

Thoughts? — TKD::Talk 08:42, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Sounds good. I'd forgotten about the debates that arose regarding whether Quad God was machinima. Then there was Quake: The Movie/Escape from the Bastille to further complicate matters (using game assets in professional 3D renderers).--Drat (Talk) 09:14, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
This page absolutely needs a cleanup, and your skeleton for the article looks more promising than its current state where every game engine has their own section arbitrarily listed. I'm not too sure about devoting a section to the Anachronox release, that really was a one off thing. Although a significant release grabbing up awards and recognition, it really should not get undue weight in the article compared to say the entire Quake Movie era. - Hahnchen 16:00, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
I copuld've sworn that I hit "Save page" two weeks ago, but I guess not. Yeah, only the numbered items would definitely have their own sections; the unnumbered items ere more points to touch upon within that section. Sorry for the confusion. — TKD::Talk 01:53, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

Garry's mod

Is gmod another thing used in HL2 machinima? Flashn00b 23:14, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Theoretically, yes, although I don't know offhand of any productions that use it. — TKD::Talk 00:10, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
What about War of the Servers? http://www.litfusefilms.com/movies/waroftheservers/#viewfilm Cubed05 15:03, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Software generates video news bulletins

Maybe this is of use for the article? —msikma <user_talk:msikma> 15:56, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Yes, it'll be useful, but this entire article could use a nice reorganization first. — TKD::Talk 00:10, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

GWfilms

Im suprised that GWfilms famous Militia machinima wasn't mentioned a single time in this article...

Militia2 generated lots of user attention towards the potential of machinima... as well as winning several awards too...—Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.169.92.20 (talk • contribs)

History

For what it's worth, a company called Slippery Slug advertised a program for the BBC Micro called Movie Maker in the May 1986 edition of Acorn User magazine. Possibly one of the earliest examples of Machinima software? Alf Boggis 20:27, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Also 3D Movie Maker from Microsoft (huge fanbase for 3DMM) and MediaStage from Immersive Education. Also Alice 3D, a free program which will allow far more control using Sims 2 characters.

MGO

WHy is it everytiem I make a space for teh Metal Gear Onlien Machinimas it is deleted? I think they should be added also. Especially a mentioning of FOX Chronicles. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by GamerSam (talk • contribs) 00:53, 7 December 2006 (UTC).

Has FOX Chronicles been mentioned in any third-party reliable source? (Keep in mind that blogs, forums, and wikis are generally not reliable sources.) — TKD::Talk 02:41, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Warcraft III machinima

The game engine of Warcraft III has been used to produce many machinemas, but they were mostly in the game's custom map format rather than independantly watchable video files, so I don't know if awareness of these productions is wide enough outside the warcraft community to warrant it's mention in this article, so I'm writing this question here for further discussion. Blizzard entertainment, the creators of the game, did sponsor a Warcraft III cinematic contest a bit over a year ago, although that may not be a wide enough reckognition either, since the contest wasn't sponsored by a third party. 195.210.220.81 18:24, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Film Genre?

Two things:
1) The first paragraph has redundant information. It first states that "machinima...is both a collection of associated production techniques and a film genre defined by those techniques," and then ends the paragraph with, "as a film genre, the term refers to movies created by the techniques described above." The information is redundant and one of these should probably be excised.

2) Or maybe both. It seems pretty debatable that machinima should be counted as genre. There is nothing inherent in the production of machinima that can limit the kinds of stories it can tell. It doesn't seem to be any more an example of film genre than live action is a film genre. -- The Dane 01:06, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

About WoW Machinima

Well, i was just wondering why, movies Such as Tales of the Past, and Tales of the past II havent been added to the notable section of this article, Seeing as Their Author recieved a spot on a Danish Television channel for the work he did on the movies. Also on WarcraftMovies.com over 186,000 people ahve downloaded this video. Kage4hm 08:55, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Please read the WikiProject Machinima guidelines. I'll re-iterate that the production needs to be the subject of multiple works by reliable sources, and that pointing to a download counter doesn't count.--Drat (Talk) 09:18, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Earlier today I was trolling through WoWWiki.com and found a page with several Notable links which i believe would make Tales of the Past worth mentioning in this article, For example, The creator of the series was Given an interview about his work for it on a Denmark Television program, and Tales of the Past 2 was also mentioned in a Danish Newspaper, both of these are credible recources and i believe meet the requirments you desire. 71.110.91.36

Can these be verified?--Drat (Talk) 10:16, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Here is a link to the Tales of the Past page on WoWWIki, at the bottom of the page there are the 2 links that I mentioned above, they have been included in the website for notability, i cannot translate them but they are deffinatly Tales of the Past related. [1] 71.110.91.36

Machinima discussed

I think that all the machinima articles should have a web site address so that people can view what the story is about and decide if they like it, so they don't only have to go for our word on it. Although, I do believe that only the people who write the articles should be allowed to post the addresses and only one address should be placed. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Terrortree (talk • contribs) 19:26, 6 March 2007 (UTC).

Star Wars Battle Front II Machinima

I hope no one minds, but I added the Star Wars Battlefront II machinima "A Clone Apart" to the list of Machinima's. It is really funny and I believe it deserves a chance to be noticed. If anyone has any objections please post them. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Terrortree (talk • contribs) 19:29, 6 March 2007 (UTC).

Wikipedia articles are required to be neutral. Whether you think it is funny does not matter. What matters is coverage in multiple, non-trivial works by reliable sources. See the WikiProject Machinima guidelines for more info. A Clone Apart has been repeatedly deleted 1 2.--Drat (Talk) 08:31, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Star Wars Battle Front II Machinima cont.

I now understand why I shouldn't put it down because of how funny it is (sorry if I insulted anyone but Im new) but I don't understand why we can't put "a clone apart" down, what's wrong with it? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Terrortree (talk • contribs) 19:14, 7 March 2007 (UTC).

There isn't any need to start a new topic. Please read again what I wrote before, specifically about references. You need to show why the production is notable (important), and be able to cite reliable sources, that are wholly independent of the crew behind the production.--Drat (Talk) 22:41, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Okay, I understand now, so if became more popular and had more than... 3 episodes then it could be a viable option?—Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.93.111.229 (talk • contribs)

Only if more than one reliable source has written about it non-trivially. Are you actually reading the guidelines?.--Drat (Talk) 04:20, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes—Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.93.111.229 (talk • contribs)

Well, there's now no need to put it up, it got canceled - Terrortree

Please Expand

"The demos that receive attention among machinima enthusiasts tend to be storydemos, or ones that focus on consistent narrative rather than pure "eye-candy". IX and Halla by Moppi Productions are notable demos in this category."

Why are these examples notable demos in this category? I haven't seen them, so I can't correct it, so could someone else do it? Its in the section "Demoscene demos as machinima". Thanks, Talk User:Fissionfox 12:20, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Open source machinima?

Today, most proprietary game engines are commonly used to create many machinima. These engines are not the only ones, but the open source engines such as Ogre3D, Crystal Space, and others are used to create more of them, collectively known as open source machinima. Can anyone verify this? --Bryan Seecrets 09:27, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

30K

It's past 30K. Getting a bit long. Anything we can do to shorten it? RJFJR 18:02, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Short term, I'd say that it's not a drastic issue; many featured articles are well in excess of that guideline. Long-term, I had proposed a compete rewrite (see #A better outline for this article), but had never gotten around to it. Another solution that I wouldn't mind would be to shorten the laundry lists of exists here. We really don't need that many for the main article on machinima, and most of the existing ones don't have references. — TKD::Talk 06:55, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
Just to note, I'm thinking about doing the rewrite in two stages. The first will be to rewrite and expand the history section as noted above. Once that happens, the examples section will go. At that point, we might lose some information, but that section is so loosely structured that it's bordering on a violation of Wikipedia is not a directory; a coherently flowing section of history interspersed with relevant (albeit fewer) examples will better serve the reader better than the current layout. Phase two would be the addition of new information on production issues and techniques, public reception, and legal issues. — TKD::Talk 22:23, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Dude, Where's My Mount?

9/03/07: Added a series known as "Dude, Where's my Mount?" to the list of Notable World of Warcraft Machinima. As to notability: Over 1.5 million hits across the series and making of on youtube, including over 15,000 in the first three days of episode three.

Honors recieved from youtube.com, machinima.com. Countless posts from people not involved in filmmaking at worldofwarcraft.com, machinima.com, machinima101.com. References made to the series from rvb.roosterteeth.com, home of Red vs. Blue, which is arguably the best known machinima on the internet. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.164.143.64 (talk) 06:20, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Download counters, views, andtrivial references generally aren't regarded as counting toward nnotability, and reader and forum comments aren't reliable sources. Now, if there were a full article on machinima.com reviewing the production in detail, you'd have more of an argument. The only reason that I haven't gone through the entire examples section with a fogurative axe is that I'm planning to restructure this entire article (see #A better outline for this article above), and there won't be a list of examples, because relevant productions will be worked into the prose of the other sections, and I'd rather not reduce the article so drastically in the meantime. At the same time, though, these sort of arguments over which production are counter-productive. That particular laundry list of World of Warcraft productions seems to be a regular point of contention, but, in reality, it could never hope to explain why those particular examples were notable, at least not in that list form. so I removed that sentence entirely for the time being. In relative terms to the rest of the paragraph, there's no reason to make the reader think that they're as mainstream as Leeroy Jenkins or South Park; to do otherwise would be to give undue weight. — TKD::Talk 07:04, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Etymology

The existing information that the word is a portmanteau of "machine" and "cinema" is correct. It may also be of interest to note that it is an accidental mutation of a conscious neologism. I just wrote an account [2] of the origins of the term, including quotes from relevant e-mail. (A few years back I would have edited something into the Wikipedia article myself, but things look a little more formal nowadays and I'm worried about the exact rules for citation, and the fact that the article is already large.) --Anthony Bailey 80.229.18.75 21:14, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Looks like Zsoverman added it; I just cleaned up the reference a bit and clarified the paragraph so that it's clear that Paul Marino's book corroborates your primary account. Wikipedia prefers secondary sources whenever possible. — TKD::Talk 04:13, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Songvids

Should songvids be mentioned in the context of Machinima? I get the impression they're one of the most prolific amateur forms. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 222.154.238.36 (talk) 03:10, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, in cases where a notable machinima production is a video. The article on Paul Marino, for example, mentions his work I'm Still Seeing Breen. But I'm not sure that there's a broad generalization to be made, any more than to say that some machinima productions are comedies, some are used for advertisement or advocacy, etc. If you find a source for a generalization, let us know. — TKD::Talk 01:00, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

List of examples

After some thought, I decided to recast the sprawling examples section as a list for now. I've also cut several unsourced generalizations for now; anything that can be sourced should be added back in. My philosophy is that it's easier and safer to work from sources to add information, not to try to find sources for existing text (in fact, when I wrote the first couple sections of the article, I only used very little of what was there before). The items in the list should eventually be dispersed to appropriate places in the running text (don't worry, we still need to write a whole sections on production techniques, so there will be opportunities to mention the more prevalent engines) or perhaps integrated into list of machinima productions.

Another reason for doing this was that, after discussing things with Drat, another editor of machinima-related articles, we agreed that there are just too many machinima-capable game engines out there nowadays for a prose list by game engine to be viable long-term in this top-level article on machinima. This might've worked a few years ago, but it won't in 2007, not with the proliferation of machinima. Instead, we should try to focus on other ways of organizing notable productions. I've started by listing genres from the Kelland/Morris/Lloyd book. In more general terms, it's a sign of deficient article organization if there are many subsections with one or two paragraphs, as was the case here. It's also generally bad for a section to have 15 paragraphs.

Those who know me know that I don't like long bulleted lists. Short-term, though, I do think that it's at least a marginally better way to present productions not covered elsewhere for now, until we can expand list of machinima productions or incorporate the information elsewhere in the article on a case-by-case basis. I also prefer it in that it somewhat de-emphasizes that this article isn't really meant to be a long list by game engine (by contrast, previously the list probably took up half of the article), but instead a broad overview of the various topics surrounding machinima in general. — TKD::Talk 05:29, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

I should also note that I took the liberty of removing productions that were already mentioned in the running text, and one or two productions that I don't think have third-party reliable coverage. If you can find a good non-trivial third-party source for Potentior (which looks interesting, but WP:ILIKEIT doesn't satisfy verifiability and neutral point of view), please do re-add it. Also, I did remove some analysis. In general I don't doubt that it has a sound basis, but on Wikipedia we need a reliable source that directly and specifically provides that analysis. — TKD::Talk 05:42, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Im surprised that Red Vs Blue and Halo CE and Halo 2 aren't mentioned. Wasn't is those games which made machinima main stream. I think that the introduction of their series should be included in the page due to it being a major turning point in machinima history. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Leemyster (talk • contribs) 19:30, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
That list is basically a random sampling of examples that have yet to be integrated into the main text; it's not really meant to be comprehensive, but rather almost a to-do list. That's why it's named "other notable examples". Read the history section; Red vs. Blue and Halo are mentioned. — TKD::Talk 20:18, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Legal

What is the legal status of the videos?--Playstationdude (talk) 02:09, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

It depends on the End-User License Agreement. Most game developers/publishers retain the rights to their graphics and animation; some game EULAs address this and allow for non-profit, amateur distibution for Machinima productions. A tiny minority of companies grant a commercial use license. Quite a lot of Machinima is technically illegal.... Prof Wrong (talk) 12:03, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

I hope you people that work on Wiki can see this request. I would like a list filled with Machinimas. Here is a requested list.

Red Vs blue Spriggs Civil Protection P.A.N.I.C. The Naighberhood

And so on..... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.233.247.10 (talk) 17:59, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

SMIL

Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language is very relevant for multimedia and machinima subtitling and language translation.

Check this explanation:

http://collaborative-translation.ning.com/group/subtitling/forum/topic/show?id=2237585%3ATopic%3A1605 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.51.137.243 (talk) 05:42, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

No mention of Digital Ph33r?

I know i sound like a fan boy but shouldn't digital ph33r be included somewhere in the article. It doesnt have to be a large amount but something considering that his use of machinima has made machinima very mainstream —Preceding unsigned comment added by Leemyster (talk • contribs) 14:54, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

Do you have sources for that? Last time I checked, it was Red vs. Blue that really helped machinima get on the map, some five years ago, and we've got loads of sources to back it up.--Drat (Talk) 15:11, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

RuneScape?

could RuneScape movies be considered? over half of RS's community (pretty large, considering its the most popular browser MMO in the world) are also deeply invovled in RS Vids, allthough I wouldnt consider the thousands of Music VIdeos (RSMVs) part of it, many many RuneScapers make their own Machinima with RS (the IM feature with the words appearing over a characters head helps), and TehNoobShow has a large following with his popular comedy series, in fact, he sums up the whole phenomenon with his RSMV, "RuneScape Idiot". In closing, RuneScape vids should be considered. (last time I checked, there was way more RS Vids then there was World of Warcraft) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.224.25.70 (talk) 01:14, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Have any of them been covered non-trivially in multiple, reliable independent sources?--Drat (Talk) 01:55, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

No ICTON?

As someone who's been watching Garry's Mod Machinima, I also think the ICTON team needs a mention in Machinima, I would also would say that to Jaanus Syndicate but JS isn't really popular, but with Djy1991 with 40,000 subscribers( Since I last checked) I think ICTON should have a fair mention. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 206.78.82.79 (talk) 22:34, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Have any reliable, independent sources covered the productions non-trivially? Cripes I hate sounding like a broken record.--Drat (Talk) 02:55, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

List of games used

Something needs to be done about this list. It should be for games that are commonly used, particularly in notable productions, not every game that is used. People keep adding games that they clearly personally use in their ludicrously non-notable shows. For example, the Smash Brothers games, of which the most notable example they seem to be able to cite is Smashtasm, which has not (as far as I can tell through searching), been covered non-trivially if at all by reliable independent sources.--Drat (Talk) 06:05, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Well... that's just incorrect. search ssb machinima on Google or Youtube, and you'll get way more results then just smashtasm. 74.73.142.163 (talk) 01:11, 7 December 2008 (UTC)
Have any of those been covered non-trivially in multiple, reliable independent sources?--Drat (Talk) 02:23, 7 December 2008 (UTC)
Agree with Drat. 74, keep in mind that Wikipedia has a no original research policy. It's not that anyone is saying that those games are never used, but in order to achieve notability and avoid original research, this list needs to be better-sourced. Kyle Maxwell (talk) 04:34, 6 January 2009 (UTC)
I removed the list of software and video games outright. Any relevant, cited examples should be integrated into prose form. As it was, a number of those games (Quake, Halo) were already cited in the History section, so there was no need to repeat them in a laundry list here. On top of this, the software section was more external links than useful contextual information (only one of the programs was a blue link). — TKD::Talk 07:21, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

This article is longer than the actual Animation article

Some serious trimming needs to happen to cut the useless information. Everything ever produced doesn't need to get mentioned. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.148.7.199 (talk) 14:00, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

This is old, but I'm replying anyway for posterity, and since my point will still hold. Given the extreme importance of animation, there are many articles covering various specific aspects of the topic, so that's something to consider. We haven't spun off subarticles here because it hasn't been necessary yet. The majority of this article (including the examples in the History, Genres, and Production processes sections) is cited to reliable sources. — TKD::Talk 07:27, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

Some potential sources

Just noting, for future references, some possible new sources to use:

— TKD::Talk 10:18, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Another list of sources: http://www.cc.gatech.edu/gvu/machinima/papers.html — TKD::Talk 19:16, 2 March 2009 (UTC)

Directory external link

WP:EL states that a directory link may be appropriate. Currently we use the ODP directory. What do people think about using Machinima Premiere's directory instead? Unlike the ODP, it includes the three other external links that we currently list, appears to be more comprehensive, and is more suited to specialist and engine-specific knowledge. Because of these considerations, we can simply link to that one directory only, and tell people to get their links added there, not here, minimizing, and probably altogether eliminating, need for discussing any new links. Thoughts? — TKD::{talk} 17:43, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, that new link is vastly more comprehensive. I'll put it in now.--Drat (Talk) 21:17, 11 March 2009 (UTC)
It appears that I was wrong about two of the sites; I must've not had enough caffeine yet. :) Oh well, three links is better than four, and the directory spins off to more material. — TKD::{talk} 21:40, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Incorrect Information

"Originally, the rules created confusion; one machinima group, Edgeworks Entertainment, incorrectly interpreted them as a reduction of machinima creators' rights". From what I have been told and read(I can find a link), the Microsoft Rules did limit rights. Without the ability to make DVDs this group in particular stopped creating Machinima and selling their DVDs. Microsoft also has been reportingly ignoring emails and/or any business idea for Machinima creation for a licensing. Thanks, --66.169.200.163 (talk) 03:00, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

The long and short of that sentence is that fair use still applied. Whether DVD production and distribution falls under that protection was, and would still be, something for a court to decide based on the four-factor test specified in U.S. copyright law.

Here's how the cited source explains the situation:

Some machinimists did not understand that the Microsoft Rules benefited them; they did not realize that the Microsoft Rules did not (and, as a unilateral license, legally could not) reduce any preexisting rights, but instead expanded machinimists' rights by explicitly allowing limited uses of Microsoft's intellectual property.

Mind you, this is from an article in the Harvard Journal of Law and Technology, so we're dealing with a high-quality source. As for "reportingly ignoring emails", we would definitely need a third-party reliable source (i.e., neither Microsoft nor the complainant) for that. — TKD::{talk} 07:18, 10 April 2009 (UTC)
Right and I agree,though the problem is that Edgeworks even requested a bunch of times to be allowed a licensing, but they were denied and it is a fact that nobody else owns a licensing from microsoft to sell DVDs. If you can show me a single other source that is allowed the same rights as Rooster Teeth, then I can agree with the statement fully. Thank you, --66.169.200.163 (talk) 18:57, 11 April 2009 (UTC)
I don't think that such a source exists (I've been looking at various sources for this article for months), but, regardless, fair use is a provision for the unlicensed use of a copyrighted work. The addition of whether other groups have actually been able to acquire commercial licensing would be an interesting, orthogonal point. — TKD::{talk} 20:22, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Excellent article

This is professional stuff. Congratulations. Tony (talk) 13:50, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

The first picture

Couldn't we cut off all the black in the first picture? DavidHøstbo (talk) 18:23, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, the image info addresses this: "Note: The preservation of black letterboxing is intentional; the video was distributed thus. The letterboxing was used as a post-production technique to hide undesirable elements of the head-up display. Please do not crop the screenshot." Eik Corell (talk) 19:36, 27 January 2010 (UTC)

Language and 'Style'

Style is very subjective, and I find dogmatic grammar and style rules annoying. Common conventions, however, make for easier reading and comprehension.

In the section Limitations and solutions

"It may be possible to point the camera elsewhere or employ other creative cinematography or acting.[86] For example, Tristan Pope combined creative character and camera positioning with video editing to suggest sexual actions in his controversial film Not Just Another Love Story.[87]"

may read better as

"Tristan Pope worked around limited expression by creative character and camera positioning to suggest sexual actions in his controversial film Not Just Another Love Story[87]. Creative camera work, cinematography, and acting may address many such limitations[86]"

That the film was controversial may be interesting but not strictly neccessary in this sentence under this heading.

If this paragraph started with something like

"Limited character motion and expression is a difficult problem for current (April 2010) machinima creators."

then some of the phrases in the paragraph (like Another solution) may be unneccesary.


196.23.21.91 (talk) 03:20, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Machinima.com

Machinima.com is a massive hub and viewing center for machinima, why is not listed in the article or external links? 129.96.126.4 (talk) 04:43, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

It's already listed in the Machinima Premiere directory. Since that directory has many relevant machinima links spanning a broad range of interests, we chose to link to that to minimize the number of useful external links that would be listed separately. — TKD::{talk} 05:12, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
the Machinima Premiere Directory has been down for some time. Someone has added a link to Machinima.com, perhaps including a few more video resources and other sites would be a good idea. Etownunder (talk) 15:04, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

No one seems to want to update the external links. I'll attempt to remove the mprem link which now goes to a SEDO landing page. I suggest adding links to other sources that would help users like Koinup, GamersTube, and Machinination. Users finding this article get little help out of the external links section at the present time, the above links would help them find places to host and discuss machinima. Etownunder (talk) 17:22, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

3D or 2D

I'm pretty sure the machinima can be made out of anything; therefore, it doesn't have to be 3D as the article suggests.
Phlum (talk) 11:32, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

True, as a game engine programmer myself I can say that there is no real fundamental difference between 2D or 3D in this respect. Something does not need to move in the Z axis to be animated, and 2D and 3D game engines are still based on the same premises. Technopeasant (talk) 03:50, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

External links

The "External links" section was pretty bad, and, given that this is a GA, I decided to nuke it and start from scratch with just the Open Directory Project link. (I put the bibliographies in the to-do section; they seem more appropriate there.) It's a shame that Machinima Premiere seems to be dead, because that was a useful directory. Does anyone know of any other good, neutral, WP:EL-conformant machinima link directory to use?

By the way, I'm of the opinion that we shouldn't be linking to engine-specific sites, because that's a slippery slope of "why this engine and not this other one?" There's just too many engines for that to be tenable these days. —TKD [talk][c] 19:17, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

Linked to the archive.org collection as well. I'm not really that fond of the ODP link, for lack of comprehensiveness, and would prefer a directory maintained by a more machinima-specific site, but I don't think we need more than one directory link and the archive.org link. —TKD [talk][c] 19:24, 22 March 2013 (UTC)

Enlightens?

I don't understand the first sentence of this article, particularly the use of the verb 'enlighten'. Is this some sort of jargon? It just seems like poor English to me. --2.105.139.62 (talk) 19:53, 6 August 2014 (UTC)

Machinima Legal Issues/Microsoft Rules/Blizzard Rules

I've noticed the article is completely devoid of any discussion of the legal issues in machinima? I know there is significant disagreement among scholars on some of the finer points, but shouldn't it at least be brought up? To the same end, what about the new Microsoft and Blizzard machinima rules? The most up to date analysis I've seen on Microsoft's is at [3], and Blizard's are discussed [4]. Any thoughts on inclusion? I figured it would go into the legal section as two subsections, unless "Machinima Legal Issues" is an article-caliber topic. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.54.171.220 (talk) 21:09, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

Certainly, especially since the following legal non-compliances apply for Machinima in Second Life
1. Linden Lab TOS 2.3 violates Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works (Paris Text 1971)
1.1 Properly-designed Intellectual Property Requirements are made by ImmersiveEducation.org people, Sponsors — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.188.80.58 (talk) 13:03, 13 August 2015 (UTC)
Yes, the article needs to have coverage of this topic, but I'm not sure that the links that you provided qualify as a reliable source, since it is self-published material by an author whose prior work in that area does not appear to have been published in a reliable source. — TKD::Talk 17:40, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
His work on video game legal issues has been published in the Gaming Law Review. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.54.171.220 (talk • contribs)
OK; thanks for that. I wasn't familiar with his work. I'll keep all of these links in mind when writing that section, unless, of course, someone beats me to it. :) — TKD::Talk 16:18, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

The way it's written now, it seems a bit biased towards the gaming industries. Any thoughts about it?93.125.198.182 (talk) 17:58, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

Garry's Mod

Is Garry's mod mentioned in here? Because using Garry's mod is a great machimation tool, and many good video's have been made in it. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.17.221.246 (talk) 07:30, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Have any of these productions been covered significantly by reliable, independent sources? There are a great many games, mods, etc. used for machinima, we don't need to list them all.--Drat (Talk) 08:02, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
Just wanna say I agree here, Garry's mod should be mentioned somewhere here because it is almost made for making machinimas and is one of the most widely used tools to do so. - zalkar — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.139.81.117 (talk) 03:20, 5 April 2012 (UTC)
(I fixed format of previous post)--Canoe1967 (talk) 21:29, 19 April 2012 (UTC)
Outstanding Garry's Mod machinima examples
1. Source Youtube Profile of Machinima.com > I'm Different - The Defective Turret (Gmod Machinima Song) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.188.84.37 (talk) 05:46, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

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Merge proposal: Machinima years

I recently came across Category:Machinima by year, a category containing only six years, and I can't help but feel that the most important content in these pages is already in the machinima series that have articles, and otherwise should belong here. Machinima isn't film, so I don't think it really merits these kinds of articles, especially since the actual page content is very sparse. Details would be better served improving coverage of the spread of machinima in this article. Thoughts? Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs talk 15:40, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

I don't think that a merge from category space to article space is the done thing. If you were keen to see the end of Category:Machinima by year, just remove the category labels from the relevant articles, then WP:CFD#HOWTO. Klbrain (talk) 17:54, 30 August 2020 (UTC)
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