Oxhorn's Machinima Festival Adventure

I wrote this in December after attending the Machinima Festival in November of 2006.

When I received word that one of my movies had been nominated for a "Mackey" by the Academy of Machinima Arts & Sciences, I was pretty thrilled. It was about then that I got sucked up in a whirlwind of machinima activity; the Xfire contest was drawing to a close, mtvU was having me make some commercials, and I was invited to attend the Xfire contest award ceremony at Stanford as well as the Machinima Festival in New York. In the end, I could only pick one, and I chose to go to New York.

Now, I really didn't know what to expect. I'd never been to a machinima festival before and I really had no desire to go to New York. But I got on a plane with my friend Mark who did voice acting for me in Inventing Swear Words and we flew east to see what would happen. Mark insisted that we explore the city (much to my chagrin) and so I relented, as long as our explorations didn't interfere with the Festival.

We made it to New York fine and we found our hotel easily enough. We even became adept at using the subway system. But when we tried to find the Museum of the Moving Picture, where the festival was being held, we got rather lost. You see, it was on 35th street and 36th avenue (or was it 35th avenue and 36th street?) and we walked around in circles for nearly an hour trying to find the place. But, after a number of phone calls to the museum, we found it and checked our coats.

There were a number of lectures that took place at the festival, all of them on the nitty-gritty of machinima making. The problem was that the lectures were taking place at the same time as the screenings of the nominees, and, being the megalomaniac that I am, I really wanted to see my movie on the big screen. So we spent the day running between the first and third floor, catching a few words from the lecturers downstairs and then hoping to see my movie upstairs. It wasn't until the day was nearly done that I realized, genius that I am, that a list of each movie and the time of its screening was available in the lobby. Brilliant.

So then we had a chance to catch our breaths, and we got to actually pay attention to the lectures. I must say that, not knowing what to expect when I arrived, I was terribly impressed. The organization of the festival was fairly smooth, which was, as I was told, a significant improvement from last year's festival. Some of the presentations were rather boring, and poor Mark had to sit there rolling his eyes and tapping his foot, being not at all interested in machinima (well, not as much as me, at least) but most of them were genuinely interesting. I think that one of the most interesting presentations was the demonstration of iClone, a software created by Reallusion, which is pretty much a machinima making studio wherein an author can create his own characters, creatures and monsters, items, clothing and even worlds where he can shoot footage for machinima movies.

I was impressed by iClone, but I do have my reservations. One thing that drives machinima, I think, is that people are seeing dramatic or comedic movies made with games that they are familiar with. So those who play World of Warcraft go and download WoW machinima that they find entertaining, but if they never played the game, how entertaining would they find the machinima? I think part of the enjoyment is that players are familiar with the world and with the game's storyline and enjoy seeing races, monsters and areas that they are familiar with used in ways that they would have never imagined. I can't help thinking that the lure of machinima might be lost if artists start to make machinima with tools like iClone that fans are unfamiliar with. But I'll get more into this in another article.

One of my favorite presentations took place on the following day, and it had to do with sound design and foley recordings. One thing that my movies often lack is good sound, mainly because I have not had access to a good library of sound effects, though this is a problem I am soon to rectify. They also gave great tips on recording your own foley sound effects, and hopefully I'll be able to replicate these skills in the future.

There were a number of other great presentations, but the highlight of the festival was, of course, the award's ceremony at the end. I put on my snazzy black suit coat, but I forgot to bring my top hat. I sat in the back with the other WoW machinimators and then the ceremony started. The host was great and incredibly funny (albeit, crass) and it was wonderful seeing my movie as well as the movies of my friends displayed on that huge screen. There's nothing quite like it. It's hard for me, because on one hand I take great delight in seeing people laugh at something I made, but on the other hand I can't help but feel guilty at being so engrossed with me, my movies, my songs, me, me, me! Pride is a dangerous thing, and it is hard finding the fine line between the humble acknowledgement of gratitude on the part of the fan along with the urge to create something even greater, not for ones own glory but for the entertainment of the fan, and doing so solely for ones own pride. But that is, again, another article for another day.

My movie didn't win. There was one movie which swept the Mackies, and it deserved it. The Adventures of Bill and John was made by a couple of French fellows from KBS Productions, and it was genuinely funny, well made with great music selection and wonderful writing. It won a number of awards, as it should have. But I must admit that I was more pleased to see Jason Choi, the creator of Edge of Remorse, walk away with two Mackies, simply because he is a WoW machinimator like myself, and nepotism is such an instinctive thing.

Though the award's ceremony was great, my favorite part was getting to meet all my fellow WoW machinimators, guys I have been competing with in contests and whose work I have been admiring for ages. One thing that I walked away with from this festival was the realization of how broad the genre of machinima is. I sit at my laptop and make WoW movies and watch WoW movies, but there is a whole world of machinima out there made in games like Tribes, Halo 2 and other games that I've never heard of before that are all hilarious, well done and otherwise impressive. I hadn't really given this any thought before the festival, and while I was there I felt rather lost amongst my peers, which is why I was so glad to run into fellow machinimators who use WoW to make their stories. I met with John and Ryan Ebenger from Red Sky Foundry (of The Brothers Tauren fame). It's funny that they live so close to me, only a few minutes' drive north from my house, and yet I had to go all the way to New York to bump into them. Terran Gregory and Tristan Pope (who was fascinated with my suspenders, by the way) were both there (authors of the Return and Switcher series respectively and who worked on the South Park WoW episode), as well as Jason Choi (Edge of Remorse) and the fine fellows at WarCraftMovies.com.

I think my favorite image from the event was of all of us standing outside the museum smoking. I had forgotten all my pipes, but luckily I found a nice corncob pipe at a store in Queens that came in handy for the occasion. I was surprised and pleased with how genuinely nice everyone was. Though few of us had met before, we all prattled on like chums and talked about our favorite WoW machinima, and it was often someone else's, not our own, that we liked the best. It was great to see Jason standing with two glass Mackies. There were five of us who got nominated this year; my own little movie The Anti-Elf Anthem for Best Original Music; Jason Choi of Riot Film's Edge of Remorse for Best Picture, Best Direction, Best Virtual Design, Best Original Music, and Best Independent Machinima; The Hackleman Brothers of Myndflame's Illegal Danish: Super Snacks for Best Direction; The Ebenger Brothers of Red Sky Foundry's The Brother's Tauren 2 for Best Virtual Performance: Puppeteering and Tristan Pope of Crafting Worlds' Converse Commercial for Best Editing; and out of all of us Jason was the only WoW machinimator to win one (he won for Best Visual Design and Best Direction). So here is a challenge: I want WoW machinimators to sweep the Mackies next year! I will do my part and try to come up with something great (if I can find the bloomin' time), and I want to see something that will win a Mackey from a number of authors in time for next year. Get to work lads!

After the festival, Mark and I stayed an extra day just so we could explore the city. We went to Central Park, Times Square, the Chrysler Building, the Empire State Building, ground zero, a number of really cool churches, and we took the Stanton Island ferry which went right past the Statue of Liberty. Before I came to New York, I really had no idea why there was such a fascination with the city, and arriving at my hotel in Queens, I was even more baffled. But when I got to explore Manhattan I finally understood. The city is like a sculpture in its own right, only one that breathes and is functional. I think there are plenty of wonderful places out there besides New York, and Seattle where I live certainly has its fair share of them, but Manhattan definitely has a sort of addictive appeal which I had to experience for myself to understand.

It is a great place to visit, but I don't think I would ever desire to live there because I've grown fond of the rain, fog and the looming shape of Mt. Rainer that towers above the horizon. Hopefully I'll never have to move. Unless, of course, I get a good job somewhere out of state. Like California, perhaps. Like Irvine California, perhaps.

Ahem.