Embedded Machinima

When id software introduced Quake3 embedded in a web browser via a plugin I asked how long before you could do embedded machinima: live, streaming, virtual theater where the audience does not have to have the same software as the producers. Or scripted machinima where the audience viewport and the actors inside are controlled with software.

Still have not found any yet but this example of web access to Open Sim is a step closer.

Xtra! Xtra! Read All About It!

With subheading: if you can type, then you can make movies.

Similar to Go!Animate, which I talked about earlier, Xtra Normal (currently in beta) provides a very simple interface through a web browser to a virtual animation studio. In the case of Xtra Normal, the tool provide three dimensional sets and characters that look like Lego people (at least some of the characters do).

The bonus is the text to speech engine that provides the capability to add spoken dialog to your movies. There's a number of voices in different languages available (male or female; english, german, french, etc.), but I could only get one of the voices to work.

I really like the simplicity in the interface, especially the drag and drop part of adding camera cuts or animations directly into the script itself (wish other engines worked this way). Want to add a cut to a character's face just as he's about to deliver that emotional monologue? Now you can do it by adding the camera icon directly before his Oscar worthy text and choosing which angle to put the camera at to catch the virtual tears as they fall.

Just for fun I put this together in about 20 minutes:



Worst Nightmare.

TVNima - Online Machinima Application

It looks like there is yet another foray into virtual video creation. TVNima appears to be specifically designed for news broadcasting using virtual spaces. It requires the Virtools plugin (3DVIA) and allows users with simply a browser to import video, audio, images, etc. and create a virtual news broadcast. The video below shows how simple it is (cleverly using TVNima to showcase itself).

I believe there's two significant things about this.

1. This will be a web based machinima tool (although fairly limited and requiring a plugin). I believe it is the first?
2. It's narrowly focused, necessarily so, towards a single genre, that of virtual newscasting (I suppose that Gaming News with Lady Mainframe and News at Seven now have some competition). How soon will there be virtual "The View" shows spreading virally? Will there be more narrowly focused machinima platforms coming out? How virtual interactive game shows?


Be A TV Director With TVnima (online Machinima Application) - Awesome video clips here

Apparently owned by a French company, the only other example I found on YouTube is a short French videocast?