Shep Korvin - Blog is the new Black

Making Movies

Machinima. It's something I always fancied turning my hand to... and this week's Ed Wood festival seemed the perfect opportunity to get started :)

OK, on reflection, maybe it was madness. I've never tried shooting in-world video before - and for that matter, it's a good few years since I even tried using desktop video editing software. Any sane person would probably have tried a... y'know... practice project, or something, in advance. But would that be in the spirit of Ed Wood? I think not!

And so, early on Saturday morning, I embarked on my mission to produce a semi-coherent machinima piece - from zero knowledge - in only 48 hours. Did I succeed? Well.. I certainly made *something*. Whether it's a complete success, I guess you'll have to judge for yourself at the premiere :)

On the set at Shep Korvin Studios ... Hospital and Jungle Island in one convenient room!

Things I've learned:

• Nobody owns a zombie costume. Everybody owns a vampire costume. Therefore, most of my zombies look like vampires. Would that have bothered Ed? I think not!
• Shooting crowd scenes at your own shop, without closing the place to regular customers, can be a bit random. I may, possibly, have accidentally left some innocent customers in the crowd scenes. But... y'know... business is business!
• Manual camera tracking is _never_ as smooth as you thought it was when you did it. Yeah, I _know_ you can get all kinds of neat camera tools now... but that was just something else to waste time learning.
• Asking every girl in your address book to come and dance around your store in their lingerie for an "artistically necessary" scene is a great way to spend a Saturday evening. 
• And when you've exhausted your own address book, start on members the "Super Awesome Lucky Chair Wow!" group too...
• Windows Movie Maker is a flakey piece of crap that is guaranteed to crash on you *just* when you got the perfect edit on the song and dance finale... and you'll never... ever... get it back just how you wanted it.

Anyway, I'm kind of relieved to have something finished (the completed project is rendering to disk as I type), and have a new-found respect for competent machinimists(!). It might even be fun to have a go at something a bit more professional, without the time constraint.... one day.... when I've recovered....

Burning Life - Dead again...

It just goes to show the power of the Second Life login message... for 48 glorious hours, the Burning Life festival was being advertised in LL's message of the day, and the playa was *bustling* with activity!

This is a shot of an impromptu gathering on the roof of the Terrorhub on Thursday night ... when I first saw the crowd, I kind of assumed it was probably a bunch of people who had decided to go and sit on my roof just for the hell of it - imagine my surprise when I got within hearing distance, and discovered they were actually discussing the theme and symbolism of the exhibit!!! I couldn't believe it! I joined them on the roof, and we all chatted into the early hours... the gathering had a really good vibe; sitting on a roof, shooting the breeze as the sun went down really captured the whole spirit of the festival for me.

Late into the night, a reporter from the Metaverse Messenger turned up and asked me some questions about the installation. To be honest, it was about 1am real-time for me, and I was already up far too late after a hard day at rl work. I think my semi-conscious state might have been reflected in my not-particularly-clever answers... but nevertheless, I was really happy - it's the first time I've ever been interviewed about anything I've made in SL. (Yeah... my first interview - and it WASN'T about lingerie! Surprise or what!?!)

So, when Friday night came around, I was pretty excited by the prospect of logging in to another night of fun out on the Playa... except.... well, you can guess the rest. Security alert at chez Linden... no more Burning Life hype in the login message... and, predictably, the virtual Playa is a ghost town once more. A couple of green blips on the distant fringes of the map, and barely a soul to be seen....

Here's hoping the Lindens start pushing the event again soon. And if you haven't been to the festival yet... go now! There's some incredible installations to be seen out there - it's well worth a visit!

It's a Trap!

Don't trust GavinLeigh Wake.  Push the red button! You know you want to!

(thanks for the review Gavin!)

Burning Life Terrorhub

This week, I've been working on a Burning Life exhibit. In a shock development, it's got nothing to do with lingerie, and nothing to do with lucky chairs either.*

If you'd like to visit, the site is listed in search - just use the keyword "terrorhub".

 

"Denied the ability of flight and free movement, the only way to exit the Terrorhub is via a maze of barbed wire fences. Overlooked by giant screens and closed circuit cameras, the visitor passes an assortment of exhibits representing the theme of social control... religious artifacts, wartime propaganda, censorship, prohibition, suppression of sexuality. In one corner, a TV monitor flickers good news on all channels... in another, a retinal scanner silently scans visitors and assesses their threat level. The maze is littered with warning signs... are they all to be trusted? Are the mysterious fumes emitted from beneath the installation *really* safe to breathe? Is there *truly* an exit to this place, or is the notion of eventual freedom nothing but a cruel hoax?"

*OK, I might be lying about the chairs...