The Fragparty Movie, Intro (1998)
A blast from the past, this opening clip is the only portion of my first film - made precisely 10 years ago - that I’m even a little bit pleased with.
The game is Quake 2. Video was captured to VHS camcorder in 1998 from a Canopus Pure3d video card. 3d titles with a program made by Ulead called “Cool3d” - I don’t know if it’s even still around. Music is a mix of Downward Spiral era Nine Inch Nails. Camerawork is all live, all manual - it was all I knew how to do back then.
The entire movie, called “The Fragparty Movie” and running around 30 minutes, was just a bunch of first-person deathmatch demo clips edited together with various hard rocking songs underneath. The demos were recorded at an over-the-net party a group of friends and I used to have pretty regularly in 98-99; the party consisted of meeting on a Quake 2 server, and blasting each other to bits. Many times we’d be on Roger Wilco or Battlefield Communicator - the VoIP vehicles of the time. And around once a year, there was a “GeekFest”, where someone would invite everyone else to town and have a local LAN party. I went to one in 1999, it was my first trip to Toronto, and while it was frigid it was also a great time.
The “OGF”, as this group of friends came to be known, were some of the original members of Planetquake’s Quake 2 mailing list; we migrated to our own private list when several dozen of us longed for a better moderated environment. A good many of us are still on that mailing list today, and every once and awhile a game will come along and someone will say, “Let’s get together!” and the Online Gaming Friends reunite once again.
The Fragparty Movie was something I created as a tribute to this great group of gaming friends. I got special permission from id Software to distribute 100 copies of the movie on CD, which I did to everyone in OGF who wanted one. I even gave away one copy for free, I ran a little “easter egg hunt” when I released Father Frags Best in January of 1999: be the first to name all the famous people depicted in the pictures on the wall of that movie, and I’d send you a free copy of The Fragparty Movie on CD. Someone emailed me the correct answers (there were 10-12 if I remember right) in less than 24 hours. Ha!
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what an interesting post, Phil. How did you happen to come across the old recording? Was it on videotape or CD? I actually like the title sequence. I can see some of your later work in it (connection to contemp rock/the free form feeling, poetic imagery). And the story behind it is interesting. Any of your old pals talk about the film very much? How much time did you spend on the whole 30-min film?
Comment by Ricky Grove — August 1, 2008 @ 7:46 pm
This copy was on CD, I’d come across it earlier this year while moving. It’s not something asked about often, but fondly remembered as far as I can tell. There was a resurgence of interest after MRE went big, a lot of guys asked if it might be possible to make it available as a download (inconceivable at the time of its release). So I created a DivX version for the OGF guys.
I can’t remember exactly how long it took to assemble/edit, but it was over a period of a few weeks. Interestingly, the closing credits of the film are shown over what was my very first recam with Keygrip2. It’s pretty rough, I had no idea what I was doing… But working on that recam was what inspired me to dare to try Thresh vs. Billox, and later to release all those tutorials for Keygrip, in hopes that the way wouldn’t be quite so guesswork-oriented for those who came after me.
Good memories.
Comment by Overman — August 1, 2008 @ 8:36 pm
Is it me, or “this video is no longer available”? I want to see, I want to see.
Comment by Tom — August 2, 2008 @ 2:49 am
Ups, it is here. Sorry.
Comment by Tom — August 2, 2008 @ 2:50 am
This has a wonderful abstract quality, I agree with Ricky, the moviemaker emerges
Comment by Kate — August 2, 2008 @ 3:49 am
What impresses me is how it’s one long take. That must have taken a few attempts to get it just right? If it were me, I would have cut it through the environment on accident. “Pinion” near the end? I’m trying to recognize the beginning… it almost sounded like a remix of “Mr. Self Destruct” or something (”and I control you”). Good stuff. It’s fun watching replays of Halo 3 games with friends at get togethers and LANs. It’s funny: in some ways not much has changed over the years. Thanks for sharing, Phil!
Comment by kradproductions — August 2, 2008 @ 6:51 pm
@krad - It might appear as one long take, but this was actually stitched together flythroughs from about 10-12 different maps. I took advantage of certain moments to cover some of the seams; breaking the surface of water or lava was most of the time a cut point. The final few seconds inside pipes is from three different maps itself.
Yes, it took quite a few rehearsal takes to prevent clipping and to keep the arcs smooth.
Music, yes it’s Pinion near the end, before that it is indeed one of the Self Destruct remixes, though I can’t remember which CD its from. As a weird bit of trivia, that same “I control you” section of that song was also used in the movie The Fan with Robert Deniro and Wesley Snipes.
Comment by Overman — August 3, 2008 @ 2:29 pm