Anyway, if it’s just going to be a big gripefest, I don’t think I’m interested in using this conference for it. But if we moderate ourselves, keep level heads, and discuss it in a civil way, I think it has the potential to be productive or if nothing else educational.

I’m kinda bummed I was AFK while most of this was going on at Conf #07; Ricky kept notes for me from that point forward, I didn’t get to hear much of the latter half of the talk firsthand and would have found it interesting.

Fleefers, you have the coolest voice. First time I heard it. It was all like totally Fleefed-out. Anyway, I hear ya. Michelle spoke up. I missed it. I’m a jack-ass. Get a room.

I’m a relatively new to the wider community like some of you and have wondered for a long time what the inuendos about machinima.com were about. Personally I have had no bad experiences, and am grateful that the site hosted some of my own stuff and created an additional channel for those that I represent.

Zuckerman, your analysis and suggestion is excellent. It’s hard enough for people who have been around for a short time to figure out wtf is going on, and the newcomers must really get confused sometimes. Through them a bone, please! Maybe it’s about time everyone’s cards were put on the table so we can move our love of filmmaking into the bigger theatre without confusing the punters!

@Zuckerman: actually Michelle did speak up about m.com, although, as I remember she did most of it in the text chat window. This talk seemed to be more of a structured speaker type of event and so many of us chose to use the text chat. That is a departure from the usual free-form banter I’ve been used to at previous talks.

But that segment of the conversation was small compared to the what, 3 hours that we spent talking. I think last nights was the best chat yet (that I have attended).

The only obstacles are: It’s not … endorsed by Blizzard, to put it mildly, and that the toolset is constantly evolving and there’s a lot of reverse engineering involved. For some people though that’s right up their alley.

There are a lot of strong important feelings about the whole thing and I’m saying it might be good to dedicate an entire conference to it. Or something.

Zuckerman: Despite some of the stronger opinions last night, not all of us have a had a negative experience with the site as machinima directors. Obviously I can only speak from my own experience, but I found some of the comments were way off, especially with regards to the You Tube channel. I’ve always been given full credit//control on content I’ve submitted to the site whether it be films or tutorials and the communication with whoever I’ve dealt with, pleasant and helpful. As for inviting machinima.com along to the talks, I believe they’ve always had the option to attend, just like anyone else and would have been welcomed.

For future reference Zuckerman = Popcorn Pastorelli.

I don’t mean to stir the pot here willy-nilly but I thought things got a little weird last night at some point. I’m not sure if it had to do with all the machinima.com talk or what. Obviously there are quite a few negative feelings for that site and I’m sure it’s all very valid. I myself had a problem with them a while back and so I could understand why that little pocket of doom opened up there for a bit — It was even kinda funny. But, I’m kinda new to the Machinima community and so I know nothing of what all went down with most of you folks — I know everyone has their own story. But it does seem that many of you know each other’s stories already so nothing ever really gets said about it. It just is hinted at or kinda skirted past. And well, for me at least, it’s pretty damn potent — this sort of collective distaste with machinima.com. I know you all probably feel you’ve talked it to death but I think perhaps there needs to be some sort of big gigantic organized talk about it. Maybe even invite machinima.com to participate. I don’t know. There are two reasons for this. One is that it will hopefully clean a lot of the left-over nasty I-Hate-Machinima.com-Residue away, and, Two, it might perhaps provide some clues as to the future of machinima. Machinima.com right now is THE representative, the ambassador to the world, of machinima. This is due to the virtue of their name and of their publicity department. So, as machinimators, we all should be quite concerned with this site and what becomes of it because right now it is, in a form, speaking for us all. Hate them, love them, ignore them. It doesn’t matter. They are there — the ruling-by-default class. So, do we just make little jokes about them and move along or what? I am truly asking.

I know this will piss-off a handful of you, but, I’m ready. I just want to start a dialogue.

P.S. I will never use the term willy-nilly ever again. I sincerely apologize from the bottom of my heart.

@Joe90: You might want to take a look at Antics or iClone, both of which can import assets from that Google 3D Warehouse where you can find just about everything under the sun. I’ll bet you could build the period set you needed with one of those.

Phil, in answer to your questions if there are ‘props’ in a flight sim, lol - well actually this is a major problem for making movies that are not in the air. The ground objects suck big time. Some movies are starting to appear that mix in other games like Call of Duty for the ground action. I’m also trying to recreate a 1940 RAF dispersal room in Sims2 and chroma key in aircraft flying outside the window.

Do any other tools, maybe like moviestorm, have good 1940’s objects and players?

Was a pleaseure to meet you all in the unusual SL environment. Thats a great idea and at does gives some good visual feedback to conversations.