Vanderpol’s mysteries

If you have been looking for a Machinima editor (and free by the way) to produce quickly 3D movies or animations, MovieStorm is definitely for you !! It’s easy, fun to use, fast…

You don’t have to create your characters, since you can download bundles/libraries with lots of basic settings, clothes, and characters. However, in case you want to get out the beaten moviestorm track, you’ll have to stop by the shop. They sell tons sets, accesories (musical instruments, guns, …). Nothing’s free.

There are also tons of animation movies online about any kind of topics (love, mafia, music, sports, politics..). This is a good source of inspiration. A few are golden nuggets, but most of them lack originality or even really sucks (there are probably many tennagers trying their luck ;-P

However, Ihave used the first beta version realease and experienced some bugs, and the animation of characters in the time line in (almost) real time can be hassle and is not so smooth as it should be to make this tool really easy to use. Anyway, this is the best machinima soft I have tried so far, and I highly recommand it to every person who wants to be involved in 3D movie making at low cost and without spending months creating mesh and modelizing items.

One could say It allows you to create your movies like THE SIMS, and make the whole character choreography and life : you lead them with the “action” palette. It’s a palette full of action verbs, such as “shoot at”, “kiss”, “lean head”, “sit down”, “punch”, “walk toward”, “run”… but the best is the emotional palette.

You can change your character feelings and emotions troughout the whole footage, like he can be happy and smiling at the begining and when you want it, he can start to weep or scream and raise his middle finger. That’s really a plus because you can make your animation from home with a more “human” or emotional touch.

You will also find the director’s room where you can set you cameras, the angle, positions. Combining the timeline and the camera palette, it’s possible jump from one camera to the other anytime. Nice, but sometimes, having your camera following a character’s head is not so easy to do…

At last the render is done in .AVI, but you’d better have a race horse as a computer anyway, because 3D pumps all your ressources…

It took me 2 afternoons to make the whole dialogs and story (moviestorm can record your voice too but you’d better avoid it… an audio editor is far such as Garage band because audio slows down MS too much) and choreography. The render took between 10 to 14 hours…

So here is my parody of Ozone, a forgotten boys band :-p

Enjoy !

P.S. : (there are no subtitles but I imagine it’s not so hard to understand )

A new wave of death metal is coming to us from Sweden (Göteborg), and the great band In Flames.

I hope you will like the video… I like the little pink men, they’re like the Duracell rabbit ;-)  Enjoy !

The Mirrors Truth

If you want some more… you’ve got it

Hi there,

I have bought a couple of months ago the David Sprunger’s method “Play piano today”.

I started piano after 10 mediocre years of guitar playing (ear-spanking ?). I decided to start playing piano after I tried a podcast called “blues for piano and keyboard” (I love blues!) made by David Sprunger, a piano instructor for over 12 years. it is for free. He explains super well so you have to try it ! the adress is :

http://playpianotoday.com/podcasts/ppt_1.xml

After playing the tunes for some time, I decided to buy the whole package. It was around 80€, which is nothing for 17 DVD / cd-roms + music book (the price of 2 piano individual lessons with a flesh and bones teacher). I don’t think it can replace a real teacher, but you can learn any time you want, and it is super high quality (see other reviews on Google !)

This method gives me real fun and pleasure every week, since it is divided into very progressive difficulties and levels. It is super well done, clear. Songs are oldies but goodies, and you really learn to perform them following your inspiration and adding tons of gimmics, patterns, style.

The author, David Sprunger is a great teacher, gives good tricks, he is funny and he sings very well (you can even sing along if you’re good enough - I am not run for your lifes when I start singin’ ). Plus the video really helps to see his hands techniques and positions.

His website : Piano Lessons Online Demo of “Rhythmic Patterns” and you can order the package.

Of course, if you’re not ready to spend a certain amount of time behind the keyboard, this method is useless for you… adn you’re helpless !

The catch phrase is “This piano lesson podcast contains a rich library of piano lessons for absolute beginners through very advanced players. ” and that is a real good summary.

To conclude about this method, buy it or borrow it if you are any interested in music. I would have saved years if I could have the chance to find it 10 years ago.

Sincerely,

Pierre