Phil Rice 00:07
Hello and welcome to And Now For Something Completely Machinima, the podcast about machinima, virtual production and other related technologies. My name is Phil Rice. I'm here with my co hosts Ricky Grove, Tracy Harwood and Damian Valentine back to them from a high speed chase from the paparazzi. If you don't get that, check out some of our probably we'll probably put something on our blog or social media about that, but any idle, new-found fame and is he's connecting to us from a undisclosed location. But he's managed to find the time while on the run to make a machinima pick for this week's episode, and this one is made in Okay, so last episode, we had machinima from Eldon Ring, which as a couple of us pointed out we haven't seen much from that. And Cyberpunk 2077 is another I would put in that category at least I personally have not seen a whole lot of what we would call machinima from that and Damien's found one, it's a music video called Don't Fall Down. So Damien want you to introduce it for us? Well,

Damien Valentine 01:25
I played the game a lot when it's released, despite all the glitches, I really enjoyed it. And then recently, there was an announcement that's coming in this new expansion pack, and it got me thinking about the game again, I started thinking, I wonder if anyone's made anything with it. And so I started looking, and this is one of the films I came across, it was a couple of others, but this is the one I like most and it's a music video, as you said, and it's done in a way that makes you think there must be some odd tools out there. That you know, let people control the camera and film it in a way that you don't normally do. And I really enjoyed this I like the music video, I think it kind of fits the world really well. The game is set in and it kind of shows off different parts of the city Excuse me. And of course night cities is a wide variety of different locations in it obviously is one city and you got the desert outside but I thought this video did lot should sort of the game really well. And I thought there's gonna be my pick because as you said, we haven't seen anything with Cyberpunk so far. And people are starting to figure out how to make more because it's there's a lot in the game that people can use. And I want to see that. So what do you guys think?

Ricky Grove 02:39
Well, interestingly, you've talked about the mod. It's the same mod that was used for the Elden Ring pick that I made it's the Otis inf mod will happen both sure to have a link in the notes for this I should probably do a blog about this guy because he's really interesting and he he's really good the tool is excellent you can as I mentioned in the last episode, you can record a section and recam it just like Phil did back in the day when you had duels between people you recorded and then you go in the 3d world and put the camera there you can do slow mo you can create a camera moves, move in and out all kinds of interesting things with it's not a great mod. And the creator of this film. Who was the person who made the film Damien?

Damien Valentine 03:35
His name here just a second. I hope I'm gonna pronounce this right Put f Naskh.

Ricky Grove 03:50
Store. That's right. So

Damien Valentine 03:54
yeah, if you're watching this, I butchered your name, I do apologise.

Ricky Grove 03:59
Okay. But anyway, the, the person learned the mod, because it does take a little bit of learning curve to to learn it. And they did a fantastic job of moving in. I'd like the fact that the the it's not really a story again, it's a it's a kind of mood that enhances the music. The music is the primary thing and the music, it matches the visuals of the game perfectly. But it spends a lot of time moving in amongst the crowd, the AI manufactured crowd and you get this feeling of almost like street photography, or, or street filming. And and all of the characters. It shows you the detail that the creators of the game the effort they put into creating detailed street level characters because they're all kinds of people in various mental states. You know, and because it's a futuristic sci fi, you get this almost Blade Runner kind of quality to it, you know, and you get this mood, some characters are pathetic. Some characters are arrogant, some characters are scary. And so you get a kind of feelings all the way through the music video for the kinds of people they are. And then it ends with a kind of car, a wild sort of car. I don't know how you describe it a wild chase, not a chase, but it's just a drive. And so the whole organisation of the film matches the music very carefully. So the the director obviously loved the music very much. And it was a kind of tribute and peon to the the mood of the music and it caught the game world really well. I liked it. I thought it was a really interesting and unique film. I've seen these kinds of films before done much less, with much less craft, this one crafted it so that you had a series of feelings about you wanted to know more about the people that you saw, I liked it, it was a great choice.

Tracy Harwood 06:10
I really enjoyed this as well. I mean, it's really interesting. And I agree with you, Ricky, you know, there's some? Well, I mean, I've got a few things I want to say about actually. And I think what's interesting about it is that it's this kind of first person perspective of some of someone going about their life in Cyberpunk. And you kind of get the sense of people watching. And I think what intrigued me about that was it's trying to portray, something beyond what you actually see. And you see it through these really beautiful, stunningly detailed images of these characters and assets in the game. But actually, what it felt like is that perhaps you were you were the person following this, this other person and really closely. Because that you've got this kind of first person perspective, haven't you. But the, the perspective is at different heights. So sometimes you you know, as you're it feels like you're walking down the street, you're looking the other characters almost at eye level. And sometimes it feels like you're your navel level to them. So you may be sitting down on a bench watching them go past. And other times, you're sort of somewhere in between. And I wondered if perhaps, who you are in this film watching is a child, just looking at the the level of the you know, what's what's focused on with the cameras, it could be something that you, you might look at as a child, the fact that you're staring at something I kind of felt in that kind of way. So it made me think then, as it as you're looking at all these different levels, maybe maybe what I'm what I'm viewing here isn't one person doing the viewing. And, you know, maybe that's why we're looking at these characters through different patterns of behaviour, and maybe different patterns of emotional attachment or engagement to the surroundings. Based on how they're feeling, I don't know, I kind of got that sort of sense of it. And you know, what it made me kind of think, think a little bit more about this song, this song, don't you know, what's it called Pray by Haelos. And also, the don't fall down title of the film. And I thought then maybe maybe what we've got here is something that resonates that kind of crazy film that starred Michael Douglas called Falling Down, a guy whose day gets progressively worse. And in the end, he just kind of loses it against his whole in environment for reasons, which kind of reveal themselves as this story unfolds, but you're never really quite sure what's, what's going on. And I wondered if it kind of reflected, reflected that in this kind of world. And actually, that's perhaps what resonates so much these days, because there's all this sort of crazy stuff going on, that nobody ever really understands. But in this in this kind of video, I think we, we, we've kind of never know what the triggers are that push this person to this edge is what you know, why do they get in that car? Why are they on that bike weaving in and out of the traffic? Why are in like, in that car that misses that turn and goes through that fence, you kind of never really know and you never know what the outcome is. And I found that kind of really, really intriguing and resonating, a little bit of that, that kind of feeling to me. And then there's then the song itself and the lyrics 'pray, don't fall down'. All down, which are kind of emphasised in in this in this video, I actually had a look at the original video, the original music video because I wanted to see what the comparisons were. And you know what that kind of emotional angst that you get a sense of in this film is absolutely in that original film in a music video as well. But it's, it's presented in a very different way. It's presented this quite disturbing breakup between a young couple, but I actually think this is a better video for that music than what the original was. Which, you know, yeah, I just was very intrigued by the whole thing. It's so to me, it was really interesting for a whole number of reasons. And some of those really go kind of well beyond the imagery that he created for it. So it's really great pick Damian. Really enjoyed it, thank you.

Phil Rice 11:01
I enjoyed it a lot, too. I think my, my analytical brain the first thing that I was wowed by was what Ricky had pointed out the the stunning variety of these NPC characters of NPCs. And their behaviours, not just the looks, I mean, yeah, there's no duplication of, of outfits, that's quite a feat in it of itself. It's an area that Rockstar has excelled in have kind of led the way in, I think it in various versions of Grand Theft Auto, you see that get more and more diverse. As it goes, I can't wait to see what they're going to do with the next one, if this is any indication of where they're at with that. But but also on the behaviour level is where he noticed that there's actual different states of mind presented exactly in these NPCs. And I have to think that that's somehow I'm probably misusing the term here. And I don't mean to try and sound smarter than I actually am here. But it seems like procedurally generated, if that makes sense that it's, it's created on the fly from some almost like AI art is created by taking different pieces of other different things and bringing them together. It's like you have a list of here's the potential pieces of outfits and the different, you know, heights of characters and possible skin tone, and, and then attitude and mannerisms and what kind of day they're having I picture, there's a database of that. And whatever they've got is just randomly assembling these. That's how that's the only way I could think of that you could get that kind of variety, you don't sit there and individually create that many different NPCs. So it's, that's where my analytical brain went. But we just finished binge watching the latest series of Black Mirror this week, me and my wife, which for those who haven't seen it, it's essentially it's today's Twilight Zone, a little bit harsher commentary on on the role of technology and our use of it. And so all these images on the street, and almost everyone there has some kind of device in front of their face. And I thought that's not that different from us. This is a futuristic game. But that's kind of the way it is. It's now every day, everybody's got their, their Apple crack pipe in front of their face all the time. Actually, the last episode of the current sixth season of Black Mirror focuses in on that. We're like a laser. It's really, really something anyway. Ricky mentioned that this movie is a feeling and yeah, the first movie that I thought of related to this is the one that we reviewed last month from the young lady who made the the one with all the cinematic footage of different women in different scenarios and stuff. And we talked about that that was this evocative sense of feeling and that there didn't have to be a narrative that was clear and precise there because it wasn't about that. More poetic in nature, I guess. And this struck me in that way. But then I started thinking about in the movie I referred to where it was the footage of all these women. There wasn't a precise narrative, but there was there were narrative elements that were latched on to that feeling that really informed that feeling and gave a very specific feeling when he watched it. And this doesn't use that technique. So how is this filmmaker accomplishing that? Like I was starting to analyse myself watching it, how is he doing this? How is he or she, how are they making this film do this to me, because I'm not really being told how to feel at all. It's not even really being suggested. It's completely open to interpretation. And yet, this feeling is there. And I think what it comes down to is simply where the filmmaker, the camera person, if you will, in this video where they chose to look that it simply comes down to that. There's a clinical psychologist, he's famous for other reasons, but he's also a very brilliant mind. Jordan Peterson, has talked about that the most difficult challenge that robotics faces today, is replicating the action of seeing on the part of a robot, which doesn't initially seem to make any sense. Why would that be so hard, you just a camera, but no, seeing for us is much more than just eyes. We choose what to focus on. We make decisions, every microsecond of what to look at and where we focus and, you know, there's periphery, and then there's what you're actually focused in on and to, to a great degree cinematography is, is creating a limited view for us to do that in, you know, it's removing a lot of the periphery and giving us something to focus on. Now, you still have choices to make within the frame of where to look, but camera does that. And I think that this film, whether it was deliberate or not, does that masterfully that what they've chosen to put on the frame, there's a consistent theme to that, that maybe it's hard to name and articulate, but it's there. And I think it's not just one thing, either. I think that, you know, that Tracy and Ricky and Damien and I could have all watched this film, and maybe not felt exactly the same thing. But because it's hard to pin down and talk about I don't know, that we could ever really know. Yeah, that we're feeling the same thing. You know, whereas with the, the film from last month, okay, we didn't all feel the same thing. But like, when I talked about how it made me feel, I feel like that all of you understood from having seen the film, you go, Oh, yeah, I see that. This is different. And I'm fascinated by that. So I don't know if there was a message to this film. Maybe this was just another love letter to the game. Maybe that's all this was. But for some reason, it just I kept having this nagging feeling that there's there's something more there and I kind of liked the fact that it wasn't named, that it wasn't pinned down.

Ricky Grove 18:05
Yeah, I agree with you. I think it was more than a love letter. Because, like in street photography, your choice of angle as you point out means everything. Yeah, and there were too many times where the camera lingered on certain characters in the film that made you think this person was being very empathetic. They wanted you to understand that something was going on with this character or series of characters in this strange environment. It reminded me of all things, and I hope this again, it is it's a strange thing. But do you remember the paintings of this mediaeval painter Breugel the Elder, he would make these incredible paintings of peasants, all involved in, say, a festival. And you'd have the drunken person, you'd have the funny person, they'd have the kids playing, you'd have the pies and the ladies putting out the pies, and the crows going on. And the great thing about it was as he he allowed you to be able to see all of these people in their absurdity, and been in greatness, and pathos. And that's how, in a way, that's how I felt about watching this film. I thought these people were absurd and and troubled and happy and stupid. And it it just gave me an end because of the way he chose the chose to move the camera. And I'd love to see the director make a dramatic film because I think the skills are all there to do that. But I just got this feeling of a combination of sadness and joy. Schadenfreud, I guess, would be the way to describe it. But yeah, it was just marvellous and that's really hard to do, especially when you're photographing. You can randomly created crowds in a video game

Phil Rice 20:01
Yeah, it's very difficult. Yeah, I think that's what made me linger on it was just wow. You know, how did they do this? It's, it's a combination of something the filmmaker brought to this, but something that the game was giving him too. That is extraordinary. And maybe I wouldn't have been as taken aback by that if I had spent a lot of time in the game. And these weren't none of these visuals were necessarily new to me at all. But I haven't I've watched videos of the game, but I've never bought it. I've never played it yet. So it's, it's, yeah, it's extraordinary that this ultimately came from Yeah, computer generated footage of completely fictional characters.

Ricky Grove 20:48
I'd like to point out that if you did this same film, and you matched it frame for frame, in Unreal, using characters generated, say, with character creator, you would not have the same feeling. In fact, you may not even generate that sort of feeling. It's because it was shot inside of a game. And there's a amount of randomness to it. So in a way, you sort of lose a little of that when you move to the modern platforms of machinima.

Damien Valentine 21:19
Yeah, because I don't think it's related to the game itself, or not the story of the game, because if you're gonna make that you focus on the actual characters, the main characters of the story, but it's a love letter to the world of the game, and how much effort was put into making that world seem like a living place?

Phil Rice 21:38
Yeah, in a way, a love letter to exactly what we're talking about that came through. Yeah, yep. Yeah.

Ricky Grove 21:45
Marvellous. Great. Wonderful pick, Damian.

Damien Valentine 21:47
Excellent. I'm glad you enjoyed it.

Phil Rice 21:51
Alright, well, that's it for this episode. Join us next time and we'll dig into our next film. So from myself, Ricky Tracy, and Damien. Thanks a lot, and we'll see you next time.

Ricky Grove 22:01
Hey, see ya.

Damien Valentine 22:02
Bye bye.