Machinima ( or ) is the use of real-time 3D computer graphics rendering engines to create a cinematic production. Most often, video games are used to generate the computer animation. Machinima-based artists, sometimes called machinimists or machinimators, are often fan laborers, by virtue of their re-use of copyrighted materials (see below).

The practice of using graphics engines from video games arose from the animated software introductions of the 1980s demoscene, Disney Interactive Studios' 1992 video game ''Stunt Island'', and 1990s recordings of gameplay in first-person shooter (FPS) video games, such as id Software's ''Doom'' and ''Quake''. Originally, these recordings documented speedruns—attempts to complete a level as quickly as possible—and multiplayer matches. The addition of storylines to these films created "''Quake'' movies". The more general term ''machinima'', a misspelled portmanteau of ''machine cinema'', arose when the concept spread beyond the ''Quake'' series to other games and software. After this generalization, machinima appeared in mainstream media, including television series and advertisements.

Machinima has advantages and disadvantages when compared to other styles of filmmaking. Its relative simplicity over traditional frame-based animation limits control and range of expression. Its real-time nature favors speed, cost saving, and flexibility over the higher quality of pre-rendered computer animation. Virtual acting is less expensive, dangerous, and physically restricted than live action. Machinima can be filmed by relying on in-game artificial intelligence (AI) or by controlling characters and cameras through digital puppetry. Scenes can be precisely scripted, and can be manipulated during post-production using video editing techniques. Editing, custom software, and creative cinematography may address technical limitations. Game companies have provided software for and have encouraged machinima, but the widespread use of digital assets from copyrighted games has resulted in complex, unresolved legal issues.

Machinima productions can remain close to their gaming roots and feature stunts or other portrayals of gameplay. Popular genres include dance videos, comedy, and drama. Alternatively, some filmmakers attempt to stretch the boundaries of the rendering engines or to mask the original 3-D context. The Academy of Machinima Arts & Sciences (AMAS), a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting machinima, recognizes exemplary productions through Mackie awards given at its annual Machinima Film Festival. Some general film festivals accept machinima, and game companies, such as Epic Games, Blizzard Entertainment and Jagex, have sponsored contests involving it.

History

Precedent

1980s software crackers added custom introductory credits sequences (intros) to programs whose copy protection they had removed. Increasing computing power allowed for more complex intros, and the demoscene formed when focus shifted to the intros instead of the cracks. The goal became to create the best 3-D demos in real-time with the least amount of software code. Disk storage was too slow for this; graphics had to be calculated on the fly and without a pre-existing game engine. Released the following year, id Software's ''Doom'' included the ability to record gameplay as sequences of events that the game engine could later replay in real-time. Because events and not video frames were saved, the resulting game demo files were small and easily shared among players. A culture of recording gameplay developed, as Henry Lowood of Stanford University called it, "a context for spectatorship.... The result was nothing less than a metamorphosis of the player into a performer." Another important feature of ''Doom'' was that it allowed players to create their own modifications, maps, and software for the game, thus expanding the concept of game authorship.

''Doom''s 1996 successor, ''Quake'', offered new opportunities for both gameplay and customization, while retaining the ability to record demos. Multiplayer games became popular, almost a sport; demos of matches between teams of players (clans) were recorded and studied. Paul Marino, executive director of the AMAS, stated that deathmatches, a type of multiplayer game, became more "cinematic". At this point, however, they still documented gameplay without a narrative.

''Quake'' movies

On October 26, 1996, a well-known gaming clan, the Rangers, surprised the ''Quake'' community with ''Diary of a Camper'', the first widely known machinima film. This short, 100-second demo file contained the action and gore of many others, but in the context of a brief story, rather than the usual deathmatch. An example of transformative or emergent gameplay, this shift from competition to theater required both expertise in and subversion of the game's mechanics. The Ranger demo emphasized this transformation by retaining specific gameplay references in its story.

''Diary of a Camper'' inspired many other "''Quake'' movies," as these films were then called. A community of game modifiers (modders), artists, expert players, and film fans began to form around them. The works were distributed and reviewed on websites such as The Cineplex, Psyk's Popcorn Jungle, and the Quake Movie Library (QML). the latter became known as "Adobe Premiere for Quake demo files". Among the notable films were Clan Phantasm's ''Devil's Covenant'', and Clan Undead's ''Operation Bayshield'', which introduced simulated lip synchronization and featured customized digital assets.

Released in December 1997, id Software's ''Quake II'' improved support for user-created 3-D models. However, without compatible editing software, filmmakers continued to create works based on the original ''Quake''; these included the ILL Clan's ''Apartment Huntin''' and the Quake done Quick group's ''Scourge Done Slick''. ''Quake II'' demo editors became available in 1998; in particular, Keygrip 2.0 introduced "recamming", the ability to adjust camera locations after recording. Paul Marino called the addition of this feature "a defining moment for [m]achinima". With ''Quake II'' filming now feasible, Strange Company's 1999 production ''Eschaton: Nightfall'' was the first work to feature entirely custom-made character models.

The December 1999 release of id's ''Quake III Arena'' posed a problem to the ''Quake'' movie community. The game's demo file included information needed for computer networking; however, to prevent cheating, id warned of legal action for dissemination of the file format. Thus, it was impractical to enhance software to work with ''Quake III''. Concurrently, the novelty of ''Quake'' movies was waning. New productions appeared less frequently, and, according to Marino, the community needed to "reinvent itself" to offset this development.

Generalization

In January 2000, Hugh Hancock, the founder of Strange Company, launched a new website, machinima.com. The new name surprised the community; a misspelled contraction of ''machine cinema'' (''machinema''), the term ''machinima'' was intended to dissociate in-game filming from a specific engine. The misspelling stuck because it also referenced anime. The new site featured tutorials, interviews, articles, and the exclusive release of Tritin Films' ''Quad God''. The first film made with ''Quake III Arena'', ''Quad God'' was also the first to be distributed as recorded video frames, not game-specific instructions. This change was initially controversial among machinima producers who preferred the smaller size of demo files. However, demo files required a copy of the game to view. The more accessible traditional video format broadened ''Quad God''s viewership, and the work was distributed on CDs bundled with magazines. Thus, id's decision to protect ''Quake III''s code inadvertently caused machinima creators to use more general solutions and thus widen their audience. Within a few years, machinima films were almost exclusively distributed in common video file formats. Roger Ebert discussed it in a June 2000 article and praised Strange Company's machinima setting of Percy Bysshe Shelley's sonnet "Ozymandias". At Showtime Network's 2001 Alternative Media Festival, the ILL Clan's 2000 machinima film ''Hardly Workin''' won the Best Experimental and Best in SHO awards. Steven Spielberg used ''Unreal Tournament'' to test special effects while working on his 2001 film ''Artificial Intelligence: A.I.'' Eventually, interest spread to game developers. In July 2001, Epic Games announced that its upcoming game ''Unreal Tournament 2003'' would include Matinee, a machinima production software utility. As involvement increased, filmmakers released fewer new productions to focus on quality.

At the March 2002 Game Developers Conference, five machinima makers—Anthony Bailey, Hugh Hancock, Katherine Anna Kang, Paul Marino, and Matthew Ross—founded the AMAS, a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting machinima. At QuakeCon in August, the new organization held the first Machinima Film Festival, which received mainstream media coverage. ''Anachronox: The Movie'', by Jake Hughes and Tom Hall, won three awards, including Best Picture. The next year, "In the Waiting Line", directed by Tommy Pallotta and animated by Randy Cole, became the first machinima music video to air on MTV. As graphics technology improved, machinima filmmakers used other video games and consumer-grade video editing software. Using Bungie's 2001 game ''Halo: Combat Evolved'', Rooster Teeth Productions created a popular comedy series ''Red vs. Blue: The Blood Gulch Chronicles''. The series' second season premiered at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in 2004.

Mainstream appearances

Machinima has appeared on television, starting with G4's series ''Portal''. In the BBC series ''Time Commanders'', players re-enacted historic battles using Creative Assembly's real-time game ''Rome: Total War''. MTV2's ''Video Mods'' re-creates music videos using characters from video games such as ''The Sims 2'', ''BloodRayne'', and ''Tribes''. Blizzard Entertainment helped to set part of "Make Love, Not Warcraft", an Emmy Award–winning 2006 episode of the comedy series ''South Park'', in its massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) ''World of Warcraft''. By purchasing broadcast rights to Douglas Gayeton's machinima documentary ''Molotov Alva and His Search for the Creator'' in September 2007, HBO became the first television network to buy a work created completely in a virtual world. In December 2008, machinima.com signed fifteen experienced television comedy writers—including Patric Verrone, Bill Oakley, and Mike Rowe—to produce episodes for the site.

Commercial use of machinima has increased. Rooster Teeth sells DVDs of their ''Red vs. Blue'' series and, under sponsorship from Electronic Arts, helped to promote ''The Sims 2'' by using the game to make a machinima series, ''The Strangerhood''. Later, Electronic Arts commissioned Rooster Teeth to promote their ''Madden NFL 07'' video game. Blockhouse TV uses Moviestorm's machinima software to produce it's pre-school educational DVD series ''Jack and Holly''

Game developers have continued to increase support for machinima. Products such as Lionhead Studios' 2005 business simulation game ''The Movies'', Linden Research's virtual world ''Second Life'', and Bungie's 2007 first-person shooter ''Halo 3'' encourage the creation of user content by including machinima software tools. took four days to create ''The French Democracy'', a short political film about the 2005 civil unrest in France.

In a recent interview with PC Magazine, Valve CEO and co-founder Gabe Newell said that they wanted to make a Half-Life feature film themselves, rather than hand it off to a big-name director like Sam Raimi, and that their recent Team Fortress 2 "Meet The Team" machinima shorts were experiments in doing just that.

Production

Comparison to film techniques

The AMAS defines machinima as "animated filmmaking within a real-time virtual 3-D environment". In other 3-D animation methods, creators can control every frame and nuance of their characters but, in turn, must consider issues such as key frames and in-betweening. Machinima creators leave many rendering details to their host environments, but may thus inherit those environments' limitations. Because game animations focus on dramatic rather than casual actions, the range of character emotions is often limited. However, Kelland, Morris, and Lloyd state that a small range of emotions is often sufficient, as in successful Japanese anime television series.

Another difference is that machinima is created in real time, but other animation is pre-rendered. Real-time engines need to trade quality for speed and use simpler algorithms and models. In the 2001 animated film ''Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within'', every strand of hair on a character's head was independent; real-time needs would likely force them to be treated as a single unit. Kelland, Morris, and Lloyd argue that improvement in consumer-grade graphics technology will allow more realism; similarly, Paul Marino connects machinima to the increasing computing power predicted by Moore's Law. For cut scenes in video games, issues other than visual fidelity arise. Pre-rendered scenes can require more digital storage space, weaken suspension of disbelief through contrast with real-time animation of normal gameplay, and limit interaction.

Like live action, machinima is recorded in real-time, and real people can act and control the camera. Filmmakers are often encouraged to follow traditional cinematic conventions, such as avoiding wide fields of view, the overuse of slow motion, and errors in visual continuity. Unlike live action, machinima involves less expensive, digital special effects and sets, possibly with a science-fiction or historical theme. Explosions and stunts can be tried and repeated without monetary cost and risk of injury, and the host environment may allow unrealistic physical constraints. University of Cambridge experiments in 2002 and 2003 attempted to use machinima to re-create a scene from the 1942 live-action film ''Casablanca''. Machinima filming differed from traditional cinematography in that character expression was limited, but camera movements were more flexible and improvised. Nitsche compared this experiment to an unpredictable Dogme 95 production. Machinima is a digital medium based on 3-D computer games, but most works have a linear narrative structure. Some, such as ''Red vs. Blue'' and ''The Strangerhood'', follow narrative conventions of television situational comedy. In creating their improvisational comedy series ''On the Campaign Trail with Larry & Lenny Lumberjack'' and talk show ''Tra5hTa1k with ILL Will'', the ILL Clan blended real and virtual performance by creating the works on-stage and interacting with a live audience. In another combination of real and virtual worlds, Chris Burke's talk show ''This Spartan Life'' takes place in ''Halo 2''s open multiplayer environment. There, others playing in earnest may attack the host or his interviewee. Although other virtual theatrical performances have taken place in chat rooms and multi-user dungeons, machinima adds "cinematic camera work". Previously, such virtual cinematic performances with live audience interaction were confined to research labs equipped with powerful computers.

Machinima can be less expensive than other forms of filmmaking. Strange Company produced its feature-length machinima film ''BloodSpell'' for less than £10,000. Before using machinima, Burnie Burns and Matt Hullum of Rooster Teeth Productions spent US$9,000 to produce a live-action independent film; in contrast, the four Xbox game consoles used to make ''Red vs. Blue'' in 2005 cost $600. The low cost caused a product manager for Electronic Arts to compare machinima to the low-budget independent film ''The Blair Witch Project'', without the need for cameras and actors. Berkeley weighs increased participation and a blurred line between producer and consumer against concerns that game copyrights limit commercialization and growth of machinima.

Comparatively, machinimists using pre-made virtual platforms like Second Life have indicated that their productions can be made quite successfully with no cost at all. Creators like Dutch director Chantal Harvey, producer of the 48 Hour Film Project Machinima sector, have created upwards of 200 films using the platform. Harvey's advocacy of the genre has resulted in the involvement of film director Peter Greenaway who served as a juror for the Machinima category and gave a keynote speech during the event.

Character and camera control

Kelland, Morris, and Lloyd list four main methods of creating machinima. From simple to advanced, these are: relying on the game's AI to control most actions, digital puppetry, recamming, and precise scripting of actions. Although simple to produce, AI-dependent results are unpredictable, thus complicating the realization of a preconceived film script. For example, when Rooster Teeth produced ''The Strangerhood'' using ''The Sims 2'', a game that encourages the use of its AI, the group had to create multiple instances of each character to accommodate different moods. Individual instances were selected at different times to produce appropriate actions.

In digital puppetry, machinima creators become virtual actors; each crew member controls a character in real-time, as in a multiplayer game. The director can use built-in camera controls, if available. Otherwise, video is captured from the perspectives of one or more puppeteers who serve as camera operators. Puppetry allows for improvisation and offers controls familiar to gamers, but requires more personnel than the other methods and is less precise than scripted recordings. However, some games, such as the ''Halo'' series, (except for Halo PC and Custom Edition, which allow AI and custom objects and characters), allow filming only through puppetry. According to Marino, other disadvantages are the possibility of disruption when filming in an open multi-user environment and the temptation for puppeteers to play the game in earnest, littering the set with blood and dead bodies. However, Chris Burke intentionally hosts ''This Spartan Life'' in these unpredictable conditions, which are fundamental to the show. Other works filmed using puppetry are the ILL Clan's improvisational comedy series ''On the Campaign Trail with Larry & Lenny Lumberjack'' and Rooster Teeth Productions' ''Red vs. Blue''. In recamming, which builds on puppetry, actions are first recorded to a game engine's demo file format, not directly as video frames. Without re-enacting scenes, artists can then manipulate the demo files to add cameras, tweak timing and lighting, and change the surroundings. This technique is limited to the few engines and software tools that support it.

A technique common in cut scenes of video games, scripting consists of giving precise directions to the game engine. A filmmaker can work alone this way, as J. Thaddeus "Mindcrime" Skubis did in creating the nearly four-hour ''The Seal of Nehahra'' (2000), the longest work of machinima at the time. However, perfecting scripts can be time-consuming. Unless what-you-see-is-what-you-get (WYSIWYG) editing is available, as in ''Vampire: The Masquerade – Redemption'', changes may need to be verified in additional runs, and non-linear editing may be difficult. In this respect, Kelland, Morris, and Lloyd compare scripting to stop-motion animation. Another disadvantage is that, depending on the game, scripting capabilities may be limited or unavailable. Matinee, a machinima software tool included with ''Unreal Tournament 2004'', popularized scripting in machinima.

Limitations and solutions

When ''Diary of a Camper'' was created, no software tools existed to edit demo files into films. Rangers clan member Eric "ArchV" Fowler wrote his own programs to reposition the camera and to splice footage from the ''Quake'' demo file. ''Quake'' movie editing software later appeared, but the use of conventional non-linear video editing software is now common. For example, Phil South inserted single, completely white frames into his work ''No Licence'' to enhance the visual impact of explosions.

Machinima creators have used different methods to handle limited character expression. In the ''Halo'' video game series, helmets completely cover the characters' faces. To prevent confusion, Rooster Teeth's characters move slightly when speaking, a convention shared with anime. Some machinima creators use custom software. For example, Strange Company uses Take Over GL Face Skins to add more facial expressions to their characters filmed in BioWare's 2002 role-playing video game ''Neverwinter Nights''. In some cases, some game companies may provide such software; examples include Epic Games' Impersonator for ''Unreal Tournament 2004'' and Valve Corporation's FacePoser for ''Half-Life 2''. It may be possible to point the camera elsewhere or employ other creative cinematography or acting.

Legal issues

New machinima filmmakers often want to use game-provided digital assets, but doing so raises legal issues. As derivative works, their films could violate copyright or be controlled by the assets' copyright holder, an arrangement that can be complicated by separate publishing and licensing rights. The software license agreement for ''The Movies'' stipulates that Activision, the game's publisher, owns "any and all content within... Game Movies that was either supplied with the Program or otherwise made available... by Activision or its licensors..." Some game companies provide software to modify their own games, and machinima makers often cite fair use as a defense, but the issue has never been tested in court. A potential problem with this defense is that many works, such as ''Red vs. Blue'', focus more on satire, which is not protected by fair use, rather than on parody. Berkeley adds that, even if machinima artists use their own assets, their works could be ruled derivative if filmed in a proprietary engine. The risk inherent in a fair-use defense would cause most machinima artists simply to yield to a cease-and-desist order. The AMAS has attempted to negotiate solutions with video game companies, arguing that an open-source or reasonably priced alternative would emerge from an unfavorable situation.

Generally, companies want to retain creative control over their intellectual properties and are wary of fan-created works, like fan fiction. In 2003, Linden Lab was praised for changing license terms to allow users to retain ownership of works created in its virtual world ''Second Life''. Rooster Teeth initially tried to release ''Red vs. Blue'' unnoticed by ''Halo''s owners because they feared that any communication would force them to end the project. However, Microsoft, Bungie's parent company at the time, contacted the group shortly after episode 2,

A case in which developer control was asserted involved Blizzard Entertainment's action against Tristan Pope's ''Not Just Another Love Story''. Blizzard's community managers encouraged users to post game movies and screenshots, but viewers complained that Pope's suggestion of sexual actions through creative camera and character positioning was pornographic. Citing the user license agreement, Blizzard closed discussion threads about the film and prohibited links to it. Discussion ensued about boundaries between MMORPG player and developer control.

Microsoft and Blizzard

In August 2007, Microsoft issued its Game Content Usage Rules, a license intended to address the legal status of machinima based on its games, including the ''Halo'' series. Microsoft intended the rules to be "flexible", and, because it was unilateral, the license was legally unable to reduce rights. However, machinima artists, such as Edgeworks Entertainment, protested the prohibitions on extending Microsoft's fictional universes (a common component of fan fiction) and on selling anything from sites hosting derivative works. Compounding the reaction was the license's statement, "If you do any of these things, you can expect to hear from Microsoft's lawyers who will tell you that you have to stop distributing your items right away."

Surprised by the negative feedback, The license prohibits reverse engineering and material that is pornographic or otherwise "objectionable". This prevents legal problems if a fan and Microsoft independently conceive similar plots. It differs from Microsoft's declaration in that it addresses machinima specifically instead of general game-derived content, allows use of game audio if Blizzard can legally license it, requires derivative material to meet the Entertainment Software Rating Board's Teen content rating guideline, defines noncommercial use differently, and does not address extensions of fictional universes.

Hayes states that, although licensees' benefits are limited, the licenses reduce reliance on fair use regarding machinima. In turn, this recognition may reduce film festivals' concerns about copyright clearance; in an earlier analogous situation, festivals were concerned about documentary films until best practices for them were developed. According to Hayes, Microsoft and Blizzard helped themselves through their licenses because fan creations provide free publicity and are unlikely to harm sales. If the companies had instead sued for copyright infringement, defendants could have claimed estoppel or implied license because machinima had been unaddressed for a long time. Thus, these licenses secured their issuers' legal rights. Because of the involved legal complexity, they may prefer to under-enforce copyrights.

Common genres

Nitsche and Lowood describe two methods of approaching machinima: starting from a video game and seeking a medium for expression or for documenting gameplay ("inside-out"), and starting outside a game and using it merely as animation tool ("outside-in"). Kelland, Morris, and Lloyd similarly distinguish between works that retain noticeable connections to games, and those closer to traditional animation. Belonging to the former category, gameplay and stunt machinima began in 1997 with ''Quake done Quick''. Although not the first speedrunners, its creators used external software to manipulate camera positions after recording, which, according to Lowood, elevated speedrunning "from cyberathleticism to making movies". Stunt machinima remains popular. Kelland, Morris, and Lloyd state that ''Halo: Combat Evolved'' stunt videos offer a new way to look at the game, and compare ''Battlefield 1942'' machinima creators to the Harlem Globetrotters. Built-in features for video editing and post-recording camera positioning in ''Halo 3'' were expected to facilitate gameplay-based machinima. MMORPGs and other virtual worlds have been captured in documentary films, such as ''Miss Galaxies 2004'', a beauty pageant that took place in the virtual world of ''Star Wars Galaxies''. Footage was distributed in the cover disc of the August 2004 issue of ''PC Gamer''. Douglas Gayeton's ''Molotov Alva and His Search for the Creator'' documents the title character's interactions in ''Second Life''. and sketch comedy reminiscent of the television show ''Saturday Night Live'', the New-York-based ILL Clan further developed the genre in machinima through works including ''Apartment Huntin''' and ''Hardly Workin'''. ''Red vs. Blue: The Blood Gulch Chronicles'' chronicles a futile civil war over five seasons and 100 episodes. Marino wrote that although the series' humor was rooted in video games, strong writing and characters caused the series to "transcend the typical gamer". An example of a comedy film that targets a more general audience is Strange Company's ''Tum Raider'', produced for the BBC in 2004.

Machinima has been used in music videos, of which the first documented example is Ken Thain's 2002 "Rebel vs. Thug", made in collaboration with Chuck D. The following year, Tommy Pallotta directed "In the Waiting Line" for the British group Zero 7. He told ''Computer Graphics World'', "It probably would have been quicker to do the film in a 3D animated program. But now, we can reuse the assets in an improvisational way." In television, MTV features video game characters on its show ''Video Mods''.

Others use machinima in drama; these works may or may not retain signs of their video game provenance. ''Unreal Tournament'' is often used for science fiction and ''Battlefield 1942'' for war, but some artists subvert their chosen game's setting or completely detach their work from it. In 1999, Strange Company used ''Quake II'' in ''Eschaton: Nightfall'', a horror film based on the work of H. P. Lovecraft. A later example is Damien Valentine's series ''Consanguinity'', made using BioWare's 2002 computer game ''Neverwinter Nights'' and based on the television series ''Buffy the Vampire Slayer''. Another genre consists of experimental works that attempt to push the boundaries of game engines. One example, Fountainhead's ''Anna'', is a short film that focuses on the cycle of life and is reminiscent of ''Fantasia''. Other productions go farther and completely eschew a 3-D appearance. Friedrich Kirschner's ''The Tournament'' and ''The Journey'' deliberately appear hand-drawn, and Dead on Que's ''Fake Science'' resembles two-dimensional Eastern European modernist animation from the 1970s.

Another derivative genre termed macinima verite, from cinéma vérité, seeks to add a documentary and additional realism to the machinima piece. L.M. Sabo's ''CATACLYSM'' achieves a machinima verite style through displaying and recapturing the machinima video with a low resolution black and white hand-held video camera to produce a shaky camera effect. Other element of cinéma vérité, such as longer takes, sweeping camera transitions, and jump cuts may be included to complete the effect.

Some have used machinima to make political statements, often from left-wing perspectives. Alex Chan's take on the 2005 civil unrest in France, ''The French Democracy'', attained mainstream attention and inspired other machinima commentaries on American and British society. Horwatt deemed Thuyen Nguyen's 2006 ''An Unfair War'', a criticism of the Iraq war, similar in its attempt "to speak for those who cannot". Joshua Garrison mimicked Chan's "political pseudo-documentary style" in his ''Virginia Tech Massacre'', a controversial ''Halo 3''–based re-enactment and explanation of the eponymous real-life events. More recently, ''War of Internet Addiction'' addressed internet censorship in China using ''World of Warcraft''.

Competitions

After the QML's Quake Movie Oscars, dedicated machinima awards did not reappear until the AMAS created the Mackies for its first Machinima Film Festival in 2002. The annual festival has become an important one for machinima creators. Ho Chee Yue, a founder of the marketing company AKQA, helped to organize the first festival for the Asia chapter of the AMAS in 2006. In 2007, the AMAS supported the first machinima festival held in Europe. In addition to these smaller ceremonies, Hugh Hancock of Strange Company worked to add an award for machinima to the more general Bitfilm Festival in 2003. Other general festivals that allow machinima include the Sundance Film Festival and the Florida Film Festival.

Machinima has been showcased in contests sponsored by game companies. Epic Games' popular Make Something Unreal contest included machinima that impressed event organizer Jeff Morris because of "the quality of entries that really push the technology, that accomplish things that Epic never envisioned". In December 2005, Blizzard Entertainment and Xfire, a gaming-focused instant messaging service, jointly sponsored a ''World of Warcraft'' machinima contest.

See also

Machinima: Virtual Filmmaking

Computer animation

Computer-generated imagery

References

Further reading

—Also as:

External links

Academic machinima bibliography to 2007

Academic machinima bibliography to 2011

Warcraft Movies, a resource for ''World of Warcraft'' machinima

Machinima, a resource for ''all '' machinima works

Blue Entertainment, a resource for ''battlefield 2'' machinima

T.O.M.B. The Online Motions Box, links to thousands of Machinima motions

GamersTube, a resource for various machinima

The Movie Vault, a competitive machinima video website

Flight Sim Machinima, links to flight-sim machinima

Machinination, a resource for machinima artists

Machinima Central- Machinima Community/Resources

Category:3D computer graphics Category:Animation technology Category:Computer animation Category:Emergent gameplay Category:Film styles Category:Machinima Category:Works based on video games

ar:مشينما ca:Machinima da:Machinima de:Machinima es:Machinima fr:Machinima ko:머시니마 it:Machinima nl:Machinima ja:マシニマ no:Machinima pl:Machinima pt:Machinima ru:Машинима simple:Machinima fi:Machinima sv:Machinima tr:Machinima zh:Machinima

Name	Will Smith
Birth name	Willard Christopher Smith, Jr.
Birth date	September 25, 1968
Birth place	Wynnefield, Pennsylvania, United States
Origin	Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Other names	The Fresh Prince
Occupation	Actor, producer, rapper
Years active	1985–1993, 1997-2005 (rapping), 1990- (acting)
Label	Jive, RCA Records, Columbia, Interscope
Spouse
Children	Trey SmithJaden SmithWillow Smith
Website	}}

Willard Christopher "Will" Smith, Jr. (born September 25, 1968), also known by his stage name The Fresh Prince, is an American actor, producer, and rapper. He has enjoyed success in television, film and music. In April 2007, ''Newsweek'' called him the most powerful actor in Hollywood. Smith has been nominated for four Golden Globe Awards, two Academy Awards, and has won multiple Grammy Awards.

In the late 1980s, Smith achieved modest fame as a rapper under the name The Fresh Prince. In 1990, his popularity increased dramatically when he starred in the popular television series ''The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air''. The show ran for nearly six years (1990–1996) on NBC and has been syndicated consistently on various networks since then. In the mid-1990s, Smith moved from television to film, and ultimately starred in numerous blockbuster films. He is the only actor to have eight consecutive films gross over $100 million in the domestic box office and the only one to have eight consecutive films in which he starred open at #1 spot in the domestic box office tally.

Fourteen of the nineteen fiction films he has acted in have accumulated worldwide gross earnings of over $100 million, and four took in over $500 million in global box office receipts. As of 2011, his films have grossed $5.7 billion in global box office. His most financially successful films have been ''Bad Boys'', ''Bad Boys II'', ''Independence Day'', ''Men in Black'', ''Men in Black II'', ''I, Robot'', ''The Pursuit of Happyness'', ''I Am Legend'', ''Hancock'', ''Wild Wild West'', ''Enemy of the State'', ''Shark Tale'', ''Hitch'' and ''Seven Pounds''. He also earned critical praise for his performances in ''Six Degrees of Separation'', ''Ali'' and ''The Pursuit of Happyness'', receiving Best Actor Oscar nominations for the latter two.

Family and early life

In West Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, born and raised, Smith spent time in Germantown in Northwest Philadelphia. His mother, Caroline (née Bright), was a school administrator who worked for the Philadelphia school board, and his father, Willard Christopher Smith, Sr., was a refrigeration engineer. He was raised Baptist. His parents separated when he was thirteen, and did not actually divorce until around 2000.

It is untrue, though widely reported, that Smith turned down a scholarship to attend the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT); he never applied to the school, although he was admitted to a "pre-engineering program" there. According to Smith, "My mother, who worked for the School Board of Philadelphia, had a friend who was the admissions officer at MIT. I had pretty high SAT scores and they needed black kids, so I probably could have gotten in. But I had no intention of going to college."

Recording and acting career

Early work (1985–1995)

Smith started as the MC of the hip-hop duo DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince, with his childhood friend Jeffrey "DJ Jazzy Jeff" Townes as turntablist and producer, as well as Ready Rock C (Clarence Holmes) as the human beat box. The trio was known for performing humorous, radio-friendly songs, most notably "Parents Just Don't Understand" and "Summertime". They gained critical acclaim and won the first Grammy awarded in the Rap category (1988). Smith had a line in "Voices That Care", a 1991 Persian Gulf War song by a celebrity group. Smith spent money freely during his early career and underpaid his income taxes. The Internal Revenue Service eventually assessed a $2.8 million tax debt against Smith, took many of his possessions, and garnished his income. Smith was nearly bankrupt in 1990, when the NBC television network signed him to a contract and built a sitcom, ''The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air'', around him. The show was successful and began his acting career. Smith set for himself the goal of becoming "the biggest movie star in the world," studying box office successes' common characteristics. His first major roles were in the drama ''Six Degrees of Separation'' (1993) and the action film ''Bad Boys'' (1995).

Breakthrough (1996–2000)

In 1996, Smith starred as part of an ensemble cast in Roland Emmerich's ''Independence Day''. The film was a massive blockbuster, becoming the second highest grossing film in history at the time and establishing Smith as a prime box office draw. In 1998, Smith starred with Gene Hackman in ''Enemy of the State''. He turned down the role of Neo in ''The Matrix'' in favor of ''Wild Wild West'' (1999). Despite the disappointment of ''Wild Wild West'', Smith has said that he harbors no regrets about his decision, asserting that Keanu Reeves's performance as Neo was superior to what Smith himself would have achieved. Though in interviews subsequent to the release of ''Wild Wild West'' he stated that he "made a mistake on ''Wild Wild West''. That could have been better."

2001–present

In 2005, Smith was entered into the Guinness Book of World Records for attending a record breaking three premieres in a 24-hour time span.

He has planned to star in a feature film remake of the television series ''It Takes a Thief''.

On December 10, 2007, Smith was recognized at Grauman's Chinese Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard. Smith left an imprint of his hands and feet outside the world renowned theater in front of many fans. Later that month, Smith starred in the film ''I Am Legend'', released December 14, 2007. Despite marginally positive reviews, its opening was the largest ever for a film released in the United States during December. Smith himself has said that he considers the film to be "aggressively unique". A reviewer said that the film's commercial success "cemented [Smith's] standing as the number one box office draw in Hollywood." On December 1, 2008, TV Guide reported that Smith has been selected as one of America’s top ten most fascinating people of 2008 for a Barbara Walters ABC special that aired on December 4, 2008.

Smith is currently developing a film entitled ''The Last Pharaoh'', in which he will star as Taharqa.

President Barack Obama has stated that if a film were to ever be made about his life, he would have Smith play his part, because "he has the ears". Obama stated that the two have discussed a possibility of a film based on the 2008 election, but this may not happen until the end of the Obama presidency.

''Men in Black III'' is set for a 2012 release. In it, Smith will play Agent J, one of his more popular earlier roles; it will be his first major starring role in four years.

On August 19, 2011, it was announced that Smith had returned to the studio with producer La Mar Edwards to make a new album. Edwards has worked with artists such as T.I., Chris Brown, and Game.

Smith and his son, Jaden, are currently filming ''After Earth'', which is set for a 2013 release.

Personal life

Smith was raised by his parents in West Philadelphia. Smith credits his father's dedication when discussing his own involvement in the lives of his three children: "I look at my father and how he was able to keep four kids fed and clothed and still managed to find time to spend with us." Smith married Sheree Zampino in 1992. They had a son, Willard Christopher Smith III, also known as "Trey", but divorced in 1995. Trey appeared in his father's music video for the 1998 single "Just the Two of Us". Smith married actress Jada Pinkett in 1997. Together they have had two children: Jaden Christopher Syre (born 1998), his co-star in ''The Pursuit of Happyness'', and Willow Camille Reign (born 2000), who appeared as his daughter in ''I Am Legend''. Along with his brother, Harry Smith, he owns Treyball Development Inc., a Beverly Hills-based company named after his first son. Smith and his family reside on Star Island in Miami Beach, Florida and in Los Angeles, Stockholm, Sweden and Philadelphia.

Smith was consistently listed in Fortune Magazine's "Richest 40" list of the forty wealthiest Americans under the age of 40. He donated $4,600 to the presidential campaign of Democrat Barack Obama. December 11, 2009, Smith and his wife hosted the Nobel Peace Prize Concert in Oslo, Norway, when Obama had won the prize.

Smith has said he has studied multiple religions, including Scientology, and he has said many complimentary things about Scientology and other faiths. Despite his praise of Scientology, Smith said "I just think a lot of the ideas in Scientology are brilliant and revolutionary and non-religious" and "Ninety-eight percent of the principles in Scientology are identical to the principles of the Bible.... I don't think that because the word someone uses for spirit is 'thetan' that the definition becomes any different." He has denied having joined the Church of Scientology, saying "I am a Christian. I am a student of all religions, and I respect all people and all paths." Smith gave $1.3 million to charities in 2007, of which $450,000 went to two Christian ministries, and $122,500 went to three Scientology organizations; the remaining beneficiaries included "a Los Angeles mosque, other Christian-based schools and churches, and [...] the Yitzhak Rabin Memorial Center in Israel". Smith and his wife have also founded a private elementary school in Calabasas, California, the New Village Leadership Academy, which uses Study Technology, a teaching methodology developed by L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology.

Discography

With DJ Jazzy Jeff

''Rock the House'' (1987)

''He's the DJ, I'm the Rapper'' (1988)

''And in This Corner...'' (1989)

''Homebase'' (1991)

''Code Red'' (1993)

Solo

''Big Willie Style'' (1997)

''Willennium'' (1999)

''Born to Reign'' (2002)

''Lost and Found'' (2005)

Filmography

! Year	! Film	! Role	! Notes
	''Saturday Morning Videos''	Host	TV
''ABC Afterschool Special'' – "The Perfect Date"	Hawker	TV
''The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air''		TV (1990–1996)
		Fresh Prince	TV, Cameo, episode 18 "I'm with the Band"
''Where the Day Takes You''	Manny
		Tea Cake Walters
	Paul
1995		Detective Mike Lowrey
1996		Captain Steven "Steve" Hiller, USMC	MTV Movie Award for Best Kiss
			MTV Movie Award for Best FightMTV Movie Award for Best Song from a Movie
''Happily Ever After: Fairy Tales for Every Child''	Pinocchio	TV Series;Episode 14 of Season 2 which aired on April 13, 1997.Episode also starred Chris Rock and Della Reese
1998		Robert Clayton Dean	Nominated—NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture
	''Torrance Rises''	Himself	Cameo
''Wild Wild West''	Captain James "Jim" West
	''Welcome to Hollywood''	Himself
''The Legend of Bagger Vance''	Bagger Vance	Nominated—NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture
2001		Muhammad Ali	MTV Movie Award for Best PerformanceNominated—Academy Award for Best ActorNominated—Broadcast Film Critics Association Award for Best ActorNominated—Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture DramaNominated—NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture
	''Men in Black II''		BET Awards
Girlfriend by [[B2K	Himself	Music video
	''Bad Boys II''	Detective Mike Lowrey	Nominated—NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture
''All of Us''	Johnny	TV, 3 episodes (2003–2004); Creator/Executive Producer
	''A Closer Walk''	Narrator	Documentary
	Himself	Uncredited Cameo
''American Chopper''	Himself	TV, Cameo
	Detective Del Spooner	ProducerNominated—NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture
''The Seat Filler''		Executive Producer; Independent Film
''Shark Tale''	Oscar	Voice
	''There's a God on the Mic''		Documentary
	Alex "Hitch" Hitchens	ProducerNominated—BET Awards
2006	''[[The Pursuit of Happyness''	Chris Gardner
2007		Dr. Robert Neville
		John Hancock	ProducerNominated – Saturn Award for Best Actor
''Lakeview Terrace''		Producer
		Producer
''Seven Pounds''	Ben Thomas	Producer
2010			Producer
			Producer
''Men in Black III''		''Post-production''
		Box office grosses

! Year	! Title	! Budget	! U.S. gross	! Worldwide gross
1992	''Where the Day Takes You''		$390,152	$390,152
		$44,942,695	$104,942,695
	$6,284,090	$6,284,090
1995		$23m	$65,647,413	$141,247,413
1996		$75m	$306,169,255	$817,400,878
1997			$250,690,539	$587,790,539
1998		$111,549,836	$250,649,836
1999	''Wild Wild West''	$170m	$113,805,681	$222,105,681
2000	''The Legend of Bagger Vance''	$80m	$30,695,227	$39,235,486
2001		$107m	$58,183,966	$84,383,966
2002	''Men in Black II''	$140m	$190,418,803	$441,818,803
2003	''Bad Boys II''	$60m	$138,540,870	$272,940,870
		$120m	$144,801,023	$348,601,023
''Shark Tale''	$75m	$161,192,000	$367,192,000
2005		$70m	$177,784,257	$366,784,257
2006	''The Pursuit of Happyness''	$55m	$162,586,036	$306,086,036
2007			$256,393,010	$585,055,701
		$227,946,274	$624,346,274
''Seven Pounds''	$55m	$69,369,933	$166,617,328

References

Further reading

External links

in 2002

Category:1968 births Category:Actors from Pennsylvania Category:African-American businesspeople Category:African American sports executives Category:American beatboxers Category:American film actors Category:American film directors Category:American film producers Category:American hip hop musicians Category:American hip hop record producers Category:African American rappers Category:American television actors Category:Baptists from the United States Category:Columbia Records artists Category:Grammy Award winners Category:Interscope Records artists Category:Living people Category:National Basketball Association executives Category:National Basketball Association owners Category:People from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Category:Philadelphia 76ers executives Category:Rappers from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Category:Saturn Award winners

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