The Art of Video Games: Dreamcast
Smithsonian American Art Museum
September 2nd, 2012
| Action | Sonic Adventure |
| Target | Rez |
| Adventure | Shenmue |
| Tactics | ChuChu Rocket! |
The Art of Video Games: Dreamcast
The Art of Video Games: Nintendo 64
The Art of Video Games: Nintendo 64
Smithsonian American Art Museum
September 2nd, 2012
| Action | Super Mario 64 |
| Target | Star Fox 64 |
| Adventure | The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time |
| Tactics | Worms Armageddon |
The Art of Video Games: PlayStation
The Art of Video Games: PlayStation
Smithsonian American Art Museum
September 2nd, 2012
| Action | Metal Gear Solid |
| Target | Einhänder |
| Adventure | Final Fantasy VII |
| Tactics | Final Fantasy Tactics |
The Art of Video Games: The Guestbook
I went to The Art of Video Games exhibit at the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C. yesterday with my brother. I'll upload more of the video we took when I get back from the two-week road trip I'm leaving for tomorrow, but I wanted to show off one of my favorite things at the exhibit: the guestbook. This guestbook was laid out for visitors to sign just a few days before on August 30th, and it already had quite a few people write in it. There are a lot of nice messages in there, along with people mentioning their favorite games or drawing their most beloved characters. It's a little lengthy, but I recommend checking it out to see what fellow enthusiasts had to say about the exhibit and video games in general. You can see my brother and I put our own messages in at the end.
I didn't see any mentions of Giant Bomb in there (I'll do that when I return to the exhibit later this month), but someone did draw the NeoGAF logo!
Go to the 15:00 mark for my hilarious suggestions for what my brother should write.
Road Trip
In December 2011 my brother and I took a road trip for Christmas. First, we drove from North Carolina to Washington, D.C., then from there to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, and from there to Kansas to visit our mom. Usually when we take trips I fill up my phone with old Bombcasts, but I've heard most of them at least two or even three times now, so I needed to find something different. I don't listen to any other podcasts and generally don't like to listen to music anymore (unless it's a soundtrack I can associate with some experience I had, like a game or movie), but I wanted something that wouldn't easily be tuned out to make the drives seem shorter. This meant I needed people having conversations, and the only thing that came to mind that would be suitable for both my brother and I was the talk radio stations from the Grand Theft Auto series. So along with Giant Bomb's Game of the Year 2009 deliberations (my brother hadn't completed Uncharted 2 when the podcast was first released), I placed Chatterbox FM from Grand Theft Auto III, V-Rock from Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (has some good music along with more Lazlow), West Coast Talk Radio from Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, and Integrity 2.0 from Grand Theft Auto IV on to my phone. It didn't take my brother long to realize what we were listening to.
None of the subsequent talk radio stations were as good as Chatterbox FM.
We're about to take another road trip in September after he returns from Afghanistan and I'm trying to figure out what to do next.
My Penny Arcade Shoes
With Kitty peeing all over my only real pair of shoes, and my nurse clogs I wore as Nurse Joker for Halloween 2008 being a filthy mess (for a different reason), I was out of options for footwear in the first half of 2011. I preordered a pair of Penny Arcade's new shoes, not realizing the wait for them to be manufactured and shipped out would take so long. They eventually arrived on August 15th.
They feature the Penny Arcade logo on the front and the Konami Code on the back.
E3 2012 Press Conference Food
I went to China Star, a local Chinese restaurant right by the Food Lion, on June 4th to get a bunch of food that would last me throughout the whole day of press conferences. I wanted to cut down the amount of time not at my computer watching streams as much as possible, which meant no unnecessary cooking. I also went to Food Lion while my meal was being made (everything is cooked fresh when you order it at China Star) and got two large bags of butter popcorn. The meal was far more delicious than what E3 2012 deserved. Thankfully I didn't die, though I knew it was a possibility.
Smashburger's Logo Sure Looks Familiar...
I know this is old, but in my defense, I took this picture on December 27th, 2010. My brother and I were with our mom for Christmas, and at some point when we were out I saw this place:
Look familiar?
Photo by Dwight Burdette
Playing with Fire
This is my second animated short using the Source Filmmaker beta. I started it shortly after finishing my tutorial test video on the 7th and got finished with it today. Except for eating and sleeping, all of my time the past three/four days has been spent on this.
Originally, the concept for the video was for it to open up with the scout telling the second half of a joke, with all the other classes laughing afterward. Unable to find a second half of a joke that I liked and would be able to deliver well via voice recording, I decided to make the video about a scout hitting on a pyro with negative results. The idea was to make a video that focused on facial animation and lip synching using custom dialogue in order to get some practice with the tools.
0:00 - The first thing I wanted to do was make the scout look as douchey as possible while still being able to see all of his face (meaning no sunglasses), so I removed his default hat (you can see it in the cubby behind his left shoulder. I actually moved the mic up and angled the hat based on its position and weight of the headset) and placed the backwards cap on his head, locking it to his movement. I then added a pair of headphones which I couldn't figure out how to attach. The cord is actually going through his body, but I tried to make it look like it's going under his shirt.
I recorded some dialogue (using a $30 Logitech headset I got at Walmart a couple of years back), beginning with the winky-kiss thing, and then used the automatic lip synch to get something to work with. I then spent several hours tweaking every millisecond of the shot, editing the movement of his face, eyes, and mouth. I even animated his tongue properly, though I don't think anyone can really see it. There are a lot of subtle touches that aren't noticeable on their own, but I think they make the whole thing better. I didn't have any reference to go off of, and I'm going to film my face while recording dialogue in the future to make it easier. I also darkened the scene a bit so his facial movements would stand out more.
I bought a professional recording mic with a pop filter so I can better record audio. I guess I'm about to find out whether I'm a good voice actor or not seeing as I've never done it before!
The music didn't come until much later, when I came across the "scout_boombox" WAV files. This is 04 on loop.
0:09 - Nostril flaring is funny. I'm really proud of the scuzzy look the scout gives here.
0:11 - When the second shot begins. I knew I wanted HER (that's right) to turn her head as she does in the video, but I went back and forth on whether or not she should have any dialogue. I originally used the announcer's voice from Team Fortress 2 as a sort of inner monologue saying, "Kill him! Slaughter him like a dog!" but later changed it to the 'negative vocalization' sound for the pyro. I wanted her to have sound when the first two shots were a bit longer before transitioning to the final, much louder shot since there was too much silence in between, but after trimming the clips I found it to be funnier if she is completely quiet. I also cut off the music. I tried to find a record scratch WAV file but was unable to.
0:14 - The final shot and probably what I spent the most time on. I wanted a high enough vantage point for the scout to launch through a window and fall, but there really wasn't a proper place on Sawmill, the random map I chose. I lowered the angle of the camera and staged everything at the very top of the building. There actually isn't any flooring up there, and both characters are on the level below. Since I don't know how to animate a window breaking (I don't even know if that's possible), I made it so only the very top of the window can be seen. I then used volumetric lighting to make it look like everything inside is on fire.
There are five different audio things happening here: the scout's footsteps, the pyro laughing, an explosion sound effect to simulate a flamethrower, the scout's dialogue, and some ambient forest life sounds. For the footsteps, I used the five "footsteps\wood" WAV files and put them together. I mixed them around so it wouldn't sound like an obvious pattern of them going in order and put a delay before the window break so it would seem like the scout is either jumping or getting blown off his feet. Since the pyro's laugh and the explosion sound effect are currently behind a window, I lowered their volume.
0:17 - I increased the intensity of the light to simulate an explosion and added glass_largesheet_break1.wav for the window breaking, along with increasing the volume for the things I lowered previously as sound is now able to escape the building. Animating the scout falling out was by far the hardest thing of the whole project, and I eventually settled on what I have now since I just wanted to move on. There are a lot of small movements that aren't noticeable at the speed he is going. I even came up with a pretty great "fear" face and turned his dogtags around his neck so they would be flying behind him. I increased the volume of his scream as he gets closer to the camera and lowered it as he passes it and added a "crackling fire" noise to indicate things are burning inside.
0:24 - That was a long fall. WILL HE RECOVER
In total, I have one track of dialogue and 46 sound effects, 42 of which are in the last shot.
Proof of my commitment:
Source Filmmaker: My Tutorial Test Video
I got accepted into the Source Filmmaker beta on July 5th, and this is the first video I've made using the program - the result of spending hours watching Valve's tutorial videos and working alongside them. This is actually the first video I've ever animated, period. It's fun!
Anyway, here are some things I spent time working on that a lot of people won't notice:
0:02 - The bottom half of a body in Pyro's cart. I spent some time making sure the legs were hanging over the edge realistically.
0:05- G-Man. Can you spot him?! I actually took the time to make sure his feet were situated on the roof correctly, even though I knew no one would be able to tell.
0:06 - The devilish grin on the second Scout's face. I had to mess with a bunch of sliders for this one.
Now it's time for something original!