Thursday, December 13, 2007

Second Life: Education in a Virtual World (on slideshare.net)

Mica Braun (a.k.a. Danielle Kane) and I (HVX Silverstar, a.k.a. Bernadette Daly Swanson) took a look at what libraries and academics are doing in Second Life. Many of the examples are drawn from projects at University of California or from our volunteer work with the Alliance Library System, founder of the Second Life Library & InfoIsland/Info International Island.

Slidecast from the LAUCB Conference, Academic Library 2.0
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/LAUC/academiclibrary20/speakers.html
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/LAUC/academiclibrary20/schedule.html

The powerpoint slides and machinima can be downloaded from the LAUCB site or viewed with the audio of the 1.5 hour presentation/workshop from Slideshare.net, current "Slideshow of the day" -
the permanent link allows for downloads:
http://www.slideshare.net/HVX.Mica/second-life-education-in-a-virtual-world-slidecast/
The original slides (some not included in the slidecast) are available in two parts from the location.
Second Life: Education in a Virtual World

Friday, December 7, 2007

Introduction to Machinima: Filmmaking in Second Life

In early December, two sections of the UIUC/Alliance Library System's Virtual Worlds Librarianship continuing education course met for the Introduction to
at the new location for the Machinima Institute in Second life. A new offering of courses to be taught in Second Life as well as using Moodle (distance education content management system) will be announced shortly on the UIUC site.

UIUC Class: Virtual World Librarianship in Second Life

The Machinima Institute was recently relocated from ALA Arts InfoIsland, where it was located since Feb. 2007, to its new location on Eduisland 3.
If Second Life is already installed on your computer, use the SLURL to get to the new location: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Eduisland%203/60/30/22/?title=Machinima%20Institute
SLURL_machinina_institute2
I will be teaching the spring sessions for UIUC and will be taking two sessions (4 hours) to introduce machinima and its application to libraries which will include hands-on activities and a group movie assignment.

New Method for Streaming Machinima using SilverStream Servers in SL:

I am currently using a server and screen system for playing video (on playlists) at the Machinima Institute. It costs $600L and is available from AWM Mars who represents Silverstream Network and is affiliated with WBA Advertising on the Innocence sim in Second Life. They are based in the UK. It’s excellent (meaning "no fuss" and easy to set, reset or add new videos to the playlist). The video is triggered when avatars approach the vicinity of the servers placed around the building. The URL for your quickime video file will not show to anyone viewing the video in sl.
I am currently using a server and screen system from for playing video (on playlists) at the Machinima Institute. It costs $600L and is available from AWM Mars who represents Silverstream Network and is affiliated with WBA Advertising on the Innocence sim in Second Life. They are based in the UK. It’s excellent. The url for your quickime video file will not show to anyone viewing the video in sl.
The server is located on the floor to the left of the screen (black and white box) and the video is streamed to the proprietary screens without using the media tab in the ‘about land’
Other great services include MerlinRocket.fr and Veodia for live video streams.

Saturday, November 17, 2007

Force Sun to Midnight: Daruma Picnic's Art to blow your mind...


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDw-AxosPRk

Daruma Picnic's interactive sound and movement exhibit high above the Library Islands in the very beautiful Second Life.
From Infotainment Island....look up, jump up!
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Infotainment%20Island/132/127/31

Thursday, November 15, 2007

Give one, get one: one laptop per child from laptopgiving.org


slide_laptop, originally uploaded by HVX Silverstar.

one laptop per child from laptopgiving.org

Monday, November 12, 2007

Chat Log from Introduction to Machinima Session, Nov. 10th

View the chat log:I have used the very cool sleeds.org/chatlog tool to pretty up the text chatlog.
http://sleeds.org/chatlog/?c=174
Note: please disregard the links in the body of the chat as they do not appear to work in the log.. all relevant URLs have been listed at the top. Thanks.
Answers to some of the questions that I missed:
Flash videos from YouTube or other sites will not play in SL. You will need to convert your videos to a quicktime movie optimized for streaming to play in SL. See the slides for more details on that. The URLs for sites and slides discussed are available from the chat log. Alt-enter causing a black screen and change in screen resolution? - I will have to look into this...

Friday, November 9, 2007

Second Life Link and Facebook

As of yesterday there were 116 users on Facebook with the Second Life Link application installed. The installation is simple and just requires entering your Second Life profile name (exactly as it appears in your SL login) and entering your home region and coordinates to your home location. You will be prompted to login to SL and click on the Facebook/SL Link post as shown in the image. This will register you in the Second Life Link database. Now, you can click on the SL Link icon in the applications section of your Facebook page and jump into SL.. well, via the SL login screen. Mine is set to the Machinima Institute on ALA Arts InfoIsland in the Info Archipelago.

Saturday, November 3, 2007

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Monday, October 22, 2007

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Stop typing!

Yes, you too can shed yourself of the L-pose and stroll around chatting with your arms at your sides. Take a look at Torley's instructions for stopping the typing animation while chatting...Torley's page

Saturday, September 29, 2007

AVI files in Vista won't play

So, when I try opening any uncompressed AVI files captured on Vista... it looks like they're one frame long.. just a picture.. what the heck... other times I get the dreaded error message
This is from back in February...
A post from VirtualDub confirms the bug: "I ran test the test application and can confirm that this bug occurs in Windows Vista RTM. Essentially, every program that uses the Microsoft AVIFile APIs (avifil32.dll) to generate AVI files will produce them with a malformed RIFF structure!" http://www.virtualdub.org/blog/pivot/entry.php?id=145

Tuesday, September 18, 2007

Most Viewed YouTube Video Searching on the keyword Machinima

With 4,253,041 views, Male Restroom Etiquette ranks first in YouTube when searching on the keyword machinima. The machinima was created by zcOverman and filmed in Sims2 and Sim City 4 with the use of other tools. The high Quality DIVX version is available at: High Quality DIVX Version available at:

http://z-studios.com/films/mre/
. The machinima was uploaded a year ago to the Comedy category and contains the following keywords in the YouTube record: machinima, overman, sims, restroom, etiquette, rules, men, toilet, bathroom, humor, larry craig.

alibrarians, comedy, DIVX, hosting machinima, keyword, male

Searching on the string "Second Life"... what is the most viewed machinima on YouTube?

Right! U2 in SL Virtual Concert in Second Life

Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Wohl Enoch using ThinC Book Press in Second Life

Wohl and HVX at the Machinima Institute on ALA Arts InfoIsland.. in the beautiful Second Life.



http://library.stanford.edu/depts/hasrg/film/machinima_bibliography.html

Machinima: A Published History (real life bibliography & Second Life Book)

Yea, Wohl/Colyn!!!!! Look for it soon at a campus near you.. SJSU in SL.


http://library.stanford.edu/depts/hasrg/film/machinima_bibliography.html

Machinima Weekend on Second Life Teen Grid: July 21-22


machinimaWeekend036a, originally uploaded by HVX Silverstar.

Eye4youAlliance Island and the machinima and wellness educators and teen instructors welcomed teens from across the grid to our first ever Machinima Weekend - July 21-22. We are shown here at the end of sessions taking group shots during the NASA rocket ship blast off with a previous launch being streamed to the screen behind us. The file was streamed into SL from the Merlin Rocket server in France. Slideshows were created in Powerpoint and images of the slides were imported into Second Life to create ThinC books and corresponding scripted projection screens which the teens and adult instructors used to familiarize themselves with the topics before the hands-on sessions. View some of the slideshows on Slideshare.net/hvxsilverstar (FRAPS, A Very Brief History of Machinima, Using YouTube's New TestTube: Video Remix, Audio Swap, Camtasia, Prism, Shoot Better Machinima Using the Second Life Browser, Machinima & Actors: Using Gestures & Animations,Online Editing - Group Movies: an introduction to Jumpcut.

Thanks Foobar Lindeman, Bride and the MerlinRocket.org staff and developers for hosting our video.


Monday, July 9, 2007

Try out the YouTube Remixer Engine by Adobe Premiere Express

So, Youtube's new remixer service is up, but the music remix is "coming soon". Isn't this the most important part? Not to downplay the other features, it does offer transitions, great borders such as htis one, text bubbles, icons, etc.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Scvl2mh8IZg

Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Ramapo Islands, Second Life!



The Art & Vision of Peggy Sheehy, Fred Fuchs & Ramapo Central School District. Machinima coming soon.. tonight

Screen shots taken from Ramapo Islands, Second Life machinima:
taken on location in the Ramapo Islands, Teen Second Life
Ramapo Visionaries: Peggy Sheehy / Maggy Marat and
Fred Fuchs / Gus Plissken and the
Ramapo Central School District
Scripted Bots: Lyr Lobo
Project: KJHax / Kevin Jarrett
Soundtrack: Chris Hambly
Machinima by HVX Silverstar / Bernadette Daly Swanson

HVX Silverstar


hvx_silverstar_bernadette2, originally uploaded by HVX Silverstar.

Here we are in front of my HVX lens!

Wednesday, May 30, 2007

YouTube's TestTube

Thank you, YouTube!
www.youtube.com/testtube

The YouTube engineers say this is where they try out their "recipes and concoctions that aren't quite fully baked."
So, let's join in and put up some of our machinima.

TestTube's Features include:

Active Sharing:
Show your fans what you're watching

AudioSwap:
Replace the audio on your videos with officially licensed music.

Remixer (New):
Rexix your videos with text, overlays, audio, graphics, etc.

Streams:
Join the streams to chat with TestTuber's watching the same videos.

Saturday, May 12, 2007

Example of Quicktime Streaming Server and Nokia N800 Internet tablet in SL

"The basic idea is to use GStreamer on the Nokia N800 to stream live audio and vdeo and transmit the streams via RTP to a Quicktime Streaming Server which reflects as an RTSP stream to interested clidents, such as a Second Life client.

http://web.media.mit.edu/~lifton/snippets/n800_to_sl/

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

Second Life Community Conference (SLCC): Aug. 24-26

For anyone intersted in attending the SLCC 2007: Chicago!

Registration and hotel booking has not yet been announced, but keep an eye on the site for updates that should be coming shortly.
http://slcc2007.wordpress.com/
Machinima Track:
http://slcc2007.wordpress.com/machinima-track/

Join the SLCC Googlegroups discussion list:
http://groups.google.com/group/slccdiscussion

Friday, April 6, 2007

Torley Linden's Video Tutorials

Admit it! We all need them. Take a look at Torley Linden's tutorials:
Torley's Video Tutorials
New Videos include:
How to create and send a Notecard
How to use Undo
How to make a flag that waves in wind
How to make tiny prims
Yea, Torley!!!

Friday, March 30, 2007

Second Life: Academic Libraries & Student Avatars: Poster Session and Machinima at ACRL in Baltimore

Meet the librarians behind the avatars at the Association of College & Research Libraries (ACRL) poster session in Baltimore this weekend. This 10 minute "light-weight" machinima was created to promote the comeraderie that is Second Life.
Librarians of Second Life: http://blip.tv/file/180218
Snapshot_Posters002

Ma-chin-i-mark-et-ing

Catch "the falling star" and a glimpse of Vincent Van Gogh's Second Life as you experience the permanent exhibit constructed by Tr3ssis Virtual Worlds of the Netherlands.

View the YouTube version


Machinima created for the opening of the Virtual Starry Night Exhibit, March 30, 2007 by HVX Silverstar (a.k.a. Bernadette Daly Swanson).
*The Falling Star* (excerpt) Music created and performed by Uwe Drechsel
www.insilmaril.de
Tr3ssis Virtual Worlds
www.tressis.nl
In Second Life
http://slurl.com/secondlife/kythio/59/188/105

Thursday, March 29, 2007

Second Life Voice in Beta with the Beta Viewer!

If you are interested in testing the voice beta in the Second Life Beta Viewer, you will need to download the beta viewer software. Be sure to keep your original Second Life Software in tact, as the beta viewer is for testing purposes only and is a separate piece of software.

March 28th SL voice beta announcement
Read Joe Linden's original announcement from February 27th.

Thursday, March 1, 2007

Don't miss Machinima Guru, Moo Money, at Cybrary City open air auditorium on March 5th

Moo Money will be giving an introduction to the built-in camera in your Second Life software. Join us at Cybrary City open air auditorium for the session on Monday, March 5th, 2007 at 2:00 PM. Thank you to ZnetLady for making the arrangements and to Abbey Zenith for providing the space in Cybrary City.
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Cybrary%20City/209/61/24/
Join the Second Life Library's googlegroup at: alliancesecondlife - googlegroup

Wednesday, February 28, 2007

Machinima Institute on ALA Arts Island Coming Soon

The Machinima Institute will be opening in the Spring of 2007 and will provide Second Life residents with a location for machinima displays, events and immersive group instruction. Thank you to Lorelei Junot for the wonderful location and inspiration for librarians, students and library visitors who will be introduced to machinima for recording their SL lives and sharing it via YouTube, Blip.tv and other social software sites.
Info Island Machinima Institute, ALA Arts InfoIsland (149, 161, 31)

http://slurl.com/secondlife/ALA%20Arts%20InfoIsland/151/164/47


Thursday, February 15, 2007

Machinima instruction from Kiwi Alfa Feb 15, 17, 19

Machinimatographer, Kiwi Alfa, will be continuing to give free machinima classes on the Fox Atomic Sim (Feb. 15, Feb. 17, Feb. 19). It's the same class with options for date/time.
This class will provide you with the basics for using the free scripted camera (Alt-Zoom Camera Update) to create smooth shots.
The sessions will be hosted on Fox Atomic island.
Join in and enter the upcoming machinima contest.
This class is hosted by Kiwi Alfa.
Where? Fox Atomic Sim
When?
Feb 15th - 12:00 PM SLT/PST
Feb 17th - 03:00 PM SLT/PST
Feb 19th - 12:00 PM SLT/PST
SLurl: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Fox%20Atomic/131/145

Wednesday, January 24, 2007

Squirrelverse: Graduation Village for new teens to Second Life - 18 and older

Graduation Village in Second Life opened on Saturday, January 20, 2007.
Operated by Squirrelverse (http://www.squirrelverse.com"), Graduation Village is a privately owned education services facility on the Main Grid that has a dual purpose - to give Teenagers aged 18 and over a place to hang and to meet informally with adult educators and librarians, and to be a focal point for the provision of commercial education and business services. Contact Fleet Goldenberg "in world" for further information.
SLURL:
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Kaunis/20/221/293/

A FLV version of the file is available on from Library Famous on blip.tv. The FLV file on blip is an On2 VP6 encoded FLV file. The original file was in Quicktime and was taken into the Flash 8 encoding module to create the FLV file. Much better. I'm learning as I go, so the machinima will look better as we move along.

If you are interested in joining the Library Famous (machinima actors guild) group in SL, just search using the groups tab. If you join the group you will be asked to join us in the upcoming video about librarians in SL.

Now for YouTube's version of the video. This is an MPEG4 file saved to the spec suggested by YouTube. Due to compression of the files in order to host the worlds' video collection, the videos on YouTube aren't as clear as the FLV files on blip.tv.

Save video (different format) via YouTube
On YouTube, select the small version of the file by clicking on the icon at the lowe right side of the player (2nd from edge).

Friday, January 19, 2007

Mashups: YouTube's Deal with Warner

YouTube: the deal with Warner
According to YouTube, Warner is the first label to support YouTube users' creativity by authorizing free use of their music content.

Read about the YouTube deal.

Sunday, January 14, 2007

Making a One Minute Machinima in Second Life

Read the complete article on machinima.com:
Full article: Making a One Minute Machinima in SL

By Chris & Becky Carella of The Electric Sheep Company

Their tips include:
Suppressing the UI (ctrl-alt-1).
Making sure your cursor is not showing!!

Tuesday, January 2, 2007

Eric Linden's Top 10 Machinima Tips

First, create an avatar and download the Second Life software:
http://www.secondlife.com.
See the Community Media site: http://secondlife.com/community/media.php

Eric Linden's Top 10 Machinima Tips for Second Life

1) Set up your screen capture software. I recommend downloading FRAPS (http://www.fraps.com/) to capture your footage. FRAPS captures very clean footage while maintaining the best possible frame rates.
2) For dolly shots, contact Alt-Zoom Studios http://alt-zoom.com/
to get their free, scripted camera object. This is currently the best scripted camera in Second Life, and will give you the ability to capture smooth camera moves.
3) Try to isolate your action in a way that prevents extraneous background objects and scripts from coming into view. This will help you maintain a more consistent frame rate ? especially if there is a lot of action in the scene.
4) Try capturing in mouse-look mode. You can get smoother camera movements this way.
5) Try to capture footage in a larger format than what you plan to deliver it in. For example, I always capture at 640x480 when I know my output is going to be 320x240. You?ll maintain higher quality throughout the editing process this way.
6) Try to limit the number of actors in any given scene. Having a lot of avatars within a scene ? especially if they are all using unique animations or have a lot of attachments ? will reduce your frame rate.
7) Always capture several frames in front of- and at the end of your action. This helps greatly when you?re editing scenes together.
8) Try not to move the camera too fast; this can be confusing for the audience and disrupts continuity.
9) Try several views of the same action sequence. Capture more than you think you?ll need. You can always delete. This will allow you to make more creative decisions when you?re editing.
Related Articles: Making a One Minute MachinimaMaking a One Minute Machinima in Second Life.
10) Hide the Second Life UI (ctrl+alt+1) when capturing.