In Chicago, August 25-26 is the Second Life Community Convention. There will be different presentation tracks at the conference and machinima is one of them. Teen machinima will be highlighted through an intern program with Global Kids with teens presenting and hands on making machinima techniques will be available as well.
The term ‘machinima’ is a combination of ‘machine’ and ‘cinema’ or video creation done ‘in-game’. It is not particular to Second Life but because SL has built-in video capture, the platform lends itself well to the medium.
Machinima has everything to do with libraries. It mashes up content including music, storylines, and images. These movies can be (and often are) honored in film festivals, shared on social networking sites such as YouTube and taught as courses at universities such as Georgia Tech. Most capture tools such as Second Life, Camtasia, and FRAPS have free versions. Promoting programs, collaborating with teens, and exploring how to tell a story are some of the many things that can be done with machinima.
The machinima track for the SLCC conference will be audio streamed into Second Life. It will be streamed on the ALA Arts Info Island, 159, 189, 29. If you sign up for a free account at: www.secondlife.com, log in, and click on the ‘search’ option at the bottom of your screen, you can locate ‘ALA Arts Info Island’ and teleport to the location.
More links on machinima are available at YALSA’s del.icio.us page. Add your own!
Posted by Kelly Czarnecki
