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EDIT:

Well I feel like an idiot, as one viewer pointed out, looks like Craig Kesicke updated his blog literally an hour before I made this post (his last update being in May), so he is still alive. For now, the offer still stands, since the no-reply thing this close to Halloween really alarmed me.

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ORIGINAL POST:

While work is progressing steadily on “The Tunnel” I have a new problem. Since Machinima.com generally isn’t happy about me using game soundtrack music anymore, composer Craig Kesicke was supposed to be creating music for this episode and has already created some that I plan to use. However, I haven’t heard back from him in a few weeks despite sending some follow-up emails, so I can only assume his rowdy past has caught up with him and he has been arrested by the local authorities.

While this time delay would normally be nothing to be concerned over, I’m trying to do everything in my power to get this episode done before Halloween. This means I want to allocate as much time as possible for composing music for the scenes as I finish filming them. I’m not done with the episode yet, but I have multiple scenes done that I need music for, so I’m opening up the doors for anyone who’s interested in composing music for this episode (and possible future ones). If you compose music and want to give this a shot, go ahead and email me at [email protected]. Some people have offered to compose music in the past. I plan to sift through my old emails and contact some of them, but don’t hesitate to take the initiative and email me again if you’ve contacted me about music before. For everyone else, I will want to hear a sample of your past music, even if it’s not the style I’m after for this episode.

Since I was originally planning to use soundtrack music, I’ll be putting together tracks I was considering as an audio reference for each scene along with a description of the kind of mood I’m after along with any details I can think of. I’ll want samples of music first before I send the footage to score the actual scene as a way of minimizing any unused work. Finally, be prepared for rejection. As a soundtrack freak, I can be picky about the kind of sound I want, also it’s possible someone may have got to me before you did. I generally don’t like creating a competitive atmosphere like this for people, but in this case, I really want to see this episode done in time and I think this might be the best approach. I do give feedback on anything I want revised or changed however, so there’s nothing saying you can’t keep trying again with different samples if I don’t like the initial ones. Also it’s very possible different composers may end up working on different scenes.

Thanks in advance to anyone who contributes. I unfortunately can’t afford to pay people what their music is probably worth, but I will of course give credit to everyone whose music gets used in the episode.

Hey people, I came up with a way to show you the status of the next episode without having to make a new post every time. Behold:

This is a rough representation of how completed the episode is. I probably couldn’t have made something like this until recently, since there are hundreds of smaller elements involved with mapping, lighting, and animation. While I’ll be releasing it as an entire video (can’t promise on Youtube though), this one splits up relatively nicely into 3 different parts, so that’s how I’ve marked progress indicators on here.

I plan to update this image every few days until the episode is done. If you notice it moving slowly, that’s likely due to those last remaining red bars under “animation.” So you can just refresh the image if you’re wondering how things are coming along. It won’t be updated to the hour or anything, I recommend checking back every couple days if you’re dying to know what’s happening. I probably won’t have any new announcements until I’m much closer to done. Now you can see how close that is!

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Also a rant on the Source engine was linked to me today by one of the animators that I thought was worth pointing to:

http://www.planetphillip.com/posts/valve-you-should-be-ashamed-of-yourselves/

This guy appears on Podcast 17 and reviews all sorts of Half-Life mods. There are good points here. I have a LOT to say on this topic, but I’m going to wait until after the episode is done. While I am struggling with bugs daily, I’m also working with an older version of the SDK offline, so I’m only fighting with the bugs Valve added a couple years ago and never fixed, as opposed to the new ones they’ve currently added. From what I’ve gathered, if I had to use the SDK in its current state today, the episode might be impossible to finish. Good thing it’s not!

I’ve been meaning to give a minor update as I tackle one problem after another, however I realized that I don’t think I’ve ever given a total update of everything I’m doing when working on an episode. Judging from the comments, some people think they’re missing something when I don’t give an update all the time. You’re really not, but as proof, I’ve documented everything I can remember from yesterday. So here’s a sample for you of everything you missed, just yesterday:

--Finished animating as much as possible of an interior scene. Won’t be able to continue animating the rest the scene until after done filming up to a certain point as I need to see layout of where the physics props end up for continuity. Adjusted several more dynamic props that don’t match up with other scenes unintentionally for continuity purposes. Probably spent about an hour animating an investigation sequence for Dave, ended up scrapping it since it doesn’t look very good and there won’t be a lot of reason to keep the camera off Mike for that scene. Completed difficult sections of Mike investigating. Adding info_targets and syncing up with Faceposer for looking around the room was kind of a pain. Alternated between aiscripted_schedules and scripted_sequences for movement around the room. Ended up using aiscripted_schedules for beginning to navigate through doorway, but scripted_sequences afterwards, except only for movement and orientation, not animations. Still not sure if there’s any logic whatsoever as to what direction an npc will face after completing an aiscripted_schedule. Would be a helpful function that Alex could look into, though I doubt there’s much he can do, plus I already asked him about finding a way to implement custom movement animations into aiscripted_schedules. Not optimistic about that.

--Readjusted some env_physexplosion entities since their usage still looks slightly unnatural + timing is off. If I push the values too high, I risk getting sparks and dust clouds from friction, which doesn’t make sense for the subject matter. Don’t know how to eliminate the dust cloud, maybe the sparks use a .vmt I can hunt down and make transparent. I hate crap like this. May have to come back to tomorrow.

--Ryan deleted the online utility he made for creating soundscripts again. I don’t know why he spends time working on things only to delete everything he’s ever done periodically. Left him a message, but probably no chance of reaching him within the next 72+ hours. Emailed Alex about an offline utility so I don’t have to do it manually. Got lucky and reached him. Utility didn’t work due to runtime dependencies, I’ll look into it later, I’ve already made the soundscripts for the hardest parts remaining.

--Sent Alex some follow-up information on the map database project that could help future episodes go a little faster.

--Did a test shot for a potential slow motion sequence from Ben’s animation. Found out that for reasons unknown the engine is skipping some frames of the animation. Tried it again and it skipped even more frames. This is a major bug, Ben will work on smoothing out the animation and maybe increasing the source framerate, though I don’t know if that will make any difference. I’m somewhat worried about finding a solution to this, I might be able to record multiple shots and splice in individual frames if the location is random in the animation. At at least one point it isn’t. Was almost not bitter and angry about the source engine before this happened.

--Finished an outdoor transition scene, added aiscripted_sequences for citizens walking in background, adjust a lot of dynamic props and pathway of main character to look more natural. Decompiled some other maps to try and pull some good light values for the scene. Found some after about 15 VRAD compiles of the map. Took notably less time than I expected, not nearly as long as the last transition map I worked on. Scene’s a little dark, but it looks good.

--Ben’s animation isn’t done yet, but the end positioning is mostly final enough for me to get started on the next scene. Also need to tackle lighting for early map again since some bug is occurring between the episode 1 and 2 engine again. Can work on this stuff tomorrow and hopefully start filming. Still a little worried about lighting continuity, but I’ll see what happens. Really worried about the bug with Ben’s animation, but if I focus on that I’ll never finish.

--It’s looking more likely I’m going to have to do this animated texture myself afterall.

--Got some more emails, replied to Gareth, nothing else looks that urgent, I’ll catch up at some point, my “to reply” list is about 120 emails long at the moment.
 
So you can see for yourself how exciting working on an episode is and all the fun you’re missing out on when I don’t update. When you don’t get lots of updates, I’m basically sparing you from all this.
 
The short version:

I plan to finish up as many odds and ends as I can today and begin filming by tonight or tomorrow. The animation still isn’t done due to how some of the workflow is playing out, but if at any point I get to a point where I’m waiting on other content, I’ll resume work on Freeman’s Mind.

Well in the August update I said I was absolutely going to be done with the animation for Civil Protection that month. That ended up being not completely true. I actually was done with the animation at one point while I was waiting for material from other people, but then I got the material, so I’m no longer done with the animation. That and the new Freeman’s Mind episode + website revision probably set me back at least a week and a half. There’s the joke about “Valve Time” which I seem to be doing an admirable job of following. I honestly wonder if the Valve staff is so delayed because of dealing with engine agony the way I do or if it’s for other reasons.

The good news is that I’m getting very close to being done with the animation. So much so, I’ve prepared a progress report on what’s left to be done before I can film everything. It’s been declassified CIA-style, so you can read it with no fear of spoilers:

I’m still waiting on some material from other people, so what will probably end up happening is that I’ll work until I can’t work on anything else again, then start on the next Freeman’s Mind episode. So this month is likely to be a blended mania of finishing the animation, filming, and working on Freeman’s Mind. In an attempt to shoot myself in the foot again, I intend for all animation and filming to be done for the CP episode this month. The sound editing will be mostly out of my hands, so I’m giving no time estimate for that, however if that ends up taking a long time, all that means is I’ll start on Freeman’s Mind sooner.

More features and changes are still being planned for the website, though they probably won’t get my full attention until after I’m done with the CP animation work. Same goes for subtitles.

Welcome to the re-launch of Accursed Farms. The first thing I want to emphasize is that very little, if anything, on this site should be considered to be in a final state. As of right now, this site should be considered in an alpha or beta state. The old site kept getting hacked, so it was important to get a new version up as soon as possible that still gave people access to the movies. This one is based on Wordpress and will have multiple web programmers and designers having access to it, so the site’s ability to function will hopefully not rest in the hands of just one person like before. There will be some immediate benefits of drawbacks of this site over the old version, though I think over time it will be purely a beneficial thing. Here are some of the immediate changes below:

 

MOVIE LINKS: Unfortunately, due to a new system, the old movie page links are all no longer valid. I apologize for the broken links this will cause, but the good news is the new naming scheme will be a little more intuitive and not contain just a seemingly random number.

 

USER COMMENTS: The good news is all your old user comments made on the old site have been transferred onto the new site. Also now when you log in to comment, you will STAY logged if you choose. The bad news is you may have to re-register your name. The other bad news is I’m no longer allowing anonymous comments. When I initially created the videos, I was happy for all input since my viewerbase was so low. Ever since about last year however, the situation has degenerated more towards chaos, so I’d like a little more accountability as to what people are writing. I’m not trying to discourage dissent or criticism about the videos, just people acting like jackasses. For the majority of you to whom this probably doesn’t apply, my apologies for the extra inconvenience. If you don’t want to register on the site, but have something you want to say, you can always email me.

 

LAYOUT / GRAPHIC DESIGN: The design of this site is absolutely in a temporary state and will certainly undergo changes over time. If you’re a graphics or web designer, feel free to contact me if you have proposals as to how site should look or how the layout should function. You can send me mock-up pictures showing how you think the site could look better or be more intuitive to navigate. In general, I want a dark, but clearly readable theme, plus I have some graphics I created for the Accursed Farms logo that might help accentuate parts of the site. You can find a few of the graphics to work with here. I can’t promise I’ll use your design, but if I like it, or elements from it, we’ll work towards implementing it into the site and give you credit for your work. Also if you have any ideas on how to make the FAQ more readable and navigable in particular, let me know.

 

NOESIS TUTORIALS: As some of you may know, I was contracted by Noesis a while back to create tutorials for how to make machinima in the Source engine called the Source Machinima Choreography Guide and the Source Machinima Cinematography Guide. Recently however, Noesis is changing their business model so that they won’t be selling conventional tutorials like they did before as they want to avoid piracy of the guides. Thus, the old links I had on the site are no longer valid. Their plans are to start posting ALL of their tutorials on design3.com with unlimited access for a subscription fee instead. I’ve been told my guides will be appearing there at some point in the future and there may still be some DVD copies on Amazon.com

 

FUTURE CHANGES: In the future, I hope to implement many more features. While I’m offering no dates as to when these will happen, here are some things you can hopefully expect in time:
-An official forum dedicated to the videos and misc. related topics
-An “extras” page which will contain some audio outtakes, alternate camera shots for some scenes, scripts, etc.
-A twitter posting with boring and dry updates about what’s going on with production from a technical standpoint
-A better looking design (hopefully)
-All the videos available in more formats besides WMV
-Many more subtitles for existing videos

 

CREDITS: All I did was manage the development of this site, the real work was all done by other people who I’d like to recognize:
WALT SNIDER - Programmed the back-end code of this site and is responsible for importing all the old news posts and comments and is handling the security of the site now. You can check out his homepages at WaltSnider.com and JobWellDumb.com and korenewmedia.com.
RICH SMITH - Assisted Walt with converting over the old database and all the comments. His homepage is at CodeLizard.com
ZACHARY REIDELL - Created the front-end work for the site you see right now and got a lot of the functions working, like all the movie pages. He was able to get this page constructed very quickly. You can check out his homepage at http://zchr.org/.
”VLAD” - Was also working on the front-end work with a more complicated, but ran into health problems that set him back. I was worried he was going to keel over dead. You can see his homepage at orangestonephotography.com
JERRY BRAMSTÅNG - Has done a lot of minor feature and repair work in the background on the old site for a long time and has generally been the guy I turn to in emergency website problems.
PRESTON JOHNSON - Has helped me for a long time and almost created the original site and almost created this site, but has had setbacks both times. I think he might be a secret agent, I don’t know.
MIKE SOUTHWORTH - Created the previous website of Accursed Farms and has since moved on the greener pastures.
ANDREW THEIS - Is the current host for the site. You can check out his homepage at andrewtheis.net.
Also “Will” for creating the favicon and everyone else who’s offered me help on the website so far.

 

In the meantime, my main focus still remains to get more videos out, so that’s what I’ll be working on. -Ross Scott