In Upcoming Feature Film, Reality and Virtual Reality Both Depicted With Second Life Machinima

Earlier this year I mentioned VolaVola, an upcoming feature film from established Italian director Berardo Carboni, which will mix Second Life machinima and real film footage to tell a story of shifting realities. Evo Szuyuan, avatar name of the cinematographer who shot the in-world footage, just shared this scene from the movie, and it suggests the reality-bending game is even trickier than originally suggested. In it, you see two characters, Sofia and Matteo, interacting within Second Life at the well-known SL gallery of an Italian artist known in-world as Gazira Babeli. But we also see them at their computers in real life -- and those shots were also created in SL.

"We first did the shots in Gazira Babeli's gallery with Dancing and Hiro (the avatars of Sofia and Matteo)," Evo explains, "But since everything is shot in Second Life we needed to make it more clear, so we applied a toon effect on the second Second Life footage in post-processing.... I really love the toon effect, but it is also a bit of a pity. Especially in this scene because Gazira's gallery is great just the way it is. But, the effect seems to work."

It's an interesting solution to the problem. When I worked with the great Lainy Voom on a book promotion machinima which showed two people logging into SL from their real life computers, that footage was also shot in SL. Our method to distinguish the two realities was to make the "real life" shots look drab in comparison to real Second Life, but without significant post-processing.

To make things more complicated with VolaVola, there will also be real footage in the final film, as well. "The movie is also going to be made in a traditional way with real life actors (of which some did the voices for the machinima)," Evo adds. "And in that version you will see the original first Second Life shots." She tells me that the movie will premiere soon at a European film festival, "and hopefully soon in the US and other places." For now, you can follow its progress on VolaVola's official Facebook group.

Comments

[Maggie Darwin]

This sort of thing may be a little easier in the future with Aimee Trescothick's VNC media plug-in. I understand there's work in-progress to bring the media plug-in API to Snowglobe...

We still have the issue of distinguishing VW nesting levels visually, of course. :-)

[Phoenix Psaltery]

Very, very cool indeed.

P2

[Leondra]

WOW! What an interesting weave of realities. The clip also so nicely captures SL interactions and how real relationships develop. I will be looking for the film when released.

TY

[Gwyneth Llewelyn]

This is simply awesome... Berardo Carboni is a genius. The fun thing is that for a SL resident, the "cartoon" is immediately identifiable with SL, since we are so used to the animations, expressions, movements, camera movements, and so forth... but it doesn't look like SL, but just as an incredibly detailed cartoon!

If this catches on, the Japanese studios that spew out a cartoon per week for their so many huge series will start doing it all inside SL... :)

[Iggy O]

Serious...I feel one of those "immersive moments" coming on. Tremendously good. I just have to see this entire film now.

[LaPiscean]

This marriage of VW and RW video is what will be required to take Machinima to mainstream television. :)