Coley's World: Second Life Machinima Captured With Webcam to Unreal Effect

ColeMarie Soleil sees Second Life's arts scene from her unique point of view

Colemarie sent me this machinima music video she recently made, capturing a live show of the indelible Skye Galaxy covering "Mad World", with a photographic technique that's as simple as it's spectacular:

"Believe it or not," ColeMarie tells me, "I was at the show, set up a shot, then turned on my webcam, and then filmed using my webcam." The visual effect seems hyperreal, or as metaverse artist AM Radio put it to me, has a "wrenchingly real, nearly disturbing effect".

"I saw all these machinimists on Flickr using their fancy iPhones so I thought I'd be a smartypants and use my webcam," says Coley.

ColeMarie Soleil covers the Second Life arts scene for New World Notes when inspiration strikes. Before joining SL, she was a studio musician, a wandering gypsy, a graphic designer, and a solo artist who's performed at Whiskey a Go Go in Los Angeles and the Apollo in Manhattan. See more of her machinima here.

Comments

[Metacam Oh]

Great vid, too bad it was wasted on a cover song.

[Thorgal McGillivary]

Excellent video... excellent cover... the visual style fits the song, or better - this incredible version of this song, very well!

[Truelove Tomorrow]

wonderful video...love the dream like quality...your artistic talent matches perfectly the sweet and pure musical art of skye's voice...best cover of this song ive ever heard <3

[Adric Antfarm]

At first it feels like a shaky camera on a screen, but about 2:00 when you see the girl with the doll dancing, you start to see where she is going. A nice haunting quality. Dark.

The music really isn't on the same level of the video however.

[Doreen Garrigus]

Interesting video---cool effect.

Regarding the music: reverb much?

[Ann Otoole]

Very nice.