Machinima as a developing and versatile tool for storytellers and content creators

Abstract

Over last 3 decades, there has been a steady growth in the feld of machinima, the act of using real time computer graphics for movie creation. Tis paper aims to be an introduction as well as a detailed description of this new art form in terms of it’s history, culture and technology. Using examples of machinima content from a variety of diferent genres, formats and time periods, I aim to portray the medium from as many diferent angles as possible. During the research, I discovered that this new medium has much bigger infuence on today’s media than it might initially seem. Most people associate machinima with internet and gaming folklore. While there’s nothing misguided about such connotation, it can’t be ignored that machinima that empowers everyone, from amateurs to huge Hollywood studios. In the end, doing the research for this dissertation had made me develop a major appreciation for the evolution of machinima from it’s humble origins in mid-90s’ hacker culture up to the current point, when we can see feature length machinima movies getting theatrical releases.