By using gas and other fossil fuels, you're releasing carbon into the atmosphere that's been locked up for millennia. By burning wood, you're releasing carbon that's only recently been locked up - And in my case the carbon would be released anyway, as the wood rots naturally or gets burned, depending on what they do with scrap wood.

Besides I do it 'cause it's a lot cheaper than ordinary methods of heating a home despite the inconveniences of cutting it all up by hand - I burn mostly pallets scavenged from the local industrial estate. I also know a builder who has agreed to give me all his scrap wood. It's a quick, dry, powerful heat - And when you live in the woods on a north-facing hill like I do and don't see much sunlight, that's very important to me. Especially now when I've been flooded and everything is damper here than it normally is (very damp).

*double post - 12 hour rule*

Got another announcement to make: I've spent this morning and some of this afternoon playing around with Minecraft mods in single player in between doing household chores and other boring crap.

I seriously doubt that 9 people will want to come on Minecraft at the same time so I'm going to opt for the following instead to film the boardroom scene, and will see if I can make it look good with some clever editing (this is just me pissing about with the mod):


If it looks that bad after editing then I'll go back to using actors again, I guess. However, they're NPCs so parts of them can be transparent, unlike players. Also this mod allows me to make them different sizes - Glukkons can be larger than the slig, and Abe. I just wish characters could stand facing diagonally to the North-East or South-East rather than only North, East, South and West.

EDIT: BTW I'll still need help re-shooting the scene of Abe dangling from his wrists in a cell, but that'll take a lot of setting up first on my part.

That's exceptionally clever!

I hereby express disappointment. I felt that the project was about creating something together, and here you've decided to exclude all other human involvement.
I may be alone in this but I feel that regardless of the limitations to skins and stuff, the end result would be more fun, more impressive and more in the spirit of Minecraft and the server if the characters were played by other players.

I agree with what Splat said, in a way. I also think that using a mod to do it would take away from the overall feeling.

Need be, I might be able to convince 1 or 2 friends to wake up early to help out. I'm sure that other people could do the same. While this isn't ideal, I think it's a better option than what you've done.

That video does look good, though.

I should be around, depending how long it takes. I have a lot of study to be doing and early nights to catch up with, if those two can ever go together.

I'll be available on the 5th, given I'm awake,

Remember guys, you've already helped me a great deal with acting the other scenes, with skins, with suggestions - I'll still be using all of that and crediting those involved accordingly. The project wouldn't be as good as it is - Hell, it may not even exist without your inputs. Every contribution has been very valuable. I haven't forgotten, nor am I casting any of that aside. Even if I do decide to use NPCs instead of actors for the boardroom scene, it'll still very much be a community project.

After I've slept on it (was awake for 24 hours, been unconscious for the past 12... lol) I'm sort of undecided. What I may do is film the boardroom scene with actors at 9pm GMT on the 5th anyway Announcement!, and if not enough people show up (making filming impossible), then I'll use NPCs instead as a backup. There are pros and cons to filming the boardroom scene with NPCs rather than actors:

Pros of using NPCs:

* NPCs can be different sizes.

* NPCs can have transparent parts. This makes the Glukkons look marginally better.

* I don't need to wait for 9 people to be available. Many of you are keen and I appreciate that, but I've had lots of "maybes". I mean I'm flexible and we'll see how many people show up on the 5th, but I understand that many of you have other, more important commitments.
Getting outside help is a possibility, but it means forgoing the whitelist for an evening and Havoc needs to be around for that.

* Filming the scene will be you guys standing around for about an hour or two while I fly around and capture shots exactly as I want them to be, swapping texture packs. Getting camera movement in Minecraft as I want is very hard for me and takes me lots of time, while the scene doesn't require much movement - Only people to turn around and nod when I want them to. It'll be boring. Filming it offline with NPCs would mean none of you would have to do that.

* Knowing that what I'm asking 9 of you to do is boring, I wouldn't be under pressure to get the filming done as quick as I can - It also allows me to shoot as many re-takes as I like. Remember how bored people got with filming the scene with the pig conveyor?

* I have used texture packs to make glowstones invisible to get better lighting. I can fly with noclip in single player to fly through them - I cannot noclip in Multiplayer even with the same mod. I can fly around them but I'll often hit them, meaning I'll probably have to take many, many re-takes.

Cons of using NPCs:

* I kind of agree with Splat on sacrificing some of the community spirit of the project for the sake of convenience, even with the existing contributions. And that's a rather large point. I'd feel a bit bad about that if I decided to use NPCs.

* NPCs can only face North, East, South or West, not in-between those directions.

* NPCs move randomly and not when I ask them to. This will make timing things right difficult, but at least I'll be wasting my own time then and not somebody else's.

* NPCs can only nod randomly - They can't punch the air or anything. There's only so much in editing I can do to give the illusion that they're cackling manically or talking to each other. It's possible, but difficult.

So yes, this is what I'm facing. You can probably see why I've considered this.

Regardless, tomorrow evening I'll make a list of people who have said they're available/maybe available for the 5th.

About the NPCs. I think we should have the background Glukkons and Sligs NPCs and the actual characters real players. Unless if that's what your already doing?

The mod I'm using is not compatible with SMP - Would be nice if it was, then I could have the best of both worlds and only need 4 or 5 people as opposed to 9. However, that still wouldn't solve the problem of the Glukkons not being transparent.

Confirmations for filming the boardroom scene at 9PM GMT on the 5th are as follows:

Confirmed:

• Mudokon_Master
• Phylum
• Enchilado
• Dripik
• Wil

Tentative:

• Crashpunk
• Hulaabeo
• Splat

If everyone shows up, we'll have enough people. Looks like I have some rehearsing to do.

I've decided to film the scene both with actors and with NPCs and use what people think is better.

Shit. I'm going to have to set my alarm to school time for this. I was hoping to not do that until I went back to school.

I'll be there.

I'll be there too giving my alarm wakes me up :P

I'll be available, aslong as it doesn't take too long.

Okay, I've made the scene with NPCs. They lack... Movement.



By making this, I've found out what is possible and what isn't - I cannot noclip on the server, so there are 2 or 3 shots that have to be filmed offline using NPCs, if I make them look like the player models (same size, non-transparent arms for consistency).

I've also found out that I need at least 7 of you later today - 9 would be preferable, but if I shoot two of the shots while being clever with camera angles, tomorrow's filming can be done with 7.

Still, watch this before we start this evening - It should show what's expected from people.

ha that's so cute Darkhoodness :D

I'd act but i don't know much about minecraft.. I've been on the free browser-embedded version but that's all.

Put me in the confirmed pile.

Done.

I'm still miffed that I have to chose between having characters that can have transparent parts and are properly scaled compared to each other but have next to no movement, or characters with better movements played by actual people that can't be scaled and can't have skins with transparent parts.

Ah well, it's just a crappy Minecraft project anyway I guess. Perhaps having extra movement in characters will add to the charm and outweigh the skins not looking as they should.

It's not a crappy project at all! The NPC Scene was really good :)

I think it'll be great despite the limitations of size and stuff; people expect that from Minecraft and it'll just add to the feel of the thing. This'll be great.
Besides, if you rescaled the slig, every scene with a slig in would have to be played by NPCs to match (all that chasing...).

I can't say I loved my acting as Abe without sounding conceited, so I loved your direction!

The NPC clip looks awesome to me and the screen transition is flawless, great work dude!

I should be free at 9PM. I can't really guarantee it due to university assignments but hopefully I should be able to make it.

I'll be there.

Around 9PM as well for me. Might come on a bit earlier.

I might be late, but still there. :D

Just woken up from a nap, gimme a minute to light my fire before I freeze and then I'll be right on.

I want to be there. :/

Yay, we're finished (I think).
I had to go down south for a few days so I'll be off the forums 'till I get back. Good job everyone too! :D

http://www.oddworldforums.net/attach...1&d=1325809844

(yeah I'm aware that some of the set was missing - But it doesn't show up in the video, thank goodness)

I think I have all the shots I need - And can shoot with NPCs for the shots I don't have.

Thank you for your time everyone who participated, sorry if it got boring in parts (I did say) - And thanks so much for co-operating and appearing to help me!

I now have to finish the front of RF, then work out a way of filming the cell scene with someone while using the movement mod - Then I'm finally ready to edit and finish this thing. Stay tuned, people!

We only appeared to be helping. Actually we were useless. :p

Also, I'm glad Max and I managed to fix that stage correctly after we managed to destroy it with out incessant bickering.
We were definitely the right bunch of people for that job :D

I had a lot of fun last night. I've recorded some footage 'Behind the Scenes' and I think Alexfili did too.

I had so much fun last night. Thanks for organizing everything, Edd. Can't wait to see the final product AND the behind the scenes footage. :D

I sure did. Here it is:

Wil, you still need to give Edd a CT :P

Hehe, that's made my day. :) Thanks, Wil!

Isn't funny how we get our custom ranks from Minecraft :D

Also here is my footage of last night, complete with voices!

Crash, why didn't you invite me to voicechat? :(

They certainly have a lot more personality now - Thanks guys!

I did notice that the green glukkon skin has a glitch. I thought I fixed it. Bah. Ah well though.

Sorry, I didn't host it for starters and I didn't know you wanted to chat :(

I think something weird happened to the sound, Chris. Did anyone else notice the end was a bit off?

Splat, we did mention that we were voice chatting several times. People said "oh, add me!" as they wanted to be added. You never said anything, so we assumed that you couldn't.