Hey everyone, I've received a couple emails asking about what I'm working on right now and I thought this would be a good news update in case people think I'm just twiddling my thumbs. If you don't want to read this, I've made an ADHD version at the bottom. Here's a breakdown of most things:

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THE WEBSITE - While most of the actual work is being done by Zachary Reidell and Jexius, I'm trying to manage some changes to the website I hope to get implemented. In short, I want it easier to create new episode pages and have more information added to each of the episode pages as well, including some notes I have for some of the episodes. I also plan on updating the FAQ and make it easier to navigate.

UPGRADING TO WINDOWS 7 - While this might be a simple procedure for some, I've been using Windows XP for a long time and I have a cornucopia of specialized software that I use, some of which is not compatible with 7 or at least the 64 bit version. I plan on setting up a virtual machine for the most incompatible stuff, but I'm trying to clean up all my files and determine everything I'll need to reconfigure or reinstall. I also already use a custom GUI I made via Litestep, so adapting to a new OS can be an involved process for me.

VIDEO ENCODING TESTS - Since opinions are so divided on what format people want to download the videos in, I want to do some encoding tests on MKV and MP4 and see how they hold up, even when using VLC player.

CIVIL PROTECTION - There are some important bugs to isolate with the engine that I encountered when making The Tunnel. Once I can have the reproduced reliably, I'll be looking for coding help to try and fix them, or else revert back to an earlier version of the source engine.

FREEMAN'S MIND - I want to stay true to my intention of being more regular with releases. While I haven't decided on a new microphone to get yet, the next episode shouldn't have too much shouting, so I plan on starting on that in the next day or two.

MOTION CAPTURE - I'm very interested in getting this up and running to see how much I can implement it into Civil Protection. I have the hardware I need, I just need more time to put into it.

SUBTITLES - With the help of some volunteers, I'm reviewing some of the submitted subtitles for the different episodes and hope to get more up soon.

SOUND EDITING MINI-CONTEST - I could use a backup sound editing person for future jobs that need extra help in the sound editing department. I plan to make an announcement on this later, but I have the perfect test in mind if people want to audition for this part. I don't have the files ready yet, but I plan to get them done soon. All I can say is if you enjoy sound editing, you should enjoy this test. If you're a sound editor and want to help out, let me know what video format for previews is most useful for you to work with when editing.

COMPOSER SHOWCASES - I still plan on having some posts dedicated to different composers who contributed towards "The Tunnel," even if their music didn't make it into the episode.

MICROPHONE RESEARCH - I've received lots of feedback on what microphones I should look into, which I need to sort through. I've also had at least one person claim that my problem lies with a lack of a compressor moreso than the mic, so I'm looking into that too.

ENGINE RESEARCH - While I really have my hands full with Civil Protection and Freeman's Mind, I have tons of ideas for videos I want to work on, and one of which will be a very different format than anything I've done before (many different characters, continous storyline, longer content, etc.). It will still be comedy, but set in a medieval fantasy environment. Based on my research, I think the Dragon Age engine (Eclipse engine) will be the best choice for attempting this, even though the storyline won't be based on anything from the game itself. This means I'll have a new game engine to learn, which is likely to take a while.

T-SHIRTS - This is a low priority for me, but I eventually hope to get some t-shirts made due to viewer request with the show logos and/or some quotes with Freeman's Mind along with accompanying artwork.

EMAILS - While I've caught up on a bunch of them, I still have many to reply to. I should reiterate that if your email is asking questions that are in the FAQ, you may not get a reply. Also type "cl_drawhud 0" in the game console to get rid of the HUD in Source-based games, since about 5-10% of my emails seem to be about that question alone.

GAMES - While this isn't consuming a large portion of my time, I am YEARS behind on games I've been interested in playing. I actually haven't had much downtime at all over the past several months. I went straight from finishing The Tunnel, to moving, to doing a series of Freeman's Mind videos. In addition to catching up on everything else, I'm trying to at least have some more fun in between.

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ADHD version: Ross is working on lots of different things. He will start a new Freeman's Mind soon.

I wonder how many people who don't have ADHD actually just skipped through and read the bottom.

OK

Hm, sound editing sounds interesting. I've used Audacity a bit for a few things, but nothing major or anything like that. Might be worth trying the test though...

Can you let me know about the motion capture when you find out more? Things like cost, how it works, how well it works, etc. Maybe post it on the site for other people that may be interested.

I'm interested in the T-Shirt part.
Imagine people's reactions to someone with a "LASER! caution." shirt.

Or an "Okay, what the f*ck did I just shoot?" shirt with a puzzled Freeman holding a magnum standing over a dead bullsquid. Or something similar with "Call me Ishmael, b*tch!", a shotgun, and an icthyosaur. It's part of the "Thing's That Freeman Killed." line of shirts.

Windows 7 is my favourite OS atm. I had no problems with upgrading to it.

It all sounds like good progress but I am just slightly dubious about the motion capture part, while i'm sure it will allow you to get much more animation done for Civil Protection and hopefully in turn speed up the whole production time I do worry that the animation style could clash heavily with the existing animations.

Another thing is that machinima films such as Clear Skies 3 which use motion capture for character animation sometimes lack detail or have bad acting and they can end up looking rather generic and uncoordinated like the character is drunk, there's just something about the style that doesn't quite work.

Ian Chrisholm also forgot to animate the hands of the characters in a lot of scenes in Clear Skies 3 so they are all either fully open or clenched into a fist, rarely pointing or gesturing properly.

Hey, sign me up for that sound editing contest

While I'm not an industry professional or anything, I can definitely mix multiple tracks of sound and/or music into a video and have a wide variety of tools to do so.

If you need a reference of my work, I don't have any video-related evidence but I do mix and master songs written by myself and others. If you actually listen to that, the section between 1:10-1:45ish is the best example of my mixing.

It would be nice to test the skills I acquired in my Audio Production classes in college. I have yet to come across an opportunity to use them that I can actually enjoy, and even just being the backup sound guy would be awesome.

And just maybe if I end up doing this, I'll feel a little less like I wasted a fuckton of money.

Because I did.

...Ross, if you have the time...check out 'Amnesia', I THINK you'll like it...

I believe you get a license for Windows XP with Windows 7 Professional and above for 'Windows XP Mode' which is basically just a virtual machine running Windows XP. I was able to set this up with relatively little hassle on my PC and it didn't cost me anything (apart from the cost of upgrading Vista to 7).

This link may help: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-GB/windows7/products/features/windows-xp-mode

Windows XP mode is intended for business applications and doesn't support things like direct3D as I understand it. I'll be using an all-out virtual machine for some of the stuff I need.

Also for those interested in sound editing, what format is good for you for matching sound to video previews? If there's no preference, Xvid AVI is easiest for me.

It really depends on the program you're using. I remember Cakewalk Studio (5, I think) tended to re-encode everything every time you exported something containing one or more original tracks that were already encoded, resulting in minor quality loss every time you saved the entire project into a single file. But it wasn't much of an issue for me, since I only had to deal with 10-12 tracks of raw wav and professional midi output. Only used it for video a couple of times, wedding footage and such. It wasn't a problem.

The right answer is probably 'no preference', but if you aren't sure about your software I'd go for a raw, unencoded format. Processing speed or file volume aren't really an issue anymore in this day and age anyhow. No quality loss, that's what you'll want. You can always encode properly afterward.

I actually skipped to the end as a joke on my ADHD, but I still did read everything.



This made me a happy panda.

You certainly keep yourself busy Ross. Take your time, have some fun. We can wait.

I also noticed an advertisement section was added to the main site



All I can say is SHOW ME THE MONEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well the advantage of compressed is a massive space savings. The video quality doesn't really matter provided you can see what's going on. When I set up the contest, I'll only want audio files back anyway, the video preview is for the editor's benefit to coordinate what's happening with the audio. The audio itself will be uncompressed .WAV files.


Here's the story behind that:

1. The SEO guy for the person hosting the site wanted a small text ad placed on the site. While I was happy to have a (site hosted by... [link]) he wanted something more blatantly like an ad.

2. Around that same time Zach enabled Google Ads by accident.

3. I decided since I wanted to appease the host with his small text ad anyway, I may as well just leave the Google ads and maybe use the money for the videos or to give some kickbacks to people working on the site, I'll see.

Regardless, this is as far as it goes. I want text-only ads in the bottom of the screen where they're not that noticeable. There will NOT be flash ads on the site, that's the last thing I want.

Awesome! Way better than most sites out there...

Motion capture? Sounds interesting. I am looking forward to how that works out.

Oh wow. You have a lot of stuff on your hands there. If that were me, I'd be tearing my hair out. And for that mo-cap, are you using that software you mentioned in that 'Meeting of the Minds' video? Ipi or something. Can't remember.