I have thought a lot about the focus of my project and have decided that it will not focus on World of Warcraft, or it's lore, or history. Instead, World of Warcraft is my digital medium that I have spent enough time inside of, met enough people, and know the mechanics of the virtual world in the sense that I feel comfortable in being able to express myself through such a digital world. It will be my medium, my virtual world, like some use Second Life, Eve, Rift, or other online virtual games to explore, to focus in on and really dissect and display my relationship with a virtual world and how these relationships are often hidden behind the bedroom door or looked upon as maybe a waste of time, or unproductive. Instead I want to reflect myself through my virtual character whom I have spent countless hours and years building up and participating in many online events with.
To really narrow my ideas down in a nutshell I will be doing a performance piece, this piece does not necessarily have to have me physically present. This piece will have to do with my relationship with my online virtual playground, and in this piece my character will be a reflection of my thoughts and feelings. We will be questioning each other, and philosophizing about deep feelings in regards to a game like World of Warcraft, why do I play? When do I play? Why do I feel more safe in a digital world? Is it possible for an economy and a community to survive in a digital world easier than in a real world? All the while my character will be reflecting his feelings and thoughts about the physical world.
Instead of just focusing on me wanting to be in the virtual world only, my virtual character is going to try and convince me to let him join the real world, because he doesn't want to be in the virtual world anymore, unlike myself, the machinima will end with my character emerging as a real person and I as a virtual person.
Below are some machinima videos that I watched from various websites that are on the same kind of lines as I want my machinima to be. Below is a rather dark machinima about a frenchman's take on the "other side" of virtual worlds and the extension of our consciousness in our avatars. The video has to do with sex, money, and power but that is all still very real in a virtual world.
Another interesting story, which is an Anime series I have watched, focuses in on some of the questions I want to address about my relationship with a virtual world. The series is called Serial Experiment Lain.
This anime focuses on identity, reality, and communication. It's about a girl who eventually becomes so deeply involved in the virtual world she cannot differentiate reality from a virtual world anymore.
So I have decided to use my character that I have played now for 3 years. This character (below) has been through a lot, last year my account was hacked and he was used to gold farm by the Chinese for 3 months, I got him back and had some interesting things sitting in my account that the thieves left behind. I am going to incorporate what I believe to be his view on another player using him to farm gold, although I don't know exactly what happened because I wasn't there it would be nice to recreate it in the eyes of my virtual character (A reason he wants to leave the virtual world so badly, because of identity theft, but wait he doesn't realize that is in the real world too...)
I've always been into pondering and questioning the dark side of the world, as I have always been a huge fan of Silent Hill too. These kinds of games that I played as a kid really make me think about the human psyche and how so many games and virtual worlds are deep reflections of things going on under the surface of society.
One of my favorite quotes from Silent Hill Origins:
"Silent Hill Origins is an exploration of the darkness behind our everyday society."
In creating a machinima about swapping roles with a virtual character is my idea of actually being able to express my feelings about the kinds of movies, comic books, video games and MMORGPS that make me question society's need to escape reality. This is my chance to create my own interpretation on how I feel about virtual worlds and what my character should expect when he becomes part of the physical world, plus I have never edited and created my very own machinima all by myself and I really would like to try. So I am accomplishing two things with one assignment.
I will be posting more references and pieces from other artists I find have an influential impact on the direction I have chosen to take my machinima. I have more to post, stay tuned.
I am a bit confused at your project, while I do think that it's great that you want to blur the lines between the virtual and real, it's already been dome before, as you have mentioned in your description of the anime. While it's all a good idea, I think you need to do something else to make it even more original. With your grand knowledge of WOW, I'm sure you could come up with ideas that no one has ever come across before. Best of luck.
ReplyDelete--Max
Hi Max,
ReplyDeleteAn interesting idea although as with Max, I am a bit confused - it is one thing to create a "Machinima" it is another to create a "performance". I am not particularly concerned that the idea you speak of, a sort of video/machinima rumination on reality and virtual consciousness - I am sure you can work to make something like this wholly your own, thus original in content.
That said - my sense is that a machinima might be the least interesting manner in which to present your piece. As you have spoken and written of performance - what about the possibility of doing some kind of a live experience of your avatar from WOW interacting with your audience/visitors to our show or an interviewer? Imagine maybe a talk show setting where you are present only as your avatar as a projection, using voice (could be skype or WOW voice assuming there is such a thing).
Such a live performance event would do so much more to heighten the sense of the virtual and the real, don't you think? As you would be doing it rather than making a video about it? Or this could be that you are not in dialogue with anyone but live and doing a sort of personal monologue from WOW, a lecture in a manner of thinking.
Anyway, I would much prefer that you think of some sort of live performance as your avatar - don't you think this would be interesting?
Your experiences of losing your identity to China etc are fascinating! Imagine your audience interacting with you live in character as your avatar? How cool would that be? You could be projected or on a flat screen, a game console? Huge possibilities here!
Keep researching performance, particularly what is now referred to as "mixed reality" performance.
joe
Thanks Joe for the insight, you really opened my eyes to some different avenues I can take with this. I do like the idea of a kind of talk show involving my WOW character. That would be awesome. I am going to do some more research and come up with some wire frames of what this may entail. Thanks for the input! -Jett
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