One can also look at Machinima.com and the Machinima FAQ.

For me the above video is an excellent example of Machinima. There are a number of filmmaking techniques visible in this music video and for someone familiar with Warcraft it shows a tremendous amount of understanding of the game world.

Warcraft has over 8 million players and a large number of those players are sitting in our college classrooms. Some of those players are even in film studies courses. In the past we might have asked these students to create a short film by developing and filming a script or adapting an existing scene. Why not move the filming into one of these game worlds? Why not combine something we know students love with something we want them to love and understand? I hope to help some of our faculty to develop projects in this direction which will give some validity to the amount of time I’ve spent playing, at that point it will count as research :-)

I love the Mob movies these are based on and think it is a wonderful twist on such a classic feel good childhood memory. It would be interesting to find a way to do something like this in a film studies class.

I never wanted to take a class with Ted when I was a student. Everyone said he was really tough. What they didn’t say is that he would walk to the ends of the Earth to make sure each of his students succeeded. They might not succeed in his class but that was not important. What was important for Ted was that each student lived up to their potential and succeeded in life. I didn’t find this out until I returned to teach at Wooster and started to eat lunch with Ted at the “Round Table” in Mom’s. Even in the couple of years that I really got to know him he was able to make a lasting impression. I think that was one of his gifts.

We miss you Ted.

Maybe I should let other people catch up. The next closest blog trails me by 63 posts.