I’d like to announce our open source machinima studio: Machinimascope.
Machinima is the process of filming animation inside game engines. The main home for machinima is http://www.machinima.com.
We’ve been working towards this for a little while for our own use and we’ve had some interest already in the project but are now calling for contributors - initially we are looking for Java programmers to help with the tools but we are also looking for contributions to a common art repository that can provide a basis for new machinima without commercial constraints.
It is very much still in the early stage. The first useful thing it will do is some basic lip-synch and facial expression animation for matting character close-ups into a scene. We’re hoping to have a source release early Jan. The licence is yet to be decided but will probably be GPL.
It is of course (mostly) all Java built on the Open Mind scene graph, our own ODE binding for the physics engine and a port of Cal3D for character animation. It also includes a Java port of OpenSteer - simple AI flocking behaviours. This kind of project demonstrates one of the real joys of Java - the ability to stick a whole load of components together, quickly, painlessly and robustly.
There’s a project overview at http://www.shortfuze.co.uk/shortfuze/template/Machinima,Engine.vm but the real meat is in our wiki: http://www.shortfuze.co.uk/Wiki/Wiki.jsp?page=Machinimascope.
Dave Lloyd
Short Fuze Ltd