Do you have Character?

When I posted the news about BloodSpell episode 2 yesterday I hadn't watched it yet. Now that I have I must say I really enjoyed it. Now we have all that first impression and critical eye stuff put aside I quickly found comfort in this episode having already known the characters and story so far. This kind of made me reflect on the importance and power of character development. Some times we take it for granted, there's characters in our films so there you go. But if you really want to pull people in for the long hall. Lock them in emotionally. We search for ourselves in the reflection of others. This is the importance of good characters.

I'm finally watching the TV series, Battlestar Galactica (Nathan Moller's rant on the show was my final straw). I got the first season DVD which is very cool. I've never watched a TV series this way and its really opened my eyes. No commercials, watch anytime, instant gratification! I think bypassing a whole season of commercials and not having to wait for episodes or suffer repeats is worth $20! I'd love to do that with LOST too but a) don't know if I can miss a whole season so I can wait to watch it all later, and b) I'd hate to come across online/offline chatter that spoils anything for me. Anyways, point to my rant, when I began to watch EP2 of Bloodspell, I fell into that place of starting another episode of Battlestar Galactica. "Lets see where they will take us now..." Nicely done Strange Company. PS - a quick 15 - 30 sec 'the story so far' would help the audience quickly get into 'Bloodspell' mode for that episode.

If you want to fill your Bloodspell gauntlet a little more there is a podcast over at MachinimaLIVE of the fmx/06 fesitvals' Bloodspell presentation. Its not Hugh Hancock but David Maas summarized the main points and filled in for Hugh.

Finally 2 more CG trailers that left my jaw on the floor. Another game trailer, HellGate: London, from Blur Studios (did I mention these guys rock?) and another that I'm not sure who produced but I love the cinematic style and storytelling method, Assassins Creed. These films/shorts are inspiration where I'd personally like to take my machinima work.