With this blog I would like to cover different aspects of machinima that strike me as important and interesting. First, I will elaborate on the history of this form of game video art before I give the reader an idea about the different types of machinima, and thus focus on their role within the game community. Throughout the essay, I will make use of machinima examples that are posted online in order to visualize my points.
Second, I will address a question that is directly related to the creation of machinima: Is the appropriation of existing game content for the purpose of re-mixing, re-assembling and extending it a violation of authorship and copyright? Throughout the text, I will use the Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game (MMORPG) World of Warcraft as an example because the game is well known beyond the gamer community. Since I have written my master’s thesis on “Collaboration in MMORPGs,’” I will use this game as an example. I have chosen the format of a blog in order to create an academic multimodal essay.
Third, in a parallel stream of writing, I will give an account of the creation of machinima in order to demonstrate the difficulties and challenges that come with the production process of this medium, in order to stimulate the discussion regarding if machinima can indeed be seen as a “low-cost alternative to full production film making” (Elson, Riedl, 2007, p. 8).
With the blog, I also hope to stimulate discussions that go beyond the topic of machinima and turn to wider contexts of “remix culture,” (Manovich, 2007, p.1.) or “participatory culture” (Jenkins, 2006) as new forms of user created media in fields like art, design, or music.
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