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Blastr, Filmclub

Blastr is not a new web site. It is part of the Sci-Fi Channel stable of online properties, and has been known for years as Sci-Fi Wire, an old and honorable internet name going back to the early ’90s when it was owned by a couple of independent Sci-Fi fans. They made a ton of money selling it to the Sci-Fi Channel before the Dot Com crash, and the site has mostly held to their initial format ever since, right up until its renaming and re-imaging. The look and feel of it does fit more with their other corporate offerings now, like DVice and Fidgit, and they have carried over at least some portion of the decades long archive of great articles. But what got a grin out of me was their celebratory story in honor of their rebranding: The 10 most gorgeous blasters and ray guns in science fiction. What a hoot!

According to this story at Female First, the kids taking place in the Film Club in the UK will be building their own science fiction films over the next month or two. Where was this kind of organization when I was in school, besides England; I would have loved it! Particularly things like their Close Encounters initiative.

Sci-Fi Art

There is some wonderful science fiction art being produced continuously, and a lot of the world class artists who produce it have put tutorials online so you can learn how to build your own. My favorite magazine on the topic is ImagineFX, which at $16 dollars a copy US seems a little pricey. Until, that is, you notice the DVD each issue comes with has all the workshops for that issue, including all the resources you need to follow along and make your own version. It also includes various free resources, like Fonts, Brushes, video instructions, 3D models, Textures, open source free apps, and so forth. A lot of their Workshops go online so you can access them there, usually around three months after the magazine hits the news stand. In addition, many of the contributing artists like Henning or Tom Nelson also post their contributions on their own web sites (again with the three month pause; no one wants to discourage you from buying the magazine and actively supporting the artists and publisher).

I have posted about this magazine before of course; what made me think of it now? I just found a nice article called Beyond Cylons and Warp Drive: Phenomenal Sci-Fi Concept Art that showcases 40 incredible works by almost as many artists. Each of the images links back to the source page so you can learn more about the creator and the project. Some of these are book covers, some are matte paintings for the backgrounds in movies or TV shows, some are paintings or page illustrations for magazines, but they are all amazing. And did I mention the site that published the article also is full of tutorials? Just in case you were thinking of building your own…

Build your own Sci-Fi: 3D Contest

It began April 14th, and runs through July 4th of this year; the Reallusion Sci-Fi Machinima Filmmaking Competition, based on the iClone Animation software package. Build your best Sci-Fi animation segment and submit it for a shot at $10,000 in prizes. And yes, the software package in question is a bit pricey to get the latest and greatest version, but you can pick up fully functional LE versions for cheap or free from partners like Daz 3D Studios or included on disks from magazines like 3D Artist. And there are also a ton of free online tutorials from many sources to help get you up to speed, including the 2nd Life Machinima Resources. Good luck in the competition!

Build Your Own Sci-Fi: MyOuterSpace

William Shatner has been up to many fun and amusing things over the years, and this new project he is associated with allows groups of people to team up to create new science fiction projects. It is called My Outer Space, where the planets are talent pools each specializing in a range of skill sets, and the starships are virtual production companies, each working on a film, stage play, or animation. It looks like they are serious about gathering up some talented people and creating new science fiction, so stop in and check them out.

Build your own Sci-Fi: Firefox Personas

I came across an article on the Null Set about Making Anime Personas for Firefox, with some excellent examples (that set is listed under Steelbound). I also found rather nice collections by Songbird, Bellas, Kawaii Mooru, and Fleur, to name just a few. I also found huge selections of other science fiction themes, but these should give you the idea.

Building your own seems pretty simple and straightforward; the short version is you create an image each for the top and the bottom of the browser, both 3000 pixels wide, with the top at 200 pixels tall and the bottom 100 pixels. For slightly more detailed information, check the Persona Create and Test page. These are too much fun; I think the trick is building ones that look good but don’t interfere too much with the tool bars. If you need to install the personas Add-on, you will find it here.

Build your own: Music

No real film fests this week except for the tail end of a few winding down, so a good time to talk about building your own. One thing you will need when creating your own Sci-Fi movie, animation, or radio play is a good sound bed of themes and incidental music. The Super Collider at SourceForge has a single primary purpose; to generate quality music with a command/control string of only 140 characters. These Twitter-sized bites of code play entire musical masterpieces when run through the original program. You can view the source code for the first 120 entries, to give you an idea of how to create your own.

The SuperCollider real-time audio synthesis and algorithmic composition program that takes the source code and converts it into music you can actually listen to is part of the SourceForge family of software. There are more projects you will want to track, so please follow the Wire’s Rendition of the SuperCollider’s instruction set so you don’t miss anything.