A Pixelated Point of View

Time for the first update of 2023! Ever since the last update in December a lot of stuff happened. Like, all at once. Before writing this post, I had a A4 page and a half full of things I wanted to mention in this post. This is most likely the most extensive post I've shared thus far on this blog. There's a lot of cool stuff to share and a lot of things I'm currently working on behind the scenes. Let's get right into it. Kicking off Let's start off with some small and personal things. I'm doing great. I feel highly determined, strong. I don't know what exactly is going on, but I like this feeling. I hope it stays all year! I finally (seriously, it's way overdue. I had it on my agenda since last september already) updated all of the thumbnails so that they accurately reflect the laurel count for every film. Some backgrounds on the laurels were also updated. A lot of films were seriously lagging behind. I really like the new thumbnail for IGNIIITIION Insta...

 Another year over. Another one has just begun. 2022 is almost at its end and it has been a very interesting year. This year saw the release of four projects (ONRIDE, DUSK, Pixelated Soundwaves and AR3NA) and many of these projects were a first. ONRIDE, for instance, was my first Valve based machinima used with the demo smoother. DUSK, was my first real Source Filmmaker project if you don't count all of the testvideo's I made over the years. Pixelated Soundwaves was the first audio-based project released for A Pixelated Point of View, and AR3NA was my first longform film and possibly the longest and ambitious film I have created so far. Wow. It didn't occur to me until I just started thinking about it. A lot of boundaries were pushed this year and a lot of projects were 'first-timers', so to speak.   In addition, a new format called APPOVTALK was established and its first two installments were released. The first episode saw me rambling about the use of depth of fie...

  Today is December 15th, 2022. Today is the day. AR3NA is finally being released. It's been a crazy year, but here it finally is: ready to be shared with the world. I can't wait to hear what you think about it. AR3NA will have its premiere at exactly 12.00PM on YouTube. The full film will be released on YouTube, behance and the blog. A shortened version of AR3NA will be featured on Vimeo due to storage constraints on free Vimeo accounts. Since I still wanted to have a release on Vimeo, I decided to create a shorter version of the film for that specific platform AR3NA (or ARENA) is an experimental machinima and visual study produced by A Pixelated Point of View within the game Quake III Arena (1999) by ID Software. With a production time of almost one full year, this is the first ever longform/feature film project to be released by A Pixelated Point of View.  AR3NA is a visual study about Quake III Arena; its environments and its textures. A deeper critical look at over two-hu...

AR3NA has been completed. The film will automatically premiere on Thursday December 15th, 12PM Central European Time on YouTube. A four minute shortened version of the film will release on Vimeo. A release post will be shared on the blog the same day and will contain more information regarding the project. A shorter version on Vimeo. Why? This is due to storage constraints on Vimeo. Although I was able to release the entire film on Vimeo if I were to render it with a 1mbps bitrate; the final result would not meet my expectations as it would be extremely pixelated and unrecognizable; especially during fast motion moments. By releasing a shorter version on Vimeo, I'd be able to provide a release on both platforms that both meet the quality I have set for my releases. The Vimeo version also contains a 'call to action' to the full film on YouTube. The full film will also be viewable on the Internet Gaming Movie Database (igmdb.org) Please find the trailer for the film down belo...

New month, new update! This will probably be the last update post for this year, as ARENA's release is coming closer and I'm extremely busy with the finishing touches. As I most likely won't start any more new projects during the remainder of this year there's not much use for another update. There will be a dedicated release post for ARENA, and of course a christmas wish/2022 recap from my side somewhere next month. With that out of the way, let's take a look at where I am right now. A PIXELATED POINT OF VIEW WEBSITE For the past year and a half I have been teaching myself how to code. I've been able to work with HTML and CSS thus far, and I am currently deeply progressing into JavaScript. There's a lot more languages left to learn as some are extremely convenient for web design, machinima making and videogame modding for instance. Think about the Source Filmmaker, which supports custom Python scripts. Or, for instance, Javascript, which I will be using for...

Let's go back to 2020 when I said that I envisioned Regression to be a complete saga of multiple films. I still think about it this way. I can safely say that Regression 3 is not the final installment in the Regression-series. To be honest, when I said that 'time would only tell whether more Regression films were coming',  I was lying. Ever since the first Regression film came out I already made a list of possible Regression films and their respective Grand Theft Auto games that they will take place in. That list will remain a secret until it's been decided that the series has come to an end and all films have been released. Although I have a good idea what I want and don't want with this series, I am not set on the amount of films that are going to be made as I am still exploring other GTA games beyond GTA V, such as GTA IV and others. To be honest I am shifting this list all the time so it's better to keep any form of confusion away. The only thing that I want...

After eight months it's time for a new installment in the APPOVTALK series. Episode two steps away from the Quake universe (just for now) and discusses the highly popular online game 'Habbo Hotel' in tandem with one of its most popular features from the past: 'Trax'. APPOVTALK 2 briefly discusses the roots of the hotel, the Trax feature in general and finally follows up with a demonstration of how Trax used to work on an externally operated 2009 Habbo Retro server that showed the game just before the merger from Shockwave to Flash; which unfortunately broke the Trax composing feature irreversibly in its wake (existing songs could be played again a couple of months later - yet, no new songs could ever be produced again). The video is pretty lengthy, around 30 minutes, but I prefer this kind of format as it allows me to truly speak my mind so to say and to really dive into the matter at hand. In addition it allows me to reflect a bit on the good old days of Habbo Hote...

Custom Content, unfortunate decisions, positive progress with ARENA post-production and upcoming projects. Time for an update. First things first. Pixelated Soundwaves released last week. I really enjoyed making the album and composing all of the songs. The first reactions on the album so far are highly positive, especially within the Habbo community or with people who used to play the game. You can check out my YouTube channel if you want to give the songs a listen. Now, before I move on to ARENA, I have finished recording the second installment of APPOVTALK, which focuses on the creative process behind Pixelated Soundwaves by exploring a couple of Ableton live projects, a bit of a backstory on Habbo Hotel and also a demonstration of how Trax used to work back in 2007 inside of an externally operated classic Habbo retro server that emulates version 31 of the hotel (which released somewhere in late 2008/early 2009). Expect the format of APPOVTALK to be a lot less formal from this episo...

Mockup of the Pixelated Soundwaves Album ‘Pixelated Soundwaves’ officially releases on October 7th. It is the newest project (and the first one that is primarily audio-based) by A Pixelated Point of View. It is a digital, freely accessible music album that contains 12 custom made tracks with existing audio samples across various genres. In addition, the project contains a thirteenth video, a so-called ‘continuous mix’ . The total runtime of the album is approximately 45 minutes and has been composed, mixed and mastered in Ableton Live by A Pixelated Point of View.  The samples used to compose these tracks have been derived from the game ‘ Habbo Hotel’ ; an online browser game originally released by the Finnish company Sulake Oy in early 2000. The main goal of the game is to create your own virtual avatar called a ‘Habbo’ and explore the premises of the digital hotel. Players can also visit public spaces or the private rooms of other habbo friends, play games, make new friends, tra...