LittleBigPlanetMachinima
From DomWiki
This is a page where I am compiling together a list of tips and tricks on making movies with LittleBigPlanet. Machinima is the when you use videogames to make films. (e.g. Machines + Cinema)
I made one video which took the audio from Red Vs Blue episode 1 and made a video for it using Little Big Planet, the result is here.
That video was made using a Dazzle DVC-90 (I do NOT RECOMMEND this device, at all.) and edited using Sony Vegas Movie Studio edition for $50.
Now I'm totally hooked, so I decided to document this. Send me additional tips: email me: binary1230atyahoodotcom
Contents |
Software
Any editing software will do. I like [Vegas Movie Studio these days because it's way cheap, small, fast, and gets the job done nicely for non-HD work. For HD video you'll need something beefier like Adobe Premiere and a nice computer.
Equipment
I used the Dazzle DVC-90 for my first video. YUCK. Can't recommend that at all. Apparently the way to go is with the Blackmagic Intensity Pro card + component video (since HDMI on PS3 is HDCP protected so HDMI capture is impossible). I'm going to be trying this out soon.
Other stuff you'll probably want:
- Multiple PS3 controllers
- A cheap PS3 headset (walmart had ones for $20 that work fine)
- Either an audio mixer, or a couple splitter cables so you can capture and watch what you're doing at the same time
Techniques
Before you start
Play through the game and user-created levels. This not only gives you ideas of what LBP is capable of, but also lets you unlock the myriad of costumes and stuff you'll need to make cool machinima.
Moving your arms
If you've played the game, you know that if you hold down the trigger buttons and move the sticks, your arms will move and you can gesture. If you hold down the triggers only a little you can make your guy point a little bit.
Moving your FACE
If you tilt the controller you can move your FACE and look around. In practice though the PS3 sixaxis is not the most precise motion sensing device, so it often takes a few tries to get a shot right.
Expressions
Use the D-PAD to make your guy happy, sad, worried, mad, or neutral. Note that the hands do different things in each expression.
EyeToy or PS3 EYE
You can put your own stickers anywhere in-game, and if you have an EYETOY or PS EYE (PS3 webcam), then you can take pics of stuff and place it down. Mysteriously, importing JPEGs off the PS3 hard drive is an incredibly useful feature shown working in screenshots but is sadly missing from the retail version of Little Big Planet in probably a lame marketing ploy to sell more PS3 EYE units. Here's hoping MediaMolecule's hands get unbound by Sony on this and this incredibly useful feature gets added.
The PS2's EyeToy works with Little Big Planet as well, just at a lower resolution. However, results with that are really good it seems.
The custom images in this awesome fan-made music video for the band Frost* show this working well:
Pete, the author of that video, kindly provided me with the following info:
Yeah, it was lucky I still had the old PS2 EyeToy camera. I was amazed when it just worked in LBP and very pleasantly surprised to find that the manual focus on the EyeToy allowed me to get really close to my printed artworks. With a good, bright light illuminating my print-outs I got some very pleasing results.
All the artwork was prepared in Serif's DrawPlus (but any paint package would have done) and printed onto either white card or photo paper.
I got about 15 - 20 images on an A4 sheet and the EyeToy was able to get close enough to fill the frame with the bit I wanted.
I also found that when you first capture a photosticker the framing of the image is maintained for the first time you paste it. But if you hit "Undo" after the first paste, you get the full image that was captured (not just the framed part), and this seems to be of better quality than the first version.
In-game Camera Positioning
Use the camera gizmos in the editor to set up your shots. This also allows you some degree of movement too as your guy runs by.
Another incredibly useful trick to get really close up shots is to open the pop-it and select a costume. When you do this, the camera zooms way in. If you back out of the popit menu and don't move, the camera stays very close-up.
Don't be afraid to use multiple close up takes of the same scene spliced together to make the illusion that you have more control over the camera than you really have. Editing magic is always fair game. You can also zoom the shots a bit in your video editor, though doing so reduces the amount of resolution you're using. Sometimes though, it's worth it.
http://www.machinima.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=17959 A good way to swap angles quickly would be to wire up a piston with a mag key to a 3-way switch so if you wanted to change angles just move the key to trigger different cameras, or even put the camera on the piston.
Also, if you go into the in-game settings menu from the pause menu, you'll see an option for 'screen size' which can scrape you a little more in-game zoom without losing any resolution. You can also use this if you're filming in the editor to zoom in past the UI (the thermometer).
Lip-sync
Probably the coolest thing you can do easily is lip-sync. If you hook up a PS3 headset, your sackboy will "speak" any incoming audio that you say into the headset. You can also place the mic on a PC speaker and play back recorded audio into it. This technique works very well.
NOTE: Lip-sync doesn't kick in unless you're signed into PlayStation network. If you are playing single player it won't work. You don't need to be in a multiplayer game, but you do need to be just signed in.
Problems:
PROBLEM 1: Lip movement has about 0.5 seconds of lag behind the audio. You can fix this later in a video editor pretty easily. However, the problem with fixing it later is that if you are recording gestures, they will appear 0.5 seconds ahead of when you did them in the final video, and it could look weird.
Another (untested) option would be to do the following, assuming you're recording all your audio beforehand: 1) Run the audio directly out to the PS3 headset, but don't listen to it yourself. 2) Split that audio off into a delay unit which delays the audio by 0.5 seconds and listen to that in headphones
In this manner, the audio you are reacting to is 0.5 seconds behind - therefore the lip movement on screen and the gestures will be exactly lined up and you won't have to worry about mismatches.
PROBLEM 2: You can't use multiple headsets in single-player. This means that two characters can't talk at each other on screen. This is a PS3 limitation and not something wrong with LittleBigPlanet.
If you hook up two headsets, only one is recognized and that one headset's audio is put on all sackboys. (NOTE: That problem is now fixed as of Patch v1.11! Thanks Media Molecule!)
One possible (untested) solution is to use a multiplayer game and multiple headsets on multiple machines to get the effect of everyone talking. This works great for all non-remote players, though there could still be some lag. However, remote player's lip-sync is damn near perfect.
