Introduction: This proposal will explain my plan to develop a rhetorical analysis of machinima projects as part of a wider discourse community.
Work Completed: So far I've developed my introduction, current situation, and project plan sections of my proposal. I've begun compiling additional research for a wider view of the discourse community, including video game theories and expanded media theories. I have also spoken with several class members to develop and refine my plan. Every step has been recorded on this blog. It's been a lot of hard work so far, but I'm more exhilarated than exhausted.
Next Steps: The next step is to combine all of these pieces into a comprehensive project proposal. This will include a full explanation of the complete plan as well as a conclusion. I'll be finishing the complete draft of this proposal this weekend. Finally, I'm going to build a multimedia presentation explaining the whole proposal. I haven't figured out exactly what I'm going to build, but since I'm working on machinima, it would follow that a machinima project would best fit the rhetorical situation. That being the case, I need to select a game to record and edit. This will be the most difficult part of the project, I think.
Conclusion: I'm excited about this project, and I've received nothing but compliments and positive suggestions so far. The best part is that I've been wanting to build another machinima this summer, and now I have a good reason to build one. The biggest question is what game will work best?
Thursday, June 5, 2008
Academic Bio
Sean Callot is a graduate of
After graduation, Sean worked in retail management and public relations. Throughout his degree and professional career, Sean focused on multimedia presentations and rhetoric.
Currently, Sean is a graduate student at
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
Chapter 6 notes and comments
I agree with Dan in that this section does not seem to apply to the Master's Thesis requirements. I imagine that by meeting with your adviser and vocalizing your qualifications, you evade the necessity of a written section of qualification.
However, there are other aspects which address the author's qualifications. The project plan, for example, addresses what you know by forcing the author to research and build an effective argument for taking a specific tack on addressing the research question.
Additionally, I was confused by the organizational chart on p. 105. Including an organizational chart in the proposal appears useless.
I'm just generally confused by this chapter.
However, there are other aspects which address the author's qualifications. The project plan, for example, addresses what you know by forcing the author to research and build an effective argument for taking a specific tack on addressing the research question.
Additionally, I was confused by the organizational chart on p. 105. Including an organizational chart in the proposal appears useless.
I'm just generally confused by this chapter.
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
Project Plan, first draft
As a side note, I'm still not certain where I should explain the theoretical constructs I'll be using, so I included a brief explanation of the main theories I'll be applying in this plan. I also decided not to include the machinima production portion in this draft, due to possible time constraints. However, I'm still considering adding an example of machinima to the project as well.
August 20, 2008 - Begin reviewing and selecting machinima examples
September 1, 2008 - Finalize machinima selections and contact producers; request committee members
October 1, 2008 - Construct review worksheet; update committee on status; begin analysis
November 1, 2008 - Update committee on status
December 1, 2008 - Update committee on status; complete analysis through the month
January 5, 2009 - Update committee on status; begin writing
January 19, 2009 - Chapter 1 complete
February 4, 2009 - Chapter 2 complete
February 19, 2009 - Chapter 3 complete
March 4, 2009 - Chapter 4 complete
March 19, 2009 - Thesis complete, submitted to committee
April 4, 2009 - Revisions
April 11, 2009 - Thesis defense
A rhetorical analysis of machinima seems to be a daunting task. There are many hundreds of pieces of machinima available through many different discourse communities. Game developers have used machinima for several different purposes, ranging from marketing applications to narrative devices. However, the focus of this rhetorical analysis would center on user-generated machinima content. By examining user-generated content, a more complete image of the greater discourse community is possible, and larger assertions may be made regarding the rhetorical devices used and rhetorical conditions each piece of the discourse attempts to address.
To this end, this study would select three machinima projects made available by their creators for public display. Such machinima projects are easily available from second-generation websites, such as YouTube.com or Machinima.com. Each of these sources offers server space for machinima producers, as well as forums for machinima enthusiasts and producers to collaborate and discuss what they have made and how to improve their creations. Machinima projects selected from these sources would embody effective artifacts from the discourse community. Thus, these projects would best suit a rhetorical analysis of this type.
Once the projects are selected and contact has been made with the producers themselves, interviews with the producers of these machinima projects would be conducted. This would allow the producers an opportunity to discuss what their driving motivations were when creating their projects, and what questions or situations they were hoping to address. The results from these interviews would also guide the questions applied in subsequent stages of the rhetorical analysis. After all, if a machinima producer had very specific intentions for his participation in the discourse community, then those intentions would be critical in analyzing the overall project. These interviews would serve much the same purpose that a director’s commentary of a film or author’s epilogue of a novel serves.
The next stage of the analysis would be to apply the rhetorical theoretical constructs described above to the machinima projects themselves. Burke’s pentad would be assisted by data collected from the interview portion, but would also evaluate the effectiveness of the machinima from an independent observational point of view. By assessing the act, agent, agency, setting, and purpose of a machinima project, this study would examine the overall effectiveness of the dramatic aspects of the project.
Bitzer’s rhetorical situation would examine different aspects of the machinima projects. This analysis, combined with data collected from the interview portion of the study, would review and assess the effectiveness of each project at addressing their presupposed rhetorical situation. This proposal included a very brief analysis of 9/11 Survivor’s rhetorical situation, and how effective this project was at addressing the situation. In truth, this could be the most difficult portion of the analysis, as interaction with each project and assessment of the effectiveness of the project can only be effectively gauged by examining responses to the project. The tools each website allows for commentary will hopefully assist this portion of the analysis. Additionally, information garnered from the interview process would also provide illuminating data toward the effectiveness and acceptance of the examined projects.
If a Bitzerean analysis proves unwieldy, or if the analysis proves insufficient, conducting an analysis of the modality of the project as outlined by Kress and Van Leeuwan would provide a different, and possibly more useful, perspective. By analyzing the modality, or the believability a particular project, I will be able to conduct a more holistic examination of the machinima projects. Since there are so many cinematographic techniques available, and Kress and Van Leeuwan examine and provide tools for the analysis of cinematic techniques in a rhetorical context, it follows that using their theories of modality examination is appropriate.
Finally, Foucault’s social discourse analysis would help tie the entire project together. By examining the interviews, the results from the Burkean and Bitzerean analyses, and comments taken from the associated websites, the machinima project’s place in the discourse community will be assessed. Additionally, this kind of analysis will determine to what extent the project either reinforces socially-constructed standards of discourse or subverts them, and how effective the projects are. This kind of analysis will also help build an Ulmerean “wide view” of how machinima fits into the gamer and intellectual community. This final portion of the analysis will help guide recommendations for further research, such as the possibility of further pedagogical use of machinima across the curriculum.
Tentative Schedule
June 30, 2008 - Thesis Proposal submitted to committee chairAugust 20, 2008 - Begin reviewing and selecting machinima examples
September 1, 2008 - Finalize machinima selections and contact producers; request committee members
October 1, 2008 - Construct review worksheet; update committee on status; begin analysis
November 1, 2008 - Update committee on status
December 1, 2008 - Update committee on status; complete analysis through the month
January 5, 2009 - Update committee on status; begin writing
January 19, 2009 - Chapter 1 complete
February 4, 2009 - Chapter 2 complete
February 19, 2009 - Chapter 3 complete
March 4, 2009 - Chapter 4 complete
March 19, 2009 - Thesis complete, submitted to committee
April 4, 2009 - Revisions
April 11, 2009 - Thesis defense
Monday, June 2, 2008
Project Plan, first draft outline
- Select machinima videos to analyze
- Select machinima which address an issue
- Ensure machinima are not copywritten
- if so, secure permission to analyze
- Include selection criteria in final paper
- Select key theories to apply
- rhetorical
- Burke
- Foucault
- Bitzer
- game
- WoW reader
- Game theory books enroute
- media
- Bolter
- Ulmer
- rhetorical
- Apply theories to videos
- apply theories as they appear necessary
- if excluding one theory, explain why
- Analyze results and determine effectiveness
- Compose thesis
- Create a machinima adhering to theories
- Select game
- game should have sufficient user-control
- should maintain focus on gameplay
- modality concerns should be paramount
- plan video production
- screenplay
- storyboard and plan shots
- script and determine sound synchronization techniques
- Produce machinima
- record gameplay footage
- embed and synchonize sound
- edit until you want to cry
- review
- Select game
Chapter 5 notes and comments
We return, again, to the RFP to develop a plan of attack. This reminds me of how military leaders build operations orders for missions. You figure out what the objectives are, then you plan out what you are going to do.
First you map out your objectives, selecting your primary followed by secondary and tertiary objectives. You get these by paying attention to your RFP and POC. You then build your plan with all the objectives in mind but focusing on the primary objective. Make sure you keep an eye on your audience analysis from earlier, especially ethical considerations. I have a friend who does not do this, and his approaches to any given problem will work, but will also have unfortunate repercussions.
Next you build your plan of attack, focusing initially on the how. This seems very important, especially when you build a mind map for the solution to find the best fit solution.
I have a little difficulty determining the "Why?" question. I suppose this section is a control measure, ensuring that the proposal remains cohesive and structured, and should also be structured to address the audience's concerns. Again, as with all rhetoric, the audience needs are key.
First you map out your objectives, selecting your primary followed by secondary and tertiary objectives. You get these by paying attention to your RFP and POC. You then build your plan with all the objectives in mind but focusing on the primary objective. Make sure you keep an eye on your audience analysis from earlier, especially ethical considerations. I have a friend who does not do this, and his approaches to any given problem will work, but will also have unfortunate repercussions.
Next you build your plan of attack, focusing initially on the how. This seems very important, especially when you build a mind map for the solution to find the best fit solution.
I have a little difficulty determining the "Why?" question. I suppose this section is a control measure, ensuring that the proposal remains cohesive and structured, and should also be structured to address the audience's concerns. Again, as with all rhetoric, the audience needs are key.
Current situation, first draft
This first draft of my current situation section consists of a condensed version of my original introduction and literature review. I'll be revising and updating it when I receive three new books of video game and media theory.
Current situation
For almost thirty years, the concept of a computer-generated entertainment system has captured the imagination of writers, researchers, and countless children and adults who demanded more interactivity in their play. Beginning with the first AI-driven game, Pong, and the two-dimensional adventure game Super Mario Brothers, and evolving into the life-like graphics of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and Assassin’s Creed, these games have stirred the imagination of gamers and researchers alike. Playing and beating the latest game became a driving force for children through the 1980’s and 90’s.
Building upon those accomplishments, early gamers realized that their game consoles could be connected to a video recorder in order to produce simple movies of their conquests. Gamers eventually built upon this concept to produce full movies of their gaming excursions.(Lowood, 2007) Shortly after gameplay videos began circulating, gamers realized their games could also be used to produce simple computer-generated animated short films. This foretold the beginning of what would come to be known as “machinima.” Recently, more advanced machinima projects have entered some areas of mainstream entertainment. By replacing the soundtrack and using game characters as actors to tell their story, wildly popular television shows such as South Park and CSI: New York included video game-generated content in their 2007-08 seasons. Radio and television news programs have also reported on commercially successful machinima projects, such as Red vs. Blue, a comedy series solely utilizing the Microsoft console games Halo and Halo 2. (Chong, 2008) Despite the increasing popularity of machinima projects, the academic community has spent very little time examining the various creative and rhetorical aspects machinima projects entail. As the following literature review and subsequent theoretical constructs will reveal, there is a significant gap between what scholarly research has been conducted and where popular media is progressing. Given that there has been so much attention paid to machinima in popular media, it should follow that scholarly attention be paid to this burgeoning form of media. To that end, this thesis will examine machinima projects as participation within a discourse community by remediating existing intellectual property for new ends.
While so little scholarly research has been conducted regarding machinima as a whole, there has been a fairly large body of research into the parts and components that comprise the whole. These parts include the video games that are used, available software tools, and copyright concerns. Additionally, artists have taken to using tools similar to those used by machinima creators to remediate video games for their own artistic goals.
Henry Lowood’s article “High-Performance Play: The Making of Machinima” lends the most directly pertinent information to the scholarly examination of machinima projects. He begins by calling video games the “art form of the digital age.” (Lowood, 2007) Lowood explains that machinima projects combine gameplay communities, subversion, and gameplay performance into a single art form. Much of the introduction material from this proposal comes from Lowood’s historical analysis into the development of the first generation of machinima. He places a heavy emphasis on the fact that, since machinima is produced entirely using open-source or commercially produced computer software, movies made from video games reduce the cost concerns inherent in making movies. When producing a machinima, even in the earliest days of graphics-intensive video games, gameplay is the key. (Lowood, 2007) id Software, a pioneer in early game development, embraced the game communities which emerged around their flagship games, Wolfenstein 3D and DOOM, allowing gamers access to level design tools and early gameplay display capture software. The graphics and gameplay were top quality, but id Software took a step further and opened the source code of their games to gaming communities. This, Lowood insists, gave gamers the opportunity to improve id Software’s creations and maintain a vested interest in the game. Gamers were able to build new levels of the game, apply new “skins” to enemy characters, and even build entirely new games (Lowood, 2007). When id Software released the successor to DOOM, titled Quake, game developer John Carmack described it as “the coolest thing anyone has ever seen…” (Lowood, 2007). Again, id Software made all the development tools available to the gamer community, including a dynamic rotating camera tool. While DOOM only supported first-person camera views, Quake offered a third-person perspective that could be manipulated to view the action from different angles. This tool helped to build the first true user-generated, story-driven machinima movie, entitled Diary of a Camper. (Lowood, 2007) This first machinima, Lowood explains, demonstrated what could be done using the kind of tools that were originally reserved for game developers. Subsequent examples of machinima projects offer variations on this basic theme. This essay demonstrates the kinds of creative opportunities available to talented gamers with a desire to remediate traditional media into something wholly new.
However, Lowood does not examine the creative and rhetorical choices project developers make. Jim Andrews examines the remediation of games into artwork in his essay, “Videogames as Literary Devices.” In this essay, Andrews provides several examples of artists incorporating video games into their larger projects. For example, one piece called Pac Mondrian, which combines the classic video game Pac-Man with a Piet Mondrian painting, Broadway Boogie Woogie, uses the game engine as a metaphor for running through the very real streets of New York City. (Andrews, 2007; Hennessy et al, 2004) This kind of remediation is very similar to the production of machinima in that it re-imagines the game in a different context. Similar projects Andrews describes further demonstrate this kind of mash-up as works of art using new media. Hennessy’s explanation of Mondrian’s original work, which combines the emotions he felt when first experiencing the rhythms of New York jazz music with the city layout of the area surrounding Broadway, also demonstrates how different kinds of media can be combined to create altogether new artwork. (Hennessy et al, 2004)
Narrative machinima being the norm, there are art projects which take a much more abstract approach to remediating video games. Rebecca Cannon’s article “Meltdown” touches on certain key aspects of remediating video games for rhetorical means. While her work focuses on artistic modification of game engines, such as the work of the anti-war gamer community Velvet Strike, she also addresses a non-playable encounter called 9/11 Survivor. This user-created gamelplay modification was designed to depict the plight of a survivor of the World Trade Center attack of 11 September, 2001. This piece of user generated content, built using the Unreal Tournament 2003 engine, follows a businessman in one of the towers contemplating what had just happened before jumping to his death. The player has no control over the action whatsoever. The only control the viewer, now relegated to an observer stance, maintains is to change the camera angle around the central character. (Cannon, 2007) Technologically, this mod emulates the earliest gameplay videos Lowood described, where the videos had to be played using game engine itself, as opposed to watching a streamed video. However, the makers of the mod, unlike the pioneers of machinima described earlier, were pilloried by the public and castigated in mass media. Cannon explains that the modders were simply using their preferred medium to express their level of concern. It should also be noted that 9/11 Survivor was created as a class project, indicating some of the teaching possibilities of machinima in a pedagogical setting. (Cannon, 2007)
Cannon’s article comes closest to a true rhetorical analysis of machinima. She examines artistic mods in light of the arguments their creators are trying to make. However, she does not apply traditional rhetorical theory to these projects. Her analytical approach is primarily artistic, and while she does address the artists’ original interests in using video games as media for building arguments, she focuses primarily on the technical and artistic aspects, not rhetorical or literary constructs.
In light of this limited body of research, it becomes clear that a gap exists in the field of rhetoric. Machinima projects have received focused attention from artistic inquiries, technical researchers, and members of the academic community at all levels. A rhetorical analysis of several machinima projects would at least partially fill the gap in the research.
Current situation
For almost thirty years, the concept of a computer-generated entertainment system has captured the imagination of writers, researchers, and countless children and adults who demanded more interactivity in their play. Beginning with the first AI-driven game, Pong, and the two-dimensional adventure game Super Mario Brothers, and evolving into the life-like graphics of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and Assassin’s Creed, these games have stirred the imagination of gamers and researchers alike. Playing and beating the latest game became a driving force for children through the 1980’s and 90’s.
Building upon those accomplishments, early gamers realized that their game consoles could be connected to a video recorder in order to produce simple movies of their conquests. Gamers eventually built upon this concept to produce full movies of their gaming excursions.(Lowood, 2007) Shortly after gameplay videos began circulating, gamers realized their games could also be used to produce simple computer-generated animated short films. This foretold the beginning of what would come to be known as “machinima.” Recently, more advanced machinima projects have entered some areas of mainstream entertainment. By replacing the soundtrack and using game characters as actors to tell their story, wildly popular television shows such as South Park and CSI: New York included video game-generated content in their 2007-08 seasons. Radio and television news programs have also reported on commercially successful machinima projects, such as Red vs. Blue, a comedy series solely utilizing the Microsoft console games Halo and Halo 2. (Chong, 2008) Despite the increasing popularity of machinima projects, the academic community has spent very little time examining the various creative and rhetorical aspects machinima projects entail. As the following literature review and subsequent theoretical constructs will reveal, there is a significant gap between what scholarly research has been conducted and where popular media is progressing. Given that there has been so much attention paid to machinima in popular media, it should follow that scholarly attention be paid to this burgeoning form of media. To that end, this thesis will examine machinima projects as participation within a discourse community by remediating existing intellectual property for new ends.
While so little scholarly research has been conducted regarding machinima as a whole, there has been a fairly large body of research into the parts and components that comprise the whole. These parts include the video games that are used, available software tools, and copyright concerns. Additionally, artists have taken to using tools similar to those used by machinima creators to remediate video games for their own artistic goals.
Henry Lowood’s article “High-Performance Play: The Making of Machinima” lends the most directly pertinent information to the scholarly examination of machinima projects. He begins by calling video games the “art form of the digital age.” (Lowood, 2007) Lowood explains that machinima projects combine gameplay communities, subversion, and gameplay performance into a single art form. Much of the introduction material from this proposal comes from Lowood’s historical analysis into the development of the first generation of machinima. He places a heavy emphasis on the fact that, since machinima is produced entirely using open-source or commercially produced computer software, movies made from video games reduce the cost concerns inherent in making movies. When producing a machinima, even in the earliest days of graphics-intensive video games, gameplay is the key. (Lowood, 2007) id Software, a pioneer in early game development, embraced the game communities which emerged around their flagship games, Wolfenstein 3D and DOOM, allowing gamers access to level design tools and early gameplay display capture software. The graphics and gameplay were top quality, but id Software took a step further and opened the source code of their games to gaming communities. This, Lowood insists, gave gamers the opportunity to improve id Software’s creations and maintain a vested interest in the game. Gamers were able to build new levels of the game, apply new “skins” to enemy characters, and even build entirely new games (Lowood, 2007). When id Software released the successor to DOOM, titled Quake, game developer John Carmack described it as “the coolest thing anyone has ever seen…” (Lowood, 2007). Again, id Software made all the development tools available to the gamer community, including a dynamic rotating camera tool. While DOOM only supported first-person camera views, Quake offered a third-person perspective that could be manipulated to view the action from different angles. This tool helped to build the first true user-generated, story-driven machinima movie, entitled Diary of a Camper. (Lowood, 2007) This first machinima, Lowood explains, demonstrated what could be done using the kind of tools that were originally reserved for game developers. Subsequent examples of machinima projects offer variations on this basic theme. This essay demonstrates the kinds of creative opportunities available to talented gamers with a desire to remediate traditional media into something wholly new.
However, Lowood does not examine the creative and rhetorical choices project developers make. Jim Andrews examines the remediation of games into artwork in his essay, “Videogames as Literary Devices.” In this essay, Andrews provides several examples of artists incorporating video games into their larger projects. For example, one piece called Pac Mondrian, which combines the classic video game Pac-Man with a Piet Mondrian painting, Broadway Boogie Woogie, uses the game engine as a metaphor for running through the very real streets of New York City. (Andrews, 2007; Hennessy et al, 2004) This kind of remediation is very similar to the production of machinima in that it re-imagines the game in a different context. Similar projects Andrews describes further demonstrate this kind of mash-up as works of art using new media. Hennessy’s explanation of Mondrian’s original work, which combines the emotions he felt when first experiencing the rhythms of New York jazz music with the city layout of the area surrounding Broadway, also demonstrates how different kinds of media can be combined to create altogether new artwork. (Hennessy et al, 2004)
Narrative machinima being the norm, there are art projects which take a much more abstract approach to remediating video games. Rebecca Cannon’s article “Meltdown” touches on certain key aspects of remediating video games for rhetorical means. While her work focuses on artistic modification of game engines, such as the work of the anti-war gamer community Velvet Strike, she also addresses a non-playable encounter called 9/11 Survivor. This user-created gamelplay modification was designed to depict the plight of a survivor of the World Trade Center attack of 11 September, 2001. This piece of user generated content, built using the Unreal Tournament 2003 engine, follows a businessman in one of the towers contemplating what had just happened before jumping to his death. The player has no control over the action whatsoever. The only control the viewer, now relegated to an observer stance, maintains is to change the camera angle around the central character. (Cannon, 2007) Technologically, this mod emulates the earliest gameplay videos Lowood described, where the videos had to be played using game engine itself, as opposed to watching a streamed video. However, the makers of the mod, unlike the pioneers of machinima described earlier, were pilloried by the public and castigated in mass media. Cannon explains that the modders were simply using their preferred medium to express their level of concern. It should also be noted that 9/11 Survivor was created as a class project, indicating some of the teaching possibilities of machinima in a pedagogical setting. (Cannon, 2007)
Cannon’s article comes closest to a true rhetorical analysis of machinima. She examines artistic mods in light of the arguments their creators are trying to make. However, she does not apply traditional rhetorical theory to these projects. Her analytical approach is primarily artistic, and while she does address the artists’ original interests in using video games as media for building arguments, she focuses primarily on the technical and artistic aspects, not rhetorical or literary constructs.
In light of this limited body of research, it becomes clear that a gap exists in the field of rhetoric. Machinima projects have received focused attention from artistic inquiries, technical researchers, and members of the academic community at all levels. A rhetorical analysis of several machinima projects would at least partially fill the gap in the research.
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