EDUCEDGE,

–Pre-flight checklist–

Step 1: Control Panel
1-Plug in your phone-mic headset
2-Control Panel /Sounds and Audio Devices / Audio (select your headset otherwise Microsoft will keep the default) / Apply / OK
3-repeat 2 for Voice (select your headset)

Step 2: Open FRAPS
1-Verify all preferences for movies
2-FRAPS movie will go to my desktop / FRAPS
3-Minimize FRAPS

Step 3: Follow each step describe below to set up Second Life for filming (’setting preferences’).
Red Arrow/Beam
Click on map button or View / World Map
Click on CLEAR button (right side of screen)
Chat Bubbles
Click on Edit / Preferences / General Tab
Under Show Names: click Never
Open/Close the Debug (Client) Menu
CTRL-ALT-D (opens the Client and Server menus)
On client menu: disable camera constraints
Decrease draw distance
Edit / preferences / Graphics
128 or lower is easier on the computer (higher if landscape shots or distance objects)
Mouse Sensitivity
Click on Edit / Preferences / Input & Camera
Increase mouse sensitivity
Mouselook Shortcut: M
Close Chat text entry field
Edit / Preferences / Text Chat / Close chat after hitting return / apply-ok
Hit return (chat should disappear)
Type M (otherwise, use View / Mouselook)
Use ESCAPE key to get out of Mouselook
Window Size
File / Set Window Size/ 640×480
Get Rid of UI (Turn on and off using these shortcut keys)
HIDE/Show interface: CTRL-ALT-F1
>>Go into Mouselook (M), Hit ESCAPE or M again, then get UI back (CTRL-ALT-F1)

Step 4: Action!
Record
Click F9
>the counter on the upper left corner of the screen should go red
Stop recording
Click F9 again (counter should turn yellow)
Preview what you’ve filmed
Go to Desktop / FRAPS / [secondlife movie]
double click to open (will open in the default software. Mine is Microsoft Media Player)
>note that sometimes the movie does some jerking at the beginning. Allow for post-editing by recording a little bit longer in order to dismiss the first few seconds of jerking.
>need to switch from touchpad to external mouse. Filming should become smoother when panning or orbiting.

Step 5. Post-Production Editing
Open Microsoft Movie Maker
Import Video
Drag clips in tab to create movie
Select effects
Post to Blip.tv

(Forget Jumpcut and forget VirtualDub. If you have Microsoft Movie Maker, no need for extra steps such as compressing. It’s doing it automatically. Just make sure to choose that document when uploading to blip.tv)

Several techniques exist:

1-$10 per upload via the SL UI: simple click, browse, upload. Your pic (.jpg) shows up in your texture folder

2- Flickr2SL board and Flickr stream: Miki Gymnast’s Flickr2SL is free (Rezzable 04 (152,111,648) but you must own the land for this to work.
How-to: upload images to Flickr, tell Flickr2SL board to look at the right stream, navigate the Flickr stram using a couple of button on the board. (Meredith Wesolowski, SLED 3/09/08)

Also Snagit has a plugin to upload any snapshots to Flickr. Other suggestions: pre-loading .jpgs of PPT -upload with Snagit and display with Flickr2SL board.

3- FreeView (Ross Perkins, SLED 3/07/08)

OK, after many many trillion hours of hesitation, I finally jump in.

So first of: the SL buit-in movie capture tool does not work. It is broken and the Lindens have mentioned that they do not intend to fix it. They are happy that users use 3rd party such as Alt-Zoom, FRAPS, etc. I wish that they’d simply remove the button from the UI.

Yesterday, I tried my hand at the Alt-Zoom camera. I had my screen split in 2: on the right, SL with my av in my office and my inventory open at the Machinima Starter Kit object. On the left, the “How-To: Alt-Zoom camera video.” I paused the video each time a step was explained so that I can replicate in SL. To note: the instructions coming with the Starter are in somewhat different order as the video’s…so I followed the video because I felt that starting with positioning the camera first was more logical than starting with the waypoints.

[switch to present tense] My first /action provides an error. Something to do with time. Odd. I replicated the 3second delay as shown in the video. So I decide to take all the waypoints back in my inventory and start again…except that the waypoints seem to have gone. I cannot see them. So I assume that they disabled themselves and went back to my inventory (really?). So I set up my waypoints again around my office. This time it does not work because the system won’t add the waypoints: Obviously, there are enough in the vicinity. That’s my clue that my first waypoints have not disappeared. Just gone transparent.

So after hunting them down (screen set on midnight and following the pulsating signals), I click eventually on a couple ones. But there is one that keeps not wanting to get caught. So I tp to Info International thinking to replicate my video skills with my Lakhota booth.

I arrive in the middle of a discussion among the librarians. I am greeted by Rolig and before I go toward the map, I throw the question out there: “Anyone knows how to recover waypoints that have gone transparent?” Rolig answers: Ctrl-alt-t. “Really?” I add. “Be right back.” I rush to my office, press ctrl-alt-t and pooffff! everything gets highlighted red and become transparent. Now I see my waypoint -quite clearly- I click, take it in my inventory and fly back to Info Island. “Rolig, this was magic,” I thank her. Now I fly to my booth to repeat setting up my Alt-Zoom camera.

This time, I use only 3 waypoints so that I don’t crowd them. Click on film, type /action, and…… YEAH! It’s working. I see it! I see my av. sitting on the camera, flying along the path I built with the waypoints. Now, I get off the cam, collect all my waypoints (to clean the place….would not want unnecessary clutter in a space already limited in prim number), and ….wait…where do I find my movie?

I read somewhere that it would go directly to my disk….but maybe i was supposed to have set up my UI accordingly. Ah! ok, well. At least, i’ve got the Alt-Zoom screen capture figure out. Now to figuring out the “record and RETRIEVE” next step. No retrieve, no edit. Which everyone agrees, the edit room is where the movie actually happens. [I certainly did not know that I would have gotten myself into learning movie making skills ...and storyboarding...and editing...and...when I started this doc program].

Next step, buying FRAPS and setting it up. mmmmmmm, I think i’ll do the easy stuff first…like getting myself an account with blip.tv (which I’ll keep for my personal use) and jumpcut for the machinima edit. maybe I’ll try both. later. Jumpcut first, since this is what they used in the video tutorial and jumpcut seems to be an all-in-one solution for post-production.

March 9:
Just found a shortcut to the SLmovietest1.avi…But the search tool tells me that the doc was moved or something and so the shortcut is no longer valid. Ah! good one. I  can’t find the document anywhere. local disk, my documents….?