Mass Effect Footage: Opinions Sought?

[beccatoria]

OKAY SO.

Man, I have been busy. VIDUKON! In general I'm glad to say that I think most people had a good time, and hopefully the few things that did not go, err, smoothly, will be worked out at future cons, since people did seem keen to have another one. Which is aces! Also it really was awesome to get to meet a bunch of people for the first time, and to see a bunch of others returning - it started to feel...familiar, like a reunion, and that was nice.

Hopefully in the next few days I'll actually get together a bunch of recs and perhaps a slightly longer report on things.

But for now, because I am impulsive and stressed and realised (a) I have slightly more money than I thought this month and (b) you can, actually, buy a small HDTV for less than a hundred quid these days, I am...somewhat seriously considering getting one and then capping my own Mass Effect footage. So far I've been using generic walkthroughs from YouTube, which are fine as far as they go. Problem is not everything is easily available, and bluntly, I end up manufacturing a bunch of it myself with masking different sources together and it's sort of a nightmare. And I would like to be able to just...clip myself a standard library with all the major variations.

I mean, it's a stupidly huge undertaking either way. But.

HYPOTHETICALLY. IF I DID IT. Here is my dilemma:

What Shepard do I use?

No, no, of COURSE I mean Femshep, but what I mean is. I've been using what is, essentially, an amalgamation of the two default Femsheps throughout the series because it's generic enough it was easier to source footage and I didn't feel like I was ripping off anyone's custom Shep.

I also don't want to use either of my Sheps because, well, I don't particularly think I'll be vidding their journeys?

But I guess I have residual bitterness from that stupid competition they ran for the ME3 default face when of COURSE the generic blonde, white chick won. (And then they didn't even stick with that because they went back to the red hair which if they had to change the default model part way through at least they stuck with that much. *sigh*)

But on the other other hand, I do think there's something useful about using a character model that is as close to the "default" version as possible. We all have our custom Sheps, but we also all recognise Sheploo (man I hate that name, makes me giggle EVERY time) and a shaggy-haired redhead as "Shepard" too.

Especially the few vids I have actively planned, I kind of...don't want to necessarily read as though they're the adventures of someone's personal Shepard, but rather explorations of her as an archetype.

Which in turn brings us back to the unavoidable fact that the fact "default" Shepard is a white dude is all kinds of ist, and making her a chick only solves one of them. :/

I'm kind of leaning towards keeping the model I've used for my previous vids for consistency and because she's more recognisable. And that iconicness is actually pretty important to me. I want to vid...varying versions of the pop culture icon, not my game's playthrough. So, you know, I kind of want to stick with the Default (or as close as possible with Femshep since they kept changing it).

But I'm not totally comfortable with the way I'm leaning. Cus there's no avoiding the underlying reasons for how the default looks. Should I just jailbreak this thing and make an awesome new Femshep for vids purposes (including possibly remastering Machine into higher quality)?

EITHER WAY THIS WILL PROBABLY TAKE YEARS. o.O

[ETA! I should also say, if I do this, I would totally be willing to share footage with any other fine folks who wished to vid ME...]

Comments

[jetpack_monkey]

Are most captures done on televisions? I thought they were done on computer playthroughs, where you could removed HUD elements through the console.

In any case! I think you should just tweak the hell out of Shepard's looks until you come out with something that you wouldn't mind watching in cutscenes but is still recognizable Shep? So maybe keep the hair at the default cut. For some reason I use hair as a Shep touchstone.

Also, something that you can reasonable replicate across all three games. I hate the ME3 importer. I hates it so much.

[jetpack_monkey]

Additionally, I have a Mass Effect vidsong now, so I am looking at your project with great interest.

[beccatoria]

MWAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA SOON I WILL HAVE PEOPLE MAKING ~ALLL~ THE VIDS!

This project WILL probably take ages, but I'll keep folks updated. :)

[beccatoria]

Actually from what I can tell a fair number of youtube walkthroughs are done on capture card, but those aren't things where there's a preoccupation with getting rid of HUDs, etc. FRAPS or something on PC would probably be a better way to do it (and also easier to mod the saves, though you CAN do that on XboX at least for ME2 and 3) if I had a computer good enough to run the games at a decent graphics level and cap it at the same time, but alas, I don't, and can't afford one. :(

It's not a huge deal for me personally, though, because I've only been using the cut scenes where there aren't any HUD displays (though you do have to work around the dialogue circle) anyway and ME is cinematic enough there's a good amount of footage. Being able to get rid of HUDs for actual gameplay would be cool. But equally then everyone would see how awful I am at playing... I think I'm approaching it more as a music vid than a game vid maybe?

I think that the mop of red hair is definitely a very identifiable Femshep thing, which is why I'm reticent to move away from it, even though I'm already using an amalgamated version of the default (which involves changing the hair from the ME1+2 default to closer to the 3 one?). But equally that suddenly means it's very restrictive in terms of her background. IDK.

I think I probably will stick with it because it's so identifiable. But I just feel a little...uncertain. I'll sit with it a while.

[goodbyebird]

lol you ridiculous perfectionist completist doof, you. I adore it! But also pity you? Because if there ever was a big damn project, this is it. New tv sounds shiny though, either way. And I say stick with the default femshep. That's the one that's most recognizable, plus, you already used her in your first ME vid, since you're doing a trilogy you might wanna keep to the same visual? idk.

*glances up* And I see you are infecting others. Excellent.

[beccatoria]

YES. YES I AM A RIDICULOUS PERFECTIONIST COMPLETIST DOOF. (Though I dunno, in terms of ridiculous projects I've undertaken, I'm pretty sure organising a con and fan editing the entire back half of Battlestar Galactica's final season rank up there... o.O)

I think I am leaning towards sticking with the amalgam default. It's just...since I'm already using an amalgam of the first and second versions it felt...less justifiable, especially if I consider, for the first time, remastering a vid to get my first ME vid in shinier quality.

But also...I want that hit of familiarity when people watch the vids, even if I'm uncomfortable with why that's the familiar version. Eh, I'll sit with it a while, and probably stick with the defaultish version eventually. ;)

*cracks knuckles and gets back to infecting others*

[lunarwolfik]

It might work to use the default from ME2 and roll with that one, cause it avoids the lameness that was ME3 Shep but is still pretty iconic?

At the least, so long as she has red hair you're golden.

[beccatoria]

Yeah I really didn't like ME3 Shep. I'm leaning towards using the model - more or less - in my existing vids. Which is the default face in ME1 & 2 but the longer hair for two reasons 1) it's basically the hair from the ME3 default, just without the customised front spikey-bits so it's like an amalgamated version of both defaults and 2) the bob-haircut from 1 & 2 changes a fair bit in 3. The parting is suddenly on the other side, it's more round in shape. It's not massively disconcerting, but it's also...a change whereas the longer hair is consistent.

I do tend to agree with you that it's the red hair that's identifiable.

As I said, there are some reasons I'm not totally happy with rolling with that, but...at the moment at least, it's still how I'm leaning...

[lunarwolfik]

Yea the bob haircut basically took a huge turn for the worse in ME3. Actually a lot of Shep's look got kinda blah or just damn odd for ME3.

Are you gonna be posting the vids once you make them? Cause I'd love to watch them! (One can never have enough Shep and/or Shep/Garrus interaction!)

[beccatoria]

To be honest I wasn't a huge fan in ME2 because it seemed...lopsided to me, but I would have stuck with it if it hadn't changed in both shape and colour in ME3. Like, idk, probably it's fairly unnoticeable, but...I can't unsee it and it bothers me.

And yes! The plan is posting! Hopefully more news soon...ish? Though if you want to check out ME clips, YouTube is already pretty excellent for that - you can find most anything on there, just not, annoyingly, with your choice of Shepard and lack of subtitles. ;)

[lunarwolfik]

Overall, the hair selections were pretty slim pickings (don't even get me STARTED on M!Shep hair cause...damn, just, so depressing. Would some purposefully ruffled hair have killed them?)

Yeaaaa, that was my main problem, most of the vids online are SUPER PERSONALIZED Sheps and it just...weirds me out? Cause I'm watching and I'm just quietly mumbling to myself "you have the wrong gear...and hair...and face...YOU ARE NOT SHEPARD OMFG". >.>