One Crew. Half a Ship. No Idea.
If you are an EVE: Online player, you should be familiar with the Clear Skies trilogy. Even some of you who may not have played EVE, but follow the machinima community, should know what it is. For everyone else, this review is for you.
Clear Skies is a trilogy of films written and directed by Ian Chisholm that were released online, which qualifies them as to be considered a web series. It is centered around the crew of the Clear Skies, a Tempest battleship. The crew consists of Captain John Rourke, Charlie Fodder (Gunnery), and Solomon Burke (Engineering), however they are joined by a few other people on occasion. Now, there is not really just one story across the trilogy, it's more like 3 separate stories, with some carry over between them. It is because of this that this review will be more like 4 reviews in one (Review-ception?), a mini one for each part of the series, and one for the series as a whole.*
The first part of the series was just a short 45 minute story essentially introducing us to the characters. As a first effort, it was quite good. It introduced us to the main 3, as well as gave us a compelling story to follow. My rating for Clear Skies 1 is 8 stars. This is mainly due to it being somewhat slow and there not being as much action as a sci-fi film should have.
Clear Skies 2 goes a bit more in depth into the groups backstory, and gives us even more action. The action in this comes to us in the form of a giant space battle. Epicness ensues. On top of this, we see a few people that had minor parts in the first movie, and they get their fair share of screen time. The second movie runs about 45 minutes, like the first, but gets 10 stars. The reason the sequel gets a perfect score is the addition of the added action, as well as the more in depth backstory.
Clear Skies is a trilogy of films written and directed by Ian Chisholm that were released online, which qualifies them as to be considered a web series. It is centered around the crew of the Clear Skies, a Tempest battleship. The crew consists of Captain John Rourke, Charlie Fodder (Gunnery), and Solomon Burke (Engineering), however they are joined by a few other people on occasion. Now, there is not really just one story across the trilogy, it's more like 3 separate stories, with some carry over between them. It is because of this that this review will be more like 4 reviews in one (Review-ception?), a mini one for each part of the series, and one for the series as a whole.*
The first part of the series was just a short 45 minute story essentially introducing us to the characters. As a first effort, it was quite good. It introduced us to the main 3, as well as gave us a compelling story to follow. My rating for Clear Skies 1 is 8 stars. This is mainly due to it being somewhat slow and there not being as much action as a sci-fi film should have.
Clear Skies 2 goes a bit more in depth into the groups backstory, and gives us even more action. The action in this comes to us in the form of a giant space battle. Epicness ensues. On top of this, we see a few people that had minor parts in the first movie, and they get their fair share of screen time. The second movie runs about 45 minutes, like the first, but gets 10 stars. The reason the sequel gets a perfect score is the addition of the added action, as well as the more in depth backstory.
However, due to some work from Sol and Charlie, the crew ends up with a ship again. This prompts them to go after the people who made them lose their ship in the first place and another epic space battle takes place. The third move gets 9.5 stars from me. Although the camera work as a whole is better, there are a few scenes where the movement just was too much, hence the loss of a half star.
Now that you have a (very) general idea of what the trilogy is about, I will tell you a bit about how the movies were created. All three of the movies were created using the Source SDK (hence the Half-Life characters being the bodies of everyone in film) and assets from the popular MMO, EVE: Online. All the interior shots, as well as a few exterior shots, were created in the Source SDK, with EVE providing all the space combat and outer space shots.
The third film added a few other interesting things that the first 2 didn't have. Clear Skies 3 was partially filmed using motion capture. Overall, this resulted in some better camera/character movement, but sometimes it didn't (this was the movement that I was referring to above). However, there was another addition that was infinitely better than the motion capture.
After the success of the first two films, CCP, the creators of the EVE game, invited Ian Chisholm to Iceland for a tour. It was on this tour that Mr. Chisholm was gifted a version of CCP's Jessica, the graphics engine that they use to make their game trailers. This allowed for some insane ship sequences. It also allowed for some ships to be used that may not have been able to be used otherwise. Due to this, it gave closure to the series as a whole.
 |
| The Clear Skies trilogy gets 9 stars |
Combined, the trilogy gets 9 stars. This is a very good rating, especially for something that is fan-made. And even though some things aren't necessarily canon in the EVE universe (one thing that comes to mind is how the ships are piloted), it still is a good way to introduce non-players to the game. If you want to check the series out for yourself, they can be downloaded from the Clear Skies website or on YouTube. You can also buy a DVD of all three from the CS site (BluRay copies are sold out) if you so desire. Fly Safe everyone.
*I will keep the spoilers to a minimum.
Have an idea for a review?
And don't forget to subscribe!
No comments:
Post a Comment
Leave your 2¢ worth...