Is the Open Movie Dead?

[projectwidow]

In my own experience doing my short film project (Project Widow)… there have been many good things as well as pitfalls and now that I am doing this by myself I guess that proves that SOMETIMES a community based film project can in fact stray.

When this project started it was intended to be a technological piece that could prove that Blender and Renderman could work together, we had tools developed and worked with all sorts of people from different backgrounds, from software developers to artists. We rendered a few shots, the tools delivered as promised but we wanted more than that, I wanted more than that. We needed a story because some shots of this was just that, it was worthless without some kind of story to draw people to want to see it, I mean other than CG geeks like ourselves. Mind you this was back when Blender 2.49 was brand new.

I guess over time things became complicated, Blender wasn’t able to do the things it can now at the time, the technical feasibility of Blender and Renderman was further explored by Matt Ebb, which in turn Brian Savory got involved and then further development by Pixar itself… we kind of kick started things back in 2009 to where things are now, which is cool to see from the sidelines. So yeah I guess that aspect of it we were successful in at least proving that such a thing could exist and deliver.

Anyway… we had a LOT of involvement from people all over the world at first. We were ambitious and driven but in the end it slowly dried up and now I am doing it solo (which is why it’s taking forever), not because of the people per se, more or less a cyclone storm of unfortunate events and technical difficulties that led the demise of it being an “open movie”. Now it’s more of a closed short that I just happen to write about on here as well as the blog.

Another thing we didn’t have was structure, get this done then do this… get that done and then do this… we were flying by the seat of our pants. Our modeler was great though and pretty much designed the entire world, the main character and well, everything. To this day those assets are in use. We had a storyboard artist draw up the starting point, I still have them and now they reside on my Kitsu server. We had software development for Aqsis, the shader editors, even an attempt at ad-hoc file sync which we called Arachnid (it died once we started to use SVN). Rigging and basic animation. All these little pieces formed the basis of a “community” and now reside on my hard drives.

I like to think that open movies are not dead, they just really are hard to create, develop and finish. That’s the hard part, probably the hardest part, is to finish. I have seen countless threads on here about people wanting to form a “studio” of sorts and create a short, a movie, a series, a game… etc… and they can gather steam for some time but eventually they fail and like I learned the hard way, they usually end up being shelved. Project Widow went into hibernation mode for 6 years while I tried to find myself and purpose in life, only to get resurrected and being the only remaining contributor.

Sorry for the wall of text I just wanted to throw some insight into the thread.

[Richard_Culver]

I don’t remember what the percentage was.

These days it would definitely be higher I imagine.

It was not until well after 2.5 and Sintel that a larger influx of professionals began to circle.

But this really peeked from 2.8 forward.

How many would work on the open Blender Studio projects for free? Don’t know. But I would not write it off completely.

Alright so my takeaway is that I think there is a value in getting professional feedback, some guidance and so on.

I don’t think community contributions should be a large percent and definitely not 100%.

But hey you can try. Go for it.

I think the real practical value is in learning and having a positive experience. Slaving for the hope that something might a) even get finished at all much less b) reap the promised rewards of sale - and whatever the successful completion of the project brings - would not under my definition constitute a positive experience for most artists who have the chops to contribute in a meaningful way.

That’s my opinion. And also based on the experiences I have heard reported by people involved in all-community-based projects. There are other opinions. But that is mine.

I think giving back to the community in ways of good experience should be measurable, realistic and immediately tangible. And giving to Blender should also be measurable and also immediately tangible, and not based on the possible outcome of the project which can not in any way be measured.

Again, this is my opinion. I know it is not shared by everyone.

But my reason for starting this thread was to get a finger on the pulse so-to-speak on the idea of an Open Project.

These are my takeaways from that.

[Richard_Culver]

@projectwidow

Sorry for the wall of text I just wanted to throw some insight into the thread.

Another wall of text person!

Welcome and thanks for the input.

I would respond more meaningfully but this thread is already full of my own walls. So I will keep it brief.

Your story is common. And so thanks for sharing!

[Richard_Culver]

Alright so in a very concise way, here is what I see as the ultimate open project outside of the Blender Studio. From my perspective.

First, it would follow the Blender Studio model with only a few minor tweaks as far as the community is concerned.

The first point would be that it would have to be an existing studio with some kind of track record, or a significant progress on a project, working together as a tight-knit production team. So it would have already gotten or somehow acquired some seed money. Or simply be a studio with enough track record to secure funds for a project.

The funding would have to be no-strings attached. Enough funding to complete the project from start to finish, or to finish one started. All people working with salaries. And the funding would have to allow for Creative Commons Attribution license for the film and all assets.

Now while these first two points might seem like a non-starter, I would not be so sure. I know of a lot of artists who survive from grant to grant. So it could be a series of grants or a single grant or someone looking for a sure tax write off.

However unless you crack some form of these first two points it is going to be a crap-shoot at best. In other words unless the stars align on these first two points I don’t think a project outside of the Blender Studio stands a chance of finishing.

But now, with these two boxes checked, we can move to the next items.

It is a given that the assets would be available for free. And I would propose putting them on a marketplace rather than trying to host and manage them. All in a state that they could be acquired as you would for any project from a marketplace as packs prepped for use by the public.

Of course a project that had enough assets that were not so stylized or bespoke that they could not be used for any project, would be a plus.

The next aspect would be community contribution. Under this, I see it quite the other way. How to contribute to the community. And this aspect I would put under an apprenticeship program. I have been running an apprenticeship program at my studio for a number of years now with a local Uni. So I have some ideas here.

But the gist of it is that if people are asked to contribute, they get something direct out of it. They get guidance training, experience etc. There is a lot to say about this. I could write volumes.

The next thing is training materials and documentation. Some way to bring the workflow process to the community, also free. The apprenticeship program would also fit into this training system.

And then finally, a budget to hire at least one developer, to contribute code to Blender in a meaningful way and also from the view of tools that address production issues in a studio, but that also could be merged with the release versions of Blender. This is not an easy one. But I think it would be a great way to contribute to Blender directly.

This might sound like a lot. And it is. But I think you also have to compare the small chances of this actually coming together, against the attempts so far which simply have not worked. It might be difficult to have all the stars align for this. But why not set something like this as the bar? If you don’t have something that approaches this, you don’t have something that has ever worked. I mean that is being real.

[Cairyn]

If you already have a studio and the funding though, and you’re paying the workers, you are in the realm of commercial production, so why would you want to make it an Open Movie at all? (Except if the project is crowdfunded, and you promised the assets to the contributors, but that’d not be “no strings attached”.)

I imagine if I’d do a movie, I would be better off to keep my assets for myself (lest someone starts to compete with me using my own creations), and have a commercial distribution venue to refinance the original funding, or to acquire funding for the next project. This hypothetical studio and its hypothetical funds won’t fall from the skies.

There are, of course, reasons to do noncommercial projects, like Blur Studios used to do short films as testbed, education, and self-advertising. Or Blender Studio itself as practical application and feedback generator for Blender. Or Pixar’s tech studies. Maybe you just want to create something as giveback to society, but beyond that, there is no necessity for Open anything under these conditions. (Which may be the reason why there are not many Open Movies around.)

It all leads back to the big ol’e Why? A movie, even a short one, is such an incredible sink for time and money that there must be a strong motivation to do it at all, even more if you’re going to give it away. Not everybody is a millionaire with an eccentric hobby.

• Learning, of course, is a valid motivation, but usually you don’t need to do whole movies to learn about a field or a technology.

• Socializing (or team-building, or finding like minds) is also great, but the scope of a movie is a challenge for any unpaid team. Maybe it’d be possible to do like an old fashioned club: have a common goal, meet up, chat, eat a barbecue, produce a movie.

• Doing it as your professional portfolio - maybe a bit over the top.

Excluding the commercial venue above, this leaves the creative reason: you absolutely, firmly, dearly believe that you have a story to tell that should exist in the world, and you do not have the means to do it on your own (no studio, no funding), so you use the Open Assets as a lure to crowdfund or entice others to contribute.

Wouldn’t that at least be a starting point when you do not have a studio? Do a small open project to prove you can do it and to generate interest, find collaborators, solve technical issues, learn all you can. Then use funds (or even just goodwill) generated by that project, plus the contacts and connections you now have to do a slightly bigger project. Work your way up to a full theatrical movie in several iterations. The Open-ness of anything produced along the way would just be a means to the end.

(Sounds cynical, but a movie - even when short - is just such a huge endeavor that I can’t imagine anybody doing it without secondary goals.)

[Richard_Culver]

I think those are all fair and well-thought-out points.

I think the one thing I have not talked about up to now is the why.

That will be different for each person organizing one.

And so I don’t have an answer to that which would apply to all.

I will say that life is not simple and rarely if ever are the reasons to do anything only on one layer.

The answers to these rhetorical questions, as we all know, are multifaceted.

Why Blender?

Why is it open source?

Why would anyone care to keep developing it for no profit?

And the Blender Studio open movies, sure the connection can be seen.

But the even here the reasons are multifaceted.

Agent 327 being developed as a Hollywood commercial film sheds light on the fact that there is more than meets the casual eye here even.

And then she sheer number of organizations that have contributed to Blender lately.

Why?

Why do that?

Tax write off?

It is never that simple.

And the more underlying almost elephant-in-the-room question is; are we all assuming that the Blender Foundation and the Blender Studio are the only organizations that will emerge with the purpose to do something good with and for Blender without the need to satisfy commercial for profit demands, and also succeed?

Just thoughts. I don’t have all the answers. Won’t even pretend to.

But I do have an opinion of what would make an open movie succeed as a project.

[joseph (J)]

@Richard_Culver

And the more underlying almost elephant-in-the-room question is; are we all assuming that the Blender Foundation and the Blender Studio are the only organizations that will emerge with the purpose to do something good with and for Blender without the need to satisfy commercial for profit demands, and also succeed?

I think there’s a small problem with this line of reasoning- the idea that you either work with Blender to “do something good with and for” as part of an open movie, or you work with Blender to satisfy commercial demands. This is a false dichotomy- there’s a huge third option, which I believe is by far the most common; people “doing something good with Blender” for non-commercial reasons in a non-open movie setting. Specifically, people making non-commercial “movies” or shorts that have no intention of releasing their assets or seeking community involvement. I’m talking about myself, currently, but also many, many, other creators I know who use Blender.

To that end- and to your question, “why open movies?” For me, the answer is simple; I have no interest in open movies, I don’t think anything I’m doing is worthy of releasing assets to the public, and even if they were, I don’t want them to be CC.

I think that, more than anything else, may explain why the “open movie” as a project format seems dead - it’s simply not a good option for a wide smattering of projects, ranging from non-commercial passion projects like my own projects to commercial projects

[BlenderBob]

We didn’t implement Kitsu yet.

So why is it that so many people connect open movie with “you have to contribute to the Blender code”? We are a bunch of people who decided to make a movie together. We decided to use Blender because it works for us as we obviously we are Blender users. But we’re not Blender programmers.

And even if we decided to give all the profits to the Foundation, our project is not a foundation project, it has nothing to do with the foundation. They are not involved in any way and we’re not asking anything from them.

That also means that we don’t have to do everything in Blender. We use substance for the textures. We’re thinking of using Embergen for some of the VFX. If we need do to compositing, we are probably not going to use Blender and we’re certainly not going to edit the movie in Blender. And the sound mixing will be done in something else. But maybe 90% of all the CG work will come from Blender.

But to develop code for the Foundation? Why? That’s not what we do. And we don’t feel like we have an obligation to do so.

[Richard_Culver]

Yeah, I think it is true.

I think I have achieved what I wanted to achieve with this thread. I wanted to explore all of these notions and also see what people thought currently.

If I was going to make an open movie, I would only do it if I could do it as I have described. As for reasons, I think it would be fun. It would be a blast to dive in and teach and learn and move forward to with a challenging project. As for motivations, they would be multi-faceted.

But I have no immediate plans for this.

Being pragmatic, it is best for me to move on from this topic.

[thetony20]

@BlenderBob

We didn’t implement Kitsu yet.

Ahh, OK, I look forward to hopefully seeing how the production ends up using it.

[sozap]

Hey that’s a fun project you’re doing here, it’s quite interesting to follow your progress !

@BlenderBob

Some people say that an open movie means that we need to develop part of Blender and give the code to Blender. We’re making a movie here, we’re not programmers. But we will release the geo nodes setups, already started with the bamboo generator. So now I call it a collective movie instead. Haters will hate.

I think the concept of Open movie follows closely open source. In the sense that you should provide the sources of the movie : which is all the assets, shots, render frames, so people can re-create the complete movie on their own if they like. And the creative process also is more or less open.
Just like you can take the sources of a software and build it you should also be free to add your own changes and redistribute all that if you like.

The only thing is that you should name your source, that is you can take sintel character and use it in Tiki movie if you mention that the Sintel character is from BF, Sintel movie project.

IRRC that’s how it was formulated by Ton when they launched the concept with Elephant Dream. It’s a very bold move to make a movie like that, and that limit a lot the possibilities for commercialization / distributions, on the other hand having access to a complete short film is amazing for educational, research or whatever purpose !

I’m kind of attached to that definition and I hope people won’t over-abuse the term. Community project is cool and very valuable too !

Good luck and have fun !

[sozap]

@BlenderBob

So why is it that so many people connect open movie with “you have to contribute to the Blender code”?

That’s weird, for sure Open Movies at Blender fundation is also a mean to push the development of blender forward, but that’s not mandatory for the project to become an Open Movie.
Anyway, if you don’t need to develop blender for your project you shouldn’t have to force yourself right ?

What Blender Studio is doing, is that they also release a lot of information about their pipeline and their process in a similar fashion, but I don’t think this is related to open movies.

To me Open Movie is really an extension of free software liberties but adapted to movie.
1/ you are free to access the files / source code and see how the movie / software function internally.
2/ you are free to use and modify .
3/ you are free to redistribute.

This apply to free software / Open Source Creative Commons and Open Movies.
If a software is lacking one of these liberties then it’s not open source anymore.

[Richard_Culver]

I think there is more to it than that.

The Community Open Movie as it has been promoted in the community is more or less, to be blunt. I want to make a movie (for whatever reason) and I don’t have all the time money or skill. So hey, if I say I am not going to get anything personally by giving up the rights to it with a CC license, then it will be ok to ask others to work for free, for some imaginary good of the community.

I have been very careful not to call out anyone in particular because this has been happening like a broken record for well over a decade. At least I know that now after starting this thread it is still happening.

My entire approach to this problem was to summarize what a successful Open Movie has been, using the Blender Studio as a model.

This is where contributions directly to the code comes from. It is a part of the successful model. And the successful model includes paying people.

Even studios outside of the Blender Studio have developers who modify Blender. And when possible these tools see their way into Blender.

So this is also a successful model for even a commercial project especially a feature project which is demanding, and usually requires modification.

This is also true outside of Blender and is in fact the core strength of Maya initially and why it was so widely adopted in the industry. Because extensibility was exactly how Maya was created.

This doesn’t mean you can’t succeed with vanilla Blender.

And also it is not saying you have to have Blender code contribution to call it an Open Movie. I think it is a strong plus.

And to cap this last point. Whatever your claim is, whatever contribution you are planning to make, if you are saying sales or fundraising for the film when completed is going to benefit anyone, or Blender development with contributions, or anything. My point is this has never worked.

What has worked is having a budget to pay artists and developers to improve Blender working together.

Until someone completes a project and actually gets funds then funneled into development, this Open Community Movie with volunteers is unproven.

I say it would be much more pragmatic to seek out nonprofit grants from corporations to do this outside of Blender Studio and pay everyone salaries. It would take a well organized and group with s track record to pull that off.

And it has been pointed out that, why would anyone do that? Well, the same motive anyone would have who likes creating stuff and seeing it help Blender.

It is the same motive stated by a community project.

I am not sure why it would be viewed as any different.

[sozap]

Hey ! That’s interesting points here !

I don’t want to mix the terms Open Movies and Community projects, it’s so different that it’s really dangerous to mix the term, unless it’s already over abused ?

I agree too about the funding, Open Movie != “Everyone working for free”, but that’s possible too of course. Some open source project are really based 100% on non-payed donation to the community, others uses different ways of funding, Open movies are the same to me.

And sure, blender managed to be that good because of the funding alongside a lot of volunteer donation, studio doing contribution, so yeah funding is important !

And how they put open movies was super clever, and you’re right, it’s a combo of movie + all the asset + big changes to blender source code + your name on the end credits + follow the creative process.
And since it was blender foundation they already had a lot of confidence in their audience which is super important too.

Like if you think about it, it looks like only them can manage to pull that out

@Richard_Culver

I say it would be much more pragmatic to seek out nonprofit grants from corporations to do this outside of Blender Studio and pay everyone salaries. It would take a well organized and group with s track record to pull that off.

I think this is what “Wires from Empathy” / Urchn project tried to do, but they didn’t manage to finish it apparently, so still it’s super tricky !

Anyway, I’m off, I can go on on that discussion for a long time and I got the feeling that we are nearly on the same page !

Have a good one !

[Richard_Culver]

@sozap

Anyway, I’m off, I can go on on that discussion for a long time and I got the feeling that we are nearly on the same page !

Agreed… I think some points were made at the end that I thought were maybe directly or indirectly attributed to me, so I thought I should explain.

To be clear, I myself personally never heard anyone say contribution to Blender was a necessary component to being an Open Movie.

What I said was in response to the claim over the years - again to no one in particular here - that part of the motivation for making an open movie was to use the funds raised as a contribution to Blender.

What I am saying in response to that is be pragmatic. Package the project to have direct contribution built into it if that is your intent. It will have a very definite effect on the possibility of the project success. Then, if the project is also successful and raises money for Blender, all the better!

Speaking for me personally. I have always had a plan to add a Blender developer or more to my studio when that made sense. Because as a studio it does put us in a position to contribute in a positive way.

In general, why not embrace the opportunity to make a difference to Blender in real time, as the project is happening? It just makes practical sense. The more studios doing that the better for Blender.

[Cairyn]

Separating the “funding” and “Open Movie” ideas of course makes the Openness a secondary (independent) thought. If I am not using the lure of the “free assets” or “contributions” to get people to give me money (or work, or freebies), but have it funded any other way, then I may or may not make the results ultimately Open; it doesn’t make a difference to the production.

Of course I may see actual advantages, especially by contributing code from my company tools to Blender (for better future integration). But I could select what I Open to the public (the code, any Python scripts, the assets, the characters…), or even change my mind mid-production what I will make Open and what not. In other words, Open Movie is just a label that I could slap on the finished product - or not. It doesn’t help the production of that specific project. (I may earn goodwill or attention with this label, or I may hope for community improvements resulting from my Open contributions.)

That makes Blender Studios practically the only venue with an interest in doing fully Open Movies, because their raison d’être is the very contribution to Blender. For everyone else, a selective contribution that matches their future interests is more pragmatic, keeping other aspects of the project private. And that would not be an Open Movie any more, going by the definitions dropped here.

(Personally, I would find the question much more interesting how to get a project off the ground if you don’t already own a studio and have sufficient crew to implement it - but that’s beyond the scope of this thread and has probably been discussed elsewhere already.)

[BlenderBob]

@Cairyn

Personally, I would find the question much more interesting how to get a project off the ground if you don’t already own a studio and have sufficient crew to implement it - but that’s beyond the scope of this thread and has probably been discussed elsewhere already.

Well, that’s what I’m doing with the Tiki project. I don’t have a studio, we’re starting from scratch and we are already 80 people working on it. My vision of open movie is that it’s open to anyone who wants to participate, but I have to change that because I got too many requests, not doing it for the money as all the profits will go to the foundation, and giving away all the assets for the film expect for the commercial ones like the plants. But everything we generated ourselves for the film will be released once completion.

[Cairyn]

I just started looking at your Tiki YouTube videos. Should be interesting to watch unfold! It’s great that you got so many collaborators so fast (but then, you are well known on YT so there’s a plus )

Giving all the potential profits away still means you need to cross-finance it from some other project of yours - at the very least you need to eat. I guess that question is answered somewhere already in the comments so I’m going to read through those. (Yes, crowdfunding etc, but will it suffice?)

(I just recently came to Blender from Cinema4D so I am too green to start anything or contribute anything, alas.)

[thetony20]

@Cairyn

That makes Blender Studios practically the only venue with an interest in doing fully Open Movies

But is it fully open, I mean apart from the final video, which is uploaded to Youtube, just about everything else is actually locked behind a subscription paywall.

And that largely continues even for older stuff. I mean Agent 327 is over 5 years old now, but still subs based access. In fact, on a minor funny side note, to be able to even comment on a blog post, you need to be an active subscriber, having an account isn’t enough.

Even Sintel has various parts locked away, some decade+ after production. Of course given how old it now is and the huge changes in Blender since, exactly how useful any of it would be is likely questionable, but still, can we really call it Open?

Possible that BlenderBob’s endeavor will end up as a rare actual Open Movie, guess time will tell.

[Richard_Culver]

Well, I think you might be missing an important aspect of the funding source. Under the current model it is understood that money donated is for the cause. This is clear. Yet the artists producer and developers are all getting paid at market rates mind you.

It is absolutely within the realm of the grant world (some people live in this world and make a living as scientists and even artists) to give grant money specifically for the purpose of a project to be open source. And it would be in the stipulation of getting the money that it be used in that way. And it is expected and even quite usual for the people getting the money to use it as salary and to pay others a salary. This is exactly how the Blender Foundation has operated since its inception. A combination of contributions and government grants.

Now the corporate world as jumped in, in a major way.

So the idea that an independent studio could get a grant to cover its overhead and salary to produce something for the community and give the assets away as a stipulation of getting the grant and offering it up as CC license is not at all an unusual or dubious idea.

These kinds of things happen all the time.

An open movie being made this way, I have never heard of. But then, one of the community attempts have worked.

Maybe it is time to do it another way.

So that is it on that point. I think I have talked about the rest of it now and over the years to leave it at that.