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Well the new episode is finally out, it took about 1-2 weeks longer than it should have for a lot of different reasons and has been the most problematic release so far for several other reasons. This episode contains an enormous amount of custom content I hunted down on the internet, as you'll see in the credits. So thanks to everyone who let me use their maps, models, and textures. The tone of this episode is a little different than the others as it was intended for an environmental contest that ended up getting postponed, but I'm releasing it anyway. It's a little fact-heavy as a result, most of the humor is towards the end. My primary reason for making this though was an excuse to use a one-liner I'd had in my mind for a while (the "hybrid car" one). And for those wondering, I took the corny title from the old computer game by the same name.
You should by no means assume anything said in Civil Protection or Freeman's Mind necessarily reflects my own beliefs, however this is one case where they do. The theme of this episode is how we're in big trouble once we run out of oil. The research I did on the topic suggest that things are going to get pretty ugly in the future. One expert interviewed by National Geographic says that the world oil supply is plateauing right now and we have about 6-8 years before it will start to decline and this guy was right on the money about when the U.S. was going to be be unable to rely on domestic oil back in the 70's. Besides what Mike mentions in the video (I won't spoil it), I think our only realistic solution is figuring out how to get cellulosic ethanol production to work on a mass scale (this isn't the same kind made from corn, sugar, and other crops). I'm not really a miltia type, but the more I read about the situation, the more it makes me want to live in a cabin out in the woods with guns and a bunch of canned goods. That would be a good place to be if society starts to fall apart. It'll be at least 10-20 years before things really get bad though.
If you hate this episode and think it's being too preachy, don't worry, this is probably the first and last episode of CP with any sort of "message". I'd rather focus on making funny, strange, or exciting videos anyway. Finally, check back in a few days and I'll have an update about what you can expect in the future with regards to CP and FM.
EDIT: I forgot ANOTHER person in the credits! Oh well, his nickname is "JakeyB" and he did the port of "The Postal Dude" model I used as a cameo in this episode.
64 comments:
Downloading Now ... Thx Ross
Hippie!
Nice! That was great - well done!
This episode had some great scenic shots. But now I want an alien invasion...
Well the sheer scale of this episode and the different maps/models used certainly makes this a great episode regardless of the 'lack' of humour.
Great Stuff !
Kick-ass work!
Great episode, I can tell that it was a lot of work to go through. Though I'm a bit confused, you mentioned in a recent announcement that this episode would be the longest one yet, correct? Well this one is possible the shortest episode yet. So did I miss something? I can only assume that it'll be explaiend in the next announcement.
Nonetheless, great episode, I can tell that it still required quite a bit of work, I congradualate you in another successful episode.
Great message
Ever thought about somehow printing T-shirts with the Civil Protection logo on it (without infringing possible copyright laws). You'd probably make some good money, I know I'd buy it. Or if not, could you possibly consider releasing the vector image for the logo so we could print our own?
Great episode. It's nice to know that there are people that actually care enough to get their message out. Good job! I can't wait for the next episode! Peace Out!
Cool. Now, release another Freeman's Mind please! That's my favorite series :)
CP is pretty good too though ;)
Hey Ross,
I love your work. Your videos are special in the fast as they are not very "dirty", or not using foul language as much as many other hit machinimas, which allows me to show them to my brothers. Although, I do have one favor to ask: would it be ok to upload all HD videos on filefront? This would allow me to save to my computer to watch, since i am frequently without an internet connection. Besides, I don't know about others, but the CP Episode 5 HD link doesn't work.
Thanks for the great work
Great work! I dont have any problems if you ever decide to do a similar episode. :)
Great job Ross!!
I thought that this was probably the most ambitious CP episode yet and you definitely pulled it off successfully. I really liked the variety of maps and characters and it was hilarious how you tied the whole thing back into Half-Life 2 at the end. Excellent work and I hope it does well in the contest!
Excellent episode, nice how you managed to keep a healthy degree of humor attached to an otherwise serious topic. The visuals were great too.
larry: You're a hippie, hippie!
anonymous guy: yeah, that was originally going to be for Halloween, I'll clear up everything in the next post
pjc: maybe, I haven't researched what would be involved in that. I don't have a vector drawing either, the logo isn't much bigger than what you see in the HQ version.
matthew: I can't promise all of them won't have language, but I really like it to count when I do use it. Filefront deletes your files if they go a couple days without getting any downloads is my main problem with it. I plan to set up mirrors once I get the new website up however. Don't worry, you'll get the high quality copies eventually, sorry they went down.
ben: Thanks, yeah it was tricky talking about today's world in the future of an alternate timeline.
Hey, Ross.
I was just wondering, what are the names of the maps you used to make this?
Outstanding job.
YEA! Thanks ROSS! I KNEW it would be out today. Call it a sixth sense (the ability to sense when a CP episode is out) but I knew it. Thank you!!
fantastic work but you scared the shit out of me.
Wow, Ross! I wasn't expecting this much, it's absolutely awesome! The mapping work was just mind-blowing, all the custom models would have been a pain to get working. I agree with the humor being excellent for the serious episode, I really really loved this one.
Thanks a whole bunch for your hard work!
Perfectly timed, it rhymes well with the current economy crisis (it is not strictly because of oil shortage, but certainly raises fears about how sustainable our current living standard is. I live in Europe, but my country also had an economy crisis in the past years.
So if you feel like any message to convey, feel free, CP anf FM are your artistic tools to do it.
And finally, I am looking forward the website, and are especially interested in the subtitles.
was this that BIG episode, or did you scrap the big episode idea
Well, to you and anonymous user 4, this isn't the episode which was stated to be the longest one. That has been slightly delayed to make way for this current one, so it isn't cancelled. I'm assuming it's because Oil's Well is for a machinima environmental contest, and it'd be better to get out of the way first.
Still, once the second Noesis tutorial is done, things will pick up fast.
Yay! *starts loading!*
Wooow,
Thank you Ross, I really enjoyed that trailer.
Could you tell us release date of the full Oil's Well movie?
:D :D :P
A.
Holy crap I AM IMPRESSED!
The 7-Hour-War scene was so god-damn EPIC!
Great episode Ross.
Loved it.
Very high-quality piece. More a work of art than of humour - the joke is easy to see coming. Still funny though (the corpse conveyor is the best piece of dark humour I've seen in a long time). And, as 'erikiller' said - "The 7-Hour-War scene was so god-damn EPIC!" In fact, Epic sums up almost the whole thing. Which brings me back to the point about art.
Well done!
A little too long-winded (especially since a lot of people SHOULD know this stuff by now), but it's still awesome. Love the Postal Dude cameo and the final line.
Arkon, are you joking or actually serious? This isn't a trailer so you know, this is the full episode of Oil's Well.
You might have been confused with the posts above, or perhaps it's just me who's confused.
This just seemed a little preachy to me. And there wasn't much humor in it.
Great maps, great models.
I'm sad though because my English skill sucks and I couldn't
really understand what Mike said in the whole movie.
Anyway, great job. Maybe I can read the script while watching this episode later.
Keep up the good work!
g. b. jackson: I'll try and put up a post in the forums naming the maps in a day or two.
anonymous guy: If I scared you, then mission accomplished.
otto: well good, maybe you can takeover more of the audio next time
kuangeleven: I don't plan on making any more episodes with a message to them. And the website and subtitles are going to be a priority, I'll talk about that soon.
james: No on both counts, I'll talk about it more in the next post.
arkon: sure, just as soon as somebody commissions me
ErikKiller: Ha ha, thanks, I tried to do it justice; I figured the Combine wouldn't be messing around.
dirdle: Well this is just the beginning of dark humor from me, there will be more of that coming with CP and other works. As for art, that might be a stretch, though the main music theme I used I think really helped sell it, it helped create just the mood I wanted.
last anonymous dude: Yeah, it was because it was for an environmental contest, but I'm still happy with how it turned out. Variety in episodes has been a goal of mine from the beginning for CP, but don't worry, I'll make sure the next one is just them screwing around again.
ed: It might be another month, but I hope to get the script and subtitles up on the new site.
Man,this is depressing. Watched the news, watched a movie called 'Into the wild', and now this...
Aint saying anything bad, you did a good and rightful job...
but after all this, kinda want to spend my life as good as possible, while I can.
It must have taken a lot of work to set up all those scenes! It looked very clean and the camera and lighting were beautifully done. I'm already looking forward to your next video.
I just finished watching the new episode and it sounds sort of like a PSA at the beginning lol.But then at the end the Aliens arrived!
Nice work Ross.
:D
Funniliy enough, I'm writing a sociology paper on the subject of oil. Also, I noticed one of the dead bodies on the conveyor belt had a skin from a custom pack made by Marphy Black for the Zombie Master mod (http://www.zombiemaster.org/smf/index.php?topic=6230.0), but forgot to credit him.
chewy: All those skins I used from a skinpack by Russell Harris. If he took them from somewhere else, he didn't leave the name of who made the originals. I really did try to credit everybody.
Oh, I really love this episode. Great work!!!
P.S Can I get the script of this? I want to make a Korean subtitles.
Great Job Ross!! Woop I'm in the Credits!!
I loved the line about Hybrid Cars and Corpses! And fishing with a Machine Gun! Ha!
Nice episode - interesting to see a more serious side. Just hope certain politicians don't see this and get bad ideas about using genocide to "solve" crises in real life...
Anonymous: "want to spend my life as good as possible, while I can" - it's that kind of attitude that causes these kind of problems in the first place. One of the key reasons alternative fuels haven't really taken off is because the powers that be are raking in loads of profit from the oil industry - and want to "want to spend their lives as good as possible, while they can" i.e. getting rich off oil rather than gambling on the financial risk known as "change"
Awesome Ross <3
I approve. and Electric cars are the way to go!
Hydrogen really is the biggest joke on 4 wheels.
It would take twice the electrical energy just to make water into hydrogen to then sell like gas to put in cars that turn the hydrogen back to electricity to power an... Electric car!
That is right people. A Hydrogen Fuel Cell car is just an electric car with a complex power system. One that can be refilled only at a hydrogen fueling station most likely owned by shell or texico or BP.
Go Watch "Who killed the electric car?" you will be so pissed afterwards you may punch a baby!
PS im not a tree hugging hippy. I just hate paying loads to run my car.
eh, i am dissapointed, 500 yrs to make a 5 min vid. it was okay. :(
myrrh: I haven't updated this one yet and it went through several rewrites. I plan to put all the scripts up once I get the new website up.
chuck: The problem is more lack of government intervention since you can't count on business to do what's best for civilization. I'd say all the individual can really do is prepare for a regression of society
f12bwth: Yeah hydrogen is a joke. The problem is more imminent than what it can deliver presently.
karanjhala guy: This one took me a little over a month to make, most of my time has been spent on the tutorial. More CP is coming and it will be out faster than previously.
Hehe, your '500 years' was mostly spent on three other movies. Two being of Civil Protection and one being for Noesis, I trust you know. This fourth one was actually made pretty quickly, I think.
quite different than the other ones but i really enjoyed it aswell.
mirror:
http://civil-protection.ziphoid.com/vid/files/CP06-OilsWell-1280x720.wmv
I thought the video was very VERY well done, yet a bit to preachy for my taste. I watch stuff like this to escape from everyday life's problems. So I am happy to hear that you don't plan on releasing any more "FOR THE CAUSE!!! CHAAAARGE!" videos. ;-)
I honestly think though that you should start a large scale production of a Seven Years War movie. Some of the footage in this video was pretty cool. However, when you mentioned the fact that this video was really hard to make, that was kinda like "aaaaw, then I suppose he might now =(" But hey, if you are ever not planning on releasing any more CP or FM or tutorials (yeeeea, like THAT will ever happen!) Perhaps you will indulge yourself in this idea. =)
Thanks for the new vid! Keep it up!
mike & dave fan: awesome man, you'll have to contact me once I get the new website up, I'd love to have more mirrors.
shifty: Yeah don't worry man, this was more of a one-time deal, I promise Mike and Dave will just be screwing around in the next episode. This video actually wasn't the hardest to make at all, it was definitely easier than episode 2 or 4. What was frustrating is that it was meant to be more of a collaborative effort and I ended up having to do a lot more of it myself than I planned on.
Thanks for the masive update and the new CP episode.
I'm curious to see how you'll handle the rest of Half-Life.
In the mean time, I'll be enjoying some fishing with Dave. :)
man u should have mirrors for download. i cant download from damn filefront. tnx mike&davefan for mirror. upload on rapidshare will be appriciated =)
You do a great job, but am I to really believe in "fossil fuel"? Oil cannot come from bones, its illogical. Peak Oil is a scam.
http://www.engdahl.oilgeopolitics.net/Geopolitics___Eurasia/Peak_Oil___Russia/peak_oil___russia.html
http://www.infowars.com/articles/economy/peak_oil_index.htm
http://www.infowars.com/?p=2347
info_warrior: "fossil fuel" is just a term. Most oil comes from ancient swamps and most of it is plant matter, look it up if you want to know more about its formation.
By "peak oil", I'm referring to us not finding more oil than what we're consuming, meaning, the finite supply of oil is going to go down as time passes. The articles you're pointing to are primarily talking about artificial pricing, using peak oil as a scapegoat. I'm sure there's plenty of validity to that too. Finally, I agree, Russia is probably is NOT in peak oil right now, since they have the largest deposit on Earth and they're not an OPEC nation, so they're able to basically hoard it for themselves. What I'm talking about is GLOBAL consumption, which includes places like the USA, most of Europe, China, India, and many other countries which are highly dependent on oil.
If peak oil existed, the price of oil would be much higher than it is now; instead the price of oil is quickly decining. I am confident we will always be able to find new sources of oil-there is no peak oil. Renewables just produce too little power and cost too much, although the most dangerous scam by far is ethanol. Government intervention usually just enriches the vendors of these ineffective technologies. The real solution is to end urban sprawl and drill everywhere.
DUDE! My GOD that was incredible! The facts sure, whatever. But the level of *detail* you went into with each and every scene. Ok granted, some may have already been "made", but the people, cars, camera angles, character animations, and all other custom work was absolutely shocking.
It's not every day...or even YEAR, that I come across a Machinima with this much attention to detail and level of workmanship. Even if I was completely against what you were saying (which I'm not...we ARE screwed), I would *still* wet myself at the entire production.
GOOD JOB. Shit, why can't more people do stuff like this?
anschluss: We're plateauing right now, you won't start seeing huge increases in oil prices until it starts declining. This is still a decade or two off. You're confident we will always find new oil, but the amount of new oil we have been finding has been declining since the 60's. This hasn't been a huge problem yet because we've had a crapload in the Middle East and Russia. I agree about ethanol and say so in the video, I also decry hydrogen technology, which is an energy sink. For the cost, electric vehicles are MORE efficient than oil. Their range is getting very close to that of gas cars (depending on the models) and the tech is getting better all the time. This won't solve all oil dependency problems, but it will buy us a hell of a lot of time. Finally, as for drilling everywhere, we're not talking about water, oil simply doesn't exist everywhere and it takes tens of thousands of years to form.
cbi elite: Thanks, I actually pay a similar level of attention to detail to all the CP videos, the difference being it's more obvious in this one since it's a variety of maps as opposed to time spent on subtle animations. I plan to have all CP episode meet a certain quality level, but you'll hopefully be glad to know my most impressive stuff is still yet to come.
Extremely well done... albeit in the tone of a lecture for the most part.
It has at least been interesting to see the consumers' and producers' reactions with the recent spike in oil futures - due to the 'safe haven' of commodities not supply, as is evidenced by the current falling prices - to see what the initial reaction can look like.
And yes, mass-produced cellulosic ethanol can not come soon enough. Definitely better than the 'clean coal' euphemisms.
Ever read about Whale Oil, and the switch from it?
Great job Ross! Keep them coming!
The dead body gag was genius man, good way to deal with such a heavy subject. One downside, genocidal alien invasion seems like a really good idea right now. Ah well, no pain no gain I guess 0_o
Actually, in some cases, a loss of population can sometimes make things much worse because you don't have so much people working on getting the food and resource and all that.
Heck, some countries desperately need immigrants to fill in their jobs. For oil consumption though, there's so very many people.
Hello Ross :)
Could you publish english subtitles for Oil's Well please? They may be in SRT, SSA or any other sub format :)
Thank you
You may not be a militia type, but get out to a range and try shooting a gun. You've shot a Glock 17 in HL1, and an H&K USP in HL2. Now it's time to do it in real life! =D
Also, great episode. Great message, great cinematography. I especially liked the use of the Frank Lloyd Wright house.
brambor: I don't have them yet, but I plan to get them up eventually
coyoteatquiznos: Ha, I've fired a Glock .22 and an MP5 actually. It was part of this student course I took with the police when I was getting my degree.
the future may not be THAT bad. my chem professor says Canadian gov't is working on an alternative solution that might work(can't believe we're falling behind Canada..) which is to extract hydrocarbon clathrates under the ocean. Apparently there's enough to last for hundreds of years. Then the dilemma would be: energy or global warming?
That was awesome. Did you find a map with the synth, or was it custom made?
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