Drakan Music Video

Discuss Drakan: The Ancient's Gates with other players (no spoilers please!)
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Riftweaver
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Drakan Music Video

Post by Riftweaver »

After seeing many video game based music videos around, I figured Drakan could use some attention. I've already come across two Drakan music videos who's link I'll post at the bottom of this post.

I'm looking at recording footage from the PS2 game "Drakan: TAG" and then editing it, along with adding in a "yet to be decided music track" and that's where you guys come in, I'm looking for suggestions as to what type of music you'd like to see in it, along with any comments or ideas you may like to add.

Mighty Wings - Drakan - Arokh
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ax6abPNSDJo

Drakan: The Ancients' Gates Music Video "Up Up Up"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0l5IFcl5 ... re=related

Riftweaver
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Post by Riftweaver »

I'm putting a list of ideas together as to what music tracks I could use and how they could relate to Drakan as far as theme/lyrics go.

The first place to start would be from the music and themes found within the Drakan video games, I've downloaded both the OOTF and TAG music tracks, many thanks AT and anyone else who may have helped out, along with the artists who created them.

(1) Drakan music tracks
(2) Bring me to life by Evanescence - The idea of this one comes from how Arokh was sleeping in stone before being awakened and soulbound to Rynn.
(3) Fighter by Christina Aguilera - I've seen this one associated with female warriors such as Xena.
(4) The Fire burns forever by Hammerfall - Supported with the images of Arokh and other dragons, this could turn out well.
(5) Pirates of the Caribbean Soundtrack - Seems to have an action/adventure feel to it.

Currently I'm looking using (1) Drakan music for the title and credits with (4) The fire burns forever to support the edited videos from Drakan TAG.

Eris
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Post by Eris »

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Riftweaver</i>
(1) Drakan music tracks
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></font id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
Well, as this is going to be a TAG MV, I think it will be weird to have OOTF music in it (haven't tried that yet so maybe I'm wrong), so you'll have to use TAG music and for me actually it was not very impressive. With the exception of the Main Theme (or Adrellian Isles 2) which associates more with the menu and credits, so you can probably use this for nicely credits...
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">
(2) Bring me to life by Evanescence - The idea of this one comes from how Arokh was sleeping in stone before being awakened and soulbound to Rynn.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></font id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
I think this song suits Rynn from OOTF fine, but not for Rynn from TAG. Besides, the music associates more with cyberpunk than fantasy.

Actually I was thinking about making a Drakan MV too a long time ago [:)], and what I thought would perfectly suit Drakan was Within Temptation music, it's symphonic metal and goes very nicely with fantasy, open areas, nature and brave warriors etc. There are also many songs to go with dungeons (the heavy ones). If you like the idea you can take a look at these songs: the howling, our solemn hour, final destination, the other half, the promise. I'm not sure about 'stand my ground', 'deceiver of fools' and 'towards the end', but take a look at these too.
And the best one IMHO will be Dark Wings, it's exactly about Rynn and Arokh.

P.S. my fav song from Within Temptation is The Cross, but the lyrics are not very suitable to Drakan. Though it's a very energetic song, very nice to listen when playing MP : ) So check it out too...

Riftweaver
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Post by Riftweaver »

Sweet thanks for that, you made some interesting points, I'll take a look at the Within Temptation songs and IMHO by Dark Wings. You know the game developer for "The Chronicles of Spellborn", created an official music video for their game using "the howling" song, it seems like they even filmed the singer and added in custom CG effects as well as game play footage. I'll keep you up to date on the Drakan music video's progress, when I get another chance to work on it, I'm getting busy at the moment.

Riftweaver
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Post by Riftweaver »

Current Status: Preproduction (Researching Hardware & Software used to capture Audion/Video from Gaming Consoles).

Currently I'm looking at recording gameplay and in-game movies from Drakan TAG using the "Dazzle DVC107" video capture device, which seems to be one of the preferred products within the machinima community, so far as I've read.

If you would like to record video games either on the PC or via the Consoles such as the PS2 or X-Box360 etc, it maybe best to look at the machinima community first, as video games seem to be more demanding on capture devices then say transferring an old VHS tape to DVD which many of these products are generally designed for. Currently from what I've read the Pinnacle "Dazzle" Capture product seems to be the "tool of choice" by many gamers and machinima enthusiasts when recording from video game consoles such as the Play Station 2. If you are looking directly from PC games i.e. Drakan: The Order of the flame or World of Warcraft, I'd recommend a software program called FRAPS as it doesn't seem to effect the frame rate and general overall performance of your game like some other programs I've come across.

Common recording problems people have when capturing from a video game console: http://forum.easycap.co.uk/index.php?topic=63 (This relates to the easycap product, but these problems are also visible in similar capturing devices).

Eris
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Post by Eris »

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">

I'll take a look at the Within Temptation songs
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></font id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
Also, if you would like smt more kind of breathtaking, you could use the new age stuff like Era or maybe smt like Apocalyptica. Besides, this music is without lyrics so it'll be much easier to find smt suitable from there.
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">
You know the game developer for "The Chronicles of Spellborn", created an official music video for their game using "the howling" song, it seems like they even filmed the singer and added in custom CG effects as well as game play footage.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></font id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
No, I didn't know that, thx. Watched it yesterday, and it's a nice video, though I was expecting more

Eris
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Post by Eris »

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Riftweaver</i>

Common recording problems people have when capturing from a video game console: http://forum.easycap.co.uk/index.php?topic=63 (This relates to the easycap product, but these problems are also visible in similar capturing devices).
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></font id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
Capturing from console seems to be so difficult. I wish you luck with that. While on the other hand, it has to be very easy with PC, but I still've got problems with my onboard audio : (. Well, maybe I'll use the audio card from the other older PC with this one and try to make a video too, someday. Or that will probably be a complete OOTF walkthrough like speedrun but without using shortcuts and game bugs, in response to the one that this guy from planet drakan has made...

Riftweaver
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Post by Riftweaver »

Current Status: Preproduction (Audio/Video Capture Successful)

After about 2 weeks of research I found two products that work well with devices such as the PS2 and X-Box 360 which use RCA connectors.

(1) Pinnacle Dazzle DVC107 - Great Video/Audio Quality, good response time and reliable.
http://www.lakopacific.com/page/Product ... 38567&pid=

(2) Pinnacle Video Transfer Device - Video/Audio Quality is not as good as the above product (DVC107), but records without the use of a computer (which is great if your console is in a different room or if for some reason you are unable to connect it to your PC).
http://www.lakopacific.com/page/Product ... iPod__PSP/

Although (1) DVC107 was my first choice, it turns out there's a bit of a supply problem here in Australia and it seems to be sold out state wide, so I decided to try out the (2) Pinnacle Video Transfer Device instead. While the recording may not be as good as the original source, it's still better then most videos found on youtube, the audio is great and there are no lip-sync problems and as of yet I haven't seen any lag.

From here I'll be recording the entire game so I'll have a better idea as to what I'm dealing with. I still have to finalize what audio tracks I'll be using but all of the suggestions are helping, I'll put together a ranked list later on as to which seem to be the most appealing and appropriate for Drakan TAG.

I started editing a small video clip recorded by the Pinnacle device which outputs the video/audio in the MPEG-4 only to find out most programs can't edit it unless the file format has been converted to a more usable format such as .mov or .avi etc. I came across a free program that can convert MPEG-4 video files to almost any other known format, it's called Squared 5 (http://www.squared5.com/svideo/mpeg-streamclip-win.html), which seems to work well with a simple menu and a useful list of options.

Outlaw Wyvern
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Post by Outlaw Wyvern »

This should be really fun! You seem very enthusiastic.
Drakan: The Ancients' Gates is top of the mountain IMO, so anything you do with it is bound to be something that'll interest me.
Thanks in advance.
Drakan fans are just about always good people.

Riftweaver
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Post by Riftweaver »

Just a small update to say I'm still working on the Drakan "Music Video", however with real-life commitments it tends to slow down the progress on such things.
I have recorded the first 3 levels of the game, while trying to master all of Rynn's moves to show off some interesting attacks rather than using a lot of the basic attacks that I've seen in other promo and fan made videos. I'm also trying to show off areas or cut-scenes that haven't been used much or even not at all in other videos (if possible).
The estimated run-time of this video should be 3-5 minutes (depending of which music track/tracks I use).
I have even thought about having a "gag-reel" or "blooper video" at the end of the music video for comedy value, such as getting enemies to attack other, funny deaths or perhaps glitches or bugs that maybe able to be exploited in some way. In regards to the songs, I'm looking at songs by "Within Temptation" and "Hammerfall".

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