[NickM]

Guys:

I know written short stories & fan art are forms of fan fiction but has anybody ever thought of doing 'short films' as a form of fan art? I mean use the FRED system & other software to 'short stories' like the visual equivalent of 'radio dramatizations' like 'Big Finish' does for Dr. Who or Blake's 7?

I've seen some on-line players who 'edit' their missions both from cockpit view & external camera views to give the impression of a movie track rather than just a mission in a campaign;

Thing is, I don't know if there are copyright restrictions or prohibitions of say the Freespace or wing commander universe that prevent somebody from doing something like that.

Any information is helpful;

Thanks ahead of time.

[Phantom Hoover]

That'd be completely cool, we already have similar projects that haven't had any issues. Just don't try to make money off it.

[NickM]

Thank you for the feedback; as for making money, I doubt I can even come close to creating such a project

But then again who knows? The Terran Kilrathi War and the Earth Vasudan wars lasted 'decades'; I'm sure there were some backwater skirmishes that didn't need a frikkin' carrier battlegroup.

[NickM]

That'd be completely cool, we already have similar projects that haven't had any issues. Just don't try to make money off it.

Honestly I am thinking more along the lines of 'Blue vs Red' or whatever it's called.

[AdmiralRalwood]

To my knowledge, nobody's used FSO for machinima yet; on the other hand, fully-voiced in-engine cutscenes are a thing, and functionally indistinguishable from machinima.

[NickM]

Machinima? So that's what they call it.

[0rph3u5]

Thing is, I don't know if there are copyright restrictions or prohibitions of say the Freespace or wing commander universe that prevent somebody from doing something like that.

If you are in a territory that has a "fair use"-policy (e.g. the USA) you have grounds to argue that fan fiction is fair use as commentary/satire of your reference material* as long as you make no money of it (through add revenue, merchandise or similar). However, companies based/doing buisness in the US have the obligation to challange any supposed use of their copyright, otherwise they lose their claim on the copyright (that's how fan projects get shut down).

If you live somewhere that doesn't even acknowledge the concept of fair use (e.g. Germany) you wholly at the mercy of the licence holders.

Since both Freespace (licence and copyright held by Interplay) and Wing Commander (licence help by ???, copyright held by EA) are held by US-based companies, you might be looking a throny prospect.

* (Note: you actually have to comply with a certain ammount of actualy engagement in terms of commentary for that to apply but there are grounds to argue that inserting your original characters in a universe and then have them react to it counts as commentary of a sorts - but take that with a huge helping of salt)

[AdmiralRalwood]

Since both Freespace (licence and copyright held by Interplay) and Wing Commander (licence help by ???, copyright held by EA) are held by US-based companies, you might be looking a throny prospect.

It's no more thorny than the existence of mods set in those universes.