The Ottawa International Animation Festival runs from September 20 – 24 and the blurb informs us :
Every September, the Ottawa International Animation Festival presents the world’s most cutting-edge, quirky and important animation — and transforms Ottawa into the centre of the animation universe.
The festival features screenings, workshops, talks, competitions and more. One of those competitions is The Canadian Student Competition which will feature a short film entitled “Second Life“, directed by Benjamin Reyes and Joshua Fischle and produced by Ryerson University.
This short film, is not surprisingly, inspired by the virtual world of Second Life, as an article by Bruce Deachman at The Ottawa Citizen informs us; Ottawa filmmaker comes home with Second Life . The article is itself an interview with one of the directors, Benjamin Reyes, who explains :
“I was interested in these stories you would hear of people meeting each other through the Internet, through things like Second Life. That idea was bizarre and interesting to me, that you could know somebody strictly through this avatar and not even see their face or know what they look like, and you don’t really know who’s controlling them.”
The film appears to have been inspired by Second Life, rather than machinima filmed in Second Life but it’s interesting to see how virtual worlds can inspire other mediums.
The article also covers relationships and technology and how they are evolving, how we build relationships without seeing each other.
The film, Benjamin Reyes tells Bruce Deachman, isn’t autobiographical, Benjamin hasn’t been in the position the film’s character finds himself in, but Benjamin does use technology to communicate and he feels :
“I felt like this was my generation’s story to tell. We’re at a point now where technology is really intersecting with people’s relationships with each other. The way we communicate through technology has changed a lot and I felt this was an interesting time to address that.”
I haven’t seen the film, so I can’t comment on the content, it is described as a cautionary tale so it may not paint virtual experiences in a positive light but it does look like the film will cover themes many of us are familiar with, although we don’t really get to choose which reality we live in, not yet anyway.