Why Present My Song in 3D?

Hey, YouTube has video and people get that. Why use 3D? Glad you asked. Easy:

1. It's cheaper! By this, I don't mean inferior, I mean you can afford to do this. In fact, once you learn to do it well, you can out do video. Video is linear and 2 dimensional. 3D is non-linear or linear and 4-dimensional because time isn't really a dimensions, but multiple choice is.


2. It's multimedia. If you want to include band photos, promo shots, announcements for next week's gig, and yes, even the video you've been shooting with handhelds, you can.


3. It's editable forever. Not only can you add different media, you can do it forever. You can change parts later, add more current stuff, even change the recording of the song to the alternative dance mix, or the new version you just remixed because your singer just couldn't stand his voice or your lead guitarist couldn't stand your lead singer and fired him without warning the rest of the band. In other words, because shit happens.


4. If you have a 3D animation, you only need a frame grabber and time on a machine to make a video and it can be waaaay cooler than what you can make with WindowsMovieMaker, and you can even use it with WindowsMovieMaker.

Ain't technology great? Well... distracting from the music but you have a whole life and career to think about; so, don't overspecialize too early. There is lots of fun to had and playing gigs is just a tiny fraction of what you can do with your talent.

Beyond that, once you master the basic techniques of model building, animating, sequencing and scripting, you are just a step to the right of building storyline-driven concept albums in 3D where your music and band are part of a larger game world than can include other bands. You can build a site that has you and all of your friends in other bands in the same world or different worlds.

Just two steps to the left of that, the same techniques I am showing here when combined with AJAX scripting can be used to create interactive tutorials, interactive technical manuals and other mundane but highly profitable content. Who knows? The music thing might not work out.

Try doing any of that after you leave the video editing suite having mortgaged your house or sold your car for the video of one song that can only be put up once on YouTube or mySpace and once downloaded, is done. It's like taking a band photo: the band always breaks up a week later. At least with 3D, you can change out the avatars at will or even keep them, and new photos can replace the old ones.

You use real-time 3D for the reason you use any hypermedia format:

IT'S ALIVE! IT'S ALIVE!

.... And it stays alive. Forever.