Skyrim Machinima: Not the Dovahkiin You're Looking For

Machinima is a movie genre that uses game technology instead of traditional film technology: by recording in-game footage (usually heavily modded) and applying voice overs, music tracks, and post-processing effects indie artists can create some pretty impressive short films at next to no cost.

While Machinima has been around for years, current gen games seem especially well-suited for the genre. In this hub I'm going to point out a few of the more impressive Skyrim Machinima videos that I've come across in my YouTube wanderings. The Skyrim Machinima scene is still pretty young, so there isn't a lot of high-caliber stuff (most of it is terrible) but expect to see some epic short videos in the near future.

Probably the most impressive Machinima I've seen so far, The Great Battle of Skyrim boasts "500 Draugr, 200 skeletons, 500 Dwarven Warriors", a couple of epic battle mages and one very hungry-looking dragon.

The Great Battle does a pretty good job showing off what the Skyrim engine is capable of if you have a beefy rig.

The same people who brought you The Great Battle of Skyrim bring you another epic action short: The Siege of Markarth. Unless I'm mistaken, this one features a few custom effects you won't see in the game.

Dovahkiin is more of a music video than a film but I really enjoyed the mood created by this little gem. This video does a good job showing off Skyrim's visual capabilities. (Something that can be further enhanced through mods.)

Aaron Canini is a talented and prolific Machinimist and the man behind Drakortha Productions. Aaron has created entire shows for games like Fallout 3 and GTAIV. Although he hasn't done much in the way of Skyrim Machinima, yet, I expect to see more of his stuff in the future.

You can see his first tentative Skyrim video, Skyrim - Primitive Earth, on his homepage.

His second video, Skyrim - Troll Slayer can be found on YouTube. (Just search for 'Drakortha' for a list of his uploaded videos.)

100 Ways to Die in Skyrim (2 parts) is one of the most popular of the huge number of Skyrim videos uploaded to YouTube that poke fun at the game, the players, and society in general. You could spend hours watching videos of bizarre glitches, gory death scenes, humorous situations, and gorgeous scenery. Although most of these videos don't qualify as 'Machinima', a few of them, like Bashur's The Adventures of Khaije the Khaije and The Horker Scrolls do make an effort to provide a humorous narrative and backstory.

There are also more serious works, of course, like The Beauty of Skyrim, Fragile: The Journey, and the teaser trailer for an upcoming Machinima, The Black Blade. The videos range everywhere from painfully amateurish to tantalizingly promising.

HubPages restrictions prevent me from linking more than twice to the same domain, so you're on your own here, but some of them are well worth wasting your time on if you have a few minutes to spare.

Web comics that use screen captures from video games are known as Machinomics.