Valve, the creator of game franchises such as Counter-Strike, Half-Life and Portal, just announced the open beta release of Source Filmmaker – Valve’s in-house movie-making software is now available to download.
Source Filmmaker works from inside the Source engine and its been used by Valve to create all its animated short films, including those in the “Meet the Team” series of Team Fortress 2 shorts. Because the SFM uses the same assets as the game, anything that exists in the game can be used in the movie, and vice versa. By utilizing the hardware rendering power of a modern gaming PC, the SFM allows storytellers to work in a what-you-see-is-what-you-get environment so they can iterate in the context of what it will feel like for the final audience.
Below you can see a short clip created with SFM…
Source Filmmaker system requirements:
- OS: Windows 7 / Vista (Windows 7 64 bit suggested)
- Processor: 3.0 GHz P4, Dual Core 2.0 (or higher) or AMD64X2 (or higher)
- Memory: 2GB (4 GB suggested)
- Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce 200 series card or better, or AMD Radeon 3000 series or better (NVIDIA GeForce 400 series or AMD Radeon 5000 series preferred)
- Monitor: 1366 x 768 (1920 x 1080 suggested)
- Hard Drive: At least 15 GB of Space
- Sound: DirectX 9.0c compatible USB headset with mic (suggested)
