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Strange Company was a group of machinima creators and distributors based in
Edinburgh Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian on the southern shore of t ...
,
Scotland Scotland (, ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a Anglo-Scottish border, border with England to the southeast ...
. They are known in the medium as the longest-standing machinima production company, having produced machinima films since 1997, and for creating the Machinima.com website, which distributes such films on the internet since 2000.


History

''Strange Company'' was founded by Hugh Hancock in 1997, at the time a student at the
University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh ( sco, University o Edinburgh, gd, Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in post-nominals) is a public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Granted a royal charter by King James VI in 15 ...
and a part-time journalist with an interest in the computer game '' Quake'', and Gordon McDonald, a commercial film-maker and soundscape artist. Following Hancock's coining of the term "machinima" with Anthony Bailey of Quake done Quick, Hancock and McDonald founded the Machinima.com website in 2000, a hub for machinima producers on the internet. Having worked on commercial animation production since 1999, ''Strange Company'' currently focuses on the creation of machinima productions. The company has produced animation for companies and organisations such as
Electronic Arts Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the ...
, the
British Academy of Film and Television Arts British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...
, Scottish Television and the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
. The group has also created several independent releases, including the H.P. Lovecraft inspired ''Eschaton: Darkening Twilight'', and an adaptation of the Percy Bysshe Shelley sonnet "
Ozymandias "Ozymandias" ( ) is a sonnet written by the English Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822). It was first published in the 11 January 1818 issue of '' The Examiner'' of London. The poem was included the following year in Shelley's c ...
". The group spent a number of years working on the "
Lithtech LithTech is a game engine developed by Monolith Productions and comparable with the Quake and Unreal engines. Monolith and a number of other video game developers have used LithTech as the basis for their first-person shooter games. Monolith in ...
Film Producer" project, the first attempt to create a stand-alone machinima production environment, which was cancelled in 2001. In March 2002, they participated in the formation of the Academy of Machinima Arts & Sciences. In 2006, ''Strange Company'' produced its first feature-length machinima film, ''
BloodSpell ''BloodSpell'' is a 2006 fantasy film produced by Strange Company. ''BloodSpell'' employs filming techniques known as machinima, and is the first feature-length production to use BioWare's Aurora Engine, developed for the role-playing video game ' ...
''. After two years of pre-production, ''
BloodSpell ''BloodSpell'' is a 2006 fantasy film produced by Strange Company. ''BloodSpell'' employs filming techniques known as machinima, and is the first feature-length production to use BioWare's Aurora Engine, developed for the role-playing video game ' ...
'' was released in 14 episodes during 2006. In October 2007, it premiered as a full-length feature film at the Machinima Europe festival 2007. In 2008, the film was released as a DVD image under a Creative Commons license. In 2007, Hancock and fellow ''Strange Company'' member Johnnie Ingram wrote Machinima for Dummies, a 400-page reference guide to machinima creation. The most recent ''Strange Company'' release is a short film adaptation of a
Lord Byron George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824), known simply as Lord Byron, was an English romantic poet and peer. He was one of the leading figures of the Romantic movement, and has been regarded as among the ...
poem entitled, "When We Two Parted.", which was featured on the front page of YouTube UK on its release. Many of the ''Strange Company'' team also worked on the Boingboing-featured scientific cookery sho
Kamikaze Cookery
although it is not indicated as an official Strange Company production. In March 2010, ''Strange Company'' announced a high-profile project, a
performance capture Motion capture (sometimes referred as mo-cap or mocap, for short) is the process of recording the movement of objects or people. It is used in military, entertainment, sports, medical applications, and for validation of computer vision and robo ...
/Machinima hybrid title Death Knight Love Story, featuring the voices of
Joanna Lumley Dame Joanna Lamond Lumley (born 1 May 1946) is an English actress, presenter, former model, author, television producer, and activist. She has won two BAFTA TV Awards for her role as Patsy Stone in the BBC sitcom ''Absolutely Fabulous'' (1992 ...
,
Jack Davenport Jack Arthur Davenport (born 1 March 1973) is an English actor. He is best known for his roles in the television series '' This Life'' and ''Coupling'', and as James Norrington in the ''Pirates of the Caribbean'' series. He has also appeared ...
,
Anna Chancellor Anna Theodora Chancellor (born 27 April 1965) is a British actress who has received nominations for BAFTA and Olivier Awards. Background and early life Chancellor was born in Richmond, England to barrister John Paget Chancellor, eldest son of ...
and
Brian Blessed Brian Blessed (; born 9 October 1936) is an English actor, presenter, writer and mountaineer. Blessed is known for portraying PC "Fancy" Smith in ''Z-Cars'', Augustus in the 1976 BBC television production of '' I, Claudius'', King Richard I ...
. Death Knight Love Story is a short romance/action adventure, and was released in 2014. In November 2017, ''Strange Company'' released the VR RPG game "Left-Hand Path" on Steam. It received "Very Positive" reviews rating on the site. On February 5, 2018, founder Hugh Hancock died of a
heart attack A myocardial infarction (MI), commonly known as a heart attack, occurs when blood flow decreases or stops to the coronary artery of the heart, causing damage to the heart muscle. The most common symptom is chest pain or discomfort which ma ...
.


Releases

* Eschaton: Darkening Twilight (1997) *Eschaton: Nightfall (1999) *Ozymandias (1999) *Matrix 4X1 (2000) *Tum Raider (2001) *
BloodSpell ''BloodSpell'' is a 2006 fantasy film produced by Strange Company. ''BloodSpell'' employs filming techniques known as machinima, and is the first feature-length production to use BioWare's Aurora Engine, developed for the role-playing video game ' ...
(2006) *Fair Game (2007) *When We Two Parted (2008) *Death Knight Love Story (2014) *Left-Hand Path (2017 Video Game)


References


External links

* {{Machinima production companies Film production companies of the United Kingdom Machinima