You plan on ousting George Lucas from the "amazing filmmaker chair," and we think that's great. But you'll probably need some help. Meet Machinima, "the convergence of filmmaking, animation and game development. It's real-world filmmaking techniques applied within an interactive virtual space where characters and events can be either controlled by humans, scripts or artificial intelligence." It can be script-driven, whereas the cameras, characters, and effects are scripted for playback in real-time. While similar to animation, the scripting is driven by events rather than key frames. It can also be recorded in real-time within the virtual environment, much like filmmaking (the majority of game-specific Machinima pieces are produced in this fashion). Some of the advantages Machinima has over traditional animation include eliminating the rendering process and providing a space where characters can interact and "real world physics can be reproduced."

Machinima even has its own Academy headquartered in New York. The officially titled Academy of Machinima Arts & Sciences is a non-profit organization established to promote, organize and recognize the growth of Machinima filmmaking and filmmakers. This organization was developed in March of 2002 by several leading members of the Machinima community with the goal to both make current creative industries aware of Machinima as well as to bring support and credibility to independent Machinima productions. The Academy of Machinima Arts & Sciences is made up of a number of influential community members with a keen interest in Machinima as a viable medium. The purposes of the Academy are to advocate, develop and advance the arts and sciences of Machinima. In addition, the Academy looks to foster cooperation among creative leaders for cultural, educational and technological progress of Machinima, recognize outstanding Machinima achievements, cooperate on technical research and improvement of Machinima methods and equipment, provide a common forum and meeting ground for various Machinima branches and crafts, represent the viewpoint of actual creators of Machinima; foster educational activities between the professional community and the public-at-large.

Machinima offers insight into the future of the arts. It puts power into the everyday person's hands, asserting that our ideas are just as valid as Lucas's (well, some of them are). More so than being a new filmmaking experience, Machinima gives hope and promise to the masses, it's kind of like the Model T of movie making.