Free Film Project

ffp is looking for a maintainer. Much remains to be done to reach the goal of a complete movie studio package, although other free software programs have been developed to do video editing and perhaps other parts of the job. Figuring out what is available now and then working on what remains to be done would be the basic approach here.

Administratively, the project should be migrated from sourceforge to savannah and updated for current GNU standards and infrastructure.

If you're interested, please take a look at this general information about GNU packages and being a GNU maintainer, and then email maintainers@gnu.org with a bit about your background and interest. Thanks!

(The original author was Jonathan Day, but we've had no luck contacting him. If you are Jonathan, or know how to reach him, please email us.)

What exactly is it that I'm proposing will make up the software side of this project? Simple. A complete suite of utilities which, when used together, will act as a complete virtual film studio. Yes, this is ambitious, but it's almost irrelevant as to how close to the goal this project ever goes. Every utility that is written is one more utility people can use and one fewer that people need to rely on closed, proprietary packages for. Taking this one step at a time, there is no reason at all why this should not achieve the same level of success as the FSF has had in developing a full, free Operating System.

Design Notes

This is a list of design notes so far written for the project. It is intended as a guide for programmers wanting to write software for this project.

Interoperability Requirements Data and File Formats Graphics Formats Remote or Distributed Processing

CVS Repository

Programs submitted to the project will be made available to developers through the Sourceforge CVS repository. The maintainer may also have a copy available for download. If so, a link will be added to the location it can be obtained from.

Mailing Lists

These are mailing lists for the open discussion of issues relating to the project.

FFP Mailing Lists

Mailing lists include:

freefilm-development - Discussion of development of FFP software freefilm-writers - Discussion of how to produce GPLed stories freefilm-project - General discussion list and announcement list freefilm-current - Discussion of the GPLed movie under production

Additional lists may be created, in the future, as the number of developers for each section increases.

Software under Development

These are all the programs that have so far been developed for this project and for which at least some version has been made available.

Graphics Utilities

Filters

xyz2rgb

Lighting Control Software

OnCue

Scriptwriting utilities

Scriptwriter

Things that need writing

These are the utilities that, so far, have been determined as being needed for this project. This list is not comprehensive, nor is it ever likely to be. As packages do get written, by myself and/or others, a reference will be added under "Software Under Development". Where "free" programs, from other projects, fit into this scheme and can be used, they will be added to a list of "additional packages". This shouldn't deter anyone from writing exactly the same kind of package, but specifically for this project. There'll then simply be more than one instance of that type of program, which is always a Good Thing.

Animators Audio utilities

Editing suites Manipulation suites Mixing desks

Colour Seperation Overlay software Graphics utilities

Filters Manipulation toolkits Rendering packages Toolkits for manipulating sequences

Lighting control software Modellers Morphing toolkits Musical score editors Project management utilities Recording utilities (ie: putting output onto film, audiotape or videotape) Scriptwriting utilities Software sound synthesisers Storyboard utilities

Editors Scripting tools Viewers

Video editing suite

Additional Packages

These are programs which are either GPLed or otherwise free, which could be used as substitutes for applications specifically written for this project.

Graphics packages

Manipulation toolkits

The Gimp

A Gtk+-based image editor

Modelling packages

3dom

QT-based 3D Object Modeller

MindsEye

Modelling/Animation Package

Rendering packages

Panorama

Raytracer system

A number of non-free, zero-cost programs exist, which perform many of the functions listed. However, the lack of freedom means that they cannot be adapted to work with any of the packages above, or any of the other GNU software. I cannot, in good concience, recommend using them, as a part of this project, for that reason alone. Unless the programs are freed, there's simply no way to ensure that they'd work with the other software.

Even in those cases where there is compatibility, it is very strongly recommended that people use "free" alternatives, if at all possible. If no free alternative exists, and you are interested in writing one, please feel free to do so.

Return to [ Free Film Project's home page | GNU's home page ].

Please send Free Film Project inquiries & questions to jd9812@my-dejanews.com.

Please send FSF & GNU inquiries & questions to gnu@gnu.org. There are also other ways to contact the FSF.

Please send comments on these web pages to webmasters@www.gnu.org, send other questions to gnu@gnu.org.

Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire article is permitted in any medium, provided this notice is preserved.

Updated: $Date: 2008/04/13 18:04:27 $

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