MikuMikuDanceCup 2009 Summer (MMDCUP III Trilogy)

I haven't really covered any MMD related topics here before. Let this be the first light one. (This is a hard topic for me, because there are great amounts of info around and mostly not in English. But I'll still try).

MMD is a short for MikuMikuDance that is a simple program that makes it possible to animate Miku and other Vocaloids in 3D. This is used by many enthusiasts and there are a lot of those low-polygon dance videos out there. Some want to take it onto a higher level and use it for story animation. Many of these are made for special MMD events like MMDCUP III Trilogy that was held about a month ago. It featured 133 MMD videos that received a staggering 3.2 million views during the event.

Since the event is over, there is an official closing movie. I had to embed it with Korean subtitles, because there is no original one in Youtube. You can find authentic version in NicoVideo here.



Vocaloidism had a coverage on this, but to sum the most important things up, there was a competition under three themes: Season, Future and Easy. It started at 24th of June and ended on 24th of August. Activity in NicoVideo defined the rankings. All participating videos can be found here. Those who can't access NicoVideo can watch most of them in Youtube. I used this channel (find videos with 【第3回MMD杯本選】 in their name).

I could go into discussing about points and top videos, but I won't do that. Instead I will make my own picks out of the competition. These are highly subjective and you may want to watch all videos yourself. I watched most of the competion videos and favorited what I liked most and now I try to present them in more organized manner.

My favorite one is "Island" (アイランド). Nice song, natural chracter animation, nice camera work and most importantly, great story. It also reminds me a great PS1 game with absolutely wonderful music, Chrono Cross.



Another favorite is the one where Miku has birthday and gets a present. What happens there looks very realistic, you'll see.



Sometimes it is not Miku in trouble, but Haku instead. By some peculiar reason she just can't get off the table. Luka is also playing cute, but I can't get what she's doing. She can dance to OSTER project tho. I've seen a lot of Miku dancing videos, but some still impress me. In one video Miku wants to be with her master and actually finds a way with help of Luka. Escaping to real world would be a good idea if things would turn out like in horror movie. Maybe Miku is destined to fight for Earth or just bad guys as hero so that Haku can safely drive her trailer (for great lol, skip to 3:15 and watch to very end). For laugh, it is also worth checking out what Mona does.

I could go on, but I already doubt that many of you read this post through. I'll finish this post with one promotional video (not quite new tho) that might make you want to try MMD yourself.



I haven't tried using MMD, but would like to. Ideas and people are welcome :)