Space Engine - Rising Beyond

Alright. Space Engine now. This was started 10 months ago,but I stopped working on it when I left for Paris. Now that I'm back, it was time to finish it. I've always had this passion for space, like many of you, so I finally took the opportunity and made a video, since Space Engine has all the tools you need. I remember 7 years ago, watching the "Infinity Pre-Alpha Tech Demo" and being in complete awe that you could fly into a planet without loading screens...but then that was post-phoned to make room for Infinity Battlescape... A lot of research was done to see how I can get the best quality out of the engine ( v.0.9.8.0 ), so I had to edit the config files, some planets too etc. Then put everything into AE and composed it. Warning: Story of my life :p I've been reflecting a lot lately on what I would like to do in this world, and what it needs from me, like last year, and the year before last year. The question is always: should I study something else and broaden my knowledge, get some degrees and maybe have more security from that point of view or...keep doing what I like, study from what I find on the internet on the subject but maybe being more unstable? I still haven't found an answer. Like in previous phases of my life, I tend to focus a lot on things that I consider important but that people around me think they are not. Trackmania has become one of those things. It has become a mania that has taken already too much time of my life. I wanted to make 1-2 videos max, just to test it, like this Space Engine one...but then the videos started getting traction, people liked them, and that made me want to improve and try different things. So I ended up making 26 of them, not counting the ones I still have to finish. In order to improve, I learned more about video editing, cinematography, photography, compositing etc. but then I also neglected other things like drawing, building RC planes, even sailing, just to focus on this. Why should I focus so much on the computer? It's not like I live in a place that is polluted, gray and cold. After my last experience I realized that what satisfies me is not the goals that I achieve but the things that I learn. I learned nothing about filmmaking there, but learned a lot about work and people. This is something I think you learn better with experience rather than with studying. (depends on what you are studying of course) So this is an important factor that is keeping me back from trying my best to go to university. I will probably learn many new things there but are they worth the sacrifice of the things that I would have learned from not going there? I know it's a 1st world problem, and that on the absolute scale again, it's just stupid, but this is what I've been wondering these days...I'm a human too after all. Anyway...I usually avoid writing these things here because each one of you has his own problems and don't need to listen to mine as well...but maybe some of you might find them interesting, I don't know. Speaking of things that I think the world is missing...one of them is "quality", in general. It's a world that wants quantity. It's better having 5 bottles of dirty water than 1 with clean water. Better having 1 broken videogame every year, than having a good one every 5 years. Still better than nothing of course. But people unintentionally agree with that, by buying the dirty water or the broken videogames, so nobody cares about finding a way to sell 5 bottles of clean water or 1 good videogame every year, because the cost would simply not be worth it. (The water one is just a metaphor, I'm not comparing it to videogames...just to be clear) So there is a crisis of values, where garbage is being sold like gold to the masses and real gold is appreciated by too few. In conclusion, under these circumstances, my content will not go anywhere. I'm not saying my videos are gold, but neither garbage...what I'm trying to say is, quality can't feed me, unfortunately. It takes too much time and care to do a good, solid video, for only too few people to understand the difference from a fastly, badly made one. And usually it's the fastly, badly made one that is more profitable. Just compare Eye Candy with River, a video that took 4 days with recycled content from older videos and crappy effects vs one that took me several months and has a lot of thought and research behind for the story and the effects. Should I find a balance in-between? Well, I don't do it for profit, but I will have to one day, If I want to survive. Thank you for reading... Cya -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Space Engine: http://spaceengine.org/ Music: Akira - The Blithering Heights Water Drips - Auroras Rhythm of Mankind & Nature - Two Invisible Worlds My facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/Danixks-634764303223321/