SST_Brink

Just a really crazy idea of some story element you could throw in... The crew from the original game could be the ones responsible for crashing the wrecked ship that we saw near the dais on the central island... This would require time travel, and we know this could be feasible in a Dig universe, because of the existence of "Spacetime Six." But, for instance, Boston could find the bracelet and its tracking device, and think he was looking at a duplicate of the one he had found earlier... and, while traveling in a spaceship, accidentally end up crashing on the Central Island before he ever arrived on Cocytus in the first place. In which case, he might bury the bracelet in the grave himself. This could work as just a short "scene" in the game, and there could be many other times and locations on Cocytus in which the crew would have to visit for some reason. The concept of seeing the same location twice, but having it be changed, is intriguing to me. But, the storyline becomes a little more complicated, and a little less plausible this way.

Does anyone know how to play the various songs from The Dig on a piano? Or at least, can explain the melodies to me? It would be greatly appreciated! ~ Soren

I had noticed the new splash page earlier. Work on the project has been pretty slow, but I'm still trying to keep it going. It may take many years to complete anything. The project may be killed in a few months. It's really hard to say anything for sure. Either way, it would be nice to have hosting for the things which have come out of this project.

Wow, that's really neat! Congratulations on your discovery!

Is any program successfully able to listen to and/or extract music, voice clips, or animations from The Dig? SCUMM Revisited says something about unsupported codecs when I try to listen to music in the digmusic.bun file. I can't get SCUMM VM to work at all, and the Smush Player doesn't really work either. Can anyone help?

Here is a past thread which may be of help to you. It relates to the same problem I think you are having difficulty with, and I am sure you can find an answer from it if you like. Click Me!

Funny you should mention that... we're working on one at Geocities right now, but I think we're moving some stuff over here at http://dig.mixnmojo.com right now... just wait a little longer, you'll see some stuff...

Just a reminder that my last post (in reply to TheFilmGuru) somehow got placed above his post, so it's kinda backwards... Anyway, I think it's safe to say that our preliminary screenplay is completed. Of course, the page number corresponds to about 4 hours and 15 minutes of video, so we will have to cut it down, I think. That's all I have to say right now. I'll keep you posted on further developments.

It is interesting how my last post is before yours, but okay...

Where to start...hmm... Ok, first of all, if you have read the novel (in case you didn't know, there is a novel), there are less puzzles involved. This takes care of that problem fairly easily. The plotline seems to be quite interesting to me... Second of all, this is an extremely low-budget fan film... it's not much, but it is better than nothing. I was born in 1986, do the math, I don't have that much money, and I am doing this with friends. I believe we can accomplish this, and make it look fairly decent. How many of the legal issues still apply if this is going to be a non-profit private film, shown to only those involved in the making of it? Thirdly, I have about a year's experience in 3D animation and CG art, it should be enough to get some good results, as far as I can see. I don't know what we are going to film this on (Mini-DV, etc.) Any suggestions? No, I don't have 70 million dollars, but I am extremely interested at what I can accomplish with what I have. I can imagine that at least some of you doubt my abilities. If I make this into a film, and it is utterly horrible, you can doubt my abilities then and I will not mind. Thank you very much for your input on mattes and legal issues, it is very helpful to me.

Umm...one question...how come it is 2 CD's? I have never heard of a 2-CD dig soundtrack. Are there more than 11 tracks?

Well, it looks like we're both doing the same thing! Although, I guess I have less resources available, being a high school student at the School of Science and Technology. I am about 2/3 done with the screenplay myself , so yeah, it can indeed be done. I am basing my "fan film" off of the novel, and am hoping to use Michael Land's music from the game. I know mine will probably be less professional, but I expect it to be much better than a simple home video. Me and my friends appreciate the Dig as much as you probably do, so I don't think we would want our film to be less than what it deserves to be. Good luck, and I hope that maybe we can find a way to help each other. The last thing we need is this to become a competition. If you have any guidance with using blue or green screens, I would appreciate it. I think this is just perfect. Suddenly, the desire to finally make The Dig into a film exists, and there are lots of people who want to make it into a reality. I hope that at least one of us, succeeds in visualizing the great story of the Dig like never before. Have lots of fun! -Soren

Here's the whole plotline of the Dig, shortened into a list of "scenes." I am using it to get a big picture at the massive-ness of the story, so I can wrap my mind around it. I just thought it might be entertaining for you all to look at: Borneo (and a Title Sequence) It’s A Rock, Mr. President The Ultimate Souvenir Picture Small Talk, Small People Burning Hell At Your Back I’m Paid To Worry Just Another Star Framed By The Black Of Space A Home Run For Boston EVA It’s A Little Weird Up Here Some Kind Of Artifact Trapped Within A Psychotic Rainbow Flashes Of Light Cavorting Gravity What You’re Telling Us Makes No Sense Amid Oceans Of Preternatural Calm Others Have Come Did You Feel That? A Diversion Only Spirits, Maggie? Monitor Them Without Condemnation Cocytus It Is, Then Teasing Up Old Memories Lights In The Sky A Sign Of Mental Strength There’s Nothing We Can Do These Are Different Acting On Your Own Orders Truly Problem Solving Alien Engineering Be Not Impatient For Failure The Crystal Hard To Make A Corpse Worse Off We See Reason For Hope All Out Of Bright Ideas We Must Get Them Out Thinking Like A Human A Shocking Experience They Continue To Make Progress A Planetarium We May Look Like Food Favored By The Grand Intangibles The Crystals Must Be Attended To To Cancel Out An Invincible Guardian Sometimes You What, Maggie? A Distorted Mockery Of A Face Something Of An Obsession All Spasms And Twitches The Creator The Beauty Of Mortality I Find Myself Unable To Move Missing A Part The Fifth Island Allgegenwartig Find Out What the Beams Are For You Will Never Go Back Too Many Miracles To Deal With Conclusion* Credits * I have heard many people say that the conclusion/ending to the Dig was really unrealistic. If not that, it only takes up a very small amount of pages in the book. A very short conclusion, and in that time 2 people die and come back to life, and the Cocytans are freed, and they all go home. Truly, it may be "altogether too many miracles to deal with at once." In an effort to make this a better film, we are considering lengthening the ending for our project. I don't know how we will do this. We don't necessarily want to change the ending either. I am interested in hearing what all of you think about the ending, and how we could make it better. Perhaps, we should not do anything to it and leave it alone. What do you think?

#1. Yes, we have thought about filming underwater. Although, I don't know how we would be able to breathe to speak our lines...perhaps we would all be wearing spacesuit helmets... #2. Having our project info on dig.mixnmojo.com would be great, but I do not think we should set anything like that up until we have a lot more of the project completed. Maybe a few months from now? Hopefully, the project will NOT be abandoned by then. There is a possibility that busy schedules might interfere with taking on such a project. Assuming that we remain up to the challenge, I think it would certainly be convenient for us. #3. Nice graphics there. However, take a look at what I was able to do in a program called Blender. Of course, I spent a few hours on this image, so it's not like it was easy...I think this is the correct URL here: Consider this as highly detailed concept art... We are just starting what looks to be like a very big project. I hope we actually get around to filming, and we don't just get stuck in concepts and the script. While most of The Dig remains in our heads at the moment, be patient and we may soon have some concrete information about the film and what we are going to do with it.

Hmmm...well...how could you guys help? First of all, you can provide us with valuable input, ideas, and suggestions. Here's one thing to think about: How are we going to simulate weightlessness inside the space shuttle cabin? Those scenes are actually in the novel, and are not from the game. If we decide to include the scenes covered in the 4th and 5th chapters of the book, how can we make it look like our hair is floating, etc.? I would like to hear your suggestions, and if any of you know how they accomplish the effect in professional sci-fi movies, I would gladly like to know that as well. If any of you happen to know how to work with blue or green screens (like they use for the weather on TV, and obviously, for visual purposes in films) we would really like some help on that. We see the need to composite live action characters over a CG background, especially when it comes to placing our characters on the planet of Cocytus... If you have any talent in 3D modeling and/or animation, and are willling and able to create fairly decent models of Cocytan artifacts/machinery, we may be able to use them in our film. Metal plates, life crystals, spire interiors, etc. Perhaps a few of you are able to make REAL metal plates with inscriptions on them. If anyone is involved in pyrotechnics and can make a "life crystal" with a tiny green light in the middle or something, that might be helpful, too... I know all of this is probably beyond your capabilities, but at least most of you can help out on ideas and thoughts and input. I'm just giving ideas myself here, as to how you might be able to help us. If you come up with another way in which you might be able to help, I would be delighted to hear it. Oh...and about that 3d simulation...yeah, we could probably do that easily, if we ever fully complete this project. Cocytus and it's unique locales will most likely be modeled in 3D sometime over the next two years. I imagine it would be simple to have a camera fly around it...I don't know about 15-20 minutes, though!

Hello to all of you Dig enthusiasts... I guess I am the first in my group to let you all know that a Dig fan film is sorta in the works. We haven't gotten too far in it's creation, and it is still sorta in the concepts stage. I am in the midst of adapting the novel into a screenplay for our personal use, and others are working on the CG aspects of what lies ahead (Cocytus looks nothing like any place on Earth) or drawing concept art for the nasty creatures of the aforementioned alien world. I, for one, hope that this project will not be dropped or abandoned before it is completed. If completed, it would be the first live-action representation of the novel in existence. As for legal stuff, I think since we are not intending to sell the fan film, or display it on TV/Internet, etc., the legal issues should be okay. Feel free to correct me on the details of this if you like. We are considering this a private film right now, but I expect a lot of you will be most eager to see it yourselves. In that case, I think we would need legal permission, etc. I hope we will be able to handle all of this... Anyway, The Dig has been something I have wanted to see as a movie for a long time. I know Spielberg tried to do it, so it would seem that such a task would be completely impossible for me and my friends. You would be surprised at what can be accomplished when one is truly determined to acheive their dream. This is one of my dreams, I guess. I will remain enthusiastic about the project and will work as hard as I can to make it a reality. I only hope the fan film becomes as good as it has the potential to be. I suspect that we will spend two years in making this film, and much may change in that time. At this point in the beginning stage, I see no reason to give up, for one will never complete a long journey without taking the first step. Just keeping you all informed, I hope my friends don't kill me for saying all of this...I'm not sure how involved they are in this...Feel free to give input, feedback, and ask questions, but please--keep it constructive and not destructive. - Soren