pouët.net

The demoscene in the 2010s

category: general [glöplog]
I wrote up some of my random thoughts about the future of the demoscene. http://www.pelulamu.net/countercomplex/the_future_of_demo_art/
GRAH! Spent too much time on post and lost the session. In short, this is awesome, but I think tagging (putting your name on) and releasing are still parts of "core demoscene activity". If no one sees your work, then it's not a demo in my opinion. A virtual platform would be very cool, but not easy to get accepted, and how long would it it last?
added on the 2010-09-03 17:11:09 by IC IC
go make a demo about it.
end of story.
added on the 2010-09-03 17:44:31 by SiR SiR
Quote:
Based on this theory, I think it is a horrible mistake to recommend the modern PC platform (with Win32, DirectX/OpenGL, C++ and so on) to an aspiring democoder who doesn't have in-depth prior knowledge about programming


This.
I always advertise basic4gl to aspiring programmers. It gets everything right: simple environment, immediate results, restricted possibilities, and an horrible language which soon is not enough.

I've seen many advertise C++ and huge libraries to complete beginners and I don't think it's helpful at all. Did you learn that way?
added on the 2010-09-03 17:49:54 by ponce ponce
An insightful and thought-provoking article, thx!
added on the 2010-09-03 18:11:19 by Marq Marq
nice read and good thoughts.
added on the 2010-09-03 18:13:07 by wysiwtf wysiwtf
this basic4gl is actually prettu awesome :)
Pity you can't upthumb an article. This would thoroughly deserve it!
added on the 2010-09-03 21:11:09 by CiH CiH
really good article! i asked myself the same question about interactivity (or the lack of), because i found it's hard to explain to people. i mean, a demo doesn't look as good as a pre-rendered animation, and one can't 'play' with it like a video game. on the other side, interactivity is just impossible when you try to push the limits of the hardware, because you have to work with a very special case, and most of the time it's only tricks and dark magic.
added on the 2010-09-04 00:31:59 by tobé tobé
Heaps of respect for viznut, and a really solid article.

I'll add a little bit though about the general direction of the demoscene and the trends that are being developed. As the demoscene is a living entity that grows and evolves, the path it takes is being dictated by the actions of its members. Each individual player introduces something new into the whole construct that will apply a gravitational pull on the demoscene towards that thing. That little something can evolve into something groundbreaking that changes the demoscene in a fundamental way. It can be anything. A new effect, a new demo style, a new website, a new social aspect, a new party, a new platform, or just a new idea.

This is why the "unwritten" rules are always in flux, and year after year they change to adapt, much like the demoscene itself changes and adapts to meet the contemporary. As such, my only prediction would fall under the "Yes.. demoscene will evolve and adapt through the influence of its members and their ideas" category.

In the end, while I thoroughly enjoyed reading Viznut's article, i'll object to the "philosophy as a driving force for change" as up to now demoscene has been mutating to new forms solely through "hands on" examples and finished products.

And although I adore talking about "the product".. it's "the product" itself that will seed the evolution. (Hope I'm making sense =P)
added on the 2010-09-04 02:58:16 by aMUSiC aMUSiC
bravo viznut!
ya actually kept me reading, which isnt happening too often to me on the intarwebs. =)

i agree 1oo% with ya. had those thoughts and conclusions too :)
added on the 2010-09-04 04:04:53 by gentleman gentleman
Thanks viznut, interesting read.
I think the following quote from the article
Quote:
The core activity of the demoscene is very technical. Exploration and novel exploitation of various possible hardware and software platforms. Experimentation with new algorithms, mathematical formulas and novel technical concepts. Stretching the expressive power of the byte. You can remove musicians, graphicians and conceptual experimenters, but you cannot remove hardcore experimental programming without destroying the essence of demo art.

really sums it up nicely, and reflect how I feel about it as well.
added on the 2010-09-04 11:23:34 by Sdw Sdw
A thought provoking article...

Quote:

demoscene will evolve and adapt through the influence of its members and their ideas


i think this sums it up all nicely.
added on the 2010-09-04 11:27:08 by Defiance Defiance
Quote:
Especially those who happen to be coders "on both sides" tend to have an urge to separate the two worlds in some way or another by emphasizing the aspects that differentiate democoding from professional programming. You can't be very creative, independent, experimental or low-level in most programming jobs, so you'll want to be that in your artistic endeavours. You may want to choose totally different platforms, methods and technical approaches so that your leisure activity actually feels like leisure activity.

That's exactly the reason why I'm doing Oric and Atari demos: Coding graphical applications in C++ during the day does not really motivate me for doing something similar in my free time :)
added on the 2010-09-04 12:00:11 by Dbug Dbug
good article, although I personally disagree with the "beginners should not start on the PC/C++/OpenGL" and some other oldskool/restricted platform zealotism.
added on the 2010-09-04 12:08:49 by Navis Navis
thank you for the article
added on the 2010-09-04 13:01:07 by oiD oiD
Quote:
I personally disagree with the "beginners should not start on the PC/C++/OpenGL" and some other oldskool/restricted platform zealotism.


Same here.
added on the 2010-09-04 19:02:28 by keops keops
Quote:
I think it is a horrible mistake to recommend the modern PC platform (with Win32, DirectX/OpenGL, C++ and so on) to an aspiring democoder who doesn't have in-depth prior knowledge about programming


of course is much easier for an illiterate young boy to begin with an archaic, out of commerce, and almost no more documented platform, dwelling with registers, accumulator, assembly instruction, blitters and strong hardware knowledge requirements, than to begin with his new shiny netbook bought for his studies, running a well documented compiler with a robust and not that hard graphics library.
added on the 2010-09-04 19:16:06 by rmeht rmeht
Thanks to everyone for their comments and compliments.

I believe that it may very well be possible to learn democoding via the "OpenGL/C++" route as well, but I also believe that it is a very difficult and challenging route. Why start with an extremely complex platform if you can start with a simple one?
Yeah, let´s all use processing instead.
added on the 2010-09-05 02:52:19 by T$ T$
viznut: Do you really think a C64 is simpler to write your first demo effect on than a PC with C++ and OpenGL?

(OK, and if you discount slow ugly rasterbars?)
added on the 2010-09-05 03:31:22 by Sesse Sesse
Sesse: from personal experience, absolutely not :) .

But, I think the concept is good. I went for a couple years coding demos before I fully understood everything, and even now, I know steps the machine is taking without knowing details.

I personally think learning low-level stuff might be beneficial to a n00b, but I'd also rather advocate learning it the OpenGL/C++ way. I guess I can see both sides and benefits to each :) .
added on the 2010-09-05 06:00:16 by ferris ferris
Oh yes, and fantastic article :) .
added on the 2010-09-05 06:00:29 by ferris ferris
Quote:
Almost any deviantART user could submit their work in an average graphics compo, sometimes even win it. As almost anything can be a "demoscene production", being a "demoscener" is no longer about what your creative methods are like, but whom you hang around with.

This is so true it hurts. That makes us 'fellow-sufferers'? :)

Speaking for myself - since a decade or longer i tried making the 3rd and 4th circle of activity the 1st, but i have to admit - it's only drifting away from what seperates the demoscene from the rest. I realise now - i'm doing it WRONG.
Visually perhaps more interesting compared to 'core demoscene' demos - but in general, rarely more interesting than non-demoscene work.
Time to draw conclusions...
added on the 2010-09-05 12:19:43 by Sander Sander
@Sesse: I think both are very bad choices for "writing your first demo effect". I'd recommend something like Processing for that.

The point of the second phase (where I recommend simple and restricted platforms) is to teach you the profound basics of programming. I've noticed that quite many aspiring demosceners have enough appreciation for their roots and/or oldschool computer esthetic that they've choosen something like a C-64 for this purpose. One could just as well write 256-byters for MS-DOS or play around with Forth or some esoteric languages. The academic world uses constructs such as Turing machines for a similar purpose. The idea is to force you to build things from elementary blocks instead of just copypasting special-purpose function calls and example code all around. I've seen many coders who have started this way and continued it for years before finally realizing the basics they should have learned in the very beginning.

@aMUSiC: I agree with you that the way how the demoscene progresses is very "hands-on" and non-theoretical. Unlike academic freaks who often get obsessed by philosophical ideas and build their activity on those, an average demoscener wants you to "go and make a demo about it". That is, most
of us don't get convinced about the greatness of an idea until we get some hard evidence. And I think this is mostly a good thing.

Still, there ARE mental processes that lead demosceners to do what they do. They're often quite emotional or subconscious, and you can't necessarily put them in words other than "this sucks", "that rules", "it's totally devoid of scene spirit", etc. I have been trying to extract some of these ideas and to bring them to the "rational hemisphere of the brain" by giving them an understandable shape of some kind. It may therefore sometimes sound like that I'm claiming that demosceners are consciously adhering to certain sacred principles or unwritten rules, but that has never been my purpose.

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