History of Multimedia/Syntax

1. History of Multimedia/Syntax Brogan Bunt – Programme Chair Bachelor of Multimedia

2. Wagner (1849) - Gesamtkunstwerk Artistic Man can only fully content himself by uniting every branch of Art into the common Artwork: in every segregation of his artistic faculties he is unfree, not fully that which he has the power to be; whereas in the common Artwork he is free, and fully that which he has the power to be. Music, drama, set design (painting), costume design, dance… (actually you can find this unified conception in Aristotle as well)

3. Multimedia bathos (the late 80’s CD boom and bust) • Combination of still and moving image, text, sound, etc. • Screen based (restriction of the senses) • Miniaturisation (tiny proscenium arch) • Limited interaction (although powerful as communication channel) • Information economy (functional rather than aesthetic demands)

4. Informing traditions • Functional tradition – cybernetics (feedback/control) • Bush (“As We May Think”) – memory & info-overload, storage, retrieval • Engelbart (“Augmented Intellect”) – interface between human & machine • Kay (Xerox Parc) – GUI, desktop analogy, mouse & keyboard refinement • Cantor (Macromedia) – making multimedia production accessible • Avant-garde aesthetic traditions • Futurism (embracing the dynamism of modernity, machine as symbol) • Marinetti manifesto • Dada (questioning aesthetic subjectivity – automatic processes, randomness, collage) – Duchamp • Current examples (BEAP – Rinaldo, Piccinini, etc.) • Manovich – InfoAesthetics manifesto • Hacker traditions (geek counterculture) • Commercial forces/Military research

5. Marinetti – Futurist Manifesto – early 20thC We will sing of great crowds excited by work, by pleasure, and by riot; we will sing of the multicolored, polyphonic tides of revolution in the modern capitals; we will sing of the vibrant nightly fervor of arsenals and shipyards blazing with violent electric moons; greedy railway stations that devour smoke-plumed serpents; factories hung on clouds by the crooked lines of their smoke; bridges that stride the rivers like giant gymnasts, flashing in the sun with a glitter of knives; adventurous steamers that sniff the horizon; deep-chested locomotives whose wheels paw the tracks like the hooves of enormous steel horses bridled by tubing; and the sleek flight of planes whose propellers chatter in the wind like banners and seem to cheer like an enthusiastic crowd.

6. Futurism

7. Futurism

8. Ken Rinaldo

9. Info-Aesthetics Manifesto (Manovich) • INFO-AESTHETICS MANIFESTO [ updated 3/3/01] • Twenty first century has arrived. What comes after modernism, postmodernism, and new media? Welcome to INFO-AESTHETICS. INFO-AESTHETICS is not only the aesthetics of data.INFO-AESTHETICS is the new culture of INFORMATION society. INFO-AESTHETICS is already here. Do you see it?A computer: Never before a single machine was an engine of economy --AND the main tool for representation. INFO-AESTHETICS needs to reflect this duality.How can we use new media to represent human experience in INFORMATION society in new ways? Discover INFO-AESTHETICS.In the beginning of the 20th century modernist artists created new forms, new aesthetics,new representational techniques, and new symbols of industrial society. We need to do the same for INFORMATION society. Join INFO-AESTHETICS. INFO-AESTHETICS SUMMARY [updated 10/28/01

10. Media 1839 – Photography (Daguerre) 1895 – Film (Lumiere Bros.) Computers 1833 – Analytical Engine (Babbage) 1890 – electric tabulating machines (Hollerith, for US census), basis for IBM (1924) 1936 – Turing (“On Computatble Numbers”) – resembles film projector (endless tape) Parallel histories – representational media/computer (Manovich) Late 20th Century – “The two separate historical trajectories Finally meet…All existing media are translated into numerical Data accessible for the computer. The result: graphics, moving Images, sounds, shapes, spaces, and texts become Computable, that is, simply sets of computer data. In short, media becomes new media.” (Manovich)

11. syntax • Literal Values • String (“dog”) • Numbers (1, 3.6) • Booleans (true, false) • Variables • Single values: X = 12 • Arrays: X = [1, 2, 3] • Scope – (global, local)

12. syntax • Operators • +, -, /, %... • Keyword – a reserved word in the language • _root, _parent, this, while, for….. • Actions/commands • Stop();, gotoAndPlay();… • Expression – evaluates to a single value • this.speed = this.speed/2; • Statement – like a phrase or sentence (get evaluated) • this.speed = 12; • Code blocks – more like a paragraph ({}) • Functions – return a value

13. events • Events • Frame events (onEnterFrame is assumed) • Button and MovieClip instance events • MovieClip events

14. objects • Objects • Properties (attributes, nouns) • myMC.speed = 12; • Methods (capacities, verbs) • myMC.onRelease = function() { trace (“myMC clicked); } • Ball example • Speed property • Animation methods

15. Common structures • Conditional statements if (this.speed == 12) { this.stop(); } if (this.speed == 12) { this.stop(); } else { gotoAndPlay (“wrongSpeed”); }

16. Common structures • Repeat loops for (var I = 0; I < 12; i++) { trace(i); } while (x == true) { if (p < 12) { trace(p); p++; } else { x = false; } }