So now I am sitting here amongst young(er) nerds and flash fans all sipping from their holy grail of ‘what’s the new version of so and so gonna be doing (cool)’. A mainly male audience I get some half-year old vibes from the London Google Dev Day, yet the advertising element is reassuringly milder.
Day 1: Some of the more interesting tech stuff was Stefan Richter‘s talk about Flash Media Server, which was quite comprehensive (and fun) to listen to. The finishing of the day rather put the beginning to shame, looking at Erik Natzke‘s just super-impressive graphic engines he paints with. Even the idea being around for at least 12 years and John Maeda rings a bell in the corner of code-eye-candy, Natzke’s hyper complex paintings are just jaw-dropping in their beauty.Hard to top, but then the last hour(and some) went to James Paterson, known for his illustrative animations and that guy is charmingly his own inhabitant of his surreal dreamy world. Very inspiring to listen to.
Day 2: So far, Aral Balkan reminded me that I shouldn’t become a coder. I have been leading a very interesting life in the last 10 years, being not realy designer, not really artist, not really coder. He as giving a really good argument, showing how AS1 is so much simpler than AS3 in doing certain things and that the script’s architecture should become more easy to use. Functionality, ease of use for him is the better starting point/atmosphere for creativity and progress in an idea. He didn’t put it that way, he merely mentioned making tools more accessible/hackable as ivory-tower tools (my term) is not helping artistic or creative productivity.
Damn, how could I ever get so obsessed about MVC?…
Jeremy Thorp talked about emergence and agent systems. Nothing new in terms of experimentation. After the last book I read, I wonder when the whole idea of unpredictability doesn’t impress people anymore, but get’s looked at as a starting point, not a result. Nice chap though.
The GMUNK session was like listening to the linguistic capabilities of Beavis and Butthead and looking at video work from a similar MTV generation (fast moving cuts to avoid any other impression than visual rape), even though seemingly done by a 14 year-old NY ‘ghetto-guerilla’. After one too many ‘…shit, man…’ and ‘…this was so ghetto…’, I just needed to leave the room, along with some other visitors.
The inspire slot this evening belonged to Robert Hodgin, who is obsessed with simulation systems, especially fluid dynamics. To understand how much of a physics nerd he is, you had to hear him say that, ‘when he watches the sea he might easily get bored, but trying to make computers simulate water gets him going’(paraphrased). Some people might argue with ‘get a life’, yet when you see the sound reactive animations he creates with processing code only, then you just have to be envious at the sheer beauty and genius behind the projects.
Day 3: After a second short evening of lousy party(the first one had a bad venue), because they actually ran out of booze after half an hour, the last day offered not too much more after having seen the edge of animation, hardcore code examples.
So I left with mixed impressions. It seems to be a dev heavy event(as many girls as a saw mill pensioner can count on his fingers). Newest products and features are given most interest(Flex, Air, Sound manipulation). Code is everywhere(Sound creation with code, coded animation, tools and engines are the new standard). Structure and best of practise are everywhere, yet the querky aspect of using a tool in a different way is missing a lot. Even the inspiration sessions, as stunning as they were in their beauty, didn’t show much conceptually newand many many things are shown that people who still know director have done and have been around more than a decade ago. They are though faster, more high-res and 3D now…
Adding to the last point, it was noticable how many speakers(who did cool stuff or are trying to) were giving the audience advice on how to be happier whilst working with flash projects. Is the generic flash developer just a sad number cruncher with an accountant life-style, yet wearing skater-gear? Is working with the (arguably)most able media tool, in a mid-life crisis? Maybe flash becoming a more mature tooltakes the fun out of it a bit as well. Maybe Aral Balkan’s proposition of a smaller, quicker code is the right philosophy towards staying critical with the tools you use, as John Maeda said, years ago, a tool will always influence what and how you do things, but it shouldn’t so it’s up to you to stay open to different problem solutions.
But I am probably getting too heady here, cause the most fun was still talking to the guys and of course, the guys with the glass balls.
From Brighton and Back,
Marcus
):