Art, Games, and Technology Research
In the article “Computer Graphics: Effects of Origins” Beverly J. Jones describes a phenomenon that happens in human life and culture, that is there are patterns that are followed in culture. These patterns are then applied to technology and art.
The author clearly states the thesis of her paper by saying, “It is a premise of this paper that old cultural patterns do not die. They may fade or become more evident; that is, they may be deemphasized or emphasized only as part of the general ‘nonexpert’ culture can such patterns contribute significantly to maintenance and/or change.”
I really found it interesting how Jones describes how technology and the increased abilities of computer graphics lead to more art or more specifically new forms and ways to channel creativity through programs like Photoshop and video editors. She describes a process of history and periods of time in which technology went through stages of development. This is the historical example that I chose to look at because it seemed the most interesting to me of the three. It was incredible to think about changes of technology in these stages. From the heavy bulking early computers that were a seemed to be a miracle performing the most simple of tasks by today’s standards, to the advent of gaming and a focus on graphics and virtual experience. Then we look at virtual art and moving away from the “geometry” and with the expansion of technology comes a further expansion of art. This is a pattern that will continue combining with culture.
Creative Bloq is a computer art magazine that looks at the changing landscape of computerized art and because of this it inadvertently looks at cultural patterns. That is to say that this magazine keeps up with trends in technology and how people are applying this technology to create art in new ways and this is a direct reflection on the cultural pattern that is being formed through what is new and popular in this art.
This is a piece of computer art from a Creative Bloq post that shows the use of current culture combining with technology to create art.
Bibliography
http://www.creativebloq.com/computer-arts-magazine
https://blogs.uoregon.edu/aad250shuette/files/2010/09/8-jones-rhmbna-282kran.pdf
Filed under Unit 08 | Comment (0)Art, Games, and Tech
After watching the TED talk by Jane Mcgonigal she makes the claim that there is a massive untapped resource in people who play a lot of a certain type of strategy games. On this point I agree with her, there is clearly a massive resource potential that has not existed before. However I am not as optimistic as her that this will work as well as she hopes. The real world is much more complicated than a game, and there are much more serious consequences and more importantly the real world is strange. She claimed to not want to predict the future, but she did exactly that with her “End of Oil” game. She predicted a peak oil situation that caused the collapse of society. However this situation is unlikely, if oil prices rise more innovation is incentivized and reliance on oil will drop. I also think she is not applying this idea in the right way, people will probably not switch from playing world of warcraft to one of her games. Instead of building her game around the problem she should really be trying to trick people into solving problems by playing games they like. So what would proper implementation of this look like?
Filed under Unit 08 | Comments (2)