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Subject: Re: [webartery] Future of Web art
Date: Mon, 15 Jan 2001 22:53:26 -0500 (EST)
From: Alan Sondheim <sondheim@panix.com>
Reply-To: webartery@egroups.com
To: <webartery@egroups.com>


But I agree here. I work very little with dhtml but go nuts over video
codecs, pushing whatever tiny boundaries I can, even though I doubt anyone will be able to read Sorenson compression in years to come.

On the other hand you're right about Atari. By the way, anyone interested
in older mint hardware will find a store on St. Mark's Place in NY (south
side between 2nd and 3rd Ave) with a LOT of very old computers and accessories.

On the third hand, who will be able to use them? One might say that older
media work requires increased technical specialization to operate; the
defile will become narrower with time. This is already an issue; my tiny
vrml stuff won't run on newer machines, and the rework of the lpmud I did
for DOS won't run on anything I have past the 486s.

Not to mention, although this is far afield, well not that far, the tape
that Kathy Acker and I did together - EIAJ standard from the 70s, which
Tony Conard revived (it's since circulated & been shown) - but there are
other tapes we did which lie fallow somewhere, unusable; I haven't even
seen an EIAJ machine for years and the tapes deterioriate.

What's interesting here is also protocol layering. What I mean is that it
is "probably" easier to figure out how to make a wire, say, from a wire
recorder reveal its secrets (there's a binary parameter - which way to run
the wire, +/- - but that's usually figured out by a basic knowledge of
sound, and a speed parameter - also easy with voice) - than a cdrom. Or
look at it this way.

Figure out the wire, then figure out the mono-tape.
Figure out the mono-tape, then stereo.
Stereo, then multi-track.

Once you're onto digital, however, you're on to layered codings, codecs,
and so forth.

Even w/ video it's the same - figure out scanrates and theoretically you
could look at the old stationary-head high-speed machines (very very rare,
experimental if I remember). But once you start on helical scan, it's more
difficult. Figure out helical scan - 2", 1", etc. - and w/ 8/hi8 you're
dealing with complex color components, signals, control track issues -
take that another level to digital and you NEED the original equipment.

The same easily for cdrom, which alien intelligence might literally take
for a mirror of sorts (remember the bronze/copper circular mirrors of
Japan or China for example).

So the mining of the real's resulting in density of codes, protocols,
compressions, layers, not to mention all that machinery out there. Would a
blue laser read a cdrom? One operating within the visual spectrum (no)?

And so forth.

I've felt the need - and others have as well - for outmoded tech for
retrieval for a long time. It's been acute in television and videoart;
the machines just aren't there. I used to have a Sony 3600 and 3650
and Portapak in the 70s; I can't even remember how long it's been since
I've seen them. Even with 8mm, it's going to be hard to find really
first-class non-scratching projectors that can handle warped film. The
last wire recorder I saw was one I had about 20 years ago. A while ago
we did a desperate source for even a 5" floppy even though the Salvation
Army is full of machines that run them.

Then there are more exotic filmstocks like 17.5mm, and the older European
9.5mm - not to mention 17mm, 4mm, and so forth. A lot of the films in
these formats are salvaged by frame-by-frame rephotography; this won't hold though for more analog or complex formats like the old Sony cv video standard - not to mention the quarter-inch machines...

I'd love to see one - just one - cuneiform representation of a jpeg
scrawled heavily on baked clay tablets. Say something on the order of 16k.

Alan

 

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