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Farb-Rausch Releases PC Demo Creation Software
RaD Man [ACiD] writes "Farb-Rausch, one of the best-known groups at the forefront of the PC demoscene, has just released Werkkzeug, a fully featured, freely downloadable PC demo creation tool used to make the visually stunning and award-winning demo The Popular Demo. Not only have they freely published the creation tools, but they've also released the original datafiles for The Popular Demo as well." We also recently featured a 96kb FPS demo from the same authors.
Computer demos have always led the way to the latest in graphics. Be it with commodore 64 (those were the days), Amigas, or the PC it will always be amazing to see what the next year's demos have to offer. I say that this will only spur on more creativity..good for them.
FuckTheFuckingFuckers.com - Post your th
Common, what money is there in the demo scene's dev tools? Squat. However the talent that is put into making the demos happens to be what is worth the big dollars. So WTF Mate to that. =)
FuckTheFuckingFuckers.com - Post your th
I also miss the demo scene. But the the PC scene is kinda mixed up since there is no reference machine with certain specs. Yesterdays state-of-art demo can be done in Basic tomorrow...
C=64 demos still rules! I was blown away at The Party '94 (and '95) in Denmark when I saw all the clever tricks they managed to make those old machines do!
Back in the old days, when groups like the Future Crew still ruled, the demo-scene was way more interesting. Making stunning effects is much more of a challenge when the hardware you're working on is limited. These guys used to create a 3D-engine from scratch in 64kb, as there was no DirectX. For me, the massive computing/graphics power we have today has taken away all the fun.
Why they would do this?
... alex ;-)) act, but in the past big demo groups have released even their source code for next generations of sceners to learn from (ofcourse ripping is a fact :-().
...)
...) Thus allowing to show something spectacular in such a small sized package.
:-)), it still will be difficult for most groups to reach their level ;-)
Maybe for simple reasons, maybe just as simple as the 'new' scene spirit of sharing as opposed to the original hacker culture. More of a 'hippy commune' (hi Statix, ehm
In fact, there are a few other demo-authoring tools out there already. (Demopaja, smouse,
What makes this one so unique is that it allows you to make REALLY small demos, as opposed to the multi deca-mega-byte demos. It allows you to create small demos called intros. (all fitting in 64k).
The big trick is to GENERATE your data from parameters as opposed to loading the data from a file. (jpg, tga, gif, xm, mod, mp3, 3ds, iwo,
As for the commercial value of this: The other mentioned demo creation tools are also commercialised (at least some) as VJ tools for a videowall or related devices. This is not the case for this tool. Maybe shortsighted of me, but I do not see the commercial value of this product besides the obvious one: get the competition to pay for reaching your level of competence, but even still, then this is only scene related.
And as everyone knows: it is not the tools that make you good (but it helps), so I fear that if it is the intention of Farbraush to level the competitionfield (because it is all too easy for them to win competitions
Gongo / Green ^ openUDS
On the MindCandy DVD, a collection of the best PC demos, the commentary mentions that when demos went hardware accelerated, the trend moved more towards style and combination of effects than clever coding. On a 486-50 a demo's code really had to be top-notch and use all sorts of clever tricks to achieve the seemingly impossible - plus the coders would write everything - including the music playback and graphics routines. On a 2Ghz PIV with a GeForce and with the ability to tap into either the OpenGL or DirectX API for graphics (and a third-party music player), it becomes all about style and combination (and procedural effects if size dictates).
:)
Farbrausch's tool is just another step in this evolution. Kudos to them - it just means more good 64ks
--- Hot Shot City is particularly good.
ROTFL.
I used to think that too... technology keeps rushing by, and you slowly lose your contact. Some people then give up and start whining how much the past was better, and other people don't. And catch up.
Just for the record, the sound system used in the Farbrausch 64k demos is done in 95% hand-optimized assembler, is only 4.5K in size in its newest incarnation and needs less than 10% CPU on a recent PC for synthesizing a complete song in realtime.
And honestly, that FELT right when I did it.
kb^fr
The scene itself isn't really interested in making stuff with the .werkkzeug, most comments we got so far were more like "Thanks for releasing, I'll have a look at it, let's see what I can learn from it for doing my own stuff".
;)
There have always been the '1337 selfmade and the l4me demomaker demos, so I don't think we endanger the scene at all. But perhaps some "outsiders" fiddle around with the tool and get interested, that'd be a cool goal
kb^fr
When there was no 3d hardware available and operating systems were open (for examples: Dos, Atari TOS, Amiga WB), demos had a reason to exist: they stressed the available hardware, doing things no one knew they could be done. Demos usually wrote to the bare metal, bypassing any operating system libraries (if they were any).
For example, no one knew that Amiga could do 60-FPS sprite scaling, until demos did it (and the chance of having a good conversion of Outrun was totally missed).
But what is the reason for a demo today ? a demo is limited by the O/S architecture (no direct hardware access) and by what the local graphics/multimedia API offers. Demos are no longer a demonstration of the programming abilities of their creators; at their best, demos show off the abilities of the video card they run under (of the lack of abilities).
Demos are an indication that we have reached an age that technology in no longer important, and creativity is more important.
> Destroyed the GeForce 5200's in the lab...
:)
That's actually the best thing that can happen to a GeForceFX 5200. If you buy your next card, try to go for something that's NOT slower than a 4 years old GeForce2
You watched demos on a 486? Were you insane? Back in the 486 era, PC "demos" were absolutely pathetic compared to e.g. the Amiga scene!
;) Bang that metal!
'Course, even today I have problems taking demos that access hardware through an API (DirectX, OGL) seriously...
I mean I just picked up Unreal Tournament 2004 a couple weeks ago. Total, it weighs in at SIX CDs. Looking on my drive, the textures alone are nearly 3GB uncompressed. And against that stands 64k demos, which really have pretty cool 3d when you get down to it.
Now I'm not oging to go on about bloat or any of that shit,I know full and well why UT is huge when the FR stuff isn't. However the FR demos are still cool in their own right. It isn't easy making shit that small. Their mathematical texture generation adn tiny sound engine are programming works of art.
That they have 3d hardware to make it possible doesn't diminish their acomplishments. Programming isn't just about making a bare CPU do cool things, it's about pushing a whole system, complete with advanced subprocessors to the maximum.
Now they are doing only once kind of maxing, diskspace. One might note that there are other areas that suffer, memory usage in particular, but it is still an impressive feat. They are showing what can be done by focusing on the on disk optimisation.
Also the artistic aspect is not to be discounted. It isn't easy to design pleasing visuals and synch them to music. FR is on par with FC when it comes to demos that appeal to the senses. Far too many demos from the FC era were just slideshows of algorithm implementation. The FR demons, by and large, are quite artistic. An accomplishment even given no space constraints, more so given their small size.
I believe the Party Demos are for like Raves and what not that are carried out through the US and Europe. The video from that is displayed on a big screen and people dance to it.
;)
"Parties" are the events that demogroups use to show their newest productions and compete with other groups. It's like a LAN-party without the script kiddiez
Just how it goes. Whenever some new technology comes out, curmudgeons will bitch about how much it sucks and how it was better in the past. Same for things like demos. People love to carry on about how much the new demo scene blow and/or isn't "real" because it uses modern technology/hardware acceleration.
I think it more or less comes down to jealousy. The current FR demos are just impressive, any way you cut it. You can go on and on about the sacrafices they made to make it happen, it is still a huge feat. People like the grandparent poster will never be satisfied, since basically they are pissed that someone else is better than them.
It's not something unique to computers, however. Whenever something new comes out, there is always a bunch of people to declare how it sucks. Whenever someone else pushes the limit of that new thing, the same group declares how that isn't anything and how hard it used to be.
You see it all the time on Slashdot. Any time there is a story about new hardware, there are a good bunch of people that carry on about how it's not necessary and how THEY are perfectly happy on their 486s and so on. What it really comes down to is they are jealous that a new toy has come out that they can't or won't afford. They may not admit this ot themselves, but that is usually the root of it.
Fortunately, the demoscene endures, despite critics. It has changed from it's beginnings, but for the better I think. No longer is it so much a slideshow of who can implement the coolest algorithm, it's more an artform of who can produce the coolest audio/visual presentation.
Of course groups likes FR show that there still IS room for pushing the technical limits. Best of all, they usually manage to do it AND be artistic at the same time.
Things change. I wrote my first effect in '87, my last demo in '96, and I can see the value in the evolution that the scene has gone through. Hardware exploits, technological tricks and techniques, are a thing of the past; clever coding and artistic talent are still king.
Jare / Iguana
To answer all the "real demos are coded on bare metal using raw assembly." and "r33l 3l33+ d3m0z @r3 13$$ Th4n 64k!!!111" flames: Demo music tracks were being composed in external editors since the Amiga. Anyone who was into the 'scene in the early 90's will remember Scream Tracker, since it allowed you to not only edit music for your own demos, but you could listen to other favorites too. There were even some kits floating around the BBS's that allowed you to 'plug in' S3M playback into your own work.
This is really just "Scream Tracker for Graphics" (or "Shockwave for Demos" for the n00bs). Makes sense to me since most 3d engines use virtually the same pipeline; this just pushes the creativity away from the bits that are the same from demo to demo.