He never grew up; but he never stopped growing Published by John Torvi on March 20, 2008
I'm sometimes asked how I would like to be remembered. I've had a diverse career as a writer, underwater explorer, space promoter and science populariser. Of all these, I want to be remembered most as a writer — one who entertained readers, and, hopefully, stretched their imagination as well.
- Sir Arthur C. Clarke
If you have been keeping yourself occupied with the latest Barack Obama speech (don't get me wrong - you should), you might have missed the fact that Arthur C. Clarke passed on this last week.
A major force in the genre of science fiction, he wrote over 100 novels in his lifetime. While some of his early contemporaries concerned themselves with ray guns and giant monsters from outer space, Arthur, a scientist himself, concerned his writing with the larger questions of humanity, the universe and technology. An individual of many talents, his accomplishments speak to the passions that he had for those things that he felt were important.
A short (very short, I will miss some here) list, in no particular order:
An essay postulating the concept of geostationary satellites as telecommunications relays. Written in 1945.
Numerous awards for his writing
Foresaw man reaching the moon before the year 2000
Knighted in 2000
Nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994
Nominated for an Oscar with Stanley Kubrick for their work on the motion picture film 2001: A Space Odyssey
Appeared in a early multimedia cd-rom game called "Rama" by Sierra Interactive
A motion picture starring Morgan Freeman and directed by David Fincher is supposed to be in the works, based on his novel "Rendevous with Rama"
Clarke's written work came at a time when the modern mechanized age was still in its infancy. Early computers took up many rooms, and could only perform simple mathematical operations by today's standards. Modern airlines had only been around for 20 years, and space travel was not even on anyone's practical radar screen. But with the growing popularity of genre, it was evident that people were curious about the future and how it might look.
Clarke contributed to what would later be refered to as hard science fiction; that is to say that much of his fictional written work had some basis in science. His stories (the ones that I've read) were written with the mind of a skeptic combined with curious nature of an explorer. His writing always maintained a link with solid ground, yet it didn't shy away from pondering the nature of the universe.
I don't think that humanity will be able to reproduce another Arthur C. Clarke. He came at a time when the science fiction genre was still relatively small and unexplored, and spacecraft were relegated to the realms of one's imagination. The new century is far from what SF writers had predicted, and the rate at which technologies change and die has grown rapidly. The underlying wonder for humanity's exploration of space in Clarke's books remains something still worth reflecting upon, even today.
Beautifully Arranged Published by John Torvi on February 26, 2008
What happens when you blend an interesting story within your advertising.
createdigitalmusic.com shared a story about a video advertisement from Ford that was done for the UK.
Ford, or the advertising company that worked for Ford, hired a team to create musical instruments out of their 2008 Ford Focus hatchback to be played in a commercial using music composed by a motion picture composer. This to herald in the dramatic re-styling of the Ford Focus product
There has been controversy over the authenticity of the instruments being played, because they sounded TOO GOOD to be believed. Anyone who knows musical instruments knows that there is a great deal of care and expense put into instruments to make them sound good.
One would see on the surface that this could be a public relations nightmare. After all, if they're trying to put one over on us with musical instruments, what does that say about their claims about their products?
However, the conversation isn't about the quality of the car. It's about the instruments made from the car. And the controversary regarding them, couldn't have been a better result for Ford.
Ford continues the conversation this week by releasing an 'informal' interview with Bill Milbrodt, the maker of the instruments used in the commercial. Bill has previous experience with making musical instruments out of car parts and lets us behind the scenes to discover the process for putting together the commercial.
It will remain to be seen whether or not this directly affects the sales of Ford Focus hatchbacks. But people will stop at the auto mall and recognize that this is the car that was taken apart to create beautiful music. And they will remember the controversy that surrounded the advertisement.
Freeing Madame Tutli Putli Published by John Torvi on February 21, 2008
Today I wanted share with you a really clever online promotional campaign the National Film Board of Canada is using to promote the short Madame Tutli Putli and it's nomination for Best Animated Short Film in the Academy Awards.
Walmart drops HD-DVD in favour of Blu-Ray Published by John Torvi on February 16, 2008
This week, Walmart announced that it
would be pulling it's HD-DVD players and discs in favour of the
Blu-Ray format, which has to some extent cheaper players. To many
this is a signal that the HD-DVD format has been handed it's death
sentence. Toshiba, HD-DVD's main proponent, continues to campaign
for the format in the hope that it's players offer better value and
consistent quality for the consumer.
But are consumers going to put up with
Walmart's decision to discontinue it's support of two video formats
now to just one? The large majority of people that want to own their
movies, rather than rent, are families with children who may watch
the same movie many times and the individuals who would like to have
their own film collection. Walmart's market isn't the high end
consumer either – the average Walmart customer in North America is
in a middle to lower income bracket and thus always in search of a
good deal. It would seem that Walmart is banking on the hope that
it's customers have the income to sustain buying a new player and
possibly replace the discs which are in a soon to be outdated format.
For the people that remember the battle
between VHS and Beta oh so long ago, this battle seems to be very
familiar. People with the outdated Beta video recorders, which in
fact produced a superior quality image to the VHS standard, were
gradually converted to the VHS video recording format.
There are some differences in the
battle of VHS and Beta and the high definition disc formats of HD-DVD
and Blu-Ray. In terms of the technology that is currently available
and in the culture in which these technologies are used.
HD-DVD and Blu-Ray are not the only
video formats available in the world today, as it was in the times of
VHS and Beta. The Internet and the evolution of computer-based video
has allowed for a larger number of encoding formats and delivery
options in the marketplace. Formats such as Quicktime, Flash video,
DivX, and Windows Media are either already installed on Macs and PCs,
or are free to download.
Video content creation is now
ubiquitous; in the hands of the large production houses and the
basement cinema creator. The latest blockbuster movie trailer from
Apple competes with the latest heavy metal drum solo on YouTube. And
I don't believe that it will be long before HD becomes common place
on YouTube. DivX's Stage 6 site already offers user uploaded content
of HD quality.
So what are the lessons learned from
this?
Stating the obvious - video is now an
accessible and important medium - it has the ability to quickly
illustrate concepts and stories that which may take thousands of
words to describe. User generated content has allowed everyone to
have their own voice in this medium. Quality video editing and
encoding software is now within the consumer price range. And even
smaller companies can create professional content to reach a
worldwide audience with smaller budgets.
There is a larger, more diverse set of
niche “channels” (cable, satellite and on the Internet) all vying
for their consumer's dwindling attention span. The successful
producers in this evolving medium stay connected with their audience
and create bold interesting content that keeps their audience
watching.
There are a myriad of formats to
service a multitude of differing customers and needs, and there is
always a new format on the horizon. New encoding formats may have a
shorter time to prove themselves in a market which has too many
options to sustain all of them.
In this era of ever evolving format and
delivery options it is important to be able to deliver visual content
in a variety of formats to help to deliver your message.
Deciding what formats and platforms you'll support
ahead of time in pre-production will insure the largest audience
spectrum possible and make you format neutral. Able to agilely
respond to the market's evolving format foray.
Satu Creative Technology offers
affordable encoding services to it's clients using the current
encoding formats that are available for on-line and off-line
distribution. Call us today!
Internet Whosit Base? Published by John Torvi on February 14, 2008
I was searching on Google for my name to see how people are reaching this site, (not completely narcissistic, rather trying to find ways to increase traffic to my site) when I happened across an entry into the Internet Movie Database. For those of you who haven't been to this site, it is one of the internet's largest databases of movie related information. You can find information about your favorite movies, directors, writers and movie stars right there. And supposedly now, you can find little old me, for the work that I did as a digital ink and painter on a short film I worked on called Mr. Reaper's Really Bad Morning.
I would have to admit that it did go to my head a little. I often use the database to look up information on movies that I've watched, or when I do some research on a movie that I'm looking forward to seeing. So to find my name "up in lights" so to speak is a little wierd. I'm not sure how I was selected to be part of this huge emporium of information. Or if this is to get me to sign up for the professional subscription to the site, so that I may further edit my entry.
Ultimately though, I think it is more fuel for the fire to work on more of my own projects. A little push if you will in the right direction.
Updates to Google Analytics Published by John Torvi on February 11, 2008
Google recently announced updates to the tracking script that is inserted on each page to track website usage. Although the legacy urchin.js script is reported to work just fine, the new ga.js script will allow power users access to some of the new features that are in beta.
Story, Interactivity and Character Workshop Published by John Torvi on February 02, 2008
I went to this workshop at the Banff Centre the weekend before last. It was my second time at this annual workshop, so I knew what I was in for. The weekend was put on by the Banff New Media Institute and Digital Alberta, and they had presenters come from various entertainment companies to talk about the craft of storytelling in digital media. It's a chance to get advice and feedback from people who have established themselves in the business, and meet a lot of like minded people who are interested in the storytelling art. The initmate setting was such that attendees were able to chat with presenters over meals in between the sessions during the day.
Featured speakers were Matt Costello (7th Guest, Doom 3), Tad Stone (Starz Film Roman Studios), Gabe Kean (Belle & Wissel Co., Born Magazine), and Mike Laidlaw and Matt Rhodes (Bioware). Previous speakers have come from such companies as Pixar, Cyan Worlds, Sony Imageworks, and Dreamgazers Interactive Inc.
I feel very fortunate to be able to go to events like these to learn, to recharge and to just be inspired. You not only learn through the workshops that you go to, but through the people that you meet each day, and through the stories that the speakers tell over morning breakfast.
Special thanks goes out to all who put together this event. And also Chad Kerychuk from the Banff New Media Institute, who boosted my truck from certain death, as I was on my way back to Calgary.
Yet another web site update Published by John Torvi on November 07, 2007
I’ve updated the site again today, with a few things. Some additions and some subtractions, to make my site sleeker and focused.
A Blog — with comments!
You’ll notice that I’ve added the ability to add comments to the blog. In the last few months, I’ve grown very passionate about the idea of connecting with your potential customers and having an open dialogue with them. It’s about listening and understanding what your customers want to help their business succeed.
Having said all that, a conversation is best suited to a place where all voices are heard and the venue is respected for what it is. I don’t have a problem with negative or casual responses (at the moment), those are all cool and a good starting point for conversation. It is meant to be a blog for my business, and thus I will manage comments as such.
Flash animation and demo reel header
I’ve updated the site with a place for showcasing some of my animation work that I have worked on. This will be updated often with more pieces to come.
Poking holes in hits Published by John Torvi on September 24, 2007
I was watching tv on the weekend when a tv announcer came on who was talking about generating hits for a
website and how that was an important indication of the number of
visitors going to a website.
What are hits? Are they like mob hits? Hit singles? Why are they important?
To put it simply, if a webpage contains 5 images, then one visit to that page would constitute 6 hits (1 page + 5 images)
Thus
hits, while expressing the number of files that were requested,
actually don't demonstrate the number of visitors that visited a
website.
Why is this significant to the everyday person who is
just concerned with trying to draw more people to their website?
Imagine if you are trying to tell your boss that the company website is
getting a million hits a month. Yet your boss replies and says that
number isn't anywhere close to the revenue that is being generated by
the site. Your visitor count could actually be closer to 100, 000 or
less, depending on how many pages and how many images and other files
are on your site.
Thankfully, there are tools out there that
allow you to see a better picture of how well your website is actually
doing, and how many people are actually visiting your site (amongst
other things)
Satu Creative Technology educates its clients on
the use of web analytics and uses Google Analytics to produce accurate
reports of visitor traffic.
Call us today to set up an appointment to find out how you would be able to use web analytics to your advantage
Lesley Jones achieves high site ranking on Google Published by John Torvi on August 23, 2007
I was checking up on some sites that I have worked on in the past to see how they were ranking on Google. And I was pleased to find that calgaryhomestaging.ca achieved a #1 site ranking for 'calgary home staging'.
Now I'm not exactly sure how long it has been ranked at #1, but I am sure that this is something that doesn't happen overnight. In partnering with Lesley, we were fortunate to pick a good solid domain name such as calgaryhomestaging.ca, and specifically spell out exactly what the business was about on the site's homepage.
Is your site ranked #1 on Google today? Do you know what you need to do to maintain that ranking?
Email us today to find out how you can achieve results like these for your website.
Casual Connect Seattle 2007 Published by John Torvi on August 12, 2007
I had the opportunity to go to this interesting conference down in Seattle, Washington. I had only heard of the term "casual games" when this conference came up, but I grew more enthusiastic about it, the more that I read.
Casual games are those types of video games that dont require a huge time commitment to progress through. Games of this genre can find their roots in games like Pac Man, Defender, Space Invaders, and other coin-ops of yester years. They are the antithesis to "core games" like the Doom series, World of Warcraft, Eve Online and the like, as these games require a substantial investment of time and have some depth behind them. Casual games are all about simplicity, usually restricting the game controls to the mouse and the left mouse button.
Studios that are developing these games are usually small teams ( > 2) and have substantially smaller budgets than a large game studio does. Casual games have found markets in web, PC, mobile and console markets.
Casual games can be sold through distributors online, the games companies themselves or some combination of both. Branded games have also been developed to create excitement around a brand. One of the most notable and successful of these is the branded XBOX games produced for Burger King.
The conference had over a thousand people attending and covered the business, creative, and technological ends of developing these games. The small size of this event allowed for a attendee to ask a great deal more questions than they would be able to at a larger conference. The diversity of topics provided a great deal of breadth for anyone trying to enter this market for the first time.
There were some people talking about game design, some talking about development practices, and some talked about the great potential for in-game advertising. All of them were willing to talk about what worked and what didn't, and the lessons learned from their mistakes along the way.
What caught my interest at this conference was that it could have been re-named "The Small Development Team" conference, as much of the conversation was centered around this theme.
Agile methods on both the creative and technical side were discussed in many sessions, and how small teams can benefit from this type of development.
None of the courses went into a great degree of depth in any area (no session on using photoshop or learning actionscript), and I think that was just fine. The general sessions created a conversational starting point for many of the diverse background of professionals who attended the conference.
Special thanks to the Digital Media Association of Alberta and the Canadian Consulate in Seattle for this opportunity.
RSS 2.0