scream@brahms.udel.edu (Darren Amato) (04/22/91)
My roomate and I have been collecting and watching amiga demos for 4 years. We feel that we should start contributing to the massive list of amiga demos out there. Unfortunatly we don't know how to go about doing this. We both have assembly language experience and some C knowledge. I know that some of the demo greats such as: Anarchy,Crionics,BudBrain,Cryptoburner and Scoopex do not have internet accounts so we can't contact them directly. If anyone can put us in contact with these programmers please E-mail me. We are interested in how they started learning about the internal workings of the amiga and how they started learning how to program. I also have a few questions about demos: 1) Are demos like Phantasmogoria, Crionics Mega Demo and BudBrain Demos all pure code? What I mean is, did they sit down in front of an amiga and start typing straight assembly code into an emulator? ( They must be using some types of software tools) I find it hard to believe that someone can sit down and write a 1 Meg Vector Rotating, super human scrolling, etc etc demo from pure assembly or C code without any help from a software tool. Of course I could be totally wrong and these people could just be amazing programmers. But I don't know?? 2) Why don't Americans make any demos? I've only seen European demos. 3) Is there any program that will emulate PAL mode on a .5Meg agnus? -scream@brahms.udel.edu
scream@brahms.udel.edu (Darren Amato) (04/22/91)
In article <20668@brahms.udel.edu>, scream@brahms.udel.edu (Darren Amato) writes: > and start typing straight assembly code into an emulator? ^^^^^^^^ I meant to type "editor" not "emulator" sorry. -scream@brahms.udel.edu
scottb@glacier.UUCP (Scott Barcik) (04/24/91)
Well, sorry to disappoint you, but nearly all of the EuroDemos that you see are coded straight, w/o any help from software tools. That's what makes them so impressive. As to getting started programming demos, good luck...you'll need it. I doubt you will get a response if you tried contacting the coders in any of the groups you listed, due to their 'elite/lamer' mentality. However, if you do happen to get ahold of a sympathetic coder out there, either mail me, or post to alt.sys.amiga.demos, 'cause I'm sure everyone there'll be interested in what you have found... -- Internet : scottb@glacier.UUCP |"`All things are true...even false things.' UUCP Mail: ...!uunet!glacier!scottb| `How can this be?' WWIV-NET : 3@5309 -or- 3@5302 | `Don't blame me, man. I didn't do it!'" FidoNet : Yech. :-) | ---The Principia Discordia
peter@cutmcvax.cs.curtin.edu.au (Peter Wemm) (04/27/91)
scottb@glacier.UUCP (Scott Barcik) writes: >Well, sorry to disappoint you, but nearly all of the EuroDemos that you see >are coded straight, w/o any help from software tools. That's what makes them >so impressive. >As to getting started programming demos, good luck...you'll need it. I doubt >you will get a response if you tried contacting the coders in any of the groups >you listed, due to their 'elite/lamer' mentality. However, if you do happen to >get ahold of a sympathetic coder out there, either mail me, or post to >alt.sys.amiga.demos, 'cause I'm sure everyone there'll be interested in what >you have found... Well, I did a bit of coding ala EuroDemos a while ago.. I wrote freelance for people, and had a great time.. Half of the fun was looking at other groups demos and analysing them to see how they work -- and telling each other how "easy" it was to do a particular effect. But as you say, everybody who is anybody usually makes it very difficult to get hold of them - occasionally somebody gets busted for piracy and everybody goes "underground" even further. I only coded for the fun of it - and kept well away from the other things that are usually associated with demos... Not many of the coders are pirates, just the groups that they depend on to get their work "spread" usually are - and the coders usually get another member to draw the pretty graphics and write the scrolltexts. The development environment - gad! What development enviromnent? A common environment: 512k amiga, 1 drive, monitor, perhaps printer, and some bizare version of Kuma Seka Assembler... They write their own tools, (Sound|Noise|Pro-trackers, IFF to bitmap converters, assemblers, etc) often work in marathon programming runs, occasionally up to 40 or 50 hours straight (Serious!) or more.. To get yourself known, you will have to get your demo (or MegaDemo if it is not attached to anything) to as many BBS's and groups as possible... Then, maybe, if you are lucky and good enough, it might make it to the centre stage in europe.... The big thing that you need is something original in each program.. or an improved version of somebody else's idea.. If you write another boring sin-scroller (everybody does that it seems...) you wont get very far at all... As well as that, you will probably need a good musician, and graphics artist (if you are not...) who can work on something like soundtracker or clone, so that you can get good music with little CPU overhead. Above all, You have to learn how the hardware works in intricate detail- you can forget the OS if you want to get anywhere... As above: Good Luck, You'll need it! The competition is much tougher now than 2 years ago... >-- >Internet : scottb@glacier.UUCP |"`All things are true...even false things.' >UUCP Mail: ...!uunet!glacier!scottb| `How can this be?' >WWIV-NET : 3@5309 -or- 3@5302 | `Don't blame me, man. I didn't do it!'" >FidoNet : Yech. :-) | ---The Principia Discordia -- Peter Wemm ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ peter@cs.curtin.edu.au (Home) +61-9-450-5243 Curtin University of Technology, Perth, Western Australia. Amiga... Because life is too short for boring computers. (Dan Zerkle)
jones@uv4.eglin.af.mil (Calvin Jones, III) (04/29/91)
"Mr.Scary" <s892011@minyos.xx.rmit.oz.au> writes: > c) ... A comparison of Pixar's work with Amiga > demos is preposterous, and unfair. Can we get a second opinion from Leo on this? 8-) --- Cal ____ HOBBIT / / / 340 Meg Online HOLE / / / 12/24/9600HST bps AMIGA: ____ / / / Exclusively Amiga \ \ \/ / / "Best Amiga BBS in FL" The computer for the BEST of us! \ \ \/ / July, 1989 Final List(tm) \_\_\/ A comfortable place to meet -------------------------------------- Cal Jones, Sysop. 904-243-6219 24Hrs