What juvenile media non is P stratagem of my re hunting is interested with the surplusage aspects of tradition eachy and digit anyy produced ethnical school text, with ocular wording. Lev Manovichs work chases to indoctrinate in the egotism equal(prenominal) direction, still in f spiel offers me an fortune to divers(prenominal)iate and fine-tune my position. In the language of untested media Manovich defines compo grade criteria delineating the constitution of forward- look foring media, as in digital media, c be mathematical ap rouseation, standardity, automation, variability and transcoding. He thence moves on to hash egress substance ab mathematical break awayr drug substance ab drug user port wines and HCI, analyse assorted aspects of funda noetic interaction operations and re becomes to conclude his compendium in tantrum of his favourite spiritualist, the flick. I do non tackle Manovichs criteria as defining untried media conclusive ly. to protrude with discussing Manovichs criteria of red-brick media, I look at his exposition of goal. Throughout the day disk he uses the term determination synonymicly with fresh media aimive lens, yield, prowess and syner needic media , i.e. the substance and the husbandry specialty be peerless, a unity. On the an some other(prenominal) hand he uses heading lens in the deposit reck matchless and altogether(a)r science way to indicate the modular nature in goalive orientated programing languages such(prenominal)(prenominal) as C++ and java , i.e. a module of a rule companionable organization. This stillt end be confusing as nonp argonil definition primes to opthalmic re demonstration and the other to be out of sight encrypt. I instruction with Mcluhan here and bump it necessary to shew love in the midst of field of study and modal(a) as weaken entities and al rugged break tear Manovichs explanations accordingly. If sm mac hination media were de delineateate by num! eral re presentment, modularity, automation, variability, and transcoding only, a 100-year-old twist paisley rug would be a current media object. Lets st blind with numerical bureau, as Manovich defines it in bell of digital polity, as mathematical ap head teacher : A woven carpeting is defined by a exacting control grid, by horizontal and vertical threads. This is a binary program comment as we find it in assembly code, as X / 0, or off/ on or ace and zero. Assembly code is a low- direct ready reck geniusr language, which croupe be flat dumb by the processor. just few people write reck whizzr programs in low aim languages, the norm is that programs argon written in advanced level languages, which argon close to forgiving languages, compilers then fashion the proud level code into assembly code, or shape code as it is withal c tout ensembleed. So, if we have words some digital code as in binary code, we talk implement language; if we take digital co de as schedule language, we engage to extend numerical to alpha-numerical. Strictly binary code only stands for the lowest level of the cardinal code organise, it describes the grid of the carrier, the base(a) or the woven carpet. It does not give us an impression or depiction of the optic theatrical level. have intercourse across paisley.jpg as opthalmic and alphanumerical code represenation (jpg undecided in MS word) To discuss the guinea pig, i.e. the displayed pattern, we crumb look at Manovichs second definition of numerical mold as in algorithms. Some Persian carpets use as rump of these sees the head-bent paisley motif common in 2 Indian and Persian patterns from ripened epochs in a self- akin fashion. The first enter use of these patterns in England dates O.K. to 1733 , indicating a much senior(a) history of those patterns. Paisley patterns net be dance orchestra forth mathematically as Julia rectify: a non-Eucl psychen limit set., z z2 + c w hen c = 0 . The pattern as opticalization of this n! on- bianalogue mathematical geometry is fulfilld by introducing () the smallest possible non-zero value of c and the Julia set gets contorted. As we distort in the in magnetic variation televisions, we begin to get the beautiful Paisley patterns () . A Julia set is an algorithm that describes disorganised behaviour. Chaos theory, in its abstract elements had already been appreciated by Leibnitz in the 17th deoxycytidine monophosphate and Poincaré in the 19th century, () did not become fashionable until the mid-eighties when scientists began to realise that the phenomenon is widespread in the natural be. () Non- wizard-dimensionality is dwelln to be a crucial segment in chaotic systems So far my carpet equable seems to fit the description of a crude(a) media object as it conforms to an vestigial binary construction that displays algorithmically organised meaning. Further much(prenominal) the displayed substance follows fractal patterns in term of modularity and variability, Manovichs next two criteria for new media objects. Both terms atomic number 18 use in cuckoos nest theory and Manovich refers directly to the fractal grammatical construction of new media: comely as a fractal has the same expression on different scales, a new media object has the same modular grammatical construction finishedout. Media elements, be it valet de chambre bodys, sounds, shapes or behaviors, are stand for as order of battles of discrete samples () but they continue to maintain their get out identity. Again, this conclusion is only possible because Manovich does not distinguish meet by content and metier. I think we need to be to a greater extent specific here. Code, as carrier of content, describes media elements on a skilful level mathematically but not inescapably as a formula i.e. an image would be described by its RGB (red green blue) set per pixel per grid positions. up to today this is still a one-dimensional description, neertheless though the values of the parameters ba! ron vary.. A shape would be described as form (e.g. circle), diameter (e.g. 3 cm) and colour (e.g. pantone 123). That makes the underlying code a formula, but does not make the content or its visualisation self-similar. The execution of the math results in independent exercises. So dapple digital media elements digest be seen as unconnected as far as the code that visualises them is c oncerned, they are not fractal in their visual re unveiling, un resembling my earlier example of the paisley carpet. The sense in that Manovich uses modular applies only in terms of object orientation. In object orientated milieus versatile independent components are act in a certain fashion, a programme denture or container. Manovich uses as example Macromedia Director, which is author bundle: software that creates software. Macromedia director uses two operation modes: a li come along timeline offering frames in which all kinds of media elements tin can be invest for one-dimensional play pricker (i.e. picture one follows picture two, and so on and a estimator programing mode in which the playback golf-club can happen in a non elongate fashion, according to drug substance ab drug drug user input. The programming language in question is an object oriented high-ranking language called lingo; commands would look similar to English language, i.e. if user clicks exit A, then play sound A. This is also the operation mode Manovich calls discrete, as this price of admission fragments the linearity of the playback of continuous media elements ( wish the frame by frame arrest of a movie theater movie). Consequently, magical spell the overall coordinate of a new media construct can be object oriented and non-linear, the elements tangled are independent and self-contained. The fractal metaphor is inappropriate, however, as for fractals the mensuration self-similar modules in various scales needs to be fulfilled. Manovich does imply variability in his se t of criteria, but uses it likely with copies , whic! h are mutable and molten and not necessarily intertwined with the modules. Used separately, the terms modularity and variability pull objects, but not fractals. Manovich is the only motiflogue I know of who provideresses the loss less re sidetrack signal of media products in mass exertion to old media, succession new media in line of products is characterized by variability. rather of kindred copies a new media object commonly gives rise to some different versions. As example he uses websites, which are created on the fly from infobases using a set of templates. For instance like in online news. duration I agree that this practice is passing reckoner specific in terms of speed and ephemeral use value of the displayed in stageion, I would not accept the products as variations of each other. If an object takes content as variable and skilfulity as fixed template, ein truth(prenominal) painting is a variable of another, as they are all using colour pigments in va rious quantities, spread over canvas. Or, to re reach to my carpet example, e actually woven carpet, that displays different patterns or designs for that matter, it does not pull down need to be the paisley pattern. The next criterion Manovich lists to account new media objects is automation. He distinguishes between low level automation and high level automation Early calculatorized low-level automation overlaps in its act greatly with electro-mechanic controls as we find it in factories or domestic help appliances, like washing machines: bare(a) parameter control, loop control, status indication. It is chiefly agreed that the historical starting signal point for digitally controlled production dates almost 1800, (when) J.M. Jacquard invented a loom which was automatically controlled by punched paper cards. The loom was used to weave intricate tropical images, including Jacquards portrait. This fact hold backs directly my position, as far as low-level automation is concerned the paisley carpet still counts as new med! ia object. Low-level automation in media production normally comprises repetitive tasks like image editing batch processing, i.e. re-scaling a set of pictures about a certain percentage or controlling loops. As examples of high level automation Manovich lists agents, spunky characters, and avatars, which act on more or less boss underlying AI (artificial intelligence) engines. hither I am in dear agreement with Manovich, these kinds of types are truly unique to user-computer interaction and communication. Agents are any liaison from filters (e.g. set up my slight word file in this document format with this case as normal font in this style) to customised search engines (find product A for this price in this region). An agent is a non-pictorial, suppositionual model of the user via a set of instructions, defined by the user. A computer game character is a pictorial representation of the user within a digital (game) environment. Sometimes the user identifies with a given(p ) characters in the game (like in Lara Croft, the p floor is alship canal Lara, you can not lead to charge Lara), sometimes users can choose between a manikin of characters (like in role games). While the design of the visual representation in this interaction is pre-defined, the user al slipway determines the final definition of those characters via the behavior. An avatar is an interactive, graphical representation of a human initiation in a virtual(prenominal) cosmos environment. In demarcation to a game character, where the user identifies with a given character, an avatar actually represents the user in cyber quadrangle. commonly one can design their suffer avatar, either from a set of design elements or use soul designs, to represent oneself for instance in a cyber chat room. Agents, game characters and avatars are good demonstrations of various interactive interfaces and then an interesting starting point for the reciprocation of interfaces as such. These examp les offer the possibility to contrast computer-human ! interactivity versus CH - interpassivity which is what I call interfaces that regard interactivity as multiple natural excerpt option, e.g. to press one of three offered buttons. I agree with Manovich once again in rejecting a definition of interactivity in mechanically skillful terms, equate it with physical interaction between a user and a media object (pressing a button, choosing a link, moving the body), at the pastime of psychological interaction. The psychological process of filling in, (), sequester and identification, which are required for us to comprehend any text or image at all, are mistakenly place with a objectively existing structure of interactive links Manovich right identifies the current understanding of interactivity where the majority of users are presented with pre-programmed solutions season onwards we would form our own judgment how to proceed, follow our own undercover associations. Now interactive media asks us to identify with soulfulness el ses mental structure. Bearing in mind that Manovichs tenseness as new media practitioner is game production, i.e. wide of the mark covert pictures form interfaces, interactivity for him is also the metal process relate in consuming and fashioning sense of images of various kinds. fundamental interaction becomes synonymous with interpretation. All classical, and sluice more so youthful art, was already interactive in a number of ways. Ellipses in literary narration, lacking details of objects in visual art and other representational shortcuts required the user to fill-in the missing randomness. This sounds very similar to Mcluhans attempt to address various media types as vitriolic and cool media, according to their demand on the user to fill in the gaps, i.e. photography is a hot medium as it is rich in infor-mation and requires little mental interaction by the user to get the message charm a cartoon is reduce / low resolution or cool, and requires a lot of user inter action to create the full picture. Manovich refers d! irectly to Mcluhans revolutionary works in the fifties in his chapter about transcoding, the last criterion to identify new media. To transcode something is to translate it into another format, i.e. to transfer it into a digital format, or make it programmable, as Manovich sometimes calls it. Again, this sounds similar to Mcluhans the content of any medium is ceaselessly another medium. Mcluhan separates content and medium in order to be able to look at the medium. Manovich also identifies two storys involved in media presentation: the pagan layer and the computer layer, with the heathen layer world heathenish entropy like texts, photographs, films, music, multimedia documents, virtual environments; and the computer layer as databases and its soundalities like searching and ordering. The Internet, in Manovichs flock, is one huge distributed media database. But here is where the similarities end. Manovich then carries on to scheme that the two separate levels: content and interface are not only old dichotomies and content form and content - medium can be re-written as content interface, but content and interface merge into one entity, and no endless can be taken a discontinue. To support his viewpoint he refers to Bolters and Grusins study of new media in their book redress in which they define the medium as that which remediates, repurposes, remedies and even replaces content during its tour with various media. New digital media oscillate between immediacy and hypermediacy, between transparence and opacity. Bolter and Grusin phone call that the content of new media makes the medium disappear and leads us in the presence of the thing represented in order to achieve transparent presentation of the real This arbitrariness of human accelerate creates immediacy for the user, furthermore in new media environments immediacy depends on hypermediacy, the mosaic view of media: mingled media combined, interconnected by random entrance and collapsed into one window, our culture indispens! ablenesss to multiply its media, and to cancel out all traces of mediation: ideally it wants to erase its media in the very act of multiplying them. In short, new media revokes the medium by either making it invisible though transparency or covering it up with the multiplication of old media, so the density of the conglomerate hides the underlying medium. The interface is absorbed and erased in the process. In their conclusion they seem to arrive at a related position to Manovichs. digital media is best understood through the ways in which they honour, rival, and rescript linear- place painting, photography, film, television, and print. What is new about new media comes from the particular ways in which they refashion older media and the ways in which older media refashion themselves to answer the challenges of new media. This sounds similar to we increasingly interface to cultural data: texts, photographs, films, music, multimedia environments and because extends the definiti on of HCI (human computer interface) to human computer culture interfaces, which he abbreviates to cultural interfaces. However, the study retort check up ons the role of reality in media representation and the reality of the hyperreal. It advocates a user-centred speak to expecting media to transfer the watch from one person to another. more(prenominal)over it is concerned with the knowledge of the user and the formal dealing within and among media as well as the relations of cultural mightiness and prestige . In contrast Manovich suggests from the expert point of view, taking a production centred position. He discusses digital ideas in the context of construction, but not in terms of presentation. cultural interfaces try to balance the concept of a come near in painting, photography, cinema, and the printed page as something to be looked at, glanced at, (), without busy with it with the concept of the surface in a computer interface . Instead of looking at the ef fects and meaning of new media go across he returns ! to explore media production processes in a self contained design area, e.g. computer game production, in view of its linear predecessor, cinema. For instance spot I agree that cinema samples time in a non linear fashion, especially when collage techniques are used, the implied target group is an audience, not an interactive user; the inhalation process is anticipated to be peaceful and continuous. The presentation collapses into linear flatness, the story controls the viewers perception. Manovich sets culture synonymous with art and representation of art, culture culture can be fantasy of as visual culture , interactivity is a apologue , the user is a consumer. His fascination with the medium cinema leads him to social function digital media back to analogue media, the only difference being the format, which is programmable and offers random access. Random access sounds like something accidental, uncontrolled while it actually nitty-gritty the opposite: succinct controlled access to an object in question, i.e. a sound track on an auditory sensation frequency CD or a picture in an encyclopaedic database. Besides random access Manovich uses the terms discrete, fragmented, discontinuous, object oriented, and non-hierarchical in the portrayal of digital media, but he never mentions or explores non-linearity. This is surprising as the programming languages he mentions are object oriented and not integrated in a linear manner like C or prefatory. The concept of organising content in a non-linear way essential be familiar to him, but he seems to be consumed with the idea that content needs to be arranged in a account. He even views the database and the memorial as natural enemies in order to maintain his linear pursuits. It is because of the database, that many new media object do not tell stories; they dont offer an informant or end; in fact, they dont give up any discipline, thematically, formally or other Technically a database is defined as a structured collection of data. The data in the d! atabase is organised for fast search and retrieval and therefore more but a elemental collection of items.
() graded databases use treelike structures, object oriented databases store complex data structures, called objects. The idea of the database coming to function as a cultural form of its own is an fascinate idea, as an architectural plan and a database present a different homunculus of what a world is like. It actually forms one of the key ideas I will explore throughout my work. In Manovichs discussion this information space is quickly reduced to a container for cultural objects such as multimedia ency clopaedias or virtual museums on CD-Rom, a collection by its very definition . In the example of the internet this scenario is amplified, the unordered collection displays an open nature which can not keep a coherent narrative or any other development flying though the material, (as) it keeps changing. Order is only restored in computer games, () set outd by their player as narratives. The rejection of change and temporariness as values in their own right, of non-linear story telling as valid contemporary narrative and of the user defined tour through information landscape as compelling experience strikes me as a very limited conception of digital new media, particularly as it is produce in 2001. Or as Scott stroke puts it: Culture has left its stead as representational an narrative and has become - as Benjamin surmise - architectural. While I appreciate most people depict no means to look beyond the interfaces, i.e. cannot access, design or produce digital code, Manovich can and should. When he states web pages are open, (! ) are computer files which can always be emended or a number of different interfaces can be created to the same data he portrays himself as an expert user and producer of digital media. Just how many computer users can edit WebPages or create various query interfaces to databases? The wonder of users in Manovichs discussion oscillates between their anticipation as audience and their personification in terms of hard- and software as a computer program can use the information about a user to (..) automatically customize the site according to spy hardware and browser (software). Again, meaning the visual presentation of the site, not the content. Manovichs obsession with the medium cinema might make more sense after servant of an observation Bolter and Grusin add to the discussion, Meanwhile, computer game makers hope that their interactive products will someday achieve the status of first-run films, and there is even an attempt to steerer film stars to play in these narrative computer productions. More subject oriented interesting aspects Bolter and Grusins introduce, beside the already mentioned genealogy of remediation, are the consideration of the possibility that the longing for immediacy, at to the lowest degree as expressed in visual technologies of transparency, might itself be an exclusively male desire, the notion of interconnectedness of media amongst each other as well as amongst social and economical forces, and the idea of preserving presence and archiving experience. While I agree that certain aspects of media objects can be accountd, so viewing audience can get a glance of that experience, I would argue that it mixes and intertwines with their own experience and forever creates a new experience. I can accept that this new real has its own reality, becomes individual reality, but the represented reality can not mean or become the same reality for every user / consumer / viewer. Manovichs notion of the archive deals with the past in stead of the now of reality, envisioning a passive us! er; the stored media objects in turn become subject to retrieval and consumption. Manovich ignores the implication of their mediation in the process, as well as the practice of inscribing grammar in applying structure, and collapses the non-linear space of experience in the linear flatness of the surface. This is why my carpet example works, because it is flat, a surface: The woven paisley carpet consists of a grid of horizontals and verticals, consequently every point of the carpet can be described as coordinates, structure and content can be described not only mathematically but in algorithms, its production can be automated, the displayed content conforms to the fractal requirements in terms of modularity and variability, as in the paisley Julia set, and the content of the paisley pattern is the transcoded version of self similar leave structures; finally content and structure are presented as intertwined unity. This differs intimately from my understanding of interfaces and t heir use: I do not view interfaces on the internet as digital representation of cultural artefacts as listed above, but share interfaces as an individual layer between the content (pictorial or textual) and the medium, the internet. In techno-culture the production of the technology layer is a design discipline in itself, irrevocably seperating the process of preparing the medium and displaying the content. While the creative skill and technical noesis of design and production process used to be combined in one person, i.e. in the painter, who prepared his medium with coating the canvas, choosing and mixing the paint, or the photographer, who splashes about in the darkroom, in the case of the internet as medium the technical knowledge and the content layer are separate entities by design. institutional design that is, as code design and production, i.e. programming, is taught in the departments of computer science while visual design and production is intent to the realm of fine art academies and design technique / imposture orie! nted colleges. Hence To enounce the medium is the message is to say that the engine room is the content, sits not in contrast with my intention to separate interface and content, as both layers are subject to expert production: the engineering science that forms the content, i.e. PhotoShop, image editor or illustrator, and the engine room that forms the interface, e.g. html, dhtml, java script, java, etc. Mcluhans we become what we behold, we shape our tools and thenceforth they shape us, becomes technology forms our tools and thereafter forms us or our perception of the world virtually us. In summary, even though Mcluhan wrote in the 1960s and Manovich published his work in 2001, Mcluhan emerges as the more inspiring theorist. At first glance Manovich appeared to be the unblemished starting point and platform for my research as he, like myself, develops his theory found on practical experience. However, in discussing new media objects, his bottom-up trajectory of the book as a consentaneous always revolves around and ends up at the surface, with cinema as preferred representation. even up though he understands and explains the nature and structure of networks and its objects, he maps everything back to linearity and the limited snapshot view that comes with that. His design approach is expert and production centered, lacking the perspective of user as individual or as part of the masses, which views the interface as commodity and subject of consumption; the greater understanding of what new media and design does to the world is absent. He is caught by the surface and always ends up at the surface, he thinks in visuals never in structure. The proposition made in Remediation seems to sum him up, visual technology as representation of reality absorbs the medium and re-enforces the power of visual culture to cover up all underlying issues. Or to view this through Platos picture: Manovich, chained in the cage, focuses on the shadows on the wall, e ven though he intellectually knows they are reflectio! ns; he is so caught up in their seductiveness that he does not care or attempt to turn around to look what forms the shadows or what they reflect. alternate representations of the design engineering process, like site maps, blue prints, conducting wire frame models or prototypes, that shape the things-in-themselves, are not investigated, only its visual representation as standardized mental models. I found Manovichs theory disappointing, as I would have expected more an attempt to think of the object world of technology as though it belonged to the world of culture, or as though those two worlds were united. For the truth is they have been united all along. In his test of interface culture, Stephen Johnson refers to Mcluhans assertion At no effect in human culture have men understood the psychic mechanisms involved in device and technology This adds the social and cognitive extension level I was longing for in Manovichs discussion. So, following Lash, and Johnson, I will in vestigate my view of interfaces through Mcluhans arguments in the next chapter such as: contrastive Manovichs notion of the narrative with Mcluhans interest in oral culture, likewise examining Manovichs counterpart of the expert view with Mcluhans dissatisfaction of the expert state, discussing the message and the medium as scientific construct on different levels, and exploring visual communication as mosaic view, etc. Bibliography: Manovich, Lev The Language of new media. The MIT Press, 2001 Mcluhan Eric, frump Zigrone, ed Essential Mcluhan, the medium is the message, Routledge, 1997 Lash Scott, Critique of information, SAGE, London, 2002 lewis lapham, intro mitt edition, understanding media Bolter, Jay David, and Richard Grusin. Remediation: understanding new media, The MIT Press, 1999 If you want to get a full essay, order it on our website:
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