/\ /. \ _____ _____. _____ _____. // \ ______ .___\_ \_ | .___\_ \_ | // .\/ _ \_ | | | |____|_ _| | |____|_ | | | | |____| ______/ \_ | ______/ | | | ^\____ \| |____| | | |____| | |____| | | | | | | | | | | |____. |. | |. | |. | |. | | |. | | |: | |: | |: | |: | | |: | | || | || | || | ||_ | | || | | | | | | | | | \ | | | | | ^\_______/^\_______/|____| | \_____/| |\_______/^ cRu|________\ | | Issue #45 |. __|__ /\ ____ ____ |: \ / __/. \__\_ \___\_ \_ _. June, 2003 || / \ \__/ / / /___// | 341 Subscribers World Wide | /___/ \ / / __/_ / | | / / / / / / // | ^\____ /___/___/ /^\____ //____| \/ /___/ \/ --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Table Of Contents --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Opening: Message From the Editor Letters From Our Readers Features: A Time for Change -- Farewell to the Editor Chair Party Report -- Breakpoint '03 How to Kill Your Compo in 10 Weeks Reviews: Music: On The Sideline -- "My Sky" by Jimmy Redfern and Astradyne The Lineup -- Monthly Music Listings Demo: Screen Lit Vertigo -- "FR-025: The Popular Demo" and "Relais" Opinion / Commentary: Coplan's Eyes -- Inspiration From a Different View Link List: Get Somewhere in the Scene Closing: Staff and Contact Information --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Message From the Editor --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Welcome to issue #45 of Static Line! This issue marks the beginning of a new era for the magazine. Let me introduce myself - I'm Ciaran Hamilton, and I'll be editing this magazine along with Ben Collver, starting from this issue. Static Line has been running for almost five years now under Coplan's editorship, and that's a long time for a magazine such as this one to keep going. The magazine has always strived to carry interesting and meaningful articles, and that won't be changing. Coplan isn't gone entirely either - he'll still be writing some articles (including In Tune), as well as a regular article called "Coplan's Eyes", which you can read near the end of this issue. Be sure to check out his feature article this month, too. Also in this issue, we've got a Breakpoint '03 party report from Seven, a feature on how *not* to run a music compo from Novus, and a review of "My Sky" from Ben. The Lineup and two demo reviews from Seven also make their regular appearance this month. A few important things to note: for the moment, new submissions for the magazine should be emailed to static_line-owner@scenespot.org instead of the usual address. This should only be a temporary change, so don't delete the old address from your address books just yet. :) Also, please note the new URL for the magazine archives - ftp://staticline.scenespot.org/issues/ . If you prefer using HTTP to download your issues, you can now do so at http://staticline.scenespot.org/issues/ . The old location will still work as a mirror, but the above address is now the 'official' location. Enjoy the issue, and we'll see you next month! --Ciaran and Ben --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Letters From Our Readers --=--=------=--=------=--=---- -=- A Message from Eino Keskitalo -=- A fine issue (44), special thanks to PsiTron for his insight on ReNoise, as I am one of those people who still need to find a friendly tracking enviroment on a modern machine. Unfortunately, Sk@le crashed right after starting up on my machine. ReNoise I definitely have to give a try. Intresting proposals about centralizing the scene in Web. In my rather non-authoritave opinion, you'll need a few activists, a good working concept and everyone to participate - else you'll end up creating just another portal. But you've probably thought all this before, so I'll just say that personally, I right now don't have the time to follow the scene very thoroughly. With the Internet, the scene seems to be happening globally rather than locally, which would be easier to follow and participate (or be motivated to participate). --Eino --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- A Time for Change Farewell to the Editor Chair By: Coplan --=--=------=--=------=--=---- It's a dark and dreary day when you come to the realization that you no longer have the time, or the patience to do something that always brought you joy. Even more appropriate is the fact that it's been raining over my house for 22 of the 31 days this past month. But the Sun came out sometime in the last week, and life didn't seem so dreary. It's a fact, I haven't had the time or the patience to continue my editing of Static Line. But two guys came along that helped me realize that Static Line will carry on...and I feared that this would not be the case. Thanks to Ben and Ciaran, Static Line will carry out without my seat at the Editor's Desk. Many of you already know where Static Line came from. It was formed out of the ashes of TraxWeekly, a magazine that I contributed to for a couple of months before it folded. Static Line was my next project. Ironically, it only started because I wanted some place to review music. I never thought that Static Line would've been around for 45 issues. I never thought it would've lived 5 years. And now that it has, I almost felt like I couldn't give it up. But people's lives change. Back in 1998, when Static Line was born, I was doing no more than contributing a few hours of studying a day for my college career. I didn't have a serious girlfriend, and I sure as hell didn't have any money to do much else. Today, I'm 26, getting ready to sit for my licensure as a Registered Landscape Architect (belive me, this is a lot harder that it would seem), I have a fiancee, and I'm saving for a house. I work 50+ hours per week in my prestigiuos career as a designer for a Civil Engineering firm, and I still like to write music when I can. I'm afraid there isn't much room for editing Static Line. So a few days ago, I thought the magazine was going to be doomed. Something I was not real happy about. Then comes along Ben and Ciaran, each of their own accord, to offer their torch-carrying abilities. Not only were each of them willing, but between them, they have done a lot to change the future of Static Line. They both have a lot of energy and passion. And a lot of great ideas. Worry not, Static Line will still always be the same great magazine that I have been building for over five years now. But two fresh new minds might wake it up a bit and make it that much better. The magazine is in great hands. In addition, I will still be writing editiorials for the magazine, and when I can I'll be continuing my music reviews as well. But writing an article is far less time consuming than pulling together a magazine of this caliber. And that is why you might want to join me in welcoming (and thanking) your two new editors. To many more years: --Coplan --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Party Report Breakpoint '03 By: Seven --=--=------=--=------=--=---- I really liked Mekka/Symposium the previous two times I attended, so I was very happy to hear that it wouldn't really stop after all, but instead be replaced with Breakpoint. The location was moved to the south (Bingen instead of Fallingbostel, still in Germany), but they kept the date and duration(Easter weekend, friday till monday). The remaining M/S organisers were reinforced with orgos from Underground Conference and Evoke, and they had promised they would try hard to keep the scenish atmosphere. Another reason for me to look forward to Breakpoint was the Scene.org Awards ceremony. The idea to celebrate the best demos of the past year with a kind of demoscene Oscars has been floating around for quite some time (I remember Abyss/Future Crew talking about it in an old diskmag), but this year the Scene.org guys actually put their shoulders to the wheel to make it a reality. I felt very honored when Melwyn asked me to be part of the jury, so I gladly accepted. The actual voting had been done some time ago, but the results weren't told to anyone yet, not even to the jury members. So I was quite anxious to be there, to meet the nominees and the other sceners in the jury. I had already taken the Friday before and Tuesday after Breakpoint off from work, when a family member died. Some things are more important than the demoscene, so I didn't leave for Breakpoint until Saturday noon, after the funeral. Thanks to Hilde & Nico who drove me to the station, as I still don't have a car. -=- Saturday 19 April -=- The trip to Germany took several hours longer then expected, because I first got confused about what my endstation was, and then at Bingen I couldn't get the doors of the wagon to open, forcing me to go back from Mainz to Bingen via a slow local train. Luckily I could still catch the last shuttle bus to the party place, with only 7 minutes leeway on a 7-hour journey. At the station, the organiser Gizmo had told me there were about 1000 visitors so far, there wasn't a single delay in the schedule, and Variform/Kewlers had won no less than 3 Scene.org Awards! It took the small bus 20 minutes to drive to the top of a nearby hill, where the abandoned army base was located in which Breakpoint took place. I talked a bit with Storm/ex-Kolor, and some guys from Surprise!Productions. XXX/Haujobb welcomed us at the entrance, and a moment later I ran into Melwyn who confirmed my suspicion that I had missed both the Awards ceremony and the afterparty for the winners, nominees and jury members :( Determined not to miss anything else, I dropped my luggage at one of the few remaining empty places and headed to the bigscreen. 22:04: The C64 compo has just started. The first one was an invitation demo for Coop 2003, and was of lower quality then the remaining 3 entries. The cooperation between Metalvotze and another C64 group is nice, but the bluescreen-like effect that's repeated after every part gets boring fast (and the noise hurts my ears). I think Love or the Beertime 3 demo will get the first place. Looking around in search for familiar faces, I first noticed Avoozel & Warp, two nice Dutch sceners I've met at WOEST last year. A bit later and much to my surpise, I ran into Phoenix/Hornet, who once again had made the trip from the USA to Europe for the sake of demo-partying. I was even more amazed when he introduced his two friends as Dan Wright and Jeremy Williams! In case you don't remember, Dan aka Pallbearer/Toxic Zombies started the famous Hornet archive and the DemoNews newsletter, and now sells CDs from demoscene musicians via Fusecon. Jeremy was the founder of the Demoscene fanclub, and both guys are now part of the Mindcandy DVD crew. In fact, they had a survey about the second Mindcandy volume with them (If you want to have your voice heard, go to www.demodvd.org and tell them which Amiga demos you'd like to see!) The Hornet archive CD was in no small part responsible for getting me hooked on demos, and I've read all the old Demonews issues, so meeting Dan was a bit like meeting a celebrity (I'm afraid I was just rambling incoherently to him. Sorry Dan :)) It's always a bit weird to meet sceners you know but have never met before, you usually have some vague idea of how they should look, which usually turns out wrong, f.e. I always imagined Dan had black hair. Unlock is the next scener I recognize, and he has the new Pain T-shirts with him! I also met Sir Garbagetruck, who was dressed a bit more demoscene-ish. I had previously only known him as a nick on the Nectarine radio. But since I skipped lunch today, I have to cut the conversation in search for food. Outside the partyplace one of the two food stalls is still open, and while I order some fries, I notice the guy standing next to me holding a Scene.org award statue! He's Nytrik/Cocoon, and the award is for the best graphics in 2002. Raw Confessions has actually been in the works for two years, which accounts for the differences in style and details of the scenes. It's too bad they're not releasing anything at Breakpoint, but Guile has become a father, and thus has less time now. Skyrunner is also ordering some food, and as usual he has submitted an entry in the tracked compo. Confusion ensues when I ask whether it was preselected, he says it wasn't, but it *was* played. It turns out not all tunes that passed the preselection were played on the soundsystem, so you have three states: not preselected, preselected song(which you can still get from the main FTP and vote for), and played songs. 23:27: The next compo is over: 28 great freestyle graphics were shown. After so many entries, it's hard to even remember the first picture (I think it was something with a killer easter rabbit). There was a lot of variation in styles, and also in the tools used to make them. This info was shown before each entry, and after a first look on the finished result, the orgos showed the different stages of the creation, that each graphician had to provide. Finally the complete image was shown again, and the orgos zoomed in on details. This is IMHO a much better way to run a graphics compo, than simple showing each image for 30 seconds. -=- Sunday 20 April -=- The wild compo is next, and has all kind of entries: a stop-motion lego story about zombies, a modern rendered version of the famous C64 demo Desert Dreams/Kefrens, a real-life version of a C64 demo (think Real Reality/Never, but more oldskool), a videoclip about "sceners in the sun" (to the tune of "Seasons in the sun", but with their own lyrics), several normal rendered animations, of which the one from The Silents was probably the best, a PalmPilot entry without sound, and of course a bunch of joke/low quality entries, with several about the war in Iraq. 2:11: I just went to the campfire, had some long conversations with Unlock, Newt and Kusma. One topic was how friendly everyone is at a demoparty, and how very little (if anything) gets stolen, give the amount of portable hardware there is. My cynical side thinks this is at least partly because the average visitor can afford both a computer and the trip + entrance fee etc, so he's not really poor. Unfortunately a campfire can only warm 50% of your body at the same time (if we exclude cremation), and it was getting rather cold, so I went back inside to defreeze my back. Just as at Mekka/Symposium, the surprise coding compo is not about size-optimizing, but about making a demo with specific topics (This year: heating tubes, overcrowded shuttle busses, MS is dead and more). That's more then a solo-coder can do, so I decided not to spend my time on it. Instead I got the network running on my laptop, and checked the schedule. After trying to make some overview shots of the partyhall with my new camera, I decided to call it a day and unrolled my sleeping bag. 7:30: Back awake, but it's now really cold. I know PS is somewhere at the partyplace, but I haven't seen him yet. An educated guess leads me to the campfire, and indeed: there he is. We talk a bit about the awards (he was a jury member too), while some really drunk guy who can hardly sit upright, amuses everyone by singing along with his cd-player (something like "tarara boem tara, my beautiful communist"). No much is happening, so I'll use the occasion to describe the partyplace. The main hall is a big army hangar, it's more narrow then the Mekka/Symposium hall but a bit longer. There's a podium with a bigscreen on the far end, the screen is rather small compared to MS. The soundwalls on both sides of the screen are almost the same size. The 10 meters in front of the stage are filled with chairs, so you can watch the compos comfortably, but as there is only a single corridor between the tables, there's a jam after each compo when everyone wants to go outside or back to their place. Warm air is blown inside via large plastic tubes. The entrance of the hall is connected to a large green tent, which contains the info desk, the beamer team and the rest of the orgos-only space. The remaining 2/3 of the tent is filled with the (very small) second stage, and some tables and benches so people can eat there while enjoying the various DJ-acts. Outside the tent are two food wagons, selling pizzas, french fries, sandwiches etc, the usual party food. A second hall, parrallel to the main hall, is used as sleeping hall, it's also heated. The toilets are in two seperate toilet-wagons. In front of the tent is a meadow, and at the far end of it is the fireplace, quite close to the bushes in fact. I hope we won't start too many forest fires :) 9:19: Steeler and his co-presentator XXX, who has a big black moustache for the occasion, are giving away leftover prizes. Yeah, Breakpoint is so well organised they have too many prizes for the main compos, so they invent things like "best sleeping performance on stage", "best cyber security", and "first person who can bring 4 beers to the stage" :) The prizes weren't very seriously either, old C64 game roms and such. In the end they just threw what was left in the audience, I got hold of a genuine 650MB CD-R. Woohoo! 9:35: Bad news: So far, the orgos have not received a single Amiga 64K intro. That's really a disappointment, especially after the amazing Planet Potion intro last year at MS'02. The deadline is extended an hour, but I doubt this is going to change a lot... 10:29: And indeed, due to the lack of entries the Amiga 64K compo is cancelled :( 11:35: Besides the usual announcements like "Name/Group, please come to the infodesk, your entry doesn't work!", the orgos have also asked if anybody had insulin with them. Sounds like a diabetic got sick, I hope they find some. On a brighter note, the bigscreen is showing the weather forecast: 22 degrees, sunny with few clouds. People cheer and applaud, as the weather was rather gloomy yesterday. The PC 64K compo has been delayed until the shuttle bus arrives. The bus drives around during the whole duration of the party, between the partyplace, several hotels and the station, so those who prefer to sleep in a cozy bed can do so. During the compo it became obvious that the 12 entries had been sorted by the orgos, from bad to good. The second-to-last entry was Candytron from Farbrausch, which aims squarely at the "my instinct votes for boobies"-crowd with one very well animated 3D model (a bit anorectic, though). It has only a few effects, but they look good and the soundtrack with synthetic vocals is incredible for a 64K. The last entry was Project Genesis from the new Hungarian group Conspiracy, which last almost 10 minutes, has several soundtracks, and a variety of effects and 3D scenes, but the design isn't very coherent. They're pretty well matched, I'm curious which one will win! The console demo compo has been delayed for an unspecified time, and all the competitors have been called to the info desk. I heard there's some problem with the video system :/ 15:28: Sorry for the long gap, but the weather is splendid and most people are outside, sitting in the sun and having a good time. The green stickers from Madwizards can be seen everywhere, with the slogan "The real party is outside!", and I have to agree. My 5 liters of Jupiler (Belgian beer) are long gone, and I'm meeting new people left and right. Since I don't remember faces easily, especially after several months (between demoparties), I'm taking pictures of everyone who dares to cross my path. The SID music compo is in progress, but I'm only back inside to flush my cameras flash card to the laptop. 17:49: I had a discussion about code vs design with Bhead, a friendly guy from T- Rex, the Russian group who made "Broadband". He offered me some white wiry snack that tasted between fish and cheese. I couldn't read the Russian writing on the package, but he said it was dried squid. Yummie :) Some guys had caught a green lizard, and they were daring each other to lick it. In the end we put the frightened animal back in it's natural habitat, before someone/something got hurt. There's one very original fun-compo: build your own balloon. One team is testing their entry, taped together from large plastic sheets, above the barbeque. I partially missed the fast intro compo, but from the ones I caught, I liked the South Park-inspired one best. I'll need to check them all at home, together with the compos I've missed. Especially in the 4K compo there seems to be some very good productions... The C64 graphics compo is happening now, 16-color images at a very low resolution. There are several anti-war/anti-USA pictures but I'm not impressed with their quality. My favourite is a greyscale image of the Eifel tower, it looks almost photographic (insofar this is possible within the limit of the format). 18:34: I'm eating a pizza while listening to the streaming music compo, but I'll probably go back outside when I've finished. Since the orgos put some powerful speakers outside, there's little reason to stay in the dark hall for the non-visual compos. There are no separate instrumental/vocal categories, unlike at Assembly or SOTA. 20:59: The Amiga demo compo is over, with only 3 entries. Madwizards made a very impressive contribution with Fate Fits Karma, but I think the audience preferred TBLs MAGIA. It reminds me a lot of Little Nel, their winning demo of last year. Too bad Phoenix and the other Hornet guys missed it, they just came back when the endscreen was shown :( They've been taking notes during all compos, which is probably the most fair way to vote, due to the stringent limitations of the human brain during parties :) ) 21:39: The technical difficulties with the console compo have been solved, and 5 entries are shown, 3 of which are for the GameBoy Advance3. It's very clear which one will win: Phloam/Unique, the only one featuring multiple parts and complex 3D scenes. Another good point that the orgos copied from Mekka/Symposium is that all entries are available for download directly after the compo. Dan Wright has missed some wild demos, and to be able to vote fairly he watches them on my laptop, before the demo compo starts. -=- Monday 21 April -=- 0:04: There were 21 demos, again shown in increasing quality. One didn't work, and several low-quality techno demos took way too long IMHO, but a vocal part of the public still liked them. There were quite some invitation demos of varying quality, and about 7 high-quality entries. I really liked Relais/Kolor, a heavy 3D demo with cute robots in a airship station, and The Popular Demo/Farbrausch (announced on the bigscreen as "hund" = dog.) starring a mirror-ball man dancing in various splendid scenes. Federation Against Nature made two entries, I prefered the one in the tradition of Nature Sucks: pure software raytracing (nice for the people with more CPU than GPU power). [ Editor's note: "Relais" and "The Popular Demo" are reviewed later on by Seven in this very issue. ] Since this was the last compo, a lot of people are going to sleep in their hotel, the sleeping hall or simply on the floor. I hope they noticed the change in the voting deadline: instead of 5 o'clock, it is now 1 o'clock for paper voting and 2 o'clock for network voting. You have to exchange your wristband for a voting form or a voting key, and while this may be a good protection against fake voting etc, I really think the extra hassle at a moment when everyone is dead tired will result in far less votes. 3:46: I've been talking with Raymon from Unique, he's running Phloam on his GBA, and the colors look much better than in the taped version on the bigscreen. It reminds me of the demos of 94/95, and the hardware is in fact not that different from an old 386: 16.75 Mhz processor, 240*160 screen. The memory is very small, only 256 KB, but reading data from the cardridge is faster then from harddisk. I also had the chance to meet Gargaj and Boyc from Conspiracy, the new group formed by three old Hungarian groups. True to their name, they kept the existence of their group a secret till Breakpoint, which wasn't always easy: when you're in a group which has the potential to beat Farbrausch, you get exited about it. The reason they formed Conspiracy was to show that Hungary can still make great demo, and to pull more newbies into the scene. I hope they succeed! Enumerating the nationalities of the visitors we know, PS, Melwyn, Gargaj, Boisy and I concluded there were people from at least 19 different countries at Breakpoint. Not bad for a "new" party :) 8:40: I'm woken up by some announcement, it's in German so I understand it only a little bit, it seems something got stolen and they ask to return it, please :( On a more positive note, almost all party T-shirts are sold out. (Later it turned out nothing was stolen, it was just a drunk guy who didn't remember where he had put his stuff) I've just bought a pack of Slengpung playing cards at the info desk. I guess everyone knows that Slengpung is the main demoparty-photo archive, and they've selected 54 well-known demosceners and put their pictures on playing cards. The result can easily be used to convince non-sceners that the scene is mainly about getting terribly drunk, given the state of some sceners on the cards :) 10.28: I've been socializing with the dutch guys, Avoozle, Inopia & Cosmic Trance. Skrebbel draws my attention to the fact there are only two bus runs after the price ceremony, which could cause problems: I think at most 30 people fit in the bus, and there are hundreds of sceners :/ The American guys are back from their hotel, but luckily they had voted before they left the previous night. The prize ceremony was scheduled at 11, but it's just been delayed one hour. I'm not sure how long it will take, but I'm starting to worry: there'll probably be only a single shuttle bus I can take after the prize ceremony, and I really have to catch my train to Belgium (the Thalys requires a reservation, so you can't just take the next if you miss it). 11:55: Newt had an iBook running MacOS X with her, since I use a Mac at work we could debate its good and bad points. Later the topic turned to the (lack of) girls in the demoscene, and when she complained it was hard to get to know other girls, I introduced her to Clary/Drifters, who I had met earlier. Zito/MOOds, Clarys friend gave me a MOOds promoCD, containing all their releases of last year and a number of Amiga demos in movie format. By giving these away, he hopes that more people get to know the Amiga scene. I asked if he knew the DemoDVD team was planning an Amiga DemoDVD, and presented Phoenix to him. You can vote for your favourite Amiga demos on the survey, but it's probably way better if the Amiga scene participates directly :) 12:10: Everybody is waiting for the prize ceremony. I'm starting to wrap up, so I'm ready to catch the bus. The floor in front of the stage is not only covered with the usual flyers, plastic cups and beer cans, but also with a lot of broken bottles. While picking a fragment out the sole of my shoe, I think about the dangerous combination of drunk sceners with a floor that's a health hazard. If someone stumbles here, they'll have to carry him to the hospital :( Before the ceremony begins, Steeler auctions off the last remaining Breakpoint organiser T-shirt. The money goes to Scene.org, to pay for bigger harddrives and maybe the next Scene.org awards. In the end, Muhmac/Freestyle is willing to pay 80 euros for it. The way the winners are announced is also inherited from Mekka/Symposium: a graph is shown with rising vote bars, one for each entry, and one by one the bars stop growing. Then the 3 winners are called to the stage, given their prizes and their picture is taken. The winning demos were also shown again on the bigscreen. The most thrilling IMO were the PC 64K intro results, where the bars for Candytron and Project Genesis kept growing long after the others ended. Tomcat/Greenroom and Vicky went crazy when Conspiracy (their fellow Hungarians) won the compo. For the Amiga demos Magia/TBL snatched the first prize away from MadWizards, just like they (Madwizards) had predicted in their Fate Fits Karma. I was a bit disappointed that Relais/Kolor didn't beat The Popular Demo/Farbrausch, but its mood was probably a bit too subtle to stand up against Farbrauschs sparkling eyecandy. Federation Against Nature got the third place for their raytracing demo. Skyrunner won the third place in the tracked music compo, and had to go back on stage because due to the excitement he had forgotten to thank the audience for making his old dream of winning a Mekka/Symposium compo come true. Unique won the console demo, as expected. All three places in the freestyle gfx compo were won by Haujobb members, and the wild compo was won by the Silents (although the next 6 wild entries were all rather close). After the last compo results, Steeler gave a little speech to thank the sponsors, and also the audience. Appearently we behaved much better then at MS: there were no damages, not a single theft , and very few deaths (and nobody important too) :) The bad news was that Bingen city and the German government, who both owned this old army depot, had decided to level the place next year, but the orgos would search for another location, because Breakpoint definately will happen again next year! I quickly say goodbye to the friends in my vicinity, and carry my bags outside. The overcrowded bus gets us to the Bingen station in time, and the rest of the trip goes without any problems (I'm asleep most of it anyway :)) I'm really glad I visited Breakpoint, even if I missed the first day and the Scene.Org awards. I've never talked so much and met so many new people at a demoparty, there was an incredibly friendly and kind atmosphere during these 4 days. Even a couple of guys at the campfire who weren't sceners, but were visiting to see what it was about, said the feeling is much more open then at a music festival for example. If friendliness had mass, Breakpoint would have created a black hole :) I really hope to see everyone I met again at the next party, probably Assembly. Till then! --Seven --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- How to Kill Your Compo in 10 Weeks By: Novus --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Ever wondered why monthly compos get no respect? Go ahead. Take 1st Place in March's round of the UbErNiFtY c0mp0, post it on your website, brag about it on #trax, and trumpet the news on message boards across the scene. Odds are you'll be met with one big yawn, with maybe a slight bump in your downloads. Why? Because UbErNiFtY c0mp0 will be closed and forgotten by next month. Sad, ain't it? Way too many monthly compos nowadays shut down after absurdly short times. That's not just a recent phenomenon either. That's a pattern that stretches all the way to my first exposure to the web-based tracking scene in 1996, perhaps even earlier. And when monthly compos come and go so quickly, it's no wonder that so few people take them seriously. The problem is that for so many monthly compos out there, this seems to be the entirety of the planning that goes into them: "Hmm... I need to draw more visitors to my website so more people will download my music... Hey, I know! I'll run a compo! I'll get a couple of my friends to be judges, slap together a website, set a deadline, and that's it! It can't be THAT hard, can it?" Yes. Yes it can be THAT hard. Compos are time-consuming, especially judged compos. Just do the math. Let's say you open a judged compo and get 10 entries. I'm guessing here, but the average length of most tracks seems to be about 5 minutes. So right away, you're talking 50 minutes to hear all the entries. But that's if you just play each song once. To be fair, you really need to listen to each entry 3 or 4 times. That 50 minutes just turned into 200. And then you have to write some comments about each entry, another 15 minutes per song, multiplied by 10 songs, and that's 150 more minutes for a total of 350. That's 6 hours for just 10 entries. And anyone who's ever thrown open a compo and done a semi-decent job of promoting it knows that 10 entries is an aburdly low number. You're gonna get more. Assuming that you plan ahead and leave yourself plenty of time, it's still possible to pull it all off. But too many compo-organizers don't plan ahead. Instead, they open their compo, give people a month to enter their tunes, and announce that the results will be up a week after the entry deadline. And then Real Life attacks. They can't spare 6 hours to judge the songs. They miss the results date, and then often make yet another critical mistake: they don't even bother to let their visitors know what's going on. So people stop by for a day or two, don't see the results, get bored, and quit visiting the compo website. And finally, weeks later, the organizer gets all the results up, announces he's now accepting entries for the next round, and gets 2 entries because nobody cares about his compo anymore. And he shuts it down. Multiply that scenario by several dozen since 1996, and it's no wonder monthly compos have such a crappy reputation. Folks, if you're gonna run a compo, a little planning goes a LONG way. I hate to use my Complete MOD Compo as an example since it smacks of self- promotion, but alas, it's the only compo I have any inside knowledge of. And hey, it's been open for 16 months now, so I must be doing something right... When I started CMC in 2002, I knew that my busy job schedule was going to wreak havoc on my free time, so I nixed the idea of making it a judged compo. So, I went with a public-voting compo, which requires less of my time. I also looked for ways to streamline things on the backend so that I could do minor tasks such as counting votes while I had free-time at my job, saving the harder work for when I was home. For quality purposes, I decided to pre-screen all the entries and only let the best ones compete. But I realized that if too many people entered songs, I'd never have enough time to screen them all. And similarly, if CMC didn't have enough voters, it would all be meaningless. So, I killed two birds with one stone by requiring all contestants to vote on the current month's crop of songs. That guarantees a consistent supply of voters and keeps me from getting overwhelmed with too many entries. Please keep in mind that I'm not saying that all compos should be carbon- copies of mine. What I'm trying to stress is the importance of planning ahead. If your compo is going to run smoothly, you need to spend hours ahead of time thinking about the details of how your compo will run, how you'll find the time to run it right, and how you'll head-off potential problems before they can even develop. Also keep in mind that the main focus of your attention should be your visitors, not the musicians who enter songs. If you run a compo, finding entries will probably not be a problem. Finding visitors WILL be, especially repeat-visitors. If nobody's around to download the winning song, then winning your compo won't mean much. If you focus on attracting more visitors, those increased hits will lead to everything else you're looking for, including more and better entries, high-profile competitors, and a good reputation. I like monthly compos. They provide a great outlet for trackers to promote their music and get feedback, and they can play a valuable role in the tracking scene. If you want to run a monthly compo, by all means, go for it! But the scene needs one more failed monthly compo like I need an extra hole in my head. So please: plan ahead, and run it right. --Novus --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- On The Sideline "My Sky" by Jimmy Redfern and Astradyne By: Ben --=--=------=--=------=--=---- -=- Introduction -=- Greetings and salutations. This is my first column and music review. I can't hope it will compare to Coplan's In Tune, and most of the time I will be reviewing songs by my musical superiors. That stated, please do not cut me any slack! Send any feedback, flames or otherwise. -=- "My Sky" by Jimmy Redfern and Astradyne -=- I have always liked this style. It starts out with a slow, smooth melody, then introduces a crisp, frenetic breakbeat sequence. What do you call this style? I think it is more drum & bass than ambient, because I believe the melody is only there to hold the drumming together. The samples are are not feats of audiophile engineering. Some of the drum and synth samples are 8 bit, and some of the sustain loops were not clean. Unfortunately the drum sequences are pre-cut loops rather than tracked, but there is tracked percussion accompanying them. No matter, I believe the point of this song is to perk you up with breakbeat goodness. If you look at the tracks, you'll see many channels with notes that are not even consciously heard while listening to the song. There are subtle echoes and great variety in the drumming. This keeps the song interesting and makes it worth listening to years after it was composed. What were the composers thinking when they created this? I vaguely remember reading somewhere that My Sky is a spoof of another song. The ending is melodic like the beginning, only more smooth and the synth chords remind me a bit of Aphex Twin. This song is very cute, and for me it was a great introduction to N.O.I.S.E. This group has been prolific over the years and has produced some high quality tunes. If you haven't given them a listen, I highly recommend them, even their MP3s. Song Information: Title: My Sky Author: Jimmy Redfern and Astradyne Length: 6:18 Filename: no-mysky.zip File Size: 2 MB Source: ftp://ftp.noisemusic.org/pub/users/wnoise/1998/ --Ben --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- The Lineup By: Novus --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Welcome to The Lineup! Every month, I scour through the hundreds of new releases on the scene's major archive sites to find the best new music, saving you the trouble of having to download 20 instant-delete songs to find 1 that's worth keeping. More feedback came in this month, this time from Kern802, who wrote thusly: "Keep up the good work! I really appreciate the service you are providing by selecting the best scene music each month. A couple of issues back, I downloaded the songs you listed and put them in my mp3 player and they kept me company on many long drives. Right now I'm downloading another batch and I'm looking forward to hearing them. I don't have any criticisms or recommendations, except to let you know that I personally like trance/ dance/ electronica/ experimental, and would like more of that. Again, I just wanted to let you know that your hard work _is_ appreciated by the scene!" Thanks for the kind words. :) You can add YOUR feedback, positive or negative (and so far, it's all been positive...) by e-mailing me at vince_young@hotmail.com. In the meantime, you may consider the following 30 tunes to be the best tracks of March 2003: [ Editor's note: You'll find the songs for April and May in next month's issue. ] -=- THE BEST OF THE BEST -=- "Soundtrack To A Midnight Kiss" - HomesickAlien - fantasy http://lysis.audio-stream.net/hsa/hsa_soundtrack.zip -=- THE REST OF THE BEST -=- "Alice Cooper: Remix" - Slash - demostyle ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/artists/slash/slash_atd_attentio.zip "Another Day" - Future Element - dance http://www.geocities.com/dinu.geo/another.zip "Broken Dimension" - Dipa - fantasy ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/artists/dipa/brokendimension.zip "Criteria" - Narfy - fantasy ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/artists/narfy/criteria.zip "Dataf*ck" - Djkor - drum'n'bass ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/groups/cornercut/016crc.zip "Depression" - Future Element - dance http://www.geocities.com/dinu.geo/dprs.zip "Dream Wielder" - Narfy - light rock ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/artists/narfy/dreamwielder.zip "Emerald" - Vibe - pop ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/groups/cornercut/008crc.zip "Establishing Contact" - Wizard - electronica ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/artists/wizard/wiz_cont.zip "Feel The Rythm" - Dipa - dance ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/artists/dipa/feeltherythm.zip "Floating Liquid God" - Mellow-D - demostyle ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/groups/fm/fm-blurr.zip "Heaven Number Eight" - Butch - fantasy http://data.modarchive.com/B/b_heaven.it.zip "Human Essence" - Vibe - pop ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/groups/cornercut/025crc.zip "It's Night Forever" - Dipa - fantasy ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/artists/dipa/itsnightforever.zip "Jade" - Narfy - pop ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/artists/narfy/jade.zip "Midnight" - Narfy - electronica ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/artists/narfy/midnite.zip "Negation" - Mellow-D - pop ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/groups/fm/fm-negat.zip "Pleasure Of A Holiday" - Slash - dance ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/artists/slash/slash_atd_pleasure_on_case_of_a_holiday.zip "Put The Wrong Things Right" - Phred - electronica http://cgi.ethz.ch/~phkeller/modules/right.zip "Rescue" - Monad - progressive rock http://koti.mbnet.fi/helunder/omamusa/MON_5B.IT "Revolting Minds" - Neuron - techno http://modplug.com/mods/nrdetail.php3?session=&detailno=10522 "Shift" - Narfy - pop ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/artists/narfy/shift.zip "Short Circuit" - Szartd - trance http://www.cutetrancegirls.com/music/artists/szartd/CMC-Szartd-ShortCircuit.xm (Sorry for the uber-long URL...) "Spit The Mike" - Wizard - dance ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/artists/wizard/wiz_stm.zip "Sunlight" - Technoiz - dance ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/groups/cornercut/015crc.zip "The Awakening Of The Evil" - Sphenx - orchestral http://data.modarchive.com/S/spx-theawekeningoftheevil.it.zip "The Vibes" - Vibe - pop ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/groups/cornercut/023crc.zip "Two Screenshots Of Life" - Vibe - pop ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/music/groups/cornercut/012crc.zip "Warcry" - Monad - progressive rock http://koti.mbnet.fi/helunder/omamusa/MON_12B.IT Latez! --Novus --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Screen Lit Vertigo "FR-025: The Popular Demo" and "Relais" By: Seven --=--=------=--=------=--=---- -=- "FR-025: The Popular Demo" by Farbrausch -=- (party-version) Found at Breakpoint partynet, but also available via scene.org 1st place at the Breakpoint 2003 PC democompo System requirements: 11 Mb HD, Windows, a Gefore 2 MX or higher Test Machines: P3 900Mh 640MB, Gamesurround III, Radeon 8500 LE 64MB, Win98 SE P4 2.6Gh 512MB DDR, Realtek AC97 audio, Geforce4 488 Go 64MB, WinXP The credits: code: Chaos music: Wayfinder, Ronny, Andreas Thiele 3D & visuals: GiZmo, Fiver2, Phaser Animation: Sarah Hill The demo: Just like last year, Farbrausch did their best to release a kick-ass demo on their own party, but where FR-020 (In Control) stranded on third place, FR-025 managed to win the top position. The Popular Demo (a name that seems to be a self-fulfilling prophecy) is a pure 3D demo that goes squarily for the highest eyecandy factor, and has a matching soundtrack. It has no real story, but a simple theme: a dancing mirrorball-man walking through several scenes. This sounds simple and plain, but the scenes look incredibly: a disco hall whose walls, floor and ceiling are plastering with illuminated mirrors, a flying disc with hundreds of mirror-people dancing, and my favourite: a passageway outside at night, with the wind blowing brightly colored leafs under arcs of floating blue lights (reminds me a lot of VIP2/Popsy Team). Most of the sparkling, glittering feel of the demo is caused by a single effect: having the brightest lights "glow over" into their surroundings, a bit like a soft fuzzy flare. Radial blur is also used a lot. The only scene that I don't really like is the simple square room with the mirrorball, I guess the aim of it is to demonstrate the mathematically correct way the mirrorballs lightspots move over the wall, but its's too simplistic compared to the other scenes. The movements of the dancers are very realistic, at first I thought it was done with motion capturing but the credits mention bones, so I'm not sure. But in scenes with a lot of dancers becomes visible they all do one of the 3 or 4 different movements. Something strange: on my laptop with its GF4 Go (which is not really a GF4 but more a souped-up GF2), one room with hundreds of dancers is initially empty, and the dancers pop up after a few seconds, where on my ATI 9500LE they're there immediately. The word "Hund" (German for dog) on the screen in that scene is probably the working title of FR-025, during the competition at Breakpoint the demo was introduced on the bigscreen as "Hund/Hund". The music is quite good IMHO, it's a happy pop/disco track that fits the dazzling visuals. The vocals at the start aren't jarring with the music, as those in In Control where when I heard it the first time, but they sound a bit too distorted, too much filtered. Syncing is excellent, as usually, and I like the additional touches such as the vocals appearing around the head of the dancer, or the sweeping sounds the rotating rings make when they pass close to the camera. Overall: FR-025 is an instant classic, designed to win the BP compo: impressive visuals, great soundtrack, very colorful and spreading a sugar-sweet happiness. Like a Hollywood blockbuster, it migh feel a bit empty but you're too entertained to care. If you haven't watched it yet, you should do so ASAP! -=- "Relais" -=- (party-version) Demo: Found at Breakpoint partynet, but also available via scene.org Divx (640*480, 25 FPS, 68 MB): ftp://ftp.scene.org/pub/demos/groups/kolor/relais_by_kolor.avi 2nd place at the Breakpoint 2003 PC democompo. System requirements: Windows 2K or XP, P3, 256 MB RAM (512 recommended), and a real Geforce 3 64MB (so no ATI cards, no Geforce 4 MX/GO) (Geforce 4 128 MB recommended), 12 MB HD. The credits: Code: Shiva, Siriuz Music: Pressure, Raytraza 2D: Raytrayza 3D: Noize, Pandur/bm The demo: Relais is one of the pickiest demos I've seen regarding the hardware/software it will run on, neither of my 2 machines were adequate :( So I had to wait for the DivX version to watch it again. (Off-topic: I hope ODD will release their World Domination, that won the Gathering, in the same way, cause that one won't run either.) Just like FR-025, Relais is a pure 3D demo, but that's the only similarity. Instead of brightly-coloured disco environments, Relais creates a melancholic world of baroque airships, from very simple crafts that are barely more than a wing with one propeller, to giant floating gardens and greenhouses with sails. There doesn't seems to be a single living being in this world, the ships are operated and maintained by a variety of robots. It reminds me of the deserted atmosphere of Myst, but on the airships of Final Fantasy (yes, I'm comparing a demo to games, stop throwing the tomatoes!) The mood grows gradually darker, with the robots sawing down trees, and one of them lonely in an asylum. As mentioned in the .txt file, they had to save on texture, sound and geometry quality to fit inside the 12 MB limit, so there is some variation. The models of the ships are very detailed, the robots a bit less so, and a few objects look plain ugly (the hexagonal windlass f.e. Surely they had polys to spare in that scene? Compare with the superb whale skeleton!) There are no standalone 2D images, except the building plans of the ships, overlayed at various points, together with fragments of German text. There are almost no effects, except the very realistic reflections in a mirror and an indoor fountain. The emphasis is on the models and the fairly good animation (it's hard to call it realistic for robots) that goes in slowmotion from time to time. Some textures look too fuzzy, but that may be partially caused by the DivX compression. The music builds up slowly at the start, very ambient with weird noises, which are later accompagnied by a complicated drumline. There isn't much variation in it, to my untrained ears, but it fits the mysterious mood of the visuals. Overall: Personally I liked Relais better than FR-025, because I enjoy stories that leave a lot to the imagination. It makes you wonder who the builders of the robots where, what happened to them, etc etc. But even if you don't like story demos, Relais is worth watching at least once, for it's impressive modelling and coherent design. If you've more bandwidth than CPU/GPU power, go for the .avi (URL above). --Seven --=--=-- --=--=------=--=------=--=---- Coplan's Eyes Inspiration From a Different View By: Coplan --=--=------=--=------=--=---- So I write a lot about inspiration. I must write a new inspiration article once every few months. But this is different this time. I'm engaged now, and it has changed my perspective about things. I'm planning for a wedding, I'm saving to buy a house, and I'm trying to control my finances, among other things. But my inspiration right now isn't Love. Love is a great inspiration, mind you. But it's overdone. How many of you find inspiration from love, or lack thereof? Have a bad fight with your significant other, and you have a great new song. Meet someone new, and out pops a ballad. That's all fine and dandy, but lets get to something you can control: Time and Task. Time and Task management is something that's very essential when you live with someone, or are planning to do so. This can also be applied to your art form as well. In the engineering world, we refer to Time and Task as T= United Trackers.................http://www.united-trackers.org Archives: Acid2.....................................ftp://acid2.stack.nl Amber.......................................ftp://amber.bti.pl Cyberbox.....................................ftp://cyberbox.de Hornet (1992-1996)........................ftp://ftp.hornet.org Scene.org..................................ftp://ftp.scene.org Scene.org Austra........................ftp://ftp.au.scene.org Scene.org Netherlands...................ftp://ftp.nl.scene.org Swiss Scene FTP...........................ftp://ftp.chscene.ch <*> MOD Archive..........................http://www.modarchive.com <*> aminet.....................http://wuarchive.wustl.edu/~aminet/ Demo Groups: 3g Design..............................http://3gdesign.cjb.net 3State...................................http://threestate.com 7 Gods.........................................http://7gods.sk Aardbei.....................................http://aardbei.com Acid Rain..............................http://surf.to/acidrain Addict..................................http://addict.scene.pl Agravedict........................http://www.agravedict.art.pl Alien Prophets.....................http://www.alienprophets.dk Anakata..............................http://www.anakata.art.pl ASD....................................http://asd.demoscene.gr Astral..............................http://astral.scene-hu.com Astroidea........................http://astroidea.scene-hu.com BlaBla..............................http://blabla.planet-d.net Blasphemy..............................http://www.blasphemy.dk Bomb..................................http://bomb.planet-d.net Broncs..................................http://broncs.scene.cz Byterapers.....................http://www.byterapers.scene.org Bypass.................................http://bypass.scene.org Calodox.................................http://www.calodox.org Cocoon..............................http://cocoon.planet-d.net Confine.................................http://www.confine.org Damage...................................http://come.to/damage Dc5.........................................http://www.dc5.org Delirium..............................http://delirium.scene.pl Eclipse............................http://www.eclipse-game.com Elitegroup..........................http://elitegroup.demo.org Exceed...........................http://www.inf.bme.hu/~exceed Fairlight.............................http://www.fairlight.com Fobia Design...........................http://www.fd.scene.org Freestyle............................http://www.freestylas.org Fresh! Mindworks...................http://kac.poliod.hu/~fresh Future Crew..........................http://www.futurecrew.org Fuzzion.................................http://www.fuzzion.org GODS...................................http://www.idf.net/gods Halcyon...........................http://www.halcyon.scene.org Haujobb..................................http://www.haujobb.de Hellcore............................http://www.hellcore.art.pl Infuse...................................http://www.infuse.org Inquisition....................http://inquisition.demoscene.hu Kilobite...............................http://kilobite.cjb.net Kolor................................http://www.kaoz.org/kolor Komplex.................................http://www.komplex.org Kooma.....................................http://www.kooma.com Mandula.........................http://www.inf.bme.hu/~mandula Maturefurk...........................http://www.maturefurk.com Monar................ftp://amber.bti.pl/pub/scene/distro/monar MOVSD....................................http://movsd.scene.cz Nextempire...........................http://www.nextempire.com Noice.....................................http://www.noice.org Orange.................................http://orange.scene.org Orion................................http://orion.planet-d.net Outbreak................................http://www.outbreak.nu Popsy Team............................http://popsyteam.rtel.fr Prone................................http://www.prone.ninja.dk Purple....................................http://www.purple.dk Rage........................................http://www.rage.nu Replay.......................http://www.shine.scene.org/replay Retro A.C...........................http://www.retroac.cjb.net Sista Vip..........................http://www.sistavip.exit.de Skytech team............................http://www.skytech.org Skrju.....................................http://www.skrju.org Spinning Kids......................http://www.spinningkids.org Sunflower.......................http://sunflower.opengl.org.pl Talent.............................http://talent.eurochart.org The Black Lotus.............................http://www.tbl.org The Digital Artists Wired Nation.http://digitalartists.cjb.net The Lost Souls...............................http://www.tls.no TPOLM.....................................http://www.tpolm.com Trauma.................................http://sauna.net/trauma T-Rex.....................................http://www.t-rex.org Unik........................................http://www.unik.de Universe..........................http://universe.planet-d.net Vantage..................................http://www.vantage.ch Wipe....................................http://www.wipe-fr.org Music Labels, Music Sites: Aisth.....................................http://www.aisth.com Aural Planet........................http://www.auralplanet.com Azure...................................http://azure-music.com Blacktron Music Production...........http://www.d-zign.com/bmp BrothomStates.............http://www.katastro.fi/brothomstates Chill..........................http://www.chillproductions.com Chippendales......................http://www.sunpoint.net/~cnd Chiptune...............................http://www.chiptune.com Da Jormas................................http://www.jormas.com Fabtrax......http://www.cyberverse.com/~boris/fabtrax/home.htm Fairlight Music.....................http://fairlight.scene.org Five Musicians.........................http://www.fm.scene.org Fusion Music Crew.................http://members.home.nl/cyrex Goodstuff..........................http://artloop.de/goodstuff Hellven.................................http://www.hellven.org Ignorance.............................http://www.ignorance.org Immortal Coil.............................http://www.ic.l7.net Intense...........................http://intense.ignorance.org Jecoute.................................http://jecoute.cjb.net Kosmic Free Music Foundation.............http://www.kosmic.org Lackluster.....................http://www.m3rck.net/lackluster Level-D.................................http://www.level-d.com Mah Music.............................http://come.to/mah.music Maniacs of noise...............http://home.worldonline.nl/~mon MAZ's sound homepage..................http://www.maz-sound.com Med.......................................http://www.med.fr.fm Miasmah.............................http://www.miasmah.cjb.net Milk.......................................http://milk.sgic.fi Mo'playaz..........................http://ssmedion.de/moplayaz Mono211.................................http://www.mono211.com Morbid Minds..............http://www.raveordie.com/morbidminds Moods.............................http://www.moodymusic.de.vu/ Noise................................http://www.noisemusic.org One Touch Records......................http://otr.planet-d.net Park..................................http://park.planet-d.net pHluid..................................http://phluid.acid.org Radical Rhythms.....http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/merrelli/rr RBi Music.............................http://www.rbi-music.com Ruff Engine................http://members.xoom.com/ruff_engine SHR8M......................................http://1st.to/shr8m Sound Devotion................http://sugarbomb.x2o.net/soundev Soundstate.........................http://listen.to/soundstate Sunlikamelo-D...........http://www.error-404.com/sunlikamelo-d Suspect Records........................http://www.tande.com/sr Tequila........................http://www.defacto2.net/tequila Tempo................................http://tempomusic.cjb.net Tetris....................................http://msg.sk/tetris Theralite...........................http://theralite.avalon.hr Tokyo Dawn Records........................http://tokyodawn.org Triad's C64 music archive.............http://www.triad.c64.org UltraBeat.........................http://www.innerverse.com/ub Vibrants................................http://www.vibrants.dk Wiremaniacs.........................http://www.wiremaniacs.com Zen of Tracking.........................http://surf.to/the-imm Programming: Programming portal......................http://www.gamedev.net Programming portal.....................http://www.flipcode.com Game programming portal...............http://www.gamasutra.com 3D programming portal.................http://www.3dgamedev.com Programming portal......................http://www.exaflop.org Programming portal............http://www.programmersheaven.com Programming portal.....................http://www.freecode.com NASM (free Assembly compiler)......http://www.cryogen.com/nasm LCC (free C compiler).........http://www.remcomp.com/lcc-win32 PTC video engine.........................http://www.gaffer.org 3D engines..........http://cg.cs.tu-berlin.de/~ki/engines.html Documents...............http://www.neutralzone.org/home/faqsys File format collection...................http://www.wotsit.org Magazines: Amber...............................http://amber.bti.pl/di_mag Amnesia...............http://amnesia-dist.future.easyspace.com Demojournal....................http://demojournal.planet-d.net Eurochart.............................http://www.eurochart.org Heroin...................................http://www.heroin.net Hugi........................................http://www.hugi.de Music Massage......................http://www.scene.cz/massage Jurassic Pack...........................www.jurassicpack.de.vu Pain..................................http://pain.planet-d.net Scenial...........................http://www.scenial.scene.org Shine...............................http://www.shine.scene.org Static Line................http://www.scenespot.org/staticline Sunray..............................http://sunray.planet-d.net TUHB.......................................http://www.tuhb.org WildMag..................................http://www.wildmag.de Parties: Assembly (Finland).....................http://www.assembly.org Ambience (The Netherlands)..............http://www.ambience.nl Dreamhack (Sweden)....................http://www.dreamhack.org Buenzli (Switzerland)......................http://www.buenz.li Gravity (Poland)............http://www.demoscena.cp.pl/gravity Mekka-Symposium (Germany)...................http://ms.demo.org ReAct (Greece).............................http://www.react.gr Takeover (The Netherlands).............,http://www.takeover.nl The Party (Denmark).....................http://www.theparty.dk Others: Demo secret parts....http://www.inf.bme.hu/~mandula/secret.txt Textmode Demo Archive.................http://tmda.planet-d.net Arf!Studios..........................http://www.arfstudios.org #coders..................................http://coderz.cjb.net Demonews Express.........http://www.teeselink.demon.nl/express Demo fanclub........................http://jerware.org/fanclub Digital Undergrounds.....................http://dug.iscool.net Doose charts...............................http://www.doose.dk Freax................................http://freax.scene-hu.com GfxZone............................http://gfxzone.planet-d.net PC-demos explained.....http://www.oldskool.org/demos/explained Pixel...................................http://pixel.scene.org #trax e-mail list............................................. .............http://www.scenespot.org/mailman/listinfo/trax Underground Mine.............http://www.spinningkids.org/umine <*> csound-tekno e-mail list...................................... ............http://plot.bek.no/mailman/listinfo/csoundtekno IRC Channels: Scene.........................................ircnet #thescene Programming.....................................ircnet #coders Programming....................................efnet #flipcode Graphics.........................................ircnet #pixel Music......................................irc.scene.org #trax Music.............................................ircnet #trax Scene (French)..................................ircnet #demofr Programming (French)............................ircnet #codefr Graphics (French)..............................ircnet #pixelfr Programming (German)........................ircnet #coders.ger Scene (Hungarian)............................ircnet #demoscene Programming (Hungarian)......................ircnet #coders.hu Zx-spectrum scene..................................ircnet #z80 --=--=-- ----=--=------=--=------=--=------=--=------=--=------=--=------=--=------ -=- Staff -=- Editors: Ciaran / Ciaran Hamilton / staticline@theblob.org Ben / Ben Collver / collver1@attbi.com Staff Writers: Coplan / D. Travis North / coplan@scenespot.org Dilvie / Eric Hamilton / dilvie@yahoo.com Novus / Vince Young / vince_young@hotmail.com Psitron / Tim Soderstrom / tigerhawk@stic.net Setec / Jesper Pederson / jesped@post.tele.dk Seven / Stefaan VanNieuwenhuyze/ seven7@writeme.com Tryhuk / Tryhuk Vojtech / vojtech.tryhuk@worldonline.cz Vill / Brian Frank / darkvill@yahoo.com The Watcher / Paul-Jan Pauptit / watcher@tuhb.org The current issue of Static Line can always be found on the Web at: http://staticline.scenespot.org/issues/current_issue Static Line Subscription Management: http://www.scenespot.org/mailman/listinfo/static_line If you would like to contribute an article to Static Line, be aware that we will format your article to 76 columns with two columns at the beginning of each line. Please avoid foul language and high ASCII characters. Contributions (Plain Text) should be e-mailed to (static_line-owner@scenespot.org) by the last Friday of each month. New issues are released on a monthly basis. See you next month! -eof---=------=--=------=--=--