Now in Video!

[Chris]

I have finally digitized some of the videos of my various lectures and television appearances. Most of these are of historical value only, but a few are also fun and a couple are still important. I'll be announcing them as they go up. My problem is uploading them; for some reason I can't get them very small; they require about 2 GB per hour of video. If anybody would like to download one and shrink it, please do so! I think it will save everybody some hassle. I made a few attempts, and was able to get some shrinkage -- perhaps I should make another attempt. I would also like to know what typical download times for these are -- that will give me some idea of how serious the size problem is.

Anyway, there are two movies up now:

http://www.storytron.com/Video/320x240/DragonSpeech.mov

This is the finest speech I have ever given. It explained my own personal evolution as a designer, my inspiration to produce genuine art on the computer, my frustrations with the games industry and my ultimate realization that I and the games industry were moving in opposite directions. It concluded with one of the greatest stunts I've ever pulled off. I gave this speech in 1993

and:

http://www.storytron.com/Video/320x240/CreativityAndGameDesign.mov

My speech at the second Computer Game Developers Conference, September 1988, in which I presented the reasons why game developers had to put their emphasis on creativity. Includes the famous bullwhip stunt.

[Jonathan Beyrak Lev]

Second one doesn't work. I recommend you distribute these via bittorrent.

[Chris]

You're right, the second one doesn't work, and I can't figure out why not. How long did it take you to download the first one and what kind of connection have you?

[Tim]

Hey I remember the bullwhip speech.  I sat in the front row and you asked us if we were squeamish before the talk.

[Louis]

Concerning the second video, the error message suggests that its file permissions cause it to not work.  I do not know why they would be different in the first place, but I would check that the second video has the same permissions as the first.

[Jonathan Beyrak Lev]

First one took about 10 hrs. I have an ADSL connection of 928/128 Kbps. Or so they say, you can never be sure with these guys.

[Jonathan Beyrak Lev]

Whoops! Seems to be some problem with the first one too; plays for 8:33 minutes, then goes boom.

[thelovegoose]

you could upload them to youtube? they handle the conversion for you and you end up with a light flash movie.

[thelovegoose]

And you could plug storytron in your description

[BlackTerror]

you could upload them to youtube? they handle the conversion for you and you end up with a light flash movie.

The problem with youtube is you end up with terrible video and audio quality. I think Jon's right, distributed distribution like bittorrent might be the best idea.

[Chris]

Well, obviously, ten hours is completely unacceptable. I have decided to go back and re-record everything at a lower video quality and with better sound compression. My current settings are MPEG-4 for video, medium quality, and I forget the sound compressor, but it gives 6:1 compression. I am also using MPEG-4 low quality with a few recordings. In some cases the low quality comes out OK, but in some it's horrible. I think I can cut the sizes in half. with medium quality.

[Jonathan Beyrak Lev]

I wouldn't reduce the quality, as it's hard to see anything as it is. Have you considered using bitorrent?

[Tim]

I downloaded the dragon speech yesterday and it took a bit under 3 hours.  My DSL download speed is supposedly 384Kbps-1.5Mbps.

[Chris]

I have re-recorded everything at lower image quality, getting much smaller files that are, in my judgement, still good enough. ("Adequacy is sufficient!") I have deleted the big files and am now uploading the new, smaller files. Stay tuned; I'll post a notice here when they become available.

[Chris]

OK, there are now four videos up and ready to go:

http://www.storytron.com/CCVideo/ABCNightline.mov

52 MB

There had been a minor incident at a nuclear power plant and ABC Nightline sent a crew from San Francisco down to Sunnyvale to interview me about my nuclear power plant simulation, Scram. This was on January 25, 1982. There was an Atari PR person hovering menacingly in the background, all set to shut down the interview, and I was visibly nervous. They set up a camera and some lights but then the cameramen started fiddling around with the cables and Ken Kashawahara told me there was a technical problem, so maybe we could just go over the material in advance. I relaxed and started gabbing away about the program; he asked questions and duly took notes for the formal interview. After about ten minutes he said, "We're done!" The PR lady and I both asked, "But what about the interview?" He said, "Already got it!" Smooth operator, that Ken Kashawahara.

http://www.storytron.com/CCVideo/BalanceOfThePlanet.mov

62 MB

Richard Hart interviewed me about Balance of the Planet on April 4, 1990.

http://www.storytron.com/CCVideo/BitsBytesBuzzwords.mov

331 MB

This was a half-hour interview with two segments. It was around March 1984. The first segment was mostly a guy from Activision showing off his Space Shuttle simulator -- a very impressive piece of work for the Atari 2600. At the last minute they remembered me and asked me about my program, Excalibur. I managed to get through the 30-second title sequence before they cut me off. They had run out of time. Oops. The second half of the show is Bill Budge and Tripp Hawkins on Bill's great game, Pinball Construction Set.

http://www.storytron.com/CCVideo/Mystique.mov

657 MB

My lecture at the 1990 Computer Game Developers' Conference entitled "The Mystique of the Loop". The basis thesis of the lecture is that we need to use more algorithmic approaches in our designs. No snazzy stunts, but a few really great lines.

I'll announce more as they come up. I fully downloaded the ABC Nightline segment just to be sure, and it came down in about 10 minutes and worked perfectly.