Posted to newsgroups, emailed to some multimedia firms:
ANNOUNCEMENT RE THE VIDEOGRAMMATRON
(repost/forward OK, kill date Dec 31, 1998)
FR: Kirby Urner, 4D Solutions
TO: Animators/Artists, Potential sponsors, Talent
RE: Business opportunity (Silicon Forest)
Those of you with animation skills, e.g. have produced shorts
for Childrens Television Workshop (CTW), animation festivals,
videos on technical subjects etc. might be interested in
sending samples of your work and/or brochures/URLs re your
firm to 4D Solutions.[1]
Our test pilot TV series, for possible syndication (after
screening for test audiences here in the Silicon Forest), is
now in storyboard phase. Entitled "The Videogrammatron"
(inhouse project name -- perhaps changed for release), this
math-science show will feature short clips (claymations,
animations...) spliced together from archives, with each
show a mix of new and old, ala the 'Sesame Street' model,
along with interviews of talent in the field, other live
action ('Bill Nye the Science Guy' an inspiration, also
MTV).
If you're interested in sponsoring the show i.e. have a toy,
kit or gizmo of math-science relevance which you would like
featured in an educational context (with web address), this
may be worth checking into as well.
The curriculum behind this series is custom-tailored to serve
a specific market niche and has a fairly tight focus, in the
interests of having the heterogenous clips from a variety of
artists/sources all interrelate (much as 'Sesame Street'
interrelates its clips around topics A-Z and 1-20). So of
course some criteria apply (preponderance of clips will run
for under 2 minutes).
Submitted materials not returned unless return postage/mailer
included. Do not send confidential or eyes-only segments
(that might come later, if we agree to nondisclosure in
writing). Do not expect immediate replies. And please,
DO NOT SEND LARGE FILES as email attachments (by pre-
arrangement, I can point you to my FTP site for uploading).
To get some idea of themes and threads we're following, and for
a peek at current sources of raw materials, check my website
(winner of the coveted Dr. Matrix award for science excellence):
http://www.teleport.com/~pdx4d/index.html and also links at
http://www.teleport.com/~pdx4d/links.html (e.g. Richard Hawkins
QuickTime archives and STRUCK animations).
Bottom line: if you produce relevant clips, we'd like to
collaborate and offer fair compensation for your time/energy.
We will hope to negotiate (usually nonexclusive) rights to
allow unlimited recycling of your contributions in our TV
series, with full attribution and contact information
(provided you wish this) available via the companion website
(not always practical to squeeze all credits into the show
itself).
Sincerely,
Kirby Urner
Principal
4D Solutions
PS: If your firm is a sophisticated computer graphics shop,
you might want to try taking on the challenge of producing some
prototypical hypertoons. For more on the hypertoons concept,
see my write-up at: http://www.teleport.com/~pdx4d/hypertoon.html
PPS: feel free to forward this message in its entirety
(kill date: December 31, 1998).
====
Russ suggested I accompany my Videogrammatron proposal with
some clues re the video clips I'm hoping to database and splice
together. Those below focus on the prefrequency geometry minus
some of the real TV segments we'd like to be getting from
Project Earthala archives (e.g. of Fly's Eye being assembled,
refugees getting evacuated etc.).
I think Russ was on-target. Here are some ideas (some of which
already exist in one or more versions, but the idea here is to
get lots of different "artists' conceptions" around each concept
e.g. someone might do it in claymation, some with paper
cutouts, some with computer graphics... endless permutations
possible, ala Sesame Street model (clips focussed on A-Z, 1-15
or so).
Kirby
====
Video clips needed:
I. Great Circles:
1. Cubocta 25 axial spin pairs -> 25 great circles
2. Icosa 31 -> 31
3. Jitterbug 31 <-> 25 <-> 31 (left & right handed 31)
--
87
-14
--
4. Juxtapose 73 superimposition of 1 & 2 minus dupes
5. LCD triangle
6. From 25 gc net, highlight spherical tet, oct, rh dodeca
and go to 'flat' versions (reverse)
7. From 31 gc net, highlight spherical icosa, rh triaconta,
pent dodeca and go to 'flat' versions (reverse)
II. Sphere Packing:
1. Rhombic Dodecas agglommerating around a nuclear 1 in
cuboctahedral conformation
2. Dissolve cubocta sphere packing to octet truss
3. Highlight tetrahedral void in truss -> spin around face
center axes -> explode into A modules
4. Highlight octa void in truss -> spin around 6 mid-edge axes
-> explode into A and B modules
5. Spheres start growing at octa tips of rhombic dodeca (octa
inscribes as long face diagonals) -> alternate packing (ccp)
6. Spheres start growing at 1/2 the cube tips of the rhombic
dodeca (duo-tet cube inscribes as short face diagonals)
-> alternate packing (ccp)
7. Spheres start growing at other 1/2 the cube tips of the
rhombic dodeca (duo-tet cube inscribes as short face
diagonals) -> alternate packing (ccp)
8. Superimpose dual packings (1 & 5 or 7 & 8) to show pattern
of vertices in 'xyz cube' lattice
9. Superimpose all four packings and pulse between 2 'xyz cube'
lattices to show bcc lattice
10. Use lattice backgrounds to "tune in" chemicals (give chemistry
symbols across bottom) as per Russell Chu's R&D
III. Assembly/Disassembly:
1. 24 Amods -> tetrahedron (vol 1)
2. 48 Amods + 48 Bmods -> octahedron (vol 4)
3. Octahedron -> 8 x 1/8th octas
4. 4 x 1/8th octas + tetra -> cube (vol 3)
5. Cube + 6 x 1/6th cubes -> rhombic dodeca (vol 6)
6. 6 x 1/2 octa + 8 x tetra -> cubocta (vol 20)
7. Rhombic triaconta circumscribes unit sphere (vol 5+)
8. Rhombic triaconta shrinks almost imperceptably (vol 5)
9. Rhombic triaconta explodes into T mods (vol 1/24)
10. Cubocta jitterbugs to icosa (vol ~18.51) (reverse)
11. Jitterbug continues to octaphase (vol 4, doubled edges)
IV. Frequency
1. Multiplication-by-division of cubocta outer layer into
smaller spheres (10 ff + 2)
2. Triangle cross-hatching & 2nd powering demo
3. Tetrahedron subdividing & 3rd powering demo
4. Geodesic sphere (icosasphere) of higher/lower frequency
5. Cubocta <-> icosa jitterbug outer layer while varying frequency
6. Above-the-line prefrequency (angles only) vs. below-the-line
frequency (energized) i.e. 4D vs. 4D+
V. More specialized
1. Tiger jumps back and forth through 0-hoop (left/right 31)
2. Electronified brain rotates "below the line" while hypertoons
flicker "above the line"
3. Trains chug along g.c. nets, sphere-hopping at adjacency points
4. Electronified brain holds a pattern (31), tiger jumps, holds
another (31)
====
urner@alumni.princeton.edu (Kirby Urner) wrote:
>
>10. Use lattice backgrounds to "tune in" chemicals (give chemistry
> symbols across bottom) as per Russell Chu's R&D
>
See http://home.att.net/~kas-chu/toc.html for more details re
Russell's recent chemistry investigations.
Kirby