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Encyclopedia > Amiga Demos

Amiga demos are demos created for the Commodore Amiga home computer. A frame part of an animation displayed in real time. ... Commodore is the commonly used name for Commodore International, a West Chester, Pennsylvania based electronics company which was a vital player in the home/personal computer field in the 1980s. ... The original Amiga 1000 (1985) with Commodore 1080 monitor The Amiga is a family of home/personal computers originally developed by Amiga Corporation as an advanced home entertainment and productivity machine. ... TRS-80 Color Computer II The home computer is a consumer-friendly word for the second generation of microcomputers (the technical term that was previously used), entering the market in 1977 and becoming common during the 1980s. ...

Screenshot from Gift by Potion, winner of the Mekka & Symposium 2000 Amiga 64k intro competition
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Screenshot from Gift by Potion, winner of the Mekka & Symposium 2000 Amiga 64k intro competition

A "demo" is a demonstration of the multimedia capabilities of a computer (or more to the point, a demonstration of the skill of the demo's constructors). There was intense rivalry during the 1990s among the best programmers, graphic artists and computer musicians to continually outdo each other's demos. Since the Amiga's hardware was more or less fixed (unlike today's PC industry, where arbitrary combinations of hardware can be put together), there was competition to test the limits of that hardware and perform theoretically "impossible" feats by refactoring the problem at hand. The Amiga was the undisputed leader of mainstream multimedia computing in the late 1980s and early 1990s, though it was soon overtaken by PC architecture. Image File history File links Screenshot from Gift, an Amiga 64k intro by Potion This is a screenshot of copyrighted computer software. ... Image File history File links Screenshot from Gift, an Amiga 64k intro by Potion This is a screenshot of copyrighted computer software. ... Mekka & Symposium (MS or M&S) was a demoparty held annually over the easter days from 1997 to 2002. ... The original Amiga 1000 (1985) with Commodore 1080 monitor The Amiga is a family of home/personal computers originally developed by Amiga Corporation as an advanced home entertainment and productivity machine. ...


Some Amiga demos, such as the RSI Megademo, are considered seminal works in the demo field. New Amiga demos are released even today, although the demo scene has firmly moved onto PC hardware. Many Amiga game developers were active in the demo scene.


The demo scene spearheaded development in multimedia programming techniques for the Amiga, such that it was de rigeur for the latest visual tricks, soundtrackers and 3D algorithms from the demo scene to end up being used in computer game development.

Contents

Ripping

The Amiga thrived on public domain, freeware and other not-for-profit development. The architecture provided no substantial mechanism for protecting software from inspection. In order to read the memory one simply performed a hot reset (which preserved the contents of RAM) and then booted to a dedicated floppy disk that could inspect and dump the memory's contents. It was therefore common for developers and hackers to "rip" music, graphics and code and then reuse it in their own productions. This led to intense competition in certain fields, for example, in the development of sound tracking software and Tetris clones, with each group of developers trying to outdo the current state of the art. In fact, some demos even featured their source code as part of the executable to save hackers the trouble of disassembly, though it came strewn with incendiary comments for those who would seek to improve on it. The public domain comprises the body of all creative works and other knowledge—writing, artwork, music, science, inventions, and others—in which no person or organization has any proprietary interest. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... Look up RAM, Ram, ram in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... A floppy disk is a data storage device that is composed of a disk of thin, flexible (floppy) magnetic storage medium encased in a square or rectangular plastic shell. ... Tetris is a very popular computer puzzle game. ...


The doctrine of software patents, copyright and intellectual property was not fully fleshed out at the time of the Amiga's popularity in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and the potential profitability of software was a shadow of what it is today. Consequently, 'ripping' was considered by many, rightly or wrongly, to be fair game. It was not unusual for computer game music and graphic art to appear in demos and music disks (compilations).


Intros

Smaller demos are often known as intros, and are typically limited to between 4kb and 64kb in size. Intros were originally used as an 'introduction' by a cracker-group on computer games and other software disks cracked for copying and redistribution. Later it developed into a stand-alone artform and many demo/intro groups disassociated themselves from the cracking/copying scene (although many of the major demo groups were still heavily involved in this). Software cracking is the modification of software to remove encoded copy prevention. ...


Full demos range from under 512KB to several megabytes. There have been several thousand demos produced in many languages and many countries, particularly the UK, Germany, and the Nordic countries. Overview map of the region. ...


Demo software

Most demos have been custom written in 68000 assembly language, although a few were written in C and other languages. Demos on the Amiga flourished because of the power of the "Copper" Co-processor for synchronising display changes to the vertical beam position on the screen, and the blitter - a chip capable of fast block moving of graphical data from one position on the screen to another. The Motorola 68000 is a CISC microprocessor, the first member of a successful family of microprocessors from Motorola, which were all mostly software compatible. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... A Blitter (acronym for BLock Image TransferrER) is a chip that specialises in bitmap data-transfer using bit blit methods. ...


Antitrax 2010 (ATX) released the very first "megademo", called Antitrax 2010 Megademo, in 1987.


Eric Schwartz produced a series of animated demos that ran with MoviePlayer, an animation software package similar to Macromedia Flash. The animated demos drew heavily on the whimsy and graphic style of comic strips. MoviePlayer was the name of the software application for Mac OS used to play QuickTime movies before it was renamed QuickTime Player. ... // == Macromedia Flash == ==]] Using Macromedia Flash 8 (bundled in Studio 8) in Windows XP. Maintainer: Adobe Systems (formerly Macromedia) Latest release: 8 / September 30th, 2005 OS: Windows (no native Windows XP Professional x64 Edition support), Mac OS X, Linux (i386 only, via wine [1]) Use: Multimedia Content Creator License: Proprietary Website...


Red Sector Inc (RSI) produced a piece of software called the RSI Demomaker, which allowed users to script their own demos, replete with scrolltext, vectorballs, plasma screens, etc. To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ...


Partial list of Amiga demo groups and demos


Note that these demos are not necessarily the most famous. Equinox is an Amiga demo group with an active period between the years 1987-1996. ... Melon Dezign was an Amiga demo group started Denmark in 1991 by Seen (not the grafitti artist) and Paleface (not the finnish rapper). ... Overview of the Assembly 2004 party hall. ... 1999 (MCMXCIX) was a common year starting on Friday, and was designated the International Year of Old Farts by the Sometimes-United Nations. ... Overview of the Assembly 2004 party hall. ... 1996 (MCMXCVI) was a leap year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International Year for the Eradication of Poverty. ... Overview of the Assembly 2004 party hall. ... 1998 (MCMXCVIII) was a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International Year of the Ocean. ... Overview of the Assembly 2004 party hall. ... 1995 (MCMXCV) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Pygmy Projects is a demo-group that creates demos and intros for the Amiga home computer. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... Sanity was an all-german demo group, born in march of 1990 by Panther (code) and Hawk (code), who quickly took in Vindicator (music) and Cruiser (gfx) as well. ... The History of Scoopex (written by Antibyte / Fishwave / TMB) I. The Beginning (1988 - 1990) Scoopex - an Amiga demo group founded back in 1988 by Ranger & Shark the Master. ... Spaceballs is an Amiga demo group from Norway, originally based around the city of Halden. ... The state of the art is the highest level of development, as of a device, technique, or scientific field, achieved at a particular time. ... The Party is a demoscene event held yearly from 1991 to 2002 in Aars, Denmark. ... 1992 (MCMXCII) was a leap year starting on Wednesday. ... Nine Fingers is an amiga demo by Spaceballs, which came in fourth in The Party 1993 demo competition. ... The state of the art is the highest level of development, as of a device, technique, or scientific field, achieved at a particular time. ... The Party is a demoscene event held yearly from 1991 to 2002 in Aars, Denmark. ... 1993 (MCMXCIII) was a common year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar and marked the Beginning of the International Decade to Combat Racism and Racial Discrimination (1993-2003). ... Spreadpoint is one of the first amiga groups. ... The Black Lotus (TBL) is a demoscene group which was founded in 1989 by two Swedish sceners who went by the handles Dickhead and Rubberduck. ... Fairlight logo by JED of ACiD. Fairlight (FLT) is a warez and demos group initially involved in the Commodore demoscene, and in cracking to illegally release games for free, since 1987. ... Overview of the Assembly 2004 party hall. ... 1996 (MCMXCVI) was a leap year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International Year for the Eradication of Poverty. ...


External links


  Results from FactBites:
 
Demoscene - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (2338 words)
Demos in the demoscene sense began as software crackers' "signatures", that is, crack screens and crack intros attached to software whose copy protection was removed.
Although demos are still a more or less obscure form of art even in the traditionally active demoscene countries, the scene has had an impact on areas such as computer games industry and new media art.
Sometimes demos even provide direct influence even to game developers that have no demoscene affiliation: for instance, Will Wright names demoscene as a major influence on the new Maxis game Spore, which is largely based on procedural content generation and is being programmed by many demoscene veterans.
  More results at FactBites »


 
 

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