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                                    Issue #1
                                 April 30, 1995
                HNews is a weekly newsletter for the demo scene.
          It is produced by the group Hornet at the site ftp.cdrom.com.

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Subscribers:  474  | Last Week:  N/A  | Change:     | Size: 46,786
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CONTENTS

 --[Article Name]-----------------------[Author]-------------------

   Hornet News Introduction             GraveDigger
   Digging Under the Surface            Maverick
   What is a Demo?                      GraveDigger
   Art for Freedom                      Dan Wright
   NAID          - How it Came About    White Noise
   NAID Demos    - Done the Right Way   Trixter
   NAID Intros   - Misconceptions       Miss Saigon
   NAID Graphics - Genuine vs. Fake     GraveDigger
   NAID Music    - A Test of Endurance  Snowman
   Miscellaneous                        Trixter, White Noise, CGM
   Subscribing
   Closing


---[Hornet News Introduction]--[GraveDigger]-----------------------------------

 Back in September of 1992, Dan Wright began writing and distributing a
 small periodical text file known as "DemoNews." This newsletter was meant to
 be a form of communication for those interested in the PC Demo scene. The
 first several issues were a listing of demos recently uploaded to the
 "demo" site, short reviews, and a request for demos that had not yet been
 uploaded. There were also notes of goings-on in the scene, such as when a
 group might release their next demo.

 From its beginning, the newsletter had grown from 2k to upwards of 100k,
 and Snowman eventually took over as DemoNews editor. DemoNews saw 86 issues
 released, and the Hornet demo group took a month off from producing its
 weekly newsletter to re-organize various matters and issues. Now, you are
 reading one section of the new newsletter, HNews, which is the result of
 the many changes taking place with Hornet and the demo scene in general.

 There have also been FTP site changes, with mirror sites coming and going.
 FTPENG (ftp.eng.ufl.edu) started out as a mirror, and eventually became the
 main demo site. FTPCD (ftp.cdrom.com) also was a mirror at one time, and
 now is one of the two main sites, along with FTPENG, on which you can find
 various files related to the demo scene.

 This entire history has been centered around one thing: a love for "demos."
 Hornet started out as an FTP site, and also became a demo group bearing its
 name. One of the duties of Hornet is to upkeep the /demos/incoming
 directories on both FTP sites. We have to figure out what each file
 contains by viewing the info file or peeking in the file archive. We have
 to log the upload and move it to the proper directory.

 We would like to welcome you all to the very first issue of Hornet News!

 -Brett Neely (GraveDigger) gd@ftp.cdrom.com


---[Digging Under the Surface]--[Maverick]-------------------------------------

 Just about every single coder I have talked to (including myself - yup I
 talk to myself) has debugged, fooled, or messed around with demos in some
 way or another. Now there's nothing really unusual about that. In Imphobia
 9 we had Ervin/Abbadon admitting that he debugged some FC intro and
 discovered the STOSB, ADC, STOSW trick. If you debug Imphobia itself you'll
 find some references to VGA registers that I can't find in any references,
 documented or undocumented.

 But there are some pretty interesting tricks that you can perform even
 without the help of a debugger. Certain programs often leave the machine
 (particularly the GUS and/or the timer) in an unstable state when finished.
 When running one demo after another some interesting things can happen.

 Example 1.  If you have the EGG music disk and Airframe try this one. Go
 into Egg and *start playing* one of the songs. (Twitch, Razz or Tree will
 do very well but those are my personal preferences). Press ESC after a few
 patterns, quit completely from EGG and then go and run Airframe. Lo and
 behold, Airframe is now running at twice the speed you are used to. Guess
 what? Egg has not reset the GUS timer (I presume this is the reason) and
 Airframe is using it to time its fps. Of course I found this out by pure
 fluke by running one, then the other, getting excited when I saw what
 happened, and doing it again until I was convinced that it could be done
 every time.

 But it does show how good Airframe's code is. The voxel sequence *flies*
 and I mean speeeed, not the fact that it is a flying sequence. The city
 fly-through is really breathtaking at double speed. The space-cuts in the
 middle show you Prime could have used objects with TRIPLE the complexity
 with no speed loss, and only that 64K barrier to think of. Only the music
 is weird but of course it would be! Imagine what these guys could do in
 twice as many frames per second! Of course Airframe is deliberately the
 speed it is because of its design - a word lots of groups need to memorize!
 The slow and languid way the space-ship flies around is of course great
 just the way it is, and the slowness of the tune creates the mood to match.

 Example 2. Ditto for example 1 but this time on Cyboman II. You'll notice
 that its music is the right speed but the graphics are  double the speed.
 And, yes, that huge doughnut doesn't cause even a hint of a flicker!

 By the way I have a DX-50 with VLB and a 1Mb GUS MAX. If would welcome
 comment from some other guys with other configs who try these tricks out.

 Example 3. Run that amazingly original and extremely good No! by Nooon. At
 the beginning of any long sequence, preferably near the start, press the
 PAUSE key, and then press space after a few seconds. What  you will notice
 is all of the remaining sequences will be out of sync with the music but
 also, since I presume they are timed by the music, they will run in the
 same number of frames until the end of the timing pattern. If you didn't
 get that last bit, then let me explain. PAUSE, wait, SPACE. Now watch just
 how much faster all of the sequences are. The longer you leave PAUSE on the
 faster the sequences run (because they have to catch up with the end of the
 pattern). The Einstein texture map zooms around in about one second and the
 skull bit is over very quickly.

 Again the real quality of this code is shown. No flicker, no jerkiness,
 just everything happening a lot quicker. The dolphin looks really amazing!
 It swims at full speed - not slow motion!

 Example 4. Run Second Reality on a laptop or any PC with an LCD screen (I
 have one to do work on), the slower, the better ;-). At the credits screen
 you will see the images that scroll up flash onto the undisplayed page just
 before the page gets flipped. No big deal here, but a bit of a clue to
 those who were wondering how it was done.

 Panic also has a couple of non-displayed pages that are visible for a
 fraction of a second because a laptop's screen quality isn't good enough
 for a 70 Hz frame rate.

 Example 5. Try turning turbo off  after Imphobia starts running. The sneaky
 middle scrolling part will now screw up and flicker and you will be
 convinced once and for all that it's a hardware effect.

 Example 6. Load up a VESA driver before running Crystal Dreams II. The
 vector flying sequence is now see-through! This is a *really* weird one
 which I can't seem to get to work all the time.

 Anyone who has noticed some similar things happening in other demos, please
 contact me (especially if you are the authors!). Anyone who can explain how
 *anything* in Dowhackado is done please contact me!

 Curiosity, Watcom and ASM rulez :-)

 -Maverick/Serenity paulf@is.co.za


---[What is a Demo?]--[GraveDigger]--------------------------------------------

 Recently, we were confronted with a sticky situation. We received a file
 which was called "E-Views," (from here on referred to as EV) and it claimed
 to be a multimedia presentation, or in their words, a demo. The distributor
 of EV contacted the owner of the FTPCD site, and asked about where he could
 upload it. The suggestion was to put it into /demos/incoming.

 Snowman also received e-mail to inform him about this upload and its
 contents. He then sent me a copy of this e-mail and asked about what should
 be done with this file, since it seemed to go against Hornet's idea of a
 demo.

 So, _What is a demo?_

 When I think of the word "demo," many things come to mind. Future Crew,
 Renaissance, party/competitions such as The Party and Assembly, futuristic
 movies, doom-like graphics sequences, and stunning music. There's one other
 important facet to a "demo" under this definition: it's freeware.

 The simple fact that a "demo" does not ask for registration and does not
 advertise any products constitutes it to be a "demo", in the Hornet sense
 of the word.

 To be able to run a successful demo archive, then, there has to be a set
 structure on what can stay and what can not. Therefore, it was agreed that
 EV was not an appropriate item for the demos archive, because it is
 shareware and is an advertisement.

 We informed the distributor of EV of the decision, and he was rather upset.
 It is unfortunate that some people can't agree on something as clear-cut as
 this, but the standard has been defined, and we intend to uphold that
 decision in the interest of maintaining some form of law-and-order, so to
 speak.

 There's another reason for this limitation. The resources on which to keep
 the archive are limited. There's just not enough room for everything, as
 much as we would like to offer as many files as possible. Therefore, we
 have to draw the line somewhere. Our purpose is to provide a site for the
 demos and related files that drew us into the scene, in hopes we can
 provide someone else with what we wish we had before a true demo site
 existed.

 Therefore, we intend to continue to providing the demo scene with an FTP
 archive, spread across two FTP sites, in which to transfer demos, and
 related programs. We will only carry freeware, advertisement-less demos. It
 is our understanding that this is the proper thing to do in the interest of
 both the majority of the users as well as the maintainers of these sites.

 If you have any thoughts or opinions regarding this topic, I would love to
 hear from you. Feel free to mail me at the address at the end of this
 newsletter.

 -Brett Neely (GraveDigger) gd@ftp.cdrom.com


---[Art for Freedom]--[Dan Wright]---------------------------------------------

 The FREEDOM CD is underway...

 I was lucky enough to meet with Christopher (r3cgm@dax.cc.uakron.edu) at
 NAID and discuss a bit on the project.  We plan on doing a 6 panel front
 insert (2 more than escape).  This will allow for 1 extra full color
 picture.

 Here is the art we need:

   4 full-color images         - 3 for front insert, 1 for back insert.

   up to 4 black-white images  - 3 for inside front insert and 1 for back
                                 insert.  The back insert is a joke (no one
                                 will probably see it but you can do
                                 something). Inside the front it can be 1
                                 long B/W image if you want...text will
                                 overlay it though.

   1 3-color image for sticker - This would be SPOT color.  the sticker will
                                 Be 3x3" in dimension but that has no
                                 significance to the size your art has to
                                 be.

   1 2-color image for CD      - The CD art will once again contain 2
                                 colors. SPOT.

 Not everything has to say "FREEDOM."  Only the CD, sticker, front insert
 COVER and BACK INSERT.

 Project deadlines are in JULY but it is a good idea to get started early--
 plus there will likely be a few rounds of fixing up which will take a couple
 weeks.  I would like the STICKER to be ready in MAY....

 Ideas I am leaving up to you.  FREEDOM is the title and the CD will
 concentrate on DEMOS and MUSIC...computer stuff.  But who says the art has
 to relate.

 Okay, that is all for now, hope everyone gets this...and if you have any
 comments/suggestions let me know.

 BTW, I am looking for QUARK express to lay this out so if anyone can help
 me obtain a copy that would be great.  I don't want to pay more than $150
 for a used copy w/ manuals if you can get that for me...

 Out.

 -Dan Wright dmw@inca.gate.net


---[NAID - How it Came About]--[White Noise]-----------------------------------

_____Disclaimer

 You are about to read my praise of the NAID organizers.

 In this article, I intend to convey the atmosphere I witnessed and have
 been a part of in the last few months before NAID.  This is in no way a
 complete detailed account of the NAID organization.  This, I will ask the
 organizers to write with me, and the result will be hooked to dmax, the
 Hornet WWW site (http://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/demos/dmax/top.html).

 This article is given for you to read as is.  I make no warranties as to
 the complete accuracy of what I write here.  In other words, if I
 hallucinated some of this stuff, well it ain't *my* fault.  A man's gotta
 protect his back, right? :)

 And, last but not least, the opinions expressed in this article are *mine*,
 and mine only.  Though I think most of them are shared by Hornet, I claim
 them as my own, and they do not necessarily express the entire group's
 view.

 Read on...  if you dare.

_____Main Article

 NAID... it was fun.  No, I mean *real* fun.  Like...  a real TRIP!  (in
 every sense)  It went very smoothly, if we judge based on reports from all
 the other parties around the world. And I think a lot of us overlooked or
 don't fully realize the tremendous amount of work that goes into creating
 such a get-together.  I, myself, probably don't even realize it all, since
 I was only involved at the very end of the entire organization.

 NAID, the North American International Demofestival, is the brainchild of 4
 people:  Etienne Caron (Mr. Khan), Eric Lagace (Midnight Sun), William Le
 (Veritech Knight), Laurent Gauthier (Struk).  Sponsors that agreed to take
 part of the event were the College Edouard-Montpetit (CEM), A.G.E.C.E.M.
 (the CEGEP's student association), COOP Montpetit (the CEGEP's store),
 Advanced Gravis (makers of the oh-so-POWERFUL SBOS... not! :>), Corel
 Corporation, Tim Horton's, Mediatrix (the guys behind the AudioTrix Pro),
 Subway, Techno-TV (cool californian show about... Demos! Nothing else), La
 Piece de Musique and Monolithe Info.  Phfew.  Didn't forget any.

 The greatest thing in all this is that they actually managed to get all
 these guys to get excited about a "demoparty", in a province that barely
 knows where the switch is on a computer...  Okay, I'm exaggerating, I
 admit, but computer literacy is not at a very high level around here, so to
 get all this guys interested in that kind of party is quite an
 accomplishment. Congratulations to Struk.

 So how did I get involved with NAID?  Well, if you guys remember well, I
 wrote a somewhat short but to-the-point article for 01 not so long ago,
 which partly detailed my encounter with the creators of NAID.  Prior to
 that, I had only sighted them on a local BBS.  From that point on, after
 having met Mr. Khan, began my real involvement in the intricacies of NAID.

 NAID wasn't planned in a day.  It took the four guys 8 months of planning,
 negotiating, thinking and discussing to come up with the final result.
 That, of course, on top of CEGEP studies - CEGEP is an intermediate level
 before University in Quebec, which prepares you for University or the job
 market.  A lot of work, I have to say.

 Picture people talking to the sound of "Verses" kicking on an amplifier
 behind them, in front of a cafeteria table with a computer on it hooked to
 the amplifier, with NAID posters hanging on the wall behind the table. That
 was the settings in which I greeted the organizers each and every day for
 close to two weeks prior to NAID.  Noisy, hectic, stressed but yearning.
 That sums up pretty well how we all felt towards NAID.

 Fear is the extra feeling the organizers had that none of us did.  Fear
 that it would all crumple, that the sponsors would back off from the party,
 fear that not enough people would show up.  Fear of being disappointed.
 Worst yet, fear of disappointing others.  Of disappointing all those
 demofreaks coming from all over North America to attend the first party of
 its genre.

 There are a lot of things that went on behind the scenes before and
 *during* the party that most people didn't get to see or even hear
 directly. A lot of shuffling and talk during and especially after the music
 competition.  I heard some of it, even witnessed some of it.

_____The Music Competition

 I'd like to make here only one point in favor of the organizers, and not
 only because they are good friends of mine, but mainly because the
 intentions behind the decisions were all but wrong.  The guys were so
 astonished by the huge number of submissions that they decided, thinking
 "hey, we'll give them *all* a chance" - which I think was a nice way,
 theoretically, to thank all the musicians who submitted entries -, to play
 all the tunes.

 They were wrong in doing so, because the infrastructure they had planned
 out was not thought with 55 entries in mind.  The rules and conditions of
 entries were not stated as solidly as they would be at, for example,
 Assembly.  But this can mainly be attributed, I think, to the lack of
 experience of the organizers in such a field.  How could they in their
 right mind have planned such an overwhelming response?

 Over 5 hours straight of music playing.  Glitches of course, but think
 about it: what player to use?  What memory configuration?  What sound
 setup? I read here and there comments about the compo and I selected a few
 that I remember off the top of my head to address here (not that I intend
 to denigrate them, quite the contrary, but maybe expose some attenuating
 facts):

 - "The sound setup was advantageous the techno songs..."

 Of course.  The sound checks had been made with 2nd Reality, Verses,
 Crystal Dream II, and other demos.  And, frankly, what usually supports
 demos best is fast-paced music, techno or not, with aggressive drums.  So
 yes, the sound setup *was* accentuating drums.  But think about it:
 50-something entries...  would you have wanted the sound techs to
 recalibrate the 12000 watts stereo system we had over there for each and
 every song?  They could have done it, only I witnessed the first setup, and
 it took em close to a full hour before getting the right type of sound for
 demo music to come out right.

 So, yes, I agree, slow songs and less drum-aggressive songs were somewhat
 hampered by the sound system, but the sound calibration was a choice that
 would make one side or the other unhappy.  The organizers chose, quite
 wisely I think, to calibrate the system for the main intended use:
 demo-watching.

 - "They lost my song!"

 This happened to more than one person, notably Epeuis of Night Vision and
 the Hornet. Here's what I have to say about it.  This is a 2-way
 circumstance.

 First, the 55 songs should *not* all have been played (I know, this
 involves pre-selection and somewhat of a "separation" process where
 injustices and unequalities and favoritism can spark up, but I think it
 would have saved some people headaches).  That way, less tunes could have
 been lost.

 Second, the echoes I got back on the few songs that didn't play is that
 they were not very visibly identified.  And this is where I say this is
 2-way.  First, the organizers didn't force down a labeling system, handing
 out pre-made labels or asking people to drop the disks at a special table
 prior to the competition.  True.  Second, if that was really the case, then
 how would you expect the guys to differentiate your disks from all the
 demos, plus the ones I brought them *during* the party which I had no time
 for labeling (including dope by Complex)?  As I said, it's a 2-way thing.

 - "It was fame and name-driven...  I mean, Necros' song wasn't even started
 that the crowd roared..."

 I seriously don't think the organizers can be blamed for that.  They
 couldn't control the crowds.  I too found myself roaring and highly
 anticipating Necros' song, as would be expected from any musician one
 personally likes.  It's more of a social phenomenon than anything else.
 It's like going to see a movie strictly for an actor or a director.  The
 film isn't even started and you already expect it to be good, mainly
 because of the director or the actor.  I think in that way every darn
 competition that has international (professional or not) artists entering
 is "name-driven".  Just go to a European demo party and watch which demos
 get the best reaction from the public.  You'll most probably come back with
 only huge group names.

 - "One of the organizers stated that only a few songs stood out and that
 most of the rest was technostuff..."

 This, I have not checked with the organizers themselves and will not. But
 if that really was declared by one of the organizers, then it was an error.
 A glitch, like we at Hornet let slip out once awhile, like mostly everyone
 lets slip out once awhile.  I'm sure that statement did *not* convey the
 entire NAID organizers' reflections about the compo, overall.  If it did,
 then *DO* bash them for that.  :>

_____The Graphics Competition

 I have to admit (shame on me!) that I missed that part and the intro
 competition because I was sleeping at home after having partied out all the
 energy left in me (foolish, but oh so fun! :>) at the rave from 5 to 6.

 From what I gathered, I understand that the winning graphic was
 controversial because it created an argument on whether it had been scanned
 or not. Having seen it briefly on my computer screen as GraveDigger, one of
 the judges, watched it over, I can't really state myself on one side or the
 other.  All I can say is that only the winner really knows how much work
 went into it.  And I hope he really drew it himself, cause they're ain't
 nothing cheaper than a scan in a graphics compo.

_____The Demo Competition

 You all should have seen what the organizers looked like Saturday night.
 Midnight and -no- demo entries for the next day's competition.  They were
 simply biting their nails over it. They really sweated this one out,
 especially since it was advertised as the main event.  But you guys out
 there really rocked 'em off their feet with your productions.  As you
 rocked me, too.  As you rocked the hundreds of people who got together
 around the screen and watched your creations.

 I have to thank you all in my name and in the organizers' names for the
 incredible work that you all inputted in those productions of those.  All of
 you, even Verhot.  :)  You stole the show, "Dope" or no "Dope".  And, from
 the bottom of my heart, I thank you for making us thrill for a few hours.

 Here again a few glitches, mainly with the projectors.  That's once more
 nothing the organizers could have prevented, since the supplier of the
 projector had never seen such a thing, so it would have been hard to ask
 someone who's supplying a projector in the tens of thousands dollars price
 tag to bring a better one.  But he promised to supply three projectors of
 the highest model (far better than the one we had, which was far from being
 bad already) for next year.

 The only thing which lacked to make demo-watching just perfect, in my
 opinion, was an overlay screen to hide typing and re-booting between demos.
 But again, that too was hard to solidly validate in front of sponsors when
 you're at your first party ever.

_____Closing Words

 All in all it was a great party, with surprisingly very few glitches for a
 first time around.  Something not even The Gathering 95 can claim
 (according to the first report from Scoop, it didn't look too nice).

 I think all 4 guys did a tremendous job, and so did all everybody who helped
 them out from secondary organizers to security officials and to the CEGEP's
 administration.

 I think we should all let them know that we appreciated what they did for
 us, even though it didn't run perfectly (does anything ever do anyway?).
 They don't have a permanent email address, but I do.  Catch my drift?  Even
 if it's just a small line to tell them something like "I've been there.  I
 liked it.  Thanx.", I'm sure they'll appreciate hearing from all of you.

 So people, get those mailers running and may my mailbox be FLOODED!

 I'd have more to say but time is lacking.  Watch out for the organizer's
 side of things on dmax, coming SOON!

 -White Noise jeff@ftp.cdrom.com


---[NAID Demos - Done the Right Way]--[Trixter]--------------------------------

 NAID's demo compo was probably one of the best judged compos of any party,
 and I'm not saying that because I was one of the judges.  :-) There were
 several reasons why:

_____Pre-Testing of Demos

 The demos all had to be in by a certain deadline, but it wasn't just a
 formality--they had to be tested on the compo machine *before* the compo
 actually began.  Think about how smart this was:  By testing beforehand,
 all the different system configurations that had to be done were in place
 before the compo began, thus eliminating delays in the compo.  We found it
 also had a great side-benefit:  Two of the demos crashed, so we were able
 to notify the programmers, and both of them were able to fix their demos
 before the compo began.  As a result, all 11 demos submitted ran perfectly,
 and each demo got a fair shot.

_____Diversity Amongst the Judges

 The judges were not only from different geographical backgrounds (a
 Scottsman, two French-Canadians, and three Americans), but all had
 differing levels of experience:

   - The Scottsman (Cairn McGregor) was a reporter for a local newspaper,
     with a keen eye for details
   - The two French-Canadians were both articulate observers of demos
   - DareDevil / Renaissance and myself have been democoders for over
     three years
   - Snowman / Hornet has been a demo-musician for over three years

 The mix of people helped to get a good, round, objective observation of all
 the entries.  It also brought with it, however, some heated discussion.
 For instance, Cairn McGreggor couldn't understand why DareDevil and I had
 given higher marks to some of the 4th and 5th place demos--we gave them
 high marks for coding because we recognized some of the skills necessary.

 On the flip side, some of the other judges couldn't understand why
 DareDevil and I gave *low* marks to some of the demos, and that was because
 we recognized some ripped code.  Based on this experience, I'd heavily
 recommend that any jury in the future have at least two coders, because
 ripping ideas is marginally okay, but ripping code is not.

_____Solid Rating System

 The rating system was designed to eliminate any major differences of
 opinion, and was simple to follow:  We gave up to five points in four
 categories:  Coding Skill, Art/3D object design, Music, and Overall Design.
 Five points was the best rating; 1 was the worst.

 Six judges rated each demo, so the maximum score for any demo was 120.
 (Tome of Opticron, which was the 1st place winner, received 103 points, for
 example.)  Looking back, however, some of the demos' points were so close
 (places 5th to 9th were no more than 2 points apart between each other)
 that in the future, we should probably give up to ten points instead of
 five.

______Quality of the Demos Themselves

 For not having one European production in the whole lot, the overall
 quality of all the demos was exceptional (except the last-place demo, which
 was essentially a joke-demo).  Many had great design; Tome of Opticron, for
 example, had more original design than Second Reality or Dope.

_____Fair, Understanding Audience

 The audience has to be given some credit as well.  They gave credit where
 credit was due, applauded when original effects were shown, and *never*
 yelled at the screen.

 All in all, NAID's demo compo was great, given the fact that it was the
 first ever in North America.  I'm sure that next year's compo will improve
 tenfold.

 -Trixter trixter@ftp.cdrom.com


---[NAID Intros - Misconceptions]--[Miss Saigon]-------------------------------

 When I imagined the judges at demo parties, a picture of the Olympic Figure
 Skating judges invariably came to mind: stern, stuffy and sticklers for
 technicality.  In short, I thought they were probably boring old
 representatives from the sponsoring companies who had no sense of humor at
 all.  I found out how wrong I was when I went to NAID, where I got an
 inside look at the judging of a compo.

 During the opening ceremony, The Veritech Knight announced the names of
 those who were selected to be judges.  Much to my surprise, I heard my name
 called as one of the judges for the intro compo.  I was thrilled to have
 been chosen, but I was also apprehensive as I had never even been to a
 demo party before, let alone judged a compo.

 As I watched the intros, the truth about compo judges hit me: they're
 normal people.  Even though I was the youngest judge, none of the judges
 for any compo were particularly "old".  At any rate, they were not the
 white-haired businessmen I expected to see on the judges' panel.

 The one correct impression I had was that the compo judges ARE a lot like
 the judges for Olympic Figure Skating.  As I looked at the criteria sheet
 for the judging of the intro compo, I noticed that each entry was to
 receive marks for technical merit, as well as artistic impression.

 The other judges and I watched the intros on the big screen with the crowd,
 and earnestly scribbled down notes on each one.  I tried to be very serious
 about it, like the judges I had imagined, but then I thought, hey! This is
 _supposed_ to be fun!  After I came to this stunning realization, the intro
 compo became a lot more enjoyable.  Aside from some technical problems
 involving the Soundblaster, everything went very smoothly until the end.

 Then came the fun part: deliberation....  I don't know how the OJ trial
 will end, but it will probably be something like the process we went
 through to pick the winning intros.  Of course, not all of us agreed on the
 winners, so we had to defend our opinions and convince each other that the
 intros we picked really should be the winners.  After extensive discussions
 and debates, re-viewings of all the intros, and hours of picking apart
 minute details in each intro, we narrowed the choices down to the three
 winners.

 Overall, it was a lot of fun being a judge:  the personal room was a nice
 place to hang out when the chaos of the main stage got to be too much for
 me, and I got to know a lot of people that I probably wouldn't have had a
 chance to meet otherwise.  It really made my first demo party a lot more
 memorable for me.

 -Jackie Smith (Miss Saigon) jsmith@UBmail.ubalt.edu


---[NAID Graphics - Genuine vs. Fake]--[GraveDigger]---------------------------

 A matter of an important nature came to my attention while I was at NAID. I
 was fortunate enough to be chosen as an alternate judge for the graphics
 competition at NAID. Ryan Cramer was originally selected, but did not show
 up.

 In judging this competition, I had to work with two other judges. They were
 The Veritech Knight and another man whose name I did not know. TVK, of
 course, was one of the organizers of NAID. The other man worked for a
 professional graphics company, and was not familiar with the workings of
 the demo scene. This presented TVK and I with a problem.

 We had to explain to this man that the graphics to be entered in this
 contest were not to be scanned, and in fact to be created entirely by hand.
 He did not seem to agree with this; what with his work in the field and not
 requiring any kind of moral obligation to present a true work that comes
 from the mind and soul, and not from a magazine or comic book page.
 Instead, he saw art entirely from a visual standpoint, and took no regard
 to the means with which the graphics were created.

 Moral issues versus the big dollar.

 There was speculation that the graphic we selected to be the first place
 winner was a scanned picture. This led us to view it in several programs,
 examine the "beta" graphic layouts that the artist had provided, and use a
 "zoom" feature to examine the pixel layout more carefully. Being that I am
 mainly a music person, this was a good experience for me to learn the
 doings of several graphics programs, and also to learn about scanned
 picture detection. This process was grueling, and also involved questioning
 of the artist. Fortunately, we all agreed on the first-place picture, but
 looked into the matter more carefully to be sure it was legit.

 In the end, it was decided that the picture was not scanned, and the artist
 won the first place prize. But all of this has led me to think: is prize
 money worth the trouble of presenting a false piece of work?

 No, trouble is not the word. How hard is it to scan a picture, resize it,
 fix a few spots, and save it again? Then, it must be easy to work
 backwards. Take parts of the picture away and call it a "beta" copy.
 There's not much trouble there. What I really meant to say was, "Is prize
 money worth the embarrassment of presenting a false piece of work?"

 The demo scene in North America has been, to this point, very
 noncompetitive. Uncompetitive in the way that "cheating" to produce a
 resultant work is literally unheard of. This is because there has never
 been a demo party in this area before. But now we have NAID. We have an
 outlet, a competition, a dream come true. And we have to be careful.

 Personally, I think it is a waste of time to present a false piece of work
 to the demo scene. The demo community is a good place to express one's
 inner thoughts and feelings by constructing a representation of emotions
 through the production of music and graphics, and where appropriate,
 combinations of the two. Therefore, it would be morally improper for anyone
 who is dedicated to the demo scene to present any form of false creation.

 Unfortunately, in an attempt to be fair, judges are forced to seek the
 truth where there may be no need to do so. By taking an entrant's word, it
 is possible that fraud will result. To prevent it, investigations must take
 place. As holds true in real life, which serves as an effective mirror held
 to the demo scene (even if through a pool of water), corruption is not
 easily avoidable when there is money involved.

 Looking ahead, I unfortunately see the risk of counterfeiting in the North
 American Demo scene. Never before has there been a competitional outlet on
 such a large scale as NAID for demo lovers and creators in this area. With
 this risk present, it is very potential that such fraud will exist and
 become visual in the future.

 We as a community can oppose such fraud by exposing it and disallowing it
 to impress us. In fact, do not allow it to remain among the domain of demo-
 related productions.

 A person who spends a large majority of their life creating a work of art
 from the throne of their personal computer should not be stepped on because
 their work is not as good as someone else's who used a scanner to import
 graphics. That's just not right. Hard work and honesty are the true
 forefathers of art; and not lies, cheating, and shortcuts.

 I do hope that all of you who are reading this believe in this philosophy
 of mine, because it is merely an extension of the ideas presented to me as
 I first set foot into the promised land of the demo scene. I respected
 these precise values, and intended to value their significance for all it
 was worth. And it is with these words that I ask you to be fair, honest,
 and dedicated to your personal beliefs, for which you must take a stand.

 -Brett Neely (GraveDigger) gd@ftp.cdrom.com


---[NAID Music - A Test of Endurance]--[Snowman]-------------------------------

 Two weeks ago, the world saw one of the _longest_ party music compos in
 history.  I was lucky (unfortunate?) enough to be a judge.

 It was Saturday April 15th, the first day of NAID.  Expectations were high
 and caffeine was buzzing in the air, sparked by can after can of Mountain
 Dew and a pinch of Vivarin.  The opening ceremonies started and the judges
 were announced for each compo.  I was very excited after hearing some of the
 names:

   Intros   : Jackie Smith
   Graphics : Ryan Cramer
   Music    : Snowman

 Some judges failed to show, and others were added.  In the end, the Hornet
 family had a judge in every single compo:

   Demos    : Trixter
   Intros   : Jackie Smith
   Graphics : GraveDigger
   Music    : Snowman

 Sadly, the only competition Hornet was were able to enter was the music
 compo itself (thanks GraveDigger).  As such, being a judge was the next
 best thing to actually entering.  :)

 The music compo was to be the first of all competitions.  The judges were
 instructed to report to "Special Room #1" at 15:00 for briefing.  I got
 there about 14:59 (I'm never late, just prompt).

 I plopped myself down on a couch in front of a DX2/80 amidst 8 or 9 other
 people.  That day I learned a new vocabulary word: anglophone. An
 anglophone is someone who is not French-Canadian born or French speaking. I
 was the only anglophone in that room.

 The Veritech Knight started talking about the specifics of the competition.
 "Blah blah blablah.", he said (I don't speak French).  After giving a
 puzzled look at him, he said "We have about 50 entries to the music
 competition."

 '50 entries!?' I thought.  That's quite a bit.  At 3 minutes a song, that's
 about 150 minutes, or about 2.5 hours.  Not too bad.  Even if we add in
 time for changing tunes, the whole thing shouldn't last longer than 3
 hours.

 Then the Veritech Knight went on: "blah blah bakablah blah", to which one
 of the other people responded "blah blah?".  Then the VK humorously
 responded "blah blah?  haha blah _blah_ blah!" and they all chuckled.

 At this point, I'm started to get a bit peeved.  Forgive my choice of
 Spanish as a second language, but I do not understand French.  At this
 point, I had to say "Look, all of you understand English.  I'm sorry I
 do not speak French.  Can we please discuss the compo in English?"

 The gentleman on my right whispered "blah blah" about me to a friend of his
 and they laughed.  Then the VK said "Sorry" and we went on in English...

 It was decided that we would play each and every song.  That decision
 having been made, I was to realize shortly just how much in error my 3-hour
 estimate was.

 We concluded the discussion, and I went to have a cigar.

 At 16:00, I found a seat in front of the big screen and the compo started.
 There were perhaps over 150 people in the crowd.  It was very exciting, and
 I was very proud to be a judge.  For the next 20 songs, I diligently took
 down notes for each one.

 After 20 songs or so, we stopped for a 15 minute break.  I went to go have
 a cigar and ran into Trixter.  "Trixter," I said, "I'm gonna fall asleep if
 I have to listen to another 30+ songs in a row".  And so Trixter sat next to
 me for the remainder of the competition.  I was thankful.

 The competition went on, and on, and on, and on... :(

 Around 21:00 I took a picture of the audience that remained.  There were
 perhaps 20 people left, almost half of whom were awake.  Jeff and
 GraveDigger and Dan Wright visited us occasionally to provided moral
 support.

 I must admit, I was getting irritated with the length of the competition.
 One thing I kept remembering though: every song that played was the child
 of some musician.  I did my best to remain objective and honest throughout
 the whole competition.

 The group Mazurka had about 7 entries.  No problem there until about the
 5th entry.  At about song 30 something, one of the Mazurka musicians
 decided that he wanted to have a light show with his tune.  He announced
 over the loud speaker "Hey you guys, you don't mind if we have some lights
 to go along with my song do you?".  The audience was split on this.  I was
 dead opposed.  This was unusual, this was preferential, this was _unfair_.

 They played the song and these fancy lights kept zipping around the room
 and into my face.  I was so disgusted that I got up and went to get a drink
 of water.  I came back after the song was over and we continued...

 At this point, its about 22:00 and the competition has been going on for
 about 6 hours, not counting the 1 hour meeting we had in "Special Room #1".
 Trixter and I are punchy and hungry.

 Finally, at about 22:30, they concluded the music compo.  From my
 understanding, there were still 2 or 3 songs left but that they would be
 listened to in private.  I circled 4 songs that I really felt were
 excellent and went to have a cigar.

 Trixter ended up becoming a judge, simply because he was one of the few
 that actually listened to all of the songs.  The two of us met the next
 day with the NAID organizers and the winners were decided.

 Overall, I was _very_ impressed with the quality of music submitted.  I
 wish I had collected all of the music on-site so that we could have posted
 them to ftp.cdrom.com right away.  :(

 I hope to be a judge for the music competition again next year, but a few
 changes should be made:

   -Only 20 songs played on the big screen
   -Intermission after 10 songs
   -Judges need more discussion with one another

 The NAID music competition showed off a lot of North American talent and I
 was proud to be a part!

 -Snowman r3cgm@ftp.cdrom.com


---[Miscellaneous]-------------------------------------------------------------

 Trixter:

   Chromatiks 2, the sequel to the first multi-group music disk on the PC,
   has been released to ftp.cdrom.com in /pub/demos/incoming/music where it
   will probably reside for a week before moving to /pub/demos/music/disks.

   Chromatiks 2 has some previously unreleased tunes from artists that
   haven't tracked music in a while, like Skaven/Future Crew and
   Snowman/Hornet.

   Trivia:  Chromatiks 2 was released on the 1-year anniversary of
   Chromatiks 1.

 Jeff:

   It's coming...  http://ftp.cdrom.com/pub/demos/dmax/top.html

 CGM:

   1. Music Contest 3 has started.  We will have more information about it
      in future issues.  For now, you can get the rules and intro on
      ftp.cdrom.com under /pub/demos/incoming/mc3/mc3rules.zip and
      mc3intro.zip.

   2. We are currently working on an incoming demos directory for
      ftp.luth.se users.  Stay tuned for details.


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---[Closing]-------------------------------------------------------------------

 For questions and comments, you can contact us at:

   Jeff        |    jeff@ftp.cdrom.com - general stuff, WWW
   CGM         |   r3cgm@ftp.cdrom.com - unusual stuff, o1 + HNews newsletters
   GraveDigger |      gd@ftp.cdrom.com - music + demo reviews, general music
   Trixter     | trixter@ftp.cdrom.com - code reviews, general code
   Dan Wright  |     dmw@inca.gate.net - Freedom CD

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
