Talk is Cheap
the ACiD news ...
n
e
w
unsane
Issue No.15 An Official ACiD Productions
tm Public Update April 1997
by Cth
ulu
Cherry blossoms open to the sun after a harsh winter
of discontent
and the pale buds express their approval to the world by
exposing their
faces to the light of the sun and the chance of the eleme
nts.
Mao Tse-Tung used the opening of the cherry b
lossom as an
opportunity for all negative energy to be released and
vented, and
since the last newsletter that has certainly been the ca
se for us here
at ACiD Productions. If there has been anything not quit
e up to snuff,
from the temporary downtime of the vital website to the q
uantity of our
released art itself, we have heard about it from every
set of typing
fingers under the sun.
Your comments have not been ignored. Springtime is
a time for
rebirth, the reinvigouration after the icy wastes of w
inter, and an
awakening after convalescent hibernation. A yawn, a stret
ch or two, and
we will be emerging to survey over the dominion over
all before our
gaze. The greening trees will bow in the wind towards us
, the sun will
shine his radiant salute, and the animals of the worl
d will express
their approval in celebration of a more intimate manner.
Though the very forces of nature itself are evide
ntly under our
influence, we will illustrate below as well how the act
ions of mortal
men can fall under our sway and be played to our ad
vantage in the
cosmic card game of life.
by Hack
As part of ACiDs continuing attempt to keep you
, the public,
informed of what ACiD is doing we proudly announce Acid!P
ress. This new
division will give new direction to how you find out abou
t ACiD doings.
With Mindcrime as its advisor, the new wing wil
l be involved with the
newsletter, press releases
via
the acid-public mailing
list, and the new artpacks
archive newsletter, as
well as a few other things.
New recruits have be
en
called in to provide
for the
task
at hand. Cthulu,
Striker, Sodium, and Hac
k
will be leading the way,
writing
the informative
tidbits, and Shrike will
be maintaining the
art
packs archive newsletter.
Ever since John Lennon died, it just
With all this free
hasnt been right, says Eggman, wh
o, information and cheap talk
along with Walrus, became immortalized
you should soon be
in the chorus of a song by the Beatles.
swimming in a sea of ACiD
Kno
wledge.
by Mindcrime
In our increasing efforts to decentralize and
form a more
independant union of subdivisions, ACiDs ANSI department
has recently
joined forces with a new ANSI upstart to form Avenge, the
new ACiD ANSI
department. Following in the same tradition of previous
subsidiaries,
Avenge will be releasing its own artpacks, seperate
from the ACiD
Acquisition and observing its own schedule. Heading up
this division
is White Trash, who has vowed to avenge the apathy an
d increasing
immaturity that lies within the present ANSI community. W
ith this limb
completely severed from the main ACiD body,
all monthly
Acquisitions after 56 will consist of pure high resolu
tion artwork.
Avenge will debut on May 1st, 1997.
by Mind
crime
In the time honored tradition of spring cleaning, AC
iD productions
does a little of that out-with-the-old, in-with-the-new
kind of thing
this month. Swept out under the twisted fibers of the
ACiD broom is
Wolfie, who has been replaced with a new, im
proved sysadmin with more
synapse bandwidth. Bob the Janitor was no
where to be found when we
needed him for this cleaning, so he gets a taste of his
own medicine.
Burps, in a bold effort to enhance the effect
, downed a litre of Jolt
Cola with a mouthful of PopRocks, and subsequently di
ed. With the
heat of the coming spring, Cool-T melted, l
eaving only a puddle of
grey water behind. Cyber, and his buddy
Cypher Hex, that is skipped
off hand in hand to a better place. Endless Namele
ss found out the hard
way that nothing is endless. Forge took u
p a new profession as a
locksmith. Piromaniak, acting through the s
moky mind of his strange
disease, gathered up his Infernal Flames and h
eaded down south. Liithn
tried too hard to pronounce his name and his face stu
ck like that.
Madball was last seen trying to get Un
sane to give in to his demented
ways. Raider, Sensei,
and Shaolin were called into action to def
end an
ancient Mongolian tribe. Alien friends of Sargon
came down and took him
off to fight in the Telurian wars on planet Zarnac.
The Silent Killer
snuck up on Stone The Crow and jabbed him wit
h a Spear. Not realizing
that Stone The Crow was actually made of stone, TSK ran
screaming when
his Spear broke in half and STC flew after him.
Wonder Monkey got
tossed into a new exhibit at the Museum of Natural Histor
y, where hell
only be able to interact with his ACiD buddies every on
ce in a while.
Intensity was trying so intensely to cou
rier every pack he could that
he suffered an aneurysm and died. Polymorph g
ot caught in an infinite
loop and kept changing into Elvis. And finally, D
eep, after being told
by his mother not to go so far out, got caught in the
tide and was
swept out to sea.
by Mindcrime
No ACiD acquisition would be complete without the a
ddition of new
recruits those who dare to defy the normalcy of simpl
e art with the
creativity and originality that it takes to join the
unique team of
highly talented ACiD artists. Honing their skills in t
heir medium of
choice, these men and women have become the future of t
he digital art
world.
The wife of RCAs Starlord, and an extremely ta
lented artist,
Kitiara joins us to provide a females take
on the ansi medium.
Perplexer thought hard and long about which group
to join, but finally
decided to draw ansi with the big boys of ACiD Prod
uctions. Also
joining our ansi team is Mongi, who not only
enjoys his time in
ACiDDraw, but also likes to fiddle with the tools
of the high
resolution artist, providing us with quality vga work.
Eggman, proving
once again that the eggs have it, also joins our
team of high
resolution artists, along with
Mainline, who displays his skills
with more than just the line tool.
Joining the amazingly popular Acid
Ascii division, Remorse, are seven
of todays finest manipulators of
the age old ASCII character set.
Cannabis brings us his laid back
style, but often eats us out of
house and home. Gravedancer
pranced around in the ACiD
graveyard to bring back Spirit of
Illusion. Pariah forced his way
Kitiara, a new female artist,
into our ranks using a Phaser X
was seen chased around by some
and an Atom Bomb he picked up
of ACiDs friskier members. She
while in exile. And, although was hear
d yelling Stop staring
were not sure what hes reverting and grow
your own! on occasion.
to, Revert joins up to round out
the new Remorse Recruits. Last,
but most certainly not least, Macaw flies into
our highly talented
programming division to provide us with some spirit
ed intros and
loaders.
Although not new to the group, three members
have shifted
internally and are just getting comfortable in their n
ew positions.
Catbones has been promoted to overall Art D
irector. He will be
presiding over the happenings of all art related division
s. Bad Spirit
has been shifted to Information Services, where he is b
usy helping us
with providing constant attention to the oft updated ACiD
Web Page. And
finally, retiring from active service this month, B
eastie slides up a
chair with the other members who have gained ACiD Alum
ni status over
the years. We thank him for his dedication and support
over the many
years he was with ACiD Productions.
By Striker
Catbones gets a new alias: Daddy.
This just in: On April 5, at 2:45am central time, Tabaq
ui, aka
Mrs. Catbones, gave birth to a beautiful 7 lbs., 10 oz
. baby girl.
The infants name is Elspeth. Shhh. If you listen, you
can hear Cats
hard drive come to a screeching halt as he floods it
with digital
photographs of their newborn. Congratulations to our new
acid!parents.
Acid.org gets bigger, better, and faster.
ACiDs official web domain was upgraded recentl
y in order to
increase transfer rates and accessibility. www.acid.org,
which used to
run on a t1 connection, now boasts three impressive t3 co
nnections. The
improved domain now runs at an amazing speed of over 10
0mbps. Due to
these changes, users do not wait as long for art to
draw out while
online and the domain no longer becomes lagged due to hea
vy traffic.
Another improvement in our web presence is the new m
ember profiles
section, which shows several ACiD member histories,
pictures, and
hobbies. This new section is a great way to
get to know
ACiD members better. The profile section can be
accessed at
http://www.acid.org/members/profiles. This new ar
ea will be added to
as members send their information to Bedlam, who is r
esponsible for
maintaining the area.
New Remorseview promises improved ASCII/ANSI viewing.
The latest development in the Remorse ascii divisio
n of ACiD is a
viewer coded by Mr. Kite. Mr. Kite stated that Remor
seviews main
purpose is to make viewing ansis and asciis REALLY easy
without a lot
of overhead. The viewer is capable of viewing any length
ascii or ansi
and has unique features such as a mid-viewing mode.
The main feature of Remorseview is its ability to v
iew asciis and
ansis in 25/43/50 line modes with a choice of the IBM PC
or AFS Amiga
font for all modes. The viewer is conveniently sma
ll as well,
taking up a mere 20k. Necromancer, head of Remorse, said
that we hope
to have a full release by May. We also will have options
for selecting
a different interface ASCII, our second being a newschool
interface.
Java Viewer offers wide compatibility.
ACiD View/Java, currently in beta testing, will
be the most
versatile viewer that ACiD has ever released. Because
it is coded in
Java, it can be run on any computer that has a Java Inter
preter such as
Java Development Kit JDK, from Sun, states Mr. Kite
who coded the
viewer.
The viewer is able to view ANSIs and ASCIIs of mo
derate lengths
and also views GIFS and JPEGS. Also planned for the p
rogram is full
XBIN support, scalable functions, screen capture capabil
ity, and more.
ACiD View/Java has been successfully tested under both
Windows 95 and
Linuxs Xwindows. Mr. Kite also plans to release an App
let version of
ACiD View/Java which will be available to the public and
allow web page
authors to display ansis on their pages.
by Mindcrime
Congratulations go to the following winners in our
Tommpa1 Post
Card Contest. Some of the entries were quite entertaini
ng, and others
were just laughable. Randomly drawn from the entries re
cieved, these
are the winners. They are awarded with eight original, ha
nd drawn cells
by our very own Tommpa1.
- Izzy from Alamogordo, NM, USA
- KRL from Balwyn, Victoria, Austr
alia
KRL sent us a great postcard -- a self
made collage of
pen graffiti, newspaper clippings and b
eer bottle labels!
- Lauren from Cupertino, CA, USA
- Sadistic Nightmare from Southbur
y, CT, USA
- The Speed Racer from Plantation,
FL, USA
- Tabaqui from Rolla, MO, USA
Tabaqui inundated us with almost a doze
n cards featuring
scenic down home pictures of Kansas and
Missouri.
- Tonic from Ilmenau, Germany
Tonic sent us a killer anime postcard o
f Plastic Little!
- Vince Scheib from Chesterland, O
H, USA
Thanks to all who participated and made this a contest wo
rth having.
Due to the massive response this drawing of drawings r
eceived, we
look forward to holding more of these events in the future
Introduction by Mindcrime
The debate over which of two popular artistic
mediums, High
Resolution VGA and Low Resolution ANSI, is the better ha
s been brought
into the spotlight recently by the gradual shifting of sc
ene art groups
from ANSI to VGA as their primary art form. ACiD P
roductions has
recruited two artists, one prefering high resolution and
one prefering
low, to debate this topic for the information and entert
ainment of our
audience. Were hoping this may open the eyes of both
sides and help
bring this debate to a healthy closure.
The VGA Point of View: The ANSI Point o
f View:
Written by Wildcat/ACiD!VGA Written by Akairo/AC
iD!Press
ANSI is dying, VGA is king. A lot High resolution
graphic art,
of people in the scene have tried to commonly called
hi-rez, is
fight this Ive heard endless becoming an ext
remely popular
complaints about the lack of ansi in computer art form.
Many excellent
packs, the fading of the BBS scene, arguments as to h
ow and why high
and the ballooning of pack sizes. resolution graphics
should replace
However, all of this amounts to the ANSI American Na
tional Standard
petty complaints of the people who Institute have be
en presented to
are being left behind. us. However, the
pros of ANSI and
the cons of hi-rez
are frequently
VGA is a far superior medium where overlooked.
almost anything can be achieved
- you dream it up and you can put it Many people believ
e that hi-rez is
on the screen. There are countless always associated w
ith quality art
programs, from freeware to and artists. Obviou
sly it is much
professional graphics suites, that easier to create a p
leasing work of
can help you create magnificent art when you can sc
an in freehand
pieces of art. So while the whole drawings or simply
render three
scene, as well as the rest of the dimensional objects.
There are very
world, is moving to high-rez, high few pixel-by-pixel
hi-rez artists,
color graphics, why is a large while EVERY ANSI ar
tist is required
portion of the scene still sitting to plot pixel-by-
pixel. Veteran
in front of ACiDdraw trying to make pixel-by-pixel ANS
I artists are
a coherent comic-rip in 80 by 25? obviously capable
of creating
fresher, more movi
ng pieces than a
One reason may be nostalgia. True, novice mouse/scanner
artist.
ANSI had its day, but that day has
passed. VGA is by far superior in Just because you
can do simple
every aspect: higher resolution, commands with Phot
oshop or figure
more colors, better tools, and a out how to use a
color scanner
broader following of artists. If we doesnt make you
an experienced
cant improve ourselves as new artist capable of
creating works
technologies present themselves then with elements such
as strong value,
we are destined to remain a group of contrast, spacing or
principles like
immature 14 year olds hanging out in gradation, proporti
on, or balance.
ANSI saying eYE DReW mUH FIRst Just because you can
make drawings
ANSI t0D4y. with better resol
ution and more
colors doesnt mean
that the layout
Perhaps another reason for this is and composition wi
ll automatically
just plain stupidity. There are be superior to th
at of an ANSI
several obvious advantages to VGA artist. Alot more go
es into creating
that people seem to have overlooked. art than just the m
edium. Are oils
First, real money can be made from so much better tha
n acrylics? Do
it. Im not talking about the 10 pastels far surpas
s charcoal? Of
you picked up for doing a little course not. Its
not the medium,
logo for some sucker, Im talking its the artist.
serious commercial projects. Many
freelance artists in the scene are It is a common mi
sconception that
making anywhere from 25-50 an hour all or most ANSI
artist only draw
- not bad for a kid with a hobby. fonts or rip comic b
ooks. Well I beg
Also there is a strong artistic to differ. ANSI as
an art form may
advantage. You can do so much more have had its root
s in comic rips
with VGA. Im not saying that all and cheap fonts, bu
t it is obvious
ANSI artists are 13 year olds with that original art
has become more
no originality, but how many ANSIs common in the ansi
scene now than
have you seen lately that have not ever. Just because
you are a hi-rez
been ripped out of Spawn 15 or artist doesnt aut
omatically mean
X-men 112? It is rare that you will that you have a crea
tive imagination
find a VGA that has been ripped the or you know how to l
ayout a piece of
fact is that as a whole the High-Rez art without copying
someone elses
scene is trying ALOT harder to be style or influence.
original and change the scene for
the better. Each VGA artist has his In addition to
the artistic
own distinct style. When a VGA elements and princi
ples, which are
artist does a logo, he doesnt do a vastly more i
mportant than
lord-jazz style in my opinion, resolution or amou
nt of colors,
doing a logo in this-or-that style there are the file s
ize and hardware
is just come cheap way of saying Im differences. Any a
verage Joe can
ripping someone. A true artist tell you that he wo
uld rather be in
would do it in HIS OWN style. His possession of a p
ack filled with
style would be influenced by other ANSI screens displ
aying wonderful
artists, of course, but as a whole movement, correct
proportion, and
it would be his and clearly striking contrast
over poorly
distinguishable from others. Many composed or lai
d out hi-rez
ANSI logos tend to run together pictures with no
movement, no
often it is hard to say if someone pleasing balance,
and just three
did this, or if someone did this in dimensional render
ed fonts with
imitation of another persons style, boring backgrounds.
Its true that
or if its just a plain rip. With a there are artists
that create MIND
VGA, I can immediately identify the BLOWING high resolut
ion graphics,but
artist by their distinct style. how many are there
in comparison to
amateur/novice arti
sts? And is it
Clearly the VGA scene is trying worth downloading a
n extra two megs
harder to improve themselves and just to see these m
ediocre works of
develop unique works of art. Even art? For only a qua
rter of the size
artists who use only filters which you can view pi
ctures done by
has become a bad word in the art veteran ANSI arti
sts, which are
scene, even though they are valuable obviously drawn
with better
tools must start with a blank page craftsmanship.
and create a picture that is
pleasing and interesting. I have In order to r
un most high
tremendous respect for anyone who resolution paint pro
grams you need a
can start with nothing and create a pretty fast comput
er with alot of
pleasing picture solely by relying memory. Typical
ANSI drawing
on their tools and talent. utilities such a
s TheDraw or
ACiDDraw require a
little under a
Style imitation and comic ripping megabyte of memory
and work on a
have long been used as crutches of common 386 processor
. Perhaps with
the ANSI community. If we are ever all the money that
you might get as
to make the scene a place where a freelance high re
solution artist
serious artists can meet and improve you might be able
to pay for the
themselves and others, we must not extra speed and me
mory, but if you
allow ourselves to be ruled by the are like me you can
t. ANSI allows
people that depend on these crutches. you to create art,
with as much
In order to meet our bright future, chance as being wond
erful, vibrant,
we must cast aside our past and moving as
high resolution
limitations. Can you see yourself graphics, with ext
remely cheap and
drawing ANSI in 2 years? 3 years? barebones systems.
10 years? ANSI WILL die out, just
like RIP has died. Not because it is So high resolution
graphics, when
a bad standard, not because the done correctly by
a veteran or
people who draw it are not good professional, can
surpass an ansi
enough. But because it is outdated graphic done by a ve
teran. But what
and outmatched. The future is upon is the ratio of
veterans to
us, but how many of us are even in amateurs in the hi-
rez scene? High
the present? resolution is still
very young. ANSI
was developed in the
late seventies.
High Resolution pe
aked into super
vga in the early ni
neties. Because
it is fairly new it tends to excite
us and
make us look at possible
careers and fame. But only a very
small percenta
ge of us in any of the
sc
enes demo, tracking, hi-rez, or
ansi
will ever go onto a regular
job using
the skills we developed in
our youth in this scene.
Is ANSI a d
ying medium? No, its
impossible. Just bec
ause there
arent any bulletin board systems
around anymore to draw for do
esnt
mean we cant enjoy the art form for
what it has become. It started as a
basic character set fo
r early
communic
ations terminals and has
Disadvantage 1 for ANSI: we
exploded into a whole art form. As
dont see one billion VGA pics
long as there are more quality
of Calvin in old art packs.
artists in the ANSI scene than the
hi-rez s
cene,wonderful ansi art will
be produced. No novice hi-rez artist
can truly surpass a veteran ansi
artists correct display of art
elements and principles, no matter
Note: The views expressed in this how hi-tech his m
edium might be.
debate are that of the individual Charcoal was one
of the first art
author and have no relation to forms, drawn on c
ave walls by our
that of ACiD Productions. ACiD is primitive ancesto
rs. Charcoal,
an ART group, first and foremost, today, is still a ma
jor medium. ANSI
and supports all artistic mediums. has a solid founda
tion beneath it,
so lets not be so h
asty to throw it
out.
by Mindcrime and Shrike
As many of you already know, ACiD Productions hosts an
art scene
file archive, artpacks.acid.org, which provides a storage
and archiving
service to all members of the art scene. This site was put
in place not
only to ensure a lasting and efficient archive for
scene related
material, but also to provide an easy to use, not to men
tion powerful,
interface for both scene members and worldwide compute
r art fans to
find and aquire their favorite art packs. This new secti
on of the ACiD
newsletter has been put in place to inform you of curr
ent happenings
and facts about this exciting new file archive.
The archive has recently aquired many mirror sites to
hopefully
accomadate for the heavy traffic the site may experienc
e during peak
online times. Our hope is that you will be able to use
these mirrors
to your advantage when the main artpacks site gets b
ogged down or
appears slow. You can link to several of these mirrors
from the main
page.
Another helpful service provided by the artpacks adm
inistration is
a detailed breakdown of the top downloaded files
from the site.
Statistics are provided for electronic magazines, progr
ams, artpacks,
and a combination of all three. These pages can be found
at:
http://artpacks.acid.org/www/html/topday.html
http://artpacks.acid.org/www/html/topmonth.html
Virus scanning has now
been implemented into the
archive. Individual files
are scanned several times a
day with McAffees Viruscan.
However, we still recommend
that you cross scan all
files locally for your own
safety.
Pipe code support has
also been implemented. This
system allows file ACiDs new mot
to is If sheep can be
descriptions to contain cloned, ACiD me
mbers can be as well.
colors using the standard Look for a bigg
er memberlist next pack.
pipe code set of 00, for
black, to 15, for white.
Thanks to Mr. Kite, we now offer online viewing
of ANSI files!
Using his newly developed Java ansi viewer applet, it
is possible to
view ansi files contained within the individual archives.
If you have any questions about the archive, be
sure to email
either Shrike at fare@ionet.net or RaD Man at radman@acid
.org. Be sure
to re-load often, new services are being added all th
e time as we
strive to better serve the computer artscene community.
by Cthulu
Refreshed and ready to tackle new challenges, ACiD
Productions is
assured that, one way or another, its lead will
soon grow more
parallel with trends in the art scene as a whole. Ou
r approach may
no longer seem as groundbreaking, but our toned-down meth
od will offend
less the sensibilities of the average art enthu
siast, while
continuing to provide the guidance and inspiration you
have all come
to grow and love and even perpetuate. The time of t
he opening of
the cherry blossoms comes to a close - complaints have
been met and
answered. The time of rebirth is almost passed, and nary
a sighting of
Saga, Union, or Legend has been noted.
Social Darwinism assures that those who are strong
will persevere
while all others will eventually peter out and fade into
their doom of
obscurity. Looking strong after seven years in a s
cene where the
average group lifespan is two months, our place on t
op is secure,
thanks to our award-winning art, but even more to our bro
ad fan base.
We thank you for allowing us to occupy the pi
nnacle of this
hierarchy and promise to thrill you for many seasons to c
ome.
- ACiD Productions 1997 -
- A rose by any other name would not smell
so sweet -
ACiD Credits: Writers: A
CiD!Press Editor
: Mindcrime ACiD
ACiD Special Thanks: RaD Man and Wi
ldcat Photographer:
Nitnatsnoc ACiD