[HN Gopher] Tiny tools and the ephemeral nature of digital art
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       Tiny tools and the ephemeral nature of digital art
        
       Author : dhotson
       Score  : 49 points
       Date   : 2021-08-11 10:29 UTC (1 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.nathalielawhead.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.nathalielawhead.com)
        
       | tenaciousDaniel wrote:
       | The skeleton hand cursor caught me by surprise, and I burst out
       | laughing. I miss the early internet.
        
       | egfx wrote:
       | I built a digital art tool https://gif.com.ai (and I can't find a
       | job as a frontend programmer but that's another story)
        
       | DiggyJohnson wrote:
       | > I think it's fascinating how certain art will outlive the tools
       | it was made in, or some tools will outlive the art... with
       | formats once supported in that tool just dying out and no longer
       | being something you can even see.
       | 
       | This is a novel thought that I have not considered. Thanks for
       | sharing.
       | 
       | Can we think of any examples of physical media that this applies
       | to? Is there any physical art that is unachievable to us in the
       | 21C?
        
         | dahart wrote:
         | > Can we think of any examples of physical media that this
         | applies to?
         | 
         | Interesting question! I can think of a bunch of examples that
         | are _somewhat_ similar, but don't feel perfectly analogous. I'm
         | thinking painting with a camera obscura might count. Optical
         | film compositing isn't done anymore, along with a lot of
         | special effects techniques that predate computer graphics.
         | Photography used to be much more physical than it is now, for
         | example the process of famous photographers like Ansel Adams
         | involved building the camera, mixing chemicals, and a lot of
         | darkroom work.
        
         | 0xdeadbeefbabe wrote:
         | Stradivarius violins?
        
         | showerst wrote:
         | How about uranium-glass sculpture from the 50s or ceramics
         | painted with radioactive paint?
         | 
         | I suppose civilization is capable of remaking them, but likely
         | never will.
        
         | profunctor wrote:
         | Certain pigments for paint to longer exist for a variety of
         | reasons. Some were dangerous and others are impractical to
         | create.
        
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