A.D.A. Amiga Demoscene Archive

Demo:

Behind The Flute

Group:

Traktor

Code:

Esau

Graphics:

Esau

Music:

Esau

Category:

Demo

Release:

October 2000

Chipset:

Ocs

Download Amiga:

[file]

Garden Variety Autobulk (3.85)

Jesus Christ Motocross (4.52)

Surfing Great Victoria (4.19)

Fleetwood (3.8)

Baahl (3.1)

Duck (2.8)

Funk Def (3.38)

Hetero Sapiens (2.64)

Retrofit EP (4.43)

comment by xeron on 18 August 2004

This comment is really for both "Behind the Flute" and "Baahl".

Well, I find it very interesting that with the power of the 68040/060, AMOS has become fast enough, when combined with practice and design, to produce productions z5 has deemed "good enough" for a listing on the Amiga Demoscene archive (this is a compliment to Traktor, not a dig at z5 ;-).

From a purely technical standpoint, demos like this requiring a 68040 (from the readme) for decent speed is pretty lame. However, if you take into account that these are AMOS productions, it is pretty obvious that the people behind these are quite skilled in the art of "AMOS coding". Also, from a purely design perspective, there is nothing inherently wrong with either of the two Traktor productions on here. In fact, I've seen much worse things written in assembler, in regard to both code and design!

I like the music in both productions, I like the feel and attitude of both productions, and I enjoyed watching them, so in the end, AMOS or not, they're alright ;-)

And i'm not even slightly bitter that it seems AMOS prods are good enough for ADA but none of mine are... ;-)

comment by z5 on 18 August 2004

@Xeron:
Interesting points...which i somehow expected when adding those Traktor demos. Because for the first time after 400 productions, i wondered how people would react to those two demos. Will they be good enough? Did the Amiga scene enjoy these ones...

I don't pretend to know anything about demos. I love watching them, it's a passion, nothing more. A.D.A. was just my way of saying thank you, for paying my respect to all of the demosceners out there. And yes, all of the 400 productions so far are ones that i keep on my HD because i really enjoy each one of them. This site doesn't pretend to have the best demos but i try my best. I do actually check other sources like pouet before deciding if the demo should be here. As said, i don't have the pretention to say which one is good or bad. This is just a collection of demos that i enjoy, but with a very big eye on what other people will probably enjoy aswell.

Who knows, in future maybe every amiga demo will find their way on to A.D.A as the question still remains wether i should keep adding high quality productions only or add everything that was ever released.

In any case, this discussion will not last a lot longer anymore. Hopefully, the forum will be up soon and then it's up to you visitors to decide the path for A.D.A to go.

As for your productions, i only know two of them. And yes, i did (and still do) think about adding your Breakpoint 2004 production and nothing says i won't. So far however, if i'm not mistaken, no "joke-production" has found it's way onto A.D.A. yet.

And i stand by these Traktor demos. I don't give a shit how fast/slow it runs on which hardware, how good/bad it was coded and neither do i care about which language it was coded in. The fact remains: Esau managed to do much more than a lot of others with far better coding skills on far more advanced programming languages. Imo, he knew what it took to make a good demo, despite the limitations of the tools he used. And yes, i do tend to rewatch these demos a lot.

comment by bonkers on 18 August 2004

Probably the demo that I watched most time. The design is absolutely brillant and the music is stunning. I like all traktor demos, but for me this is still the best. I realy hope that Pumbaa and Bore start making some routines so we can see a new Traktor Demo now when Esau stoped coding.

comment by xeron on 18 August 2004

@z5
I was only joking with that last sentence... hence the smiley ;-) I understand completely about the fact that there are no joke productions on ADA... and of the three "non-joke" productions i've done (Shine and Spo3 inv for Darkage, and "Enter the Dotmatrix"), I only really consider one to be any good (dotmatrix), and even then I understand that the effects go on for too long and theres not enough of them... but it was for a fastcompo. So in the end I never *expected* to see any of those on here. Hmm.. maybe I should have just left that at "i was only joking"... anyway...

I also don't disagree with Traktor's demos being present here, I think they show a lot of effort has gone into them. I think the designs are nice, and they are enjoyable productions.

I think coders see demos differently to non-coders. For people who don't code, ALL of the enjoyment of demos comes from the design, especially these days as it is hard for a non-coder to really visualise what the "limits" of a given platform is. For a coder, the design is only half the story. It is easier for a coder to see a piece of work and put that into the context of the hardware it is running on. When a coder sees effects as basic as these ones, which an A500 could do in its sleep, requiring a 68040, it kind of takes some of the awe factor away.

Anyway, congrats to Traktor for not only making enjoyable productions, but for challenging peoples ideas of what a demo should be about, and provoking interesting thoughts like the ones presented here :-)

comment by xeron on 18 August 2004

... aaaalso thinking about it some more. I really like 4k intros, because I love the way it challenges the programmer to come up with impressive effects despite the space they have.

Thinking about it from that perspective, Traktor are producing enjoyable productions DESPITE using AMOS and Blitz BASIC... its like the challenge they have is to come up with demos that are worth watching, despite the limitations and speed of their programming tools, which is another way to look at and appreciate what they're doing. Especially since there are A LOT of really bad AMOS intros out there that don't have any of the redeeming qualities of the Traktor prods...

comment by z5 on 18 August 2004

@Xeron:
No offence taken :) And you are right ofcourse. Coders judge demos different than non-coders. Just like guitar players judge guitar music differently than other people... In that sense, i'm quite glad that i'm not a coder :) I judge the demos on enjoyment and the overall picture. A classic demo is one that i can rewatch again and again and still enjoy years later. Technical merits come in 2nd place. And as you say, it's becoming nearly impossible to judge demos on technical merits because of all the hardware configurations around. Was Zero/Universe technically good? And was Rebirth ground-breaking by using Warp3D in a 4k or is it on the contrary easier to code 4k's with Warp3D? Is Finnmark really pushing the limits of 68k 4k intros? So many questions that we non-coders never can answer.

For me, Traktor has been the only group who ever managed to make really enjoyable and well-designed demos despite the limitations they had to face.

comment by strife/apathy on 18 August 2004

I always enjoy blitzbasic and amos demos since I'm a blitzbasic coder myself! ;)

comment by mailman on 10 April 2005

This is one of the best (if not the best) AMOS production I have ever seen. I don't mind it lacks 8-bit colours and super-duper effects based on copper (or other stuff). As a demo it is nice, worth checking out production.

comment by cybernoid on 13 April 2007

Faster than lots of 68k pure code demos.

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