Week 3 - Hardware Essentials

This week, Rubin spoke to us about the different components that go into a computer. The system unit is comprised of the following elements : Drive Bay, Power Supply, Sound Card, Video Card, Processor, and Memory. The motherboard, which contains most of these items, is the main circuit board of the unit. Moving on from those most basic parts of the PC, we moved into different applications and programs that companies have used to display information. Digital Video has gone from Real Networks to Windows Media and Quicktime to Flash and Silverlight (although a failure) to a future of HTML 5. Basically, as the market changes it looks for programs that are accessible to anyone, programs where the platform will be supported on any framework. It's safe to say that Flash will remain an industry leader, but it's not an over-exaggeration to state that HTML 5 will become the new standard.

What I took as being the most helpful piece of information this week are the differing types of Digital Video. For so long I've been navigating through websites without a clear understanding of what technology I was interacting with. Also, the entire interface that Flash allows is exquisite. The thing about digital video is that it is basically a visual element displayed through a series of commands. In doing so, it parallels the System Unit in a computer... but we are seeing it happen before our very eyes as our favorite TV show loads up to stream.

In the spirit of all of this talk about conveying information and displaying it, I have decided to make a flip-book of my game; that is, a start to a flip book. The premise of my game is that now that the Big Bang has happened, it is once again time to determine the location of the constellations in the sky. I'm thinking about alterations to the game as well. I want there to be this colossal explosion that happens somewhere in between starting and finishing, something that evokes the element of surprise in a game. So, for your enjoyment, my flip book.